001board meeting mic check. Board meeting mic check. The Lamar CIS board of trustees meeting will begin in five minutes. They the board of trustees of the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District is called to order at 6:31 p.m. This is a regular monthly board meeting being held on April 15th, 2025. We have a quorum with all members present. Please join me in a moment of silence to observe as you feel appropriate. Thank you. Uh, please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance and the pledge to the Texas flag led by Sarah Langy, a sixth grader from Wartheimr Middle School. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag.
002I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. [Applause] Thank you. You may be seated. All right, we will have recognitions and awards. Dr. Nons. Yes, sir. Mr. President, we have Miss Hamilton coming to the microphone. Good evening, board president, trustees, Dr. Nonsens and the Lamar Cast community who have joined us here in person or virtually tonight. With graduation season fast approaching tonight, we're celebrating several of our students spring semester successes, both academic and athletic, as well as a national recognition earned by our district as a whole and by several of our individual campuses. First up, this past fall, the district recognized three seniors selected as National Merit semi-finalists. And now the same group has advanced to become National Merit Scholar Finalist. Each scholar now stands to earn coveted national merit
003scholarships, institutional awards, prestigious corporate scholarships, and financial aid packages. This is a tremendous honor for Lamar CSD and a testament to the rigor of the district's college and career readiness program and opportunities. As finalists were first dubbed semi- finalists earlier this year, each student must also have an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be endorsed and recommended by a high school official, write an essay, and earn ACT or SAT scores that confirm earlier performance on qualifying tests. We're extremely proud of these students, and we're excited to have two of the three with us this evening. Please join me in congratulating this year's Lamar CSD National Merit finalist. Not with us yet, we've got Parker Blacklock. But here tonight, Chase Chase Chang from Lamar Consolidated High School and Michael Huckman from Foster High School. Congratulations students.
004Next up this evening, we recognize some of our DECA students who advanced to compete at the 2025 DECA International Career Development Conference and Competition. Foster, Fulchshire, and George Ranch High School all had students compete at the state level for DECA. Back in March, more than 7,000 students across Texas competed. Students who advanced to the DECA International Career Development Conference and Competition will compete later this month in Orlando, Florida. So from Foster High School led by adviserss Lee Anne Dawson and Cheryl Kohzer, we've got ICDC qualifiers Kennedy Holmes and Non TR and Cedra Hardell Martinez and Vivian West from George Ranch High School led by Mike Milner Miller and Terry Haido. We've got ID ICDC qualifiers Marcus W and Kelly Woo and Antoine Irvin and Hiba Merchant. And from Fuller High School led by Heather Trici
005and Lynhurst O'Brien, ICDC qualifiers, Aubrey Richtor and Katie Tomkins. These students were able to celebrate, edited their photos before the board meeting. Next up, we are recognizing our Texas Music Educators Association all state musicians. Thousands of student musicians from across Texas regions and conferences audition through multiple levels of competition and cuts to become the elite in their respective vocal and instrumental fields. In Lamar CSD, we had 14 high school musicians all qualify for TMEA all state. The honors place these musicians scholars in the top 3% in the state. We want to congratulate all of our wonderful state musicians. Many of them were here with this this evening and some have remained. We've got Jesse Balon, senior from Foster High School. Annie Cedro Hardell, senior Foster High School. Not with us this evening, senior Jackson Ingram,
006senior Jesse Joel, and senior Katherine Martin. From Fulsure High School, we had Noah Hellp senior, junior Thatcher Ling, senior Joshua Morurell, and junior Takkesh Obara. From George Ranch High School with us this evening, we got Andres Barrera, senior, Tim Cranston Jr., Will Cranston Jr., and Haris Mania, senior. And from Terry High School, we had FA Fabio Marquez, senior. And that concludes recognitions for the TMA students. Congratulations to those students. Okay, next up, Lamar CSD cheer squads brought home some impressive results from the National Cheer Association National Championships with three teams earning regional bids and advancing to competition. Foster High School, George Ranch High School, and Fulshire High School each finished in the top two in their regional competitions early this year, and all went on to represent the district with distinction at nationals. Fulshire entered
007this year as the reigning UIL state champions and NCA national champions. And once again, they've proven that they are untouchable, clinching the title back-to-back NCA High School National Champions. Woo! We have representatives of the full cheerleading squads here to celebrate us tonight in their first place nationals win. We've got Laney Fulkerson, Shelby Fail, Alyssa Guerrera, Ava Gunther, Addie Garrett, and Maline Pier. [Applause] Congratulations to our full cheerleaders. And last but not least, this evening, we're celebrating the fact that Lamar CSD has been recognized as an honor roll district by the Educational Results Partnership. The ERP honoral highlights school districts that demonstrate high academic achievement, consistent growth, and measurable progress in closing achievement gaps for underserved student populations. This recognition is based on rigorous data-driven analysis of public available data, underscoring Lamar CSD's commitment to excellence
008in education. This achievement would not have been possible without the collective efforts of our student, teachers, campus staff, and district leadership team. Thank you so much. In addition to the honor received by the district overall, we had several schools that made the list individually and we're happy to celebrate together tonight with the campus leaders from this school from Brisco Junior High and a star category principal Jennifer Zebold. Ray Elementary star category principal Nancy Garcia. Williams Elementary Star category principal Lacy Kraussen. Austin Elementary Star category, principal Stephanie Horica. Helita from Dickinson Elementary Scholar Category, Principal Shannon Amanderez. Campbell Elementary Scholar category, Principal Mandy Casey. Frost Elementary Star category, we've got AP Nicola Parish is representing the campus. from McNeel Elementary Star category principal Jiren Jordan. Hubanak Elementary Star category principal Kathleen Lance. Aerodondo Elementary Star category
009principal Amber Babro. And from Bibli Elementary Star category, we've got the AP Regina Ingram representing the campus. Congratulations to our wonderful student leaders. We taking a group photo. Group photo. Come on [Music] back. congratulations campus leaders, Mr. President, Dr. Nons, that concludes the recognitions and awards. We'll move on to introductions. All right. Good evening, Dr. Nven, President Lambert Board of Trustees. Tonight, I am proud to introduce the new campus athletic coordinator and head football coach for Forsell High School, Mr. Steven Hill. Mr. Hill was born and raised in Herford, Texas. He is a proud graduate of Eastern New Mexico University where he received his bachelor's degree in physical education. Mr. is one of our very own and he is a proud Fusser resident and recently served as co-offensive coordinator and health teacher at Randall High
010School, the reigning 5A state champions in football. Steven has a total of 24 years of experience in the field of education serving as a classroom teacher, offensive coordinator, also previously as a head football coach and athletic director. Attending with Mr. Hill tonight is his wife John. [Applause] his daughter Campbell who is a senior at Forester High School and his daughter Ree who is an eighth grader at Layman Junior High School. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the new campus athletic coordinator and head football coach for Fulshire High School, Coach Steven Hill. Dr. Nas and President Lambert, that concludes our presentations for this evening. All right, trustees. We uh will now have our board member reports and shoutouts. Trustees, please keep your comments to one to two minutes. Miss Danziger, you're going to miss me. Okay. And
011I pro We will. We will. And I'm probably raining on some of your parade, but um three big shout outs I feel like I need to recognize tonight. One was um the Taylor Ray and Nancy Garcia with their first ever celebrate reading day with the magic school bus theme. It's their first time they have done this there. And not only that, their art teacher, Leticia Rudell, for having all her students create artwork depicting the themes highlighted from the popular children's PBS show. it. It brought those uh different parts of that campus to life and parents and teachers and students were having a wonderful time that day. And then I need to go next. Um I went to the 10th anniversary celebration at Aerodondo and it was an amazing event. Principal Amber Barbaro opened that school
01210 years ago and they had students uh highlighting what had happened over the 10 years and it was fun to see the changes and what went down every year. But not only that, there were so many family members that were there to uh that that descendants from um Mr. Gerodondo and there were almost two dozen I think former teachers there that came and then and also a our former superintendent Dr. Randall attended. So it was a a very well attended event and it was I was glad I was able to make it. And then a couple Saturdays ago after uh headed over into the uh Terry High School for the spring book festival after the lunches of love walkathon for uh and the librarians never disappoint. They bring out uh so many activities for these
013kids to do. But I want to do a shout out tonight to LEAF because they provided books that the children that had earned a free book and they provided those books for those students. So any way to get books in the hands of students is a A+ in my book. So those are my three shoutouts. Thank you. Um, I want to give a very special shout out to our special education department for putting on what is probably one of my favorite nights of the year, which is special education prom. That was Friday night. Um, Trusty Box, President Lambert and I have attended together the past two years. And so I don't want to say everything about it in case they want to say something, but um I don't know if other districts do this, but
014if they do, there's no way that they do it like LCISD. Um seeing these sweet kids like dressed to the nines, they um are laughing and dancing and just having the time of their lives. That is something that truly stays with you. Um they crown a prom king and queen and um they give other fun awards like best dressed and best dancer and like just the genuine happiness on these kids' faces and they celebrate each other. It's just really sweet. Um, and I also want to give a big thank you and shout out to the LCISD Police Department who stands out there at the entrance with roses and Chief Garcia, our lieutenants, our sergeants, and several of our officers are out there just for the kids. Um, and they don't just do that, they stay,
015they chaperon, they dance with the kids. I mean, they dance with the kids. It is so awesome to see. Um, so just to everyone who helps make this event possible, just a huge thank you and please keep inviting us because it is one of my faves. And uh I'll mention that I I went with Amber Staley of of Williams Elementary and a couple of her kids to uh this past Saturday afternoon. We went to the Trailer Stadium and this is another big shout out to Chief Garcia and all of our officers uh in the Lamar Police Department. You guys did a great job hosting what you called the pinwheel project. And uh we had uh snacks, we had games, uh there were food trucks, there were bouncy houses, there was a dunk a cop booth.
016Um and we had police departments from literally all over the county. And we had other ISD police departments there. We had the sheriff's department there. And they had a big Easter egg hunt. Well, it was b basically a Easter egg pickup on on the field itself. and and it was a it was a good afternoon that I spent about a good two hours there and uh I was I was really happy to be there and I was really proud to be a trustee. So, uh thanks good job guys and and uh it was bigger than last year's and I'm I'm assuming next year's will be even bigger. So, good job. Um, yes. Um, it's that time of the year where we have something every single night of the week. Um, but for mine, I would
017like to give a shout out, like Miss Danzinger said, to Miss Nancy Garcia with Taylor Ray. Um, I walked in that school and I immediately pulled out my phone and sent Dr. Neans a text and said, "This is absolutely amazing. Every school when we build schools should look this colorful and vibrant and full of life in there." So, um, we'll be talking to our bond office about that. No, but you walk in and Miss uh Miss Garcia was dressed like Miss Frizzle. Um her teachers were all in it. The students were engaged. Um I got the opportunity to read to some classes. I was there with Miss Danzinger and Vice President Hutzel. Um and I think the three of us when we were walking to our cars just felt refreshed because these students had an
018experience that um they're not going to forget because obviously I haven't forgot it. And so, um, massive shout out to her team that stayed up there for the night before and decorated and, um, it really was an incredible set when you walk in. So, um, the the sped prom was amazing as well. A couple of our officers were on the dance floor and I think they were probably sore the next morning for the, uh, um, pin wheel project and all that. So, um, again, just shout out to Miss Garcia and her team at Taylor Ray. Anybody else? All right. Now we have board committee reports. Um I get to sit and lead the board budget committee with Vice President Hutzel and Secretary Welch. And so that committee is made up of the officers. Um we've
019met two times this past two weeks. Um we're going to have some presentations today and for the next couple meetings from Miss Ledwig and her team. So um to our community, um we have a great budget team, budget, finance, all that up there. um they're very good stewards with the funds that are trusted to us and so we had some productive meetings and all that. Any other board committee reports? Um the policy committee met I don't know two or three weeks ago and we have a follow-up meeting tomorrow. So, I'll say some. Um, I'm the chair of the board strategic planning committee. And, uh, tonight we're going to hear a report from two representatives of that committee. And this has been a long process for the district that we've engaged in pretty much a year's
020time to write a new five-year plan for the school district. And, um, we went out and solicited bids for a company. Uh, we hired one. We've got a lot of community members involved. And so, uh, I just want to thank all of those folks who came, uh, to those committees, uh, meetings. They were held once a month. Now, the first one we had about 60 folks there, I think it was. And after that, we it kind of dwindled down to about, I would say about 20. And the 20 faithful that that y'all showed up almost every month. Some of you literally every month. I just want to give a big shout out and thank you because you really helped formulate some ideas and to uh help the district capture what the community believes and thinks
021and where we should go in the next five years. So, I'm looking forward to hearing the report, but I just wanted to tell the committee thank you for your involvement. I really appreciate it. Dr. Divons, do we have a superintendent report? Yes, sir. Mr. president. Uh as we know um it's already midappril and it goes fast. It goes really fast. Well, we all know that leadership is very difficult especially in 2025. Uh and I want to give a shout out to all my principles because as you saw them parade through here, you know, those campuses were recognized from an organization that's based in California on how well their campuses are performing. And uh I've always said that, you know, problems start from poor leadership and solutions come from great leadership. And so when you have
022so many campuses that are recognized like that, you know, that is just tremendous leadership. And so I want to give a shout out to all my principles that are doing a phenomenal job uh getting there early, staying late, putting out all the fires while making sure they speak life into their kids and to their teachers. And um and so if you're watching this principles, you know, I appreciate you guys. I love you to the community. You know, as you are invested in your campuses, please make sure you stop by and thank your principal because your principal is the person that makes it go. And I just want to continue to recognize them, especially in 2025. It's very difficult to be a leader of people in 2025 and our principles are doing a phenomenal job. So,
023I just want to say I love you guys and I appreciate you. Thank you, Mrs. Johnson. Are there any public comments? All right. At this time, we'll take action on the consent agenda. Trustees, are there any items you would like to pull to discuss? I I would like to pull F 9F from the consent agenda. All right, we're going to pull 9F. That's the consider of approval of renewal engagement of independent auditor for 2024 2025 fiscal year. All right. This is the time in the meeting where there are the public has an opportunity to participate. Mrs. Johnson. Is there any public public participation? It's an It is the desire of the Lamar CISD board of trustees to appropriately and effectively fulfill its governance role in accordance to best practices for quality organizations and to the
024applicable provisions of the Texas Education Code. Trustees also desire to afford an opportunity for input from the public. Members of the community who wish to address the board must have completed a public participation public comment card and submitted it before the presiding officer called the meeting to order. Public participation allows individuals to address the board regarding posted agenda items. Public comment allows individuals to address the board regarding non-aggenda items. Trustees may not respond to public comments as they are prohibited by law from discussing or deciding any subject that is not on the board's publicly noticed agenda. All patrons desiring to speak and who have completed a public participation public comment form will be heard during the public comment or public participation portion of the meeting before final board action is taken on an agenda topic.
025While speakers generally have five minutes to address the board, the presiding officer may establish an overall time limit for public participation and public comment and adjust the time allotted to each speaker when necessary to accommodate a large number of speakers. However, no speaker shall be given less than one minute. All of this is in compliance with HB2840. Tonight, each speaker will have five minutes. Each speaker must address the board from the provided podium unless special accommodations have been requested and approved. Speakers are to present their remarks to the board and not to the audience. Speakers having complaints against individual district employees may only address the board after filing a complaint form and in the manner provided for in board policy DGBA public employee complaints FNG student and parent complaints and GF public complaints. The presiding
026officer or designate shall determine whether a speaker has filed a complaint according to policy. Any speakers who complain of individual district employees during public particip public participation public comment may be directed by the presiding officer to refrain from naming the employee and will refer the speaker to the appropriate complaint policy. Schoolboard meetings are meetings held in public but are not public meetings. While the board values hearing from members of the public, trustees will not answer questions or respond to comments from patrons. Speakers will not engage in dialogue with the trustees. Please state your name when you come forward. Our first speaker tonight is Otilia Gonzalez. Thank you. Good evening, Dr. Nonsens and trustees. My name is Otilia Gonzalez. I'm one of the law partners at Purdue, Brandon, Fielder, Collins, and Mott. I'm present tonight with
027our associate attorney, Mr. Damen Millington, who's on our Fort Bend collections team. We're here related to item 9G on your agenda, consideration and approval of the RFQ for delinquent tax attorney Services. Mr. Millington and I and our team at Purdue submitted a proposal in response to the district's request for proposals for this service. Purdue Brandon has been collecting delinquent taxes in Texas for 55 years and 33 of those have been here in Fort Ben County, including for the city of Rosenberg and 62 special districts within the boundaries of Lamar CISD. We consistently deliver outstanding results and exceptional customer service for our clients. Based upon the agenda wording and the backup information, we see that we are not the law firm that is recommended for this contract with the district. We are certainly disappointed, but we
028are here in person to say thank you for the opportunity to submit a proposal. It has been many years, more than I can remember, since the district considered this service in the RFQ process and we are grateful to share how our firm could add value for the district and the service that we hoped to provide. I believe the proposed contract for this service is three years and I hope that at that time in the future we will be back in front of you again offering our services in a proposal and hopefully receiving a different result. Thank you very much for your time and have a good evening. That is all. Thank you. Thank you. All right, trustees. May I have a motion to approve the current consent agenda with the exceptions of item G? Don't
029make it. All right, Vice Secretary Welch makes the motion. Oh, sorry. Oh, I apologize. I apologize. I wrote um that is correct with the exception of Johnson. Do I have a second? Oh, trust trusty Bronzo makes the second. Any discussion? Yeah. Yes, sir. I I just want to I want to explain uh briefly item 9C because there was a question on one of the Facebook forums today about this uh the district has canled two of the four current board member elections. The reason we did that and that's actually one for uh uh you pulled F but we're talking C. Oh, you're just giving information on the discussion during the discussion of the rest of the consent items. Yes. Yes. Seats one and two. We canled the election under state law. Uh Mr. Zam uh Lambert
030is currently on the board as everybody can see, but he is the only person that filed for district one or seat one. And uh Miss Danzinger's seat number two, Miss Danzinger chose not to run for re-election and we only had one person sign up, Monica Henderson. So she is uh Zach and uh Monica are both declared winners by default under state law. So that is why we canled the election for those two. So there will not be an election for if you live in those two uh areas of uh our 385 square mile footprint. So, uh, we do have two other elections going on for two other board seats, but I just wanted to let that be known out there. Thank you. Any other discussion? All right. I will now call for the vote with
031the exception of item F. All in favor of approving the current consent agenda say I. I. Any opposed? None opposed. The motion carries. All right. Now, we'll get to that one, which is May I have a motion to approve consent item F? Do we have a motion to All right. Trusty Danziger makes a motion. Do we have a second? Trusty Yubac makes a second. Any discussion? Yeah. Um last year when we were considering hiring our an outside CPA firm, uh I expressed a a desire of the school district to uh mix it up a little bit and go with the different firm. This our school district and this firm have been joined at the hip for a long time and from what I understand they are very good. I have no complaints with uh Whitley
032Penn. None whatsoever. Uh and their services that they provide. I've just been advised that it would be wise for a fresh pair of eyes uh to come and look at the books of Lamar CISD whether it's one year, whether that's two years. Um I think there I the the fear I heard expressed was just the familiarity of personnel and of books and of the way things have been done. Uh it would just be good for a fresh pair of eyes to come in. And so I expressed that last year. Um the administration I believe I understand why the administration is again recommending them. Um but I'm I pulled this because I intend to vote against it tonight. That's it. Any other discussion add to that? Well, when is the actual audit? We've already engaged them,
033right? We already just got a report, didn't we? Um what in what is in your packet tonight is the engagement letter and upon approval we will execute that letter. Um then they begin their planning process. We get placed on their their audit schedule for the u interim work that occurs during the summer. Typically that's in the June July time frame. And then they come back and do final work in the fall after we've closed the books for this year. Any other discussion, trustees? All right, we will now call for the votes. All in favor of approving. Yes, ma'am. Well, so if we were to do an RFQ, what's the time frame for a process like that to engage in to do an RFQ? Is it RFP? RFQ. RFQ. Um, at least 60 days. Uh, probably
034maybe a little bit more than that because of the advertising requirements. uh and then the evaluation and giving the um proposers time to assemble their proposals. Uh we typically like to give them at least uh two to four weeks to do that. And so when would they when would the work actually be engaged? End of May. When would they actually start doing the work? They start doing their work in June. But they're already scheduling their their engagements with all the school districts and their other clients right now in this in the spring. Yeah. So, uh, to get on their schedule, this is the right time frame to approve this particular contract. So, you're saying you don't feel like there's enough time to do an RFQ and it would be fairly rushed. Yes. And then I
035would worry that we wouldn't get on on the calendar of whichever firm we selected. I mean, I agree with John, too. I think it is good to to change it and have fresh eyes because I do remember us discussing this last year. I do and I had forgotten. Um, so I would just suggest maybe we go with them this year, but remember next year and strictly because of the timeline we're under, but next year maybe do a new RFQ. Yeah, I think that's kind of what we said last year, too. So, I think before we get to this point next year, I think we need to take action to make sure that we do, you know, do it ahead of time so that we're not rushed and Yes, Dr. Dons. Yes. So, I just want
036to provide some clarity and context to that when when Trusty Welch brought that up last year, we had just completed the RFQ process uh for for u auditors. And so, he brought that up and so he and I had several conversations throughout the year about that. Uh and then talking with Miss Lowick and the team decide to keep moving forward and I didn't bring it to the rest of the board to move forward. Uh but if that's the board's will desire, then we can definitely put out a new RFQ. Uh that's that's not hard to do at all for next year. Trustes, any other Thank you, Miss Lewig. We will now call for the vote. All in favor of approving consent item F say I. I. Any opposed? Uh Secretary Welch and Trusty Box opposed.
037The motion carries. All right, Dr. Nven, we will now request some reports and presentations on future action items. All right, we have to the podium Mr. Gre Buchanan. Good evening, board of trustees and Dr. Nons. Tonight, we'll bring forth a discussion about the schematic design for middle school number eight. So, junior high school number eight will be located adjacent to high school number eight. It is on the east side of 359, north of downtown Fulsure. This is the floor plan for the middle school. If you'll notice, the light blue areas are academic wings on the left and right. Central administration's in the center. This is the library multimedia section. This is fine arts CTE with athletics on the right hand side. Are there any questions or discussions? I have a question. Um so what two
038questions actually the capacity of that building and why do we um why do we change the design of the building? Why don't we just go with what we have? Is there improvement or like what's the reason for that? So currently right now our our practice has been is every five to six years we update our educational specifications because construction delivery changes all of that stuff. So we go back and review our educational specs along with our technology specs because technology and our facility um equipment changes as well. So when we update those is when we update our designs because some of these have more sped classrooms in it. Fine arts has changed. They some of the things that were in our past designs didn't make it to our current designs. So by doing that we
039just start the design process over and we'll use these probably for the next five to six years and then we'll update our educational specs again. And the capacity for the building, this one will be 775. That is correct. What does Roberts have right now? Do you know? 650. Okay. So, I have more room. Yes, ma'am. Next will be our design development for junior high school. Number eight. Again, it is located on the same complex in the same area as high school number eight. This is our option one for junior high school number eight. This on the left hand side is option one for the junior high school. On the right is the approved design for high school number eight. This is option two. Again, this is option two adjacent to the high school that was
040approved. This is option three. This is option three adjacent to the approved design for the high school. This was our committee members that voted. Option one received two votes. Option two received seven. Option three received zero. And again this is option two along with the high school approved design and the voting options. Thank you, sir. Could I ask you what about the capacity for the junior high? Do you know? 1550. How does that compare to layman? They're at 1225. I will just say this, Mr. Buchanan. I I love the way you presented this to us. It's very easy to follow. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Trustees, we have Miss Cohen coming next to talk about strategic plan. Thank you, Dr. Nonsens. Last spring, the board of trustees initiated an RFQ to select a vendor
041to lead the Lamar CSD community through the strategic planning process. And tonight, myself and representatives from that committee will provide an update on the process and present a final draft for consideration. So, a strategic plan is a comprehensive document that outlines an organization's direction, goals, and action steps over a design period, and it serves as a road map to guide decision-making and resource allocation. Key elements include vision, mission, goals, objectives, strategies, and values. At the September board meeting, you approved the strate the strategic planning committee. And this committee is composed of selected members from various segments of our community, including teachers, administrators, parents, and other stakeholders. Committee members were appointed by board members and the superintendent. In addition, campus staff representatives were appointed as a result of their honor as support staff member, teacher, or
042principal of the year. JG Consulting led monthly planning sessions with our committee from September to April. And as part of our planning process, we place a strong emphasis on gathering broad and meaningful community input. This ensured that our plan would be informed by those who we serve and who serve our students every day. So JG consulting led the efforts to capture diverse perspectives. And we hosted a series of targeted focus group meetings with a wide range of stakeholders including campus leaders and district administrators, community leaders and business partners, faithbased leaders and churches, higher ed partners, local residents not directly affiliated with the district, non-instructional staff, parents and guardians, and veteran teachers and novice teachers. In addition, we launched a communitywide survey and held public town hall meetings to further expand the reach and inclusivity of
043our input gathering efforts. This approach assured that everyone from classroom teachers to community members had a seat at the table. And we heard directly from those who are experiencing our system from different angles, allowing us identify both strengths and opportunities. And this evening we have two community committee representatives, Vanessa Marcers and Pastor Jim Kyles here to present the final draft plan to the board of trustees and answer any questions. All right. Okay. Yeah. Hello. Good evening. Good evening. I'm Vanessa Marsters. Yeah. I'm Jim Kyles. We're honored to be here to present to you. Uh we represent an amazing and diverse group of people that have worked really, really hard. And so what we get to present tonight is really a collaborative effort and we are really proud um of all the hard work that's been
044done and we're excited to present it to you and have you here for yourselves. Yep. We want to thank you for that opportunity to serve on this committee. So here we have our uh process and conver uh conversations. So the uh first item is word choice matters. Uh as a committee we knew this plan needed to speak to everyone in the Lamar CISTD community. We spent time being intentional with language, choosing words that are clear, meaningful, and reflect our shared values. Every word we included in the values and priorities was carefully considered for how it would be understood and embraced by the people we serve. Yeah. Next, one of the things we wanted was simplicity with the language, common language, everyday language. In other words, we wanted it to not be so academic that anybody
045could read it and understand it and not only read and understand. The key is we want them to buy into it no matter what walk of life they're in. Uh that the language would be common enough that we could all agree that it's saying what's within our hearts. The next item, the identity. Who are we? What do we want for our students? A consistent theme that came up across meetings and feedback was the desire to p preserve the small town feel that has long defined Lamarcisd. As a committee, we acknowledge that we are no longer a small town, but we can still be community centered. That means keeping strong relationships, personal connections, and a culture where people feel known and supported. We also talked about what we want for our students to be future ready
046leaders who are well-rounded with grit, work ethic, and a strong character. The next item, stay true to where we come from. Embrace where we are now. Plan for the future. As a hyperrowth district, Lamar CISD is in a moment of transformation. Throughout the process, we were focused on balancing growth with staying true to our core values. Making sure our priorities reflect who we are, where we are, and where we're going. Yeah, we're excited about innovation. We're excited about doing things differently, but not just doing it for the sake of doing it differently. We want to break the mold. And so, uh, we have an idea that we thought could bring this to life. Uh, Vanessa's going to pass this out. Uh we I so I I have four teenagers, uh one tween and three teenagers.
047And I don't know about you, but they love this Kinder Joy chocolate candy. Uh as I'm sure if you've got kids, they love it as well. And I thought it'd be a great illustration as we're talking about to really illustrate the kind of leadership and thinking we're stepping into as a district. Uh if you've ever had a Kinder candy, which we have one for you out there as well. So if somebody wants to pass it out, yeah, let's pass it out. Don't want to leave you out. But if the board would open that candy, what we're looking at is breaking the mold. And so it's a great illustration because when you have had a kid, I know if you've never had it, it's very confusing. So it's like you got this outside shell, break it
048up, it comes into two pieces. Now, the thing that's interesting is they don't always love the chocolate, but they always love the prize that's inside. So, if you'll go ahead and open it up, if you get the chocolate side, you can indulge in that. See if you like it. If you like the other side, we want you to open the prize as well. Um, but what they're after is the prize that is inside. And that's really what breaking the mold is all about. It's not about protecting what's polished on the outside. It's about breaking the mold to get to what matters most, which is on the inside. And so when we talk about the mold in education, what is that? That's tradition. It's doing what we've always done. It's the systems. It's the routines. It's
049the safe pass. But here at LCISD, we're saying something different. Let's not protect the mold if it keeps us from reaching the prize. Let's break it. And so we talk about what's the prize on the inside. The prize on the inside is the potential that's within every single child that is in our district. It's the leadership and the ownership of every single teacher that is in our classroom. It's the future that hasn't been written yet, but that we are called to shape as leaders of this district. And as a district, we could keep things predictable, polished, and prepackaged. But that's not why we're here. And we don't believe that's why you're here either. We're all here to reach the hidden potential inside of every student, the dreams, the gifts, the purposes. And uh we know
050those things don't naturally show up on the surface. And because we're willing to break the mold, we will get to what matters most. Now, we're going to talk a little bit about our values or well, I'm sorry, we'll go into the strategic plan of our vision of the vision, right? Oh, the values. Okay, here we go. The values. Okay. So, here we go back right there. Our values reflect the heart of this plan. They define who we are as a district and what we believe in, guiding how we serve students, support staff, and work together as a community. So, the first value that we're highlighting is accountability. For our committee, accountability means owning our actions and outcomes. It's about being responsible, not just as individuals, but as a district to ensure we're following through on
051what we say we value. The district is held accountable through CCMR standards. That means not just hoping students are ready, but measured on how well we we prepare them. Accountability in this case is about making sure every student leaves Lamar CISD ready for the future. But beyond the data, accountability is about trust. Trust between staff and leadership. Trust from families to our schools. And trust that we will keep students at the center of every decision. Yeah. The next one is big thinking. Our president, uh, Zach Lambert stretched our thinking, asking us to really consider what it would look like if we were innovating, if we're breaking the mold. And so big thinking, thinking outside the box, not allowing limitations to stop us, uh, but to really doing whatever it takes and thinking new ways to
052innovate fresh new ideas. Our next value is compassion. As a committee, we define compassion as more than just caring. It's about taking action to support others. It's showing up, stepping in, and doing something to help when someone needs it. Compassion means creating a school culture where people don't just feel understood, they feel backed up. Whether that's a student needing encouragement, a family facing a challenge, or a staff member needing support, it's about building a district where people look out for one another, where doing the right thing for someone else isn't extra, it's expected. Yeah. Another value that uh we have is excellence. excellence uh was not only academic excellence but we're looking for excellence of spirit that we do the best we can with what we have that everywhere we are at we show up
053fully. We give our best as students we give our best as faculty. We give our best as leaders and that we would have a spirit that we carry with us and that students would graduate with that would cause them to be in high demand from employers and those around the country that might invite them to be a part of the next journey of their life. The third value is integrity for our committee. Integ integrity me means wholeness. That's what we say matches what we do. It's about being consistent, principled, and following through even when it's hard or inconvenient. We felt strongly that integrity isn't just about big decisions. It's reflected in the everyday actions of students, staff, and leadership. It means holding ourselves to a standard where our actions reflect our values at all times.
054In a district that's growing and evolving, integrity keeps us anchored. It reminds us to stay true to who we are no matter how much changes around us. Yeah. So, those five values could have been complete by themselves, but we added a sixth one and uh this one is very fascinating. We had lots of uh conversation around this and what was very interesting is the different opinions and ideas people had around the idea of joy. Uh and it was great some I find joy and purpose in serving the students. I find joy when uh I'm learning. I mean there was so many things that we learn hard things in a fun way. And what we realized was this is that the debate was is joy an emotion and the answer is yes but it's incomplete if
055we leave it at that. That's happiness. Joy is not just an emotion. It's actually a state of being. We get to choose to be joyfilled as we experience an emotion of joy. And what was so fascinating is that all the different ideas, all the different opinions around this word, which I felt was very great conversation and we all did, everyone agreed that we should leave it on there and uh that was really a fascinating thing. So we proposed joy. Okay. So the the vision is actually uh created by the board of trustees. Um with the values in place, the board of trustees took that foundation and created the vision statement. Uh the vision statement is we are valuesdriven community where innovation thrives, excellence is the standard and every student has access to an elite education.
056And we were so pleased with the Is that you? Yeah. What what we appreciated about the vision the board crafted is how clearly it aligns with the values and priorities our committee identified. You can see that connection in every phrase from innovation and excellence to the commitment that every student has access. It's all rooted in the same community voice that shaped this entire plan, but adds in the aspirations of the district. Let's start with the first word of the vision, which is we. Now, I had the chance to sit in on the meeting where the board crafted this statement. And you'd be surprised how much discussion went into one little word. The goal was to make sure that when someone reads we, they know exactly who that is. And it's not just the district office
057or the schools. It's all of us. Yes. Students, parents, teachers, staff, board members, community partners, everyone who's part of Lamarc ISD. Now, let's go ahead and talk about the word that probably caught everybody's eye right away. elite. We know, we we talked about it, too. At first glance, elite can sound exclusive, like it's only for a select few, but that's not what it means in this vision. When the board included elite education, it was wasn't about privilege. It was about setting a high standard, one that every student in Lamarcisd can reach. We're talking about top tier learning experiences, exceptional opportunities, and preparing students to compete with the best, not just in Texas, but anywhere. So, think of elite as something we deliver, not something we limit. It's not about status, it's about access, quality, and
058excellence for every student across every campus. Yeah. In other words, we take all the blueberries. Uh, I just have to reiterate what Vanessa said. You know, we were so pleased to see you take the heart of what we came up with as community members. Um, and really through every single word, as uh detailed as they were, to see you wrestle to make sure they were right, uh, was really a touching moment to see that we work really hard, not afraid of hard work, because the students are worth it. So the strategic plan, our mission, we equip every student with the knowledge and skills to pursue meaningful opportunities, boldly shaping futures filled with purpose, possibilities, and impact. It just doesn't get more clear than that. I think we can all agree that's a great school district.
059So now we're moving into the priorities. So priority number one, Lamar CISD students achieve academic excellence and skills for life through innovative instruction and student centered experience. Yeah. Priority number two, safe learning and working environment. Lamar uh CISD ensures safety and belonging for students and staff by addressing physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Priority number three, Lamar CISD attracts and retains the best staff through competitive compensation, comprehensive professional development, and supportive work environments. The priority number four, home and community partnerships. Lamar CISD cultivates lasting partnerships with families and the community to support well-rounded student development and success. And priority number five, Lamar CISD drives continuous improvement through servant leadership, effective communication, and accountability at all levels. All right, trustees. And so, next steps, um, this is a future action item, so we're going to bring this
060back to you May 5th at the special call board meeting. And just to share with you a visual that I've been sharing with the strategic planning committee. Um a typical strat plan is truly a joint effort board. You all did create the vision and the mission. The committee created the strategic priorities and the values and the next steps would be for the superintendent and the leadership team to work on the goals and objectives and the action plan. And that's going to take place uh during the summer in our planning meetings where we really flesh that out. And then in August we should be all set to launch our new strategic plan and start the communications campaign to build awareness. At this time, trustees, myself and our community reps are available for any questions you may
061have. [Music] Um, first of all, thank you Vanessa and Jim for taking the time to be on the committee and for also stepping up to do the presentation. That was awesome. Um, the vision and mission statement, Miss Cole Hamilton, I cannot remember. Is that what we came up with or was that I feel like the mission was was that the vision that we came up with? We tweaked a little bit of the language through the conversations. We received feedback that we wanted to truly get elite in there because it was something that was so central to some beliefs um and just be able to explain and present in a way where it did not feel elitist or offensive. Right. Okay. I like it. I just couldn't remember if that was exactly the wording. Yeah. With
062her. Yes. Yes, thank you for the tweaks, the help. Yeah, in case anybody wasn't watching the the portion of the video uh about the board committee reports, I I just want to thank the committee again. It was been a long process and you guys showed up every month uh you two and and about 20 others um showed up all the time and you guys put a lot of thought and engagement into this and so we really really appreciate it. when you look at it on the screen to the person watching at home who's just a casual tuner in might not understand the complexity of something like this, but we're a huge organization and we're getting bigger all the time and we have millions of dollars flowing through here and we have a lot of souls
063we're touching and we're educating and we're responsible for. So that's why we we have spent the time as an organization and we've gotten the community involved because it's very important as a guide book for the for the administration and for the board. So I I just again, thank you very much. Um and like Secretary Welch said, it's that guide book. And so for the community watching and principles and teachers and staff and um this five-year plan is going to be the direction we're going to go as a district. This is where um I've been a part of orgs where we create this plan, work really hard on it, and put it on a shelf. Um for us as Lamar CIC, the where we're going to go is that everything's going to be vertically aligned to
064that. So from um the goals as the board to the goals that Dr. Nons has then the goals that he will put on his team below him will all be aligned to this strategic plan. So um you do the things you talk about the most and so we're going to be talking about this the most and making sure that everything we do within Lamar CISD meets these uh priorities that we make sure that the community is involved and that the vision and the mission is the direction where we're going. So, um, thank you so much to the committee, um, for, um, Miss Cole Hamilton leading us through parts of that process at the end as well. So, um, we have a great, great team that's going to support that and so we'll be voting on
065that in the in the future. So, Dr. Ne. Yes. So, uh, before y'all sit down, uh, as as as the as, uh, the board said, you know, thank you so much for your time and efforts. I want to bring special attention to the simple fact that uh Mrs. Marsters and and Pastor Kyle's are up here doing this. Uh they volunteered to do it. A lot of times in our in our society, a lot of a lot of people have a lot of u they have a lot of opinions. They have a lot of input for you. Uh I call it digital courage. You know, people get on Facebook and they make all these posts um and it's liquid courage if they've been drinking something and then they start posting on Facebook. That's right. But very
066few people, very few people will step up to the plate and actually be a part of the solution. And uh you two have done that consistently. And I just want to say how much I appreciate that as superintendent. I've watched you two in our community. I've watched you with your families. I've watched you with other folks. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you for being a part of the solution. Thank you for believing in the Marcia ISD. Thank you for believing in our leadership. Thank you for believing in our board. Um and thank you for being here. uh just simply thank you. So I want to say I appreciate that and I want everybody to know uh that I appreciate that. Thank you. [Applause] Trustees, we'll move towards the action items. Um this
067is an item that I requested we pull so we can hear from Dr. Lazar um about the things we're doing for our seventh and eighth graders that as we're gearing up to open up our CTE center that we're starting to build that pipeline now. So, all right. Good evening. What a presentation to follow. Um while I don't have any chocolate for you tonight, I am super excited to be up here to talk to you about a proposed innovative course um for RCT students that are in our seventh and eighth grade um classes. So currently we offer a course uh to our seventh and eighth grade students called career investigations. We are proposing that we transition from that course to a course called um general employability skills. So you'll see on the screen now a comparison
068between the two courses. Um and both courses students have an opportunity to explore all of the different CT programs of study that we offer in LCISD. So a unit is dedicated um to each program of study. Um, we'll be adding the a unit on the eight additional programs of study that will be added when we open the CTE center in the fall of 26. Um, also in both of these courses, students learn about skills that are necessary to be successful in the workplace. Um, some examples of things that they learn are using appropriate greetings, giving and receiving apologies, accepting consequences for your actions and learning from mistakes, accepting feedback, working with different styles of supervision, working with people with different personalities, communicating, all kinds of stuff. The list could go on and on for the
069different soft skills that they learn in these courses. Um, another thing that they learn in both c um both of these courses is they explore topics related to job searches. Um they experiment with various modes to search for jobs. Um they engage in interview strategies uh through things like mock interviews and then they also start their resume building um in both courses. Now at the bottom you'll see there is two there are differences. Um currently in career investigation students do not receive a high school credit for this course. If the decision is made to transition to general employability skills students will receive one high school credit for taking the class. Currently in career investigations, no CTE funding is received for that course. Um but if general employability skills is approved, CTE funding will be um
070received for that class. So let's talk a little bit about CTE funding. So you'll see on the screen here, um CTE is funded in a three tier system. Uh for tier one, we receive a$110. These are courses that are not assigned to a program of study. Um tier two, we receive a 128. These are courses level one and level two courses in a program of study. And in tier three we receive a $147 and these are level three and four courses in a program of study. So when I am referring to the levels in the courses, this is where the courses appear in a TEA approved program of study. So a quick example that you'll see on the screen, I pulled this straight from our course catalog. Um these are the courses that we offer
071in our business management program of study. Um what is boxed in blue? Those are our level one and level two courses and we would receive a $1.28 for those. Um boxed in purple, those are level three and four courses. That would those would be considered tier three. So that would be $147. Dr. Lazar. Yes. Can you flush out the$128 and the$147? Is that per student, per semester, per year, per what? Yes, sir. So I have another screen where I'm actually going to walk you through that. Um how how we get to that. Yes, sir. So tonight we're talking about a tier one course though. Um general employability skills would be a tier one. That's a$110. Um currently we have 962 students that are sitting in our career investigations course. So if we were to take
072those kids and we're expecting um around the same enrollment next year. Uh, and so if we were to take and transition those kids to general employability skills, we would receive an additional revenue um of almost $94,000 for that course. So, how is the total course revenue calculated? Um, a couple of things that that we need to look at. We've got to look at full-time equivalents, which we refer to as FTEES. Um, to get that, we take the enrollment, divide it by six, multiply it by the average daily attendance. I've used 95% here. Um, so you'll see the number in red that we get for FTEES. Um, and this is for I'm looking at general employability skills, right? If we were to take that 962 enrollment, then you've got to look at the basic aotment. Um,
073per the summary of finances, we get $6,160 um for a basic allotment per FTE. So we would take the basic aotment, multiply it by the FTEES, which was that number in red, and we get the number that's in blue there. Um then to get the additional weighted funding, okay, so this is where those numbers that I just talked about on the previous screen, we take that number in blue, so the basic aotment times the FTEES, multiply it by the tier weight. Here we're talking about a tier one course, so that would be a $110. You subtract a dollar from that. Um and that's where that additional um $93,827 comes from. And then the total course revenue, you add the basic aotment plus the weighted funding. So the course as a whole would bring in a
074little over a million dollars. So um finally, how is this course revenue spent? Um it's spent on a lot of different things. Okay, so um it's spent on CTE salaries and benefits. That includes our CTE teachers. Um it's spent on resources and supplies for all of our CTE courses. That includes things like welders and a saws and carpentry, groceries for culinary arts, computers for our business courses, 3D printers and engineering, CPR cards and resources needed for our health science certifications, and again, the list could go on and on for the um multitude of resources that we buy for our CTE classes. Um it's spent on maintenance and repair for CTE equipment and facilities. It's used to purchase CTE textbooks and online subscriptions. Some examples of online subscriptions would be the ICV curriculum that we use
075in our AD classes or code HS um is what we use in our computer science courses. It purchases industry based certifications. Um it goes to fund CT staff development. Every summer we pay for our teachers to go to content specific conferences. For instance, we send our a teachers to a teacher conference. Our health science teachers go to something called HOSA for a conference. Um it goes to CTE student and employee travel for CTSO student competitions. So the DECA students that you saw at the beginning, we um if they are a CT student, we pay for them to attend those competitions. Pays for buses for CT field trips. Um as well as any barn upkeep and supplies. Um and those are just a few examples. So at this time, I'll take any questions that you have.
076We're going to start this transition next year if they've That is what's proposed. Yes, ma'am. Okay. That uh giving more opportunities to our students at an earlier age so they can start developing that interest and also get the high school credit right away. That's that's a massive plus and that falls in line with the priority one that we just heard from our committee members of Lamar CIC students achieve academic excellence and skills for life through innovative instruction and student centered experiences. So um you're already doing what we say we're going to do. So I appreciate that and um everyone knows that the CTE is fond I'm fond of that and appreciate the opportunities that gives our students. So, any other questions, discussion? All right. Thank you, Dr. Lazar. May I have a motion for the
077board of trustees to approve the CTE course general employability skills for seventh and eighth grade students to take starting in the 2025 and 2026 school year. All right. Vice President Hudel makes the motion. Do we have a second? Miss Danzinger makes a second. Um, any discussion? All right, hearing none, we'll call for the vote. All in favor say I. I. None opposed. The motion carries. We'll now have reports and presentations onformational items. Our trustees, we have Dr. Maxwell and Mr. Bob Templeton here to talk about our our quarter for demographic report. Well, good evening to board of trustees, Dr. Nonsens. Uh, tonight we have Mr. Bob Templeton from Zonda Education to present on the quarterf data and projections for Lamarcisd. Uh I won't steal his thunder, but I'm seeing more people move into our district
078and he's going to go into more details about that. Uh but we'll both be up here uh after the presentation for any questions or discussions. And I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Templeton. Well, thank you. Good evening, board president, Dr. Nans, board members, it is great to be here with you tonight. The school year has flown by. This is our fourth quarter apart. The data was gathered in December. We completed the report late January. And uh I'll touch on big picture economic conditions. We like to look at the unemployment rates. The unemployment rates as of December for Harris County, Rosoria County right at that 4% range. The region is still seeing job growth. It is still leading to population growth. In fact, we're fortunate Texas still leads the nation in new home construction.
079We have four major cities in Texas that are in the top six cities in the country for new home construction. and Houston is in the second spot. New home starts as of the fourth quarter was 39,36. That's up about 10% from the fourth quarter of 2024. And when we compare it to prior to the pandemic, it's up about 27%. This graph really illustrates the roller coaster that new housing has been on for the last several years. The dark blue line is the annualized start rate. The turquoise line is the annualized closing rate. And you can see how the last several quarters the start rate has been accelerating. The closing rate is keeping pace. So we are seeing strong activity for starts and closings for new homes. Despite the interest rates still being well above 6%
080and despite the overall concerns with the economy, new housing is continuing to hold their own. When we look at total home sales within the district, you can see again a little bit of a a roller coaster. We had the most home sales within the district back in 2021. That's when those interest rates were a little lower and then we started to see the rising interest rates leading to a pretty dramatic drop in total home sales. What has happened is new home share of the sales has actually gone up. The builders have been very competitive with buyowns on the interest rates, offering some discounts, offering incentives to to be more competitive. And so, new home market has actually grown in share of the total home sales within the district. We are starting to see a little
081bit of a softening in the sales price of new homes. You can see during 2024, new home sale average price was 406,000. We didn't see any softening in the existing home sale price and that's primarily because we have such a low supply. There's a low amount of existing homes for sale. Many of the current homeowners likely took advantage of those low interest rates. So, they're sitting on the sidelines now, not really wanting to move up or to buy a different home. They're staying put, which is keeping that supply of existing homes low. When we look at the ranking of school districts in the greater Houston area, this is a ranking report based on annual closings. Lamar Consolidated is still in the number one spot, far and away outpacing the second most active school district. The
082annual closing is 5,11. The inventory, those are homes that are under construction and finished vacant new homes, is at 2455. VDL stands for vacant developed lots. Those are lots that are on the ground ready for builders to build. We have 5,085 and we have 53,797 futures. That's the highest amount of futures in the Houston region. And you can see you're going to be growing very strong growth for many, many years because of the size of the district, the location, the amount of vacant land that's still not even in these futures. you do have a long runway of growth. We tracked the starts and closings by quarter and you can see for 2024 we got really close to 5,000 starts, much higher than what we saw in 23 and in 2022. The good news is the
083closings are keeping pace. So, we're not seeing a big buildup of of finished vacant inventory. We closed a little over 5,000 when we compare it to a year ago. And this is really surprising considering the interest rates are still relatively high and we still have some challenges with economic conditions. But compared to a year ago, we've seen an increase in starts by 689. We've seen an increase in over a,000 closings and we've seen an increase in the number of futures of over 15,500. When we break it all down by your current elementary attendant zones, you can see the most active by far is the Hey, good elementary with over,00 starts. The second most active is the Morgan zone with with 574. The crazy thing about your district is you have seven elementary zones building more
084than 300 homes. Most fast growth districts would be lucky to have four or five and you've got seven. You have 11 zones that are building more than 200 homes. So, very strong growth across the district. This map really kind of paints that picture very clearly. The green shaded areas are the active subdivisions. We have 94 actively building subdivisions. We have 39 future subdivisions that are in various stages of planning. We actually have groundwork underway. Bulldozers working to deliver new lots. We have 2900 lots where the groundwork is underway in 18 different subdivisions. Developers aren't slowing down, so it's full speed ahead. We delivered about 1,600 lots in the fourth quarter. Those areas that have a red outline, those are the areas that are seeing new lots being developed. I'm going to touch on some of
085the highlights. I'll go through this rather quickly. Arabella on the Prairie. It's 983 total lots, 33 homes under construction. It's really just getting started. That yield is still growing. It's currently about 299 students. I suspect that yield is probably going to more than double and get closer to 0.5 to 6 when we start the next school year. Its location to Gray Elementary really does set it up for seeing a significant increase in the yield. Next, we're looking at a very large future. It's Brentwood Farms, 1,500 future lots. It's also in the gray elementary attendant zones. The first three sections account for about 166 lots. They've been approved, and you can see from the satellite image back from December, the groundwork is underway. Next, we're looking at Evergreen. 743 lots, 26 homes under construction. It's a
086Dr. Horton community. Price points are in that $300 to $400,000 range. And you can see from the satellite image from February, huge numbers of lots that have just recently delivered, plus the future sections where the groundwork is underway. What's crazy about your district is you have these massive master plan communities and literally of the 80 districts that we work with, there's not another one that we work with that has this scale of the large master plan. And this is the Hines master plan community about 7,000 lots. That number will move around just a little bit as they get further along in their u platting process. It's about 3,000 acres. Do expect the the the development to start uh in the first quarter. Expecting first lots delivered in 2027. So, we'll be able to watch the
087development take place here. But about a year to year and a half is when we'll see uh substantial activity in this uh planned community. But again, 7,000 lots, that's multiple elementary schools would be needed. It could just about fill up a middle school just within that master plan community. Pan Ridge, 774 total lots, 83 homes under construction. This neighborhood is yielding about 0502. Again, you can see the satellite image from February where the large numbers of vacant developed lots are on the ground ready for builders to build and we do have a section of futures where the groundwork is underway. Tamaron West. It's been your most active master plan community for the last couple of years. It's almost 3600 total lots, 303 homes under construction, and the yield is about48 students per home in Tamron
088West. Now, those were just some of the highlights on the single family. The multif family picture is still just kind of surprising me in that the occupancy rates are staying well below 88%. You can see from this graph, the blue bar, those occupancy rates have stayed down for the last year and a half to two years. The reason is we're adding so many units. We added 19,680 multif family units across the Houston metroplex and we only absorbed 13,000. Now, the rents haven't softened yet, but we are seeing more and more apartments that are offering concessions. So, they're being very creative. about 34% of the apartments offering concessions. Those are discounts on the first month's rent. Can be some gift cards, some other tactics to try to lure in those renters, but we still are seeing
089a significant amount that's under construction now. So, I don't see this changing anytime soon on the occupancy rates. When we look specifically at the multif family picture for Lamar Consolidated, the turquoise shaded circles represent the planned multifamily projects. The purple circles are the multif family projects that are under construction. We've got about a thousand units that are currently under construction. 270 of which are single family rental homes. This is a new type of multif family that we're seeing just about in all of our clients across the state and it's growing in popularity, but these look like little home communities, small backyards. They do have amenity centers. The rents are are are pretty high. So, they're are high renting and we do expect to see a little higher yield than a traditional multifamily, but not as
090high yielding as traditional single family neighborhoods. We've got an additional 6,700 rental units, multif family units that are in the planning stages. Plus, an of those about 500 are the single family rental type as well. I'll touch on some of the highlights on the multif family. Handover Lake, it's 350 apartment rental units. These are one, two, and threebedroom units. Leasing is expected to start in the late 2026. It's just to the north of McNeel Elementary School. You can see that satellite image from January. They still have a little bit of work left before those will begin leasing in the latter part of 26. We've got a couple of projects here. We're looking at the Canvas on Founders Hill is a single family rental community. It's expected to start leasing any time now. It's probably already
091leasing. You can see from the satellite image to the left there, the substantial number are finished and then they'll work through the remaining uh units through the rest of the year, but they are likely already leasing. And then the Camber Ridge at Cross Creek Ranch, 312 apartment units under construction. It's expected to be leasing this spring. It's very close to Randall Elementary. We've got two futures that are in the planning stages. Fulsure Lake, which is 330 future apartment units. It's a mixeduse project. We don't have the details on when they're going to break ground. Likely uh at least a year and a half out before we'll see that break ground. The Alexen Fulshire is 150 future apartment units. Construction expected to start in the first quarter. Now, this is the mid-level projections. These are the
092same projections that I presented in the fall. You can see it's a slightly conservative compared to what we're seeing with housing. So under this model, we're forecasting the enrollment would grow a little over 2,000 students this next school year and maintain about a 2,200 to 2,300 per year growth for the next four to five years. Here's what it looks like at the campus level. Starting with the elementary campuses, you can see we've got several elementary schools that are just over capacity during the next year. I know you're going to be opening campuses each year for the foreseeable future to help mitigate these areas where you do have this incredible growth. This is the second page of the elementary schools. Again, bottom line is you're growing about an elementary's worth of students each year. each year.
093That's about an elementary of growth. And you can see it does pick continue to pick up speed and by about four to five years could be up to about,00 students of growth in the 2829 school year. Here's what it looks like at your middle and junior high schools. You can see Robert's sixth grade above capacity significantly over. And I know you're going to be relieving that with the next openings and same for the Dean Leman uh middle school. At the high schools, it's Fulsure High School that's um you know dropping a little bit next year, but then it's quickly gets back up over 3,400 students in two years. And I know there's you know plans for relief down the road with another high school opening. Now, what I introduced this quarter was a high forecast.
094So because of the change from the fall to this quarter's data, that increase from a year ago where the starts jumped up, I felt it was prudent to show you a higher model. And this model is based on maintaining about 5,000 new homes per year. I have mixed feelings on what I think about that over the long haul. I think in the short hall for next year, it would be prudent to to plan on the high for next year. But then beyond that, because of what's happening with vouchers, what's happening with the economic uncertainty with tariffs, tariffs are a big concern for the homebuilders. Uh, nationally, it's a concern because of lumber. Lumber is not as huge of an issue for us in Texas, but nationally lumber is because a lot of the national lumber
095comes from Canada. for the other pieces of the housing market. It's also appliances, it's the windows, the all those other things that um are a concern with inflation. So that's why I'm a little hesitant on the long term looking at the high forecast, but for next year, I think it would be prudent to look at the high number because of what we've seen right now with starts and it's likely going to close 5,000 homes by the fall of next year. Now, here's what this looks like at the grade level. You can see under this model, you're growing about 2500 students per year. Is it possible that you could do this over 10 years? It is possible. The things I think that would contribute to this is at some point the interest rates coming down. So
096the when the interest rates do eventually come down that will really help firsttime home buyers. Right now first-time home buyers a little bit of a struggle because of the high cost related to the cost and the uh mortgage rates. So I think at some point they will come down. I don't know that we're going to see it anytime soon though. At least that's the word we're getting from our economist because of the inflation still being up pretty strong. What this does is you can see it just accelerates those yellow shaded cells. And before we were growing about 750 elementary kids per year under the high growth model, we're growing about 900 students at the elementary campuses. Again, you can see it just kind of pushes up everything earlier and at the high school level pushes
097it up a little earlier as well. And so again, I think for one year I would look at the high, but then when we do facility planning, it's likely going to fall somewhere in between there. I'll do key takeaways and be ready to answer any questions. The fourth quarter new home starts up about 4% from a year ago. And that's despite the higher interest rates along with the inflation and election uncertainty. Overall 24 starts were up almost 16% compared to 23 totals. The district has roughly 2450 homes currently in inventory. Some of those are under construction. Some of those are finished vacant. We've got plenty of lots available for builders to build on. groundwork is still moving at a very strong pace. 2900 lots where the groundwork is underway. I think in five years your
098enrollment could be roughly 57,600 students and in 10 years that enrollment number could be around 67,400 students. Be happy to answer any questions. That was a lot of information. Trustees, every time you come, it's just it blows us away with all the stats and everything. And you I know you keep a lot of this sip in your head, and it's amazing how you I know you refer to the PowerPoint, but you you do an excellent job. So, thank you. Thanks for keeping us informed. It guides us. We are um leaning into new data because this is a new era. We are in a new era in education and enrollment is more than rooftops and birth rates. It is also about the choice aspect. And so in our next report, I'm very excited because we're going
099to be introducing charter school location data. I'm about to have the ability to show the charter schools impacts by school district. And we're also going to eventually do the same thing for privates. So we're going to be able to show private school location data, charter school location data, and this is all in preparation for the change that's happening if it happens and when it happens. And so that we're trying to lean into helping provide clarity on your kids and where they're going. Because as you're well aware, there's thousands of kids across the state of Texas that are choosing charters or privates or home school. The homeschool is a tough nut to crack because in Texas right now they don't have to report and so we're basing some of our calculations on homeschool on what we're
100seeing in other states. So we're studying other states that do require homeschool reporting so we can look at these other states and see those ratios and make some correlation to what we think could be happening in homeschool in Texas. Um, I've heard from several principles along the last couple years that they're seeing some homeowners, two families living. Is there a way we can get a handle on that or is that really hard to find that information out? It's a little bit hard to find that information, but I will say we we do believe that is happening for sure. And it is because of the high cost of housing. And so the high cost of housing there will be and some of it's for a season. It's not necessarily for a whole year. It can be
101a temporary thing as they come move into areas. Maybe they're living with family or friends until they can make decisions on where to live. But yes, there is. But then it's kind of hard to figure out how many students when you don't know how many families are doing that. Yes. And I would think, and this is just my personal opinion, but if once whatever happens in Austin with the uh the the vouchers and if um homesooled parents do take advantage of that, they would have to report, right? So, we would have some information at that point. Um Dr. Nons may have some more up-to-date information. My understanding is the Senate version has a homeschool allowance, but the House version does not. So, we just have to see what happens. Uh so a couple things is
102uh one is this is really for so to answer Miss Danziger's question about the uh basically dual residents you know folks that stay to live with others um we we we can't be proactive about that but we can always be reactive and so if there's ever time the trustees would like to see what that number is we can always pull that report and make sure the trustees know you know this how many families we say are living with other families so we can just have an information we can plan accordingly And so we can always use like a five-year trend and then you know make some decisions on enrollment based on that also. And so if the board ever wants that, we can always do that. Uh secondly, this is really just for the community
103sake to say it out loud. U you know we chose Zonda because you know they're able to give us uh a report every quarter. Uh and so with us being a hyperrowth school system, you know, it's it's is prudent for us to stay on top of this data and make sure that we're able to plan accordingly. Uh my challenge to everyone watching and everyone in the room is that you know our we have a uh Swagot is our system for board meetings. And so using Swagot you can you can you can go to the board meeting you can find the area you can click on the agenda you can find the meeting you want and you can share that specific portion of the meeting with people. What I'll ask you to do is uh you
104know after this is posted tomorrow you know find a portion of the meeting that talks about demographics share that with all the everybody because as we start you know we continue to build buildings um you know I hate to say the word resoning but that's going to come up again eventually and so because we have to you know you saw the slide where all the yellow and so we just have a lot of people coming to the Marcy ISD and a lot of people that are here and so I've been talking to the staff at the staff meetings and I said, you know, folks are not coming to Lamarcisd because we are low performing school system. People are coming to Lamarcisd because we have the world's best teachers uh and we're taking care of kids.
105We're speaking life into the kids and our young people are doing a phenomenal job. And so, um I I believe the mar will continue to grow just as Mr. Tim said for the next 10 years and beyond. What I need you to do is share that information because as we start making decisions and having conversations the reasoning conversation we had last year I think we had that for a whole year just about uh and then when we did it you know there were a lot there was a lot of confusion a lot of people said you know what's what's happening you know what's going on and that's a conversation we've had in this room publicly for about a year and so what would help us is if you take this information and you share it
106so people know that the conversations are happening uh that the decisions have to be made because we have to make sure students get a phenomenal experience as we talked about in our strategic plan. Uh and then people can be uh informed and they can know what's going on in their school system because everybody in this room, if you live here, you're paying taxes to the school system. Uh and so we just want to make sure everybody has the information. So when it's time to make those deci make those decisions, uh fewer people are caught off guard, if that makes sense. And so if you would help us out with that, uh and so Swaget will allow us to do that. You can take it, you can post it online, Facebook, Twitter, however you going to
107do it. Email it to your friends and just encourage everybody to watch that piece and watch this piece because Lamarcisd is a hyperrowth school system and we will be the best school system in this nation. And so that's all I have, Mr. President. Any other discussion? Thank you very much. You're welcome. All right. Next we have uh Miss Lwick, our CFO, to give us a uh budget update. Good evening, board of trustees and Dr. Nans. Uh as he said, tonight I will be covering um key points of our 2526 uh budget preparation process. I'll cover mostly um things that we're discussing that will impact this budget um and salaries. Uh specifically I'll cover the budgetary calendar and the assumptions that we're operating under. Uh as uh has me been mentioned earlier in the evening we
108have had some board budget committee uh meetings where we've discussed different options and things that we would consider for this next year's budget. I'll discuss those options. also a preliminary budget estimate as of the current date and then also discuss some compensation plan increases that we're looking at. First of all, we start the budget process late January, early February uh and by updating our financial plan and we reflect enrollment projections. uh as you've just seen um we have baked all that into this uh into these projections uh and it also impacts our staffing needs. So um we do that we meet with campuses and departments and discuss the budget process overall and start doing our benefit and payroll projections estimates. Um and then we look of course at our health plan and how um our
109budget will impact that. And then also we re re we release our budget packets to the campuses and departments so that they can start entering their budgetary data within our systems. In March uh the committee starts meeting and uh we also start providing information to uh the campuses and departments. Uh they key in their information and then we start compiling and doing our reconciliations. This month we will be receiving our preliminary estimate of values from the Fort Ben Central appraisal district. We expect that um actually any day now but by the 30th of April. uh we will continue to have finance committee meetings and uh we have actually affirmed the race scenarios which I'll cover later and then we look at um funding requests from the various departments that are over and above the allocations.
110We also um will provide uh compensation plan information and other related items. In May, we will do updates to all those items, align revenues and expenditures and start discussing property values with the trustees, which is a requirement. Uh it's actually state law that we discuss uh in detail the values. Uh we will also provide another update to the board and we plan to to bring um compensation plan adjustments to the board on May 5th for approval. In June, we plan to uh do all the truth and taxation publications and prepare to adopt all of our budgets that are required for approval by the board of trustees, which is the general fund budget, child nutrition budget, and debt service budget. In August, we will publish our notices of tax rate. Those are additional truth and taxation
111requirements. we'll have public hearing and then we can still adopt uh or amend the budget that's adopted in June if necessary especially because this is a legislative year. So with that uh the budget uh assumptions are the pretty much the road map and the overarching um values that we use in building the budget. So, first of all, uh the property value growth rate that we're using this year is 8% over the certified values from last summer. The taxable value we're using to compute the levy is 30 billion2 30.293 billion. We are using a homestead exemption amount of $100,000 which is current law. 99% collection rate and then the basic aotment amount of 6,160. Again, we are all of the estimates you'll see are based on current law even though we are keeping up with the
112bills that are moving through the legislature right now and we are modeling the impact uh to the district of some of those. Um enrollment growth is always based on our demographic reports and um the quarterly reporting has been very helpful for us. Uh in 2425 the enrollment that we base budget on was 46,525. We have looked at both the midgrowth scenario and the high growth scenarios. This uh the estimates you'll see tonight uh as it's noted in red are based on the high growth scenario uh for 48,951 students which is a little bit over 2400 more than last year. The attendance rate we're using is 94 a.5% and the items you're seeing in red um have been discussed by our board budget committee. uh current experience of attendance is around 95% and just for um
113additional information, a 1% difference in the attendance rate uh equates to a little over $3 million either way, whether it's up or down. Uh another important piece of the state state funding estimate is the comprollers's value. That is something that we have to estimate locally. uh and we do not see the value from the controller until uh almost February of 2026. So that's definitely an estimated value. Right now we're using 31.876 billion and that is not the same number as you saw before because the comprollers values not is not based on the levy prediction. It's um based on a a different set of values. This uh projection for 2025 is based on a tax rate of 1.1447 uh about a$114 with about 66.5 cents of that being related to the M rate and then a
114consistent 48 cents for INS which is the current year rate. Uh also some assumptions that we are using um the staffing guidelines that we have had in place um through our HR department uh we're still consistently following those. This year's central office rotation uh is providing uh new positions for departments of learning technology and the police department and some additional department adjustments may be needed for growth. The 3% uh raise for staff is an average. It's uh the estimated cost for a 1% raise on the teacher salary schedule and those employees paid on that schedule is $2.4 million. Uh 1 million $1.1 million is the cost of a 3% of midpoint raise for the paygrade tables. uh and what is in this uh projection is a 3% raise. Costs for opening schools are included and
115we did use the zerobased budgeting concept. Now with respect to our board budget committee options that we've we've uh debated and talked about and and uh researched, uh there are several of those which I'll cover next. Option one was to review the instructional aid pay. So, um we looked at the instructional aid paygrade table has four paygrades. Um as you'll see going from left to right in this table. Paygrade one um has 196 employees uh that are paid on that paygrade. And to align us with our comparison districts, we would need to adjust our our midpoints um and provide a $55352 raise per year uh to staff on that schedule. And then once we align that pay grade, we would add another 3% of midpoint raise, which would equate to another $83 roughly. So the
116estimated total annual increase for each employee would be the combined amount, which is $1,357. If you multiply that by the 196 employees on that paygrade, it's a cost of about $266,000. So, if you go work through the paygrades, um 266,000 for paygrade 1, uh 340,000 for pay grade2, and so on and so forth for a total of $1.4 million. Carrying that $1.4 million to this next table, uh we have already included a 3% raise of our current paygrade tables, which equates to about $537,000. So the additional cost of this adjustment is right at $98,000. So that that is the figure that we have already reflected in this budget 98,000. The sec second option we looked at were adjustments in the special education area. The first one being uh providing for training and observation for substitutes
117that are assigned to self-contained classrooms. So here we're looking at providing 10 pay paid days of intensive training and five paid days of observation. Our goal is to train a 100red substitutes for the self-contained classrooms and the budget impact in total of that would be $187,500. the training the 10 training days would actually occur in this year the 2425 fiscal year uh at a cost uh of $125,000. So um and it would be paid at $125 per day. The five paid days of observation would occur in the new fiscal year of 2526 at 125 days per day and a cost of $62,500. the 62,500 is what is in our projection. Uh next we looked at budget uh increases for self-contained substitutes and that is in their rate of pay the daily rate of pay. Uh
118if you look at the table, you'll see that we have non-degreed, degreed, and certified subs. And the rates um relatively speaking are $90, $105, and $120 based on which category they're in. We are looking at raising each of those by $35 a day. Uh so it would be 125, 140, and 155 per day. Uh there are 12 leave days that are allowed during the year. So the $35 times the 12 leave days. Uh and we feel like there are an estimated 525 teachers andor aids in those categories. So um when you compute that the estimated cost is $220,500. We would also increase the number of wellness days. Currently staff have two days for that. Um so these uh self-contained setting substitutes would have four days and the estimated cost of that is $147,000. Um we
119are using the degreed daily rate uh since it's in the middle of the table. So at $140 a day, two days for 525 employees would be where we get the $147,000. Wellness wellness days. Can you explain what that is? Yes. Um we have been referring to that as mental health days. So the wellness days are the are the same. Our third uh category of of discussion was the pay-to-play fees. Uh we have certain certain um athletic programs where students pay uh in order to pro to participate. Uh the current fees will remain in place at this point until enough money has been saved to pay for stadium repairs and renovations. If you'll remember, we made uh some pretty drastic budget cuts in order to make room to pay for those um stadium repairs. And so
120that will continue until um you know a bond referendum is passed. Uh that's estimated at $550,000 per year. Uh the fourth area we discussed were campus library budget allocations. At this point all library books for campuses will be purchased by central administration. Uh campus allocations will be used for items in the library but not library books. The funds that are currently budgeted right now within our budget allocations for books will need to be redistributed for other campus needs. And with that, we did end with a couple additional um marching orders and we will be reviewing the rates of pay for all substitute teachers and also considering op options for revenue generation. Um mainly we discussed facility rentals on that. All right, with that I'll move on to the estimates. So as you'll see we are
121estimating our revenue at this point like this is our first um our first estimate uh 56.9 bill million dollars. Uh so with that the largest categories of course of our revenue are property taxes and state state aid. Um and there and it can be further categories as categorized as local, state and federal funds. Within this budget, we have 44% of the funds coming from local sources with the biggest piece being property taxes at about $215 million. Then um state sources provide almost 56% or $282.2 2 million with uh the bulk of that coming from the per per capita aortionment and the foundation school program. So that is our funding formula. And then there's a small portion about a third of a percent uh $1.575 million coming from federal sources mainly uh chars which is Medicaid.
122So, uh, here is a comparison of the the original adopted budget for 2425, our current year, compared to next year's, uh, preliminary budget. Um, expenditures, we are coming in at 511.918 million at this point with the largest percentage of that being for uh, payroll and benefits at $436.6 million. So, at this point, we are about $5 million short. Um, we don't like to be short, but this is the time of year when we typically are, and there are, um, adjustments that will be made to revenue. Um, and I'm really projecting that those revenues will go up. So, that'll close that gap a little bit. and um expenditures. We are still working through um department and campus budgets to make sure that um everything is is you know as we intended to allocate. With that I'll
123move to compensation in increases. This will be an action item on the May 5th agenda. The uh board budget committee made salary increases a top priority as always. And um the recommendation is for the starting teacher salary for next year to be $65,700. And that is a $2,000 flat raise for everybody paid on the teacher salary schedule. All other staff will receive 3% of midpoint. Uh the schedule you will see um these are our disclaimers are quoted from the hiring schedule and so this is not uh a prediction of any future salary increases. It also illustrates minimum salaries only. There are employees that work more than um the stated number of days for this table. So of course their um annual salary is increased based on the number of days they work. So this is
124the schedule. Uh you'll see that if um a teacher or uh employee on this schedule had zero years of experience this year, they were making 64,100 and they'll be making 66,100 this next year because they will move down to take to um years of experience one. So, you'll see how it it moves down and you can see where the $2,000 comes in. With that, I'll cover a couple other things. Uh, this is more housekeeping in nature. We are transitioning to the uh July to June fiscal year and the 2627 fiscal year. So, that means the 2526 year is a short year. It's a 10-month year. It will start as usual on September 1st, but it will end June 30th of 2026. And with that, I can answer any questions. Wow. And how you keep all
125those numbers and everything juggled. Um, I guess I need a little bit of clarification. the $35 on the um substitutes were self-contained only and not all substitutes. Yes. Now, how do we compare with our districts around us or have you looked at that? I am not sure that they have a special category for self-contained. So, so we're we definitely are on the cutting edge of that. Okay, good. I just wondered about that, too. All right. Thank you. I just I I only followed you because I was in the board budget committee pol yesterday with so I seeing it twice. It really makes a lot more sense. So it's it's a lot of information to absorb especially after the demographic report we just heard. So thank you. Um, I just want to highlight because it's probably
126everyone sitting out there, it's probably not so obvious that this is an extremely challenging time to set a budget with everything going on in the legislature going to a 10-month, you know, shortening our budget timeline. Um, what else? We we have things in the legislature that could significantly change the budget. Um, and we are going off of the highest estimated enrollment next year, which could be lower. And then based on the demographic report, he just said maybe midpoint would be better. So, lots of moving parts. Um, but just thank you because you've made it so clear and I've really truly never understood it more. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Uh the school finance piece is a piece that I had no idea what it meant and so I had to somewhat try to
127understand what it meant. So um for to reiterate for everyone that everything that was just presented was based off of what the basic allotment is right now. Um tomorrow in the house you have a second reading on House Bill Two. Um you have a second reading on Senate Bill Two. Um and then you also have readings on the safety aotment. Um there's a lot of other bills that will be read tomorrow publicly in the house and there's rumors that a vote will be taken to ma tomorrow maybe. So a lot of what's happening tomorrow would be dependent on our budget going forward. So, um, some of that may increase if there's an increase to the basic aotment. And, uh, this past week, uh, myself and a couple other trustees got to lead a training for
128our potential trustees that will be coming in. And one of the things we talked about was finances and how, um, for our community. We've talked about this before across the board, but um, the basic aotment can only be spent on certain things. And so, when we do bonds and all that, bond money can't go towards people. So bond money can is think about your mortgage for your house. Um it can only be spent on that kind of stuff. So um I I encourage our constituents and our residents and our stakeholders and our staff to um somewhat pay attention and advocate for an increase to the basic aotment because that increase to the basic aotment will allow us to um sometimes just now meet the need that we have. it's not going to allow us to
129go into excess or um have these extra frills because we still do a lot of fundraising for our PTO to send kids on field trips with buses and all that. So the increase in basic a lotment will help us get to where we can somewhat afford this thing called education. Um and so the state is putting a lot of things out there of these un um underfunded and sometimes non-funded mandates that we have. So, um, again, tomorrow's talks in the house will be very, um, I mean, it's says public school finance. So, that's going to be talked about tomorrow. So, all this, we're going to have future um, presentations on this from Miss Lewig and our team and they're paying attention to this as well. So, for our community and our teachers, um, we're advocating
130for an increase of the basic aotment. We have four priorities as a district. So, um I want to put a call out to our residents to send some emails tonight to your representatives um in asking for an increase in that because that will your budget and our staff pay. And you see we have draft up there on some of the things that we want to be able to offer our employees um with that increase in basic allowment. It will allow us to increase our sub pay for our self-contained allow us to increase our um teacher pay all that. So there's a lot of things we've talked about that we want to do and we want to do more but that basic aotment is what allows us to do that. So increase that please state representatives
131any other discussions. Yeah. Can we go back to the first slide where we talk about the parap pay? You want me to do it? The parap pay. It's option the it's under the first option. Yeah. Sorry. Um yeah, I just I just want to say that, you know, the budget committee was was kind of asked what things were important to us and um Trusty Welch brought this um and I just really want to say that I it looks like a lot of money, 1.44 million plus another almost million on top of it, but it is It is imperative that we pay our paras comparably to other districts. We need them. They do a lot of work. So I just I strongly support this use of the budget. Yeah. Uh I want to provide a a
132little little if you go to the u uh slide where we show the $5 million deficit, please. Okay, Dr. Brad midway through where we show the deficit. There you go. Right. And so as you see uh so ba basically how this works is um u the board committee you know talks to the the entire board then they come with priorities and so that's one of the main functions of the school board is to decide the budget and how we know where that goes and how that's allocated. And so that was a priority for uh everything you saw was a priority from the from the board uh budget committee and also the school board. And so as you can see right now there's a you know we'll work through that but that's a $5 million deficit
133you know with everything that's aligned in that. Uh and Miss Logan her team every year cease don't cease to amaze that yeah they amaze me every year because we we find it and we make it happen. But I want to bring that up because, you know, I've been having conversations. I've been stopped in the community um about, you know, people asking questions about again, you know, resoning and now some campuses are having to decide on what teachers have to go to open new schools. And so as we do that, uh as we open, as we grow, you know, uh staff follows kids, okay? 85% of our budget is people. And so the quickest way you can get into a budget deficit is when you have too many people and not enough children. Make sense? Because
134you get your funding based off of children. And then that funding comes when they come to school. So if they're not in school, you you miss that funding. So simply we get funding for how many children we have and then that allows us to pay the adults. Make sense? So when you have an entire track opening, some teachers have to leave some schools to go open new schools. And that is a very hard conversation. Uh especially with campus principles because when I was a principal, I was very territorial and I did not want to lose my staff. I loved I want to keep them with me. But people follow children. So when the children go to the green track, people have to go to the green track. And so when children leave a campus, that
135means some people have to leave that campus. And so the principles have to make those hard decisions to decide what positions have to leave that campus to go open new campuses. And so as we're having conversations, and I just need people to understand, uh, it's not that we're cutting positions. We're not firing anybody by stretch of the imagination as you can see our demographic report but we are reallocating staff members to make sure that we are fully uh staffed at other campuses. So when we have those conversations uh I just need people to understand that you can't keep all the people at a campus when the students leave. They have to go. They have to follow children. And so I'm getting emails. People are stopping me saying, "Hey, you know, we're losing this person. we
136really got to keep this person. I understand, but the children are going to another campus. So, the person has to go to another campus. And so, I just want to keep saying that publicly because, you know, if you're not if you're not in the system, you really don't know how it works. And so I always like to take this time to educate um everyone on how the system works and how we make sure that we're able to pay our staff because the number one priority of this board has always been make sure that we can pay our staff well. Uh and so we have to be able to do that and we want to be able to do that. I'm a staff member. I want them to do that. Um and so we'll work through
137this. But I want you to see that right now we're working on a $5 million deficit. And so as you have conversations, principles, as you have conversations, teachers, as you have conversations, I need everybody to understand that the people have to follow the children. Okay? And so then that that way we make sure that we have we are aligned and we have a equal and level and balanced budget. And I I just want to say one of the things that's jumped out to me in this whole thing uh digging into this a little bit is the attendance rate. And I was listening to a a a committee in Austin the other day in one of the I think it was the Senate Education Committee um maybe it was the House and they were talking about
138how since COVID there's been a mind shift in the minds of the public in the minds of the parents that going to school is important but not like it used to be. Like if we need to schedule a doctor's appointment and we can do it after school or during school, let's just go ahead and do it during school because it's no big deal. And he was talking about that in relevance to something else that a different point that I'm making right now. But if we could if we could increase the attendance by just 1% one and a half percent we could close that that gap without any additional funding from Austin. And that's very interesting. I don't because I don't think that our 94 and a half 95% attendance daily attendance rate is as high
139as our precoid attendance rate if I'm not mistaken. It's still down a little bit. So, um, if your kid can go to school, make them go to school. And if you can schedule those doctor's appointments afterwards, uh, that's probably best for for the whole system. Thank you very much. You're welcome. Okay, trustees. Next, we have uh our executive director athletics, uh, Mr. Mr. Deon Garrett coming to talk about legacy provisions. Good evening, Mr. President, board of trustees, and Dr. Neans. I just want to uh present the board the information from the first round of legacy applications and review the process that we went through to get to this point. So, in December, we had three mandatory Zoom meetings to discuss the legacy process and requirements. Applications were accepted from that point through February 28th. After
140February 28th, decisions were emailed on March 7th. Um, basically we clicked the button in the portal approved or denied and the email went out. For those that were denied, we followed up with an email for an appeal process. For the February 28th round, the activities that were included, you can see the 23 24 school year activities, the fall and winter activities of sports and band, and wrestling and swimming that had ended before the February 28th deadline. So when we pulled the information based on the legacy results, this is a breakdown by campus, our total uh applications were two 212. There were 158 approved and 54 denied. And I've got it broken down by campus. If you look at totals per campus, you had Foster with 110 applications, Fulsure with 78, Lamar Consolidated with 19, Randall
141with five, and then from there it breaks down by athletics approval and denied, PVA approval and denied, and academics approval and denied. Before I go on, is there any questions on this page? So this accompanies both the the legacies that were granted and the appeals. The appeals were granted. There were 17 appeals. 12 of them were approved. Five of them were denied. We've taken these numbers and these the student information. We've distributed to campuses. We've also distributed to Dr. Maxwell's office so he could distribute it to the demographics. So the next round of legacies ends this Friday. And so the decision emails will be sent to parents on May 9th. The appeals window will be May 9th to May 23rd. And then final decisions will be June 2nd based off both the appeals and the
142accepted or denials. Currently there are 48 applicants in the April quarter. These activities are going to include our winter and spring activities that were not finished by February 28th and then all of our spring activities both UIL academics PVA and then athletics that are ending after that February 28th deadline. Is this about as many kids as we were expecting or did we have any idea? I I think it's close to what we expected. Um like right now with it being 50 in, you'll see an influx like it was about where it is now and then it I say now we saw that number double the week of. So like between now and Friday, I think we'll end up at a hundred. And so it's it's we've we've targeted the right people, the individuals that are
143in varsity participation that should be able to stay. And I think that's cleared some of the confusion and kept the right people in the right places. Okay. And some of the denials is that was that just grades or was it they weren't eligible or So I I can speak on behalf behalf of athletics what I saw um a lot of the denials that we saw in February 28th were for soccer and tennis and those seasons weren't completed yet like they should have been in the April and so in that email back to them in the denial you know your application was denied but realistically you should apply in April because that's when your season's over and we can determine those. Okay. So some of them was was they just applied at the wrong time and
144then some of them were they didn't meet the requirements. Okay. And what about fine arts? Was that broken down? I couldn't I don't remember PBA. Sorry. So for for fine arts there was a point system that they had to hit and there was the band option and the theater option. There were just two different point systems. It's actually fairly easy to hit those points if they are very if they're participating in a lot of things. So, um, as far as denials go, it was just because they hadn't hit those points yet or, um, I can't think of any that were not related to points. Okay. Thank you. Our next trustees, we have Miss Cohen coming to talk about strengthening our schools through climate campus climate surveys. Thank you, Dr. Nven and Mr. President. As we
145continue working to build a culture where everyone feels their voice matters and their perspective is valued, we want to take a moment to focus on a very powerful tool that we have and utilize in Lamar CISD, and that's our campus climate survey. So there is a saying that we might have all heard. People don't leave jobs, they leave bosses. And while that might be an oversimplification, it does speak to something very real that the campus climate survey the campus and culture of a campus, I'm sorry, the climate and campus, the climate and culture of a campus matters. And the best way to understand that is to ask the people who live it every day. So this is why we do our campus climate surveys. The surveys give us an opportunity to gauge feedback from our
146parents, staff, and students. They allow us to hear from people in a way that can drive real change. But for surveys to truly have an impact, three things must be true. Number one, people have to trust the process. Number two, they have to understand that their feedback does matter. And number three, we have to do something with what we learn. And as I always like to say, what gets feedback gets better. So this evening I'm going to walk us through how Lamar CISD is working to build trust, communicate our processes clearly, and most importantly, how we use the feedback that we do receive. So one of the most important things that we need to address and something that we've consistently heard from staff is the trust in the survey process. For many employees, their two
147biggest concerns are, is my feedback anonymous? And what do you all do with the results? And those are fair questions. If we're going to ask our parents, staff, and students to be transparent and share honest feedback, we owe it to them to be equally transparent about the process and their impact. So, here's how it works. We partner with K12 Insight. They are a thirdparty provider that specializes in educational feedback systems. Once our surveys are distributed and completed, K12 Insights collects and compiles the responses independently. Our administrators do not see individual submissions and what receive are aggregated campus level reports with trends, insights, and breakdowns of responses based on groupings like roles or departments, not individuals. People are given the opportunity to include their name and contact information if they want to be follow up with.
148Otherwise, the uh data is all completely anonymous. To alleviate some concerns that people may have about taking the survey, we can continue to work with our principles to communicate the process clearly to staff and early to staff because when people understand the process, they're more likely to participate and to do so honestly. We also want to be very transparent about why we conduct these surveys. We want to identify what's working well so we can celebrate it and build on it. We also want to uncover the challenges that our teams are facing so we can respond thoughtfully and take action. And ultimately we want every school and every department to be a place where people feel heard, supported and valued. And so our annual campus climate surveys are for our parents, staff and students. But throughout
149the year there are other surveys administered to subset groups for more specific drill down data. For instance, there is a survey that goes to title one campuses and there's also a survey for parents whose students receive special education services. Um, we've established core groups for the campus climate surveys, but any campus or any department can administer their own survey throughout the year if they want to focus on any specific topic or if there's any data they want to measure or ga or gather. But the goal is not just data collection. Our goal is meaningful campus level change. And that only happens when we listen and close the loop. And so yes, our surveys are about feedback, but they're also about building trust. Another common question we receive is who writes these survey questions and do
150they really reflect what matters most to teachers and staff? And that is an important part of building trust. And here's what we want our staff and our leaders to know. K12 Insight, they're our provider. They use research-based questions to develop their process and is grounded in best practices and national trends and education. They've worked with hundreds of districts across the country and they've collected data from millions of responses over the years. That means each question is not created in isolation. So what goes into that is national benchmarking. Questions are built on validated indicators that have strong shown strong correlation with school culture, leadership effectiveness, employee engagement and retention across various districts. Customization for context. While K12 insight provides a strong foundation of core questions, we do have the ability to tailor our questions to reflect
151our district's unique needs and values. Inclusive development. The survey includes input and insight from educators, administrators, and thought leaders from a range of school settings across the country to ensure that our questions are relevant and inclusive for different roles, meaning our teachers, support staff, and principles. And then continuous improvements. Our questions are reviewed annually and refined each year based on feedback or emerging trends. So when our staff take a survey, they're just not responding to a random set of questions or generic prompts. They're engaging really strategically with designed questions that have been tested and refined to get to the heart of what matters most, our campus culture, leadership effectiveness, communication support, and overall employee experience. So, we talk about participation in our surveys. We typically um recommend receiving a response rate of 10 to 15%.
152This comes from K12 Insight. 10 to 15% from our parents and guardians, 50% response rate from staff members, and a 60% response rate from uh students. And again, that's the recommendation from K12 Insight. That's just based on national norms. And so these are based on accessibility and engagement of each audience. And so let's take a look at the data. What's on the screen now are staff rates. That last column shows the percentage. And remember I said the goal for staff is 50%. You'll see um as I click through these slides, many of our campuses are well above 50. We've got 92, 81. Um we've got one staff, I mean one uh campus that is right at in the high 90s, 97 as Randall Elementary. I knew it was there. That was a shout out to
153you, Mr. Bainbridge. All right. In student participation rates, the goal there is 60%. And you'll see in that last column again, many of our campuses are well above 60%. We have a healthy competition among our principles. Um, K12 Insights does provide a link that I share with principles in real time and with area soups so they can monitor the participation numbers and there's like I said a healthy competition among them to get those numbers up. I also do send reminders to leaders to encourage participation. Okay. So using survey results, another concern we sometimes hear is even if I take the survey, how do I know that you all are doing anything with the responses? Well, that's where accountability and follow-through come into play. So in Lamar CSD, we are committed to utilizing our survey data
154um all year and not just as a one-time snapshot. Um but it's part of an ongoing improvement cycle. And so one of the major ways that our campuses utilize the survey data is as they complete their campus improvement plans um and when they meet during the summer planning academy. I'm actually going to present campus climate survey data to principles next month so they will have it in time for their summer planning academy and that could influence what they do with their campus improvement plans. And then lastly, we recognize that gathering feedback is not just about a one-time survey moment in time. We do have some other opportunities to hear directly from our staff. Um, we know that some things are just better said face tof face or in small groups. So, Dr. Nven hosts superintendent
155advisory council meetings where he meets with the district teachers and staff members of the year from every campus and we do it twice a year. Real transparent conversations where he gets their feedback, what's working, what's not working and what are some things they feel he should focus and prioritize and the reason for that is because relationships matter. Yes, they can complete a survey anonymously, but it is important when you get to see and speak to someone. In addition to that, we do encourage staff to speak directly to their campus leaders or their supervisors and initiate those conversations on the ground locally um with their building principles if they've got concerns or ideas. All the data we get whether it's from these focus group meeting I mean the advisory council meetings, faculty meetings or one-on-one meetings
156are used to improve the day-to-day operations and how we operate. That was just a quick highle overview of how and why we use surveys Lamar CSD, but I'm prepared to answer any questions you may have. I do I have a question. Um we use K through K12 insights. Do they provide us with like a software where we can go in we meaning the admin go in and look at okay this is how basically like I don't know tabs for how people answered how this how all the different survey questions. I mean is there a software provided with it or they just provide us reports? At this time there's not a software there's not like a dashboard right where our principles can log into. We do get quite a set of reports. I didn't want to
157kill too many trees but this right here is a 46 page report. It as 138 slides and each of our campuses receive a a report as comprehensive as this regarding their their survey data. Um I just I also want to just say that I I really do think I liked everything that you said and I think it is really important for our teachers. um and staff who are taking these surveys to understand and these are confidential you know K12 gets this information comes from them it goes back to them and then it's aggregated and then like you said a report goes to uh you know Fulterra High School or layman or whatever um there's no names attached to it is purely confidential and it has nothing I mean it has everything to do with the
158district but it does not come from the district itself um and I think it's really important And I know you said 50% participation rate, but I think that's to me that's low. I feel like um a lot of people are saying, "Oh, well, why should I fill it out?" And I think it's done with it. Well, when you have that kind of an attitude, you know, if you don't fill it out, if you don't do something to enact change, then change isn't going to happen if that's what you want. Or if there's something that you really love that your principal does that you're like, "Oh man, if she stopped doing that or I I would I wouldn't want to be here. I'd probably leave." I mean, those are the kind of things that you need
159to reinforce on these surveys that say that, you know, you're pleased with this, you love this about your job and then and how can, like you said, how can we improve? How can, you know, your principal wants to support you and support their school? Because happy teachers equals happy students, which equals a happy principal. I mean, it just makes everything work well. So, um, the people being upset and not saying anything about it or people being pleased and not saying anything about it all the way around it just doesn't it doesn't work. So, I think participation like I mean I would shoot super high. I would I mean and some of them are at 80 85%. But I think 50% is very very low and I think that's a low standard. But um I just
160think it's a good opportunity for our staff to have their voices heard. Um, if you love what your principal is doing, let us know. If you think there's challenge challenging areas in your job, uh, let us know because that's the only way we can make things better. Um, so I just want to encourage everyone to participate because it really does matter and this is how you enact change for for the better for your campus and for your students and your for yourself. So, and I want to like again thank you Trusty Box for bringing this up and asking for this because this is one of those things that like you know you don't know what you don't know and we're going to assume one way but we need the feedback from all the the the
161community, the parents, the the staff and like to say what gets measured gets done. And so this is one of those things we're able to measure the relational side of the job. And so, thank you for um bringing this up and allowing us to talk publicly about um we want to hear how our teachers are filling and we want to know so we can make things better and improve what's already is awesome. So, yeah. Anything else, Dr. Neans? No, sir. All right. All right. Can I just add one other thing? Um, I know that one of the ways that we've um tried to support our schools is through the innovative school day. And I know that each campus is implementing that kind of differently because it's been piloted this year. But I think that one
162thing that might be very interesting is to have a survey sent out to our staff at all campuses regarding innovative day, how it's being implemented, if it's working, how it can be improved, what are the highlights for them, how has it helped their day, those kind of things just to see because there's we have so many campuses and um so I don't know that's something that might be of interest for us to send out just to see going forward because now it won't be a pilot, it'll be fully implemented. to find out where where we need to strengthen up or what works well and can be shared with other schools. Oh, absolutely. And to your point, Dr. Nven has already received a lot of feedback from staff at innovative day. That's one of the things
163he was intentional about asking staff directly face to face. And based on input, I know Miss Cotton Game of Thank you, ma'am. Thank you. All right. Trustees, are there any items on the future consent agenda that you would like to pull for discussion at the May board meeting? All right. You good? All right. It is 8:55 p.m. We are journeying to close session pursuant to Texas Government Code sections 551.071,551.072 551.074 and 551.082 082 the open meetings act to discuss personnel land acquisition and or consultation with our attorney and use the restroom The Lamarcd Board of Trustees are returning from closed session. The Lamarcd Board of Trustees are returning from closed session. We are now back in open session. It is 10:27 p.m. We have a quorum. Are there any motions to be made? Yes, Mr.
164President. I move that the board of trustees approve the employment of the professional personnel as discussed in close session. We have a motion to approve the personnel. Um, is there a second? Secretary Welch makes a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none, I'll call for the vote. All in favor say I. I. I. Motion. Motion carries. None opposed. The meeting is adjourned at 10:27 p.m.