001Good evening everyone. Can you hear me now? Should be on. So now, at this time, we call the meeting, to order for the Mesquite Independent School District Board of Trustees on this Monday, July 14th of 2025. Time is 6:04 p.m., and there's a quarter of a quorum of the board is present. And, notice of this meeting was posted in compliance with Texas Open Meetings Act. At this time, the Board is going to go into executive session, closed session under Texas Government Code 551, and we shall return. Thank you. I don't know why he doesn't want an executive session. Does he not? And are you sure? This was a drill. And only a drill. We followed the instructions. Mr. President. Okay. Hey, guys. No executive session. That's a good one. Good. Let me let me, please
002notify if, if anybody has signed up in advance or you wish to address the board during the, any of the comments, regarding items on the agenda, please make sure that you see Miss Sabreana Smith, our Chief Communications Officer. If you have any questions. With that, we shall, wait for Grego and commence the meeting. They went to get him. So we normally do have an executive session because we have things to talk about. I guess today we didn't even have anything to talk about. Reverend Greer, are you present? Yes. I'm here. Oh, okay. Good. Thank you very much. Usually we sit in the front, so it makes it comfortable for you. I'm so sorry I didn't recognize you back there. Thank you. So with that, we will start with the invocation, which will be given to
003us by, Reverend Greer from Trinity Church Workshop. Let us pray. Father, we thank you that you have kept us in your will all day, and we can get to this point of the day and know that it's been a successful day, because we're all here. Father, we thank you for this opportunity to be able tonight to solicit your spirit. We thank you for our superintendent. We thank you for this board. We thank you for the Mesquite community and this school district. And, father, we surrender it all back to you that you would give us divine directions, and we bind Satan in anything he would do to cause division, a misunderstanding, and how it is that way to do and to govern ourselves. And father, we know the importance of what you said in your word.
004How important it is and how you value children. And we accept our divine assignments tonight to understand that whatever we do will give you glory and honor. We will preserve the integrity of the values and principles that you have in your word. And father, we know and we believe and we claim and the power of your son's name, that this year will be our best year yet, that our future is bright and things are going to move in the right direction. That when we look back, we will have something that we can be proud of and that you will get the glory from. And now we surrender this meeting back on to you in Jesus name. Amen. Okay. At this time, we will have, the Pledge of Allegiance, which will be led by a junior
005ROTC cadet from North Mesquite High School, Marcus Arteaga. And his sponsor is Major Buckner. I pledge allegiance to the flag to the United States of America, to every republic for which it stands. One nation under God and indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Thank you, Major. Thank you, Reverend Greer. Yeah. Okay, well, at this point, at this time, what we're going to have is, team of eight moment. If you have anything you. Okay. Thank you. I just have one comment. I want to start by saying, this was a tough year that we just went through. Legislative session was, and in nice words, I'll just say it was brutal for, public education. And, we're going to see the
006effects of it this year coming on. It's going to be really tough, but we had a President guide us through that whole thing, our Board. And and I want to recognize him and especially the legislative team. Guided by Dr. Feinglas. It was it was it's hard work. I know you had, like, 7 or 8 visits to Austin and did a lot of that work. So, we're we're going to work really hard this year. What happens is you have a legislative session. A lot of things are decided, and then you have the next year where you have to put everything in place. And that's a lot of hard work. And there's going to be a lot of sacrifice by everyone. And the community should know that, that's where you need to partner with with the school
007district. With that, I also want to thank, Robert for everything that we went through. Robert, the Board has a little presentation for you. And it says to Robert Seward, President, Board of Trustees, and appreciation for your leadership, for your distinguished leadership. Thank you, appreciate it. That was last year. I don't know that I'll be as effective, but he puts he puts about 20, 20, 30 hours a week more than everybody else that I've seen in this world. I mean, he's such an overachiever. So I copied a lot of the things he did. And I told him, hey, send it to me electronically. I'll keep some of that and I'll use it. We need to establish a committee. Yeah. I have a couple for Gary, but I no, we're going to leave that later. But anyways,
008I wanted to thank you for everything you did this last year. You got it as well. With that. We'll go to the first audience portion. No one? Nobody? Great. Okay. Then we shall continue to consent agenda. Are there any items that any board member wants to pull out of the agenda? If not, I'll set the consent agenda. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Mister Rose. Second by Mister Everett to accept the consent agenda. All those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed same sign. Ayes have it. Motion carries. Next we'll go to the reports of the superintendent. And, the first item is an action item to approve administrative term contracts. I'll entertain a motion on that. We do both of these two together. Actually, there's only one action. The other two are
009reports. I'll make a motion to accept. Okay. Action. So there's a motion by Mr. Bingham, a second by Miss Hornsby. To accept or to approve administrative term contracts. Any questions? All those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Same sign. Ayes have it. Motion carries. Doctor Rivera, what did we do? Thank you, Mr. President. And and may I just say that was the most effective executive session I've ever been part of. Thank you. It was quick. Efficient. Good job on your first meeting as President. We don't mince words. That's right. So, Mr. Vice President, take note. Is it. I know he is. Well, Mr. President, the item that you use voted on is actually the approval of the Principal for AC New Middle School. And I'm going to ask my Deputy to come
010up to the lectern, Doctor Janine Fields, and tell you a little bit about the person that you just approved. Good evening, President Carbo, Doctor Rivera and Trustees. I am really excited to introduce to you Doctor Melissa Torrence, the new principal of AC New Middle School. Melissa, come on up here with me. As she makes her way up here, Melissa Torrence is an experienced instructional leader with more than 15 years in public education. Most recently, she served as an elementary principal and high school administrator in Center ISD, where she led improvements in attendance, communication, and teacher support. She previously served as principal at East Elementary in Hallsville ISD, and held assistant principal roles in Hallsville, Garland, and Center ISD's. Torrence holds a bachelor's degree in biology, a master's degree in education, and just last week, she
011defended her dissertation successfully. That's why she gets the doctor introduction. Welcome aboard, Melissa. Oh, well, I was not prepared to speak. But I am so happy to be a part of Mesquite ISD. I have been watching you guys from a distance, but, what you don't know is how you helped me through my doctoral program. I took some superintendent courses during that time, and because yours were online, I got to watch how your processes and procedures worked and learn from you and looked at your board agendas and got to bring that back to my classes and have conversations with my professors about that. So thank you for helping make me the best version of myself without even realizing you were doing so. I am incredibly excited to be a part of this district, and I'm ready
012to serve and hit the ground running. Wednesday. So thank you so much. Well, welcome, Doctor Torrance. I'm sure the AC New Middle School family is. Be happy to have you and welcome you as quickly as Wednesday. That was a fast turnaround. The rest of the information is a report only. That was the only action item that we had. And so I'm going to ask, Doctor Fields to come back and introduce a principal that was hired on the superintendent hiring privilege in the summer. And so, Doctor Fields, take it away. All right. We're excited about this one, too. We have Deidre Lester, the new principal at Smith Elementary School. Come on up. Deidre Lester brings more than 15 years of experience in public education, beginning her career as an avid middle school tutor before joining Mesquite
013ISD in 2011 as a teacher at Hodges Elementary. She later served as a literacy and instructional coach at Gentry Elementary, and became an assistant principal at Cross Elementary in 2023, helping to open that school. Lester was named Campus Teacher of the year in 2017, and is a graduate of Mesquite ISD’s Leadership Academy and Aspiring Principals Academy. She holds two master's degrees, one in educational leadership and another in curriculum and instruction, as well as a bachelor's degree in child learning and development. Welcome aboard, Deidre. I don't even know why I'm nervous. I don't. I'm never I'm never nervous. But I am tonight, so here we go. Good evening, Doctor Rivera, members of the School Board, Trustees, Cabinet and District Leaders. It is with deep gratitude and heartfelt humility that I accept the position of principal. I
014want to first acknowledge something important. This was not always part of my plan. I didn't set out on this journey expecting to arrive here. But over the years there have been many encouragers, supportive colleagues, inspiring teachers, and remarkable students who saw this day coming long before I did. They believed in my leadership and my heart for education, even when I had not yet imagine this path for myself. Ultimately, I stand here today, not through my own strength alone, but because of a deep faith in God's plan over my own. I believe whole heartedly in the necessity of stepping beyond outside of our comfort zones and in growing through challenge and serving others with purpose. I understand that my calling has always been to support individuals on their journey forward, and this new role is simply
015a continuation of that purpose. To my MISD families, the administrators, colleagues, families and students that have helped shape me. From intern to administrator, Galloway, Hodges, Gentry, Cross, TILT, ETIP and APA. You will never know how much you are a part of this moment. You know who you are. To my amazing husband, our children, my grandson, family and friends. Thank you. You willingness to support me and understand the unique demands of this educator's journey, and your patience through each transition of this life, have made all the difference. I know it hasn't always been easy, I know that. But for your grace and your encouragement, I love each one of you and am forever grateful. I hear you, Talin. I hear you. To the Smith staff, Mrs. Stacey Bennett and the community. You have already began to
016demonstrate your strength and your spirit in which you have welcomed me. I am honored to lead, to listen and to serve. I look forward to building on the strong foundation already in place, working together to shape a future of growth, compassion, and excellence for every student. Thank you for entrusting me with this opportunity and for placing your confidence in me. I am honored to serve. All right. We also have some coordinators and assistant principals that we want to, introduce you to tonight. So Sabreana Smith, our Chief Communication Officer, will do that at this time. All right. We're going to get started with introducing some new coordinators if you would stand where you are. I will share a little bit about first up we have Mr. Dennis Sadler. It's going to be. Our new coordinator for
017Administrative Services. Dennis Sadler brings 23 years of educational experience, including 20 years right here in Mesquite ISD, where he has served in a variety of leadership and instructional roles, including associate principal and assistant principal at Mesquite High School. Assistant Principal at AC New Middle School and teacher coach and department chair at both Terry and Berry Middle schools. He holds a Bachelor of Science in History from Texas A&M University of Commerce and a Master's in Education from Lamar University. Our new Coordinator of Administrative Services. Congratulations. Next up we have Amanda Karner, our new CTE coordinator. She's not here. Okay. Let me share just a little bit about Amanda. Amanda brings over a decade of experience and education with a strong focus on CTE leadership. Most recently, she served as the CTE program administrator at Opportunity Central
018in Forney ISD, where she led instructional coaching, professional development, and program evaluation to strengthen student performance and industry outcomes. Industry certification outcomes. She previously served as CTE coordinator in Dallas, and she has a Bachelor's in Fine Arts in Interior design with a minor in business and home furnishing, merchandising from the University of North Texas and a Master's in school counseling from Amberton University. That's Amanda Karner, new coordinator for CTE. And, next up we have Lyndsi Martin. Lyndsi is going to be our new, coordinator for deaf education. Lyndsi is a dedicated educator with 17 years of experience, having spent her entire career serving students at the Mesquite Regional Day School for the deaf here in Mesquite ISD. She has taught across multiple campuses, including Lawrence and Florence Elementary, as well as North Mesquite High School. Most
019recently, she served as a secondary lead for Deaf Education, where she mentored and evaluated staff, developed instructional resources, and played a key role in program development for deaf and hard of hearing students at all grade levels. Lyndsi holds a master's degree in deaf education and a Bachelor's of Science in Communication Sciences and Disorders, both from Texas Women's University. And her associate degree was earned right here at Eastfield College. So Lyndsi Martin, your new coordinator for deaf education. Okay. Next up, we have several new assistant principals during the Mesquite ISD family. We have Asia Jones. She's going to be our new assistant principal at Henrie Elementary School. Asia Jones has over a decade of educational experience right here in Mesquite ISD, where she has served as a math teacher, instructional coach, and at risk coordinator. With
020a strong foundation and instructional leadership Asia has successfully implemented They Get Better, Faster and Texas Instructional leadership frameworks to coach educators in refining classroom practices and boosting student achievement. She is recognized for her commitment to fostering meaningful student relationships and leading professional learning communities that prioritize collaboration and continued growth. Asia holds a Bachelor's of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies and a Master's of Education in Educational Leadership, both from the University of North Texas Asia. Jones, new AP at Henrie Elementary School. Next up, we have a new assistant principal at Gray Elementary. That's Christin Jackson. Christin Jackson is an instructional leader with ten years of experience in public education, including leadership roles in curriculum support, professional learning, and literacy instruction. Most recently, she served as a reading language arts instructional specialist here in Mesquite ISD, where she
021coached teachers, facilitated PLC, and led data informed planning to improve student achievement. Before joining Mesquite ISD in 2024, Jackson served as a demonstration teacher and PLC facilitator in Houston ISD as well as an English teacher and Galena Park ISD ... a Bachelor of Arts in English and a master's of Education in Administration and Supervision. And when to get your school was a no no. I mean your university. It's usually here, but in. There we go. University of Houston. Go, Cougs. Your new Gray Elementary AP Christin Jackson. All right. Next up, Rebecca Leake. Hi, Rebecca. That's our new Assistant Principal at McDonald Middle School. Rebecca has more than 25 years experience in public education, serving in roles that spanned classroom teaching, instructional leadership, and campus administration. Most recently, she served as a middle school assistant principal
022in Dallas ISD, where she led initiatives in campus safety, instructional planning, and professional development. Leake has been recognized as a campus teacher of the Year and Distinguished Teacher, holds a Master's of Education in Education Administration from the University of Central Oklahoma, and a Bachelor's Degree in Elementary Education from Langston University. Welcome, Rebecca Leake. Assistant Principal, McDonald Middle School. All right. Next up we have Crystal Easley. All right. Krystal. Krystal Easley will be our new Assistant Principal at Wooley Middle School. She brings 15 years of experience in education with a strong focus on student advocacy, instructional leadership, and support for multilingual learners. Most recently, she served as a high school counselor and assistant principal intern at Seagoville High School and Dallas ISD. Under her guidance, 100% of seniors in her cohort graduated with more than 40
023earning associate's degrees or certifications. Her teaching experience includes serving as a middle school English teacher, department chair, and ESL instructional specialist. She has a Bachelor's Degree of science in psychology from Argosy University and a Master's in education from the University of Phoenix. Crystal Easley, assistant principal, Wooley Middle School. All right, let's meet Britney Taylor. Hi, Britney. This is your new assistant principal on the west side, West Mesquite High School. Britney Taylor is a secondary education leader with a focus on coaching teachers, building strong campus culture and improving students. For the past two years, she has served as assistant principal at Woolley Middle School, a role she began in 2023 after previously working on the same campus as an instructional coach, advanced English teacher and PLC facilitator. Taylor has contributed to district initiatives through her participation
024in Mesquite ISD Leadership Academy and Excellence in Teaching Incentive Program, or ETIP. She holds a Bachelor's of Science and Communication Disorders from Arkansas State University and a Master's degree in Special Education from Ashford University. Welcome to the West Side. Britney Taylor, assistant principal. All right, have a few more. Jennifer Easterling. Hi, Jennifer. Jennifer is going to be a new Assistant Principal at Horn High School. She has more than 20 years of experience in education, serving in roles that spanned classroom teaching, campus leadership, and instructional coaching. Most recently, she served as a secondary instructional coach for Reading, Language Arts and Social Studies, supporting teachers in sixth through eighth grade. Previously, she served as middle school principal and assistant principal for both elementary and secondary campuses. Easterling began her career as a secondary special education teacher. She
025holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from the University of Southern Mississippi, and two master's degree in Education from Texas A&M University Commerce, specializing in special education and educational administration. Welcome to, Horn High School. Jennifer Easterling. All right, Reginald Geans. Hi. This is your new Assistant Principal at North Mesquite High School. Reginald brings more than 30 years of leadership experience across military, corporate and educational settings. Most recently, he served as an Assistant Principal at North Forney High School, where he oversaw instructional coaching, campus safety, and the implementation of advanced academic programs, as well as behavioral support initiatives. Prior to that role, Geans served as Dean of Students, math teacher, and department chair. He's a U.S. Army vet and two time Bronze Star Medal recipient. He holds a, Bachelor's degree of Arts and Liberal studies from
026Excelsior College and a Master's of Arts in Information Technology Management from Webster University. Welcome to North Mesquite High School. Reginald Geans. And finally, we have Kristi Coronado. Kristi Coronado is going to be a new Assistant Principal at the Mesquite High School. She brings more than ten years of experience in education with roles spanning middle school teacher curriculum support and math department lead. Most recently, she served as instructional coach at Austin Academy for Excellence in Garland ISD, where she led campus wide professional development, supported data driven instructional planning, and coordinated intervention programs across six through eighth grade math. She is a graduate of both the Aspiring Administrators Academy and the Teacher Enrichment Program, recognized for her leadership and commitment to educator growth. She holds a bachelor's degree of Science in Elementary Education with a minor in
027mathematics from Grand Canyon University, as well as a master's degree and a master's of Education in Educational administration from Lamar University. Welcome to Mesquite High School. Kristi Coronado. And that concludes our new administrative introductions. Well, Mr. President, those are the only ones. But I want to go, on record and thanking this board for the trust and confidence that they put in the administration to hire during the summer. It's because of that trust that we're able to fill these positions quickly. All the people that you saw today were already working this morning. I think they've had a long day. So it's almost over. But thank you for the hard work that you put in already. And thank you for the board, for trusting us with the summer hires. Thank you very much. With that, I'm going
028to take the privilege to move an item up. We're going to move construction up before we take a break because I would like to talk about a couple of items that are actually two items that were on the recent bond that was approved, and I think they're good news for the district. So with that, we're going to go to construction. First item is an action item to approve the CMAR, the general contractor for North Mesquite High School additions and renovations, Dr. Rivera. Yes, sir. I think Don Poole and Graham Baumann are moving up. Just bear with us just a little bit. We'll take a break here shortly after these items. Two short items or quick items, let me say. Mr. Poole, are you ready? Yes, sir. You're always ready. I know it. So tonight we're.
029First thing we're going to do is do a project overview of everything we've done thus far. And, you know, we approved the schematic design. If approved, CMAR Take a break. Okay. Let's take a break at this point. Thank you. At this point, we're going to reconvene where we left off We're going to continue the presentation with, Mr. Baumann. Mr. Jay Russell will stand in Don Pool's place and, and complete a CMAR explanation. All right. Apologize for that, Don should have taken a vacation day today, he was feeling a little bit dizzy earlier. Yeah. So we're just going to go over the process. So I'll take it from here. We previously approved the schematic design for North Mesquite in May of 2025 at the board meeting. We also at that time, approved the construction manager at
030risk method at that time as well. We issued proposals, promptly the day after that, and we received and opened 11 RFP bids on June 2nd, 2025. And as mentioned in the last board meeting, that was a record, total that we've received for one project. So everyone's pretty excited about this bond. And we're asking for approval of construction manager at risk tonight. So, each of the CMAR RFP’s include the following information, firm information, organizational history, licensing experience, financial information, of a business, as well as the fees associated with the project, the personnel listed for the project, professional references that will be owners, other clients and architects and safety standards. We then take that and evaluate each of the bids based on purchase price. These are all governed by Texas Education Code. The reputation of the vendor,
031quality of the vendors, goods and goods and services extent at which these, meet the owner's needs. The vendors pass relationship, in the districts and total long term costs. On those business services. Other other things considered are relevant relevant experience, past performance, safety record, proposed personnel methodology and acceptance of the contract terms. Based on that WRA and Mesquite ISD Construction Services reviewed the 11 proposed proposals. They were evaluated and, determined to be the best value for the project based on the things that we evaluated on, the best value was determined to be Lee Lewis construction for this single project based on their proposed fees. Demonstrated ability. Proposed team. References, and past performance on projects. We're asking for your approval tonight. We'll get back to this. I wanted to continue on with, part of this presentation before
032we go for an action item. Other things that, were considered, the post personnel team have been working out in Mesquite ISD for the last ten years. We've got Mason Nelson and Ty Parsons, in the back. Mason, first started in the district on Kimbrough Middle School in 2015. When Dr. Vroonland started the 2015 bond. So there's some history there, working on nothing but, additions and renovation projects and knowing, how the city operates, how construction services operates. And so with that, that's the CMAR update on the next, portion of the presentation, we're going to talk about an early, GMP number one is what it's titled. It's a by board, directed procurement for early tennis court works. As mentioned at the schematic design proposal, we needed to move the tennis courts early, fall of this year in order
033to be able to construct the addition and, keep it on schedule. So we've worked Don has worked, directly, with that, by board contractor to move the tennis courts. And we also have an allowance in, in that, to cover the on core primary power that's going to have to be utilized to power the relocate existing Musco lights that will be relocated to that, soccer field side. It's still tracking. The GMP number one plus the estimate on GMP number two is still tracking, within what the total project anticipated, total project costs are. We talked about during the bond, after, the CM at risk is, hopefully approved tonight will begin. Estimating sequencing and early discussions on schedule. That's it for that presentation. Any questions that I can answer or Jay Russell can answer with me. Board? I didn't
034have a question. But I want to tell you how much I appreciated all the background information on the matrix, the criteria and the scoring process. It made me feel real comfortable on the presentation and on the recommendation that you're making, it it helps us understand the process and where it's going and what's happening. I think it gives, transparency to this board as well as the district and, and our community, really appreciate it. Thank you. Mr. President, I move to approve Lee Lewis Construction as the construction manager at risk for the North Mesquite High School. Additions and renovations. So we have a motion to approve the CMAR general contractor for North Mesquite High School, additions and renovations by Mr. Everett, second by Miss Collier. Any more questions or comments? All those in favor, please indicate by
035saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Same sign. I have a motion carries. We have another item of you already explained. So I'll entertain a motion on item number two. Mr. President, I move that we approve the contract. GMP for the North Mesquite High School. additions and renovations for the tennis court. Second. So we have a motion and a second to approve the early Texas court. GMP North Texas, on North Mesquite High School, I apologize. Any comments or questions? All those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed same sign. I just have it. Motion carries. Excellent. Thank you very much. Thank you. And I want to echo some of the words from Robert. You've always been good company has always been very cooperative, giving us the information we need. And that's something that we, we really
036treasure because that's the information that we have to be able to explain later on. So thank you. Good job. Thank you, thank you. for standing in. All right. Thank you very much. Okay. With that, we're going to take a break, but we only have the effective reports left. You want to break? Yeah, a break, but I'm going to continue. So we're going to go with the effectiveness report. The first one is the report on early childhood education. They're patiently waiting. Good evening. How is everyone? Good. All right. Good evening. Thank you so much for inviting us to present information about our early childhood program to you today. Our early childhood programs can really make a difference in the lives of our students. So we're so excited to show you what's going well and tell you
037about some of the challenges we've been facing. My name is Tara Nichols, and I'm the elementary director of teaching and learning. And I have with me today Carolina Portillo, who is our director of bilingual ESL, and Andrea Bailey, our coordinator of elementary Reading Language Arts. Each of us are going to be taking apart and sharing information with you today. We know that early childhood is the place that a love for learning starts. In Mesquite ISD, we envision a place that students start their journey to lifelong learning grounded in strong literacy and numeracy. We continue to nurture the whole child, including not only the academic needs, but also the social and emotional needs. We want to empower our students to reach their full potential through a strong academic education, built around innovative programing, while being supported
038by our staff and our community. We want all students to achieve excellence always and that includes our youngest learners. So let's talk specifics. The first two topics overlap, so we're going to talk about them together. Research shows as does our district data, that students who attend pre-K are more academically ready for kindergarten than their peers who do not. As you can see from the graph of Mesquite ISD kindergarten readiness data, we had a significant increase in kinder readiness over the last two year period because the way that the results calculations changed, we can't compare any further than that at the moment. So we'll continue to watch the data and reflect in the coming years. You can also see that kindergarten students who attended public pre-K performed about 20% higher than all MISD Kinder students combined.
039This combination includes both of the students who attended pre-K and those who did not. So that discrepancy is really big. In order to give our students the best opportunity for learning, we need them to enroll with us for their Pre-K year in order to continue to improve kinder readiness. We will continue to push pre-K enrollment for all eligible students in our community. Our pre-K enrollment has shown fantastic growth over the last few years. As a district, we are continuing to push enrollment in our community using district enrollment nights and social media blasts to help try to inform and bring our families in. As you can see from the jump in numbers for 2024 2025. Our efforts are paying off. We will continue to look for new ways in which we can entice and inform our
040community to enroll their young children into this program. Our next topic tonight will be around the pre-kindergarten audit that was done by the Children's Literacy and Initiative last year. Auditors visited classrooms and went through our curriculum resources they spoke to with teachers, administrators and even parents and some of the strengths that they said. Mesquite ISD has are Mesquite ISD uses curriculum that aligns well with our state standards, ensuring concise distance and delivering foundational early learning skills. Instructional materials are both hands on and thematic, which fosters engagement and interdisciplinary learning, and the bilingual 5050 model is promoting dual language development, helping students retain connections with their home language while advancing English proficiency. Some of the challenges that they found were that classrooms emphasized whole group activities, restricting opportunities for individualized learning and differentiation, discovery based activities,
041and centers that promote critical thinking and student autonomy are often underutilized, and the pace of the curriculum materials could make it difficult for some students to master foundational skills. Administrators and teachers require additional professional learning and early childhood best practices to provide effective leadership and support. So with those things in mind, the Children's Literacy Initiative gave us many recommendations. A few of those recommendations that they gave us were to provide increased pre-K specific professional development for both teachers and campus administrators, provide increased opportunities for coaching and feedback, and training teachers on building technology, and are combining technology through hands on learning. We've already begun the professional learning by providing administrator training. At the end of the 2425 school year, focused on what professional or, purposeful play looks like in our pre-K classrooms. And this was
042a much needed session for our campus administrators. And I think they maybe even had a little fun playing with Play-Doh. We are going to continue to work on those recommendations as we begin to move into the new school year. Moving on to early literacy in grades K through two, our monolingual students have shown some progress, especially in kindergarten, where vocabulary growth stands out. In first grade, TPR scores reflect minimal gains, and we recognize the need for stronger instructional support in this area. By second grade, students showed improvement in reading accuracy and fluency. Comprehension continues to be an area of need for us. So after conducting focus groups that included principals, teachers, and curriculum staff, we're making some changes in grade two to transition to fluency and comprehension in our curriculum more deliberately. This will allow
043for faster comprehension development for our students in all of our lower grades. Our instructional efforts are now shifting to deepened skill development and enhanced our small group instruction. Only one more data base is important to highlight here. This slide shows a picture of, the performance of our kiddos at the end of the 2425 school year. As you all know, we keep challenging them with, attaining by literacy and they keep showing they are high performers. So our kiddos are overachievers and there is no doubt we have, a picture of kindergarten, first grade, and second grade. And they are not only, challenge with bilingual instruction, but bilingual assessment as well. So they take or they took last year in class lectura to show their, Spanish skills or the development of their, Spanish skills. And then they, they
044also took Em class levels. Both pieces were, implemented three times per year. And this is the last picture we took at the end of the year. So if you look carefully to all of them, data speaks louder than words. You know how it is. So when you look at the Spanish results, of course, as expected, they performed super, super high. So, there was a high, a very a little increase between 24 and 25, but they were performing at a very high level at more than 80%. So in kindergarten in they, they showed what we expected them to show in their native language, which is L1 in L2. Of course it is not, to develop as a US at the same pace. It's going to take a little bit more time. And that's why the data
045is showing for first grade and second grade. We also see some gains, but we understand that our biggest concern or our, area to grow will be first grade. The comprehension, as Andrea mentioned it before, as one of our main concern, one of our main concerns, a lot of, skills were tested with during this assessment, but we chose to show just a composite as an overall picture. We will continue to challenge the kids, and we are going to continue supporting the campuses, creating different tools and resources for them to implement with the kids. One of the most exciting things that we want to share this evening is that we've been involved in the Texas Reads, Texas Leads Grant opportunity for the 2425 school year as one of 16 finalists sponsored by the K Group and the
046Charles Butt Foundation. The cohort based multi year statewide initiative is aimed at helping districts develop, implement, develop and implement science based K through three reading literacy plans, which detail strategic moves, decision points and district investments to meet ambitious academic outcome goals for early reading proficiency. We had a diverse group of leaders, from across our district that worked so very hard, learning and discussing and planning for change. And at the very end of May 2025, we got the notification that we are a grant recipient. The work has been so good, but getting just a little bit of funding to help that work is so rewarding. So some of the things that have already come out of the work with, the K Group and the Charles Butt Foundation are, we've revised our literacy blocks in both monolingual
047and bilingual classrooms. We've begun the work of streamlining our resources to help make planning clearer for teachers in kindergarten through third grade. And we're restructuring assessment assessment systems, to be able to assess both monolingual and bilingual students in this same tool, using that same tool, focusing on personalized practice. Our students are going to develop, through our systems, professional learning and curriculum. And our campus leadership teams have begun learning the requirements for at the end of last year. And we're moving into the 25, 26 school year, and we're going to continue that professional learning with them and begin implementing personalized practice with our teachers. And so we're really excited about the work that's ahead. And we believe that making these strategic changes will make a difference for our early learners. All right. So let's talk numeracy.
048Let's talk math. This year marked the first year of implementation of our new math curriculum, Stem scopes, which is a state reviewed, high quality instructional material that received a perfect score when reviewed by the state. This program is a hands on, inquiry driven and provides students opportunities to work through productive struggle in order to build a mindset of flexible thinking. The graphs you see here reflect strong growth and numeracy across all early grades. Implementation has not been without challenges, but campuses that followed the model with fidelity saw meaningful gains. We're expanding professional learning around the CRA model concrete, representational and abstract, to ensure all students develop deep conceptual understanding. As with literacy, we are also working to grow our leaders capacity to recognize and support high quality math instruction on their campuses. So looking ahead,
049we have several strategic priorities. We'll complete our Texas Reads Texas Leads Literacy Training series and continue coaching principals and teachers. We're introducing revised literacy block schedules to increase personalized practice and intentional learning. And we're aligning our coaching curriculum to high quality instructional materials and real time student data. We are also building a unified instructional vision across K-2 by strengthening collaboration through PLCs and campus works. Our ultimate goal is to ensure that every child receives a strong foundation in both literacy and numeracy. With the right supports in place. So we want to take a moment to say thank you for your continued support and commitment to early childhood education. We believe the work we are doing in pre-K through grade two sets the trajectory for every student's future success. With your support, we are closing gaps,
050growing leaders, and ensuring our youngest learners thrive. We'd be happy to take any questions or hear your thoughts at this time. Board? Thank you so much for all your work. I really appreciate it. I know this is such an important step. This this early learning is so important. Because if I don't get it there... Yeah. They struggle throughout. So good luck. Thank you. Work hard. We appreciate it. Thank you so much. I have one more comment. I see this as part of our total vision where we're talking about achievement that you talked about today. This dovetails to help us push that forward and push it not like this but to try to push it this way. Yes. So we appreciate very much all of your effort what you're doing. I know it's hard work. And
051why haven't you done the dance when you got the grant? I would expect. We did. It was just behind closed doors. But you did do a dance. We did. We did. We did. Congratulations on that. Thank you. Thank you very much. Great report. With that, we have a report on music. Go ahead. Yeah. Good evening, President Carbo, members of the Board. Doctor Rivera, thank you for having us this evening. To talk about, music and fine arts here in Mesquite ISD. I'd be remiss without starting by introducing my awesome team that has joined us this evening. So right behind me here is, Doctor Heidi Gordon, our facilitator for elementary music. Miss Cheryl Lott, our facilitator for visual arts, and Miss Brianna Turner, our facilitator for theater and dance. So they're all joining us this evening for
052this report, and we're very happy to have them with us. They do so much instrumental work in our office to make all these programs. All these fine arts programs go every single year. So we start with our department vision, what we, view as our department's goals. And we've done this with teachers and with some students and our administrative team just developed what we're about as Mesquite Fine arts departments. The Fine Arts department in Mesquite ISD serves to provide leadership that is both empathetic and empowering. And that's about student leadership, teacher leadership, administrative leadership. We're talking about everyone there advance the arts through advocacy and support. Develop a sophisticated experience in art. And we chose that word sophisticated, very, very, with with a lot of fidelity. We thought we thought about it a lot before we
053chose that word, because we want our students to know what art really is and what true art is, and how to go deep into the art. And this all allows all children to achieve at the very highest levels. So what better way than just to show you what we're all about? So I will also say that we think. We think very highly. The North Mesquite High School band for, loaning us their, audio track, there that is actually our students playing, that track. So that is the North Mesquite High School band, who was the alternate to the State Honor Band competition just a few weeks ago. So it was really awesome, year for them and really proud to, to display them. It was part of the video. So now on to some facts and figures. Our
054enrollment numbers have really, really grown and we're very excited. In band, we have 850 students enrolled in high school band and 2467 students enrolled in middle school. Band. In Choir, 723 students enrolled in high school, and 1914 students enrolled in middle school and orchestra. 401 students enrolled in high school, and 1120 students enrolled in middle school. That is over 350 more students than two years ago. So that's a pretty amazing, increase in our orchestra numbers here in Mesquite ISD. Very, very proud of our directors, who have done a lot of recruiting strategies and really grown their programs here in Mesquite. I see this chart just shows you the breakdown of how band, choir, and orchestra looks at every single, secondary campus that we have. Of course, all those are just facts and figures with enrollment
055trends, right? So in high school, we have a total increase in high school music of 57 students. That doesn't seem like a lot, but what I'm about to show you will show you what's about to happen in middle school, 1121 more students involved in middle school music than there were just two years ago. We can really attribute that number one, we we have really helped our middle school, students by, helping their scheduling, making sure that they have room for electives. And then also the board has invested a lot of, time and effort and personnel and, money into our programs to help us with, really expanding our elementary fine arts programs. So what we're seeing now is a return on that investment. We're seeing that those that because of that, we're seeing our programs grow at
056the middle school level. And then it's not a lot of these students are eighth graders. What we're actually expecting to see, what we're projecting is that when you come back this fall and you see several of these programs on the marching field or on the concert stage that you're going to see, a lot of our high school programs are growing, too, because a lot of these students that were part of this 1100 students are moving up to high school this very year. I mean, as a percentages, 80% of all students in Mesquite ISD are involved in a music, art and a fine arts program in our district. I've said for the last several years we've been so close to 80%, 80%, kind of the number that we have really strived to get to, because that
057puts us in the very top programs of the state. And as far as enrollment goes, and it shows a really high quality fine arts programs have about 80% of their students involved, and we don't count our students. This just doesn't count our students. If they're involved in band and orchestra, they don't. Yeah, twice. This is every student. So there are 80% of our students involved in a fine arts program in Mesquite. I-s-d. You can see the graph right here. You can see the growth that's happened, especially since 21-22. You can see it's come back. We've actually surpassed pre-pandemic numbers. And every single program. And that's really, really great to see, that all of our enrollment is really coming back. We're seeing kids really join the arts. We're seeing kids be involved and and stay in
058school and in their arts classes. And we do a lot of enrichment activities and programs with our students. This is just a few of what we, highlight of a few of the things that we do. And with our kids, our middle school music students participate in all city band, orchestra and choir performances. Some of the songs on the video. So we choose our best students. We try to mimic what they will go through later on in the all state experience, through making sure that they have an experience of auditioning for a group, and then we select the best kids we put on a full concert. We spend about a half day in rehearsal and then put on a full concert at night with those students. All of our district fourth grade students attend a performance
059of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. We actually bring the four symphony orchestra all the way to Mesquite. Thanks to a grant by the Bass Foundation. And, would really helpful for us to, to have them come out. And we put on four shows and every fourth grader attends a symphony performance, which is really neat to see because a lot of our students have never seen a live symphony orchestra before. So watching them interact with the symphony, there's a lot of, they, they do a really great educational program. Every section where is a different color shirt they introduce, there's a lot of interactive nice between the students and the orchestra, and it's just really great to see, all of our students, fifth grade students attend a performance of an opera at the opera Hall at the Fair
060Park Music Hall in Dallas, which is also a great sight to see, because when the kids walk into that professional hall for the first time, they are floored. The comment that we get the most is, this is a really big movie theater. And we're like, well, not exactly, but it is something like a movie theater. Our elementary students have the opportunity to audition for and participate in the Mesquite Children's Chorus. We've set a, standard. We want all of our we want every elementary campus in Mesquite ISD to have at least one student in the Mesquite Children's Chorus, and we are at 31 of 34 elementary schools now that have a student in the Mesquite Children's Chorus. My own daughter made the chorus for next year. So, our district fifth grade students, present a fine arts
061festival for the community. We actually break our elementary schools in half. It's so big that we have to break it in half and do it over two night. So half of our schools on one night, half of our schools on the other. I can tell you I got there a little bit after the start of one of the nights, and I didn't actually have a seat in the Mesquite High School auditorium. I had to stand in the back for the performance because it was so packed. So both of those nights are so packed. We bring in a guest clinician to work with our students. We bring in somebody that's not their teacher to work with them, and it's just really amazing to watch our students experience that with another great, fantastic teacher in front of
062them. And then also the feedback that we get from that instructor that tells us how awesome our kids are and how much they know, and music. And then our district, district wide mariachi ensemble Australia Day Mesquite continues to provide performances through the Mesquite community. We are actually very proud of how that program is growing, and we're growing to a point that we're actually looking at expanding it a little bit more, maybe creating some beginning classes, creating some something else that we can really expand, that, that music in our community and make sure that we have maybe even more than one ensemble coming up in the next several years. So it's something that we're really looking at. We're we're proud of the growth of that. We were and we want to see more growth in that.
063We want to see more growth in the quality of performance and everything else. But we're really, really proud of the mariachi program here in Mesquite ISD. And then our high school campuses perform musicals, which allows all of our arts to combine in one to at one time. You'll see dance, you'll see visual arts, you'll see theater, you'll see music all together under one, one house. And it's really great to see the collaboration that happens on our each and every campus. Those are the those are just the best nights in January to go see if you don't go see any of our other performances, I highly encourage you to come see the the musical performances in January. Of course, we do like to boast a little bit about our awards and honors that we earned in
064the fine arts for the year. This is actually the Wilkinson Middle School Band right in front of you, showing off their trophy right after you at Horn High School. So some of our awards and honors, 68 ensembles received the UIL Sweepstakes Award for Superior performance at UIL Music Evaluations. That means they earned a superior rating in both concert and sight reading for high School band. That means they also earned a superior rating in the marching. Part of that evaluation means that they that at least four of the six judges saw them as a first division ensemble. So this is up from 50 ensembles just one year ago. So we are really cooking along right here. This is something that we really want to see. We, we've challenged to be, as great as we can be
065at UIL music evaluations. And so this has been really great to see growth. We have 2000 plus First Division medals won at us, also an ensemble contest. Two years ago I said it was a thousand plus. And so once we started counting this year, we have grown by almost a thousand First Division performances. Once again, outside judges come in to see our students. They play a solo or an ensemble for them, and they're rated one through five. And so first division, medals, they're seven of our students earned a position in the team and a team AA All State Ensemble. That's up from five students just one year ago. We are really, really proud of our five band students and two choir students that earned these honors this year. Just really amazing. That puts them in
066the top 2% of musicians in the state of Texas. And they go through rounds and rounds and rounds of competitive audition, highly competitive auditions to get to be an All-State, student. We actually had a five, a two based that made the six a band. So from North Mesquite High School, he was able to make the six AA ensemble as a five AA student, which is really, really neat. All five of our high school bands advanced to the UL area C marching contest in their classification, so it hasn't been very long that U-i-l has done marching band every single year. This is only our second year, a full year of being able to advance all the way to the state marching contest. This is also the second year that all five of our bands advance the
067area marching contest. Of course, North Mesquite High School was named the five AA Area champion. Poteet was named the runner up, and West Mesquite was a five AA area finalist, and they placed the highest they've ever placed in school history this year. And they're really close to being able to advance to the state marching contest. So, I've told Doctor Rivera several times, well, we may have three, and that's a lot of money, but we'll get it going. Yeah, we'll get it going when we have it. So, North Mesquite -- North Mesquite and Poteet both did advance to the state marching championships and placed higher than they did the year before. So we're really proud of that. And of course, we've been named a Best Community for Music education for the 12th consecutive year by the
068Namm Foundation. The Namm Foundation takes a lot of things into consideration when they're coming up with this award. Such as funding, staffing, the amount of time students spend in elementary school, in their fine arts programs, those kinds of things. And I will say, where we're at today, we see a lot of districts that have earned this for many, many years in a row that have not earned this award again. So when we got notification that we had earned the award, we were very, very excited again this year. Just based on where we're at, this is just one more thing that says we're doing things right in Mesquite ISD. Of course, looking ahead, we always have challenges. We want to make sure that we, recognize those challenges and how to overcome them. So looking ahead, we're
069going to continue to focus on and and recruiting and retention to increase our high school program enrollment. We've really, worked on that. We did a lot of professional development where I shared a lot of data with our, high school teachers this year about, around their recruiting and retention. What what are your retention rates look like? We know that when students change buildings, that that's when we lose the most students. So how do we mitigate not losing so many students when they changing buildings a refinement of common terms and techniques across all programs and networks, making sure that our students are using common language? It's just like anything else. You know, we just heard about early literacy. We want our students using the same language and music all the way from beginning to end. And so
070our elementary schools do such a great job. I walked into a third grade elementary music class. It may or may not have been my daughter's class this year, but I walked into an elementary music class and I was amazed at the rhythms they were able to do and how they counted so accurately, so close to what we do in secondary music. So refining all of those terms across our district to make sure that they're all the same. 90% of our ensembles achieve a superior rating in either marching concert or sight reading at you. Our music evaluations, we're almost there. We have about 85 to 86% of our, ensembles already doing this, so getting to 90% will just be a little bit more refinement, I think, with some extra, extra help and some extra, those common
071terms, those are just little, little things to get us to that very next level. And that's all I have. So thank you very much. We we really appreciate you guys. The support. You guys are so supportive of our music and fine arts programs. And we can't thank you enough for everything that you do for us. Hey, Steve. Question. Elaborate a little bit. What did you mean by we lose students when we change buildings? So generally, when students change buildings, it opens up a lot of opportunities. And we're lucky here, in Mesquite ISD, that we actually only change buildings one time from the time they start their music program in sixth grade, all the way through their senior year. They change buildings one time. So when they move from middle school to high school, it opens
072up a lot of opportunities for them. There's your students that naturally choose. I need to go this way. Their graduation requirements and that kind of thing. They're they're they have to move along. But we also try to mitigate that and let them know that where you are at right now, you have a home. And so when you're going to a large high school, you know, I think about my own child just just transitioned from middle school to high school several years ago. And then knowing that he was going to go to this very, very large high school and that he had a place to belong immediately. And when we can show kids that they really do want to stay in their programs. I don't know if you remember or not, but the very first report
073you gave us, we were concerned about numbers. Yes. I remember telling you were looks like bleeding kids. What are you going to do to fix it? You've done an outstanding job. Yeah. Thank you. So just know that. Yeah. I will say our teaching staff has worked incredibly hard on their programs, and it's obvious that we have great teaching happening in our classrooms every single day. Oh great job. Great report. Thank you. Thank you very much. Appreciate you guys here to how the department and your team. Thank you for being here. Awesome. With that, I think we have just one less thing to do. And that is we are. Do you have any other items anything you want to talk about. So we stand adjourned. Thank you. Thank you all.