001Okay. Uh, good evening everybody. Welcome to this regularly scheduled meeting of the San Marcus CISD board of trustees. Tonight is Monday, June 16th, 2025, and we uh have five schoolboard members in person and two uh present on Zoom. Um I'd like everybody to stand and please join me in the pledge of allegiance. 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. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Okay. Our first order of business this evening is the election of school board officers. Mr. Herodondo, did you like would you like to make a motion? Uh, thank you, President Holsey. I would like to nominate
002trustee an Hollyy for president, trustee Jessica Kaine for vice president, and trustee Sandra Lopez for secretary. I'll second. Thank you very much. The motion has been made and seconded. Is there anybody else who would like to make a motion? Seeing none, all in favor, please raise your hand. Thank you very much. Um, I think the only re seating we need to do with this minute is maybe to have Miss Lopez come sit over here and Miss Kane sit here either. Yeah. Scooch down that way and then Miss Lopez can sit next to Miss Vapondo. Oh, thank you everybody for your confidence. I look forward to a productive and constructive school year in which our students continue to thrive and build on the good foundations that we have been laying here. Um, please. Okay. Yeah. Without
003further ado, then let's move on. Um, uh, next up is a public hearing to discuss the proposed tax rate for the 2025 2026 year. Okay, it's not showing. We're just waiting to get the monitors fixed. Just one second. Okay, there it goes. Uh, good evening, board of trustees, Dr. Cardona, and members of the public. Tonight, we are holding a public hearing to discuss the proposed tax rate for the 2526 fiscal year. Uh, as part of this process, we're required to hold an open meeting and a public uh, notice in compliance with the Texas Open Meetings Act. The district has satisfied these requirements by holding this public meeting tonight, posting notice in the San Marcus daily record on June the 6, 2025, as well as an action item at the May board meeting. Um this slide
004shows the district's tax rate trend from 2019 to 2023. Over that period, the tax rate was reduced each year. In 2024, the tax rate increased slightly by 2 cents due to the passage of the Vader uh approval tax rate election um which was approved by our taxpayers. Uh tonight the district is proposing a total tax rate of 1.1052 for the 2526 fiscal year. Maintenance on operations at 6969. Interest in syncing at 3183 for a total tax rate of 1.0152. This is the same total tax rate as adopted in 2024. Uh we are not recommending adoption of the tax rate tonight because we're still waiting on our certified values from the uh uh county appraisal district which we will have on July 25th. Um and then we're also waiting for TA to uh calculate our maximum
005compressed tax rate so we know uh what we need to um uh put that uh rate at. um that primary uh the preliminary uh MCR rate we will have from TEA by August the 5th and then their final determination is no later than August 31st and then by law we must um approve a tax rate on or before September the 30th. Uh I now open uh the floor to any public comments on the proposed tax rate. I see no public comments. Oh, we have one public question. Would you like to come up, please? Okay. Can you hear me? Don't want to be too loud. Um, okay. This is the first time I've ever spoken at a uh a tax rate public hearing. Um so you'll have to excuse my lack of knowledge. Um anyway, um
006interesting that you that you reduced it for I guess four years. You reduced the tax rate a little bit every year it sounds like as I understand it correctly. And then last year you maybe it said a slight increase and so this year you're wanting to do it the same as it was last year. So uh my only comment is that I've been watching what's going on with the Texas legislature. Uh, I've been hearing that a lot of the school districts in the state have been running on a in the red budget waiting to hear what the legislature was going to do. So, um, my concern and I don't know what the rules are for you in your budget, whether you are supposed are allowed to have uh be in the red or whether you're
007supposed to try to keep it bottom line even. Um, but I think that now that the legislature apparently has done what they're going to do and get an idea of what the future is going to be. Unfortunately, I think we do need to that you as a board need to consider a a slight raise starting to think about raising this in order so that we can bring our our budget back into uh even steen and um start to pay back the the debt that we have already started gotten. So, that's my concern. my my concern. I know you guys have done the best you can and try to keep the the rates low even for by lowering the rates which surprised me. Um but anyway, I think it's time to get realistic and um do
008what you have to do. Thank you. Thank you. Could you just identify yourself for the record? I'm sorry. I have my little blue shirt here. Would you like that? Yeah, just into the microphone. I'm Carol Peters um uh Cwell County San Marcus School District. Thank you. Do I turn this into somebody or not? openness. Anybody else? Okay, let's move on to the public hearing to discuss the proposed budget for the 2025 2026 school year. Okay. So now let's transition to the public hearing to discuss the proposed budget for the 2526 school year. Um so tonight we have two budgets uh for your consideration. The primary difference between proposed between the two proposals is the cost of the health insurance premiums. On June 3rd, we received notification from TRS indicating an increase in the premiums for
009the upcoming fiscal year. Uh currently the district contributes 445 per employee per month which covers 100% of the premium for the active care primary plan employee only. For 2526 that premium is going to go up to $4.84 which is an additional $39 uh per employee per month. So in option one, this maintains the district contribution at the $4.45. That means that an employee would pay $39 out of pocket for that employeeonly plan. Other plans of course would also increase depending on what plan they chose. Um so for option one, we're looking at our general fund revenues to be 88, 058,849. Our expenditures 94 275 669 which gives us a deficit of a 6216820. In our food service uh revenue at expenditures 6879111 with a deficit of 288311. Our debt service our revenues are 30 93
010957. Our expenditures 29 266 344 with a surplus of 727613. In option two, this increases our district monthly contribution to the 484 to cover 100% of that uh employeeonly cost. Um this will increase our expenditures in option two for our general fund to 94 648 852 for a deficit of 65903. It also increases our um expenditures in our food service fund to 6915124 for a deficit of 324 324 and uh debt service would stay the same. Uh so at this time I open the floor to public comment regarding the proposed budgets for the 2526 school year. Would anybody like to address the board? Thank you very much, Miss. Now we have a public forum for citizens to address the board with pri without prior approval. But I do not believe we have anybody signed up
011this evening. So we will move directly into the superintendent report. Dr. Cardona. Uh Madame President, members of the board, and those of you in on Zoom, we appreciate you. To everybody that's out there, thank you very much for joining us on this summer evening. I want to introduce Dr. Cole um who is going to present our last two schools. Attendance has been a focus of all the schools this year. And so we have our last two winners for elementary and secondary. Good evening board of trustees, president Hoy, Dr. Superintendent. Uh so our winners, they have won seven months out of 10 months. So I want to say congratulations to Goodn Night Middle School and Mendes Elementary. Anytime I could get it. Thank you. Congratulations. All right. Thank you, Dr. Cole. He he and his team
012have worked really hard on attendance. All our campuses have worked really hard and 11 of our 12 schools attendance went up and the one that dipped was 0.004. Um so, uh it was a sick year this year. I think that's everybody went up is should be lauded for for what we did. I also want to take this moment to introduce two of our very brand new principles we're excited to have on board. I'll go alphabet first so that I'm not playing favorites or anything. I don't get accused of playing favorites. But our new principal of Buoie Elementary is Mrs. Jessica Barry. You can come up here please. [Applause] She is a proud Buoie graduate. see Sam Marcus through and through. And you want to say a couple words? Yes. Good evening, board of trustees, President
013Pauly, Dr. Cardona, and everyone. Um, my name is Jessica Barry, and it is an absolute honor to be the new proud principal of Buoie Elementary, a school that helped shape me um, back in the 80s and also a place that I'm really excited to lead and learn along with. So, um, I thank you all for putting your trust in me. um very excited about the school year and um thank you just thank you mom [Applause] and our newest principal of Mendes Elementary, Miss S. Suzanne Perkins. She is competitive by the way if you haven't already figured that out. So I'm a basketball mom. Thank you, President Hollyy, members of the board, Dr. Cardona, leadership team. It is an honor and privilege to stand before you today as a new proud Mendes principal. I'm excited to
014begin this new journey. I'm excited to work along the great staff at Mendes, the families, and most of all the amazing students. So, thank you for this opportunity. I take it with great pride and great responsibility. Thank you to the leadership team who has been the most supportive in transitioning into this new role. So, I appreciate everybody. Thank you. Thank you. I think both schools are in great hands. So, we really look forward to what's getting ready to happen in those schools. And finally, for my superintendent report, most people know communities and school. We started here a few years ago. Communities and schools is something that's very important, I think, to everybody. The fabric, our teachers that are here, our administrators all recognize uh the great work. And we have our CEO from communities and
015school, Natana Guerrero. Uh here, Sharon Vhill, our CEO. Uh this is their midyear report and she's going to do a quick midyear report for our community and the stuff is also in our board book and Adriana's going to tell about the wonderful things we're doing to support our children around whole child development. Good evening, board of trustees. Um Madame President Holly and Dr. um Cardona, superintendent. Um tonight I'm really excited to just begin by talking about one of our district uh initiatives. So our student support team um really works hard, works together to support our kiddos, and that of course includes community and schools, which we're so excited about. Um it's really important to always consider a holistic approach in serving our students. And so with that, I'd like to just lead um by providing
016you with this visual and asking you to just take a moment to think about what that support looks like for our kids on a day-to-day. Um when they walk into the door of our schools, um they don't only come in with a backpack that's full of materials, notebooks, right? They also come to us with a variety of complex webs that include um academic needs, social emotional needs, behavioral basic needs, right? And this is where our partnership comes in and helps support this process in our students on a daily basis. All of these needs intersect and really impact the learning journey of our students. It's important to also recognize that when we say student support team, it is a very collaborative effort and it really lies within the heart of the multi-tiered system of supports which
017includes all right and it does require the effort of everyone in this room, right? our educators, our board, superintendent, our principles, um, community and schools, all of our other community partners to really lay into the work because we believe in a holistic approach. And what that means is we layer in those integrated student supports. Now, we also recognize that it requires strategic partnerships, which is why I'm always really excited when I hear about CIS. I'm like, "Yep, absolutely. Let's do this." Right? But it is a partnership to support our kids on a daily basis. Um even looking at again this visual um this encompasses the work that our counselors do along with our school counselors our aware clinices clinicians working hand inand with their educational teams and of course um all the resources brought in
018by community and schools as well as those direct supports are really crucial um in the journey of our students know that what that translates to is a safety net. That safety net is there to help catch our kids when they're struggling. Um, as well as helping them propel propel to their future and making sure that they can meet their goals. Last of all, I'll leave you with just thinking that behind every statistic that we're going to review today, which is super exciting, it really means that our kids are being served, right? that they are being successful and we really appreciate the work that all of our team and educators do. Um I know that um the work will be showcased by um Sharon which we're so excited about. Their work is very much layered in
019uh best practices. It's definitely a TA approved program um that we are grateful for having here at SMCISD. So please join me in welcoming again Sharon uh Vil, CEO of community and schools. Thank you. [Applause] Um, sorry. Well, no. Uh, good evening everyone. My name is um Sharon Vil and I get to be the proud CEO of communities and schools. And no matter how many times you'all invite me to come here, I always get nervous. This is a quite the the room. Um, I got a pill for this. Huh? No, I am. I always get nervous. Are you kidding me? Um but let's go ahead and get started. Uh I'm going to talk a little bit about our model. Uh some of you are really intimate um with our model and some of you this
020might be the first time that you are learning about it. I will also tell you that you all sort of started a trend with us. Um before San Marcos, we didn't always know that the best thing for us was to saturate a full school district. And because of you all, we are now fully saturated at Elgen, at Lockheart, um in Taylor. So I think that I give that to your superintendent who truly understands um what it means that students have programs that follow them throughout their entire academic journey. So um at CIS we take a holistic approach for supporting students. We place highly qualified and trained staff directly on campus. We embed these staff members 100% on your campus. Your principles are wonderful enough that they give us a CIS room and it really feels
021like a counseling space where students can really get to come and dig through trauma um and learn skills to help them be successful. Um our model is not just about the direct service that we give but it's also it starts off with a needs assessment. We believe in not telling the community what they need. We believe that the community tell us what they need. So we work with principles, we work with your teachers, we work with parents and we say what are the resources that you already have. What is it that is missing? And then we go out and find it for you. So that's the first step. We then take your campus improvement plan and because we are TEA um certified, we have to take that plan embedded with that needs assessment and then
022your principles sign off on our model and our program every single year. Our program should align with what you have to do for TEA every single year. Then we really get into the services. I tell people think about CIS as a a slice of apple pie. The bottom is what we call tier one is the crust. Everyone loves the crust. And those are services that every student on your campus gets. Basic needs, backpacks, if someone needs glasses, um just think about that. Then after that, you move a little closer to the pie, a little bit more meaty, more apple. That's where we start working with students who have like needs. So some students might have uh need a self-regulation. They might be um having anxiety. They might um have lost a family member. So we're
023doing grief and loss groups. Then if you get to the smallest part of the pie, that is students who are really needing heavy support. They have a suicide ideation or they're clinically depressed. And at that point, we're really providing one-on-one support getting them group ready. Our goal is that students are not with CIS. all of the time that they're in your schools, but that we give them the skills that they need so that then they can then go back into the classroom and implement those. Okay. Um I want to talk a little bit about a Harvard study. Um most people think about CIS and they think about the work that we do in K through 12. Well, Harvard was studying um the impact of chronic absenteeism and uh they came across CIS. So they studied
024CIS nationally and what they found out was that when CIS was in school campuses fully saturated that we were able to increase the graduation rate by 7.5%. They then said, well the data looks really good in Texas, so let's study Texas. And what they did is they studied 7 million students for the past 20 years because we've been serving um central Texas for 40 years now. And what they found was that CIS students were less likely to be incarcerated, less likely to be dependent on um federal government assistance, and were more likely to be gainfully employed. Students who are with CIS compared to those who were not with CIS, um our students were earning a minimum of $1,500 a year all the way from age 26 until retirement. Um that means that our students are
025earning just in comparison at least $100,000 more than a nonCIS student and that we are giving back to the community $9,000 in taxes for every student that CIS has served. So I just share that with you because I'm going to talk a lot about the services that we do. But CIS is not just about today, but it's about what San Marus is going to look like 20 years from now because you all are investing in CIS in your education system. Okay. Last uh this current school year, we served all of your schools. We uh provided services to over 7,000 students. That means that we're saturating about 93% of your campuses. And remember that tier one um sorry that tier three that that smallest part of the pie we provided uh over 1,000 students with intensive
026case management services. We've also um and this is the midyear this is going to go up um at the end. Uh we also provided over 26,000 in direct financial assistance to your students. Okay. this um I will tell you um one of the things that we always share with you all is what is the health of the students. You have to remember that the students that are being served by CIS are some of the students that have some of your highest needs. And what we're seeing is that some of your students are struggling with persistent stress which shows up as a tummy ache, as a headache, shows up as I'm not feeling well, so don't send me to school. But what it is is that stress of maybe parents um can't make ends meet or
027someone is ill in the household and it's just this stress that continues to accumulate for students. We then also see that students are struggling with a lot of self-regulation. Um they quite don't know what to do with this energy and so we have to give them coping skills and we have to help them understand what's happening with their body so that they themselves can regulate. Okay, remember that campus plan that I shared with you all? Well, last year uh uh this school year, I'm sorry. Um most of your campuses are focusing on attendance. So, when you all are talking about that attendance increased, I'm so happy. Um our staff is really focused on helping your principles on attendance. Um we provided about 373 schoolwide activities and events. Not only do we do these one-on-one services,
028but we really focus on your entire student body. The other thing that might be new to you all is that um you all also get additional funding through CIS, your principles are able to ask our program managers to apply for something called a micro grant. That is funding that they get to either train teachers or try something new. So at Desavala, we uh gave a $4,000 scholarship to do teacher training to support attendance. At Crockett, we did another $4,000. At Goodn Night, we did $700 to target attendance. Um, so you'll see a little bit of the landscape of the additional funding that we're bringing to you all. Okay, let's talk a little bit about what people are doing with that money. So, here at Miller, CIS, uh, and your campus staff set a bold 97%
029attendance goal. Each grading period, top grade earners, um, they earned snack party plus a gift card incentive. These celebrations boosted excitement and showed students that showing up matters. At Hernandez Elementary, we CIS targeted students with 10 or more absences through an attendance challenge. 56 students were invited and 71% of them improved and they earned a pizza party. At Desavala, CIS trained teachers on anxiety in the classroom and backed it up with calming kids for every class. So, we're taking the CIS work into the classrooms and training teachers that they're able to do this work as well. Okay, I'm going to move on a little bit more. There's a little bit more for you. You have this in your packet, so I won't read it um verbatim. Okay, the la one of the other things that
030I want to share with you all is not only do we have our permanent staff that is on your campus, but we layer in additional services. So this year we've brought in interns, Americaore and volunteers directly to help us provide the mental health services and basic need supports that your students have need. These are some of the partnerships that we're bringing. Um, I will tell you that part of our work is leveraging what's around central Texas and making sure that you all have it at your fingertips. Not that your children are having to go on I35 from city to city trying to find these partners. We bring them directly to the classroom. Okay. The last thing um that I'm going to share with you all is that um we fundra to make sure that the
031district does not pay the full cost of our program. And so I just wanted to share with you some of the initiatives and some of the things that have been really successful. So we were able to receive a $1 million grant over three years from the Office of the Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention, which is a federal grant, which we still have. It hasn't gone away. Um, and it helps us layer in mental health services. Also, the Berdine Johnson Foundation has provided $25,000 to support San Marcos. The city of San Marcos has two grants that they've provided. One goes to increase mental health, and this is the one that we're really excited. We just got $30,000 to be able to help your students pay their electricity bills, their light bills, so that having no light at
032home doesn't keep them from doing homework or not showing up the next day for school. So, this is a little bit of how we pay and fund raise um to bring that program to you all. Here's some quotes from your students. I love that we have CIS because it helps me get through the day. The CIS team is so awesome. They help me have a safe place to go in school. We survey the parents, the counselors, the principles and students. And every single year, we're hearing what your community is thinking about our program, how they're feeling about our program, and then we implement changes based on that feedback. Okay. Um I think that's it. Um I will tell you that in your slide what you all have is that 99.9% of the students that we
033helped stayed in school. 98.6 of the students that we supported graduated or were promoted to the next grade level and 85.3% of the students improved in their academics, attendance and behavior goals. Um so that is another um thing that we provide to you all. Okay, that's it for me. Uh, I don't know if you want me to answer any questions. Does anybody have any questions? Mr. Adana, thank you so much. President Hollyy, I had a quick question on you mentioned briefly, you know, fundraising grants given to the organization. What is the financial commitment from the ISTD to y'all? I know during our budget process we talk a lot about inflationary challenges, cost of doing business. Does that contribution from the school district change yeartoear? Do we have to increase funding? No. What does that look
034like? Yeah. Um, so currently a campus program cost $116,327, but we subsidize that. The school district pays 43% of that cost. Since we've been here, we have not increased our rate for you all at all and we do not plan to do so. Um, next year, uh, we will be in 11 campuses. We won't be fully saturated. Um, so that means that the total contribution for CIS next year will be $815,000. And what 11 campuses are those? the campus that will not be part of CIS, um, Miller Middle School. Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you so much to your staff for all of your great work. We appreciate it, Madam President. That's it. Just want to thank all the staff members. Hope everybody's enjoying their summer break, whatever you get of a break. It's
035been a rough year this year. I think we've all survived a roller coaster ride, but I think we are all excited to get back on the ride here in August. So, enjoy your time. Thank you to the central office staff and to the cabinet members. Um, we took some personality tests during training last week. So, I think I did a pretty good job of being directive and strategic and I think it showed with our presentation here. So, I learned a lot about myself last week and appreciate all the work that the academics team and that whole group put together for our principles and our APS. So, it was really good. Thank you. And I extend on behalf of the board our thanks also. I know it has been a tumultuous year and we all are
036hopeful that it is a restorative summer and that we come back with renewed energy and purpose um and determination because certainly we have more challenges ahead of us in the fall but I think we have good people in place to address that. So, um, moving on next to we have a report from the Guadalupe Appraisal District on the real estate acquisition and renovation of property. Thank youelcome, President. I appreciate it. Uh, Dr. Cardona and the board, appreciate you all giving me opportunity to speak with you today. Oh, there we go. Excellent. Um, what we've come up with, uh, we're kind of like everybody, we're trying to deal with the growth, rapid growth that we've seen over the, um, last decade probably. Um, let me see. Put my glasses on. Apologize. There we go. Page. Uh,
037so we started about a year ago. I brought it to my board of directors saying that, you know, I really believe this is a major issue that we need to take a look at back in April of 24. Uh, and it culminated after about a year's worth of uh, due diligence and review of different alternatives with a resolution passed by my my board of directors that indicated that this was the option that we wanted to move forward with. And what that did is it allowed me to then start presenting to our taxing units. Um, as an appraisal district, we're unable to levy tax or issue bonds. We're we're served by the entities uh or funded by the entities we serve. So, uh, that's why I'm here today asking for your um, support. And let me
038I went right to the end. Look at that. All right. Go back to the home. Good stuff. All right. So, we do a lot more and I'm going to run through this here. Uh, a lot more than just appraising. Obviously, the main thing that um that really started this was the fact that we're averaging over 24,000 appeals a year. Now, um so what that comes down to is it gets into the point of of numbers. You know, can we get through this appeal season and the time that we're provided so that way we can get our entities their um their certified appraisal rule. Uh obviously everybody's aware that in the last 15 years the surge here in Guadaloop, obviously you guys here in Hayes, but in Guadaloop we're up to about 200,000 over that period
039of time. Uh the aerials you'll see here is the 2008 is when they added on to the 1984 building in the front there. Um the only thing we've done in the 17 years uh since is is add that parking lot to make it a little bit safer to come in and out on for the property owners. These are the major things and this is again photos from last year that I brought to my board. But you know during the appeal season our lobby is just not adequate. You know people get um service takes a little bit longer. Uh, another aspect is the ADA, you know, for our visitors. Unfortunately, uh, that that parking lot I told you about. I'm going to run through these here. Some of our I've been joking with everybody that, you
040know, I've turned every closet into a workstation at this point in time. The inadequate bathrooms. We only have four. This is the one the staff gives me. You know, we only have four uh single occupancy for the 41 staff members as well as the public. So, it be somewhat waiting. We got over 200 devices now u that we're managing within that small little area with those servers, 200 square feet or so. Undersized mail room. uh insufficient break room for both the ARB members when they're in session as well as our staff. A lot of my staff will uh eat in their um their cars because there's a class me class C misdemeanor if there's any discussions you know exparte um restrictive walkways the repurposing I was telling you about um those little closets um conference
041room it's hard to do organizationalwide discussions you know training sessions so we have to break it up uh because of that we've lost a public research room because I needed an extra ARB panel after the first year of 24,000 we looked at different ways of managing our current facility. Um, obviously, like I said, John, it's not going to change. Population is going to continue, unfortunately. Not unfortunately, but you know, the demand is going to be there. We're expected to get somewhere close to 300,000 in the next 20 years, which is the the basis of our uh strategic plan that we're looking at uh for facility-wise. Um, so here, obviously, when we were thinking about this, we say, okay, we need a facility to meet the needs of today, as well as, you know, down the
042road, technology, staffing, public uh services, uh, and then training. I really want to be able to have a facility that where I can bring on a quarterly basis, bring the public in so I can show them all these new IT tools that we have. So that way they'll feel comfortable about using them when they're away from our site. You know, a lot of them don't trust it, you know, and they don't feel comfortable using it. Um, we're tier one just like Hayes is. Uh, you know, where we're held to the same standards as Metro Cads, Bear and Travis and things of that nature. Uh, and that bottom is really what I'm focused is on for this facility is the taxpayer remedies. I want to make sure they have a, you know, they have a right
043to come in and and and ask us to relook at their value. Uh, and I want to make sure that they have the ability to do so. Uh, during CO, we kind of stopped doing the in-person uh, informals, which is what everybody has. Um, and we haven't been able to restart that after CO's gone because of the fact that we just don't have enough space to safely do it. Uh, and I think that's hurt our resolve rate. Our resolve rate informally has dropped down to the mid70s where it was in the high 80s prior to that. So, this is our um what we came up with. Uh we're going to repurpose this uh old Sigen ISD school. Um initially uh when somebody brought this to my attention last year, 1914, I didn't want anything to
044do with it. Uh but after having a quick little site visit, you know, they've got a lot of the major aspects in there that the school had already done prior to um selling it in 2022. Uh here's the uh campus floor plan uh that we're looking at. So, it's a full 4 acre city block uh from the the current owner. Um and then we're just going to this project is specifically to renovate the the threetory main structure, but it also provides um the additional space for for growth um as this 20-year period comes to an end. Here's a quick look at where we plan on having on the first floor is um you know, the ARBs, their own break room. There's the training room I was discussing, as well as some on-site storage for those
045retention needs. Uh the main area would be the lobby. Uh we have some self-service kiosk we plan to have again bring them in. Hopefully they can do a lot of what they're requesting on their own with a little bit of assistance. Um as well as we recapture that public resource room for mapping. Uh the third floor would be the primary uh location for all the workstations that it satisfies enough for the current staff member of of 41 as well as um as we grow over the next couple of years. Um, my my thought would be as the time came to where and this would be down the line near the end of the 20-year period, but as the growth comes to where we need additional workstations, the ARB can actually be moved out into the
046there's a a um a gymnasium area large enough that we could actually segment that um and use that and then back fill as we needed to with personnel. So, staffing projections, you know, we're looking at about two to four annually, every five years as well. I was kind of looking at it and and at this particular time um we just don't have uh the space to accommodate any additional staff. Um projections if it holds true to the weighted average of the public uh population for Guadaloop we're looking at about 40,000 in 2020 2045. Uh everybody gets an informal conference upon request. So again they get that 15 20 minute period informal. Uh usually at this particular time we've been able to say, "Okay, come back in two weeks and you can have your board, you
047know, but we're going to get to the point where we're going to have to have it same day like a lot of the major metros where you come in, you have your informal if we can't resolve it and then you move straight to the board. So that way we uh timing wise we get done in time. The probable cost, we had an architect engineers um you know service agreement to kind of give this information for us to kind of tell us exactly what it would cost to renovate uh the three-story structure there. Uh so acquisition of the site uh is just shy of 1 nine. Uh probable cost at 84 for a total of just shy of 103. Everybody um again because we don't levy anything. Everybody has an equal share relative to their levy.
048Uh so on a 20-year note at 6% first payment wouldn't be due uh funding wise wouldn't be until next year's budget cycle wouldn't be in this one. Um but we're looking at um roughly about a 16.3% increase um for every entity that we serve. Um for you guys, I broke it down uh because you guys are a split district. I think you guys are obviously coming down 123. So we're going to see a little bit more value from you all in the future. Uh but at this particular time, uh on top of your annual budget allocation, u it's a funding u requirement of roughly about $8,800. Uh cost mitigations. That's one of the benefits of this option was the fact that we can sell our current facility and and use those funds completely to pay
049down the the principal as well as uh in the five years that u I've been in the position, we've been able to send back on average to our entities about $300,000 a year of unspent funds. So, we could also dedicate those unspent funds with your approval at that time to uh pay down the interest as well, the principle of the the note. Um, conservatively, I was thinking we could knock off three or four years of the 20-year note by some of these uh, investments and whatnot. Alternate options, we did look initially um, of our current site. You can see here two options. One was a single story 8,000, the other one was a double twotory 8,000 combined. Um, the main aspect with this is uh, as my opinion was to my my board of directors
050is it it just really takes care of the next 10 years. you know, we're going to be right back in here. And if you do a cost analysis, uh the current project that we're requesting is roughly about, you know, $17,000 total. Um whereas if you went with this option, you'd be back here in 10 to 15 years to get the additional space. Uh you'd be looking somewhere about 215 um in an overall cost in the end. But so that's why we kind of decided to go with um the option we're presenting today. Final thoughts. Obviously, uh you know, we've had a great district over there. The culture was initially started by my predecessor, Miss Jamie Osborne. You know, taxpayer first, which is great. Um, so we haven't we haven't failed any of our um oversight
051reviews, whether it's the maps review for methods and procedures or the uh property value study that they do. Uh, our leadership team, you know, we have 22 years on average with this district between the three of us. So, that's great. We have the confidence of our staff, you know, and the trust. Um, as well as we have a competitive uh compensation and benefits. After last year, uh, my board went ahead and, uh, commissioned a, uh, compensation study, came back slightly low, so I utilized that to develop a gradeep program for our staff, uh, that they implemented in December. So, we're able to manage those costs, you know, into the future now because we have everything structured that way. My pitch here is obviously if I can get the facility checked off, uh I believe that
052really puts the district uh at serving you all obviously as well uh in a great position over the next 20 years as well as providing any flexibility for the individuals that are in our role later at the end of that 20 years. And that is all if any questions apologize for running through as quick as I did. I just want to clarify because we have to vote on this, right? So, we're voting that we, the school district, will be putting in $8,800 toward this. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Yes. But on next year's budget, not the one we're correct. And that would be over a 20-year peri. We would whatever your allocation for our budget would be, we would apply that same percentage to the um the the project. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much.
053I appreciate it. Thank you. Not yet. We'll go. Um, we're going to move I'm going to ask that we move into close session after our reports and information items are completed this evening so that we can have a meeting with Mr. Cruz and then we'll reconvene. We'll go ahead with the academics, operations, and finance. Okay. Good evening, Dr. Cardono, President Holly, members of the board, my name is David Underwood, and for this presentation, I'll be providing anformational update on gifted and talented. Over the summer prior to 2425 school year, there were several town hall style Zoom sessions held by TEA's Monica Brewer, who oversees gifted and talented programs across the state of Texas. Each session was dedicated to a particular section of the state plan for gifted and talented to receive feedback from the attendees.
054And most of the feedback that was provided during these sessions sought for better wording and clarity uh within the state plan which was made available to the districts around December of 2024. A majority of the adjustments that we made to our S San Marcus CISD gifted and talented handbook uh that the board approved this previous year already addressed a majority of these better defined expectations of the new state plan. In general, the biggest changes to the state plan though were in the area of accountability. Although the previous plan had expectations for gifted instruction and although there was a possibility of audits and corrective plans uh by TEA, it was not tied to district funding where it can now be revoked. So those expectations have been clarified in the new state plan as indicated on this
055slide where districts will be held accountable to the state plan now tied to Texas education code TEC section 29.123 and compliance of the program and the state plan is now also linked to state funding per TEC section 7.028 and TEC section 48.109. One of the requirements of the state plan is to also have annual evaluations performed uh for the campuses. This to meet this requirement, the campus principal uh was given a survey to facilitate with their campus GT committees. The questions provided were categorized as seen on this graph. uh trained staff. One of the main focuses over the last two years has been making sure our staff is trained for GT students. As you can see, the committees answered that with a 100% of the staff, including administrators, counselors, and teachers. Equity of services questions
056were about students having access to GT services across all ethnicities and demographics. For classroom instruction, the questions focused on the classroom setting, the amount of time the students had to work in multiple disciplines and project-based learning, use of specific resources, things of that nature. Instruction oversight category involved all things oversight from curriculum to walkthroughs to curriculum instruction oversight that was done by administration. Procedural compliance questions involved a variety of items in regards to compliance with the new state plan. So some of these items were just rolling out and so these things would not have been applicable yet or they would not have known about them and so we uh expected to see some data lower here so that we could see that grow. And then campus communication supports the district provides information to the public
057about items such as parentformational sessions, assessment windows, etc. But this is a section also about how the campuses send out that information and how they participate in helping us in those communication platforms that they employ as well. Again, this is a baseline of information to help us as a district to know where we need to improve our systems of communication. In addition, they were asked questions about social emotional supports. And so they were asked about the various different supports that they provide to students. Uh not just GT students, but all students. And so this slide contains all the items that those campuses shared. And so if you look through this list, you'll see all of those. That concludes the presentation for gifted and talented and its update. Any questions? Thank you very much, Mr. Underwood.
058Uh, next is strategic plan progress update. Good evening board. Dr. Cardona. We are excited to share with you our office of academics strategic plan for 2030. As you know, House Bill 3 requires us to have goals for early childhood math, RLA, and CCMR. But aside from that, we all know either from experience um or bolstered by effective district the effective district framework that having short-term goals, long-term goals, and uh measuring that along the way through milestones is important. And so we've been really excited to put this together um to kind of show our vision toward 2030. Tonight we're going to share those elements of our academic strategic plan with you. I do want to note that while we are obviously future focused for 2030, we're also very present in today. Uh we're still very student
059centered in the students that we have and building on that success from year to year. As you can see, our academic strategic plan is firmly rooted in and guided by our core commitment number one that our SMCSD is committed to all students performing at or above grade level. And so you should see that reflected in some some of the nitty-gritty details and data that you'll see um in the presentation. So for now I will hand it over to Beth Nash to walk us through the process we followed to establish some of these targets and the ultimate goals. Yes. Thank you. So looking at the goals that we have, House Bill 3 indicates that we were required to have a goal for RLA, math, and CCMR. So really that was our our grounding framework and what
060is going to be our big focus. And also that's the same ideas that are presented in accountability looking at how the state judges us yeartoear. So we really focused upon what do we need to do within these areas to show our growth for our students. And this year a lot when you've heard us present data we've had 80 5030 has been the big takeaway and for this year that is the goal. 80 5030 but like what Miss Medioski said moving forward to 2030 we need a big picture goal and that is where 90 60 is going to be what our focus is by 2030. So by 2030 90% of students will be at approaches grade level or above for math and RLA. 60% of students will be at meets grade level or above and 40%
061of students will be at master's grade level and above. And the reason we've grounded on that is because if our campuses achieve that 9040 for the star assessments, it means they are an A-rated campus for domain one. And that really sets them up because their star performance is not only in domain one, it's also used in domain two and domain three. So if they can show the growth that is needed to get to that 90 6040, they're going to be in a very good setting overall by 2030. And then for CCMR, we are looking that by June of 2030, we will have 90% of graduates um meeting the CCMR indicator. And once again, if stu if we have 88% that equals an A, well, we like to keep it at 90 and up just for
062for metrics. So that is where kind of those are where our goals came from. Now how did we get there? It all started with AI. Dr. Curton has come to us before and has said, "Hey, have you guys thought about using AI on different things?" Yes, we have. Um, back in January, Mr. Nades and myself started diving into AI using some different tools and procedures. Um, we first of all had to teach AI what we wanted it to know. You can't just put a prompt in there and hope to get what you want. So, we had to have it learn about Texas Accountability System. We had to have it learn about the STAR test. Um, we had to have it look at the, um, there's some different documents through lead forward. We had it analyze
063the vertical alignment documents, which shows the skills that are interlaced starting in kindergarten all the way through high school. We also had it look at the TEACS frequency distribution, and that's a document that shows how often certain TEACs are assessed on STAR. Um, I I know teaching certain times there's units that teachers really love to get behind, but it may equal one to two questions on STAR versus a unit that they despise has seven or eight questions and unfortunately that bias plays into our student results. So, we want to make sure that the information we're looking at is really grounded in the data and personal biases have been removed. Um, we also uploaded the SMCD star scores for the previous two years, so the 23 and the 24 broken down by TE. We also uploaded
064um the district common assessments for those years as well. And we looked at our local year at a glance documents that shows our pacing. How much time is spent on these various topics all the way. So everything that our curriculum department has put together year after year really came into play. And that allowed us to identify gaps that exist across these different grade bands K through 2, 3 to 5, 6 through 8 in high school. Gaps that exist that play on each other. And a skill that may look like one thing in K2 translates into a gap now in 35. But if it's slightly different, the connection is not always relevant. And sometimes we don't have the most time to spend on vertical alignment that really makes it black and white. This AI analysis helped
065start that framework. And then once he and I had this information, we handed it over to academics and curriculum. And that's where our district curriculum specialist who are truly these specialists in those content areas took a look at it. is what is what's on paper does that make sense when you step back and look at it and they had some great understandings and aha moments around it and from there we got it back to the rest of the academic directors we got it in front of principles numerous times to get that cyclical feedback of it's not just what we discovered but it was with the feedback back and forth and updating and going from there that really got us where we needed to be. So we do have yearly targets. They are broken down elementary,
066middle school, and high school. And the baseline was the 23 24 actual data that existed when we did this back in January, February. Um we're currently we have our preliminary 2425 data. And there are some highlights and some excitements that once the data is official, I will gladly share with a very excited face. Um but these are our targets yeartoear. We know growth doesn't happen on a linear basis. We know it's not going to be exactly 6% every year or 4%. But the good thing about having this plan is we can come back yearly and address adjust where are we did we meet where we need to be if not how do we need to adjust moving forward. So we do have very specific goals and these are district goals not campus goals. I say
067that because we have seven very different elementaryaries. Um TEA released the comparison groups this past Thursday and once again of the seven elementaryaries none of them are on each other's comparison groups. our two middle schools are not on each others at all either. So we recognize we have some campuses that we need to perform above these targets so that our campuses who are below they can average out to this goal. So that is something else that as you hear different campuses presenting we understand there's going to be some fluctuation in the data but as a district these are our goals. Um and then we have our CCMR goal. You know right now it's just the high school that is a lagging indicator. So once Lamar students have had graduates who have earned CCMR, that'll then
068be included. But primarily all of the high school targets come from the or CCMR comes from the high school. So when you dig into the performance objectives, that's where you'll really see the specific topics that AI highlighted highlighted and that our specialists and our campus leaders confirmed matched to their experience. Uh we're especially excited to really put some structure to our CCMR goals. We were happy to try to match that format along with our reading and math goals. We look forward to sharing data with you in the future that continues to be holistic, but also now we can pull our data and see specifically around some of those skills that you see listed there. Are we growing around, for example, computational thinking? Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh, are there questions? I see none.
069Thank you. Thank you. Okay. And I will stay up here for an accountability update. I'll just preface this by saying that uh the board requested an accountability update on the 2023 2024 star report. Uh TEA recently had the lawsuit resolved regarding the 2023 data and that has been released publicly. The 24 data has not been released publicly because it is still held up in the legal system, but the district uh wanted to go ahead and and have it publicly presented this evening and then it'll be made available on our websites um in advance of our 2025 data coming soon. Yes, thank you for the disclaimer. Um there is a lot of of moving pieces with accountability, unfortunately. Um, and you know, it's one of those things we want to highlight where we're doing well and
070sometimes our hands are a little tied. So, disclaimers. Um, the 2024 is still under litigation and until it is released, all of what we're sharing is projected. But back in August, TEA did did share with us our official data. They just did not scale it to that A throughF scaling and it was never made public and still has not been made public. Um, a lot of districts were told don't present the information because the more districts who present an A throughF score, it makes the current lawsuit just a moot point. Why should we hold back scores if the districts themselves are going to give it? Well, enough has happened. The same court that's hearing the 2024 is the one that heard the 2023 um A3F accountability. They released those um scores with no change to
071anything. So, at this point, we're just we're ready to move on and ready to get our 25 on real time. Um so but with the information we received through tea and then the scaling documents that are available in the A throughF accountability manual. These are the um predicted A3F scores for 2024. So we do have here this um district overall we're looking at a 68 which is up four points from the 2023 year. Now things to keep in mind in 2023 we moved to STAR 2.0. So, instead of it just being multiple choice questions, we now had all those new item types where at least 25% of the questions came from open-ended responses, um, short responses, drag and drop questions. It was a very different test. And the write the reading test included writing teaks
072as well, where previously it was only reading. So, I do want to preface these scores with there were some major changes that went into accountability. Um and then the high school for 2024 is looking at a 64 which is up 10 points from the previous year. Um this is something that we're living through the state changing the CCMR cut points very much late to the ball game. Um as a reminder what used to be an A was a 60 they bumped that up to an 88. That was a huge impact. And then the PES error that resulted in our graduate class not being correctly reported is in this data as well because this would have been our five-year graduates. And that's something that that graduation rate really hurt us still. So we're hopeful that this
073next year the 2025 data when we receive that that will be something where the teams there will be a very minor part of that and we're able to move past that information. But overall definitely um 24 is going upward. Looking at our two middle schools we do see that good night did decline by seven points from 23 down to a 68 in 2024. Um but Miller underneath Dr. Young's leadership and all the changes that happened there went from a 73 up to a 78. We are optimistic that we will have very positive scores at both middle schools when scores released in August, but this was for 2024. And then it's hard to group the elementarymentaries together because once again they're so very different. So I included our three dual language elementarymentaries on one slide. You
074can see Deavalla, Hernandez, and Mendes. Desavala made some very big jumps from the prior year. Hernandez decreased slightly and Mendes remained the same. And then lastly are our non-dual language elementary campuses. Buoy, Crockett, Rodriguez, and Travis. Travis had huge growth in 2024. Um, and that is something that we were also seeing again for 2025. So very optimistic there. Rodriguez improved. Crockett went slightly down. Um and buoy is an area of extreme focus as we all know but these are our projected 2024 A throughF numbers based on the data we've received and the approved accountability manual. Are there any questions? I have a question. Can you go back um to the high school data? So we understand that the 2023 data uh was or this grades that we received were based on the data that was
075erroneously entered and so the state based our calculations on incorrect data right we all understand that um what I don't entirely understand is how that incorrect data is still affecting the report and also can you go again over the CCM MR changes because I had sort of thought that if the 2023 data was wrong erroneously, right? But then suddenly the 2024 data was correct, then we should see a big jump in improvement that we should get some credit for improvement. Is that happening? Not happening. Why? So let me rewind back to your first question about the why is the 2023 PES error still impacting 2024. Part of high school's accountability is based on the graduation rate. And we're looking at the best of the four, five, or sixyear graduation rate. A lot of districts, a
076lot of campuses, their their better graduation rate comes from that either five or sixyear grad rate. Well, for all of those students of ours, that is where they're still continuing to count. In the 2024, they were considered our 5year grad rate. And then for this upcoming, they're going to be our sixth year. So whereas those would typically be more of a stronger data point for us to rely upon, we don't have that because so many of the students were not reported. So they're not counting them even though correct. Oh my god. That is something Dr. Caring the 89 students the 89 graduates. So that is something that we're having to live through. So that's why there is such a large jump from the 23 to the 24 is because of um the grad rate error
077that impacted whereas the prior year in 2023 the high school was a 54 and that was due to the PES error as part of it but then jumping over to CCMR CCMR is a lagging indicator and this was one of the big reasons why there was such long litigation around the 2023 was because the manual was changed after these students had already walked the stage and there was absolutely nothing a district could do anywhere across the state to impact those scores. What used to get us an A for CCMR was a 60. That was changed to an 88. So, that was something that for so many districts, that's really what kind of prompted the the lawsuit and the litigation was that you're making changes after we've already finished the game. How is that fair and
078equitable? So, that's why there were so many um I guess issues around releasing an accountability manual during the school year. So, it's not an issue of what's our what's our endgame, what's our goal. So, those are that's kind of the all of the contributing factors that I like to keep in mind as we're presenting this because it is a lot to keep in mind um unfortunately as accountability changes. And so, in the 2025 data, it'll still be the same issues with CCMR. We'll need to get an 88 in order to get an A. Yes. Where we would have had to get a 60 before. Right. But we but we've had time we've known about it. Yes. To be able to to adjust to that. Um, will the PES data still be in there with the
079seven-year graduates? It's still there because that's going to be our sixth year. So, whereas, you know, maybe that would have been our highest data point, now we have to rely on either our four-year graduates or the five-year graduates. So, that hopefully that rolls off. Exactly. Okay. Yes. Other questions from the DAS? I know Mr. Mclofflin has a question on Zoom. I can't see him. Can we see Mr. McGloin on Zoom? Can you hear me? Yeah, we can hear you. We just can't see you. Oh, there you are. Okay. Okay. Um, so I guess Can you move closer to your mic? Sorry. Um, yeah, I'll just speak up so you can hear me. Are there any specific plans um to deal with there's a question for the administration, but I don't know who would answer to
080deal with these campuses where scores were disappointing. um es especially at the elementary level besides just doing what we're already doing. Was there some response once the district had an opportunity to review this data? And if so, what was it? Yes. So speaking um while Dr. Sanders makes his way up here, several of our campuses are um identified as comprehensive support campuses or targeted support. So that is something that we're required to provide different support to the campuses. And then we're also doing work through our TIL, our Texas Instructional Leadership. and I will hand it over to Dr. Sanders. So, the work with the Texas Instructional Leadership Institute is a way for us to ground ourselves in some research-based practices that feature first and foremost observation and feedback. That has been something that we focused
081on for pretty much the last year, making sure that we're giving our teachers really good, sound, bite-size feedback. Because what we don't want to do is go into a classroom, overwhelm a teacher, find 10 things that we can say, hey, you need to prove in this area, this area, and that area, and not be able to provide the adequate support. So, that's definitely one thing. Another thing would be the culture and climate. So, we're really working on how to start the day strong. And I'll give you an example. DZ is one of our schools that's participating in this. And so they are seeking from the time that students arrive at let's say 7:40 until the time they leave, how do we put structures in place so that we don't lose instructional time. One of the
082things that we have realized is through no fault of their own, but as we transition throughout the day, we're losing valuable instructional time. We are also looking at how we structure our elementary schools. In the past, we have been a district that has allowed much flexibility across our schools in terms of you may hear some schools say they're self-contained across the board, meaning in elementary that the teacher is responsible for teaching math, science, ELA, social studies. And then another school, you may hear them say that, well, they're departmentalized, meaning that a teacher is specialized in teaching math and reading and then another teacher teaches another subject. Here's the thing to remember. In elementary, all of our teachers that teach elementary, they have the specialization to be able to teach every single subject. And in a
083way, it has limited our abilities to provide additional support because of how we structured things. So this year, moving forward, we're starting small. K2, for example, is a area where all of our seven elementary schools will be self-contained. In three through five, we have still allowed some autonomy from our schools, but they have come with some conditions in mind that you must meet the minimum number of minutes per content area. For example, in fourth and fifth grade is a requirement that they hit 90 minutes for ELR, English language arts. So if you have a situation where you're dividing yours up in a creative way and you're not hitting the 90 minutes, that was not something that was going to be approved moving forward. So we're we're being very strategic in how we structure the day,
084but also in support of how we utilize some of the outside resources like that provided through region 13. And although the only four schools that are required to go through teal be in person for the meetings and trainings are um two of our elementary schools and two of our middle schools, we are using that as the foundation for every school in the district because we know that it is a great resource and so we don't want to just limit it to those four schools where it's required when we have other schools that will also greatly benefit from the work that comes through the Texas Instructional Leadership and Region 13. And you know, where else are we going to be able to easily get a grant that's going to cover the the the uh cost that's
085associated with this type of professional development? Additional questions, Mr. Mclofflin? No. Anybody else? Thank you very much. Thank you. Next up is the end of the year staff report. Good evening school board members. Thank you. Um that we would like to share with you. I think our end of the year report is in your board book. Um, so this year we were at we updated our wellness plan and I think y'all did that approval in the fall. We also followed up in doing some objectives and met um with community leaders to go over that wellness plan and how to implement some things. We also uh received the fitness gram funding for our district and we implemented the fitness gram testing across the elementary campuses. um Bario Prescato the fitness trail around this educational compound area.
086Um we went out and sought funding. We received the funding. It is very exciting that this is the week the equipment is supposed to be on our premise. Um and then of course installation following shortly. We look to have um the dedication combined with maybe central office or some other um plans, but we'll get that information out to y'all. Um we also have been very excited about um activities that are going on in our social emotional learning with Adriana Go and her team. They've done a great deal of work and have implemented some considerable events including some involvement with families we're very proud of. Later you'll approve our um recommendation for our Shack membership. Uh we will continue to maintain a higher than 50% ratio of parent involvement. We have one new parent and one
087old parent that left. um we will have 13 slots. We have a maximum of 15. We did have some other candidates that applied but they were not parents and it would have break in our ratio capacity. So that was why the recommendations are that way. Um we are very fortunate that we have got some great parents that have some other professional careers. Our medical director, Dr. Julia Fischer, is a parent also, so we get to count her as well as being, you know, the medical director, too. Um, we have two nurses and we have a the new member that is a parent is also a professor at Texas State University. Um, so we'll you'll approve those later in the meeting. Um, and then for the next year, we're looking at continuing to address mental health
088issues. Uh, monitoring and preparing what's coming out of the 89th legislative session. It's closed now. um all our lobbyists with health services isn't indicating that Shaq's going to have anything significant like we saw several years ago. Um but we'll still be watching that for the next 30 to 60 days to see what comes out if we have anything we need to address and we'll be ready to do that right away in August. Uh we're monitoring the wellness plan and implement and its implementation. We also will do the dedication of the bario piscato and we will also um be exploring and we've been working on it. We've started some very preliminary work on expanding that trail or even having a trail over in the Menddees neighborhood area. Any questions? Any questions from the board? Thank you
089very much. Next, we'll move into operations in the construction update. Okay. Good evening, board president Holly, board of trustees, Dr. Cardona. I'm going to provide y'all a very brief u construction update. I can tell you that it's a busy summer uh with we have broken ground on all of our 2023 bond projects except for the natiatorum and we have a preconstruction meeting next Wednesday for the natiatorum. So we'll be breaking ground on that project. Uh just the recap of all the projects those highlighted in green as you see on your screen or in your board book have all um been completed. uh the other projects that are still pending. Um we have received all the approvals from y'all the school board and we also have issued notice to proceeds to all the contractors uh related
090to those projects. So now we're going to look at specific projects and I'll talk more about the mares here uh shortly. Uh the Mendes obviously if you've been by there you've seen a lot of activity. A lot of the site work has started at Mendes. uh the middle school renovations which include the Miller athletics and the good goodn night fine arts and courtyard. We're pushing really hard on Miller athletics. I don't feel as good about that one as I do about good night, but I'm confident that we'll have something for the students when they get back. Uh Goodn Night is in good shape. Um, the goodn night band hall is still set to be completed in November of 2025, but the current band hall is under renovation right now, and that looks to be done
091before students return on August 13th. Uh, the high school, uh, this rain has certainly impacted a lot of the utility site work that's going on, but we're still on track to finish um before August 1st. And also the administration renovation. Um that was a short window to work in once school let out. We were in there demoing and we look to have that done before August 1st before uh teachers come back. I said maybe I said students earlier but it's actually teachers come back on August 1st. So we have hope to have the admin back in their space uh before August 1st. Uh the phase two and phase three of the high school that's later starting uh later this year. And of course the natiatorum like I just said the uh pre construction kickoff meeting
092is set for next Wednesday the 25th. Uh the marquee project. So we are currently have uh four uh zoning variances that we've requested from the city uh for Crockett, Hernandez, Miller and Buoie. There's a city ordinance or a development code that states that no LED sign is allowed within 350 ft of a residential district and then another code that says that no um LED sign can be on on a on the property line. Uh, so these two, Crockett and Hernandez, we actually had the first hearing on May 15th, which I attended and there were only four members that showed up and they were split on their vote. Two of them wanted to approve the variance and two of them did not. So that got pushed to they didn't have a meeting in June, so that
093got pushed to July uh 19th, which we'll be at. and then also Miller and Buoie um because they also fall within those um those variances. Those will be heard at the July 19th meeting as well. Uh and then of course our request or our variance uh because several two of these will actually sit on our property line and then one of them is within 28 ft from a residential district. And the idea here was to use the existing marquees and then simply just replace the old style of spelling out the words with the new nice LED sign. Uh campus is under review. The high school and bond and prek are still under review. Uh the high school is under review because we want a larger sign there. It's a bigger property. So we're trying to
094replace the existing one with something and with something different, something larger, uh something more impressive. And then the ones that have been approved which will have completed by the start of school are Travis and Goodnight. So I do have some pictures for y'all. Um once again these pictures were taken um because of the timeline to get the board book in. They were taken a while ago about probably about 10 days ago and a lot has happened in 10 days in construction. So that was Mendes. Just a brief look at Mendes and the site work being done there. Um the next slides or the next pictures are the Miller wait room to the left and then also to the right looking at it from the parking lot. Um and then the entrance to the new entrance
095to the gym will be on the left and then the foyer uh that'll be connecting the entrance all the way down to the weight room and then you'll have your entrances into the existing gyms at that point. uh that shows you a sign of the bleacher or a picture of the the uh bleachers being demoed. That is completely demoed at this point. And then the picture on the right is the existing locker rooms that those walls are already up. A lot of plumbing has been done already. Goodn night middle school. Um that is the blackbox. The picture on the left is a black box that'll be extended out into the courtyard. and then the renovations that have started on the existing band hall uh which will be done like I said before students return. And
096then these two pictures are not in your board book, but we took this aerial photo of the high school. Uh that's the band pad that's going to be um moved and constructed. It's going to run parallel to uh Rattler Road. a lot of the site work, the utility work that's being done. On the right of that photo, you can see some of the drainage work that's being done. And then that's the admin rena uh as of probably about four or five days ago. So, still a lot of work to do, but we're confident we're going to have it done. And I think that's all I have for you. Any questions? Questions for Mr. Sandaval? Thank you very much. I know it's um a very busy summer and I appreciate the rerouting of the traffic at
097the high school for all of the activities going on there. Um it actually flows really well considering how limited it is. So, thank you. Any other? All right. Um at this point, I would like to ask uh for a motion to move into executive session as authorized by sections 551.071 and 551.074 074 of the Texas Education Code and 551.076 of the Texas Government Code in order to consult with the attorney regarding legal issues pertaining to possible claims and litigation involving student social media usage against social media companies and consideration of contingency fee legal service agreement with JCA Law PLLC and Guerrra LLP. So moved. Motion made and seconded. All in favor, please raise your hand. I cannot see the zoom vote, but we carry on the dis five. So, we'll move in. Thank you. 7:46.
098We're reconvening in open session. Uh we will move now into the approval of the consent agenda items. Oh, sorry. I skipped over because I have lots of notes written. I just skipped over the finance of public notice of the federal grant applications, please. Okay. Good evening, uh, board president Holly, board members, and Dr. Cardona. On page 110 of your board book, we have the public notice of federal grant applications. Uh, so this is in compliance with board policy, CBB, and CB local and our government code 21105.058. uh we have to hold a public meeting to provide notice of the federal grants that San Marcus CIST will apply for during the 202526 school year and to allow for any public input. Uh so Mr. David Underwood who oversees our federal programs is going to assist in
099providing that additional information on each grant and the grants for the upcoming school year. Thank you. So, San Marcus ISD is entitled uh to apply for the following ESSA or Every Student Succeeds Act grants. Uh title one, this grant is primarily utilized to support campus interventions for students that are struggling. And then title two is used to support effective instruction uh which includes professional development for staff. Title three, this grant is utilized to support instruction for emerging bilingual students. Title four is funding to improve school safety on campuses, counseling, and mental health programs. And then the 2025 uh Perkins grant, that one funds career and technical education. And then B grant, which supports special education services. I want to note that the dates in the board book uh were listed incorrectly as 2425. And so
100for these grants, we did correct those for the slides that are being presented this evening as 2526. In addition, we were made aware of another grant opportunity since the board book was provided and it has been added onto this slide as well. The 21st century community learning centers grant cycle 13 is a grant that supports the creation of community learning centers that provide academic enrichment opportunities during the non-school hours for children, particularly students who attend high poverty and low performing schools. And so we have added that one here for public notice. So at this time uh we want to allow time for any public comment if there are any. Seeing that there are none, that completes this presentation. Thank you. Now, is there a motion to move uh for the consent agenda items A through
101G as listed in the agenda? Motion made. Seconded by Miss Vapondo. Any questions about the consent agenda items. Um there are a couple spelling mistakes on the uh meeting from June 2nd. Uh Mr. Great House's first name is spelled incorrectly and uh Pastor Bower Kemper's last name is spelled incorrectly. They're right at the top. Oh, it's okay. So, we will approve the consent agenda with the spelling errors amended. Missy, I have a question. Can you hear me? Yeah, go ahead. Um, as to the GT plan, I saw the highlight slides, but I at least in my board book, I didn't see the the plan as modified. Was that available to the other trustees? And maybe I just missed it. Yeah, I think it was I saw the presentation and I saw the handbook, but I'm
102not sure that there was a plan included. Mr. Underwood, do you want to address that? So no plan other than that of the handbook itself to be uh approved once more by the board that was amended in regards as as a result of us transitioning from the seven to the four teachers and that needed to amend our our programming in addition to any TEA state planning pieces that needed required it to be amended as well. Maybe if that could just Yeah, maybe if that could just be broken out, I can vote against it um on principle of I can't approve a plan I haven't seen and otherwise I'll support the rest of the consent items. Yeah, there's no there's no plan, Mr. Mclofflin. It is just the handbook itself that was meant to be approved.
103Okay. Well, hold on. Let me catch up then. One second, Madam President. Okay, that resolves my question. Thank you. Yes, sir. Okay. So, Mr. Mclofflin, would you like us to request a plan? No, I mean it it says that we're only voting on the handbook and I guess that was contained in these slides. That's just all there is to it. Um, so no, I don't you can leave it in among the consent agenda items. It's fine. Okay. Any other questions? Seeing none, all in favor of the consent agenda items as discussed, please raise your hand. That motion carries 70. The next item are the items for action for the board. First, communication, consideration, and possible approval of rescending the previously approved 2025 2026 school calendar and the attending consideration approval of the updated 2025 2026
104school calendar. Mr. Fernandez. Yes. Uh board of trustees, this change is coming with Texas State University communicating they have set their spring break for the next three years. And so by adjusting our calendar, what we'll do is align our spring break with Texas State. And am I correct in assuming that this would then put um the I35 corridor in alignment so that the schools in Hayes and KL and UT would all have the same spring break and alleviate the issues that we've been having where staff some staff people and some children are not on the same spring break. So yes and no. The alignment will stop with us. Anything south of us will not align with the 35 corridor. So Hayes, UT, Texas State and ourselves will align. Kau Bronul will not align. So Texas
105State did reach out to those two school districts and they asked them if they could uh do what we're doing, resend their vote and vote on a new calendar. Uh they weren't as successful, but they are asking them to adjust it for future years. Okay. And so this will put us in alignment with Texas State for the next three years. Uh so we only adopt one at a time, but what we can possibly look into next year is adopting for the next two years. And so we can just set our next three calendars. Any other questions? All right, we'll take uh item A1, consideration of possible approval of rescending the previously approved 2025 2026 school calendar. Is there a motion? So moved. Motion made by Miss Kaine. A second. Seconded by Mr. Ardondo. Discussion. All
106in favor, please raise your hand. Oh, did you have a question? I had a comment. I can make it. I can do it after the vote. Okay. All in favor, please raise your hand. opposed. That motion is 61. Madame President, if I can just have a moment uh to explain since I wasn't here for the original calendar. Can you hear me? Okay. Um the spring break alignment makes sense to me, but here I understood we were approving u the calendar in whole and I would have never supported it coming back this early in August. So that was why I voted against it. That's all. Thanks. And the next item is to consider approval of the updated 2025 2026 school calendar. So moved. Motion by by Mr. Arundo, seconded by Miss Kane. Any questions or discussion?
107All in favor, please raise your hand. All opposed. That motion is 61 and we will advertise this and communicate it widely so that families are well aware of the changes that have been made and yeah so when Texas State made us aware of this change we automatically already posted it on our website with the disclaimer right in front of you. So Texas State University informed SM SMCISC that their spring break will take place on March 16th to the 20th. On June 16th, SMCISC board of trustees will vote to amend the current approved calendar to align our spring break with Texas State University. Great. So we'll send this out again. Okay. And just highlighting the fact that that's the only thing that's changed though. Absolutely. Super. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Uh the next item is the discussion
108and possible action to approve the Guadalupe appraisal district board of directors resolution authorizing the purchase and renovation of real estate located at 216 East College Street, Sigin, Texas. Is there a motion? I'll move. Miss Kane, is there a second? I have a question. I will second it for the purposes of discussion. Um and Miss Vipondo, your question is why? So I think that this is the the presentation that we received earlier in the evening um from the chairman of the appraisal district who discussed with us the need for the new appraisal facilities in Sigin to serve Guadalupe County. Um, and because we receive tax monies from Guadalupe County, we would then be liable for part of the expenses and thus need to approve such expenditure. That's my understanding. Do I have that right? I know
109Miss Gunther has been working on this with Guadalupe County. Yes. And we contribute to voting for their board of directors or whatever that is. Right. So, we have representation because we receive tax correct returns from Guadalupe County taxpayers. Um, okay. So, there are other questions or discussion on this item? Seeing none, all in favor of the uh approval of the Guadalupe appraisal district board of directors resolution authorizing the purchase and renovation of real estate located at 216 East College Street, Sigin, Texas. All in favor, please raise your hand. opposed. That motion is 52. And the next item is the consider approval of the 2025 2026 board meeting calendar. And that was presented to us in the board book. Is there a motion on this item? Motion to approve by Miss Kaine. Second from Miss Vapondo.
110Any questions about the board meeting calendar? Yes, I have a question. Please go ahead. So, we when we first started doing agenda prep meetings, we did them at the lunch hour and um they were generally pretty quick. uh we would you know be like 30 minutes and it seems like in the my time away from the board they became almost like a second full meeting um often with action items and and other things and my at least my personal preference would be to not have two action item related meetings in any given month um unless there was an emergency. Um what is that something that Miss Hoy as you prepared this calendar you looked at is the status of that agenda prep meeting or is there a reason that it has to be the way
111what it's become? So we moved it from the noon meeting to the evening meeting because it uh the majority of board members at the time felt that their professional responsibilities would make their attendance at that meeting more possible if it were in the evening rather than in the middle of the day. Um I'm open to whatever I at the will of the board. We also have tried very hard to restrict that meeting to only being agenda prep or budget workshops to not being voting voting items. I'm very reluctant to vote on anything in that meeting because it is not supposed to be a voting meeting. I know that last month we had to because of some deadlines. Um but generally speaking, that is not the operating procedure for the agenda prep meeting. Um, so I'm
112willing to if there's interest from the board in moving it to a noon meeting and if that would be able, but I want to make sure that the most people can be there as possible. Um, Mr. Ardondo, do you have a comment? Uh, thank you, President Hollyy. I agree with Mr. Mclofflin. Although I appreciate getting presentations in advance during an agenda preparation meeting, I don't believe that was ever the original intent. And so turning an agenda preparation meeting into like a three-hour meeting, then let's just go ahead and have two meetings a month, right? If we're going to start doing that. Um, so whatever we can do, if it's during the lunch hour, I think that sets guard rails to limit the time that we're here on those Monday meetings. But okay, I'm fine with
113that. I think that we'll then have to we've also been using that agenda prep evening time to have the budget workshops. Um, so we'd previously sometimes had budget workshops on Saturday mornings and at other various times if we're going to move away from holding that Monday night, we'll have to when we get into the budget season, which will probably come early in the fall, um, have to keep that in mind. But other thoughts? I'm not strictly opposed to moving to a noon meeting. Um, I will say I am concerned about those of us who have 1 hour. what happens if it needs an hour and 10 minutes, we lose several people, we lo, you know, we're not able to stick around for that time. Um, if there's a way to ensure that we can do
114a meeting in an hour, I'm more than happy to move in that direction, but I'm a little concerned that we will not be able to stick to that and we will lose the full board. Yeah. And for myself, I'm not uh my job is not located here in San Marcus, so I would have to be attending those via Zoom only um for the foreseeable future. May I speak? Yes, please. Since we originally started it at noon, the idea was to keep it short, review the agenda, and that was pretty much it. We have gotten into full-blown meetings just about, and I I tend to agree with Mr. Mcofflin and Mr. Ardondo on that count. But I also understand that the people that are working, for example, if you're working in Austin or whether you're working
115in San Marcus, you'd almost have to be on a Zoomin situation and and it would make us keep it a shorter meeting because we have we give ourselves that restriction. I think that that's something that either we agree to to keep it for a short period of time where those people that are working can just zoom in, review the agenda, which was the original purpose, and take items or add items to it, but not have a voting agenda. I I agree with the the men on that, Mr. Ardanda. Yeah. My last comment as as we flush this out is obviously anytime that we convene it takes a lot of resources to be here. I mean, God help us if we calculate like salary of everyone who's in the room right now. And when these meetings
116do turn into three, four hourong productions, that's a lot of staff time to be here. Um, so maybe it's an accountability thing on our part that we have these meetings only an hour. you know, as long as four of us are here, a number of us can zoom in. If other people have professional obligations, um I want to be respectful of that as well. And and I think even for me personally, it has become I have to come to agenda preparation meetings because we're doing like other things, right? But if it's a meat and potatoes, here's what's on the agenda. We go through the nine items. We add things if necessary. And then we get out of here. Maybe it isn't so mission critical that everybody be here physically for that exercise because it's just
117kind of a matterof fact thing. So that's all I got. Please. I mean, we could explore the option of cabinet meets with the three officers and then the officers can meet like if you'all have agenda items and we meet just for an hour and then you all spread the information out and you give us back the feedback and then still hold us to the timelines of getting all the the things together. I mean that way you're not violating TOMA and we can work around y'all's schedule. It doesn't necessarily have to be on that Monday if it's the officers meeting with cabinet members to develop and ask questions and y'all are the liaison. I think we all trust each other enough that we're going to take care of business and it'll keep us from putting agenda
118items on where we have to vote. I mean there's some every now and then odd things that happen but just a suggestion. I'm open to that. Although I will say that I have appreciated having the open agenda um because I think sometimes it brings forth things that hadn't occurred to me that I um am interested in knowing more about. Um so I think that it does serve a good purpose in terms of transparency. Um it's been very constructive but I I understand the point of not overloading it. Um, so I am immuneable to moving on to Mondays at noon. I want to make sure though that our newly elected secretary uh that doesn't impose an undue hardship on you because uh and like I said, as long as I'm a able to attend that by
119Zoom, it's not a problem. Um, but I cannot physically be here on at at noon on any day of the week, unfortunately, now that our schedules have changed back to Monday through Friday. Um, so so then maybe we can have an amended motion to move the count to change on the calendar that the agenda preps will be moved to the same days but at Mondays at noon. Um, and at least we will start in August with that plan and see how it goes for a few months and if we need to make changes, we can do so at that point. Does that sound demeanable to everybody? Did I make that motion to begin with? I'm willing to amend my motion if so. Sorry, John. It missed you. Uh, I was It's kind of If Miss
120Kane can amend her motion. I was going to offer to make an amendment, but if she amends her motion, it's not necessary for me. I would like to amend my motion to approve the board meeting calendar as proposed with the first Monday meeting changing to noon. Okay. And the second Miss Vapondo, we're good. Okay. Any other questions, comments? All in favor, please raise your hand. That motion is 70. Thank you. And next is the consideration and approval of the SMCISD school health advisory council end of 202425 reports and nominations for the school board report and nominations for the school oh approval for shack membership 2025 2027 for two-year terms. So moved. Motion made by Mr. Ardondo seconded by Miss Vapondo. Are there any questions on this issue? Seeing none, all in favor, go ahead. I
121just had one quick question. I don't know if Miss Vogel is still here. Um, I know that there's a grant through Texas State University about like fentanyl education and awareness. I didn't see any mention of that in the plan. If I missed it, I know that they are working in HCISD, dripping, and Wimberly. Are we in contact with those individuals? And what is the status on that? But right, there you go. Um, so yeah, the FESA program is what you're referencing. Um, I know for July, Shaq did not meet. We were wanting to get that approved uh as far as the curriculum is concerned. So, we're excited to start um this upcoming school year. So, we are in contact. We're super excited because we get to work with them along with Senator and some of
122our other uh partners that we have through CIS to just really focus on youth substance abuse. Awesome. Thank you. Any other questions? Seeing none, all in favor, please raise your hand. That motion is 70. The next item is the consideration of approval of city of San Marcus detention water quality inspection access easement at Felipe Raina SMCD administration building. So moved. Madam, who? Motion made. Motion seconded. No, I don't think that's what he second. Go ahead, Mr. Mclofflin. Yeah, I just I'm concerned from the construction presentation that that we're getting so little support from the city of San Marcus on variance requests and other things we need. Um I'm I'm not sure why we're moving forward an item that appears to be something they want um when they don't seem to show the same regard for
123for our needs. I tend to share Mr. Gothin's uh perspective on this regretfully at the moment and so I would move that we table this item until August unless there's a reason. I'll withdraw my motion. Mr. Sandival, the the only challenge with that because it is city code. The only challenge is they'll hold up the certificate of occupancy. They will not grant that until we give them the easements that they require. And that one along with the next one is the sidewalk easement which is both pertain to this building right here. Um kick us out. I don't think they'll kick us out. So, does that incur additional expense? It it we incurred additional expense by having to construct the pond and the sidewalk. Uh but there's no additional expense in getting that certificate of occupancy.
124Um we just it just delays getting it for if we table it till August. So, we've already built the sidewalk, we've already built the detention pond. We just need to officially say that we've built them and that the city owns them and we give them the detention pond easement is for the purposes of inspection when they go and they inspect these detention ponds. They need access to it and then the sidewalk because it is built on city property. Uh we had to move it onto our property. Excuse me. We had to move it onto our property because of the texttop drainage ditch that they they constructed at the same time. So it's I mean so even if we don't approve it, there's really no consequence. We'll they'll just hold up our certificate of occupancies for
125the for the building which we have it already. It's just the final final co as we call it. Um perhaps then there is then I would change my mind and I would um go ahead and move to approve these. But I would like to make sure that we are trying to have a constructive conversation with whomever we need to have the constructive conversation with at city hall to expedite all of the projects that our voters have approved and which our students and teachers are eagerly anticipating as well as our parents, our community members. Um, if that means that we need to have a delegation go to planning and zoning to discuss the safety needs around the LED uh, mares or what have you, I think that we need to do that sooner than later because
126it doesn't seem like we're all on the same page. I do say that Mr. Sandival's been I mean, we meet with them a lot and we are always professional with them. We have express expressed very themed concerns for the past nine years. And yeah, maybe it is time for y'all to get involved as elected officials because we have voiced the same. It's over and over again. And then you hear from the other side that we're holding up we're holding hostage projects and we're not. It's always seems to be one-sided. So, Mr. Aronda, your motion is standing. I withdrew my motion. You withdrew your motion. Okay. Would you like to make another motion or um I mean I'm like on the fence of a motion to deny, but I don't know where the rest of my
127colleagues are on that. Um I agree with Dr. Cardona. I know we have like the core four once upon a time the board president vice president met with like the mayor and deputy mayor pro Tam but it just seems like every other day there's some type of friction between the city of San Marcus and San Marcus ISD um and like denying our LED signs like there are a lot of four-letter words I wanted to say on camera and off when staff told me about that like I just don't understand what what where this is getting lost in translation, right? Um so, okay. Yeah. Any other thoughts? Um, I would be happy to convene with the administration and the officers to discuss uh some communication and then bring it back to the board. Um, I'm also
128happy to reach out if the board would so like me to do that on behalf of the board to leadership at the city and see if maybe we can look toward a joint meeting or um, whatever we need to do to happy to have you all show up to the next meeting we have with the mayor and all the assistant city managers. We can invite you. I'm happy to do that. I I want to make sure that the board would be okay with that. I don't want to step out without sanction of my colleagues. Uh Mr. Ardondo, uh several years ago, there was a joint meeting between the seven elected school board trustees and the administration and like the mayor and city council and their city leadership. I mean, if you can make that happen,
129giddy up. I would love to see that happen. I think that maybe we should try to aim for something in late August or early September. I think that that would be seemingly enough time. Um, okay. So, in lie then of any further conversation or anybody wanting to make a motion on this item? I think that do I need to move to table it or do we just not take action? Does anybody have a feeling on that? I think you can just pull it as presiding officer since no one made a motion to deny or a motion to grant. Okay, I'm going to close item D1 and then I'm going to offer up the consideration approval of city of San Marcus public sidewalk easement at Felipe Rea SMCSD administration building. Is there a motion on that
130item? [Music] I think it's really tied to the first one. Yeah. So, I think we need to take them to I mean my my my feeling would be we either move on both or none. So, okay. Um seeing none then we will close that item and move into uh letter E procurement consideration of possible action regarding delegation of authority to the superintendent or designate to initiate the process to negotiate and execute anou with an afterchool program for the purpose of providing services to parents and students. So Mr. Alvarez has been pretty busy with the budget so I thought I'd help him out with this one. uh after school program obviously sunset they let us know last day of school or into the the first week of June that they would not be returning and I
131want to give a lot of credit to Mr. Alvarez, he set up three meetings with three different companies and we got three different quotes and uh we can share with you all that, you know, we selected a group that is going to provide an after school program. They've been around for 45 years and they're going to offer rates comparable to what Sunset offer and may even we we're going to go back and bargain a little bit and try to get them even down a little more. Uh but they our families will not be paying more uh next school year. And the three different programs, one is called Skyhawks, that's the one that's been around 45 years. YMCA, their rates came back pretty high. Um, but we are going to lean on them. Uh, try to
132create a partnership especially with the natiatorum coming our way in the next year or two or I won't speak on Mr. Sandaval's projects. Um, and then the third was uh Kinder Care and the their program was called Champions. And so those were the three companies that we we met with. They all have great systems, great curriculums, but at at the end of the day, we want to offer the best pricing for our families. Is there a motion on this item? Motion made by Miss Kaine. I'll second. Seconded by Miss Pondo. Are there questions? This will continue to be in all the same schools that it previously was, correct? Yes. Which is all the elementaryaries in Bonum. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Eight campuses. We had roughly around 400 students in the program last year and so that
133was something we told every program that they must be able to educate anywhere from three to our fifth grade. All in favor, please raise your hand. Thank you very much. We appreciate your work on this especially doing it so quickly so that there's no gap in service for our families. 70. Uh the next issue is the consideration and possible sorry we got Margie seconded. Yeah. Consideration and possible action regarding the ranking selection of contractors for a mass notification system including the possible delegation of authority to the superintendent or designate to negotiate and execute a contract. Good evening President Hollyy members of the board Dr. Cardona. My name is Greg Huben, executive director of technology. So, I'll just provide just a little bit of uh detail for this action item that's on page 335 of your
134board book. Um, as as it states in your board book, uh, Alyssa's law, which was established uh by Senate Bill 838, uh, states that each school district shall provide each classroom in the district with silent panic alert technology that allows for immediate contact with district or school emergency services and emergency service agencies, law enforcement agencies, health departments, and fire departments. So in order to determine the best way to be compliant with that that was actually uh provided operational benefit to the district. Um it was a collaborative effort between the technology department safety department maintenance as well as finance. Uh we did gather a group of stakeholders to determine what the silent panic alert technology requirements should be. Those stakeholders included uh teachers, campus administrators, department heads, cabinet members. And then with those requirements, we did
135engage with True North Consulting Group to write the RFP specifications uh needed to issue the request for proposals. We issued that early May and it closed June the 9th and we were still scoring them uh on June the 12th, which is why it's not in your board book. So that's why I'm providing a little bit of extra detail here. We did rank all the qualified bids on eight criteria with price being the most heavily weighted criteria and unanimously the scoring committee uh selected Walker Engineering as the highest scoring bidder. Um their solution will largely depend on a uh teleor branded uh public address and announcement system but more importantly is it will be tightly integrated with the raptor emergency management suite which we now embrace. Uh so pending your questions, the administration seeks your approval
136of the recommendation that Walker Engineering provides the best value for the district and authorization for the superintendent or designate to finalize and execute a final contract. Thank you. Can you explain in layman's terms like what does that look like in a classroom? So there's a lot of ways that you can do this and unfortunately TEA doesn't give you know just strong guidelines saying this is exactly the way you'll go about it. So that's why we met with the district stakeholders. So in our situation, we've opted to actually have a true physical button on on the hall, excuse me, on the wall in the classroom. It'll be covered so it won't be an accidental press, but depending when you press that, we can take a number of different actions. It's it's we can determine what those
137are. The current momentum is to issue a hold and to uh announce to a group of campus response team members precisely where that button was pressed so that they can they can go evaluate what's happening and then very quickly escalate that to contact first responders if necessary. But in a nutshell, that's kind of what we're we're talking about. There's a lot of other integrations that may happen. Could be announcements on the PA system. It could be all of the the the displays and digital signage in the campuses being taken over uh doors locking etc. But the heart of it is the process is what I explained. Okay. And then if we approve this tonight um when would it be implemented and when would staff be trained? It will be a phased implementation. Um that should
138be finished by August of 2026. Is there a motion on this item? Motion to approve. Miss Kaine approved seconded by Mr. Ardondo. Are there questions? Mr. Ardondo. Thank you. I just had one quick question. You talked about a number of I guess in the menu of of things that where it can be scaled up. Is that separate from this contract if we said you know during a situation or a hold the you know projector the screens would give information or LED signage or like ribbon board in the hallway would say seek shelter whatever that looks like. Is that separate from this if we were to go in that direction? Yes and yes and no. Basically the this particular contract will be for the standardization of all of our announcement systems across the campuses because currently
139we have multiple different brands of multiple different ages. Uh but that standardization and the upgrade will give us the capability of integrating what we can't do now is integrating with Raptor. Uh Raptor is the emergency management suite that we we use now. uh you may be have heard us talk about navigate 360 in the past. Uh but once that integration happens, Raptor is the orchestrator then that causes all these other things to happen. So that full integration is part of the contract. We currently own uh the Raptor software and we're getting that configured. So to answer your question, um the integration with Raptor is part of this contract. the other components we'll we'll be you know putting in place with different mech mechanisms like we have the displays currently but we may add a few
140more displays districtwide. Um so there are other pieces to it but the contract this particular contract is for that standardization and integration. Any other questions? Seeing none all in favor please raise your hand. That motion is 70. Thanks for all your work on that. And the next item is uh consideration of possible action to adopt the 2025 2026 budget. We received that presentation earlier in the evening. Is there a motion on this item? I move that we approve option two which includes the increased health insurance costs. Motion made for option two. Is there a second? I'll second seconded made by Miss Kane, seconded by Mr. Ardondo. Any questions or discussion? I'll just make a comment that we had many conversations about this particular issue, which is the only difference between the two options, and heard
141repeatedly the importance of not adding additional cost to our staff and faculty when we're already not doing raises and we've made cuts. Any other questions? Miss Miss Ku, I agree that it's important that we provide this additional money for our employees. That's it. Yeah, Miss President Holly just briefly Mclofflin. So, as between the options, I I I agree with my colleagues, but I'm going to vote against this on alternate grounds. I just didn't want it to be misinterpreted. Um, but I I think it would be good to look at hopefully next year if we're able to provide across the board raises and have the revenue to do that. Uh, getting to a point where we don't have to do this lock step increase in health every year and allow some of that burden to shift
142onto the staff, some limited amount. But it seems like a year when we're uh when they're not seeing any when a lot of them are not seeing any increase would be a bad choice of year to do that. And I think that we will have to in August um or September address a potential budget amendment based on what comes through the final step like state legislature numbers and requirements for regarding increases or no increases. And so we'll now we're sort of pushing that off at the moment while we adopt this budget and that'll have to come back to us in an amendment once we understand what that looks like exactly. Mr. Ardondo, uh, thank you for saying that, President Holly. I was going to ask staff if you could explain like what this vote means
143tonight and by statute we have to approve something, right? But then obviously staff for like teachers isn't included. So can you Thank you. Yes. So tonight, the two budgets that you have in front of you do not include any of the revisions for House Bill Two. So none of the increases. We based all of these budgets on our current pay scale. So there's no increases to any of that. Um so our plan is to come back in August uh to add uh for all of those approved um items for House Bill 2, which include the teacher pay uh payraises. Um, Miss Manos can speak a little bit more about what those numbers look like and who would qualify. So, for our um three-year and fouryear, that is the 2500 that is statemandated and then five-year
144um and beyond, it's going to be the $5,000 mandate. Um, and we are currently waiting on our um, TASBY pay maintenance files to be provided after um, all of these updates and they've already um, started building those step schedules and so we will bring that back to you in August. Um, and any other recommendations any other questions, discussion? CNN is go ahead. I just had one question and I don't know if my colleagues can refresh my memory. Had we taken a vote of not giving payraises or was that just like a mutually agreed upon thing that we didn't ask staff to like build a budget with pay raises for other employees? We have not voted. We agreed that we were going to wait until we saw what happened with the legislature. Um because in the
145past we've had the issue where we approved something prior to the legislature approving something and then what we approved didn't meet out with the legislaturator's directive and so we've had to gone back and not only revise it but also add to it which put us in is part of the reason we have the budgets we have honestly. Um so that's my recollection of where we're at. So that's my recollection as well and you know I don't know what it would look like procedurally but I think it is important for us to as a board decide like hourly employees you're not getting a raise this year right by voted the board. Um but that's just me. I mean, I I want staff to entertain a dollar per hour increase for hourly staff, but I think that
146would go over like a lead balloon, but because right now we haven't decided, right? We haven't formalized and communicated with staff that we're not giving raises to hourly employees. We've gone through a budget exercise and that is like a foregone conclusion, but the board hasn't said like we are taking no action on staff raises for either administrators or otherwise either, right? So, I just want us to decide that in some formal capacity. I mean, that's what I was assuming that we would take up in August when we know the full extent of the state legislature monies and what that is going to look like in terms of the ramifications for our budget, for our obligations, for our bottom line. I mean, we heard recently that that even with the state legislature approving the monies, it
147looks like we may still lose another quarter of a million dollars because of the mandates that are coming through with that money. So, I think the board will have to discuss in total in August what our compensation package looks like. And um there are some alternate uh staffing um dollars that supplemental funds that uh will be included. And so what that bottom line number looks like after we pull teachers out um we can provide that to you all and that may be a flat amount um that's going to be recommended. So, we'll be able to give y'all more information after we collaborate um with Mo Casey and then um with other school districts and then really just identifying how we can use this money. It's a lot of unknowns at this point. So, we are
148still working with our partners to understand the the bill. Mr. Adava. Uh thank you, President Holly. But just to clarify, Miss Moz, when we talk about a flat amount of funding, we're not saying like a dollar per hour. We're talking about like $25 per employee, correct? Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. Yeah, the state funding situation is grim. I think we need to be realistic about that. And if the board is going to do something above and beyond what the very limited amounts that we're going to receive from the state, it will uh further our budget issues. I mean, that's just the reality of where we're at. So, but I agree with you that we need to be clear about that and transparent. I just don't think that we can do that tonight. I don't think
149we have the relevant information, but we should have that discussion openly and transparently with our constituents in August. Any other questions? All in favor of the motion to approve option two of the budget as proposed? Raise your hand. All opposed. That motion carries 61. And now I would request that we move uh into close session as authorized by sections 551.071 and 551.074 of the Texas Education Code and 551.076 of the Texas Government Code for discussion regarding the superintendent's evaluation and for deliberation regarding safety and security including safety personnel systems, infrastructure andor devices. Is there a motion? So moved. Motion made by Mr. Mclofflin, seconded by Mr. Arando. All in favor to move into executive session, please raise your hand. Thank you. All right, we're reconvening and now in open session. It is 9:32. Um and
150we are recommitting to take action on uh the presentation discussion and possible action regarding adoption of a resolution approving a contingency fee legal services agreement with JCA Law PLLC and Guerrero LLP and finding the need for submission of the contingency fee legal services agreement to the Texas Attorney General for approval and request for expedited review and consideration. Is there a motion, Mr. Ardondo? Uh, thank you, President Hollyy. I move that the board of trustees adopt a resolution as presented approving a contingency fee legal services agreement with JCA Law PLLC and Gera LLP that includes the findings required by Texas Government Code 2254 subchapter C that are needed for submission of the contingency fee legal services agreement to the Texas Attorney General for approval and request for expedited review and consideration. Is there a second? I
151second. Motion made, seconded by Miss Via Panda. Are there any questions or discussion? Seeing none, all in favor, please raise your hand. Opposed. Mr. McGloin, I can't tell where your hand is. Sorry. Are you opposed? You're not in the screen. Can you hear me? I can't I can't tell if you're voting up or down. Me? You. What was just I'm I'm sorry. I I had some trouble logging into the audio. What was the motion? It was the motion to proceed with the lawsuit as presented. Oh, I'm fine with it. Yes. For Okay. So, that motion carries 70. Uh and then I will entertain a motion to adjurnn. Well, I have two motions for two lawsuits. Go ahead. Yeah. Say what? I have one for the vape pinning and then one for social media. We only
152did the first one which was for the vape. I didn't think we had that one. I think it's two separate for the same. It's the same because Yeah, the vaping's closed. This is for the submitting the documents to the AG. Is that what that first one's for? And then the second one is for the social media. Yeah. Okay. Right. Okay. Go ahead. The second. Sorry. Thank you, President Holy. I move that the board of trustees adopt and approve entering into a contingency fee legal services agreement with JCA Law PLLC and Gera LLP and authorize the board president to execute such an agreement for the purposes of pursuing litigation and cause of action the potential recovery of damages against social media companies resulting from student social media usage. Motion made and seconded. Any questions? All in
153favor, please raise your hand. Mr. Ardondo, are you voting? Oh, yeah. That motion also carries 70. So, we will proceed with that process. Now, is there a motion to adjurnn? So, move made by Miss Kane, seconded by Mr. Ardondo. All in favor, please raise your hand. Thanks everybody. We'll see you at the agenda prep meeting at noon on the first Monday of August. Enjoy Disneyland. Have a good evening.