001At 6:00 p.m., this meeting of the Sigin Independent School District has been duly called and notice of this meeting has been posted in accordance with the Texas Open Meetings Act, section 551.043 of the Texas Government Code. The Sig Board of Trustees designates a time for audience participation at the beginning of each meeting to hear persons who desire to make comments in accordance with board policy BED local. Those wishing to speak sign up before the meeting begins stating the concern or noting the agenda item they wish to address. Audience participation is limited to five minutes. The board shall not deliberate any subject that is not on the posted agenda. We have two speakers this evening. Um so the first is Elizabeth Macau um speaking about the SISD police department and prayer in school. I probably speak
002loud enough. Hello. All right. For the people in the back of the room, I'm Elizabeth Macauen. Okay. Sure. Um I'm Elizabeth Macauen. I uh am a local attorney who works at the hospital. I have two kids who are here at SISD. Um I am on the Sigin Education Foundation. I am on the Drama Mamas. Um and I am also now reviewing uh books for uh our high school librarian. So lots of crossover here. Um tonight I'm here as a concerned parent to speak regarding number one the action item 10F to consider and take possible action regarding resolution related to Senate Bill 11 on prayer in schools and secondly uh action item 10C regarding considering approval of a board resolution to establish an SISD police department. With regards to the prayer in school, I understand that
003the Texas legislature mandated that you discuss this topic by March 1 and you are simply doing your job. I firmly believe the resolution as drafted is not viewpoint neutral or appropriate. In the US, we have division of church and state. The state is constitutionally precluded from favoring one religion over others and they have overstepped their bounds by showing preference for Christianity by including reference to the Bible in the text of the resolution. I strongly encourage you not to pass the resolution as worded and to leave the existing policies in place. With regards to a police department, I understand that the police department is sought due to requirements of House Bill 3 requiring school districts to have at least one quote armed security officer present during regular school hours at each different campus as well as
004for consistent operational continuity and comprehensive jurisdiction. I respectfully request that if this resolution goes forward, it goes forward thoughtfully and judiciously with regards to the types of uniforms and duty weapons that the SISD PD will be outfitted with. I understand there may be constraints on what constitutes the definition of armed within the house bill, but I encourage the school board to use whatever latitude the law allows to make sure that a sigin ISD police department is created thoughtfully to support the ISD mission to cultivate, inspire, and empower students to grow and learn. I fear some of our more vulnerable populations may be too scared to learn if we create an environment that feels more like a jail than a school. Please help me see that this does not happen. Thank you for your time and
005thank you for your service. Good evening. Thank you. And next we have U Viviana Arce speaking about the girls basketball program. Hello and thank you all for having me today. Um So, I come before y'all pretty much to talk about the girls basketball program. Um, so my name is Viviana RC. Um, so pretty much uh myself and the other parents in this room uh want change. Our girls have uh confronted the coach and the athletic directors with numerous concerns and nothing has been done. Us as parents as well have gone through the chain of command. Our girls made playoff as you may know. Uh we have a talented young group of girls not because of the coaching. Sorry. Um we faced numerous uh unfair actions. Girls not wanting to play basketball. Um daughters coming home
006crying because they're being told they uh not being told what they did wrong. Uh these last two years for us have been a nightmare is an understatement. head coach has uh pushed girls away from the program and it it shows because we have five girls that made varsity freshman year because they were a talented group that went undefeated during their eighth grade year. Um, pretty much all I want is for you to um look into the girls basketball program uh as far as development, uh look at stats, um the favoritism that's being uh given and then the lack of feedback to different girls. Um my daughter didn't have an opportunity to play this year because she tore ACL during the summertime. Uh, but my fear is next year when she comes back that she's going
007to face the same thing she did her freshman year. Um, so I'm just asking you please if you could please look into the athletic program because um, we've already gone through numerous changes of command and nothing's been done. So sorry, just get a little emotional, but thank you so much for your time. Thank you. Move on to item three, close session. The board will adjourn into close session pursuant to the following sections of the Texas Open Meetings Act. A pursuant to Texas Government Code section 551.071551.074 074551.129. Consultation with legal counsel, including possible telephone consultation with legal counsel as necessary to address legal concerns, implications, and answer any legal questions regarding posted agenda items um including one discussion of intruder detection audit reports. B pursuant to Texas government code section 551.074 074 discuss personnel matters including
008appointment, employment, evaluation, reassignment, duties, discipline, or dismissal of an employee. C pursuant to Texas government code section 551.072 discuss the sale, purchase, exchange, lease, or value of real property. And D, pursuant to Texas government code section 551.0821, deliberation regarding public school students. It is 6:08 16 p.m. with no action. Uh, next up is the pledge are the pledges to the United States and Texas flags. And to lead us in those um is Emily Brisco, a seventh grader from AJB. I pledge algiance 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. Thank you. Now we'll have our moment of silence.
009Thank you. Item six is our recognitions. Um first our superintendent report. Uh good evening board, good evening community, uh parents, families. A couple of quick announcements for you all. First, just a friendly friendly reminder that here at Sigin ID, we are moving uh to one unified communication system through parent square. If you've not already done so, please download that free app, log in, confirm your parent account. If you have any concerns with that, please feel free to reach out uh to your campus or our c our communications department and we'll get you taken care of. I want to say thank you to everyone who jump uh who joined us as well as those that bought something at the Sigin Education Foundation's Marty GR auction in Gayla. Uh this year's event raised more than $140,000 supporting
010SCF grants for teachers and staff. I'd also like to thank the SCF executive director Jill Nash for her hard work and the SCF board of directors on a fantastic event uh that will help provide valuable opportunities for our students. Um also want to share congratulations to our three destination imagination teams who have qualified qualified for state and that are getting ready. Athletically, I'm excited to announce that the 29 the 29 Sigin High School student athletes on our girls powerlifting team have qualified for regionals. Incredibly proud of these ladies. Uh congratulations to our Sigin High School Lady Matador basketball team for making the playoffs. I know their season didn't end the way that they hoped it would uh there in that first round, but they did a fantastic job. We're proud of their hard work and
011dedication representing us. Uh thanks to everyone who came out to celebrate our student athletes at meet the Matadors earlier this month. uh track and field, powerlifting, softball, baseball, all took center stage. Uh way to go. Uh we also hope that our community will continue to support our spring sports. Please come out and support our student athletes competing in baseball, softball, golf, soccer, tennis, track, and powerlifting. Career and technical education wise, uh we're excited to cla celebrate CTE month. Uh uh Sigin Mayor Donna Dodge even signed a proclamation to celebrate and several of our teachers were honored to be in attendance. Uh we're proud to offer CTE programs which provide excellent opportunities for our students and you'll hear about that a little bit tonight from Mr. Hareta, our CTE director. Uh several high school students as
012part of our CTE program are offering free uh VA tax services to eligible taxpayers on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We do encourage that you get appointments if you're interested in that, but you do not have to. Information is available on our website. Uh it's a great way that our students are giving back to the community. Want to thank our CTA CTE students who participated in Ball Early Childhood C Center's career fair today. Uh they set the example for our CTE students of tomorrow. Several students were also invited to participate in the CTE job shadow day. I want to thank our local businesses for their support of Sigin High School and our students. Uh congratulations to our students who participated in competitions for the technology student association and business professionals of America. Our AB production students won
013and will go to state for that. Uh we also have several students who uh have or will compete in various competitions at the San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo. Congratulations and best of luck to all our students, their families, and the staff that continue to support them. Uh fine arts wise, lots of great things happening. Congratulations to our high school dance, mariachi, and theater programs for their recent successful events. The theater department welcomed elementary and middle school students for a theater clinic. While our dance department hosted more than 10,000 dancers at the crowd-pleasers competition, mariachi and band also hosted the UIL state mariachi festival at Sigin High School this past weekend. Um, our mariachi matador earned its highest scores in the program's history. Uh, so I want to say thank you to all our students
014and staff and parents for representing our school district so well. One more quick shout out to the mariachi program for sending four groups to competition earlier this month. Uh, it's pretty impressive to have one group that goes to competition and we had four uh, which is pretty phenomenal. Good luck to the Sigin High School Starsteppers who will competing who are competing this Saturday at the crowd-pleasers dance nationals competition in Orlando. Uh Sigin High School is home to six Texas theater scholars, all of whom met rigorous academic and theatrical requirements for this honor. Congratulations to those thespians. Our choir and band programs are also preparing for UIL concert and site reading next month. Our middle school programs will perform the first week of March, followed by high school the last week of March. Uh, congratulations to
015our Matador color guard who earned second place in open class at the TECA Madison regional over the weekend. Uh, you have a chance to see these talented performers in action during the TECA SIGEN competition next month. Stay tuned for details and we'll get those out to you. In visual arts, our students are preparing for the vase and junior vase and team competitions this spring. Students at all levels will compete in a variety of artistic media including ceramics, painting, drawing, and sculpture. Our high school students competed over the weekend and several have qualified for state. So, best of luck to all of those fine arts students. And then one final note, we're excited to celebrate Big Art Day in Sigin ISD with the mayor next week. She'll have a proclamation for us to honor uh of
016the state statewide celebration of visual arts and public schools. So, stay tuned and we'll get that information to you um shortly. All in all, board uh community, we have a lot of great things happening across Sigin ISD. Incredibly proud of our students, incredibly proud of our staff who put countless hours in to make those things happen. Um so, lots to be celebrated and excited for. Thank you. All right. Um, we'll move on to our board member reports. Would you like to start, Mr. Dwire? Another busy month. Um, of course, I've continued to do my construction meetings at the ACT facility in McQueeny Elementary. Uh, I got to attend the spring meet the mats. We've done some board training several times over the last month. I did get to go to the Marty Gro event. I
017was very impressed. Anytime you can put people in a room and raise over $100,000 for anything is a pretty uh big accomplishment. And they went over $140,000 that night. So, big kudos to everybody involved in that effort. It was a great event and well worth it. Um my highlight of the month was I got to tour the high school CTE facilities. Um, I won't lie. I had no idea what we have to offer our students in that department. I was very impressed by the amount of programs we offer and the facilities that we have to offer those programs uh compared to 25 years ago when I went to school at that school. Um, or at that location, I should say. Anyways, uh, I encourage everybody to take advantage of what's going on there. I know
018when my children come home with the course selection sheet, I don't totally understand that and wrap my mind around that and know what could be possible for my child in four years if they were to follow those certain paths. So, I encourage you as parents and community members when you have that opportunity to do a deep dive with your child and try to figure that out because it's pretty impressive and it's pretty awesome what we have for our students uh here at Sigist. I'll try to keep this short and sweet. Of course, uh attended the Sigin Education Foundation Marty Gro event and kudos to all the directors and our executive director back there. Great work. Great work indeed. And of course attended the board training. And the one I want to highlight and just went
019to this Saturday was the Sigin Art League 16th annual elementary and middle school art show. It was very impressive. We had some students that had art there and I received a compliment from the folks from the art center. Uh just a shout out to our fine arts director and department. They're very impressed and with all the things that our students get to be involved in. So want to pass that along. Mine sounds a little bit like Mr. Dwire's because we're on some similar committees together. One of them is the construction committee. And I am so excited because we are coming to the end of some very fantastic facilities, McQuinny Elementary and the ACT facility. And they are going to be top of the line. They are totally awesome. to and it's more and more excited
020every time I I go to one of the meetings to see the progress that's been made. Um I was also part of the committees um to put help put together the gayla for uh the skiing education foundation and I am just so honored to be among so many people from the community that work so hard to put that on to raise money for the teachers teacher grants which eventually goes to the students. So that was a whole lot of fun and uh it was well worth all the work. We had a training all together that I uh it was intense but uh I enjoy being with everybody on the board and listening to everybody's thoughts and uh we had lots of laughter too along the way as well. So it's always it's always a good
021time together. went to the CTE tour which is totally amazing and seeing all the different certificates that students can get before they leave school. Um that we have so many things to offer students there. My one local one in McQueen is I went to the academic night at McQueeny and they had a choir concert that was quite nice as well. A lot of folk tunes. Had a good month. I also attended a school action funding board workshop to gain education migra uh fundraiser meet the mats and the virtual mcqueeny construction meeting and I also encourage for the audience that's here today to stick around to see the CTE presentation. That's all. I just want to talk about one of the highlights for me this month uh was attending the DTAC committee meetings um with it
022was all about district technology um and creating a five-year plan. The committee has met three times this year. Um it's amazing to have a group of administrators, teachers, principles, and students in a room to talk about what technology looks like over the next five years and really have a concrete plan. Um I appreciate Dr. Creo and how he facilitated that. Uh lots of voices were heard um particularly those of the students. I'm really excited about that plan and the students involvement in that. Um I learned a lot about the benefits of AI using it both for the classrooms and the teachers and excited for how that is going to integrate uh into our schools in the future. Um well like it's been a very quick busy short month feels like. Um, we had opening day
023of baseball which was great. That stadium is fantastic. Uh, really starting to enjoy all that that we put into that. Um, we had the National Honor Society induction which was really amazing to see all the amount of students that we have that were inducted um through that. The uh made it through the girls regional um powerlifting meet and just to see the uh these young ladies and the amount of weight that they can press was was really impressive. made me feel like I need to go to the gym more. Um, AJB did a really amazing thing with their sixth grade Titanic museum where all the sixth graders made like little pieces from the Titanic, what they thought would be on the Titanic and there was some very creative real um good stuff in there. So,
024that was really fun to see. And then probably one of my favorite things every year is the Vogle Chili Quip. Uh, that's that's always a good time. And we had some nice guest judges. Um, and yeah, and then also keep in mind Uh, it is still early voting for March primaries, so please make sure you get out there and do your job and vote. All right. I think I went to the same things as everyone else. Marty Gro, the CD tour, plenty of board training. Um, I did get to do some other things. I saw some um uh Barnes uh basketball and uh I got to uh see our DI teams this weekend. So uh they make you very proud. So um all right, that's it for board member reports. Next is student, staff, board,
025and community recognition. Emily and Dr. Uh, President Cretenden, Dr. Lee, trustees, we are going to have another video to show you and then we'll introduce you to our students of the month. So, Jeff, if you would please play on. Hi, I'm Johnson and I'm student of a lifime with such remarkable strength and so she came back and she has such great and she smile on her You guys helped me with your loudest cheer possible. Congratulate our elementary student of the month. Aubrey Johnson up. Come on up. probably like some person who like works on cars. Hi, my name is and I respectful and responsible. Um, with that being said, she serves as a lieutenant on our startup team. Um, and she takes that responsibility really to heart. Um, and she helps manage the team behavior
026and very responsible. Congratulations, right? Congratulations. Proud of you. Proud of what you do. scientist. So, I love the Apple award, but this is kind of my new favorite part. So, um making that video is a lot of fun. So, I'm very excited to introduce both of these young ladies to our trustees and to all of you tonight. So, um yes, if y'all want to come come down. Thank you. All right. So, first, um, I'm honored to welcome our elementary student of the month, Aubrey Johnson from Winert Elementary. Just a moment. All right. Now, I am honored to also welcome our secondary student of the month, Miss Emily Brisco from AJB. All right. Hold on to that one. Isn't it exciting the students we have here in Sigd? And on that note, I am happy to
027hand this over to Dr. Lee for our superintendent Apple award. Thank you, Emily. Um so friends as you know academics are at the heart of the work that we do here at Sigin ISTD but that also requires a lot of support uh from all corners of the district and its staffs. Uh our mission of building relationships inspiring success and empowering all takes every single person who wears a sagin ISD badge. This month's Superintendent Apple Award recipient was recognized by their supervisor as someone who shows up for their team and their students daily with dependability, a solutions first mindset, a can do attitude, a smile even when the day is busy. For some, the work of supporting our students starts in a crosswalk, greeting students in the morning. For others, it's preparing meals that help keep
028our students focused. And we all know the importance of a full belly for focusing on school. For nearly 33 years, this month's recipient has impacted generations of Sigin ISD students by serving them meals with pride, providing a place where they feel safe, welcome, and cared for at school. The nomination we received for this month's recipient included this quote. Over the years, she has received countless handwritten letters from students thanking her for her food and admiring her role model attitude. Students don't just notice her cooking, they notice the way she makes them feel. Her daily interactions remind us that every role in Sigin ISD can create a positive lasting impact on children's lives. This person has built lasting relationships with students at Sigin High School for years as an assistant manager in the cafeteria. More recently,
029she has served as the kitchen manager at Sagert, where she provides a welcoming student- centered environment while leading her team with calm, consistency, and professionalism. She was also recognized for her reliability, service, commitment, and heart, making her a true example of the person we need here in Sigin ISD. Always putting students first. Friends, if you'll please join me in congratulating our February Superintendent's Apple Award recipient, Miss Rosa Compost. I'm pretty sure that Miss Rosa has a lot of family in the back. If if y'all would like to come up, family members, we'd love to have you in the photo. She was also told a little white lie. Absolutely. This way. There you go. You guys got it. All right, one more round of applause for our Apple Award winner. That was so I think that's
030still We say this often, but in case you don't know, we don't know who the uh award is going to. So, we get to see their face when they figure out that it's them, and we get to see their family who's hiding behind them and has snuck in. So, it's always a little emotional. So, thank you all very much. All right. Um, next is our campus highlights. Trustees, as the parent of two former Weiner students and a former Weiner student myself, I am pleased to introduce Weiner Elementary's campus highlight presentation. We currently serves nearly 450 students in kindergarten through fifth grade. Winer is following a targeted improvement plan this year that focuses on datadriven instruction and highquality instructional materials. Administrators have begun conducting TE's alignment walks to observe classrooms and ensure that students are engaging
031with the required Texas essential knowledge and skills. Principal Tiffany Wei will share uh more about what these walk about these walks and their impact on students and staff. Mrs. This is way we look forward to your presentation. I miss Castro too. Of course. Good evening, President Kittinin, Dr. Lee, and school board. We are excited to share our TICS walks. Our TICS alignment walks were implemented to ensure rigorous standards aligned instruction across all classrooms. The focus is on using authentic student work as evidence that instruction and classroom work aligns to the full TEACS. Additionally, our TIES walks are an integral part of our campus targeted improvement plan, addressing our high priority focus areas of data-driven instruction and the daily use of our um high quality instructional materials or HQIM. So, a little background um on our
032TEICS walks. We have conducted three alignment walks so far this year. Grade levels work together to determine the TE and type of student work that will be posted. Always keeping in mind that we want to see the students authentic work. 100% of teachers post the complete TE's components including the knowledge and skill statement, the student expectation, a process standard and an exemplar and several work st uh samples including uh work samples from a student who is at a higher level, a medium level, a lower level, GT and special education. We want teachers to focus on the following. What do the students need to know? We want them to pay particular attention to the process standard. What the students are doing to learn the content. We ask them to deconstruct the tequing attention to the verbs.
033Is it tested? How is it tested? How often is it tested? How will we know if they learned it? Students complete the alignment learning tasks and teachers post student work demonstrating mastery. The next thing we focus on is the process. So during PLC planning, teachers collaborate collaboratively deconstruct the TEICSS. Teachers are given a protocol to support each phase of the alignment walk from planning to next steps. Alignment walks allow peers, administrators, and curriculum staff to review evidence of alignment and provide feedback. Expected outcomes. We want since we started our TICSS alignment walks across the campus, we have seen more consistent TEICSS alignment across classrooms. Additionally, the TE's alignment walks have shown some misalignment between the verbs and the work and misalignment in strategies that have been taught by grade level teams, which gives us the
034opportunity to have those conversations during PLC meetings. Each cycle we track posting of TE's components, quality of align student work and PLC instructional adjustments. Teachers will then choose a grade level either below or above them depending on the grade level. Um and they go and look at the work and um look at the the process standards the TE and then look at the strategies and see if there's alignment and if there is alignment with the verb that um the work and that that the te excuse me. Um trend data allows us to identify strengths, retach needs and vertical alignment opportunities across grade levels. So the impact on instruction this has is teachers are planning and internalizing with the rigor of the TE's verb in mind. Student tasks are becoming more authentic and aligned to standards
035and our HQIM resources. PLC teams are making faster data informed instructional adjustments based on real student work. So this um these are some pictures of our process. You can see that the teachers have the work posted and each of the teachers gets a clipboard and I have a sample of the um the form that we use and then we come back together in PLC and discuss what we saw and then Mrs. Castro and I turn around the information to the next grade level to share with them what we saw. Um alignment or just some notices you had on third grade work. Um, I really like I don't again it would be great if we knew the name of the strategy, but I my hope is that when we since Miss Wolf is so good at
036explicitly teaching that and giving them multiple ways to subtract and regroup. Exactly. Um I don't know if it'll come back on, but that is two of our or our two fourth grade math teachers and our instructional coach having a debrief and a conversation about what they saw on their TE's alignment walk for third grade math. Um and looking at the alignment and making sure that they can maintain and seeing that the HQIM is building upon um each each year, each grade level. and we're seeing it particularly with our students who are in third grade who have started in kindergarten. Um so in closing, by May 2026, all grade level teams will complete full TEACS alignment cycles with documented instructional adjustments. And this process ensures consistent rigor, strong vertical alignment, and improve student mastery of grade
037level standards. Any questions? Alignment are just some noticings you have. Um, I really like I don't again it would be great if we knew the name of that strategy, but I my hope is that when we since Miss Wolf is so good at explicitly teaching that and giving them multiple ways to subtract and regroup I don't I don't have a question but I I was involved in PLC myself when I was a teacher and just watching the teachertoteer interaction is so so much different than just having a meeting. And um I think that's what really helps make that process so good for students. I agree. I agree. And I since I've been in the district, we have seen our PLC's grow tremendously and become more student focused and really, you know, looking at how we
038can most benefit students, taking it back to them. Thank you. Thank y'all. Thank you. All right. If there are no objections, we're going to go in a slightly different order and move to 8A. Uh I see we have some fine arts students and staff here that I'm sure would like to go home eventually. So, we're going to move to um item 8A uh fine arts proclamation of arts and our schools month. Dr. Parrots. We don't. We do. We'd like to invite all the fine art students up to the front. That are here. Yeah. Whereas every year in March, the American Allegiance for Theater and Education, the Educational Theater Association, and the International Thespian Society partner for theater in our schools month to raise awareness about the value of theater education and draw attention to the
039need for all students to have access to a quality theater program. And whereas theater is an integral part of arts education and the arts have been part of life from the very beginning and are an inseparable part of human journey describing, defining, and deepening the human experience and adding depth and dimension to the environment we live in. And whereas all students participating in arts education courses benefit from the skills and processes developed through the arts and apply those skills in a variety of disciplines and settings, no matter their intended career path. And whereas participating in theater continues to students development through heightened skills in listening, understanding human experiences, adapting to and respecting others diverse way of thinking, communicating effectively analyzing non-verbal communication, reading, self-exression, imagination of humankind, creativity, and whereas theater helps develop self-confidence, boost
040self-reliance, and increase empathy and compassion towards oneself and others. And whereas as a creative outlet or as the beginning steps towards a professional career, theater programs in Sigin shape the future of our young people, there are a variety of benefits that come from taking part in these programs for students of all backgrounds and professional and educational interests, including creative problem solving skills, the ability to accomplish team goals, and many more. Now, therefore, I I get to sign that. So, it's me. Uh Denise Cretendon uh the board president now uh proclaims March 1st through the 31st 2026 as arts in our schools month in Sigin ISD and urges all citizens to celebrate theater programs and the students that participate in them as we work together in a toward a better future for this important part of
041every student's education. So, thank you, board of trustees, President Dr. Lee. Um, we want to acknowledge the hard work that um Eleanor put into developing this uh proclamation. Um, it was a uh a task that I went to her and said, "Hey, you know, there's everything in our school's month is March, and I want to make sure we highlight that, but I really want to highlight theater world that's going on." Um, but I wanted to make sure we highlight the that there's great things happening in the arts across Sigin ISD. Um it is art in our schools month, dance in our schools month, theater in our schools month, music in our schools month. Um so everything all the bases are touched. So um I did want to highlight a few things. Um right now in
042theater music musical theater is alive and well at both of our middle schools. Um we have our new our new theater teacher at Barnes who is starting the bringing back musical theater to Barnes. We're very excited for that. Um we have extremely devoted kids and parents, community teachers. Um we even have three teachers that are uh graduates of Sigin ISD. Three of our uh theater teachers. Um in the thespian world we had 11 um who earned a spot at the international thespians convention with nine more competing virtually. We'll find out about them soon. And we had six that were named Texas Theater Scholars. That's a very high uh high award for them. Um also wanted to highlight our other programs here. Uh we have choir who's working hard to build a strong and unified program
043and work towards their UIL season cheer um new new to fine arts on our in my world. Um developing a unified sigin ISD cheer program and had a very successful UIL season um under the direction of Suzanne Sheerhart. Dance is competing at local and national competitions at all at both levels. Color guard is competing every single weekend. Uh so if you want to go catch some color guard that could be every single weekend and they're building a middle school color guard program which is really building everything um at the top as well. Ballet Florico is building their first year of middle school folklorico programs um and we have a rough idea that it's going to um explode at the middle school level where got me a little nervous with those numbers. Um Mariachi hosted the
044state UIL mariachi festival um for three days. It did go, it bled into uh Sunday morning at one o'clock in the morning is when I finally got home. Um, but to watch the Madagi kids, the band, everyone who helped out with that, that is one of the largest festivals I've ever seen, and it was absolutely phenomenal to see, and they also performed beautifully. Band helped plan, organize, and run the state UIL mariachi competition. Um, Heather, D, David, and Garrett were absolutely phenomenal. Heather is the the queen of all things when it comes to planning, so I want to shout her out. Uh, visual arts had our first round of base competition with three state qualifiers, many that received four, the highest score possible. We had three that are going to be moving on to state.
045And we have an upcoming junior base and team, which is the elementary version competition coming up. And we had a student who was selected for the state level youth art month gallery um which will be up for consideration for the governor's um the governor's gallery um at the end of the year. And then elementary music, can't leave them out collaborated and and performed beautifully at the MLK performance and will be taking on a very hefty task of adopting a brand new curriculum over the summer um with a two-eek intensive program that's going to happen over the course of three years to get certified and they're all bought into it 100%. We're really excited about it. Can I have all of my fine arts staff please stand and be recognized? Uh before I sit down, I
046just um it's an absolute blessing and a privilege to be here, be back in Sigin. Um I told a former superintendent many years ago that this is where I plan to retire and I would like to uphold that uh that promise in this district because this is pretty special. Thank you. Thank you. Absolutely. Your dad broke down. Thanks to all the students who came. We appreciate you. Yes. Very quick. Thanks to all our fine arts staff for coming out tonight. We appreciate y'all. Now we'll go back to 7A public hearing. We have a report on the CNIC 2024 2025 Texas academic performance report or taper. PE's financial standard report, district accreditation status, report on violent and criminal incidents, progress toward campus performance objectives, progress towards House Bill 3 goals, and a report from the Texas
047Higher Education Coordinating Board on Student Performance in post-secary institutions. That seems like a report already. Um, um, Miss Miranda, good evening, President Kitten, um, Dr. Lee, and board of trustees. So, it is that time of year where we get to share the annual report. It is um a statute. Um the taper uh the Texas academic performance report was released in um December, December 18th to be exact. And we have 90 days to um compile the annual report and present it to the board. So, that's why I'm here tonight is to um you all have your compiled reports. Um yes. Um and so what is this is the there are eight pieces that um sections, excuse me, that must be included. Um and so what I'm going to do tonight is just go over what's in
048it. Um all the data has been presented in one in other ways throughout the year. This is just everything compiled. Um and then where to find it um and how people can access it. Um that's pretty much and then kind of each section. So uh why now? Um everything's final now. There was a time where we presented you know um accountability results. We kept we lots of data has been presented over the course of the year but now it's been finalized. Um the validation periods have all ended and so now everything is official and the has been closed. And so um this is very similar to like a business that presents um to the board at the end of the year to say this is kind of where we were um kind of a snapshot.
049Um so section one is the taper itself, the Texas academic performance report. It is the largest piece of the um annual report. Um it is compiled for the district and each campus has um is also included in your um the annual report. It's published as a P PDF and it is uh posted on our website. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm supposed to be switching. There's also a QR code. We've kind of gone digital this year. So, you have a paper version, but now we also have a QR code um where you can actually link to the district website and the document in its entirety is available for you. Or you can just look at each section individually because it's easier to to do that way. Um, so the taper report is all of our assessment. It
050includes all of our assessment data. It has a cover page with the accountability ratings. Uh, the special education determination is on the cover of the district cover page. Um, and then any distinctions um that were earned by either the district or the campus will also be posted on those cover pages. The taper report um includes all of our performance ratings uh uh performance levels for approaches, meets and masters for each assessment, each grade level um and each content. Um lots and lots and lots of data also includes um annual growth and accelerated growth. Uh just to note that um academic growth is not included in the taper. that is something that's used for accountability separately just so um if you're looking for that it's the pieces are there just not the the summarized um also
051includes um bilingual um education um the explanations of the way that we serve our students and the programming we use and of course uh the star performance the growth um for and the accelerated learning for them as well and then participation rates are included who took the test, who didn't take the test, and kind of um the absent rates. You also get the attendance and um rates, the graduation rates, and the dropout rates. Um again, just to remind everyone that graduation rates are even more lagging. Um and it includes the 23 24 and 22 23 graduates. And then we have our college and career military readiness. All of our CCMR indicators, all of our TSI, APs, um, and other post-secary readiness indicators are included, student information, staff information, and program by enrollment is also included.
052There's a wealth of information in the taper. Um, and again, district and each campus. Um section two of the annual report is our PE's financial standards which is based on the 23 24 financial reports. I believe they were presented in a board meeting recently few months ago. Um and so those are also included and sigen currently has a financial rating of an A. Section three is our district accreditation status. Um as of the date that this was compiled uh 2324 was what was available. Just recently they released the 2425 and SIG is um still accredited and online um the new accreditation is linked campus performance objectives. Um each campus and the district has a improvement plan which is approved by the board and then throughout the year it is monitored and updated. And so this
053is the formative review of those plans for last year. You can also link to those on the web. The section five is the report on the violent criminal incidents. Um we had one in our district in 2425 and it'll explain um by campus and um by district. Section six is a a report for post-secary institution. This looks at students who have um left us and gone on to college and it keeps track of them. So this data is also a little bit more lagging because it's um after they've left us and it's from the 22 23 high school graduates. Um just to note that if a student goes out of the state they're not included in this data. So there are some of those students. Um, just a little summary at the bottom. The 490
054graduates in 23, 147 went on to a two-year, four-year, or independent college or university in Texas. Um, of 130 students who went to a two or four-year university, 40% earned um a first year GPA of 3.0 or better. So, it keeps track of our students beyond us. And then section seven is our House Bill 3 goals. House Bill says we should have a goal for um math proficiency, reading um early literacy, reading, and CCMR. Um our current House Bill 3 goals were uh to increase the percentage of third grade students meet grade level or above u by 27 August of 27. This is where the target and the actual and you'll see that there are graphs and it's also broken down by each campus. So you can see visually kind of how we've um moved
055towards that goal. Goal two um is meets grade level or above on star math from 28% to 52 by August of 27. same exact um format where you can see where we've been and um break down by each campus in order to head towards that goal. And then CCMR um the percentage of annual graduates who meet the college career military readiness from 59 to 80% by August of 27. um we had 64% and 25 which were our 24 graduates. And this is a um even longer look of CCMR in Sigin ISD um and our as we've moved towards our goal and also a breakdown just we do have um MBLC which is um does have CCMR indicators and so um I've included C sig high school and MBLC but we know that's a tiny campus
056so they are included and that is everything. Section eight is a very large section. It is the taper glossery. It is where DEA has explained all the um information, the words, the um math and this the way everything's broken down. Um it's available both in English and in Spanish. And there are QR codes here if you want just that document alone. And that's the last section of the annual report board. A couple of quick things. Uh, one, I want to thank Miss Miranda for putting this together. Um, it is a lot of different items that have to be compiled into one place. There's nothing in this uh, annual report that has not already been seen uh by you or that's been made available by being on the website uh or on some of the TEA
057sites. Um, I think it goes without saying uh Miss Miranda is here to present some of that data uh more than anything else. But I think if you look at uh just some of the data in general, like we do have some work to do. Uh, we we've been very open and honest about that as a team. We've been open and honest about that as a board superintendent team. Um our senior leadership team um is committed to that. Miss Miranda has been instrumental in being able to help some of that work along with Miss Lions as our chief academic officer. They're driving a lot of that work that happens. Um but I just want to acknowledge that um this report is essentially the data that's already there. We know that there's work to be done.
058That's why we put in some of the improvement plans and the improvement processes that need to happen. Um and I just want to be very transparent that we know that that work is happening and needs to in order to get sig where we want it to be. Thank you. Any questions? All right. Thank you very much. Enjoy your reading. All right. Um moving on to um our next reporter information item 8B, career and technical education with Mr. Harete. President Catin, distinguished board members, and our superintendent of schools, Dr. Jackie. Thank you very much for offering me the opportunity to go ahead and present an update on career and technical education. If you hyperlink on that link, that's going to take us to the website and that might help uh in seeing what we've done in
059CTE. We are very very proud of our programs at our high school and now at our middle school. Career and technical education. One of the things to understand is we need to go ahead and understand the job growth in our area. Uh this is from uh source jobs EQ. You see all the clusters that are grouped together. Uh what's interesting you will see growth in most of these areas. You will also see what's called the above average occupation wage, the above living wage, and below living wage, which is approximately at 67,000. The only one that kind of pops an eye is at hospitality and tourism. There's still growth at 18%. A lot of tips are probably maybe not reported, but uh once again, that's uh not to um say that there's not going to be
060any growth. So look at human services, um look at information technology, um STEM or engineering in our area. When you look at that area, Sigin kind of sits right in the middle and there's approximately a 45 minute uh where that report was taken. So some people even though they live in Sigin, they could go ahead and work in the new Bron Falls area. They might be working in the east side of San Antonio. And uh you see that map and that's just taking into account that growth within that area. We showed this last year when it comes to our population. I think that's really important. I decided to put it back this year because you see the growth um in that Gen M, that Gen Z, and then that Gen A, it's at 10%, but
061they are coming, right? Uh we're going to see an explosive growth with our millennials and our Gen Z. It's currently sitting above the um Gen X, which is my generation. And of course those baby boomers that are now kind of like um going down. But one of the things that I really wanted to showcase is our IBC's our industry based certifications. When it comes to career and technical education, there are multiple programs uh several coherent sequence of courses that provide students rigorous content that lead to graduation. IBC's is an opportunity for all students. You don't see the number, but we'll showcase the number there. Uh that's the front of our page. But when it comes to CT, many people ask, well, what is a program of study? We mention that word quite frequently. What is
062a poss? Well, uh for short, it prepares students with the skills necessary for success in a chosen career. It's really a sequence of relevant real world experiences that culminate in a senior level course. And you will sometimes ask other questions like for example, do the courses in a program of study need to be offered in a certain order? The answer that is determined by the LEA that there's a recommendation for them to go ahead and take a sequence of courses. And what does a level one or four indicate? They just indicate rigor of the course that may influence the order in which students complete that sequence. And once again, LAS can go ahead and um have leverage in that order. But we're not just a question and answer. So we are exactly what you see
063in those pictures. We have an education and training program of study, construction, our nursing program of study, our engineering program of study, cosmetology, and those pictures uh kind of have a snapshot of what's happening. and those were taken this year with that signing date towards the end of last year where we had those students that were ready to go ahead and go into the world of work. This was currently this year at our local uh junior um Guadalupe fair. When I spoke with those students and I took those pictures um I did ask them a little bit of what they had done and I asked one of the students why it was gray and I said so are you going to sell this? Yes, mister. I go right around 2,00500 3,000. Oh, no. Right around
064$10,000. And it just threw me back of the skill that it takes to create something like that. Now, ROC will be falling under CTE. That's something that the state has changed. We took a that picture was was shared with me and we're very proud to now start working with commander and we're having conversations to even maybe possibly see how we could bring those programs down to the middle school with the administration at both middle schools. When it comes to our data, approximately we have 2,000 students at the high school, 27 CTE teachers with now seven middle school teachers. Um there's a total of 10 career clusters. You saw them at the beginning on that second slide. The transportation industry, the STEM, um uh uh industry, uh hospitality and tourism, public service, and uh a total
065of 16 programs of study. We offer 24 IBCs or industry based certifications. And we did uh outline some of them like American Welding Society, National Center for Construction Education and Research. That's your NCCR. Uh your homebuilders institute. That's one that we have just started. Uh we uh applied for a 12,800 grant. We got that. Um the teachers are going to be trained as a matter of fact by the end of this week. Uh both of those teachers and we're going to be offering that certification coming up HBI. We feel it's important and we're discussing that because the state in their wisdom decided to go ahead and tier IBC's. What does that mean? Some IBC's now have a one, others now have a two and others now have a three. If an IBC is tiered at
066three, the state has said no more than five students or 5% of your graduation population. NCCR core uh they has been decided by the state that it's a tier three. So we need to pivot and make adjustments to say we need to go into a tier two or tier one. So we're positioning oursel to make sure that the students can still get an IBC and we could still count towards CCMR. New programs of study at both middle schools AJB and Barnes. We have the on-ramps courses for our audio video production and computer science and we are working with both of those teachers to make sure those students are taking the courses here at the high school but they're also being uh mentored and shadowed by UT. uh PEK uh will now offer a what's called
067level one certificate or pharmacy technology with 17 dual credit hours with Lamar State College and cosmetology will offer a level one certificate with 33 dual credit hours with Lamar State College. And when I say cosmetology will offer a level one certificate, it is actually the college that reports that level one certificate. So we don't print it out. We don't give that to the students. It is the ICHE that reports that to the Department of Education and it's a lagging indicator. So by the time that report comes, sometimes we see that in our CCMR approximately a year and a half after uh they graduate. But that's good for our students. They're getting dual credit and at no cost. So we're really proud that took a year worth worth of work. Our a science building will be
068opening June the 26 and uh right now there's buzz with our uh VITA tax, we opened that uh three weeks ago. Anybody making under 67,000, we did put posters at the middle schools in the entrance. We put posters here at the education center and I know we need to put some posters out at the churches. I think had that conversation. So, we're reaching out and we have met with Emily. We're going to go ahead and um uh promote that at our local um station, radio station. Uh updating CT computer labs. Happy to say that we'll be updating three computer labs. We met with it and uh I think we received the brackets today and some of the monitors. So, we're working diligently to get that up and going and much needed. More data uh CTE.
069Um, I just want to point out that we are now servicing over 600 students at seventh and eighth grade that we were not servicing before. That impacts our funding. So, that's going to be good news. And I'll be talking with Liz on that u because we want to buy equipment, supplies, and materials to put back into those programs. And you see the counts. So, that has risen now 2,231 students. Um, which is great. Um, if you look at our website, you'll see that arrow and that's pointing to all our programs of study. It is now current. You will see what's called a four-year career plan. And I know um, Mr. Dwire was talking about that. And also, you'll see the sequence of courses. These are one pages that TA has um, come out. We have
070modified that to fit our needs here in our district. You will see the statewide program of study description that TA has. And now you will see the grade level, the level of the course and the sequence of courses. What's interesting that you will also see the certifications that the students can go ahead and obtain and then can students do anything after postsecary? You'll have that information there. But to make it even easier, we now have just a simple flow simple flowchart that we've been sharing with the counselors for some time on our programs of study. And all our programs of study are there with what's happening in ninth grade, 10th grade, 11th, and 12th grade with the certification attached to those uh courses that they're taking for their those programs of study. What is an
071IBC? We don't really are the ones that give the IBC. It's the certifying entity. It's either Adobe Autodesk. It is um your uh TVMA uh or your VetMet apps. It is uh really an accomplishment through several years of rigorous work and students obtain an IBC. And there's our number 438. Um that's a big increase from last year. You will see all the certifications there in the slide. And then we kind of just put some extra information as far as what some of those acronyms mean. Uh we are very proud of course of of our VA tax um that we started last year. But if you look at some of the other ones are PCT uh for patient care technician, our CNA, our TDLR, our cosmetology work really hard with those students last year. And I'm
072happy to report we had three students pass their written last week and we had approximately three students pass already their CNA. Uh currently we have approximately 120 IBC's that have been passed as of today. But we know that it's going to be a lot to do before uh the year ends. So we're going to try to bring that number u more than 438 course and shoot for right around 650. Um there's the data a total of 168 students that were seniors obtained in IBBC. You'll see the increase. Uh so when you look at 1617 we had zero 1920 uh we had right approximately around seven and then you're starting to see that increase. But CCMR is very unique. What does that mean? They're constantly moving the goalpost. Okay? Not in every area but in IBC's
073they are. And uh one of the things that's happening for the 2026 graduates, the rule is students need to go ahead and complete three or more uh courses for four more credits or students need to be complet. And because of those changes, it was different last year. Last year there were concentrators and the year before that you see right around there 2025 graduates only one course. Some schools took advantage in 22 23 because they just needed to certify students. Now the game is different. Now there's a high stakes game in CTE and IBC's. But when you look at our data, we have once again a total of 438 for this past year and we're hoping that we surpass that by by several hundred students. The great thing about CCMR, it's not just IBC's. So IBC's
074don't drive CCMR. There's a total of 11 indicators. But for CTE, we live in that realm of IBC's for them to receive credit as a completer and for them to receive a level one and a level two certificate. What's happening in CTE? Well, I'm happy to say that we started a new CTSO, our TSA. We had students compete this year and now we're taking one student to state. Hopefully, we'll increase those numbers next year. And we have several things happening in BPA and I'll just showcase some of those things. We work very closely with the EDC. Those are the events that they help us get in contact with our industry partners. Currently, we have the job shadow program happening in February. Um, this coming Thursday, we u we're going to have some students go. Mom
075is not there, dad is not there, teacher's not there. They show up to CMC Steel Hexel, they show up to Caterpillar and they're mentored for that day. So, we're really happy that that's happening. This is what happened on our maiden sigin. We took some pictures. Um, you see those students visiting several of our industry partners. NBLC for the first time was a part of this and we're happy that now uh we're bringing them on. We had the Sagine Expo in November. Uh we brought several industry partners and once again we work with the EDC. I'll highlight that picture of that young female with that virtual welder. As she was leaving, she kind of said, "I want to try that." And she was so scared. I'm like, "Why don't you try it?" "No, no." Like, "Put
076on the glasses." It's really about hands-on learning and changing one student at a time. But you uh the next thing I want to highlight is those students in blue, those were our criminal justice students. They worked that event. They had their radios on. They were welcoming students and they were like, "Hey, there's some students in the bathroom. This, you know, can you please check on on this?" And that was an extra set of eyes, but it gives them that those hands-on experiences. Chart your course. The high school counselors drove this. Uh we had all our middle school students come. All our eighth graders and they visited several programs. Our study, our cosmetology, our ROC program, our robotics, um SLT STEM and then we see um right there our audio video. Um so it was great.
077They they really enjoyed that day and our animal science. But they visited all the programs of study. So we bring them in and they have five to eight minutes to to um to promote their program. what's happening in job shadow days. I'll show you last year's data. We had a total of 139 students. Um and uh one of the things that was happening, we saw 75% increase in overall student participation. This data comes from the EDC. They share that with us to let us know what is happening. The pictures at the bottom, we did our uh job shadow days. That picture was taken a week ago and those were the students that were sent once again in a bus on their own and the bus drops them off to our industry partners and we had
078a couple of our female students uh work us a lot and and that was just once again great for our students. BPA, these were pictures that were taken at regionals. Those were the students that participated. I love seeing the smiles. We had close to 50 students participate in regionals and now we're taking approximately couple of dozen students to stay in BPA. HOSA. This is taken at our um um um not HOSA um FFA. This was taken uh here locally. Um they were uh showing hog and one of our uh students that's an FFA was the the princess uh for the uh Guadalupe uh fair. So we were happy she participated in in the rabbits competition and got in place. Uh what is the future for CTE? I want to continue expanding or when I say
079I, it's we. We want to continue expanding CT course offerings at the high school and middle school. More opportunities. These are the programs of study that I would like to go ahead and and uh and bring, but there's a cost, right? Everything has a cost. So, I just can't say, hey, you know what? I want to bring this program. What does it cost, Mr. Java? But I think with these is changing just a couple of things in teams. And we have a teacher that was actually So, we've been trying to coordinate that with the high school and our health and wellness program. I think it would be great, especially with that mental wellness uh increase IBC's for all students. One of the big changes is I want to um we want to go ahead and
080move cosmetology over into our PEK because that will allow $150 additional dollars per student. And then uh new opportunities for our programs of study. I have HBI in there. uh update technology in our CT uh computer labs and once again work handinhand with TSTC because of that big building that's coming up in the next couple of years. These are industry partners. You will now see the Rotary Club in there. We're happy to bring them over and uh they're offering money for free. So, we gave those scholar those scholarship applications to the teachers. We're going to have those turned in and it's several thousand dollars, tens of thousands of dollars. So, we're happy. And um you'll see Walnut Springs. That's a change that we made with our HST and now we have a full FTE in
081that program of study. Those students are going and uh they're working in that facility. And when I say working, it's once again job shadowing, being mentored or a practic. They're not getting Last but not least, it is CT month. That proclamation was by Mayor Dodge. We took three of the HST teachers. Our business teacher couldn't go, I mean Miss Stanford, but we brought her her certificate and we recognized her in front of her students and they were so happy. And right now I can tell you that we have several dozens of our taxed students that have gotten their IBC and that is open for business. We had our first student come. He was a high school student with a job and he did his income taxes on that first day. So we're happy for that.
082Um that's my email. You're welcome to have my cell number. I think mostly everybody does. And please follow me at hareterio at onx. I know Mr. Bride and and Mr. Alejandro geta follow me and I try to promote CTE because that's my life and we're very proud of our programs. We feel our teachers are working hard and we feel that the program is heading in the right direction. I I just have a quick question. And you had mentioned about the levels like one, two, and three levels for CTE like only level one. Level three can only have five students in it. Level one can only have five students in it. Is that right? So So when you go into um the website um you'll open um what's called the V4 and the V3 list right
083there. Um we can currently use IBC's um When you go right in here, industry based certifications, Mr. Bright, you'll have um two links into a B3 and a V4. The B4 will say 2530. That's a new list that TA has approved. Once again, in their wisdom, TA, they decided to go ahead and move the goalpost again and say, "We're going to go ahead and move the goalpost for IBC's. We're not going to tier IBCs." The state has said any and and if you open it up and you kind of scroll towards your right, you'll see a one, two, and a three. And then some say NA. If you see a three, the state has said we will only count five IBC's or 5% of your student graduates. Approximately around 45 IBC's. So, I could use
084the NCCR. And when you look at our NCCR, we had approximately over 80 NCR last year, but now I'm going to be capped. So, I need to go ahead and pivot and say, you know what, I need to find something different uh to make sure we could count because if you go through through those years, the student could still get NCCR. They could still probably find a job in construction or a related field. But for CCMR, that's where we don't want to get named. So we need to look for an alternative IBC in several pro programs that the state has said these are not rigorous and I could tell you that NCCR 11 modules are easy tier ones are hard tier 3es essentially are ones that school districts were putting quite a few IBC's on
085a lot of school districts were using them and the commissioner and tea basically came out and said these are not aligned to industry uh needs as much as they should. So they reduced how much they counted for accountability purposes. As Mr. Harata said, it's about moving the goalpost sometimes. Yeah. NTA and TA has just um they call it sunsetting IPCs. Um you could use another word for it, but they call it sunsetting and that means that they are no longer allowed. One of them, a lot of districts did Microsoft Office uh specialist. Big districts, they were getting four or 5,000 certifications and their CCMR was through the roof. said, "No, let's make this a change that rule." But what's good about CCMR, it's not just IBC's, there's TSI, AP, dual credit, early college. There's several
086ways in getting CC. So, I mean, although like the Microsoft one you said was like uh tier one, right? But at the same time, it's still good for our students to get that because they still need that Microsoft experience when they leave. So, so what we're going to do, we're going to continue doing what's good for students. CPR, it doesn't count. It used to 20 years ago. It doesn't count. But every students in health science needs that. You cannot get your mouse professional, which now counts, unless you get that associate or that specialist. So, it's hard for me to say, "No, we're not going to get the specialist or the associate. You're going to get the the professional." Well, they got to go ahead and get that step one, and then we want to try
087to achieve that. And hopefully with the technology we already talked about putting Microsoft Office in in those new and I just wanted to highlight that this is the second year we're doing Vita right for the community. This is year two for Vita taxes. Yeah. And we're getting traction um on that and uh you know I could tell you right now and Miss Amber has been great in updating the current IBC list and uh we have 50 students maybe 60. They've been working so hard um and that is not They have to prepare two income tax using the IRS platform and these are real um not from people but once again they they have to go through do they have children are they divorced did they remarry did they buy a house and students understand everything
088involved in doing that correctly what's great about that they could work with H&R Block they could work uh with any online company so we feel that's good business for us well it's great for our community too because it offers free tax service for all of of our community. Yes. And then we are meeting with Emily to go ahead and continue promoting that. But we got good traction last year and we'll continue getting good traction this year. Yes. I do want to uh just say thank you to Mr. Harata for the work that he does. Um he is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to career and technical education. Um he's doing an exceptional job uh trying to get us moving in the direction and organizing large programs. I mean the CTE program is extremely
089large. There's a lot of moving components to it. Um it's resourceheavy. Sometimes uh that's beneficial, sometimes that's not depending on where funding comes from. Uh but he's doing a a really really exceptional job of that. Uh on on the VA piece where we were doing taxes, uh that even got picked up by the Texas Rural Education Association, we're a TRA school district. Um and they picked up that we were offering that to our community and they highlighted that on their website, part of their uh regular blog that they send out to other school districts, too. So I just wanted to say, you know, thanks to Mr. target for all that he's doing. We're doing some great things and the teachers are doing the work. So the the teachers and the students, that's where the recognition
090lies and and I could tell you that we'll we'll continue improving that because you ask me, I'm not satisfied. We need to continue doing this exponentially. I just wanted to echo Dr. Lee. Uh since I've been here, I've noticed that over the last two, three years, you've been doing a phenomenal job. You can see the difference. So losing my hair a little bit, but it's it's working. We're we're doing good. Thank you. I'm I'm sure there's some cosmetology students that can help you out. Yeah. Thank you so much. We appreciate. All right. Um, next, uh, C1 personnel information. Mr. Newman. board. This is just the list of uh new hires and uh resignations of professional employees questions. Thank you. Uh next um item D one, two, three, and four with Liz Banks. So that's demographic
091study, bond interest, uh revenue, uh financial statements, and new vendors. Good evening, President Cretton, board of trustees, and Dr. Lee. Our first item is our demographic study done by Zonda. And if you were here around two years ago, um Mr. Hudson Huff did it uh then and he this is an update. It's super informative. So I'm going to let him take it from here. Good evening, President members of the board. Dr. Lee, very good to be with you this evening. Uh so happy to kind of take you through just a few charts and graphs and maybe a few uh few developments as we talk through it. Um again, thank you for the opportunity to allow us to be able to uh use our team to be able to provide all this information for you this
092evening. Um, one of the things I'll t highlight is just talk a little bit about what's happening with the local economy. That really ties into the job market, labor, what's happening with labor, as well as what that potential impact is whenever it talks to housing as well as ties into long-term enrollment. So, we are seeing a little bit of softening uh in in the overall labor market currently. Right now, we're seeing a little bit of an uptick related to the unemployment. Again it's it's still we would still consider us just about fully employed but we are seeing some a little bit of softening. The other thing is we also see few years ago the amount of jobs being created quarter over quarter was fairly significant. Now you you're seeing about 22,900 jobs being created which
093again is very positive. It's just a smaller number than we've seen in the last few years. So that's why we're referencing kind of seeing indicators that things were just softening. So again, we just want to continue to track that. Um when you look at the overall what sectors are softening, we we see kind of the professional services uh information services you know there's a tremendous amount of positive news that are out there about AI and all the things that are going on with that sector. But then there also some efficiencies that are being gained with that. So there's a little bit of adjustment in the labor force related to some of those things. So again, we're kind of just seeing some some some early indicators of some some softness there, but again, there's also some
094some very strong positives that are in the area. U we also see kind of retail developments also taking place in the region. Again, you'll see the Sigin Town Center. U that's scheduled to be breaking ground this year working on phase one at least in within the next several months is out there planning planning phases currently right now. We also see retail that's continuing again this is off of 46 continuing to see some some businesses move in so we know that there'll be some employment opportunities down the road related to that. U we're going to talk a little bit about the overarching what's happening with the housing sector. So you'll see a couple of things that I would point out kind of middle of the page there's a reference to about 17,000 80 homes that been
095sold in the overall San Antonio New Bronals area which is a very strong number but in comparison to what it was last year it's actually a little bit weaker what it was there was a significant surge in in in housing activity over the last several years. So again, still very strong numbers, but what I would say is when you look at that chart up there, you'll also see that uh the number of starts and closings are pretty much in lock step. So builders are a little bit anxious right now. They want to make sure that they track their number of closings as to how many how many they start. So when we kind of get down into what's happening locally, you'll also see that kind of that connection with what's happening with the overall market.
096Um again, as we talk about housing. We'll talk about mortgage rates. Uh again, we're kind of in the uh kind of six kind of low sixes, high fives now. Again, that's been up significantly from where it was a few years ago. U so that's been that's been a little bit of a challenge. Uh we are seeing again that slight uptick in the unemployment. Inflation has started to come down a little bit. So we are starting to see some good indications that that those two things may be happening and that those as those two two things happen. It does uh allow for future decisions for additional federal uh for rate cuts to potentially take place. So and we also know that there's going to be a new Fed chair that's going to be uh taking taking
097over that position and analyzing that. So we could see some additional rate cuts as we get towards the back half of this 2026 year. still think it's going to be fairly level for a little while, but we could see some some rate cuts as we get get further down 26. Now, as we talk about kind of the overall numbers, what I will say is you'll see again when you really look at the numbers, pretty close number of closes to the number of starts. So, look at where your numbers were last year compared to this fairly consistent. So again, overall continue to be very strong related to the number of closes and starts within the area. We also want to track those those numbers as to what they are going to do with each one of
098those attendance zones and what that potentially would would do with enrollment. So again, when you look at kind of your concentration of of under construction, that's one of the things that we always want to highlight is where's all the activity taking place. So you can see kind of McQueen is is really where we have a tremendous amount of de So we're showing about 42 homes that were under construction when we put together the report followed by Vogle and then Nikki has a few homes under construction. The other thing that we want to evaluate is that in those inventory so we want to kind of track where those inventory numbers are compared to couple of quarters ago to where they're at right now. and we don't see a significant increase in inventory, which is good because
099again, that's just saying that the we've got enough buyers to come continue to buy as as those homes become available. Uh but we see that we've got about 160 of those that are available for sale and again about 754 vacant develop lots that are out there that could be built on and then there's still quite a few ters. Yes. Can you explain what the annual closings is? Is that just a a change of ownership? That would be when the when when it's actually purchased. Yes. There's one that's that's you know a home can be finished not not purchased. Whenever we reference the closing numbers that's the based off. So those are new new homes. New homes. Okay. So if you look at the line of Jefferson they had zero starts but 20 closings. Those would
100have been homes that were previous from the previous year. But nothing new. Nothing new. Yes. Um again we we track the uh the n the housing activity related to pricing. So again kind of referencing your your costs associated with uh existing homes as well as new. Uh so you can see actually a little bit of softening in that new home cost compared to what it was in the last couple of years. So we're seeing a little bit of of the impact of what we're seeing in the marketplace related to overall pricing. Um this is just kind of points out kind of a breakdown of the overall district. So again, similar to what we shared a couple of years ago talking about what's happened with the population. Again, you've known what's seen what's happened in the
101state, also what's what's happened um in the county. And this also references kind of the the overall population numbers within the district as of as of this year. Um and then wealth index your house affordability and diversity are all kind of referencing related to national averages of about 100. So it kind of provides a little bit of grade. So again wealth index is a little bit lower again because that wealth index is a little bit lower and some of those housing prices are a little higher. The affordability is just a little bit lower than the national average. But again your diversity is kind of right there. And again, the only other thing I kind of point out is when you track the amount of mobility that's taking place, you've got tremendous amount of of mobility.
102So, we do have at least 16 to 17% of your population that's driving at least five five plus hours a week. So, again, quite a bit of activity that's taking place as far as people moving, driving from one spot to another. When we look at kind of the overall enrollment, we start getting into some numbers. We've got about 167 students that currently reside outside of the district. And that's about 2% of your overall enrollment in the district. Uh and then you've got about uh little almost 4,800 students, 44,775 students, 66% of your overall student population live within the city uh city limits. Uh and then we'll go through some of these uh 11 active subdivisions. So those are those that we talked about before where they um are in green. Those are the ones that
103have all the utilities and roads infrastructure in place so that they deliver homes uh at any point in time. Yellows are those conceptual that are out there in the future. Some that may platted could potentially be converted. Then you'll see a few yellows and a couple of greens that have those red outlines around them. And that's just identifying where we know the dirt works taking place, utilities, those kind of things are putting getting ready to put them in a new phase. So, we track all those again referencing kind of the number of futures that are out there and based off of the developments, we see about three subdivisions right now that are kind of highlighted in that red that are going to be providing an additional 375 lots that will be able to have new
104homes on it in the next year to years. Um few things related to kind of highlighting a couple of the developments that are out there. McQueeny Oaks, this is a few futures that are out there. Vista Lago Estates is kind of an older uh future that's been referenced in the past. Again, no movement currently right now, but we always want to track those potential numbers to know what potentially still could come down the road. Um you can see kind of Greens Point Heights again referencing about 121 vacant developed lots that are out there. We showed about 14 homes that were under construction uh at the time of the report. The other thing that I would track is you know down there at the bottom we referenced that student yield. So we're going to track based
105off of the district's enrollment numbers and what we have geocoded into our map software related to how many homes are there. We have a yield of 249. So about two to three students for every 10 homes that are in that development. Um but in Hidden Brook you're you're seeing a little bit different picture. Uh so again a few homes that are currently being built uh uh in that development right now showing about 297 homes that are occupied but again in that development we've got quite a few more students in that development. So we've got a showing about six six uh students for every 10 homes in that area. Um, one of the newer developments uh that's taking place in the northern sector uh section of of the district is this Walnut Springs. You can see
106by the satellite view we had in January that there's quite a bit of dirt work that's taking place currently right now. And at least uh for now what we see is that first uh first section of that overall master is going to be in district. So it's kind of split there. Uh but again could be about 175 lots that that are underway right now. And then we've got again kind of in the minny zone again Ridge View Estates kind of referencing about 25 homes that we showed under construction. So fairly active currently right now again kind of price points that 185 to 272 range. So again, when we look at prices across the area in the metro area, that those are are are good price points. So very attractive to many families at that point.
107And then again, I'm seeing that yield at that 329. And then we've got a few more uh that again are real close to to the Vogle Elementary here. We've got Guadalupy Heights. Uh again about 20 homes under construction and again one of the things I would point out that emphasizing that so they do they do have about 32 of those inventory homes that are available for sale that are currently there. So and again that reference of price point at that 186 to 3.5 at that point 322 yield the Royo Ranch was definitely a development a couple of years ago we talked about fairly active you can see that you do have about 693 occupying homes in that a few homes that are currently under construction but again they do have about 28 homes that are
108currently in inventory that are available for sale in that that development. And then we see a yield right now at that in that development at that point 413. And again, Sigin Ranch just a future that we'll we'll continue to track uh out there in in the Bogle zone. It has about 418 total futures that are there. Again, we'll just continue to identify those as potential uh future developments. And the Miltyms uh few homes that are currently under construction. They've got about five homes that are occupied currently right now. Again, this is a combination of several builders that are building that in that area. And then a few of those uh futures that are out there in the Kiki zone is Park Terrace as well as McQueen Point. So really between both of those, you've got
109about 700 futures between those two developments. And then stream waters again kind of in that same Kiki zone. Uh you've got uh 164 total lots, several futures that are still available, 75 vacant develop lots, and a few of those homes that are under construction listed about 13 homes that are under inventory. So that's single family. So a lot of I always say that's kind of challenged because you go through a lot of BDLs and a lot of futures as we talk through those numbers. uh we'll highlight kind of just multifamily within the overall region. So we want to kind of track what's happening with the multif family picture as well. U so we'll track occupancy rates and we do see the rate right now. Um what I would say is is we also want to
110track bedroom. So, as we have uh new developments that may may move into the area, uh we want to have an idea of how many onebedroom, twobedroom, and threebedroom units are potentially going to have in those developments. More two and threebs there are, the higher the potential yield is because they're going to be more familyfriendly related to that. So, again, we track that. We'll track the age of of those developments as sometimes those are older, sometimes older is more affordable. So, it's has a little bit higher yield. So again, reference kind of where we're at with with price points related to effective rent rates as well. Uh again, as we kind of identify what what we see happening with within the district, we show that we've got about 2,757 units multifamily across the district. We
111have about 937 students that reside in that. So we've got a.339 and again there's a down there as we represent that age of each of those developments. Some that are significantly older and some of those that are newer. So what I would say is again as we identify that affordability factors in as well as bedroom mix does factor in those higher yield numbers. We see about 400 multifamily units that are currently under under construction across the district and we'll highlight a few of those. And then one of the newer things that we've seen over the last couple years single family. So we've seen these developments that have been built where you got single family but they're truly built in order to be rentals. So we see some of those that are in in the district
112and we do have about 425 future multifamily units that are some version of a planning stage. Um, what I would say is currently right now here you got Jefferson 88. And then we've got Cedar Bluff where we have about 237 age restricted units. I emphasize age restricted. So we don't necessarily anticipate any any students coming from that. But I but I always want to reference that because at least the district is aware and someone calls in and says, "Hey, do you know we have one of these apartments that is opening up?" You can say, "Yes, we're aware, but we don't anticipate I hate to say any any children. We could have a few not anticip uh in the cottages at NE again is 82 single family rental homes. Again, this is that single family for
113rent. Again, foundations started kind of in that November time frame and anticipate many of those homes being in the spring. Um, one of the things that we we haven't seen a tremendous amount of of uh students coming from that those those developments currently right now because the price points on some of those rental rental homes are fairly high. Uh, so we continue to track. This is a fairly new u new product that's out there on the market. So right now we're seeing kind of a yield that's closer to something that closer to our multif family rather than our single family yields at least with some of the early early numbers that we're seeing in these areas. And then Creekide Gardens is has a few futures out there again that 400 total futures that are that
114are a part of this over about So again, they they do anticipate this is something that could could take place in the next in the next couple of years. So then we'll talk a little bit about that's tied into the development picture. Now we'll talk a little bit about so one of the things that we asked for we got enrollment data from last year. We tracked enrollment data this year and and evaluate both of those. Uh we put together a study that analyzes newcomers and levers. So we evaluate student ID. So if they're new student ID numbers and we we anticipate that it's not going to we take out the kindergarten students, we take out the 12th graders because those are natural levers and natural newcomers. So we focus primarily on our first through 11th
115grade. So we evaluate the new student IDs from one year to the next. And if we have an old student ID that doesn't carry over, that's identified as a lead. Um, so you can see we track this helps us track the mobility and so you can see that we did have about 179 more levers this year than we had newcomers. And so that going to share a few other pieces of information, but again when we're tracking those it's important to know how many students did we have last year that didn't carry over this year in those specific grade. Um, the other thing that we're going to track is is transition. So we're looking at student transfers. So you'll see kind of in the last few years when we were in that 2019 through 2022 time
116frame, you were kind of in that mid 400s range related to an average of how many transferred out of district. When I say transferred out of district, I want to make sure that I emphasize that that doesn't mean that they were in Sigin ISD. They weren't necessarily enrolled in Sigin ISD. they could be just living in Sigin ISD and attending one of the other school systems, neighboring school systems or charters. So, always important to refer outs that are that, but that's just the terminology that they use. Um, so what I would say is you can see your from your neighboring districts those students that transfer in and what districts they transfer in from. Uh, they're in green. And then the one thing that I would say is you'll see kind of in that purple u
117kind of where are your neighboring districts related to students that reside in your district that attend other school systems uh neighboring school systems and you can see what those numbers look like. Uh and the other one that we're really tracking over the last couple of years is really your virtual u programs. So you've got a few virtual programs that are in the state of Texas over the last several years and you can see uh what those numbers look like. So in uh school systems like Paulsville, Rosco and Fort Stockton, you can see that you have students reside in your district that are attending those virtual programs uh in those other districts and kind of what those. So again, kind of seeing a few of those things and knowing what our transfer outcome numbers have grown
118over the last uh two years, you can kind of see that difference that we've seen over the last two years. Again, the only other thing that I would point out as you look at that, you can see what the virtual numbers are kind of at that 5.2% of your overall enrollment back in 201920. And again, like many districts across the state, we've seen that growth in those virtual programs now to to about 16% almost 17% of your overall transfer out numbers are tied into those programs. The other piece that we are going to evaluate is always evaluating birth rates related to kindergarten numbers. So, we're tracking tracking that information uh to try to make sure we don't just track just one or two years, kind of go back several years to try to identify what
119that birth rate is compared to your kindergarten numbers to identify kind of a ratio. We want to try to keep that ratio as consistent as possible. What I will say is we have seen those numbers up over the last last few years kind of getting us to a average of close to 764. It's kind of where we that ratio. What I would say that we do want to make sure we account for this year is we do see going into the 26 27 year that we did have our birth numbers associated with this chart reference that it does go down a little bit this next year and then it comes back up. So, we want to make sure we take that into consideration for next year. And again, we'll just track kind of what those
120numbers look like over the last last few years related to what where your larger grade groups are and evaluate down below that reference of cohort growth or a little bit of cohort. So, it's above a one just references that great increase in previous year. And if it's a little bit below that, it went down a little bit compared to what it was last year. So what I would say is we are being fairly conservative related to what we anticipate next year. Part of what I wanted to highlight was those kindergarten numbers and anticipating those kindergarten numbers because of that associated birth rate being down with the associated year that we're accounting for that. So that drop does potentially impact the overall enrollment numbers for next year. So we would anticipate being flat to a little
121bit down next year. U but again you look that that birth rate that should come back up that following year. So we should see some increases. Uh and again we still anticipate a significant amount of housing activity that's taking place. So again I do think that we could still continue to see growth as we keep moving forward over the next several years that could be in that 2 to 3% range. a little bit more conservative than where we were in the last last couple of years based off of kind of what we're seeing in the marketplace currently right now. So being a little bit more conservative about what we think potentially could happen with growth, but again kind of referencing where we think numbers would be could be up to kind of that 7,800 number
122by the time we get about five years out and then potentially could get to that 8,900 9,000 range by the time we get 10 years out. definitely have a ways to go before we get there. And again, this just kind of references when we take those numbers into account, referencing those in those individual grade groups and how that applies within those regions where that those developments are. See kind of the impact related to Vogle Guy's new campus opening really provides a lot of capacity there for for that region with all the development that's coming. So you can see there definitely will grow into that campus. uh over the next several years. And again, as we typically model this out, anticipating a lot of younger families moving into some of those newer developments and then some
123of that will catch up in those out years when we get to the secondary campuses in the middle of high schools. So, the only other thing that we reference here before we get to the final summary is we do kind of reference a range. We are in in a day and age where you have to kind of evaluate where those numbers are potentially going to look like. So ultimately what we've provided is kind of the the projections that we have not only about the grades as well as the campuses reference that mid-range projection but we also talk to districts about you know as we go into the next year or two. We know kind of the the landscape we're working through over the next year or two related to choice um that there it's important
124to be cautiously conservative. Um so over the next year or two we reference that low projection but we also want to reference that high projection as we anticipate that is u as as future growth and development takes place uh that related to seat count and those kind of things and those out out years when you think about five to 10 years down the road you want to make sure you have have those counted for at least in your hands. So again just kind of referencing where we've been the district really has had some growth uh up until this the last year and a half two years and again I think we have seen that shift in the transfers has impacted that what we've what we anticipated related to picture but again we still show we've
125got some housing about 70 and we do have quite a few lots that are out there available to build on that is again reference where we anticipate things being as we go into the next year or two. But with that said, happy to answer any additional questions you may have. I have a question. Um probably you're not the appropriate person to answer to, but for Miss Banks and Dr. with this information now. What what do we do with this information now? How does this information get used in decision- making in the in the future? I think it definitely has uh some impact on what we talk about when we talk about future facility needs and and and the movement. Um probably one of the most impactful slides um that was included was the campus level
126enrollment history and projections and what our campuses are looking at. Um if you if you go back and look at that slide, it was page 35 of the presentation, it talks like you can see a lot about um what's anticipated for Ball, for Kenneck, for Bogle um especially with those areas. And so it it brings to question like for senior leadership especially to start looking at programs um like programmatic changes uh possibly to to hit some of our campuses that are growing faster, perhaps shifting programs around. Um, it could mean uh looking at future facility needs depending on where it's at. It'll definitely help inform us on staffing projections, especially as we look at kindergarten. Kindergarten is always the, you know, it's the luck of the draw sometimes. You you think you have an idea
127of what your kindergarten numbers are going to look like and then you really don't until enrollment comes around. And so, just making sure that we're not overstaffing, especially in a time where Miss Banks and I especially um are are trying to be cognizant of finances and what that means. a decrease in enrollment obviously means a decrease in funding um for us as a district. And so this is good data for us that that we're going to use to really help inform a lot of decisions. Um but from the looks of it right now, I think um I don't want to get the cart before the horse by any stretch, but it looks like we're we need to focus more on um some possible campus programming uh and changes there rather than new facilities at the
128exact moment. Thank you. By campus programming, what is that? What are you talking about? Are you talking like drawing redraw lines possibly, but I think we're really looking more um you know, we haven't dug into it detail. So, I don't want to be on the record as like saying this is what we're going to do when we've not made that decision yet. Um but just looking at like our dual language program um and right now like what campuses are serving dual language, would it be more beneficial to look at a campus um and moving that to a different campus that has space like McQueeny? Um we've talked very briefly. Uh Mr. Areola and I have had a very very brief conversation about possibly moving towards like a magnet type school. So having a dual language
129academy versus a dual language program that's embedded in elementary campuses. But we've got to look at all of those things. Like I just don't feel comfortable answering and saying for certain this is what we do. I think that this is just the data needed to start some of those initial conversations. I got to put the people that are smarter than me in the room with me is what that comes down to. Yeah. And some of this data could be used for potential real estate, you know, five years from now. Make some sort of predictions. Buy the property, but not actually build on it yet until later. I also just want to clarify when when I talk about like future facilities, that doesn't mean that we don't talk about future facilities now or future bonds now
130in preparation for several years down the road. Um, but like those have to be very intentional with what we're doing right now, especially in a time where our our demographic study is showing that we're going to see a decrease in enrollment for the next year or so before we start seeing public in that. And so, we just need to be very cautious about the way that we look at that. That doesn't mean that we don't do um potential facility projects that are additions to campuses versus brand new campuses, I guess, is maybe the way that I should say that. Also, why I didn't want to be on the record for something official. Any other questions? Yeah, it was it was very interesting to go through this and see all the see all the things so
131many things that were farms uh very recently are neighborhoods now. So, always interesting. Right. Thank you very much. It also helps us to remember to be very even more conservative as we're um looking at what our funding is going to look like next year. So we you typically look at keeping it flat or an increase, but um we might take that down a notch. So, okay. Next, we have the um instructional break facilities improvement. Uh I'm using the term instructional break because we have a spring break, a summer break, and a fall break. This isn't all going to get done over summer break. Um, over the past couple of years, I've picked Bose's brain, Floren's brain, Robin's brain, Troy's brain on just projects, and we have a kind of a Google sheet going of things,
132some big, some small. Um, we do have bond interest revenue that we would like to start spending prior to when we start um getting arbitrage, which is basically where we earn more interest. Uh, then we're paying those people who bought those bonds, and we have to pay that money back. So, we want to spend some of that money. These were kind of our highf flyers. Also, things that we felt like we could work in to the next few instructional breaks or kind of time them around those. So, this is just to let y'all know. I didn't want y'all to see bids being advertised and go, "What? Uh, we're doing what?" So, we do have other programs. This is just part of the list. The uh possibly redoing the front entrance to like Bogle so that
133there's more lanes going in and out. Would that be on this list at all? It's not on this list. Um, but there is a big list that the campus principles are adding their items to with priorities, pictures, reasons why. So, that if if that's something that is important to I hadn't heard that one. Um, so I don't we don't have that on our big list, but that might be something that she would put on there. So, and we'll use because I told them, you know, y'all are the ones boots on the ground. You're going to know of stuff that we don't necessarily know about. But these these are all things that came from them too, but that one's not on there yet. Bogle entrance redesign. Just for the record, uh there is one for reconfiguring
134pot because that principal has put those things in the document. Yeah, you'd be surprised how few items are on that list. So, yeah. for the bleachers. I just had a question because um I never get to sit in the bleachers because I'm always working the concession stand, but are those just replacing making them larger, some replacement, they both both campuses need more space? Uh Barnes definitely needs more space even though theirs are newer. AJBs are older, but they also need more space. Specifically, dance teams is what we've been told. Um there's missing parts. We don't have handicap seating in all of the bleachers. We want to add that. Um, this would be a very easy turnkey operation so we could get done quickly. So, how are they going to rank these? I guess is the
135committee going to get together and rank them? Um, so we're going to get bids for all of these and then we will bring it back to our superintendent leadership team and go through them. And these are very just like pick a number between Flora and Troy and Liz. And we have no idea until we get bids. We don't know what the exact price will be. I just think replace gas lines on roofs would be up there. Yeah, for sure. Yes. Not to uh make this punny by any stretch, but we're trying to get the biggest bang for our buck here. Yes, sir. And so we're looking at very specific things um that might be able to benefit as many students, as many facilities as possible. Um so like this is not necessarily an exhaustive list.
136It's just kind of a starting point for us to really look at that. Uh and then obviously if we move forward with anything that comes to you guys for approval based on uh bidding, based on whether they're on procurement, all uh the different uh vendors, all of those things and we do plan on on getting all of these done, Mr. Gara. We're not we're hopeful to get all of them done. Yes, sir. Fingers crossed that our estimates are at the high level and not the low level. Yes, sir. So, Liz, this is the first time I've heard the interest revenue. Yes, sir. Stuff. So, can you explain that a little more? So, you probably heard it with AJB because AJB took so long. We held on to that money for so long and um we
137did end up having to pay arbitrage back. But when you're paying that back, you received that money in interest already. So, we've received a lot of interest on all these bonds for this this bond 2022. And these are bonds that have been sold. Yes, sir. Yes. And you have to turn around and spend that money quickly. And historically here, which everywhere, you want to wait until the project's complete because if it's $10 million over, you want to use that interest revenue to pay for it. But we're at a spot now where everything's getting complete. We're not going to have anything that slaps us in the face we didn't know about. So, we would like to start spending this money because it takes a while to get the bids, to get the contractors to get it
138done. And this is just part of the interest revenue money that we have. And when you say very quickly, do you know what that Very quickly, what did I say? Very quickly, too. Remind me. How fast we have to spin the interest before we have to. Um, so five years, but it just it it looks we run those reports two or three times a year and it looks at the interest that you're receiving and then the interest tied to those bonds for those people that that purchase those bonds, the investors. Yeah. The short the short of the way that arbitrage works is if we make more money off of it sitting in our accounts than the investors would have made on selling it to us at their rates, they essentially are entitled to get some
139of that money back because they could have made more money if they kept their money and invested it themselves. And so like that's the very lowlevel explanation of what it is. the longer we hold on to the money, the more arbitrage we pay back because the more interest we makes off we make off of it because even interest we've already earned, we earn interest on that and it just keeps spiraling. And so the longer we hold on to it, the more we have to pay back versus being able to use. Yes, sir. Anything else? Uh the next item is financial statements and I Mr. Harriet is still here. I always give him a shout out. But um I think my very first board meeting here, April 2024, we talked about increasing our revenue, our CTE
140revenue. And um we have increased our CTE revenue the past two years. About $850,000 more revenue is being generated compared to what those kids would all would would be generating if they weren't in CTE. So we talked about that being a way to help with our budget deficit and he has been instrumental in that. He's extremely knowledgeable. So, he's still here. He's in the back. Okay. He's talking. So, he's Good job, Sergio. He's not really paying attention to getting a shout out. Sally Joe. I'm supposed to call him Sally Joe. So, okay. Um, so on our financials, um, I'm just going to start at the top and just point out a couple things. I'm going to just be totally transparent with y'all. I do have significant concerns concerns about our revenue this year for not
141maybe you can call it unintended consequences from the legislature, but I really I'll bring that back to y'all during the budget process. I don't like to kneejerk to like really bad news or even really good news from the legislature. Um so we'll in conversations with lots of different people, school districts, um finance people for public schools, and we'll get that all explained to y'all. But um I do have concerns over those numbers. So, we're not going to do a budget amendment now or next month or probably even the next month. We're going to wait until we have more definitive answers. Um, as far as expenses go, payroll, you look at the payroll, you'll see that's like 13% more this year actual than last year. Just keep in mind um that we gave a raise, we
142gave a stipend in November, y'all increase the amount contributed towards benefits, and then we have the teacher retention aotment. So, all those things play into the 13%. So, it makes sense. Uh, there wasn't really anything else in here that I haven't explained before, unless y'all have questions on the general operating fund. Um, one thing I did want to point out is we all know that we have a budget deficit. And if you haven't noticed on social media, thank you to Tanisha and Emily for helping me put together some posts about school finance and our funding. Just want to encourage people to share that out in case y'all were to order a Vader around August. Um we will have maybe set some groundwork on educating the public, but you'll see those every three to four weeks.
143So feel free to share them. Child nutrition and debt service, there's nothing really on here to point out unless y'all have questions. Any questions? All right, I guess we get to go to new vendors. Well, new vendors. So, these are new vendors and they're new. We may have used them before, maybe not, but we can. All right. Thank you. All right. Now we move on to uh nine consent agenda items. Polycbe local states that the consent agenda shall include items of a routine and or recurring nature grouped together under one action item. All such items shall be acted upon by one vote without separate discussion unless a board member requests that an item be withdrawn for individual consideration. The remaining items shall be adopted under a single motion and vote as applicable. A. Approval of
144board minutes of regular meeting January 20th uh 2026. Special meeting January 22nd, 2026. Team of eight training February 3rd, 2026. And special meeting February 11, 2026. B. Approval of tax collection reports for January 2026. C. Approval of proposed budget amendments for February 2026. D. Approval of donations received January 2026. E. Adoption of resolution regarding wage payments during emergency school closing. F. Um, adopted the revise board operating uh procedures. Uh G, approval of local district update. AE and H acknowledge public information act request December 2025 through February 2026. Are there any items that um any members would like to move to approve the consent agenda as read? Second. All right, we have a motion from Mr. Bright and a second from Miss Duncan. Any discussion? All in favor, raise your right hand. Oppose, same sign. Motion
145passes 70. All right, moving on to action items. Um 10 A, approval to purchase district library books. Jackie Sylv first I have to say that Rosco High School was mentioned in the demographic thing and that's where I went to high school and that is a town of 1400 people. So okay sorry I had to get that out. I was like Rosco I know that place. Okay. So, good evening, President Kittinden, Dr. Lee, and school board trustees. In compliance with SB13, our February book list was uploaded to the district website on January 23rd, 2026 to allow the public and school board to review the books our certified school librarians would like to purchase. We received one inquiry about a book at the elementary level, The New Girl by, excuse me, Cassandra Kalen. Um, however, after reading
146the book and discussing it with a concerned community member, they did not move forward with asking it to be removed. So, it's still on the list. Um, and for full transparency, one book was removed, but or face volume one. And this title is already in several elementary cataloges and was grandfathered in before the September 1st deadline of Septe's implementation. And just for reference, volume three of that same series was what we put through in October. So, I respectfully request that the school board vote to approve all titles on our book list. Um, and just for reference also, um, librarians will submit their last book orders this week, but we will continue to put books forward for approval in order to ensure that we have a large selection of books to order as soon as we
147return for the new school year. All right. Um, any questions? I move that we approve the purchase of East District Library Books as listed. Second. All right. I have a motion for Mrs. Miller and a second for Mr. Geta. Um, any discussion? All in favor, raise your right hand. Oppose. Same sign. Motion passes 70. Thank you. Yeah, I was going to say pretty sure we hear from you again. All right. 10B discuss and take action on recommendations of the library material challenge committee. Yes. Um so over the past several months Sigin ISD has received many many book challenges and at the beginning of February our library material challenge committees began meeting in compliance with our EFB local policy after answering a series of questions drawn from the Texas Education Code 33.021. 21. These committees determined
148whether the book would remain in the library catalog, be removed from the library catalog, or be be relocated to a different level. And tonight, I would like to present the reports and determinations on the following books for your consideration and approval. Um, so the committees chose to remove bag of bones by Stephen King from the Sein High School library. Um, the committees chose to retain tilt by Ellen Hopkins in the Sigin High School Library and the committee chose to retain push by Sapphire and the Sigin High School library. Anyone have any questions on those? Madam President, I move to amend the recommended list from the committee to remove the challenge material push from the library collection. Okay. Um, we have a motion from Mr. Bright and a second from Miss Miller. Discussion. Yeah, I will
149I move to amend the re recommended list from the committee to remove the challenge material push from the library collection. Oh, okay. So, withdrawing uh Spiller's withdrawing her second to that motion. So, just to clarify, remove bag of bones and push. Yes. Do I have a second to that motion? I'll second. All right. I have a uh motion for Mr. Bright and a second from Mr. Dwire. Is there discussion? I recognize that this book addresses serious issues. However, this concern is not simply that abuse is discussed, but that that the depictions are intensely graphic. The review committee noted the presence of offensive language and found the material to be pervasively vulgar along with mixed review regarding portrayals of sexual organs and activities in a way that is patentedly offensive. I do not believe 14 and
15015year-old students are develop developmentally equipped to process that level of trauma without structured classroom support. For that reason, I supported its removal from our library system. Additionally, I asked Jim and I some questions about this book as I was doing some research and uh Gemini would not be able to read excerpts from this book. So, if Gemini can't read excerpts from this book, I'm not sure it belongs in our high school library. Uh can you talk about um the uh like how uh these committees came to their recommendations or their answered their questions. Um so Dr. and I had many many still continue to have many conversations with um our lawyers and um one of the lawyers uh came up with the suggestion of the questions that you see in the report and um Miss
151Lions was amazing um and helped me kind of put together the agenda with the questions and so we go through as a committ for these these two books for um push and tilt. I was the chair of the committee. I did not read that book, but there was a librarian on the committee along with the parent um and two other two or three other committee members I believe. So um I lead them through those questions and ask for conversation and discussion with each question and the committee members talk about the book. Um every member on the committee except for myself because I'm not officially on the committee. I was the chair read the book um and brought forth any uh concerns or um can't think of the other word or reasons to keep the book.
152So it's just a conversation amongst the committee members and then after a discussion we take a vote and if there's not consensus then we'll keep talking. Um but then we'll take another vote and if the majority of the people agree one way or another then That's kind of where the committee goes. Can you put the on the screen? Um, yes. So there were four committee members in total. So that's what that four is on the report. And there is a recording of the meeting um on our district website as well. So when you're looking at something like indecent content um pull that one up. There you go. Um, so if it says yes, then one person voted yes and three people voted no. Is that correct? And something I've considered doing as well, um, after
153the last meeting that we had, we had one today, so not that one, but the push and the tilt. Um, that was the same committee and I had them read two books. So, I know from that committee that from now on it's one book per committee and we're not going to try to get two books in because you're just kind of done. Like we had great conversation with push and we got to tilt and they had kind of already asked all their questions. Um and I'd also like to um figure out a way for an anonymous vote so nobody feels like okay well the rest of the committee has joined this so I have to do this too. Um so that's something that I'm looking into. Also, um, you know, I don't I don't want
154to do paper because we'll be there, you know, 10 times longer counting votes. Um, so just some kind of electronic way for them to put their vote in so they feel like not everybody's looking at them. Um, so we're working on that. So the way that they came to this uh pervasively vulgar it says if um is content that is offensive in language present and reference through the materials. So four people voted yes. Um and so that makes it automatic uh the next one because it's one or more. Am I reading that right? If the committee chose yes for one or both of the questions above. Let me get to that on the screen because I don't see what you're looking at and then I can then I can Okay. Okay. Will you ask your
155question again, please? Sure. So, um there are two questions there about the vulgarity or lwdness. Um and so then it says if the committee chose yes for one or both questions, the material is pervasively vulgar. So they said yes to one, they said no to the other, but because of that caveat there, then it needs it automatically is a yes for the Yes. And I remember with this conversation um they talked about what is vulgar to one person is the life experience of the person of another person because the story is of her life experience. Um so there were conversations like okay yes but it is someone's life experience. So it just thinking back to what what was said in that meeting. So it's it is um it is not black and white um because
156there are so many definitions to pull out and so many um it's not clear always how the policy is written and what the questions are. So, we spent almost two hours today just really delving into questions and the book. Um, so it's it's not taken lightly lightly, but I do appreciate your questions and I'm I'm always happy um to hear reconsiderations because, you know, this is a takes a village to figure out what we need and what we don't. So, thank you for for asking more on it and It's also a new process for our for our team, for our librarians especially. So, I just want to say they're doing a fantastic job. Just keep doing a fantastic job. Yes, I'm getting thicker skin. Anyone else have discussion or questions uh regarding this amendment? Okay.
157So, we are voting on amending um this to um remove push from the list of Okay. Um so, for this amendment, um all in favor raise your right hand. oppose same sign. Motion passes. Uh that was 52. Okay. So now we vote on the amended or did that? Yes. Okay. Um so I will take a motion as me amended. Just to clarify, I don't I don't think that you have to do an amendment. I think that the motion was to um correct me if I'm wrong, Nancy, but I think Mr. Bright used the term amended, but what he was essentially saying, correct, I want to make sure that I've got that right, is that you would as a board you were making a decision to remove bag of bones, remove push, keep tilt. So, not
158amend or not amending. He he said amend, but I don't think he actually meant amend. Like I think he was saying amending. Yeah. Well, because the recommendation wasn't necessarily an amendment. Well, the recommendation is to keep push. It's what the library that was that's what the agenda a motion was to amend. I I heard amend. So that's what I it it was the term amend that triggered that is what it was. But I I think as long as you you guys as a board agree the motion the motion in the agenda reads the board of trustees approves the purchase. I'm sorry the wrong item. The agenda item reads within the board of trustees approves why it says the same thing. When I hear the word amend I take it as you vote on the amendment
159and then you vote on the item as amended. But if it wasn't meant to be an amendment, right? Well, because the recommendation was the board of trustees approves the recommendation of the library material challenge committee regarding challenge library material. I wasn't agreeing with that. So, I was amending that by saying that to remove two of the books, not just one of the books. I'm just trying to be thorough. Okay. So, if yall don't mind sat down and wrote this out and tried to figure it out. If you don't if you don't mind just for me voting again, it's going to it's likely to be the same, but I just feel better with the language. Um, so I'll make the motion to uh I move to approve the amended recommend uh amended recommended list from the
160library material challenge committee regarding challenge books challenge library material. Do I have a second? Do you want me to read that again? No, you're good. I think you can. All right. I have a motion for Mr. Bright and a second from Mr. Dwire. All in favor, raise your right hand. opposed. Same sign. Motion passes 70. I do want to say thank you to you and your committees. I know you guys are going through a lot. You and I have talked a few times about this whole process. I know you guys are putting in some serious time and effort into this and it is a very challenging endeavor that you are doing and I just want to say that I appreciate you and everyone on the committee's time. I I agree 100% and I understand completely
161and I again I always welcome feedback and second opinion. So I mean that's you guys are wonderful and we feel your your support all the time and Dr. Lee I thank you so much and our lawyers and everybody. So yes, still feel the love. Well, and and I feel like this is just me personally, you know, when when we ask committees to do things and to do all that work and and do all those things, then um I try to, you know, give a lot of credence to the people that put in that that time and their their efforts. Um so, thank you. So, board just so that you are aware, thank you, Miss Sylvia, I just want to say thank you for the work that you do. Um so this is the typical action
162that will happen for any challenge that we receive after the board has made its decision here. The individuals whether it's approved or denied or retained or removed I guess is the way anyone can then challenge that decision that you made as a board and it comes back to you um on both ways. So just FYI it goes on forever. Um, so we are uh we are working to try to streamline this as much as possible to to but to be diligent in what we're doing. Um, we've said it time and time again. Uh, it's not necessarily a matter of of what we personally believe or agree, but it is a matter of making sure that we follow the policy and the process that's in place and the law that's there. Um, that's our job to
163do that. And so that's what we're going to do every step of the way. And so I just wanted to make sure y'all knew what what kind of happens next depending on individuals and what they choose to do. Um but just a lot of uh thanks to Miss Sylvia uh her other librarians um our community members that are that are stepping up to take part in some of these committees. It is it is a lot of time and effort. Uh if I can make a request um if it would be possible for the board to have access to any materials that are challenged so that we could review them. I do not take lightly a committee saying this book should say and overturning that. And so being able to have additional research time um to
164be able to actually look at the book and the contents of the book and what's inside of the book. So just for clarification, are you asking that we purchase books for the board on what's challenging? We already have them, correct? They're already in our library. Not necessarily seven copies, right? We have Well, just want one here because I was if we could get enough time, I can order from Amazon. I can look at it but then realize the copy might actually exist in our libraries if there was Yes. Yeah. I mean we can get we can get you all of those things if we can have two weeks in advance to the board meeting enough time so that we could look at those books. I I'm not sure that you will always get two weeks
165time in advance. Like I want to be clear because also on an appeal um it is automatically whatever the next board meeting is. So if that board meeting is um 10 days away and we typically post that agenda on a Wednesday. If we receive the challenge on a Wednesday, it has to be put on the agenda for that following meeting. So you're not always going to get a full lengthy period of time. Like I just want to be transparent on the way that that process is based off of what our attorneys are saying. But I mean we can try to get you copies of anything. The challenge list is not a problem. Um we can share that fairly easily. In fact, I think you may you already have some of those things because they were
166shared when they were initially um challenged as part of the process. Um, but we can definitely get that to you. I just want to be clear on the timelines like we're limited on what sometimes we have the ability to do. Thank you. And just for clarification, any new books that are bought, they're looked at in a different light than books that are already existing in our library. Yes. Okay. Thank you. All right. Um, now item 10 C, consider approval of board resolution to establish a Sigin Independent School District Police Department. Dr. Coreo. Good evening, uh, board president Krendan, uh, Dr. Lee, and and, uh, trustees. Um, thank you all for having me this evening. Um so in front of you and before you you have a uh proposal for a consideration to uh start a
167sigin ISD police department. Um I'd like to give you as much information as I can give you at this point and want to kind of preface all the information that you're about to see in these slides with uh with I think this very important disclaimer for everybody on the board and and anyone's who's who's listening to the presentation. This is only the very very very first step that we're going to take. Okay. What we're basically essentially proposing to the board is uh for you all to consider uh implementing a siginist police department. In order to do that, we have to take some essential steps. And one of those big steps is um to apply for certification with the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement. Okay? And in order to do that, this is the very first
168step that we take. we bring this uh to the board and you all consider this as a project that's worthwhile for the school district. So, in order for y'all to make an intelligent uh and well-informed decision, uh I have a presentation that will hopefully give you an insight on what we're planning uh for the department, how we plan to stand it up, and what we project to see uh in in an ISTD department. Okay. Okay. Um so um just kind of an overview and an understanding of what security entails in Sigind and what the security department uh kind of works with on a daily basis. So we're currently uh servicing around 7100 students across 13 campuses. And the project that I am uh proposing or putting in front of you guys uh will call for
169an ISD outfitted or or staff with 16 personnel. Okay. So, we're uh we're looking to to outfit the department with 13 officers, a a chief of police, uh a detective for the ISD uh police department, and administrative assistant for the office. Uh totaled of of 16 personnel for the department. Uh the annual budget for the uh projected ISD police department would be right at $1.58 million for an annual budget in year one. I'll get into a little bit of the details of of what our budget looks like currently for us uh here in subsequent slides. Um okay, so our current security model like how we function here currently in in in Sigin ISD. Uh so our current annual cost right now is right at $1.1 million. Uh the that basically comes from the the model
170that's listed there. So we've got uh security officers uh 70% of our security comes from Sigin PD as contracted SRO's uh 30% comes from private security uh services across the district. Right. Uh we currently have limitations. So we currently have no investigative capacity uh across the district and we have no traffic enforcement capability with with our current model. Right. Um, in addition to the uh in in addition to this, we we have several challenges across the district. Uh, you know, I've been in in the seat or I've been in the role for about a year now, and these are these are kind of uh the things that rise to the top in terms of key challenges for the department. Uh, inconsistent coverage is is bas is is really big uh across the district. So we
171have a lot of times we have unavailable uh SRO's or security officers um sim PD officers because of of training that they do within the department. We also have might have municipal emergencies that draws them away from our campuses. So inconsistent coverage is is is definitely a big one. Uh I'll read across. So limited control. We can't necessarily select train or retain uh our own officers. uh they're not necessarily trained in school-based uh in our school-based specific needs that we need in SIGSD. Um escalating costs. So you all are well aware of this. Every year we do go back uh to a a agreement with both Sigin PD and our private security partners and every year that that agreement is is negotiated, right? Uh so there are potential of escalating costs. We have done our
172research with surrounding areas and what school districts are paying hourly wages for their security officers and that is uh slowly but surely uh ticking upward uh in in surrounding areas. Okay. Uh response delays we're definitely dependent on external priorities um things that pull uh PD officers away um incidents or emergencies across the across the city. uh that leaves gaps in in emergency response for for our school specific issues. Okay. Uh these are these are four of many uh but these are the the big buckets that kind of float to the top in terms of key challenges for for us on a daily. Okay. Um wanted to give you some context and wanted to give you kind of a a a feeling or a lay of the land in terms of security across the district. Right.
173And one of the key indicators or the data points that we can kind of leverage or kind of pull on are our P3 data. For those of you who aren't aware, P3 is our anonymous reporting tool that we have across the district. You can go go on there and anonymously report online. A variety of of of things, right? So, I wanted to give you kind of a sense. Uh in the past three years, we pulled data from 2023 to current. We've had 741 P3 tipline reports come across into Sigin ISD. and the breakdown of the 741 look as so right. So mostly from Sigin High School 512 uh incidents reported two 207 at our middle schools uh and 22 at our elementary schools. So what time uh what type of incidents are they? uh wide
174ranging everything from threats and bullying investigations, uh student staff assaults, drug offenses and substance abuse, uh weapons possessions, mental health crisis responses, trespassing and unauthorized access, traffic incidents and parking violations, social media threats, and cyber bullying. Uh it's constant. It's it's it's 247. Uh and it's it's wide ranging across the district. and and and uh and we field a substantial amount of those. Um so moving forward, what we're proposing for our Sigin ISD police department is uh an organizational structure that looks uh very much like this. Uh it would it would consist of a chief of police um who would supervise 13 campus officers. Uh the plan that we have in place is to to have two uh officers at Sigin High School and one at each of the respective uh 11 sites, right? Uh
175the chief of PD P uh chief of PD would be over the investigator uh investigator detective uh who would do criminal investigations and would be kind of our liaison between Sigin PD and law enforcement agencies. And then we'd have an administrative assistant in charge of records, uh, scheduling and and supporting administrative functions there in the office. So what would be the responsibilities? We do emergency response and incident management, traffic enforcement, school bus safety, criminal investigations and evidence processing, student mentoring, and relationship building, which I think is key and uh, one of the things that we're lacking across the district uh, with our current model. Absolutely. Yes, ma'am. Please stop me. Yes ma'am. Uh so currently what we have is one uh one officer at each one of our campuses. Sigin High School currently has uh
176three officers, two private security and one Sigin PD. Uh we did that this year because of the uh uh the usage of our metal detectors this year. This was our year one for implementation for metal detectors. So we gave them an additional uh officer there. And then we're our plan this year is to kind of throttle that down. Uh yeah. Yeah. Um that's what we would envision envision the chief of PD would spend a substantial amount at the high school and and through their through their workflow I would imagine that the investigator the bulk of their work would be happening at that campus and would be kind of taking the lead on those investigations. So although we have kind of set aside two officers at Sigin High School, there'll be there'll be additional personnel in
177and out just simply because of of of the type of of school that is, right? And the volume of incidents that'll be coming from that school as opposed to the others. Yeah. So uh exactly. Yeah. C and campus administrators would still take the the initial lead on student investigations, right? they they they have a a significant amount of of of latitude, right, that they can take with students in terms of our student handbook and and policies that we have in place. It's the it's the next additional steps that we have to take, right, uh where where our ISD police department will be able to support quite a bit. Um um yeah, I mean these officers in in in reality would would be able to take on a substantial amount of layers that our campus administrators
178are currently taking on in terms of security. Everything from exterior door checks to investigations on on specific incidents, um adherence to our campus emergency operation plan, drills, um and just kind of staying on top of that. It it it really allows the campus administration to maybe take a a not not a full step away back. Don't get me wrong, campus administrators are in charge of their campus and in charge of student safety, but it definitely allows them uh to to delegate some of those responsibilities out to folks that are aligned with with our own strategies, right? And they're trained by ISD and they're they have that school specific mentality. Yes, sir. Yeah. And I'll kind of hit some of that on on on my slides because I I honestly thought that that was one of
179the key key aspects of of bringing this in front of you guys. And and and I think this slide speaks to it is the specialized training that we'll be able to afford uh these officers that they're not necessarily getting um when they're coming from our private private security partners or from Sigin PD. So yes, they would all be TCO certified. They'd be Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Schoolbased Law Enforcement certified. Um which is that first box. They would uh be trained on arrest procedures and authority, evidence handling, and a chain of custody and report writing and documentation. Okay. Uh they would have an additional layer of training on school specific training. So we uh they'd be completely trained on active shooter response, behavioral threat assessment, student search and seizure uh procedures, and school emergency operations.
180And I think that that crucial third layer on this uh uh you know, for those of you who don't don't aren't super aware of what that uh uh SRO model entails is is this third layer is incredibly important because the SRO really is a a law enforcement officer, an educator, and an informal counselor for our students. And for for a lot of our students can can can can provide that that support, right, and that counseling for kiddos when when when they have issues. Um, so I think this is this is definitely a big piece where we would provide training around youth and crisis management, uh, juvenile laws and procedures, trauma-informed policing, mental health crisis intervention, and then more importantly, I think deescalation techniques, right? So we can be able to support campus administration in those
181tough times. So the officers that we have now, are are they trained in all three of our our officers are sigin PD officers and psych uh, uh, private security. They would get training on uh being that TCO portion of this particular training. They would get school specific training as well. Um but quite honestly, youth and crisis management unless they were to personally take on that that additional training on their own um they would they would not get that as part of their base core uh training. Yeah. Yes, sir. Yeah. Um, yeah, absolutely. Could not, you know, couldn't really put it better myself, sir. I mean, the consistency is one piece and the familiarity with with with the campus is another. And you're absolutely right. So in in a in a just to kind of give
182you a sense in a twoweek period as uh uh my department uh goes through uh payroll sheets for all these uh security officers in a two-eek period we could have anywhere between 30 uh 27 and 39 different police officers that come in and out of our buildings across all our campuses. Okay. So absolutely and and and and to be clear it's not necessarily their their prime occupation, right? This is this is a a secondary job for a lot of our folks. Um, so yes, absolutely. Uh, if if you were in an e situation in an incident and you get called to a particular area and if you're not super familiar with where you're heading, uh, it would be problematic, right? And seconds count when you're responding to emergency situations in a campus. Um, so that
183would be another huge advantage is that we would be able to train these officers, uh, school specific training in our in our buildings, uh, going through our maps, going through our campus and district specific emergency operations plan. They'd be keen and and understand reunification methods. They'd understand the services that we use. I mean, there's there's a lot of built-in uh, advantages. Absolutely. Yep. I have a question, Dr. for you before we um move on. Um traffic enforcement, can you tell me what that would look like as someone who drives a lot around the campuses? So, and I think I mentioned this at the very onset, y'all. And I want to be completely clear and transparent. Uh we've we've provided kind of a as much of a flushed out pro uh plan as we can. uh
184but certain certain uh nuances have have not just been completely documented because again this is going to be the first step and TCO will walk us through this piece but to answer your question yeah our jurisdiction would be uh on campus and in and around our our campus sites right we'd be able to um uh uh to do uh traffic violations within within our area but um but what that what that specifically would entail what kind um infractions we would give on folks. Uh we'd have to start kind of putting that in procedure. So I didn't know if that included the school zone itself and the speed limits or just onampus. Uh it would be on campus. That that's that's actually before you today as part of your resolution is there is a a a
185stipulation or a piece around jurisdictions and it basically um is specifically on our campuses. Yes, ma'am. Does that kind of somewhat answer your question? I know there's more details. Yeah, I I I think I just have a feeling that's what a lot of people are going to um ask. Uh again, as people who drive around the campuses a lot. Um so, okay. So, a little bit more about funding, right? Because I know this is this is an investment for the school district and and and and want to put as much in front of you guys as possible. But with that being said, again, the plan is as as ex exhaustive and as detailed as we could get it up to this point, considering we have not really entered the process with TCO yet. Uh, but
186we are basically calling for uh a total startup investment of $1.2 million uh that is funded from existing bond money, residual bonds from our 2022 bond. This is startup costs to get the ISD police department up and running. So, it's the the breakdown is is is just in front of you, right? Around $340,000 for vehicles and transportation. We're calling for six fully equipped uh patrol vehicles. Um I'll I'll read left to right. Uh so, $27,000 for technology and communications that includes body worn, incar camera systems, uh radio and equipment um is is part of that. Uh down at the bot in the that middle row, weapons and safety equipment around $75,000 for duty weapons. Uh less lethal options, uh trauma kits, ballistic shields, AD units for campuses. Uh around $50,000 for uniforms and personnel gear,
187personal gear, $58,500 for training and certifications, and around $550,000,000 for facility and infrastructure. Uh that includes building renovations, network infrastructure, wiring, evidence storage, armory, security systems, cameras, uh everything that the building needs to stand up in place. Can you speak to because I know people will have this question. How can we use that funding from the existing bond? when when we talked about bond 2022, we didn't talk about um establishing a new police force, but I I know the answer to this, but I just want you to address it. Um so, and and and I'll have Miss Miss Banks jump in here. Um if if you feel the need to. So the 22 uh bond did call for a significant uh portion of the bond money that that uh that was uh allocated or dedicate
188that it would be allocated or dedicated around safety and security. Uh the the SagenaD Police Department falls right into that that scope of work, if you will, that scope of project. Um and we feel that it's going to heighten um heighten the safety and security for all our our staff and students across the district. So, it can be used for that even though it specifically wasn't stated that way. The only thing that we will not be able to use the bond money for is that training and certification for 58,500. Um the about that bond did pull out $15 million for safety and security, which was um a lot uh more than we needed. We've got about 8 million left. So, but when that committee was put together, it was on the heels of Yubaldi. Uh
189people were very sensitive that um members of that committee are on our bond committee and our long-range facility planning committee and they wanted to make sure that we could do whatever we wanted to do. So we definitely have the money and we need to spend it quite frankly. So when Ruben said he wanted to do this I was like great because we need to spend that money. Thank you so much. Based off the last bond update, wasn't there like something like 8 million left in that still and this is only going to be 1.2ish? Yeah, I mean the facility infrastructure, you know, that might that's kind of just, you know, this is like pull it out of the sky. So, so there's still a lot more after this we still have to spend too for
190safety and security. Yes, sir. Just to clarify, um, we do have some plans for some of that money before Mr. Bright gets too excited down that end of the table. I know how this works. So, Liz, can you clarify your statement of have to spend? Has that bond already been sold? So yes, we have all the bond 2022 money in our checking accounts. Uh 15 million was allocated or budgeted. That doesn't mean we have to spend 15 million on that, but since we told the community that we were budgeting 15 million, that would be a best practice. Okay. Thank you. I think back in 2022, the community must have thought that 20 that was back then just cameras and other high-tech stuff. Times have times have changed. Yeah. And we still Good idea. We still
191have cameras. We still have access control. I mean, we still have stuff that we're that Rubin's working on that we're working on. Yeah, we those are some of the things that we are working through is additional security camera access control especially um to be able to start limiting who has access to our buildings and how we can track it. Uh physical keys are hard to do that because if a key gets lost, you don't know where it's at. Key card access is very easy. You lose a key card, we turn off the key card. Um we're able to shut it down and we're also able to track what key cards were swiped where. So some of the work that we're already looking at for future security needs is access controls across campuses and where where
192to put additional access controls. Okay. So moving past that first year of startup costs, this is what the annual operating budget would be for year one for the ISD police department. Um we're uh projecting at right at $1.5 million. Okay. uh year one annual operating cost. So that compares uh with our current security cost. As such, right there on the top right uh corner, like I said before, we're currently spending about $1.1 million specifically and and and and really uniquely on on personnel. That's really essentially where all that cost is going. Okay. Uh and the new department budget would be 1.5. So it's an annual increase of $475,000. And the increase is listed down there at the bottom. Uh really in terms of personnel salaries, benefits, and overtime, we're uh essentially right at that same
193mark, right? $1.1 million for personnel. The additional cost comes in with insurance, equipment, supplies, and technology, vehicle operations, and maintenance, uh yearly training, professional and development, services, contracts, and contingencies. Uh that's essentially where that where that additional overage comes from. When you say insurance here, that's vehicle insurance, those kind of things. Yes, ma'am. That is correct. What about liability insurance? Um, liability. I know uh Miss Banks was was in touch with our insurance provider and got some information about about the increase. Yeah. And I do just want to point out that Ruben's being super conservative and careful with these numbers. U we did sit down and look at them and I I I'm hopeful that we don't have an increase that there's padding in all of these areas. So, we currently have property insurance with
194TASBY. Uh, TASBY does not explicitly cover the district for law enforcement liability, but they also do not exclude it. So, basically, what would happen if we didn't go out and get our own standalone policy? If we had a claim, then um, we would put it through TASBY and see what they cover. They're essentially being silent with me. But many TASBY Districts do get their standalone policy, and I think we've got plenty of room in that 131,000. It's definitely not going to be more than that. So, Yeah, I definitely agree with Miss Banks. The the the plan is pretty detailed and pretty fleshed out. There are some potential cost savings throughout uh that we've identified uh through executive leadership team, but I wanted to put as much in front of you because the these would be
195the things uh that we would that would be essential to stand up the police department. Okay. Um so the benefits now let's talk about the amazing benefits that we would that we would experience here moving forward uh potentially next school year. So obviously immediate response right so the officers present uh present during all incidents without external dependency. Okay and that's big for us. Uh the specialized training is also paramount. So, we'd have school-based law enforcement expertise and youth development focus, operational control, direct authority over hiring, training, deployment, and accountability of these folks throughout the school year. We'd have mutual aid capacity. So, we've we would be an additional resource for regional agencies during major incidents. And just to be super clear, the the process of of of applying for a police department through Tiko, I
196mean, this is step one, but the subsequent steps uh call for us to have uh inter agency agreements, right? Interlocal agreements with both sigin PD, county sheriff, uh dispatch, emergency operations. I mean, we would have all these agreements in place and agreed upon uh before day one. Okay. Uh the other benefit is cost predictability, right? We know what our long-term budget is. Right now we don't necessarily have control other than you know on a yearly basis we have one year at a time and then institutional knowledge officers build lasting relationships and campus specific expertise to your point right know where our hallways are know know how many rooms we are we have per building know what our emergency evacuation plan is know who the staff is maybe some names of staff members and some kiddos
197maybe some high fives here and there on the hallways right and and that's that additional layer that we'd like to build in in our campus is to make sure that our students understand that these folks are our friends. They're a supporting layer. They're an additional educator almost on our campus, right? That provides safety and security for them. That's one of the the highlights that I believe that when I went through my first conference, I went through a ski an ISD police officer thing and they they had mentioned about the capability of an ISD police officer compared to your RSOs, compared to your security guards and they can do a lot more things for us, right? Yes, sir. and enforce district policy, not just law. Exactly. Help with discipline problems, things like that. Right. Exactly. And
198not to say anything about our current system. We our sigin police department officers are outstanding. All right. And work work incredibly well with with Sigin PD. But you're absolutely right. There are some limitations. They are there to intervene when a law is broken uh and to take the steps accordingly. And as a as a SRO, um, we we have a little bit more latitude on on what interventions that they can take, the trainings that we can give them. And then they're also looking at our policy. They're looking at our student handbook. They're looking at at the rules and regulations that we've set for our kiddos. It's just a different lens. It's a different lens for our folks on our campus. Yeah, it's a great point. Uh so our timeline our timeline obviously just like anything
199else that that I've kind of put in front of you guys is rather aggressive. Okay. Because our plan is to get enough of an ISD department up and running and ready to go August of 2023 to start next school year. Okay. Which mean Yeah. Which means um which means and and I'm and I'm and I'm rather confident that it can happen, right? uh for several reasons. Uh funding is one of them. Um secondly, these folks behind me uh from from the CAO uh down to student support services and and the two folks in between that are that are incredibly paramount. Uh we're all working in in kind of conjunction on this. We've all agreed that this is a worthwhile project. Um Dr. Dr. Lee has helped and supported every every way just just to kind
200of make sure that we have all our all our all our tees crossed, all our eyes dotted to, make sure that we've that we've kind of dug in on on all the possibilities for this department. So, I'm I'm confident that we can get it off the ground. Uh, but it's it's based on on obviously y'all y'all making a good informed decision tonight. And and again, your your decision tonight just kind of uh steers me in one direction, right? and and if if if we vote for this then we go down that path and uh and we start to take steps that that TCL sets forward but basically planning uh from from back in a couple of months to today and then March and May would uh leave us for setup and procurement. We would allocate
201the funds we would award contracts for vehicles and equipment. We would hire the chief of police uh of the police department and we would be begin our organizational development in June and July. We would hire and that that that's the challenge, right? and we've we've kind of discussed this as a group is that hiring would be a potential challenge. Um, but we we uh we feel confident and and we feel like we've got potential support around the area. Um, so we would complete hiring all the personnel there between June and July. We'd run them through T-Code certification and specialized training and uh and then we'd start training them and we'd start August uh August of 2026 full deployment 12 campuses student and community orientation operational assessment continuous improvement and uniformed officers in our campuses for
202next week. I just one thing on that says full deployment across 12 campuses. Yes sir. Uh um oh because MLC Yes sir. 12 sites. I I guess I should have been a bit more Yeah, check. Uh so, um you know, one of the things that we do uh here at the district and what we're starting to do and starting to become muscle memory and habit is to try and align our efforts with everything that we're doing across the district and our strategic plan. So, I did want to outline and just kind of highlight a little bit of what what uh how this aligns with our strategic plan uh and how our ISTD police department could help support a couple of our goals. So, priority three on our strategic plan calls for positive community culture. Obviously,
203the alignment is pretty evident, pretty obvious, right? Dedicated police departments that build trust with families and students. Trained officers focus on student mentoring and relationship building and school-based presence uh signals that students are cared for. And to be completely honest with you, this that's one of the big things that we've heard this year uh since implementing our metal detectors and the additional security at Sigin High School. We've I've personally heard from students and they've they've flat out told me I feel safe this year. And I think that's big. I think that's big. Um, it allows for learning. It allows for tensions to kind of dwindle down a little bit, for people to let their guards down and just be kids and be students. Um, and I think we need to leverage that. And I think
204ISD police department could definitely support uh support that priority five again, strategic operational stewardship. The department would provide long-term cost predictability versus escalating contracts year upon year. the bond funds start uh minimizing budget deficit impact and we have operational control and uh improves resources efficiency and accountability for our folks uh to make sure they're aligned with our district goals. And then priority one, challenging and meaningful learning, right? So safe campuses are prerequisite for academic achievement. 741 safety incidents in the last three years directly disrupts learning environments. Right? And we need to be able to address those accordingly. and a faster response and investigation reduces classroom disruption. So hopefully we'll be able to support campus administrators, allow them to get back to teaching and learning and making sure that that happens effectively. Um you know guys,
205you know, thank you for your ears and thank you for your attention, your consideration for the proposal, right? I mean from our standpoint, from my standpoint personally, I do believe that this is the right step. It's the most responsible step for the school district to take. um you know and it allows us operational control of what's happening out there for safety and security for our kiddos. Um essentially that's what I've prepared but I'm I'm more than welcome uh I mean more than happy to field questions or wonderings or I know this is a big step. I've got a couple of questions and this is a great idea by the way so whatever I ask don't think of it as a negative way. No no no so thank you. Do we have the possibility for applying
206for grants or does the bond money going to prevent us from doing that? So I I know that there are potential grants every year, right, that are specific to school districts that have ISD police departments. Um there are grants that are that that fund technology equipment, weapons, you know, those type of things. Um, I don't see us uh using the 22 bond funds for a startup cost precluding us from from moving forward with those grant opportunities in year two and beyond. Correct. Okay. Yes, sir. Have we modeled or spoken with other schools surrounding school districts that have I'm not too sure if San Marcos or Kamal has a Yeah. So, we we I did a significant amount of digging kind of a data dig on surrounding areas. Navaro being one of them, New Bron Falls,
207uh especially around looking at what their uh what their compensation look like for their for their police officers. Um so so so we do we have a significant amount of information of districts that have stood Del Valley being another one uh of school districts that have stood up police departments in the last five years um and and and have that connection with those school districts to be able to support. Yeah. So, how do you think this will compete with our local uh with our with our local uh police department? Um, so the way I see it, sir, quite honestly, is is with standing up an ISD law enforcement agency within the school district is another law enforcement agency within your municipality, right? Good point. So, it's another responding uh agency for a particular incident or
208potential incident. Um, one of the big pieces on on on applying for for a police department is uh we bring this in front of you all. We bring in a resolution, right? And then that second piece is the second piece is called a a TCO benefits letter. It's a letter that that kind of delineates all this information for TLE saying, "Hey, Tico, yeah, we're we we've presented it to the board. We've got funding." But one of the big pieces on that benefits letter is have you reached out to your local law enforcement agencies? Have you reached out to the police department? Have you talked to the sheriff's department? And we've already taken those steps and have th had those like preliminary conversations with them. Right. We did not want to blindside anybody when we put
209this in in front of you guys. Um so we've done a little bit of the leg work and and the the conversations have been supportive. The convers conversations have been very very responsive from both sides. Um so so we're definitely heading in a good direction and I think it's positive what I'm hearing. It's definitely working in Austin. I do hear a lot about ISD and also Westlake. Of course, we'll never get the deal that they got. They got the Teslas donated by Musk because he because he has a house in Westlake. That's Gotcha. Thank you. Yes, sir. Is there um a specific maybe pool of applicants that specifically like to work for school districts that already have that training? Are there avenues we can go to try to find those? So, I mean, you know,
210and we we've talked about this extensively, right? So, our ideal applicant would be somebody who's uh who's got experience in law enforcement, maybe a former police department uh officer, uh looking for a change in in in pace, a different setting, right? But we would look be looking for folks who potentially already certified through Told, right, and have already gone through that training. Uh and there there are a potential pool of applicants in the area. Again, it's it's it's it's an enticing role for for police officers considering considering the type of work, right? Uh if if uh it's it's it's really great work. You're working with students. You're working on on a very different workday calendar. You're working with a different uh sense of emergency uh situations that might arise. So, there are some some benefits
211for some police officers out there in in in acquiring a role like this. I guess is what I'm saying. In the search for a chief, would that be extensive? How would it um it it it would be a search for a chief of police department? And we're looking for somebody who who understands the school district, understands what we're looking for, and understands what the expectation is, but yeah, we we would be doing a search for a police department chief. Yes, ma'am. What kind of for the campus officers do they work a 187 day contract? Yeah. So, we we we kind of uh talked a little bit about what that would look like. Depending on their summer uh professional development, we're looking at somewhere in the range of 195 to 197 days work for that for
212that school year. Again, I'm still kind of flushing out what those TCO uh training requirements would be for them. Uh but in the surrounding areas, that's what you're seeing is right around that mark, 195 197. And are they allowed to have other jobs or So the these would be uh officers that are that are solely dedicated to our police department. So we we would want them they would be our full-time employees. And I assume that this wouldn't be 7 to 4:30. They would be at football games and extracurricular activities, summer school. So, we would we we're still flushing that out a bit in terms of their days worked and what their their actual uh responsibilities would be for extracurriculars. Um whether that would be tied into their total days worked, whether that would be uh
213paid at a at a different rate for those additional, but these would be the folks that we would lean on and count on to cover those those activities. What salary was used for the calculations of the costs? Yes ma'am. Uh so it was a a a subset of six different districts. Uh one second. Uh yeah so we took a sample set uh from surrounding districts. One of them was uh Navaro shirt civil New Bron Falls Marian Leveria and Hayes. Uh you know similar size similar makeup for for the most part. uh ranges were we're consistently somewhere around uh what we've what we've projected right somewhere around $35 an hour all the way up to $40 an hour depending on on the district. So whip if you turn that into a year an annual salary that's
214what you're want to know I'm pretty sure that it was $52,000 was the annual salary and then Dr. Co uh added about 30% which I think is probably a little bit higher percentage than what it is to offset benefits also. Um, so you're looking at a total cost per position for for an officer of about 67,000. 67. Yes. How does the $52,000 annual salary compare to our local police department's current salaries? Uh, it's it's comparable to a to a a city police officer, but I I'd have to get a little bit more information from you. I don't want to misspeak to be completely honest with you. Uh, I I did I quite honestly focused my research on school district police officers and their comparable salary. Oh, absolutely. Yes. So, we currently pay $50 an hour
215for our security officers uh at every single one of our campuses, Sigin, PD, or private security. So this for that salary that we referred to of around 675, you're looking at around $35 to $37 an hour. So the hourly rate is is a savings. I just I Googled it and it looks like the starting salary of PD is about 69,000. So that would be one of my concerns is it's a substantial decrease to the a comparable position in the community. Will we would with that salary would we be able to attract quality candidates? Yeah. Uh I think so you're absolutely right. It's it's maybe a variance of two or $3,000 that that that they would benefit a little bit more from from working outside of the ISD, right? Is my math incorrect there on that?
21652 to 69. It's a pretty good Yeah. So it's 52 base salary with benefits included. You're looking at that. We were looking at 67. I pulled up the local police department also and it shows their annual salary of 67,000. Keep in mind that an officer for a school district, as Dr. Curio pointed out, would be working roughly 197 days. Um, that's the equivalent of still having your summers off. Um, so they're essentially being paid for two less months work in exchange for those summers off. Just like I mean, let's be very real. That's how teachers are compensated. Also, they're only paid for their 187 days. They don't get paid for Christmas vacation and Thanksgiving break and those things. It would be the same thing for these officers. So the salary would be lower than our
217local uh competition from a city beat standpoint. I guess I don't know if that's the right term or not. Um but it would be very comparable to other school district officers that are doing the same thing that we would be doing. Yes, that makes sense at all. How how do we attract quality candidates without much discrepancy in um so again I think I think it really come boils down to the type of job and the type of role. So quality candidates will be uh kind of attracted to the the potential of the type of work. We'd be looking for folks who have experience in law enforcement. We'd be looking for folks who have who have that that training, but more important the intrinsic motivation to work with in and around students and campus life. And
218we'd want folks who are dedicated to working with staff and students, right? Who have campus in mind and student safety in mind first. So that in my mind would be a quality candidate for for the department. Um again would be somewhat of a challenge to to acquire a very large pool of folks but there are many folks who are looking to make that transition and to to be in the line of work where they're doing well providing service uh being impactful but maybe not necessarily being in that city beat kind of environment. Yeah. In in the two previous districts that I have worked with where we had our own uh local ISD police department, um there were a handful of officers in both of those districts that were retired officers um that had already gotten
219their retirement and just did not want to be retired. And so they were able to come back and do this while they still because it's technically a TRS job with our benefits versus what you typically get with ERS and those types of things. Yes, sir. When I I thought about that same thing, Lisa, and I I kind of thought about our school nurses who a lot of them could make a lot more money if they were a nurse in the emergency room or or something like that, but they choose that stable schedule. A lot of them are parents who have their um have their kids in the school district, so they want to work kind of the same schedule as their kids. Um, if you uh had this job on one of the campuses, could
220you do something else in those months that you have off? Be the go be the security guard at Schlitter Bun or whatever there is that that needs more stuff in the summer. That's my only we would iron out those details, right? Uh to to kind of add those stipulations. Again, I think a a a good portion of their summer in in my mind would be set aside and specifically for for training, right? Um we we would train to emergency operations. We would train to to responses. We would train towards investigations, but but yeah, I think we we'd flush out some of those details of what would be allowable and what would be out of bounds for these specific folks. Um yeah, more to come in in terms of what that would look like. Ruben, I
221appreciate your thorough um presentation here for us this evening. My question is really to Dr. Lee. So, we have all of our new strategic plan. We have tons of work going on. We're moving in the right direction. Um do you all foresee this taking you or sidetracking you from that current mission? Uh, I want to make sure I feel that this is a pretty big undertaking that should not be taken lightly and I just want to make sure that you guys all think that you can continue that good work that I see y'all are doing every day uh to move our district in the right direction and we're not going to get sidetracked by worrying about this as well. Yeah. Um, I think that that's a great question for starters and I appreciate that we're
222even being asked that question um because it is. Uh I think one of the sayings that I've adopted uh recently especially used it today when I was presenting on the strategic plan to the Sigin Rotary Club um is we have work to do. We have hard work to do but it's good work to do um that's meaningful and and has purpose for what's best for our students, for our staff, and for our community. Um and so I think any movement that we do that advances our district is going to be hard work. Um you guys heard me say this when I interviewed with you. It's supposed to be hard for the adults. It's not supposed to be hard for the other people. Um, so I think we recognize that there's a challenge. I do want
223to say thank you to Dr. Curo, his team especially. You can see the amount of time and effort and thought that they have put into this since way back in the fall. Um, but to answer your question, I you know, I think it's going to be work, but I think it's the right work that needs to happen um to keep us moving in the direction. We we we're focusing a lot on academics. We also have focus on some of the operational pieces, too, that can help support other work that happen. I have to say I'm I was happy to see that you aligned that to our strategic plan, pointed us to where it aligned. So, I appreciate that. Thank you. And then just for the board to know, I also want to just reinforce what
224Dr. Curio said at the very beginning. This is an initial step in the direction of this. This does not guarantee that everything works out perfectly for us. We don't know what that looks like if we were if we're given approval. We don't know what that looks like with TEL yet. Um, we don't know what type of feedback, what type of changes they might require based off of policy revisions and adoptions that have to happen. Um, there's still going to be other action required by you as a board um, when it comes to purchasing equipment, when it comes to potential hires, uh, when it comes to setting policy and procedure that would align with some of the work that's happening. Um, and so I just wanted to reinforce that this is an initial step in the
225direction for us. It doesn't necessarily mean that it's an end- all beall. Dr. Curio um has outlined a timeline um a very avaricious timeline that's there uh that moves pretty quickly. Um and I think that we also have to be prepared to recognize that there may be challenges with that timeline that may affect what we can or cannot do. Um but I have full confidence in him, full confidence in his team, uh full confidence in our team with Sigin ISD to make those changes as they're necessary and then we would report that back to you. Um, but if you do agree and move forward with approving the resolution, that is just the initial step for us. That doesn't mean that tomorrow we have a sigin ISD police department ready to go. Um, or that we
226immediately hire someone to do some of that work. This just means that we start that initial process with the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement to be able to see what has to happen uh afterwards. With the action item that is on the agenda, um it says a board resolution to establish a sigin independent school district police department. Does that mean that there is no further board approval needed in order to if going down this path um finding out more of the numbers? Um would we have to do an additional resolution to dissolve a sig independent school district if in the future It was determined it was not the best option for the district that I know of. You would not have to create an additional resolution to dissolve it. I will clarify my words and
227and correct them if need be. But to my knowledge, you would not have to create an additional resolution to dissolve it. U this resolution just kind of gets us forward and moves us in a path to make the application and and submit it. What is the next step that the board would then approve? Um so the next the next step would be once we submit uh TCO application then you would begin an approval process of policy and procedure around ISD police department. So that would be coming before you guys uh as we begin to develop that policy through tool. So you would you would have uh approval and oversight of all the policies that essentially govern the police department but this essentially gives the green light to push forward and the only way to push
228stop would be to dissolve it. Not necessarily. We have to have this resolution for TCL to even do their part, right? Um is what it comes down to. Um, it's it's interesting the way that the legal policy works when it comes to local ISD police departments because we're establishing we're essentially trying to establish a local ISD police department through the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement. Um, at any point that any peace officer can be commissioned by the board. Um, they just have to meet the standards established by TCL as part of that. Um, we're just having to set up a police department to be able to do it. We could establish police officers right now that meet the TCL standard without having our own police department. We would just do that through anou with other
229organizations, uh, city police department, uh, sheriff's offices, any of those types of things. So, you're going to you're likely looking at fairly consistent votes at every meeting on something that happens depending on what we receive back from TLE. Um, it may take us several weeks to even get TLE to say, "Yes, this looks good. Now, you would approve it." I do see that section three funding says in the last line the superintendent shall present a detailed budget proposals to the board for approval. So that's part of the resolution that the funding will be coming back in front of us for sure. Um any other wonderings because I kind of see another wondering. I well I maybe we didn't answer it completely. Just I can say this. I really I think it's a very innovative um
230it's an identified idea. I think it would be it's such a great thing for our district um to be able to have the control, the extra resources, um everything that's there. Um my I have two big concerns. Um the first being we are in a deficit and we are in a very large deficit and we haven't seen our budgeting process to for this next year. Are we in a better spot? You know, if we had our if we knew this year our budget was going to be cut in half and the next year we can cut it in half again, but right now I feel like we would be going into debt for this and that brings major concerns to me that we already have a deficit and we're adding to it. Um, another one
231of my concerns is that we're a D district and while the safety of our students is very important, I feel like our students are very safe right now in the current thing. More safe is always better. Um, but they are safe right now, but we're a deep district. And so I really feel like that if we are going to go more into a deficit budget, it needs to be to work on academics and learning, teacher salaries, curriculum, professional development. Um it just to me the timing is that we're just we're in a hard spot where we're making some very positive progress but we have that deficit and we have that but if we were we had that C if we you know had that finished budget of four million those are kind of those are
232my major concerns. Sure. And as this gets worked out, we're going to know a lot more of that information. By the time the police department actually gets set up, we're going to have those star test scorers to see if we actually did improve this year. We're going to have our budgeting process more complete. We're going to know. Um, so that's one of my concerns is that we give the green light and then if things aren't moving as positive direction as we all hope, are we now in a bad spot to reverse? Um I think so to kind of calm a little bit that concern that you may have. Um yes. So so you're absolutely right. So we we would potentially if we were to get into an issue with personnel, right, when that applicant pool
233is a bit more shallow than what we thought, we we we don't have enough officers to really outfit the entire district. Um there there there there could be a way where we're kind of running both plans concurrently, right? where we would still have a interlocal agreement with our sigin PD or our private security that provides services August of 2026 and then we throttle that down while we uh pursue our our TCL certification with TCO and then start to get our personnel up on our ISD police department side and there could be like this slow transition which is quite honestly normally how things happen around school districts honestly is is is this this gradual shift right so there would be potential of doing that. This is not an on and off. This is not like y'all
234are deciding to sign this resolution. So that's it. Gotta really build a police department next school year, right? There there there are potential. We have, like I said, we've got a great working relationship with Sige PD. We've got a great private security partner that we already work with. So there are potential for us to have different plans moving forward while we're still trying to build our police department. Right. I think it's also important to acknowledge that the timeline that uh Dr. Co has outlined here for like the hiring and the training and even the setup and the procurement. Those things would happen when we do have more budget numbers to know what's going on. Um so we're not talking about today, February 24th, we're establishing a $1.1 million project to get this up and moving.
235Um we're just saying this is the initial process. over these next several months um when Liz and I are looking at uh tax revenue, taxable value, state revenue, all those types of things that we'll get starting in April um and then again in uh June and July as we get revisions from the appraisal district. I think that we also have the ability to come back and go whoa maybe we do need to hit the brakes a little bit here. Um and so that's why I want to just be clear like this isn't the green light to go for everything. This is just the initial process to set us up. At any point that we feel like we are not moving in a direction that works for the district both financially, operationally and student, academically, we're
236going to come back to you and say this is not the right move for us. Um because the last thing I want us to do is to commit to something just because we're dead set on committing to it. No, it's going to be what's right for the time, for the moment that it needs to happen. Or we'll come back to you and say, "Yeah, we got that wrong. We need to slow down. We need to do this a little bit different." I don't know if you're used to that. I'm just not afraid to say that. I have a new question. Yes, ma'am. Um, does Tik Tok uh does it require that we have a board resolution to establish? Yes, ma'am. It sure does. So, that's the that's the requirement. Correct. Yes, ma'am. There's a there's
237not approval to apply because approval to apply, but it's different than established. It definitely calls for a the resolution establishment of a resolution, right, of the department that kind of details these pieces in the resolution, right? So, they're asking for uh kind of a an understanding that the ISD is going to provide funding for the project that that they that you all understand the jurisdiction that you understand that you got to build policy and procedure around it. Those those are the pieces that are required in that tool uh that application. Correct. I also want to say thank you for asking the questions and taking this seriously and not just being like, "Yeah, let's go." Um, ye-haw. Uh, because it does take a lot for us to make sure that we're moving in the right direction.
238And I think that's a good sign um that we have a cohesive team that is working on those things. Like I didn't expect this to just for us to come in and greenlight it. Like I expected there to be lots of questions because there needs to be. Um, if anything, I'm more impressed with Dr. Coreo than I was before this meeting started with his ability to do this. So, well done. Um, but like I just want y'all to know like I appreciate that there is real questions that there are real questions being asked and that this isn't just a okay, let's do it. Yeah. And I I really appreciate them too y'all because I mean the same questions I ask them to myself, we ask them to um and and we just kind of lean
239in on all those questions to make sure that we have um we have an avenue to dig in on it, right? Do we have the resources to be able to solve the issue? Uh just to just real quick to your point. Um yes, you're absolutely right. Deficit and and dd district uh a lot of things have to happen in order to improve our rating and a lot of things are happening concurrently. That's kind of one of the key words here within within our group is that we've got a lot of projects and they're all concurrently running and they're all going to be concurrently successful at some point or another. Okay. And and we just the the pace of schools now is so fast that um you you sometimes got to be able to stand up
240several things all at the same time and confide in in your staff and confide in the personnel that you've got and the experts in the room. And we've got plenty. We've got plenty in in this district. Um so yeah, timeline's super aggressive, but I feel really confident that we can hit our benchmarks uh and we can get it off the ground uh with some support. Yeah. Are there some things that administrators do now that they would have more time to do other things? So um and and to be uh Yeah, absolutely. So to be clear, they're they are responsible for the safety and security of their campus and they are um yeah they are responsible for securing that. So exterior door checks, hourly door checks, classroom door checks, adherence to the emergency operation plan, drills,
241practicing of drills, right? Um now does does a police officer completely remove these responsibilities from a campus administrator? No, not at all. But it's an it's an additional layer. It's somebody that you can delegate responsibilities to. A perfect example would be hourly door checks, exterior door checks. Our campus administrators are are basically conducting those right now in conjunction with their officers, right? But again, we have limited latitude, right, with those with those folks and we have extensive flexibility with our with our own police officers. So yes, we bring them into the fold. They they do hourly checks on their own, right? They do cl uh we can we can put them on a schedule. We can give them expectations of what their daily schedule should look like, how many checks they do. Um, we can
242give them roles and responsibilities around drills. We can give them specific roles and responsibilities around our emergency operation plan. What is your role around an evacuation? What is your role around reunification? Well, we can't really train to those things because it might be one of the 39 guys that that shows up that day, right? But if you had consistent staff, then you could be able to bring them into the training, train staff, students, and officers all at once, right? Let's say we had an incident on a campus. Yes, ma'am. God forbid. Um would they be the incident commander then or will local law enforcement there'll be that interlocal agreement where they can come and aid? Absolutely. So depending on the type of incident, right? uh but uh essentially it would escalate to the chief of
243police our ISD chief of police right would would would uh take lead on those type of incidents but our interlocal agreements are are are are pretty detailed and explicit right so if if it's an e situation that requires law enforcement to come onto our campus then that that would happen right that would happen those agreements would be in place um they would still have access to our buildings they would still have emergency access to our buildings after hours at least our city PD. Uh we would keep that as part of our our procedure and our practice. Uh but yes, all that would be detailed in an agreement very similar to what what we currently work with now, right? Is is there they're going to respond. City PD, county sheriff, they're going to respond to an
244incident. Um and we're going to allow them to. Now, yes, depending on the situation, the uh the incident commander, that shifts th those responsibilities shift depending on the incident, right? If it's larger, if it's a large broad scope, it's affecting multiple people, multiple sites, uh then we coordinate that with law enforcement. What's the quickest way to fix our budget long-term efficiently? It would be to increase our enrollment and to decrease those number of transfers. So, I mean, from my perspective, there's things that we have to do in regards to accountability, but also safety of our kids um compared to what other districts are doing to attract kids to our district and keep them here. And it feels to me like this is something that would do that because they're building relationships. They know our kids.
245They know our families. They know our campuses. So even though we're seeing that might be an increase to our budget, if it brings in kids, you know, we're looking at 7,000 or so dollars a kid annually. So it could have really positive long-term effects financially. Yeah. Any other questions? Madam President, I move to approve the uh establishment of Sigin ISD Police Department. Second. All right. I have a motion for Mr. Bright and a second for Mr. Geta. Any further discussion? I would just I would just really encourage the board to think about um just the the decision that that we're making at this time to move forward um time aotment to it and the money we're deciding to move forward. Any further discussion? All in favor raise your right hand. Oppose. Same sign. Motion passes
24661. Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. Pria. Um, all right. Now, oh, sorry. Does anybody need a little break? We just have a few more items, but I want to give you the chance just in Okay. Um, 10 C, consider approval of a board resolution to establish Oh, sorry. Uh, 10 D, uh, delay the teacher certification requirements application. Mr. Good evening. Um, due to the HB2 restrictions, Sigin uh no longer is able to employ uncertified teachers for foundational courses over the next two school years. That's just part of the resolution of HB2. Um, TEA has given districts an option to delay the timing of these new restrictions. U and the process for this delay would be to develop a local plan for compliance by the 2930 school year. That's u the agenda or the
247exhibit is the plan that we put in place. Um, obtain board approval which is here and then submit that plan to TEA. And so basically what we have is um I I actually think we're being pretty aggressive and we're moving pretty quickly. I think that our established timeline to um get our uncertified folks certified uh before that timeline is um is happening. But uh we wanted to give ourselves some flexibility based on these new laws. So basically to give you more data on that in uh 2627 all uncertified teachers in K through five um they will not allow us to employ them. And then starting in 2728 everybody from 6 through 12 in foundational courses we won't be able to employ them. Um as well we have just uh some for some more data we
248have 67 employees right now without standard certifications and we have that breakup is 42 have no certifications and 25 are on intern certifications. And so all we're trying to do is uh delay that option or delay the the requirement to give us maximum flexibility as we try to work these teachers into certifications and um not have to um search for other people. Jeremy, can you explain what a foundational course is and that data you just gave? Are all those foundational teachers or that all teachers in the district? So the data that I gave you were based on our uncertified foundational teachers. Um foundational classes are like uh English, math, science, anything that's not uh say the fine arts, uh PE, CTE, uh any of those. Oh, there. Yep. That's what the state is identifying as
249a foundational course for for next year it' be K through five elementary has to be fully certified. Um you cannot district of innovation your way out of it. Um and then the year after uh 2728 uh would be 6 through 12 foundational teachers. Um English, math, science and social studies. You cannot district of innovation yourself out of it. they've changed the rules. Um, that was what House Bill 2 did there. Um, ultimately, if I'm being um if I'm using the crystal ball to see what's happening, I fully anticipate that the state is getting ready to pull back any type of alternative um or local certification options. I expect that we'll probably see more from the legislature in the next legislative session. Um, that that's what they're pushing is for certified teachers. But this only has
250to do with our foundational teachers um in House Bill 2. has nothing to do with any other educators. Um, this is basically, as Mr. Newman said, given us a little bit more flexibility um, by having the option to extend that timeline a little bit and that's why Mr. Newman and his team developed that that plan that has to go to TEA to be approved. Anyways, um, so if you approve this tonight, what you're approving is the plan that we then send to TA TEA to determine if it's even approved for us or not. Mr. Newman, to his credit, um, and I want to give him and his team a lot of credit, um, They have been working very diligently all year to look at our district of innovation status, look at um timelines to make
251sure that we're supporting folks as best possible to get them fully certified knowing that that's where we're headed towards and what we're going to have to do. And I actually think there's a possibility that we'll accomplish that this year, but um the problem is is um oftentimes the teachers have to take certain tests to get the certification and they'll have a timeline where they want to take the test, but we have some that don't pass those tests the first time or the second time, and then we'll be out of compliance with those particular teachers. So even though they may be excellent in the classroom and they are they have a great plan to move forward, what will happen is if they don't pass that test, then we'll be out of compliance. Um as we go
252uh if we don't have this delay, how long does it take for them to, for example, somebody walks comes in with a BS in biology and they want to get certified, typically takes like a year and then they take a test. Yeah. So they um have to take a test to enter a program and they usually oh the ones that I mentioned the 42 that have no certification they're not even in say a program where they have an intern certification um and I think partly because our DOI has allowed it they haven't been as aggressive in getting into a program but once somebody gets into the program and has their intern certification the program requires them really to do it in a or they'll be dropped from the program. So, I just want to clarify
253something. Because we're still operating under the DOI, we those 42 teachers you're talking about do have a certification, whether it be a DOI one or something, right? Uh, no, that's incorrect. Our folks that are under DOI have no certification. There are some that may have an emergency permit, but the majority of those that I listed uh have no certification whatsoever. Exemption there. The only because we're DOI. Correct. The only certification certification that they have is a local certification through our district of innovation plan. There's nothing that transfers with them. There's nothing on their record that's attached to their TEI ID or any of that. Like they are uncertified and we are saying that we're locally certifying them through District of Innovation. That's basically disappearing for foundational courses, the core courses, English, math, science, and social
254studies. How many of those do we have? Yeah, that's the uh 42 number that I gave you. Those are all foundational. That's correct. That I actually have it broken down. I have 23 K through five. Um actually this is the total aggregate of the both intern and notice certification which is 23 K through 5 42 6 through 12 and then I have two in prek which that doesn't uh include it's not included in the foundational but again um we're been trying to be pretty aggressive to get certified employees here. So, I've been meeting with all of the uncertified and intern certification employees this last month um and kind of giving them a hard message. That's tough work. I appreciate your time, sir. Yep. And so, the only thing I'm wondering is we have to have
255these teachers in the classroom. They take away this DOI that we're allowed to make happen. What's the punishment if we're out of compliance? I mean, we can't just leave those classrooms empty if these people and we can't hire. You get what I'm saying? Like, what what do we do then? Well, so the hard message that I've been giving all of them have been an April 1 deadline. That April 1 deadline is because I have to then present and I've told them to the board non-renewals which would go on the April board meeting. And so then that gives us an opportunity from a recruiting standpoint to be recruiting replacements for the next year. So when we say you have April 1 deadline that has they have to be enrolled in something by April 1, right? not
256to have the certification completed by April 1 because I mean that's only like a couple months late. So the uncertified uh ones would have to get their intern certification by that April 1st which means they're enrolled in a program which would put them in a program and give them this intern certification for a year typically for the program they would be okay. the ones that are currently in a program, I'm telling them April 1 in order to pass the test. Uh the programs have a certain amount of observations that occur from the program. So, as long as they've passed the test, u I'm allowing them to continue on because they're just getting observations as they're teaching. But I really need them to have that test in place. Uh the the other thing is is if
257they don't get everything in by April 1, but say they get it May or June and we still have an opening, they can reapply and we can process them as a rehire and still have them be employed with us. And isn't this something they've known about and have been working towards? Yes. We're turning up the heat. We're Yes, we are. I I think it it wasn't it wasn't now that HB2 is I mean it was on my radar before, but with HB2 and the state really coming in and cracking down, we just really need to turn up the heat. It actually has given me an ability to communicate as not the bad guy, but to say, "Hey, uncertified folks, this is what the state where the state is heading. Yeah. So, just to clarify, what
258you're voting on or what we are uh recommending to you um is that you would approve us filing that application for delay of teacher certification requirements um that House Bill 2 lays out. Um all that is is us applying. Then we also have to get approved by TEA. That claim has to be the Mr. Newman and Steve Madame President, I move to approve the delay of teacher certification requirements application. I I heard Mr. Dwire first. So, um All right. So, that is a um motion from Miss Duncan and a second uh for Mr. Dwire. Any further discussion? All in favor, raise your right hand. opposed. Same sign. Motion passes 70. Thank you. All right. Now, item 10E, approval for school calendar. Dr. Lee, board, you have in front of you, um the the the current
259draft calendar uh for the school year 2627. Uh I want to hit a couple of different things that happened. We initially created a a draft calendar. um sent that out to faculty and staff for some feedback, took their feedback, made some adjustments on things, sent that out to families um for their feedback. I want to hit a little bit of that. The initial calendar um when we sent that out, we got 120 responses from faculty and staff. Um they very much uh supported that calendar. Uh thought that the format, the draft calendar, simplicity, predictability. Um there was a 5050 split on some appreciated that there was not a week-long fall break. Um the other 50% did not appreciate that there was not a week-long fall break um that was built in there. Um we took
260that was just a piece of the feedback. Uh there was feedback on the Monday after Easter. The initial calendar did not have Easter Monday off. Feedback was that people really appreciated having Good Friday and Easter Monday as school holidays because there's a lot of families that do travel. Um the initial calendar had a Monday start. Uh there was a lot of push from faculty and staff to not start in the middle of to not start at the beginning of the week and start in the middle of the week instead. Um they there were some requests for teacher planning days and work days to be identified in the calendar which we will do um as part of that work. Um and then we had additional early releases in that initial calendar and there were some concerns
261about that. Um when we sent when we made those adjustments and we sent the calendar that you have out in front of you uh for families um we received 252 responses back again almost a 50/50 split of half liked that there was a fall break that the fall break was a Friday the other half did not appreciate that there was not a full week off uh and said um there were uh several folks which we typically see this from families and community in general um they they suggest starting school earlier in August August and ending earlier in May. This calendar compared to our current calendar is a weak shift back. Um I want to be very intentional on why that is the way that it is. Um as we look forward to the 2728 school
262year, um the state will adjust assessments to be through the year assessments, meaning that our kids will take a test uh shorter test in in uh in place of the STAR test. They will take a shorter test in August, a shorter test in January, February, middle of the year, December, somewhere around there, December, January, and then they'll take a shorter test at the end of the year. The difference is going to be that those will happen at the actual end of the year. Um, traditionally, STAR testing happens in April and then there's not much to May after that because testing unfortunately. Um the way that we look forward to that and why I'm being so intentional is we're trying to prepare for the following year to be ready for instructional days in May is essentially
263what it comes down to. Um a lot of people a lot of the feedback from our families was looks good, love it, approve. Um there were a couple of questions on uh holidays and breaks um specifically um and we get this from faculty and staff also uh is spring break and when spring break is people are passionate about when spring break occurs. Uh just to be transparent for our community, for you board, um our spring break, uh we set based off of where our dual credit um partner university sets theirs so that our kids do not have to go to school and our dual dual credit instructors do not have to work during spring break. Um so every year we don't establish a spring break based off of neighboring districts. We establish our spring break
264based off of our dual credit St. Phillips College. Um and that is the spring break. It just happens to fall in line with where it is. the other comments from the uh families uh that were in there. Uh they did appreciate Good Friday and Easter Monday being off. Um and then there was some there was some questions about the April 30th holiday that's built into that calendar because you see there's just school holiday on April 30th. In full transparency, there is no real holiday that happens on April 30th other than uh that avoids us going to school for eight weeks straight without anyone having any type of break um between basically Good Friday and Easter Monday. It builds a breakin. So, this calendar builds in essentially a day off for students and staff every single
265month. There is some day that is built in for that calendar. Um, other than that, uh, everything, uh, all of the feedback was set. So, what you've got is a calendar in there that has 170 instructional days. 168 of them are full days, two early releases. Uh, staff days are 187 days, uh, which is required. 170 of those are the instruction days. There's 12 inservice days before the beginning of school. that is also intentional based off professional development that we need to have in place for our team next year as we move forward with Skyward and student management systems. Um as we move forward with instructional expectations um there are four uh staff days during the school year um and then there is one staff day at the end of the school year. So there
266is that year that day for them to close up. We did get a lot of feedback of people appreciative that the day of graduation was not the final day of school and that they were completely separate. Um but all in all, if we stick with our calendar of 450 minutes a day, um the calendar itself builds in one extra day. Um we will bring to you next month a waiver for the consent agenda. That'll be a professional development waiver that allows us to use the four staff development days through the school year to get minutes for those. So with those, we would build in five extra days in this calendar um next year without us making any adjustments to bell schedules or anything like that. If we add five minutes, it basically jumps up one
267and three/4 day. um is what it does. So you have that in front of you. The recommendation is that you approve that calendar for the 2627 school year. Also happy to answer any questions should you have any. Just want to be clear. Madame President, I move to approve the school calendar for the 2026 2027 school year. Second. Right. I have a motion from Mrs. Burns and a second from Mr. Brightes. Any further discussion? Thank you for being thorough, Jack. You're welcome. Just I know you're about to vote, but uh it will get edited to look prettier than all the colors that my color blind self can see. Um so I'll work with Emily, Jill, Tanisha, and they will make this look far prettier than the one that I have in front of you right now
268before we send that out to families. All right. Any further discussion? All in favor, raise your right hand. opposed. Same sign. Motion passes 70. Next 10 F. Consider and take possible action regarding resolution related to Texas Education Code section 25.0823 Senate Bill 11 and prayer in schools. Nice try, Miss Banks. I saw you working your way up there. Nice try. uh board, you have in front of you um a possible uh resolution and a possible policy dependent upon if we were to approve a resolution uh regarding Senate Bill 11. Um I just want to to clarify a couple of things. Senate Bill 11 um went into effect as part of the most recent legislative session and it does set a deadline for school boards of March 1st, 2026 to take action um and that each
269board has to take a formal recorded vote on whether to adopt a resolution. Um, if you adopt a resolution, uh, each campus would have to provide students and employees the opportunity to participate in prayer, uh, reading of the Bible or other religious texts, and it would occur on each school day. Um, I want to be, uh, very open and honest that right now, um, under federal law, under state law, under our district policies, our students already have that right to be able to pray individually, voluntarily, silently while they're at school. They can pray individually or in groups during non-instructional time. They can read religious texts during non-instructional time. Uh possibly even during instructional time depending on what's structured in that classroom. They can participate in religious clubs and activities as long as those are student
270initiated. Um they have constitutional protections. First amendment protects voluntary religious expression. Uh we cannot sponsor or course religious activity as school districts and participation has to be voluntary and uh student initiated. Um what this law is doing is it is requiring school districts to be on the record um of what they um whether they want to establish this or not. What happens if we establish it are some operational impacts that I think are pretty important for you to understand. Um it does require us to provide that daily period of prayer and religious reading. Um in adoption for us is essentially for school districts is it's allin or nothing is is what it is. all-in or nothing implementation, meaning that we would have to implement it by the law. Um, there's some compliance measures uh that
271are a little bit concerning to me as a superintendent. Um, first off, we would have to have written permental uh consent from every student that wants to be involved in this. Um, we must have that. That's part of the law. There has to be strict physical separation of participating and non-participating students. I mean, if we were to establish this, we would have to designate areas that those who do not have permission could not even be close enough to be able to hear what is happening. There has to be strict auditory separation of participating and non-participating students. And even district staff has to monitor what is happening in those um in those buildings. Um it also requires us to identify the spaces on campus. We'd have to adjust bill schedules as necessary. We'd have to ensure
272that physical and auditory uh separation that requires there. All of that to say, um, if we move forward with this, it does create some burden, um, for our staff and for our students, um, as far as being able to maintain who has approval to be where when when that approval, anybody can revoke permission. Even employees that want to participate in it has to provide written documentation that they are authorizing themselves to be a part of it. And so there would be several different things that have to happen. Um, as a parent, uh, myself of students that attend this district, um, I think that parents retain the authority to determine religious studies of their students, um, and what they think should or should not happen. Um, I think that we could set ourselves up for some
273compliance issues if we're not careful. Also want to be very clear that if we do not move forward with this, um, nothing changes for our students right now. If you don't adopt a resolution, our students still have the right to participate in prayer. they still have the right to read religious text. Nothing changes by you not adopting um a resolution. I think that this is um completely uh the work of the Texas legislature to try to get school districts to have to be on the record for something that we already have the ability for our students and our staff to do. Um now my recommendation to you is that you do not um adopt a resolution that you define um doing so. Um, should you want to do that though, I did provide um possible
274uh language for a resolution and also uh language for policy. Um, happy to try to answer any questions if there are any. Um, but that's kind of the the presentation there. I think my only question is our current policy under Sige ISD right now allows our children the freedom to choose between whether they want to pray in school or not pray in school religious text or not read a religious. They're offered that freedom of choice right now. That is correct. Based off of our policy that that's that's provided by federal law, state law, and our sagen ISD policy. Madame President, I move to not adopt a resolution related to Texas Education Code section 25.0823, Senate Bill 11 and prayer in schools. I have a motion from Mr. Dwire and a second from Mrs. Miller. Is
275there any further discussion? I just want to say I think again it's kind of sound like a broken record but I think it's really important that we focus on learning um in our schools with our kids right now and help our teachers to um be able to focus on creating a learning environment. Any other discussion? All in favor raise your right hand. Oppose same sign. Motion passes 70. All right. Now, Miss Banks, um 10G, consider appointing a budget committee for the board of trustees. Y'all appointed a budget committee last year. Denise and Lisa were on that committee. It was very beneficial for me. Um we went through some of the same things that y'all saw in board workshops, but we also went through different things with them. Uh this committee will will meet once a
276month. I tried to keep it to about an hour of a meeting and the committee um no longer exists after we adopt the budget in June. We can have up to three trustees. So if you are interested in being on the budget committee just I would like to be on the budget committee as I'm very passionate about our budget and deficit. We prefer members of the committee who want to spend money. That's a joke. That's totally a joke. That's off the record, not official. Well, I beg beg to differ about being on the record, sir. Sir, um it's late and delirious. I apologize. If there are not two additional members um who want to be on the committee, I would like to be on it again. I learned a lot even after being around for
277a while, but I want to give people the opportunity if um some of you who haven't served would like to gonna let me have it. Finance is fun, y'all. I'm going to do it. That's our motto. I did it my first year. It was cool. I don't I want to refresh. And I think it's important with the time police thing and everything, too. We have someone who who kind of like spend money but also is very cognizant of what our taxpayers are paying as he sits on a board for that too. Thank you. Is there anyone else that would like to serve? Thanks. Okay. So, um, Mr. Bright, Mrs. Burns, and myself are interested. Would someone make a motion for that? That is not one of us. Madame President, I move to appoint Joshua Bright,
278Lisa Burns, and Denise Grittington to the budget committee for the 2026 year. Second. All right. I have a motion for Mr. Dwire and a second from Miss Duncan. Any further discussion? No, you don't have to. You don't have to. Uh, all in favor, raise your right hand. Oppose. same sign. Motion passes 70. Thank you. Don't don't anybody fight us for being on the Oh, Lyn, Miss Linda Duncan there. Okay. Do we have any board comments or requests? I I just want to make a quick comment. Um, as many of you know, I was involved in a production at the Texas Theater and we had some uh tech people that that helped during that and they came most of them from the Sigin High School theater department and I just want to commend them and they
279did a fantastic job and they were able to um to learn and to contribute to getting their the rest of their students to be able to have a banquet there at the Texas Theater. So, it was sweat equity and I'm just real appreciative of that and that our students have that opportunity. Thank you. Along the theater lines, I just want to invite people to the public show of the singing high school 1AC play uh which is um March uh 3rd at 7 o'clock in the pack. Move to adjourn. We'll go really slow just in case uh people have a bet on what time we All right, that is a motion from Mr. Bright who gave the seconds. Uh a second from Miss Miller. Uh all in favor raise your right hands. No, there is no
280discussion on that. Um 20 seconds. Motion passes. 70. We are adjourned at 11:15.