001support. Everybody hear me? We good? Okay. At this time, I'm going to ask Mr. Cooper to lead us in our indication, followed by our pledge of allegiance to the American and Texas flag by Beckham Bennett and Collins Horn from Felum T Elementary. >> Heavenly Father, most gracious God, we thank you for an opportunity to serve. Father, we thank you for our school district. Father, Lord, we thank you that the greater days of WISD are yet before us. Father, help the administrators, teachers, staff, trustees, everyone involved, Father, to keep the main thing the main thing, which are our children. Help us to see the things that we miss. Help us to write and that which is wrong. Help us bring glory to your name by having a great school district. And we thank you again for
002the opportunity to serve. In Jesus might name we pray. Thank God. Amen. 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. Texas flag. I aliance to the Texas one state and indivisible. Next item on our agenda is our open forum. Not believe we have anyone signed up to speak tonight. So we will move into close session. According to section 551.001 ETSC of the Texas Government Code, it is now 502 p.m. 610. The board is going to reconvene back into open session. First action item will be consideration with possible action regarding a level three parent grievance appeal. >> Mr. President, I move to deny the level three parent grievance appeal and affirm the level
003level two decision of administration. Motion by Mr. McCuten. Do I have a second? >> Second by Mr. Cooper. Any other discussion? All in favor say I. >> Say nay. Motion carries 6. Next action item will be consideration with possible action to approve the hiring of director of transportation. >> Good evening board. Miss McCutchen. This evening we are making the recommendation to hire Mr. Ryan Ward as the director of transportation. He has nine years of experience in similar roles and his promotion within WISD reflects both his capacity, capability and commitment and his and he is very well prepared to lead the department into the future. Any questions for Malter? Okay. At this time I entertain a motion to approve action item B as presented. Motion >> by Mr. Timberman. Second by Mr. Pittz. Any discussion? In
004favor say I. >> Nate. Motion carry 6. M. First off, I want to thank each and every one of you. Uh, the school board, Miss McCutchen, Mr. called and uh Miss Teresa Berg Halter and all of you uh that believed in me that uh enough to feel that I could leave uh this transportation department. When I came here uh three years ago, it was it's kind of a touch something. When I came here three years ago from Red Oak, uh I was a trainer and I was telling the coaches, I was real familiar with the coaches and athletics and uh I would train them during the summer and I said uh I got a position in Walks a Hatchee as a supervisor and my girls are are uh athletes at Red Oak there, track and
005basketball. And so I was uh telling them that I was getting ready to go and they just kind of looked up at me and they say, "Well, that's fine. just leave the girls and I you know and I thought that was kind of rude you know it hurt my feelings a little bit but you know nevertheless I uh came on to walks a hatchet and so since then uh I've been going to track meets and with my girls going to red oak and me being an employee here at walks a hatchet I've always uh very supportive father but I have a red oak t-shirt on but I have my walks a hatchet jacket on top. Now, when uh Red Oak is doing bad, my walks a hatch your jacket zipped all the way up to
006the top. But when they doing good, I open it up sometimes. But, you know, uh and uh and that's just a little humor uh that we have, a little fun that we have in my household. Uh and I'm uh thankful for my wife of 27 years as well. she stood beside me in all the transition and uh and I look forward to just uh working with the community and all of you. Uh it's a group effort and we share uh things in common that we're trying to make this the best school district in the state of Texas. And so I'm glad to be a part of that. And by the way, this uh when I three years ago today, when I came in for my supervisor interview, I had on this exact same outfit. So,
007this is old. This jacket represents Walks a Hatch. I hadn't wore it since, but I thought I'd put it on tonight. And I want to say appreciate each and every one of you. Thank you. Sorry. Yeah. Okay. Our next next action item will be consideration with possible action to approve the recommendation to name a district facility. Mr. Rogers, >> the gig is up. Well, this is different. me being out here and not up there. I always wonder what it felt like for Aier to come speak to y'all and speak to us. And now now I know how he felt. But good evening, school board, Miss McCutchen. Um I miss you guys number one and I sure truly appreciate all you do for this exceptional district. As you know, we have a precious gym in our
008community. We will be talking sports and the gym I'm referring to is not the kind you play basketball or volleyball in. It's rather it's GM as in a rare and precious treasure. The gym I speak of is Mr. Ken Roberts. So, 46 years, almost half a century, Ken Roberts has been broadcasting events for WISD athletics, starting with baseball in 1981 and adding other sports in the following years. So, let us reflect a minute. What was everybody here doing in 1981? Miss Creel, she was a wideeyed undergrad at Abalene Christian. Okay. Miss Timberman, she was starting her teaching career at North Side. Jud was a mere toddler, I'm assuming. Coupe negative one. >> And y'all ready for this? Mr. Pitts was negative five. I was a fourth grader at Northside Elementary. with uh Mr. Turner, Mr.
009Mike Turner as my principal, who consequently, coincidentally is uh Ken's broadcast partner now. So again, we all had a lot more hair back then, right, Mr. Turner? Ken, >> absolutely. Mr. Ken Roberts, 46 years, started doing baseball in 1981. And by the way, baseball guys, I wanted to make sure I said this. One of my regrets in being a baseball player is not recording any of Ken's broadcast. So, it's not too late. If you haven't, I would I would recommend trying to capture some of some of the broadcast that that Ken does of your baseball games. When you get my age, when you get to be a fossil like me, you will appreciate that. Trust me. 46 years announcing, and I don't see him slowing down anytime soon. Mr. Ken Roberts, who means the world
010to me, and so many others. The countless athletes and coaches you have encountered is incredible. Speaking of which, I will give credit where credit is due. If you'll notice the picture on the screen, my inspiration for this occasion was a simple Facebook post by Coach Shane Tollison on January 2nd, 2024, over two years ago. Yes, it took me a while to get this together. Shane wrote, quote, "This picture might not mean much to some, but Ken Roberts is the voice. The pride and dedication that he brings to every game, not just football, but multiple sporting events. Doesn't matter the venue, doesn't matter the game, doesn't matter the size of the crowd or the number of listeners. He takes pride in giving every listener the in-game experience. Ken Roberts, you are first class, my friend. Thank
011you for all you do. Close quote. Coach Tally couldn't have said it better myself. And thank you for your inspiration. I can't imagine the hundreds of venues and thousands of miles traveled, thousands of hours that Ken has spent announcing games. But with that dedication comes Sacrificed by his wonderful family, his wife Rhonda and his two daughters, Britney and Haley. Please stand up and be recognized. All WISD alumni by the way. But thank you for sharing Ken with us. I did not want that to go unspoken. So, back on point. Tonight, we celebrate Ken and all his accomplishments, Citizen of the Year, WHS Athletic Hall of Fame, Texas Radioers Hall of Fame, the list goes on and on. However, However, I have a suspicion that no previous accolade will compare to this one. Ken Rhonda, girls,
012can you come up? school board and Miss McCutchen, I believe we have some business to discuss. On behalf of the Walks Hatch Independent School District naming committee, we respectfully recommend and request that from this day forward until the end of eternity that the press box at Richard's Ballpark be forever named the Ken Roberts Press Box. Hold on. We need four votes. So before I call for a motion, I can tell you I've chaired the naming committee for the last two years. Never had a quicker decision and less discussion when this was brought up. So at this time, I will entertain a motion to approve action item C as presented. >> So move. >> Motion by Mrs. Timberman. >> Second by Mrs. Creel. There any other discussion? All in favor say I. >> I. I will
013say nay. Motion carries 6. I don't I I don't often get tearful emotional about anything, but considering that Richard's Park is a place I've often told my wife I wanted to be buried at. I guess since they've opened that little crematorium gazebo, that's probably as close as I'm gonna get. What an honor. Listen, uh, we talking about my daughters, um, being in Ws Hatchee and going in the school system and Earl and Dorothy Roberts had five kids and my brother and sister are here and one brother's gone on to Gloria, one sister's not here. All five of us went first through 12th grade at Walks Hatch Independent School District. So, it's a it's a very special place for us. It's home. our our family business was here and growing up here. But of all those
014venues that John was talking about well there's um that's the place Richard's Park and Coach and I have talked about it a lot when we're sitting in those as you're looking at that two windows to the very left. Where else would you rather be? Uh, and it's such an honor to be able to to be a part and have been a part. I was looking at these guys coming in and right away three of them walk by and I thought your daddies were playing and I'd already been doing this for about seven years. And I've always said some of those grandkids start coming through, maybe that'll be time for me to hang it up. But I want to thank all my family that's here and friends. Boy, just so many. Always wondered what it would
015take to get Shane Tolson back to watch the Hatchee. Um, and the baseball team and of course my broadcast partner back there, Coach Mike Turner. And, uh, love walks the Hatchee. It's the only place I've ever wanted to be and I've get to do what I love to do and I'll try my dead level best to live up to that. That's that's amazing. And I thank you so much for the honor. I'm I'm deeply moved. Deeply moved. Come around. Haley. No. And then I told That's right. Baseball team. I'm like butter. Okay, everybody. That was >> You're welcome. All right. Exactly. I don't think that's all. Countleile. >> We must have extended that. We'll try to get through. >> Hey man, good to see you. >> How are you doing? >> Good, sir. How are
016you? Good. a picture with her. You too. Thank you. >> I guess I'll let you turn that you need. Perfect. >> Great job. Are you good? I'm looking at Okay. Our next action item will be consideration with possible action to approve the certification of instructional materials for the 2026 2027 school year. Miss Hanbug, I don't know how you follow that, but it's all yours. >> You're right, sir. I do not know how I follow that either because that is an amazing honor for Mr. Roberts. But tonight, I do want to talk with you board and Miss McCutchen. Um, this is our annual certification of provision for instructional materials, which is formerly called the TEK certification. Mr. Calden has presented this um in the past. Uh but this is necessary to access our instructional materials allotment
017funds. These funds are utilized to purchase primary source curricular materials and technology items in accordance with our state regulations and it this will apply for the 2627 school year only. Um the actual documentation that you have in your board packet of what resources we utilize to meet these requirements will begin. The primary piece begins on page 10 of the certification document. I just want to add in a few additional pieces. Uh just kind of some tidbits to note that the last um ELR adoption that we had for 6th through 12th grade was in 2019. The last ELAR or the last math adoption that we went through was 2014. And then we also had an adoption of 2023 for K5 and then an adoption again last fall with K5 math. Um and so those old proclamations
018prior to 2023, those instructional materials according to the state were not necessarily they didn't necessarily have to be 100% TESS aligned. You're going to see a number of things um in all of our areas that we utilize to ensure that 100% TE's certification um or uh coverage within our classrooms. You'll see Discovery Ed, you'll see lead forward, you'll see a number of different resources that we use. Um in 2023 2024 school year with House Bill6005 the state changed to the SBOE IMRA process. That's the instructional materials review um and adoption process. And with that change during that change they originally looked at some of those resources just a very few like amplify and Eureka and they quoted them at 100% TICS alignment. So for us, we currently use Amplify Texas. That is the Texas version
019of Amplify for K5. That is considered 100% antiques alignment according to the state. Um and then we use Blue Bonnet Math for our Blue Bond I mean for our K5 math adoption, also considered 100% TE's alignment. And so, um, as you look through that document there, you'll see a number of resources that add to those positions, um, add to those resources to make sure that we're covered at 100% alignment. Um, some areas that I'll just note with our last last fall and this spring, we last spring, excuse me, a year ago, we had teacher groups that came in um from all over the um, all over the elementary campuses, and we looked at what did we need to add to um, we had lived within our resources with Amplify for a full year. Um, one
020of those things that we needed to add to as part of our resources and our lessons were related to extended constructed responses or things which you'll hear teachers call ECRS. And so we've added in that area. We've bolstered that area quite a bit within our pacing guides and our lesson plans to ensure that we were meeting the needs um and and requests of the teachers that met during that that committee meeting last uh spring. some aotment areas I just want to cover for you. Um with this instructional materials and technology aotment with these funds um this bienium which started this 2627 school year or the next 2627 school year will be approximately $17469 per student. Now, just roll that up against the fact that we are going to be talking next month about a 612
021math adoption, which is also a very teacher and teacherheavy committee that will be bringing that um adoption to you um that the adoption considerations to you. Um but those resources are over $100 per student. And so while the state gives us $17469 per bianium every two years per student um we have to be very judicious with those funds. And so those funds are looked at through our EMAC committee. That's our educational materials and technology committee that is ran by Mr. Calden. Um and so it is a committee of um our staff members that meet and discuss and approve what resources we purchase with that with the that specific set of funds. In addition to the uh IMTA aotment, the state provides us what's called OEER funds and those are funds that can be utilized for
022open educational resources like blue bonnet math. That is a $20 per student fund and it is what's considered a use it or lose it fund. And so if we do not use it within the current year, we lose it. It's gone. And so we receive approximately $220,000. Um that covers the expense of blue bonnet math. And so that blue bonnet math is covered within that. And that is the only thing currently that we can use that OAR uh funding and aotment for. In addition to that, we receive what's called HQIM funds. Those are highquality instructional material funds and those are provided for use to purchase what SBOE identifies as highquality instructional materials in their adoption process, which has replaced the proclamation process. that funding is $40 per student and it's approximately for us around $440,000
023that we would receive. Um those funds do roll over from year to year if we are not using them. So currently the SBOE has identified um to be utilized within those funds K12 math K8 ER and ESAR and then some CTE areas. SBOE opens up every single year new areas to be adopted. Um since math, the last math adoption was 2014. That is why it was um a important piece to be adopted currently. Uh the next adoption for ELR 6 through 12 will not happen until 2030. And so just wanted to make sure that you had some of that information. Uh are there any questions I can answer for you? Okay, Miss Hbook, I'm sorry. Uh, let's go from the back go backwards with my questions. U, so you said $40 per student student, $440,000
024for HQIM. So, what product are we using that we pay for with HQM? That is HQM. >> Uh, currently we can utilize that HQIM funds. We could purchase the K2 amplify skills which are consider that again. >> Sorry. We could con we could purchase the K2 Amplify skills or K3, excuse me, amplify skills. Those are considered um high quality instructional materials that we utilize. Um there are some 68 ELR adoptions that we have through um HMH and SAVIS that we could utilize those funds for. Mr. Calden's team is really good about uh looking at what um of our areas qualify and utilizing those resources to the best of our district funds. >> Okay. And so my second question is about the T-Mac committee. Who is on that committee? You said Mr. Calen heads it up.
025So is it teachers or is it is it administration or curriculum? Who heads up? Those are all administration level um specific positions and we have a member from every one of our programs that are that come are invited to come to those meetings. Uh Mr. East, Mr. Perry are invited to uh come and attend those meetings as as any anyone is invited as they can. Special education 504 bilingual ESL um GT advanced academics. Um if we are talking about specific content areas then our curriculum experts for those areas our content coordinators are invited to talk through um what knowledge they have in relation to those resources. >> Okay. Thank you. And so you said administration. Are you talking about principles or upper admin or I see that teachers aren't involved but are principles involved in
026that committee or is it upper admin? >> Not generally. Principles are invited. If they have an area that they are requesting specifically that they are asking EMAT funds to be utilized for then um we either call them or invite them to the meeting. We know principal's time off campus is hard to hard for them to get away. So a lot of times we will call or go visit with them ahead of time to be able to get their input. >> Okay. And last question I think how uh how is it that the blue bonnet math is going to be funded next year? Is it through what a lotment? >> The OEER. >> Okay. Okay. And it'll be full fully funded. It is funded up to whatever that aotment is. Um, depending on our student population,
027it's $20 per student. So, I I give an approximate of 220,000 because we are a little over an 11,000 student district, but um there may be some some pieces there that we fund through um the HQIM, $40 per student. >> Okay. And have you received any word from the uh state board of education or from tea about the issues with blue bonnet math? Because I understand there were quite a few >> uh with the blue bonnet. There were issues with a number of things through blue bonnet reading and blue bonnet math. Um most of those issues were related to UR URL links um or grammatical errors but they are redoing any of the the books um and majority of those were related to teachers editions not student editions however they are redoing all of those
028and we are getting all new materials through great minds for anything that needs to be shifted or changed. >> Okay thank you >> any other questions. Okay. I entertain a motion to approve action item D as presented. >> Motion by Mr. McCussen. Have a second. >> Second by Mr. Pittz. Any other discussion? All in favor say I. >> Post say nay. Motion carry 6. Thank you very much. >> Agenda item seven is our budget workshop. Mr. Calden 2026 2027 budget workshop number one. Thank you, sir. Good evening, board and Miss McCutchen. We are six months out from the 26 27th fiscal year. So, it's time we start talking the budget. Yes, that that hurts my heart to say that, too. Six months out to work on the budget. Um we're going to roll through the
029same budget workshop that we've done the last couple years, obviously updated for 2627, but um a lot of uh checkpoints kind of where we are now and things that uh you're going to want to know as we roll into uh that preparation of that final budget for your approval in August. We'll start with fund balance, our good healthy measure of where we sit in terms of fund balance. These numbers are shown in millions, but all the extra zeros kind of really clutter up the screen. would point out to the chart on the right that you'll see our fund balance is improving in the general fund. Uh that is uh thanks to your leadership and your stewardship of making sure that we are staying balanced and we are living within our means. Uh 2425 is a
030little bit of a surprise. Uh we did anticipate that we were actually going to lose money at the end of the year, but we had a lot of purchase orders that expired and went unspent at the end of the year. So happy to report that we did add about 1.8 8 million to fund balance in the general fund. That does pull us very close to our 25% or three uh 90-day operating balance uh in the general fund. Uh so we're really excited about being at that point at that point, but that's really the starting point for us. Uh we know that we've got Wachi Creek opening up and we know that we still need to be good stewards and make sure that we're providing those resources for the opening of Wachi Creek and for all
031of the other uh students and staff that are within our district. So right now we're sitting at about 30.8 million in general fund fund balance uh at the end of 2425. Current year operations it's not been a great year for revenue. Uh we missed student enrollment by about 430 students. Our attendance rates a little bit below 95. We're within shouting distance of it but we're a little bit below it. uh in all when we calculate our ADA this is as of December that midyear checkpoint about 166 ADA below uh what we budgeted for the year. I'm not gravely concerned about that 166. Some of those can be made up as we go through the course of the year uh with CTE courses and um as we perfect where our uh weighted FTEES are throughout the
032the district. Uh but overall right now our our best estimate for state revenue is about 2 million below uh what we estimated going into this school year. Uh again some of those things will be uh primarily fixed as we get into uh shoring up ADA and FTEES uh throughout the entire school year. This is really just that snapshot through December. So we've got time to clean some of that up, but we do anticipate that we're going to miss our revenue estimate uh for the year. Legislatively, we're not currently in a legislative session, but that doesn't mean things aren't still changing. Uh, so we expect changes in sped funding. Uh, that was approved as part of the last legislative session, but we still don't have guidelines and details on that. So, that's one thing that could
033have a significant impact as we roll into next year. Uh, the legislaturator's only commitment at this point is to put 250 million additional dollars towards special education in the state of Texas. We don't know exactly what that looks like and we don't know really what that fiscal impact for us is going to be. Uh so that's one of the big hurdles that we are still on the lookout for uh definitiveness from TEA as we go into the 2627 budget. And then the second bullets just tell you that TEA continues to change their mod or modify uh their application of hold harmless provisions. So, you may remember back in August, we issued some bonds so that we could get under the hold harmless and and those funds would not be constrained by the increased homestead exemption.
034TEA uh just recently modified how that home that hold harmless is calculated. So, still working through those things as TEA puts these things out so that we can make sure we're in a good spot going forward. Thankfully, that does not impact the general fund. That only impacts the interest and syncing fund. So, as we roll through budget mechanics, these are really broad just to make sure that we're all on the same page as we go through uh budget preparation. General fund revenue is from three sources. We have local, state, and federal. Local is the property taxes, athletic receipts, investment earnings, facility rentals. The big rocks that you're used to uh realistically are made up by property taxes at the local level. The offshoot of that is going to be at the state level. That's going
035to be that ADA funding. So we're we're funded at the state level by a number of students that we have on an average daily and then the makeup of those students uh also goes into that calculation. Federal revenues in the general fund are SHARS reimbursements. You may remember we have really dialed back those SHARS reimbursements as there have been more changes to the program. Um spoiler alert couple of slides I'll tell you that we're going to budget zero again next year in chars reimbursement and that's down from about two and a half million uh four or five years ago when we were really at the heyday of chars within walks ISD. Uh right now this year where we are our local revenue and state revenues really roughly split 50/50. So we kind of work through
036these cycles. Um the state will we'll put some money into public ed and we get closer to 5050 state local and then we'll go a couple years without any investment from the legislature and we'll get closer to 6040 where the local taxpayer is is funding 60% uh of public ed and then we'll go back and and uh the state will put some more money into it and we get back to about 50/50. uh key deadlines and dates, property taxes, those estimates uh from the appraisal district. We will get that certified estimate April 30th and then we will get the certified values right there at the end of July, about the 25th. Um we take that send that off to the state. The state tells usually by about uh August 7th what our tax rate can
037be. So what you know really makes this a a burdensome process is that's roughly you know 48 50% of our revenue that we're waiting until the extreme last minute uh to be able to confirm. Uh so that's why we really try to take that conservative approach as we go through revenue especially property taxes uh within our budget preparation. We're going to assume a 99% collection rate. Um I highlight that only to tell you that it really is not always 99. uh this year was about 97 uh percent which really is coming back up. 23 24 appears to be the low water mark over about the last seven or eight years. Uh but 97% we're hoping is not really the new norm. Um but if it is then then we will adjust our revenue estimates to
038show 97% instead of 99. Look at the tax rate trend since 2018. It's come down from that high of a $1.17 uh on the M side to 7552. There was no additional compression uh this past year as mandated by the legislature. They focused their efforts more in homestead exemption increases instead of revenue compression on our end. Uh but we are at the floor. So M tax rate has a maximum and has a floor. We are at the floor. So we're not required to compress that anymore on any given year. You'll see that INS uh tax rate in the green bar. You see that it did increase in 2324. That was with the approval of the $574 million in bonds uh that we report to you pretty much on every month, propositions A, B, and C.
039Uh that was the 2.9 increase from those bond issues. Uh and so that's that one increase that you'll see in that INS uh tax rate. Tax rates just a number. It takes taxable values to determine actual property revenues. uh you'll see a considerable increase uh trend since 2017 in our freeze adjusted taxable values, but you'll also notice the last three years it's really kind of leveled out a lot. Uh you don't see those marketed increases. Those last three years are where we're starting to see those property uh those homestead exemption increases. You you may remember it was uh 40,000 not too long ago and now it's 140,000. So, we've seen those really big increases in that homestead exemption, which really has had a a limiting impact on our freeze adjusted taxable values. We know there's
040growth. We know there's new additions. We know that there are valuation increases, but it's been stymied a significant amount uh by the increase in the homestead exemption. Also, uh talking about flattening out a little bit, we're looking at that enrollment trend. Uh we had a very, uh normal trajectory upwards until we got to this year. And then we noticed a little bit of contraction this year about 20 student contraction 25 student contraction when we are comparing um snapshot enrollment to snapshot enrollment. Uh the 2183 is a guesstimate of where we think we might be for next year's snapshot enrollment. Um, but you'll see that that's a really more inline, more reduced, more conservative trend upward than you saw back in the 2017 to 2020 school years where we were uh increasing 3 400 students a
041year during that time. Looking at student attendance percentage, again, we're kind of looking at about that 95% attendance range. This number is going to be a little bit higher than what we actually experience at the end of the year because um when we look at funding, not all students count for a full ADA funding. Uh our prek students, they attend for a full day. We have full day prek, but the state only funds prek at half day. So our prek students will actually they will show up in that 95.84% 84% number. But when we look at actual funding on an attendance percentage from the state, the number will be lower because for our 200 plus prek students, they don't count as a full ADA. They count as a 0.5 ADA uh every day that they
042show up. I ruined the surprise. Federal revenue considerations. We're going to budget zero again next year. Again, we still participate in the SH program. We still receive roughly $100,000 or so per year, but there's still so many changes in the SHARS program on eligibility and what it takes to actually claim expenditures in SHARS uh that as a district, we don't want to make staffing and hiring decisions off of a changing uh goalpost. So, we budget zero. We know that it will come in a little bit more than that and that'll provide us a little bit of flexibility at the end of the year uh as we go forward. Enough with revenues. Let's talk expenditures. your member uh board, there's uh about six categories of expenditures. The vast majority of them for any district is going
043to be payroll, which for us makes up about 85% of our expenditures. And then we have contracted services, supplies, other costs. Uh the 6500s really are only in debt service. Uh we are not allowed to supplement those with M funds. And then capital outlay are big construction projects and and uh other expenditures to or improvements to facilities. Uh again, 6200s to 6600s make up about 15% of our budget every year. Uh ruined it with that discussion as well. That says the same thing. Payroll makes up about 80 to 85%. So when we go into 2627 things that we're looking at in the way too early projections, I'm anticipating that we are going to have a student increase in enrollment and I'm going to budget about 20 additional students for funding purposes. I know it's a
044really really low number. Uh but I don't want to get out in front of our skis. This year we got out in front of our skis to the tune of 160 students. Uh I don't want to be in that position again because that puts us in a real financial bind. I do anticipate that we will have growth, but I don't anticipate it's going to be significant in terms of moving the bottom line. So we're going to increase student ADA by about 20 for next year. Uh and really kind of hold tight as we go through. If I look at this on a sanity check level, if I anticipate I'm going to have 11,286 students next year, then I need about 94% attendance uh to meet that funding rate. That's doable. That's not herculean, but that
04511,286 needs to be a pretty good number for enrollment. Revenue considerations, again, we're expecting an ADA of about 10,435. This is down 146 from where we are this year. I told you at the beginning we missed ADA by 166. I'm increasing at 20. Thus, we're reducing that ADA target of 146. I expect property values to increase about 7%. There's no science in this number at this point. Uh that's really just a placeholder as we try to work through what does that look like for local revenue versus state revenues. Um we will get more information from the appraisal district at the end of April and we'll help fine-tune that number. Still looking at student attendance to return to about that 95% mark. Anything above 95% is great. We capture additional revenue from the state. Things below
04695% um really the world we've been living in 94 and high 94 change. Um and we just leave a little bit of money on the table from where we originally budgeted. If we meet these numbers, we're looking at local revenues to increase about 3.7 million, state revenues to decrease about 1.6 million. Our recapture payment would also increase. Um, so recapture as our property values go up and our student enrollment stays relatively level or stagnant, that's when you're going to get that additional recapture because we're going to have more wealth per ADA, more wealth per student in attendance than we had the previous year. Right now, our recapture payment is projected to be about 700,000 this year. If these numbers hold true, our recapture payment would be about 1.5 million for next year. Overall, we anticipate
047to have about 1.2 million in additional revenues over this year. Uh if these numbers hold true for next year on the expenditure side, we've come to the big one. We've been saying for a while that that Wachi Creek is going to open for the 2728 school year. Well, the 2728 school year really starts in the 2627 fiscal year. So, we're going to go back to school in August, which are going to take costs, are going to take supplies, startup monies. uh we're going to be adding that $300 million building uh to our insurance coverage and we're going to have utilities on it as well. So there are going to be some costs that we're going to incur in the 2627 school year as it relates to Wakache Creek. That's our primary goal and consideration as
048we're looking at expenditures for 267. Uh start ramping up staffing for Wakache Creek. Uh but also we need to look at those soft costs that we're going to be uh encountering throughout the district and making preparations for those. Okay, deep breath. So, this is the point when we go through that we start asking board for your budget priorities so we can make sure that we uh are investigating those and making sure that we have those listed for uh 2627 as we continue to have budget workshops and ultimately present you that proposed budget. Right now, this is a draft version of budget priorities uh within tier one uh board. We've heard that that you still would like that balanced uh budget approach. Uh so that's still a a tier one priority for us. Again, creating positions
049for the opening of Wache Creek along with the other operating costs that go into opening a new campus. Within tier two, we still have increased budget for bus replacements. Our our fleet, we do uh replace our fleet to the tune about three buses a year. that doesn't really give us a lot uh of extra buses for replacement cycle. We would like to increase that to four or even five if we could, but that is a tier 2 priority. And then of course increasing the budget as the cost of devices increases. We need to make sure that we're keeping up with uh replacement for our onetoone uh device initiative. Honestly, tier three uh those have been up there a couple of years. I don't know that we're going to have the resources to address those this
050year, but we would love to uh develop a retirement matching program uh to benefit our our staff when they move into the retirement phase. And then also an attendance buyback program, our staff that are not using all of their days off in any given year that would like to uh sell some of those back. We would like to investigate uh starting a buyback program as well. So with that, uh, I'm going to hush and ask for your feedback and your priorities as we work for the 2627 budget. >> Ryan, I understand the cost of excuse me, opening up Creek, but it really disappoints me that staffing salaries has completely disappeared from here as raises. It was number two on tier one. And to be honest with you, tonight I was going to for that to
051be moved to number one. >> Okay. >> And it's not even on there. >> What is it? Salaries. >> Salaries compensation. >> Okay. And I agree with Miss Timberman on that. We have to look at our state our salary increases in order to keep up compete with our neighbors. But also I had a question uh create positions for WCHS opening. So how many positions is that? I mean I know the principal I mean for opening you know the principal. Yes ma'am. >> How many other positions are we going to need to open the school? >> So initially uh you're going to need your principal. You'll need an administrative assistant. Uh with that principal you'll need some sort of front office people. You'll need receptionist counselors um assistant principles. I'm not saying that all of these
052are going to have to be brand new ads, but right now we don't have a firm number of who exactly is coming from Wachi High in terms of student enrollment because Miss Creel, when we did the attendant zoning, we had some grandfathering clauses in there as well. So that muddies it up a good bit where we don't have a true encount. We still have the opportunity to investigate and get that number from students before uh we hire positions, but we do know that we're going to have to have principal to start with. We know that we're going to have to have um like a band director, a theater director. Those are all positions that we're looking at and determining how many will stay at Wsuchi High and how many will be at Wetache Creek. >>
053Uh yes, sir. I understand that. But I'm talking about this fiscal school, this fiscal year. Mhm. >> I mean, we're only going to be hiring, am I correct, the principal and couple office staff to get ready for the for the next school year or do we have to hire the band director and everything and carry them a year? >> So, we are planning in the 256 school year to hire a principal for the campus. In the 267 year, we're planning on hiring band director, football coach, theater director. I'm not telling you the entire year. I would imagine we're probably looking at spring of 27 uh to hire those positions to where they would have some months to work with the principal to set their uh their visions and their policies and procedures for their departments
054in that building. But that is something that's going to happen during the 26 27 school year. That's not going to be a uh you know like a July 1 creation of those positions. It will happen earlier in that spring 2027 semester. >> Okay. I mean, I know there's going to be a lot of moving parts, but it just seems like uh, you know, we I understand that we have to budget for that, but we we need to be sure that we are taking care of the staff we have across the board from our from of the staff we have. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Not just teachers. Uh, to our cafeteria workers because I believe when I checked earlier this year, we were among the lowest four in the district in our four little small large
055communities in Ellis County and we were lower salary than most in pretty much across the board, I believe. So, we need to address that. >> Okay. It's definitely just because it's not included on here does not mean it's something that we're going to work for. Um, but realistically until we have that uh positions for Walketchi Creek's opening nailed down, that's something that I don't know uh I don't know where to start on that. We've got to start nailing down those creek positions to know how much funds we're going to have available for any staff increases. >> You know what concerns me after reading the survey? Uh in here it says compos compensation is the most frequently re uh cited concern across campuses and job categories with staff expressing challenges relating to that and feeling valued.
056So they're all saying compensation. I'm worried about losing good teachers and we have already because we're not doing enough for salary. So again I would would really like that back on tier one. >> Yes ma'am. For every 1% raise, what does it cost the district? >> Um 1% probably if 85% of our budget goes towards salary and benefits. 1% is going to be every bit of 850 to 900,000. >> So 1% would pretty much take up the entire amount we're expecting for increasing in funds. So >> it would come pretty close. So, if you're anticipating wanting to give more than 1%, you're going to look at budget cuts somewhere. >> That would be one way to look at it. Yes, sir. >> So, if you're going to bring a staff compensation, will you please show
057me where you're going to take the money from? >> Yes, sir. >> Thank you. >> I always worry about our lowest paid because 1% of nothing is nothing. >> Agreed. And with your leadership, you uh you told us last year that the state's uh support staff aotment was not enough. And so we made sure that we went in and did a 5% increase. We would love to have done more. Uh but the state essentially gave them gave us about a tenth of the revenue they gave us for the teacher increase for all other staff uh to support uh to share in. So you went over and above and yes ma'am we try our hardest uh to take care of our lowest paid staff. We know that it's that it's a challenge uh for especially our
058lowest paid staff. >> Yes. >> Mr. getting rid of block scheduling if we're looking at >> Yeah, it's a really good question that that we've spent a good amount of time on uh as a leadership team. When we say getting rid of block scheduling, um Mr. Perry would point out we're really meaning a return to a seven of eight schedule. Um there may functionally still be blocks. We may still have classes that are that take over two periods, but really it's it's back to a teaching seven of eight periods. Um preliminary numbers, just kind of doing the rough algebra on it, it's about 1.6 million uh that the district could look into saving from the high school going to a seven period teaching seven out of eight periods uh instead of the current six out
059of eight. So that would help >> it absolutely could free up funds not only for staff increases uh but it also could put us in a better position going forward with the opening of a second comprehensive high school by having that more efficient uh model of staff deployment. >> My concern just so we throw that in there with u doing well going seven of eight is our core classes having large uh numbers that they're having to uh grade uh grade papers, do read essays, whatever. And so uh so you know, we need to put a cap on how many a teacher can have if we go to seven of eight because the numbers already are large. So if you add another class period to them and you add another 25 to 30 students that puts
060some teachers up around 190 to 200 teachers I mean 200 students and that is not acceptable. >> Okay. >> And be successful. I mean and what's our goal for our students to be successful. Thank you. >> Yes ma'am. >> Anyone else? Thank you very much, Mr. Colton. >> Thank you. And then our next workshop will be in June. Uh we we did not want to do it right on the heels of a new trustee uh being seated because that's already a lot of information, a lot of head swimming. So we are going to delay it until June this year so we can get that second budget workshop. >> Next item on our agenda is a public hearing. Tonight we will be holding a public hearing regarding the 2024 2025 Texas academic performance report also known
061as taper. Following the presentation we will invite the public to approach the podium and provide input on the subjects at hand. The public hearing will begin with a presentation by Don Hilurn WD director of accountability and assessment. Miss Hilbert. >> Good evening board and Miss McCutchen. I am here to go over I'm going to nerd out on you a little bit. Go over all this data. So, there's 35 pages of data that we're going to go over in 10 pages. So, get your running shoes on because here we go. So, we're going to talk about the 2425 taper report, which is your Texas academics performance report. We'll start on that left-hand side, y'all. And a lot of this information has already been presented to you. Uh, so I'm not going to go in depth on
062a lot of these things. So, our district accountability rating we know is a C. If you want to know more about our financial standards report, Mr. Calden has has given us great information on that. You could click on that link and look more. If you want to know more about a report on violent and criminal incidents, you can click on a link there and find out more. Uh distinctions and designations, what does that mean? Each campus has 40 schools that are compared to them. So, you're comparing uh someone uh that is is very similar per se. So, those are the four categories below that when we look at 40 campuses that are comparable, we look at academic achievement, which is talking about our kids that score masters on STAR. It's the top 25 comparative growth
063which is from us one year to the other our students growing. It's our closing the gap. So our do our um accountability falls in three domains. This is domain three and then there's postsecondary readiness. So that's that SAT ACT participation and all that. Uh and we get a grade on that and that's each campus. Below that is what we call RDA which is resultsdriven accountability. It comes out around that December time frame. What you'll see on the bottom of this is we are all DL1s, which means special education, bilingual education, and other special populations. They all meet requirements on that. Uh, one thing that's changing with RDA is it's now going to be a part of our accountability system. Um, and so moving forward when we get accountability rating, so our new accountability rating starts
064in 2028. RDA will count for that. Right now, it's just a separate report. on the right hand side that's just kind of a table of contents and some of the things that we are going to look at today from uh teacher information to student information to campus information. This next slide you've already seen this information up top. If you want to know more about things though, those are live links that you can go to the taper report. Again, our district is a C. Our special education has meet the requirement. If there's also a taper glossery that even sometimes I have to go look at because some of these things that uh they put in there, you have to really wrap your brain around. There's ethnic distribution. So, what you see in blue is the state.
065What you see in green is WISD. And so, you can tell just looking at that, African-American, the state's at 12.8, district's 19.2. 2. Hispanic states 53.5, we're at 40.5. White population states at 24.4, we're at 34.8. So, we look a lot different from the state when you look at that. Uh, right below that, it's the same thing, but it's your teacher teacher ethnic uh group. Uh, we also are varied quite a bit on that compared to what the state is. Okay, this next slide is really looking at overall campus staff breakdown. So, the first part's just staff information. What percentage of professional staff do we have? That's breaking down teachers, professional staff, campus administration, central administration. You can see those percentages there. They're compared to the state. And I will tell you when you look
066down that line, they're all within that one two percentage point. So we're we're right in line with how the state is. Right below that is teachers by years of experience. All the way from beginning teachers to teachers that have 30 years of experience. We're these are pretty much the same until you hit that 11 to 20 year mark. and we're at a 36.6 where the states at a 27.6. So I I do that as a big thumbs up. We have teachers that have uh tenure here uh and and that have uh between that 11 and 20 years. Right below that is student by grade. And I know Mr. Calden has talked about this where our new students are coming into WSD. Those classes are smaller. Our larger classes are the ones that are graduating. So
067remember this is 2425 data but your big classes were grade 9 and grade 10 at 952 and 919 and just like Mr. Caldin always talks about looking at student enrollment uh we haven't grown uh just a whole lot within that. I've given you some definitions on the lefthand side from at risk to economically disadvantaged title one or EBS and homeless. And so if you're not sure on what some of those uh definitions are it's right there on the right hand side it gives you a number plus a percentage. So we're 48.8% 8% economically disadvantaged. Our 504 is 11.3. EL is 10.4. So you can just go down that list and look. And another big one is Title One. We're at 77%. Uh this is also a big one. This at risk is at 47%. So
068that accounts for about half our students that fall within just those two categories of ECOIS and title one. This next page is student information. And so it's breaking student counts down into different programs. Again, economically disadvantaged, we're that 48 mark. If you look at 504, we're slightly higher than the state. We're at 11.3, the state's at a 6.8. We're lower in our EBS where the state is 24.3, we're at 10.4, which you earlier when I told you population, our Hispanic population was a lot lower than the state. Uh, you can see everything else. Grade placement's about the same. Students with dyslexia were just a little bit higher than the state. Right below this, this is students by instructional program. Bilingual education, again, that's off from the state because our population is different. Our CTE is
069about right in line with the state. So is our gifted and talented. And we always talk about our special ed population and being higher, but when you really look at it, it's only about 2% percentage points higher than what the state is. Right below that is total student attrition. What does that really mean? That's the percentage of students that were enrolled in 22 23 in the fall who did not return to the same campus in 23 24. That talks about the turnover rate and not only WISD but all around. So the states at 18% we're at a 21.5%. And then over on the right hand side just gives you a little bit more breakdown of foster care homeless down to title one to at risk which some of those numbers I went over with you
070just a little bit earlier. Right below that is staff information. And so this is experience by principal, principles overall, also principles within our district. Uh it also it does the same thing for APS. And so you can see that top part, uh we're just slightly under the state, but pretty much right in line. Right below that, since we just got through with budget, there's our average teacher salary by years. So you can see a majority of that. Some are are just slightly higher, some are slightly lower. Uh but overall, it's it's pretty much the same. And then you have actual salaries below where it breaks it just down by teachers, professional support staff, uh campus leadership, central admin, and then the percentages. Um so, uh there's only one variance in that which was on that
071central administration piece when you're looking at salaries. This next page, the very top is WD star participation. And so that's the the percentage of students that participate in STAR. So we're right in line at that 99 to 100%. Right below that their results and comparisons for star. So star gets a grade. Uh and this is what we teach students too. These are called performance levels. So a master's level would be like a student kind of making an A. A meets is kind of like making a B. An approach is kind of like making a C and it has do better there which how we teach the kids is we we want you it's not it's do not meets but we teach kids we want you to do better on that part. So this brings me
072to the next slide right below that which is reading data. Reading data is going to show you grades three through eight. It's also going to show you high school E1 and E2. The blue bars are your approaches. So that's the the passing standard for STAR. The dark blue is 2025. The light blue is 2024. The red is meats. Same thing. Dark is is 20. Light is uh 2024. And then the green same thing. Dark is 25 24. If you want to break down this a little bit more, look at the table below. You see that first line? uh that first column is the state, the second column is region 10, the third column is the district. And so if you look at that for approaches for two years in a row, we were higher than
073the state in the region. But meets and masters, we were slightly behind. That is an area of focus that every time I go present to teachers or present to staff. That's one area that we want to look at a little bit closer is our students that are scoring meets and masters. Next slides are the exact same thing. Colors are the same. This first one up at the top is looking at our math. And so, uh, we got our approaches, our meets, and our masters. If you look at that third column for math, unfortunately, we were slightly lower than the state in all those areas for 24 and 25 for our approaches, meets, and masters. The middle part is what we call House Bill 1416. Used to be House Bill 4545. So the state requires students
074to get accelerated uh extra hours per se if they do not meet passing standard on STAR. All third graders who take the test do not meet passing standard and fourth grade required to have 30 hours. Any student that that does not meet requirement two two years in a row requires 30 hours and if I didn't meet requirement one year then I'm required to have 15. We have to track that data and then we turn that data in uh through PE submission. The bottom part you see there is all grade science. And so that would be 58. And then our ninth graders take biology. Colors mean the same here. Uh when you're comparing 25 to 24. If you look at that third column, you can tell in 25 our approaches was higher than the state in
075the region. Our 24 approaches was the same. And then our meets and mass masters again were struggling a little bit on that. Uh but it is an area of focus uh for our staff. This top page here is looking at social studies. Again, same thing. Colors are going to show you the same thing, but really look at that third column where the district. We were higher than the state in the region for 25 and 24 approaches. We were the same for 25 meets. We were higher for 24 approaches. We were slightly lower for 25 masters. And we were equal to that 24 masters. And so, uh, that's that's an area in our social studies that we're definitely scoring higher at the same as the state. Right below this is graduation rates. You'll notice that it
076shows 23 24th. So this is what we call a lagging indicator because it's not last year's data. This truly just breaks down by ethnicity number one. The very top tells you how many students that you had graduate in 23 24 which was 938. And then it shows by graduation top type. So you have from h high school foundation program with no endorsement to a high school foundation program with an endorsement. You can see those percentages. Then then you have your what we call high school program with DLA, which is distinguished level achievement. That really starts looking at those students that are taking algebra 2. Right below that, we have SAT and ACT comparison. So that top uh uh column or table is looking at SAT and ACT combined. That first one says tested. So you
077can see the states at 76.7, the region's at 84, and we're at 44. That's an area that we continue to look at. uh to having more of our kids that are participating in SAT and ACT. Uh same thing it shows you and this is just annual graduates. So this is not overall for students taking that. So that would have been that the seniors uh when this uh when this data was pulled. Right below that is the SAT. This is annual graduates again and this is by subject. And so what I want you to pay close attention to here is we have less kids participating in SAT and ACT, but our kids that are taking those uh SAT and ACT are doing better. And you can see that when you see that uh you have the
078state, the region, and the district. The state's at 975 for all subjects. The region it's 997, but as a district we're at 1023. Same thing when you look on the right hand side to look at ACT. The state's at 19.3, region 10's at 20.1, but a district we're 20.7. So again, our students that are taking it are scoring higher. We're just working on getting more students to take uh SAT and ACT exams. This top part is looking at AP. Now, this is the exact same thing. Uh participation, uh we we have increased this a lot. Miss Abid and her team have done a really good job of getting out and having more students uh take the exam. So you can see those comparisons by subject. Uh you can al by all subjects and then by
079each subject. Some of them are really close, some of them were a little further off. But on the right hand side, that table tells us that students that are scoring a three or higher. And so we're we're really beating the state and the region for our students scoring a three or higher. So it's kind of that double-edged sword. You increase participation uh then your scores may come down. And so we're not we're not at a bad spot when you look at this. Below that is CCMR. The first thing you're going to see is TSI results. What is that? That's a college entrance exam. Our students get in to get into college, but they also take it because we can earn a CCMR point for that. And so these are also annual graduates. These are TSI
080results. And yes, you can look at the state and the region. That's an area that we're behind in. Uh then I question on this a little bit. You know, sometimes we get students to take this to get a uh earn a CCMR point. So I think it's probably skewing our data just a little bit. Next below that is advanced courses. And so this is students that received at least one credit of advanced or dual credit courses. Uh so you can see pretty much for each one of these from any subject all the way down to social studies. We're pretty much in line with how the state is doing that one to two percentage points. Approve industrybased certifications. We are leading the state and the region on this. We're at 41.6 where the state and the
081region's at 34 and 32. Right below that is um our level two certificates. Again, we're right in line with the state on that as well. The one on the right hand side, right below 60 times 30, those are our um students with an IEP who have demonstrated self-employment. And so we're also above the state and region on those students that have an IEP that go out into the workforce. And then below that, our college and career military readiness. This has been a focus the last couple years. And so, uh, we are a little behind the state in the region, but you can tell we've really increased that from 23 from 22 23 to 23 to 24. All right. Our next page here is looking at attendance. Mr. Cen has got up to speed on that.
082So, we we gained just a little bit that from 223 to 23 24. On the right hand side is dropout. Uh, you know, you don't think you have dropouts in seventh and eighth grade. Uh but we're slightly below the state at that point three and 0.1 uh for two years in a row. Our annual dropout, we're quite a bit lower than what the state and the region is on that. We're less than 1% where they're uh uh at 2% for the region. This bottom part is longitudal graduation rates. What is that? Well, we're in cohorts when a student starts in ninth grade. So let's say I'm supposed to graduate this year with my cohort, but I do not earn enough credits to graduate. So I graduate next year. I'm now uh counted in and that
083calculation is a five-year longitudal graduation rate. Same thing could happen. Maybe I don't get my diploma for two years after my cohort graduated. That counts towards the six-year graduation rate. But I want you to really look at this in comparing how our district is doing in graduation rates compared to how the region and the state's doing. At that top part, I'll give you an example. For that class of 2024, we were at 96.9 where region was 89.5 and the state was 90.7. So overall, you'll see the same trend. If you look at fiveyear longitudal graduation rate, you will also look at six-year graduate uh longitudinal rate. We're about that four to eight percentage points higher of our students are graduating with a diploma than those of uh the region and the state. And our last
084slide here is really talking about growth. It's annual growth. And what does that mean? Uh I want you to look at the table on the right hand side. This is where we want students to grow or stay the same in a performance level from one star year to the next. Uh data dude and I have really been going out and teaching students about being hoppers and not droppers. In fact, this point we've met with uh oh well some of this is twice. We've met with 5,000 students uh in grades three and we've done some a little uh junior high and teaching them what it means uh to score um to be a te to be a hopper on that. What happened on that? Okay, there we go. Uh then on the left hand side, well,
085right below that, you'll see how we earn a point. Uh as long as a student scores the same except for that do not meets low, they cannot score that two years in a row. Uh you can see where we earn a point. A can student can score do not meets high two years in a row and get a half a point. Same thing for approaches low. Same thing for approaches high. The state gives us bonus points if we have a student that did not meet standard on star test. If they pass the following year, we get 1.25 points for that student. And so that really does add up. On the left hand side, this just gives you percentages by grade level, also percentages by subject on the percentage of students are growing from one year
086to the next. What is the target number that we want to look for? 80%. If we can get all those to equal 80%, we will be a campus. I'm going to tell you that right now. Okay? So, that's what we're continuing to work on with teachers. That's why we're going out and meeting with kids and having ownership within their data to make sure we hit that 80% mark for all grade levels and all subjects. And then the bottom here is bilingual education. And so really, how are we doing uh based off our students to our peers across the state and you can see across the line from your approaches to your meets to your masters, we're with all within the couple of percentage points and how the state and the region is doing. I told
087you we're going to have to put our running shoes on. So, I wasn't kidding. Any questions? That was a lot of information. Um, but hopefully good information. >> Um, yeah, the ACT and the uh SAT tested. What are we looking at or doing to actually try to get more students tested? >> You know, we start that where we do PSAT and preACT and eighth grade. So, that's the that big piece that we got to start getting students involved. We have parent meetings. Melissa Abd teams have parent meetings uh to try to um get parents to understand the importance of it. So really it's just getting that information out there. We have our our counselors, college and career adviserss both at global and at high school too that will help out in that process to get
088more students to take it. Um we also have school day ACT and SAT which a lot of those students get to take that for free because we get funding from the state reimbursement for that. So really it's just awareness. Uh we're just continuing to push that kind of like Melissa Abbott's team's done for AP and trying to get those percentages up. Just making our students and our parents more aware and the importance of it. >> Great question. Thank you. Um piggybacking off that. So, is it kind of the same thing on AP U participation? Because it looks like that we're far behind the other districts in um on the AP results as far as participant. >> The results were were a little bit higher. It's that goes back to that participation piece. the participation. I
089know the results are because we're not testing everybody >> and and that's one of those things, you know, there's been several conversations, you know, we want students to to to um take more of it, but there's also a cost in factor with that. So, it's $99 per exam, and we think, you know, that's not a whole lot of money when I'm getting college credit, but when you're 48.8% 8% economically disadvantaged. $99, which will probably be $100 for a student, is a lot of money. Uh we also meet with Mr. Calden's team to try to give a discount for students to take more. And so we meet every year. In fact, we just met over a lot of that. So we're still trying to find ways on that sweet spot to get more students to take
090it. Uh we've also have that incentive that students can earn their money back. And so I know it looks like we're still behind and there's a lot of areas that we are, but we've gained so much ground on this that we're starting to close that gap a little bit. So hopefully we will continue with that with what we're doing. >> Miss Hilurn, would you explain a little slower TSI results? It looks like we're far behind the region in those also. >> We are. Um I I there could be a little skewed data in here and I'll tell you why. we give TSIA to um um a lot of our high school students whether it's an algebra 2 and English two I can't remember exactly English three now uh and so that's to earn a CCMR
091point um and so I think with with when we're giving that mass to everybody I think we're losing out on on some of those that were not doing as well per se I don't know if that makes sense or not um whereas a lot of campuses maybe it's kind of like we did for our participation ation is lower than AP and SAT and ACT, but our the way we're scoring is higher. Same thing for TSI. I think our participation is higher, which making our score a little bit lower. Does that kind of make sense because we're giving it to the masses uh that I don't think probably a lot of school districts may be doing that. >> Anyone else? Okay. At this time, are there any individuals that would wish to speak concerning the 2024
0922025 Texas academic performance report? >> I thought Mr. Mott was going to come up there. Going once, going twice. We'll now close the public hearing portion this meeting. Thank you very much. Now on agenda item 10. Tonight we will be holding a public hearing regarding the revision of the district of innovation plan. Following the presentation we will invite the public to approach the podium and provide input on the subject at hand. The public hearing will begin with a presentation by Lisa Mont, assistant superintendent. M. >> Good evening trustees and Miss McCutchen. Uh this is for our district of innovation plan and we are doing uh proposing an amendment for this year. The first time that we put this particular plan in place was in 2022 is the original plan. We did make an amendment um
093in uh June of 2025. And at that time in June of 2025, these are the items that were on our district of innovation plan. Just a reminder, a district of innovation plan allows us to exempt the district from certain things within uh TEA that they require us to do. Gives us a little more flexibility. So like for example, that uniform school calendar there at the top that allows us to start school when we want to start school and not the third Monday uh in August like TEA says that we should. So these are the things the exemptions that we had on our plan uh in 2025. We are rem removing three of these things in our new revised plan. The uniform group coverage. This had to do with insurance for the district. It's no longer
094allowable from TEA. So, we need to remove that from our plan. The campus behavior coordinator. We are no longer allowed to exempt these discipline behavior type things such as that one and the out of school suspension below grade three. TA is no longer allowing those exemptions. So, we are removing those three from our original plan that was created in 2022. With all the great new legislation from this last fall, we need to add some things to our district of innovation plan. Many of these things we are complying with, but we uh were advised by district attorneys to go ahead and uh put these in our district innovation plan just to give us a little more flexibility because as things come out from a legislative year, it's not real set in stone yet of how they
095need to be put into place. And so as we're still learning more, we needed some flexibility um and the ability to tailor it to our district. So things that we are adding access to instructional materials and syllabi we are complying with this. This was House Bill6005 I believe. We are complying. We do have those things posted on our website, the syllabus, all the teaks, everything, our resources, it's all posted there. We just wanted to give ourselves some flexibility. Um it's not maybe every you know I is dotted and T is crossed. So we wanted to give ourselves some flexibility. Uh number of parent teacher conferences. This comes out of Senate Bill 12. They recommended we go up to two required parent teacher conferences a year. We would like to keep it at one which has
096been uh our practice for many many years. GPA calculations. This is out of Senate Bill 1191. It's a statewide method for GPA calculations. Uh but they haven't put it out yet. So that's one reason we are going to wave it uh for now. when they do get that put out and we have time to study it and see how it would work for Wakahhatchee, we could come back and remove this from our plan or we could keep our current one in place indefinitely. Uh the next two, acquisition of library materials and local school library advisory council. These are all part of Senate Bill 13. Once again, this is something that we do have in place and we are practicing, but we have tailored pieces of it to fit for Wakatchi. So, it was recommended that
097we go ahead and wave this as well. Uh, the last one, the local grievance procedure policies. This is out at Senate Bill 12. We uh there were two things in this piece of legislation. One was to allow more time for uh parents or staff members or whoever needed to file a grievance uh from 10 up to 20 or 30 days. We felt that this was really difficult for our hearing officers to thoroughly investigate something that happened 30 days ago. It's hard to go back and find that video. It's hard to find witnesses who remember things from that time. So, we would like to keep that at the 10 days to file that. And then also, uh, the new legislation in Senate Bill 12 allowed for new evidence to be presented, new things to be requested
098at level two and level three. uh that has not been our practice here in Waka Hatchee. We we want to stick with one grievance all the way through without adding things in if they elevate it to higher levels. And so we are asking for an exemption from that as well and to keep it as our current policy is. So those are the things that we are asking to add that would make our revised DOI plan look like this with the old ones that are still on there and then the new ones that we are requesting to be added. What questions can I Oh, let me go over our process first. In fe on February 11th, I presented these proposed revisions to our district of innovation committee. It is not the same exact committee from the
099original plan that was created in 2022 because many of those people have moved on. And so when we do revisions, um we get new people to replace those who have left from the original committee. Uh and then on February 12th, that committee I took a vote for them to uh approve these revisions and uh we posted the plan on the website so that we could get any community feedback. And then tonight we are here and I'm uh presenting the board that uh plan to you board of trustees for your approval and it is on the consent agenda this evening later in our meeting. And then if it is approved tomorrow, I will then post the new plan on the district website officially and I will notify TEA of our revisions. What questions can I answer?
100Any questions for Mr. Martin? Okay. At this time, are there any individuals that would wish to speak concerning the district of innovation plan revision? once, twice. We will now close the public hearing portion of the meeting. Thank you very much. >> Okay, moving on to number 12, which will be our reports. The report A will be our superintendent report, Mr. McCussen. >> Okay, good evening. Um, for my report, again, just wanted to start with enrollment like uh I do on a monthly basis and you'll see that on the bottom. our enrollment is is is as the end of February. Um at that time we our current enrollment was 11,180 with an ADA and ADA percentage of 94.89. Mr. Calden shared quite a bit of that already today. Um also just want to give everyone an
101update on our spring rounds for our campuses at uh and staff at campuses. We did begin those this past week with the high school and we will continue these through the beginning of May. Um and then uh of course providing our updates at that meeting and then um adding more time in our rounds for discussion and feedback and questions that are specific to those campuses. Okay. We held our um annual STEM and uh preK community night last week and uh very well attended if if you had a a chance to stop by there. Um the the prek had a VIP um entrance and a lot of fun things that they were able to do. Uh there were over 90 interactive booths. There were 98 volunteers. Um I was there and didn't see some people that
102were there because the facility was so large and there were so many things happening, but it was a great uh great community night. The invention convention district winners were announced as well, which was very special. Um wanted to talk a little bit about our first Friday focus. We had set this up to visit with with individuals, anybody that wanted to come in and and visit. And every other month we were doing one in person and one um virtual. So, our last inerson uh just wasn't well attended at all. So, we decided that uh we're going to change this up a little bit and we're going to start going out to folks instead. So, um April 3rd is our um is our first Friday focus, but that is a student and staff holiday. So, we'll probably
103just send out a quick little video and then um have a a have an actual in person event probably the following week. But we do want to to do that. We have an idea some ideas on how we can reach more people by going out to to them. Okay. Naming committee, they will be meeting again on March 26, which is this Thursday, and we'll be considering uh facilities to be named. So, we really appreciate those folks that uh work really hard to make sure our names are meaningful and u impactful like we just saw. So, that was pretty impressive. Okay. Also want to let everyone know we do have a job fair coming up. This will be a large event on Friday, April 11th, excuse me, Saturday, April 11th. We are doing that at uh
104the gym at the high school and um really working hard to make sure we can fill all of our open positions and um being competitive and and um just ensuring that everything that we're we're trying to do is to help help our our students have the best teachers in those classrooms and then also looking for the support staff that we also need, bus drivers, pair professionals, etc. Okay, Dual Language has a family art night. Uh, actually tomorrow it is at Howard Junior High, but it is for all three of our dual language uh facil uh campuses. So, Howard Junior High, Wedgeworth Elementary School, and Dunway Elementary School. And so, um, if you're free and have a few minutes, you want to stop by, they will be out at Howard tomorrow night. Okay. Anybody have any
105questions? Anything I can add? >> Anything for Miss McCussen? >> Right. Thank you. >> Thank you, ma'am. Our next report will be our bond 2023 construction update. Now you can come up Mr. M. >> Good evening board. Miss McCutchen. I'm here to give you the May 2023 construction update for the month of March. We'll talk about the Coleman uh football field and track. That field by field and track have been completed. It has officially been handed over to the to the athletes there. They have been using it. Um, we do have a few minor cosmetic issues and uh we're going to have a waiting on the report from TAS which is our Texas assist uh like handicap area accessible and waiting on that report to see if there's any issues we have there as well.
106Um, it does have to be separate because it was a separate project. So, we do have to have that. So, we're waiting on that report. They've already come through. We're expecting one minor issue that we have to repair. We just have to wait for the official report to do that. Finley Junior High. So, Finley Junior High, we are starting the fine arts alternate. You may just hear it called the junior high uh alternate plan we had there. So, we have started that. We started that over spring break. There's your picture there on the right. That awning and concrete that were all back there is no longer there. And just so we just so everybody understands, when they punched a hole in that awning, there was probably about a foot or more of water in that
107entire awning that has been sitting there for who knows how long. So, it's kind of glad that we did it because we were going to have some problems if we didn't eventually in that area. Um, and it was very unforeseen until they hit the hole and they were covered in water. So, um, it is gone. We will start the outside project now. Uh, then we will start on May 2nd. We'll start to get the entire inside inside area, the band hall and all that. The drama department, they have a a play on the second. So, we're not taking their room until actually on Monday evening the 5th. We're giving them Monday to finish up packing and all that. We'll take over all that. Then we'll start working on that area in there. We'll put temp
108walls up and everything else. So, we'll start all that. And as you can see there, the outside area will turn back over no later than the spring break of 27. The other areas you see there, the interior area will turn back over to the school in August 1 of 26. We'll move on to Walt Creek High School. We'll continue on this project. As you see, as you well over aware, that'll be going on until about May of 27 is when we'll probably finish that project and be handed back over to the district. Um, right now we're about 15% complete of the roof area. Um, we're about 25% of the exterior walls are sheetated, waiting on brick to start there. Um, and then we have about 65% of the block masonry throughout the D throughout the
109building completed. We are continuing with in inside plumbing, electrical, exterior brick has started. Exterior window in uh installation have started as well. You'll see some pictures of some of that. Matter of fact, right here, here's your first exterior brick going on the building. That is right outside the area A, which is right outside the administration area. So, you can start to see going up. That picture was taken this morning about 7:30 or 8. And when I was back out there this afternoon, we have in part of that up about halfway up those windows. We have a lot of that already. They're moving pretty quick out there when they get the chance. Um, so you can see those two pictures there in left and right. Here's area C. That'll be kind of as we move through.
110That'll be the next area. Area on the left there is the south side of C. Area picture on the right is the uh north side of C there. Um, you can see where the crane is sitting. And Monday morning that crane will be sitting on the other total other side of the building. That'll be a Saturday all day move of moving driving that crane around the entire around the building going to the other side. There is your area H indoor facility there. So you can see those beams started going up. Those started going up about Tuesday last week. So um it arrived I think it arrived Monday or Tuesday. It arrived Thursday or Friday the week before the material arrived. They started assembling it on Tuesday last week. So we'll continue to assemble that once
111it's all assembled and everything. And then we'll start working on everything indoor, but that we're not really worried about the the turf and all that at this time. But, uh, it is going up. There is your softball batting cages. Cage there on your left is your home side. It'll have three batting cages and pitching lanes combined area. One on your right there is the visitor site. It has two also on the end on the one on the left for the home side. It also has a large storage area that's the length of it left uh from the width at the end. It'll have a large storage area. Baseball and softball have the identical batting cages except baseballs are a longer due to their pitching lengths. So they're longer, but they'll have the exact same facilities
112in that. We're going to go to a little bit of miscellaneous picture there on your left's about 230 240ish um rooftop air conditioning units. That's that's what we have right now. We have we're expecting a I think that building has 298 total on it. And then the pictures on your right are some of the beams starting to arrive for the gym area. Right now we're running out there about 185 to 200 employees every day of the week, five days a week. And then on Saturday we're running about a hundred. We do have two full-time female workers on their full-time um working out there right now as well. Prop C. So Prop C we're going to be doing many it's going to be it's again it's over many campuses. 13 campuses were approved for that. This
113summer we'll be touching 12 of those 13 somehow or another. All different things. Um many of them have already been approved and we've been working on some of them are going to be approved on tonight. We'll have a few more next uh next month as well. Here's a list of kind of what you're going to see on many different campuses. The big ones everybody is well aware of is a geothermal removal and replacement all the way down to replacing cabinets um kitchen wall tile everything. We're touching all parts of all parts of buildings. Little rundown on Prop C. Just so you know that originally the bond was approved for those priority one, priority 2, 421 items. We've completed as of right now 313 of those for about 74 75% complete. Hopefully by the end of
114summer, if everything goes well, we'll be up about 360 totally completed and it'll be about 85% of the original bond items we will have completed. Then we'll move into priority three and priority four. As we started seeing a lot of this completion, we started looking into those as to what is in there. Some of those items were partials of items that were in priority one and two. Give you an example. Cliff Clif had their library, cafeteria, those big areas to do their carpet or I mean their flooring and all that, but their classrooms weren't. They were in priority three and four. Didn't make sense for us to do half the building and come back to then do another half and remobilize and all that. So, we did it all at one time. Felty was the
115same way, but reversed. It had classrooms, but not the big spaces. So, when we did those things, we started looking at those and what what helps to do all of it at one time. And then we've had some areas we've added on um different items. It may be that we've discovered through the savings we have savings and we see more immediate needs. It may be uh doors at certain buildings that are just starting to just fall apart getting to that point that we're spending so much in maintenance we might as well replace the whole situation there. So you're seeing a lot of those things there. So, um, by the end of the summer, we're hoping to have, again, of the original items about 85% complete, and of the priority three and four, about another 46
11647% complete. So, we're running through there and doing a pretty good job, I think, of of helping the district get better. A lot of the things we're doing, we're starting to see more and more of. Originally, we were doing a lot of air conditioning, those kind of things. Now, we're starting to see front doors, exterior doors, starting to see flooring, all those kind of things that really make the building look better. It's also wear and tear items that have been there for for many years on those things. Any questions? >> Anything, Mr. M? >> Thank you. >> Thanks, sir. >> Okay. Our next report will be staff survey results taken from January to February 2026. >> All right, board. So, uh, this year the HR department teamed up with our technology team to deploy the
117survey from the time we returned from Christmas break up through February the 13th. We collected 1,042 responses and all campuses and departments were represented. Um, the survey was deployed through an anonymous link on laptops brought in by the sec the technology team and um, our HR staff facilitated the survey. Our most positive feedback area was 98.15% which is an increase over last year and um that survey item was I am committed to helping my district achieve its goals. Our most negative feedback was 36.97% which is um actually less than last year. The same one last year was uh 45% and that was my district leaders are transparent. Okay. Uh what's working well? Our strengths that we saw from the survey are that our staff has a strong commitment to students and to the district's mission.
118There's a positive campus culture and teamwork, high trust in our campus level leadership and co-worker relationships are the very top reason that people stay in WISD. Our our key takeaway there is that staff are engaged in their work and uh committed to their students. Okay. And then a few areas of growth that we saw compensation and competitive compensation competitiveness and feeling valued uh with compensation staffing shortages and workload sustainability district level communication and trust declines moving from campus to district decisions. So our key key takeaway there is that staff are staying because of the people not necessarily the systems. So some considerations that we have to to think about moving forward um are that compensation does remain the most consistent concern across all roles and campuses. Uh staffing impacts workload and retention and um the
119better we communicate with each other uh the more trust and reliability and stability that we have across the district. So some next steps, some of these we've already started uh continue work on establishing communicating uh district processes and systems. We've been working through this through the cabinet uh throughout the year and uh continue to make those systems and processes more clear for our staff. Uh we want to continue monitoring staff retention and addressing communication and compensation concerns. Uh WSD has strong people and campus culture in addressing these areas um will be the key to our long-term stability. >> Do you have any questions for me about the survey? >> On the on this uh slide right here? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Uh what's going to be done to address the concerns that our teachers have?
120>> Okay. So um the very first one there on on next steps is continue working on establishing and communicating district processes and systems. So um last week in cabinet, this is just an example. We talked through a certain number of processes and systems and each cabinet member brought um one of those processes to discuss. And so we will make those more clear for our staff and um make sure that staff know where to find them. and um that they're deployed in a in in a realistic timeline. Uh we hope to have all of this ready um ongoing and um to also share with them uh during DT this summer >> in the conversations with cabinet the biggest concern is compensation. So what have you discussed with that? So, um, we started our discussions tonight with
121a budget workshop and, um, my team looks at all of the c the data across the state. We use the TASBY market data for different different, um, positions and make sure that we are in line and, um, so so that's where it starts. And then we'll have some internal conversations about what we need to do for next year. We're we're not there yet. >> Thank you. >> Um Mr. Balter, when I was looking at the actual survey results, a couple of things concerned me. Um one, uh that employees are treated fairly in my district and I believe in the district has a good culture and 50% around 50% of both said yes. But my concern was they had a large on the uh treated fairly. There were more that 26 29% I'm sorry 29% said
122they disagree and 16% said they did they strongly agree. So that was a culture and then that goes into culture also. I just wanted to make that statement because >> you know we need to work on >> salaries are going to be an issue. compensation is going to be an issue but uh how our teach how our staff is treated and building the great culture is what we >> maybe will keep our people here >> right I would like to note that every area saw an increase this year positive responses >> okay we don't have that response so I mean you know where you can get that from last year so that's great to know >> thank Okay, our next report will be our TIA validation results report. >> Okay, good evening once again. Uh
123teacher incentive aotment. Uh feels good to stand up here this year with a much different outcome. Uh and to celebrate that u reminder of our timeline right now u that data from the 2425 school year was collected uh last year through the summer and those things that were collected were the test observation scores as well as the student growth scores. That was all combed into one giant spreadsheet and submitted to the state in October of 2025. And then we did hear back from Texas Tech who is the data partner for TEA. And on February 3rd, they let us know that our data was validated by Texas Tech. And that simply means that our system produced reliable results and there is a consistent positive association between teacher observation scores and measures of student growth. And so
124next on our timeline, we are anxiously awaiting the end of April when TEA will confirm the teachers that we proposed for designations. They will notify us of those names as well as the amounts of the a lotments that each teacher has generated. Of course, that is determined by the campus in which they are serving the district at. So we'll hear all of that uh mid to end April, but we say end of April just to be safe. So to get into our data validation report, uh if you were with us last year, you've seen this uh report before. Uh this is what Texas Tech sends back to us. There are four scored domains. Those are A, B, C, and D. And there's one supplemental. That one is not scored. It's kind of where they uh
125give us some whatif type scenarios. What if we used this tool to evaluate your data? So they're practicing as like a field test on a STAR EOC test. Uh there are 10 checks within those four scored domains. Um you'll notice here um on the scorecard we received 84.9 points and that was out of 105 this year. So about an 80% score. That is in comparison to last year when we only got 46% of the points. So a lot of growth there. Uh the biggest area and this is where we had to show the growth was in domain A. Uh this is known as the do or die domain. You have got to score 30 out of 30 here. 30 is the most possible points. Domain A is the correlation between your teacher observation