Board Meeting Live Stream 10.7.2025

001[Music] Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being here tonight. We're going to go ahead and get started. Uh, welcome to our board meeting. This is it's October 7th, 2025 at 7:02. We're going to begin by indicating who's here. Julie, will you go first, please? >> Julie Jackson, Kim Chandler, >> Chris Win, Carrie Wer, >> Clark Nelson, Todd Hover, Ben Horsley, >> and Nicole McDermott. I'd like to first recognize anybody who's here from um some of our representative groups. PTA, please stand and introduce yourselves. I'm regent council president. >> Thank you for being here. GA >> thank you. Thank you for being here. Um Granite Office Professionals Re Amanda Pennington. >> Thank you. Uh, middle managers. >> Not sure if I saw any. Uh, GESPA. Um, Granite Education Foundation. I didn't see anybody, but I might

002have missed someone. Um any elected officials that I missed and any administrators principles that we have? Will you please stand and be recognized as well? Do we not have any? Oh, thank you. Welcome. All right, we're going to go ahead and move on to our pledge of allegiance. We're going to invite Amy Warren to come up and lead us in our pledge. Ready, you begin. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. for the intro or for our reverence tonight. We're going to turn the time over to Felicia Wood, principal and of Hart Vixson School, and Allison Bennett to introduce Hi, I'm Felicia Wood, as she said, from Hartixson School, and we

003are so excited to be here tonight to present our students singing a Halloween song. It's on videotape. And so now I'm going to introduce our musical therapist and teacher, Allison Wendell Bennett. >> Hi. So we are a school for severe to profoundly aabled children. And most of the students that you'll see do not read at more than a kindergarten level. And we have several that are following the bell chart at a color-coded level. And we're really excited to say that they voted for the song that we're performing. They also voted whether they were going to play a bell, sing, or do both. So you'll see a mixture of that. And you'll see that there's some adaptive bells as well as the regular tone bells. So, they are working really hard and they're so excited. Thank

004you so much for all the work that went in to help us share our students with you because they're truly extraordinary. >> Can I just add really quick a shout out to Luke? He's amazing. Thank you so much, Luke. >> And there are if you're handouts [Music] Whatever love, it doesn't matter. [Music] We're going out today world. [Music] >> Hi, this is North School. We have members from secondary and post high here. We're going to perform for you. [Music] and ready position. >> Ready. [Music] I have [Music] my shoo [Music] flying only one. [Music] >> And then I can have some I am beautiful. My people. [Music] Can I have some? I came to [Music] I [Music] for the I'm flying for [Music] We will sing through his [Music] I want you to are glory.

005[Music] I want people to [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Thank you so much for sharing that. Um, Principal Wood and and Mrs. Bennett, I hope you take back our gratitude. We know the hard work you guys do with those students and how impactful your work is. So, thank you so much. >> Right, we're going to go ahead and move on to our good news minute. Um, Julie, would you like to start? There's been a lot of good news um going on lately between I I'll let you guys talk about the excitement of all of our ribbon cutings, but I just want to mention that that has been a really exciting piece of what's going on here in Granite. It's been a very exciting. I can see lots of my members of my community here um

006to recognize um how much people love their schools and um are willing to engage and be a part of the process of what we're doing to try to figure out how to make sure that we offer the best education for kids possible. Um so I have appreciated the hours and hours and hours and hours of work that have gone into that. Um, we also I just wanted to make sure to mention that we've had lots of legislators in our classrooms lately and um, we sure appreciate them and it's been great to be able to bring them in and talk about, okay, so here's some legislation that you passed and here's what it looks like in the classroom and also to be able to say, you see, there are these problems. Um, maybe we can work

007on some legislation to work on some of those. So, those discussions have been really fruitful and um I've I've really appreciated those legislators who have taken the time to do that with us. >> Thank you. So, I've been out at a couple of community councils, a Cypress tour, a variety of different things this month, but I wanted to focus just on two two items specifically. One was I was able to check in with Doss Mundos at their community council, which was really fun to see um that school getting off the ground. It was their first meeting. They're still setting things up. Um, you know, getting everything running smoothly. They have some some things that are brand new, some things that are brought over from, you know, Valley Crest that are transitioning. So, it's just a,

008you know, kind of an influx in process situation, but so far things seem to be going well. Um, they had a lot of good feedback at this point, so that was just good to check in with them. Um, also I wanted to just mention an opportunity I had to go to Granger High School this last week. Miss Parker's special education class had um done a lesson I think learning about leadership and a little bit about about government and they had decided to pick one of the board members. They picked me to send some letters to. So each kid in the class wrote a little letter, you know, some information about, well, it wasn't information about them, it was questions for me, actually. And then each signed their name on it, put it in the mail.

009I got them in the mail. Um, I went ahead and wrote each student a letter back, answered all their questions, and they invite invited me out to their class. And it was just such a fun experience in that classroom. Um, Miss Parker is doing a great job with those kids. It's it's the classroom. I have felt quite honestly the most welcomed in since I've been in this role. They were so welcoming, just so friendly, just so well behaved, asking me questions. I was able to answer and chat with them all. Just a really fun experience. So, I just wanted to share that and highlight what a great job she is doing in that class and how great those kids are. So, that's all. >> Thanks, Kim. I was able to um go with Senator Blue

010to four schools in my area and it was wonderful to um have him see the students as well as visit the classrooms um and so he could see how well the teachers are doing. And just as we talked to the principal and he talked to us, uh the excitement that the kids had to have um a special visitor. So, we're just on our way. Hopefully, we can get more in the classroom. >> Thanks, Connie. Chris. >> Okay. I have a lot. first the Hunter community, the Hunter network, um instead of doing their network fall like carnival get together with all their schools, they did it in the fall. And at first I was like, "Oh boy, this is this is a busy time of year." Um but it was extremely well attended. All of our

011network schools were there for Hunter High and all the junior highs and it was just amazing. It was the community feel there was so amazing and they had some great performances and um Ben and I they got us to dance with the mascots there. It was it was a good time and I just want to thank their forward thinking. They were they're they're trying to show what their schools have to offer earlier in the year versus later in the year when they've already done all the things. And so I thought what a great concept to kind of swi switch that to the fall and it was a big success. So, thank you, Hunter Network. Um, we had three ribbon cutings in my precinct. Magna Steam Academy, Brockbank STEM Jr., and Cypress High. And let me

012tell you, it was the best thing about those were the student participation. Each of them had a musical number um and a student speaker at the high school. And I just I'm just amazed at my community. I'm so proud that we are coming together and trying new things. And um I I want to thank Ben Peters, Tim Clark, Josh Loy, and the assistant principles. Those are all the principles of those schools for taking on these big heavy lifts right now um of opening new schools and also getting established in the community and reestablished in some cases. Um I just cry when I think about it, so I'm not going to think about it too much, but it was amazing. It was just such a fun fun ribbon cutting. Um, also Cyp Matt Heyus came and

013visited Cypress High. He is the state school board president. Um, and we had such a great walkthrough for Cypress and also he got to know some of our student body officers there. He asked some questions and it was great to have him in our buildings. Um, anytime we can get legislature and um, representatives in our buildings I think is a great thing. So that's all I have. Thanks. So, community councils are being elected and those meetings are up and running now. So, it's been fun to start visiting the schools and participating in those. Um, obviously I have the Cypress tour that was that was great. But what I want to highlight um today are two things. First of all, I had the opportunity to go out to Hunter High and see the unified soccer tournament.

014This was a couple weeks ago. These are our special needs kiddos. It's put on by the Special Olympics and they divide the football field into four soccer fields and it is absolutely glorious to see those kids cheering each other on. Not not a ton of goals scored but that's not the purpose. It's just that team unity cheering each other on and giving them opportunity to participate in a sports team and that is so critical to everybody feels like they need to be needed somewhere. So it was fantastic. I spent a couple hours there and in between the games they do these little individual skill tests and the kids line up the sideline and share whatever skill it could be kicking a ball back and forth. How many goals can you get in a minute and

015they had some of the it was you know sight impaired trying to kick the ball and it was just phenomenal to watch. So that's the first thing and uh the second thing is the foundation puts on a shopathon at Kohl's um every year and so I had the opportunity to go visit. Now, just so you know, this can't be done without a few partners. So, the biggest partner the found our Granite Education Foundation works with is Discover Card. And they pay $250 for $400 kids to go on a shopping spree. Now, the quick math is $100,000. That's right off of the top. Now, I got a letter. We got a letter back from a couple of this and it was a mom who had a couple kids and they're living in the homeless shelter. And

016her letter said, "This has been the best day in my kids' lives. They will not stop talking about it. They got to go shop for their first prayer or new shoes in a long time." And so, and some of these kiddos are from my area, area I represent. And so, it really hits home. Another partner is Kohl's. At the end of this, once everything is paid for and done with, we our foundation gets $15,000 in Kohl's cash, which then becomes purchases just put right back into supplies into the foundation warehouse. They can use it for gifts. They can use it to stock up on coats, cold winter clothing, you name it, they've got this process down. And it is all run by volunteers. And so, I just want to give a thanks to our partners,

017the foundation. They worked so hard. You will not find a better welloiled machine. And a couple tweaks this year where we noticed last year a lot of the the $250 aotment was going to the basic needs of coats. Um and so this time Discover stepped up once again and coats was not didn't need to be included because after they exited Kohl's, everybody got a free pillow, a free coat, and a free toy. and that was on top of the $250 worth of um really good clothing that they were able to get. So, just wanted I don't think there's people that know sometimes our good news that happens outside of you know maybe some of the other more negative issues we're dealing with and so I wanted to make sure to share the happy news of

018good work our foundation's doing. >> Thanks Karen. That's hard to follow. Um I was very fortunate to be invited recently to attend an all principles meeting uh for principles uh who work in the Cottonwood network. This is elementary, middle school, and a high school principal. And it's it's among many it's it's the vision of this board and and of our superintendency that the principles of our schools are truly the instructional leaders of each of those schools. And as I'm sure all of you know, I am not a career educator. And it was a great opportunity for me to sit back um and to just observe for a few minutes these principles um kind of dig in and talk about instructional strategies to talk about leadership strategies and approaches. Talk about transitions from elementary school to

019middle school and middle school to high school. and just to observe and and and see not only their their great passion and drive to um foster the success of our students, but to also see their expertise and training at work. It was um motivating to me and impressive at the same time. Thank you. >> Thanks, Clark. Um there's so much that happened this month that it's hard to highlight everything able to attend all the Cypress things and that's so exciting for that community and I love seeing that. Um the couple things that I wanted to highlight. First of all, I was invited to Fox Hills. I know a lot of the elementaryaries have been doing their reading um their reading meetings or their their reading nights. Um was able to go to a couple of

020those, but I just wanted to highlight Fox Hills because uh the principal there is part of the Superintendent of Rock Band and I did tell Superintendent Horsley he needs to up his game because uh Anthony Godfrey was there on the guitar. So anyway, uh it was really fun though to see that and the kids were really super excited to go and and be able to participate in that and and get their stuck at the games and get all those things and and learn that. And it was wonderful to see the families involved and to see the families learning how to do this and even some of our families who are not um English language uh proficient that they were there and they were they were doing their very best with those families or those kiddos.

021So um I love seeing that. Um, we were able to go, a few of us were able to go to the USP Leadership Academy. Uh, just a couple, it was it was the same weekend of of the shopathon, so I'm glad Karen got to go to that. Um, but, uh, we we also, Ben and I were able to present there. And it was and it was amazing to be able to see that, to to learn and to grow. We do professional development just like teachers do, and I think we got a lot out of it, those of us who were there. And then I do want to highlight I'm just going to give a shout out to our superintendent um superintendent Horsley. He won the Chamber West. What was the official title? The Hall of

022He was the Hall of Fame winner for the Chamber West. um and going and seeing that. Just so you know, that those are kind of the businesses and and uh cities on the west side that that really um highlight and and work together to help um move forward things. And to see that uh Superintendent Horsley is well respected by that community, by those people and how much work he really does, not just for um not just for our kiddos, but for our entire district to have the opportunities that we have for our students. It's amazing and I really really want to say thank you and it was welld deserved. So it was a it was a delight to be there and be able to to see you get that award and it was something that

023I think we need to highlight. So thank you. Um, we're going to go ahead and move on. Our next, um, item of business is we have granted elected officials participation, but I didn't see any. So, we're going to go ahead and move on to our patron participation. Um, before we do, as we move into public comment, I do want to remind those who have signed up that they will have three minutes to speak. to be mindful of the timer that Miss Bushelle has displayed on her desk. Speakers will be called in the order in which they signed up. The public may sign up to share public comment at granitechools.org/board/public comment. Once your name is called, please come forward and state your name clearly into the microphone and you do need to get pretty close to

024the microphone. All com all comments are recorded, so please speak clearly into the microphone. Once the timer expires, we ask that you promptly return to your seat. Comments may express support or disscent for regulatory actions. However, public comment is not the appropriate form forum for personal complaints or for attacking or defaming individuals. Doing so is a direct violation of our policy and you will be asked to stop immediately and return to your seat. If you have a personnel concern, please contact a member of the administration or put your concerns in writing to the board. Please remember that children may hear your comments. Be thoughtful and professional. Keep your comments appropriate for a general audience. The board is here to listen during public comment, but we are not able to respond to any comments or questions

025you may have. A member of the administration may follow up with you later if needed. We're going to go ahead and start with Dana Schul and on deck we will have Sarah Harmon. Hello, my name is Dana Schaw and I am the reading interventionist at Jackling Elementary School. This is my 20th year of teaching and my 15th in granite and I've been a member of UEA and GA all of those years. Um, I've taught in this district when the relationship between GA and the board and the superintendent felt quite adversarial. And I appreciate the cooperative, supportive, kind of all on the same team vibe that I felt during the last few years. And so I'd like to thank uh the board and superintendent Horsley for a few things. The first one is for transparency about

026the surplus situation this year and also for allowing adjustments before October 1st at my school. That was very helpful. Thank you for clear and compassionate instructions for teachers regarding the presence of immigration and customs enforcement agencies on school grounds. Thank you for providing uh funding for class- size caps in lower grade. It's a great start and I hope in the future that the cap can be lowered to maybe less than 20 to one uh because that's the sweet spot where research shows that outcomes really improve for students. Thank you for last year's bump in classroom funds that enabled teachers to keep more of their salaries in their pockets. Thank you for voting to increase the property tax tax recently and for having the will to fund schools and the courage to make it happen when

027our state legislature continues to decrease public funding for public education. I'm a home homeowner in Granite School District and my four children have all graduated from high school and college and have promising futures because of our public schools. And I'm happy to pay it forward to my neighbors with kids in school. Thank you for providing that extra 45 minutes of planning time for elementary school teachers. It it helps a lot. Thanks for coming to our schools to introduce yourselves and explain your responsibility during our faculty meetings and even to volunteer in classrooms. Doing so really increases teachers understanding of your purpose and their willingness to contact you and engage with the board. and thank you for your willingness to negot to continue to p partner with GA for contract negotiations even though the requirement to

028do so is in limbo at the moment. And that brings me to my second point which is the absolute necessity and the great service that the UEA and GA provide for educators. Teachers are very busy during the workday when contract negotiations, legislative sessions, and lots of other things happen. And we depend on our association leaders to represent us and advocate for us during contract negotiations in our schools with parents and administrators, with district leaders, and as ferocious defenders of public education at the state and national level. while we are in our classrooms working feverishly to prepare our youngest citizens to be responsible contributing members of society. >> Thank you, Dana. >> Thank you. >> Sarah Harmon's next and then Danielle Houseman, you'll be on deck. My name is Sarah Harmon and I'm proud to speak

029on behalf of Eastwood. There are over a hundred community members in our advocacy group. You may recognize many of our members as repeat speakers, but I want to assure you that our concerns reflect the collective voice of Eastwood families, and we continue to raise them because they remain unresolved. This year, Granite District failed to strictly follow the new truth in taxation law, and the district lost nearly $18 million of tax revenue. This wasn't just a funding mistake. It was a failure to properly look into the requirements and complete every step of the process. We encourage you to learn from this costly mistake. When you are voting to close a school, please make sure the decision is grounded in complete and verifiable data, that any claims used to justify the decision have measurable evidence to back

030them up, that the methodology used is transparent, and community input is meaningfully considered and incorporated. We are troubled that our concerns continue to be met with conjecture rather than data. Two examples of this. We have raised concerns about Oakidge's high attrition and teacher turnover rate. Rather than taking the time to thoughtfully explore the reasons behind this attrition, the response we got was quick and felt like a dismissal that many Oakidge students simply go to ALC and DLI. However, the district's own charts disprove this as an explanation, showing only 31 Oakidge students at Morningside, leaving the loss of 164 students unaccounted for. Similarly, in response to our concerns about the unsafe walking routes, we were told that all students north of Mil Creek Canyon will be bust. This suggestion is not backed with an analysis by

031the transportation department to know whether that suggestion is actually feasible. In fact, at the November 2024 board meeting, the director of transportation, Dave Gaddy, told those in attendance that the district transportation building was at capacity and could not park any more buses. He said, "We would probably have to have some sort of capital project to address additional buses. Also, the Immigration Canyon families have been told for 3 years that the reason they don't have another bus is because there are no additional bus drivers. The number of students in Eastwood's boundary, 132 in the Cove and 162 with with Immigration Canyon, wouldn't even fit into two buses. If the board intends to rely on the claim that all students will be bus, it must require data showing this option is viable and immediate action to address

032the unmet bus needs it already has in the immigration canyon. We can't simply trust verbal assurances. >> Our students deserve a process rooted in data, transparency, and thoughtful consideration. Please ensure that this decision is not made arbitrarily or capricciously. >> Thank you, sir. appreciate it. >> I have a letter from an upland expressing support for >> Danielle >> and Kimberly Eva Evson. >> Ev, sorry, I apologize. Kimberly Evson, you you'll be next. >> Good evening. My name is Danielle Hman and I'm a proud inboundary traditional track parent of thriving dyslexic students at Morningside Elementary. I'm here to respectfully urge you to pause the area 5 boundary study and extend its timeline by at least one full school year. At the February 4th board meeting, several of you voiced hesitation before initiating the study. Your concerns

033about rush timing and community impacts continue to remain deeply relevant. The PAC's recommendation does not meet the study's stated goals. Split classrooms are still projected in 40% of area 5 schools. Class sizes will remain imbalanced and several schools will still fall short of the minimum three classes per grade. The benchmarks you promised haven't been met and accepting recommendations that fall short undermines the integrity of this process. The proposal to close Morningside is based on low enrollment in just two traditional grades, a narrow metric that ignores the school's overall vitality. Data shows that Morningside and William Penn have nearly identical enrollment profiles. Penn's traditional track declined by 27% over the over three years while Morning Sides declined by just 12%. Penn currently has 10% fewer traditional students in grades 1 through 5. And while Penn's DI

034program has grown, Morning Sides has remained stable. So why is Morningside being converted to DI only? Both schools have area 5's highest building utilization. Yet Penn's traditional program is protected while Morningside is being dismantled. I am not advocating for Penn's closure. Strong schools should be protected and that includes both Penn and Morningside. Morningside's traditional families were excluded from the pack subcommittee and that absence had real consequences. Penn's traditional community was consulted and their preference to remain non-magnet was honored. Morningside families were left out entirely. In Penn's May 14th community council meeting minutes, Superintendent Horsley is quoted as saying that the decision to become a DLI magnet school is quote not a district decision. It needs to be it needs to come from the community end quote. Penn September 2020 minutes further affirmed this principle quote

035magnet school option was explored last year but at this time we are not going to pursue it due to lack of interest in the community. End quote. Their families were asked and their preferences respected. What makes Morningside different in this regard? There is deep skepticism about the resources needed to support a DLI magnet and little to no buyin from our community. But how would any of us know that Morningside families had these concerns? We were never asked. This imbalance creates the perception that Penn's community input is being respected while Morningid's community input isn't a priority. Let's reframe this study as a springboard for creative visioning, not a reaction to enrollment charts that miss the deeper story. tonight. Take decisive action. Pause the study and reject any recommendation to close Morningside. Keep families in Granite. Give

036every child a reason to stay. Make space for solutions that strengthen, not shrink, our district. Thank you. Thank you, Dell. Kimberly. And after Kimberly, we have Andy. >> Andy May on deck. Hi, thanks for the opportunity to speak. I'm Kimberly Everson. I'm a scientist and I'm a parent of three children at Eastwood Elementary School. Please don't close Eastwood. Let's instead work together to make Granite School District stronger instead of weaker. I have two main points. My first point is related to the gold STEM designation that Eastwood has. This is a really an honor that Eastwood has and it's very rare and special and Eastwood has worked very hard. So Eastwood has moni mod modified their learning spaces in order to make laboratory space for science, engineering, uh maker space and art. We also teach Eastwood

037also teaches all grade levels computer programming and provides them opportunities to do a 3D project in Tinkercad that can be uh completed and printed on one of the school's 3D printers. We have a yearly art night. As a separate event, we have an annual STEM steamfest where there's different, it's kind of like a choose your own adventure. There's stations all around the school where students can participate in different projects related to computers, engineering, science, and art. And probably the best one is the liquid nitrogen station where you make ice cream and you can eat your own experiment at the end. Um, so, uh, you know, as a, you know, applying for gold or platinum status is not trivial. So, it requires a lot of work. The school has to file a letter of intent in

038the fall. There's a full portfolio that's due in January. There's a site visit in February and March. And then it has to be presented to the state board of education in the spring for approval. And even the these written portfolios are really intense. The Diamond Valley Elementary School application is available in another uh Neil Armstrong Academy is available on the website. These are like 35 pages just for that kind of overview word file for these applications. And so it's really intense. And as a as a testament to how difficult it is to get this designation, there's 1,123 elementary 1,123 public schools in Utah. Only about 2% 27 have the STEM, gold, or platinum status and only eight of those are in the Salt Lake, greater Salt Lake area, one of which is Eastwood Elementary. Um

039so please, um let's you know, let's keep this open. My second point is that we as a community love Eastwood. We want to build Eastwood. We want to make Eastwood stronger. Let's build together on this gold STEM status and make Eastwood an even better place and really build Granite School District. And I propose, you know, there's a lot of ways we can do this. I think we can work together to brainstorm ideas. One idea we had is that we start a Save Eastwood foundation where it's a taxdeductible foundation where all the money donated by taxpayers will have to go in order it to building Eastwood and improving the school, rebuilding, building the STEM program. It can't be diverted to other projects like the 2017 bond. Um, and I think that together we can really make

040raise enough money to make a big difference. I, you know, I propose right now I'd be willing to donate a substantial money to such a fund if it was be guaranteed that Eastwood would stay open for another 5 to 10 years. Thanks, >> Kimberly. >> Andy, and after Andy, we have Carrie Cleo. Did I say that right? >> Um, thank you for um inviting us at this meeting. Um, I am a parent. I'm a dad at Morningside. Um, we are firmly opposed to closing Morningside because the objectives of your study and the primary objective was consolidation have not been met. You are turning Morningside from a school that is 90% full to 40% full, 60% empty. Morningside has a central location. It has the easiest three-way pickups and drop offs. The enrollment at Morningside, unlike

041many other area 5 schools, is stable or rising. Despite that, we are at a loss. No reasoning has been given to close Morningside. Another point you are overindexing the value of inboundary enrollment. What you should be looking at is what is the in district enrollment whether it is stable or rising. Another point um and this really gets to the core of it. On September 2, the PowerPoint presentation that was posted by the pack committee has this slide 24 where the emphasis is on attracting students from outside the district. >> Why do we have a granite school district if you are going to prioritize outofdist students and push out inboundary and in district students? So this is very very um wrong. And finally um the parents were not consulted, the teachers were not consulted. We were

042simply presented a recommendation as a fate accompany. So uh there has been no uh collaborative effort and it feels like um quite frankly a dictat instead of democracy. Um uh and I want to add that um the the study does not follow any proper procedure like the other school districts. It simply came up with some slides, some data but there is no proper algorithm, no proper procedure on the basis of which such recommendations have been made. So, how can we trust the process? And then the director, I'm sorry to say, he went back and at this before the skyline meeting, he deleted that slide. >> Slide 24. >> We appreciate it. >> So, thank you for your comments, >> Carrie. And after Carrie, we have Stephanie Bellentine. >> So, thank you for being here. I

043am a parent of Morningside and would like to speak in support of keeping Morningside open. Um really um I'm asking to just pause, you know, pause uh because um there's more questions that we need answered really. Um this study has revealed that um we need to go back and revisit and truly study the the data points to really truly make a point um that we're doing the right thing. Uh the Salt Lake City District did a boundary study in 2023 and the committee presented, you know, 56 page professional document with detailed analysis to their board. And in comparison, Morningside got one slide um justifying the closure and just a you know a bunch of justifications on how they think the DLA program will fill up the school. You know, this is not good enough for

044our Morningside families. You know, we need a real study with an actual plan. We need um something that will give our children and our our school longevity. So, please consider pausing this. Please consider really doing the time to justify the closure of Morningside so that our children um and our future children will receive the benefit um from that decision. Thank you. >> Thank you, Carrie. Stephanie Bell. And after Stephanie, we have Kate Miyagi or is it Miyagi? Hi, I'm Stephanie Ballentine, a parent at Eastwood. And again, thank you for having us here and thank you for coming to our Eastwood school to listen to us. I greatly appreciate it. And I love hearing all of the updates that you've done throughout the district. They are very personal to me, especially when Chris talks about building,

045you know, the STEM schools and opening those schools. We love that. We love su successful STEM schools and we dream of the same in our area, Julie. We dream of the same. Um, Eastwood has it. So, today I'm here to encourage you to not accept defeat, but to help us compete. Eastwood has the location, the land, the teachers and staff, the culture, the community, the results, our performance, our traditions, our designations. You know, along with Morningside, we're high performing schools. What we would like is to give us a chance, give Eastwood a chance to be rebuilt. As the bond had mentioned, Eastwood can be another flagship school for Granite School District. Like the Neil Armstrong Academy, a few other platinum STEM schools in the district, Eastwood's Gold STEM is the only designation within our area

046five. With our limited resources, we've delivered consistent results, ratings, and performance. This takes time to build. Even your Neil Armstrong Academy still does not outperform Eastwood. We are in the top 2%. It takes time. We may be small stars but we have stellar impact. Our enrollment numbers might not might look a little bit low but our impact spans multiple communities. We have over 50% attendance and enrollment um sorry not attendance rather enrollment from out of boundaries which means Eastwood attracts. We are a magnet without being an official magnet. Furthermore, we have 1,620 signatures on our change.org petition to keep the school open. Help us compete. Our closest neighbor, Canyon Rim Academy, has over 500 students and it's currently at capacity. They are expanding this year. And as you know, Canyon Rim was closed in 2007,

047I believe. So, in less than 20 years, they're expanding. We have the same vision for Eastwood. Our future, the future of public education, especially in our area, area 5, depends on what we do today. We are counting on you to vote no on the pack study. We do not find that there's sign sufficient enough evidence. So again, we encourage you, please don't accept defeat. Help us compete. Vote no on the pack. Our future depends on it. Thank you. Thank you, Stephanie. Kate, and after Kate, we've got Vanessa Dobson. son would like to say something. >> Go ahead. >> Well, I feel like um so what is the reason for them closing Morning Side? Like there's a bunch of other schools that aren't very full. >> That's just about the gist of what I have to

048say. Um I want to start by reminding you the board of where this area 5 study started. Um on in February when you approved an area 5 study um the pack came to you and gave you two options. Um option one was to proceed with an area 5 study and option two was to take a year off from doing school closures and to do an internal study year. And there were multiple reasons given to do to take that time off. Um, one of them was to study ALC and DLI placement. Um, another one was to to give the magnet DLI time to develop and to see if we wanted to replicate that scenario. These are the same questions that you're hearing now from all of these parents from Morningside. These are the issues that have

049not been studied in what the pack has presented with you to you. We don't have answers. And these are all really enormous momentous questions for a school that is full. We are at 90% capacity, over 90% depending on whose numbers you look at for capacity. Um, and it is truly a neighborhood school. It we have three over 300 students within the Granite School District that come from the Morningside boundary. That is more than three other schools. It's close to a fourth school in our area. So, on the numbers alone, we are a bigger boundary school. He walks to school. We're on the other side of 45th South, but we walk across that kind of scary street. It's really a It's really truly a walkable school except for 40th South. Um, so thank you for busing

050from there also. Um, but the the the real question is that a lot of these parents have addressed is that this the pack did not answer these questions for Morningside. It really truly is still needed as a school in the area. It cannot be closed as a traditional school. The problem that Morningside is having and the reason the numbers don't look great for Morningside, one of which is the inboundary utilization number. That number cannot be compared to some of the smaller schools because we are so full. We have traditional students who are being who are choosing other schools in the neighborhood because we actually don't have space for them. So that number is artificially low. >> Thank you, Kate. We appreciate your your comments. Thank you, Vanessa. And after Vanessa, we have Nastia Manonyi. [Music]

051>> Hello, and thank you so much for listening to everyone's comments tonight. Um, you know, I think I I usually like to start on a positive. So, I think the positive is just that everybody really loves their schools and that Granite has some really high performing schools. I'm a graduate of the Granite School District um system. And now I serve my community working at the Disability Law Center. We're a nonprofit that provides services to people with disabilities in our state. Um, and you know, it's a wonderful tradition. Um, but I'll also just say that I think some of us on the east side are really tired. Um, my kiddo was supposed to go to Mil Creek, which had a DLI program. Uh, Mil Creek closed. So, the DLI program moved to William Penn. It's very

052full. My daughter could not get in. So, now she has friends there that she wanted to go to school with, but she can't. The other kiddos on my street are at charter schools and I have a few who went to Nibi and Salt Lake school district. Um I didn't realize they had a DLI Spanish program there. Honestly, if I knew what I know now, I probably would have put her there. I did send her to Morningside, which is just such a wonderful school. It's a really lovely community school. And I think one of the things that's so hard is that we have a recommendation right now to close Morningside, but not a plan for its programs. And I think parents are just we're losing confidence. Um unfortunately our kids are our most precious thing in

053our lives. We want to know they're going to be taken care of. We trust you and we know that you want the best for our kiddos. Um but we just don't have the information that that's going to happen. So I think like many people here have said, please take a pause and plan. I would say take a pause and plan for the east side. I think people are really tired of being chased all over the district in terms of trying to find a school that's going to stay open and work for their kiddos. I think the other thing to know about is there are families at Morningside who have already come from school closures and are their second and third school. And we have families who have kiddos in all of the multiple tracks and

054they're going to have to pick what kiddo that they're going to follow. Are they going to have their kids in multiple schools? Are they going to have, you know, one of their kids going to sacrifice and give up their program? Um, so as you can see, there's a lot of uncertainty. I know there's a lot of emotions with this. Um, but you know, we we ask you to really take your time and take care of our kids. Um, you've been doing a really wonderful job of that so far. My daughter's absolutely a testament to that. I'm a testament to that. and um you know we we hope you'll think carefully and pause this decision and get some plans in place, some comprehensive planning in place for our families. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Our

055last one is Nastia. >> Hello, I am Nastasia Mango and you were really close. Um, I am a Eastwood alumni and a parent of an Eastwood child. And first, I wanted to say thank you guys for spending so much time with us lately. Um, I am another parent speaking on behalf of the Eastwood Advocacy Group representing more than 100 members. Um the purpose of a study and especially a pack study is to gather information, conduct research and provide informed recommendations based on the data. And I am not alone in my frustration that there was no true pack study conducted. Mr. Hogan gathered his own subjective experience and observations and pulled enrollment numbers. But that's not enough. To date, Eastwood parents have conducted a comprehensive datadriven uh review of the proposed school closure, collecting, verifying, and

056presenting more measurable and intentional data than the PAC study itself produced. Through community collaboration, parents have compiled enrollment trends, facility comparisons, safe route validations, and academic performance analysis that reveal critical flaws in the PAC's conclusions. Superintendent Horsley said that perception is reality and he is absolutely correct. With the lack of transparent data, the community's perception is that the decision has already been made and these recommendations are simply an attempt to make that decision fit. And if it doesn't make sense, it doesn't work. The only way these recommendations make sense is from a financial standpoint. The 2017 bond, which increased taxes to rebuild schools, is depleted. Of those seven schools on the rebuilt list, four have uh now been closed or are recommended for closure. Without comprehensive data or informed analysis, this appears less like strategic

057planning and more like financial triage. My question is this. How can the board in good faith move forward with recommendations that lack the foundational data a study is meant to provide? and what will the district do to ensure that transparent, measurable, and consistent data collection occurs before any final decisions are made? Um, and all of the data. We're missing one copy, so I will I have six though. This is all the data that the Eastwood community has spent the past month gathering, comparing, and collecting. Um, and I made printouts for you guys. So, [Applause] Thank you. Um, per board policy, we limit our time to 30 minutes and that is 10 people each. However, we do have one individual who was told that even though she was signed up 11, that she was tense. So,

058we're going to go ahead and and allow Jen Robinson to come up. So, thank you. Apologize for the confusion. >> Thank you so much. My name is Jen Robinson. I'm a parent with two children at Morningside and a third to join in a couple of years. Choice. It's a loaded word in education, isn't it? For those of us passionate about preserving the quality and funding of our public schools, it's especially tricky. Which is why I find it ironic that in this time where vouchers and charter schools do such harm to public education, Granite School District is proposing eliminating the strongest option they have to school choice in the district. Instead of fighting to preserve and expand their best market competitor to the whole family solution offered by private and charter schools, they're dismantling the very

059best whole family school the district has to offer. Every school believes they're unique and honestly they're right, but Morningside has strengths that no one else has. Despite boundaries that look a little bit like a Derrymander district and despite suggestions that Morningside's three tracks are a weakness, our community and these three tracks in a unified Morningside give Granite District a fighting chance in the school choice conversation. Morningside is the whole family public school option that serves children of all needs and abilities. It helps children who thrive best in a traditional program with a neighborhood environment. It supports neurode divergent children who require the challenges, rigor, and specialization necessary to be successful learners. It allows gifted children the opportunity to learn with either an accelerated curriculum or the ability to speak another language. It brings them all

060together with clubs and programs and activities every school would be proud of. It does it in ways that no other school in the area can. It's typical to hear of families who have children in each track. And in every single program, you'll find bright children struggling with dyslexia. and every single one of them has the capacity to succeed thanks to our exceptional teacher, Miss Weston. A friend recently moved her family to Holiday from an East Coast city that spends a lot of money on their schools. They planned to enroll their children in Morningside as they knew it had the programs that would get them closest to the quality of education from their last city. Then they heard rumors Morningside would likely be closed. They explored their neighborhood school, a smaller enrollment school in area 5,

061and ultimately made the decision to place their children in private school. She emphasized to me that she didn't want to do this. She believes in public school. With this proposal, the hemorrhaging of students to private and charter schools will only get worse. We already see this bear out. 35% of today's Skyline students did not attend their public elementary school. There's a lot of data I'm ready to share about why closing Morning Side is a baffling choice for Granite School District's future and why we need a more comprehensive study for the entire East Side. Don't worry, we're going to be meeting soon. We'll see you next week. We're here to partner with you to build trust. We want a plan in place that ensures the east side remains a standard bearer of education, of public education

062in Utah. Granite School District also has a choice. innovate and offer a public school competitor with these other school choices or be left behind. My plea to the board, if you stand for the future of our public schools in this battleful school choice, do not let them concede the fight. Stand to keep Morningside open. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. We appreciate the parents who took the time to come and uh and share with us their comments and their thoughts. Uh we're going to go ahead and move on in our agenda. We have next up is our consent agenda. Uh we've had these these things in our on our um on our board books to be able to look over and ask questions for the last few days. So if there are no further

063questions, I will go ahead and entertain a motion. >> I move that we approve the consent agenda. >> Second it. >> I have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda. Is there any further discussion? Right. All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Nay for Kim. >> Thank you. Um, our next item is a staffing report. We're going to invite up Dr. Patrick Flanigan to come up and give us a um staffing report. Good evening, members of the board and members of the superintendency. It's a pleasure to be with you tonight. Uh looking forward to giving my annual staffing update. We'll start uh these numbers are taken out of our application system. Um and one of the questions that's asked when somebody applies to a position in Granite

064School District is where they heard about the position. This is a breakdown of where uh our applicants have heard from these positions. Our top two that are interesting to look at. They're pretty consistent year to year. Um is our district website uh which is why we make such an effort to put our recruiting magazine there uh and and make it as user friendly as possible. The other one that I like to point out are district employees. And I think uh you'll you'll notice when we get to the experience of our new hires that I think this bears out uh some of our best recruiting come from word of mouth of our current employees who have really enjoyed their time as employees here in Granite School District. Let's focus first on our ESPs or educational support

065professionals. This these numbers represent both contract and hourly. Uh we since April, it's been a busy season, have uh filled 1,769 contract and hourly positions. That represents separate postings, uh onboarding experiences, a lot of data entry on behalf of each one. uh of those positions, that represents 1,495 unique individuals, meaning that we have some of our hourly folks that will apply to a couple different positions uh that'll allow them to get up to 29 hours per week. Being able to fill those that amount of positions uh isn't just by luck. There's a lot of hard work on behalf of our building administrators, on behalf of our recruiting teams, um, and also decisions made by you and the granite board, uh, to increase salaries over the years to try and, uh, make sure that we're competitive

066with surrounding districts. Uh, you've had a very positive influence on our ability to recruit and retain our ESPs. Our salary and benefit package is competitive again. Uh, and I I know many of you have received folks that have been grateful to you for being willing to uh pay for that additional uh increase from last year going into this next year. That sure has been helpful for us as we attend these job fairs. as uh I've done the last several years. Uh I wanted to show hires that we've made in some of our uh uh most frequently posted positions since April of this year. So going back to the end of last school year and the data that I pulled was as of uh September 30th. So this of course is always a moving target when

067you have a district of about 9,200 employees that are contracting hourly. You can imagine from day to day you'll have people being onboarded and other people that are moving on to other opportunities. Uh we've uh post we we've been able to bring on 193 new hourly substitutes and this is an ongoing posting. uh it represents um a high interest in folks to be able to have that classroom experience and help out in the classroom and and the large number of applicants have helped us to have fairly low failed to fill uh numbers. And when I say fairly low, if you looked just last week, we had two days where there were only two out of the entire district fail to fill positions. And on each of those days, there are about 150 different sub jobs

068that were filled. So, we we get excited about that. I won't read each one of these. This gives you a chance though to look over them. Uh and you'll notice that uh for the most part, we have a lot of uh most of our schools are fully staffed and ready to go for the beginning of the year. Uh we do have a few special ed para positions that we're working hard to fill. uh and uh it's kind of exciting to see that uh there are no contract pair of positions for special ed that that at least we have to fill at this point. So again, this is continuation of our ESPs and what we've hired uh to this point or at least till uh September 26 on the on this particular slide uh since April

0691st. Uh if you'll remember 2 3 years ago, well actually it would been 2022 just the dire situation that it felt and the number of postings that were still uh left unfilled. Uh and my my attention is drawn to the custodial and how many we've been able to fill. How exciting. And to think that uh we just have nine. The other one that I remember being really worried about was our nutrition service workers. If you'll recall, we had a lot. It it was almost to the point where they're going to ask uh my staff to go out help uh prepare lunches and to feel like now we're at this point where we we filled uh these positions, 57 of them, and there's really there's only one that we were left and probably by this point

070that's been filled because this is as of 9:26. A few other uh some of the things that we are doing in our office uh that we started uh probably about four or five years ago. We participate in local job fairs all the way from uh Ogden down to uh Provo. We have job fairs that we attend regularly. Salt Lake Community College is another one that we attend regularly. Um we also reach out to the folks that have applied but haven't finished the application. So we proactively uh jump into those postings where we can see somebody's looked at it but for whatever reason they haven't fully submitted and we uh help them and assist them to finish the application. That's actually been very helpful. Uh and in many cases folks who thought that they had applied

071have then been very grateful and thanked us in helping to make sure that they got that application finished in time. Uh we also make sure that we attend uh those uh regular spring and summer community events to try and get the word out there for any especially hard to fill positions. And we uh continue to do the refer employee referral program uh for the especially hard to fill position. Um and those are ones that I check in with those directors regularly to say, "Hey, do we have the right position up there for this employee referral program?" Let's now take a look at some of our uh teacher application data. And and what we've done here is we've shown you what the total number of applicants and this includes even people that had applied but maybe

072didn't meet the posting standards. So anybody that had uh applied uh so about well the 24 25 school year there was 1,127 uh applicants and this year we compare that to 801. Some of that also you'll see we've we've haven't had to hire as many uh teachers this school year. In secondary, uh you'll notice uh that there were uh a few more 1,636 applicants uh compared to or excuse me, 2,410 for this year compared to the 1,636. Applicants may have been hired outside of Granite School District or Utah. And applicants typically apply for multiple positions. So when we look at that, some of these folks have applied to multiple positions, right? Now focusing let's drill down just a little bit at our elementary and preschool uh this school year uh we have hired 126 and

073when you compare that to the year before uh which was 142 you can see that there's been a fewer positions that we've had to fill. It's also been uh in in the way that we've done the staffing when we looked back in the spring we knew it was going to have to be conservative because we saw that there were lower numbers in our sec secondary school schools. You'll notice that it's about the same. And you might ask, well, why is that? Why would it be less in elementary and uh it's roughly stayed the same in secondary? And and I could venture a guess. it wouldn't be peer-reviewed data that I could present to you, but I do think that a couple of them if I were forced to speculate just a little bit uh is

074I it's possible that the drop in birth rate that we've been experiencing uh in the last little bit in some of the school choice stuff uh it's been a little bit slower to hit our secondary schools naturally be hitting in the elementary area. The other thing that I think has to play a role in there is it's hard to replicate that comprehensive educational experience you get at the high school. And so whereas maybe in elementary uh going to a charter school or private school might be a little bit more viable or even doing home school, when a student gets to the age where they're looking at the high school experience and all the clubs and sports and uh some of the uh AP courses and other things that are offered there, it really becomes difficult

075to replicate that. So could that play a a part into it? And I have to guess there has that there's something to do with that as well. All right, let's let's take a look at our 254 teachers alto together. That's the preschool, elementary, and secondary. And let's break them down just a little bit. So out of them out out of that number, 88 are new to the profession. So you can see the difference in elementary and secondary. and 166 come to us with experience, meaning they've already had previous contract classroom teaching experience, whether it be in the Salt Lake area or outside of the state or somewhere else in the state. Um, and and if you'll remember when we first started this presentation, I was talking a little bit about our referral sources, and the

076second most common one is our district employees. I really do believe that uh we have teachers that are starting in other districts. They hear uh through their friends that have maybe made the transition over here about their experience and about the benefits that are offered and uh then seriously consider coming over. Uh I know that that was uh even my own experience uh years ago as I started out in another district and then had the opportunity uh to to join uh here at Granite. So, some good information, good numbers, some good stuff to chew on there. All right, so looking at our new hires, this is a breakdown on the level of education. So, give a little bit better at least a better understanding the profile of our new teachers and that breaks it down

077by degrees that they've come to us with. the industry experience only. Those uh are largely our CTE teachers that uh are coming in and teaching some very industry specific classes that help our students that are looking to go out into industry. They have typically not gone through a traditional teaching program uh but will have a CTE teaching license with the state. This slide right here shows out of the new teachers that we've hired this year. Uh the number that we have in what's known as our Apple program or the alternative route to licensing if you'll recall years ago before 2020 that used to be run by the by the state by USB. It was known as the ARRO program. Uh and then that shifted and changed and was handed off to the districts back in

0782020. And since then uh we've had some really capable uh very uh professional folks that have taken on that Apple program. Uh and of that 26 of our uh new hires had b at least a bachelor's degree in that field uh but did not go through a traditional teaching program. applied and uh were recommended for hire and and as they are teaching uh they'll have three years to complete this program uh and get the teaching license. So they have the kind of have the content area already covered but it's largely the pedigogy that they're working on uh during this time. Uh and so this is a breakdown of the 26 secondary and then for our elementary uh where we tend to see a whole lot more applicants uh that are qualified to teach and already

079have that license in the K6 area. Uh we have one uh that is participating in that Apple program. We have uh these are our current teacher vacancies. Uh and actually the the numbers shifted just a little bit now. So uh we have a couple less because some of those recommendation for hires have been uh starting to be processed and pushed into HR uh and bringing some new teachers on board. Uh this is kind of exciting though if you'll recall it wasn't but a few years ago although we've always done uh I can always uh hang my head high for how we do here in Granite. Even in the hardest times uh we've been in a good spot where we haven't been starting with you know down 50 60 70 positions like we've seen in some

080of the neighboring districts. Uh but how exciting to think as large as we are uh that as of uh September 30th uh we we just had these positions to fill. Now uh are we satisfied with that? No. Uh are we at the land of milk and honey? Not yet. Uh we'll always strive for perfection. Uh but we're we're getting pretty close here this year. All right. Again, as we look at our teachers uh recruiting efforts, uh a huge thank you to the board uh and association during negotiations to be able to work together to put together a very positive package. Uh our salary and benefit package settlement is competitive with surrounding districts. I I think when you look at the numbers and you see the folks that are coming to us with with experience, I

081think that speaks to it. uh that that at least is a sign uh that we're we're competitive and that especially when it comes to those health benefits in our our wellness clinic, things that are not offered in other districts that demonstrate we take care of our employees, uh other people take notice and they uh uh then look to be able to join the grant family. uh some of the efforts to increase and we heard that earlier in one of the uh patron comments uh increase the uh planning time you through the use of legislative days I know has been recognized as well. We have already uh begun our efforts for the 2627 school year. I I know we just barely started this one but we've already started with our student teachers that are currently in

082our schools uh and our interns. uh we'll be recruiting both in and out of state this year. Uh however, our focus is largely in our own backyard and we found a lot of success with that. Uh that's where we find our biggest return on investment. We're using various forms of social media tech platforms to enhance our recruiting efforts. Uh and um we we we do tend to offer open contracts or at least begin starting that conversation even as early as late October for the upcoming school year. Now, as we look at the numbers and how many we anticipate hiring, uh you you tend to see maybe not as many open contracts offered. Uh but needless to say, we're still having those conversations looking to say, "Hey, how do we secure the very best, the ones

083that we're already seeing in our classrooms working that magic on a daily basis as a student teacher or as an intern?" That uh brings us to the conclusion of the presentation I prepared. Uh are there any questions? >> Go ahead. I did not ask you this in advance, so if you don't have this data, that's fine. You can follow up with me. But I'm curious, how many of those hires that we had listed for this year are one-year contract teachers? >> I don't have that off the top of my head, but I could get that to you easily and send it your way. Yeah. >> Okay. >> Uh we don't see as many this year as we've seen in years past just because there's been even less soft money for our schools to work with.

084Uh so what I can tell you is and I could even pull this data for you if you'd like Kim and the rest of the board members. Uh I could do a comparison of last year to this year. Uh but my experience and what we've seen so far is we've seen less of our one-year only postings and that's largely due to the fact that we don't have the ESR funds around like we did for about 5 years. Uh and some of the other soft funds that have been there that schools have been willing to use to try and uh get teachers. >> Yeah, that would be good to see. I'd appreciate that. I'm just, yeah, curious how many of our teachers in those contract positions, in those one-year contract positions, weren't able to find another

085posting this year. I think there was a concern uh when we were going through spring surplus, there was a lot of one-year contracts and as we work through that surplus process. I'm I'm trying to pinpoint the question here so we can get better data if that makes sense. >> Right. I And I remember some of those conversations. Okay. >> Is that right, Kim? Uh, and to be a little bit more specific, I'm I'm aware of one who it was a one-year contract, and the assumption is always that it's going to be renewed, but when a one-year, for those that don't know, when a one-year is not renewed, they place all surplus teachers first before they go to the one-year only. And so, you can imagine how those one-year only contracts fill being bottom of the

086barrel. Um, and so I don't know if that's kind of what you're referencing, but that concern came to me in the spring as a position was just eliminated and um, even though they were aware it was a one-year, it's not very often that they aren't renewed. And so it comes as a shock and then because of some things in the negotiated agreement with the GA, the surplus teachers take priority over that one-year contract, even if they're a seasoned teacher. And so it gets a little gets a little muddy. So I think that's uh board members are very well aware of that concern and that's probably why we're bringing >> Yeah. And and you know even despite you know when you start talking about uh um property rights which a a contract is it doesn't change

087the fact that in the trenches as a teacher when you're there every day of the year working giving it your all. Even if you know, you kind of still have that hope. But when that hope gets taken away momentarily, it sure is painful. >> Yeah. >> Thanks for elaborating. That's exactly why I'm asking. >> Clark, did you have a question? >> Any others? Julie, go ahead. >> Um, Patrick, I wonder what you think. I I am very impressed with how much better this looks than in in when I very first got on the board. Um I I just cannot believe how much um the problem had I I shouldn't say has been resolved because if if you need any teachers then it's not resolved right but um major improvement and um so I'm wondering what

088you think is the main thing making the difference. you you said there um benefits um and salary increase, but um you know most of the salary increase is coming to everyone across Utah together from the legislature, right? They're saying, "Okay, we're just going to give this to everybody." We are also increasing and we did a significant increase in past years. Um but I I I should stop opining. Will you Will you just tell me what you think are the things that have made the difference? >> Yeah. Well, I think there's uh multiple layers uh or different ways that we can look at that and probably a lot of elements that you could point to for a response. One thing that I do know uh and for anybody that has been uh part of the hiring

089process whether it be an HR or as a principal experiencing it, it tends to be you see it cyclical. So, we currently are in a market that's very nice where we have lots of applicants, qualified applicants. Even in the job fairs, we're seeing um a a lot of people looking for jobs. Uh and so, right now, we happen to be in one of those times where there's a lot of folks looking for jobs and a lot of them happen to be um qualified. Now, this could be for a lot of reasons. Maybe uh some families are struggling to make it uh make their ends meet. And perhaps a spouse who had taken time off to raise a family uh now is going to dust off the license that they once used before they started having

090a family to come back in the workforce to help earn money for the family to make ends meet. uh monthtomonth there may be I mean I know for years for the last several years we've looked at the retirements and thought okay surely this year we're going to see a fairly large bubble of folks retiring uh when when times are a little uncertain though uh whether that be economically or politically. I think fewer people are less likely or willing to take that leap into uh retirement. >> Wow, that was loud. I didn't mean to cut you off. I'm so sorry. Julie, is your question a little bit like what are Bane recruiting tools? Is that kind of what you're touching on? >> That's what I'm very interested in. >> Because I can I take a stab

091because I sit on the benefits committee and I >> Before you do, can I just address um I think it's very um transparent of you to say >> it's not anything I did, it's the economy. I I really think that that is good of you to say that. Yeah, we have. >> Um Karen, you're right. You are about to answer the question I was really asking. >> That's what I thought. Okay, so um I sit on the benefits committee and we do there's a lot of work people, if you don't know, we are self-funded in our healthcare. And because we're self-funded, it it allows us to have our um our clinic, our preventative medical clinic. And so our Granite Wellness Center does a lot to save us money, but it wouldn't even be possible unless

092we were self-funded. So we do a lot of work inhouse to keep our premiums low to recre. We have that as a huge recruitment tool. Um also the clinic itself being able to walk in I know I've taken my child in there for strep throat and I don't pay a copay and then they hand me my little box of amoxicilin and off I go. Right. So that has cost me zero dollars. Um and I know a lot of our employees have mentioned to me how nice it is to just be able to have access to that. I have other um co-workers that I've used it for physical therapy and all those things. And so the health benefit that we offer and the price we offer it at is a huge recruitment tool and and other

093districts can't compete against against that. And also I don't know if you want me to keep going, but another one is our early retirement benefit that is huge and that is used sorry my HR cap is on now. Um that is used to get our midcareers when we're, you know, sometimes we're able to recruit from a different district, a mid-career teacher who is just hitting their stride and and we want to scoop them up. And when you're 24 years old, you might not care much about the early retirement benefit. But when you do when you're 45 and you want to retire at 60 and then the early retirement is that you get to stay on our insurance for 5 years, which is why we have some people retiring at age 60 cuz that bridges the

094gap for insurance to have it from age 60 to 65 before they can qualify for for Medicare. So I think those are two of our biggest things are the benefits and the early retirement benefit. >> Early on in the recruiting process too, we we've as a HR team for last several years, we've been reflective in our process and asked ourselves the question, where can we get the biggest bang for our buck and we have attended a lot less of the one-day out ofstate uh teacher fairs that used to be pretty typical for years and years. and we've put more of an effort into our own backyard uh and creating true relationships with universities from USU all the way down to Utah Tech and everything in between uh to the point where we go out to

095these uh universities. We have evenings where we meet with them. We go over some of these benefits so that uh talk about hey if you come into Granite and you teach with us here are all the wonderful things that that you could that could be available to you. Uh, additionally though, when we do get our student teachers and interns here, uh, we make efforts to help them see more than just the classroom they're serving in, uh, but we've been, uh, making efforts to try and help them see the larger picture and just how many people the veritable army behind the scenes t working hard to make sure that the teachers on the stage can do their job and still be comfortable and have their needs met and all the ways that we serve these students,

096not just in uh in the lessons that are delivered in the classroom, but all the aid that's given as well, whether that be through the foundation. They get an inside peak into the the big operation that is our uh food services. They can see what goes into that as well. And when they see that complete picture, they I I do believe they start to fall in love with uh Granite and their experience. And then it's a huge help. Our teachers who agree well the principles who agree to host them and the teachers that agree to be the mentors truly create a relationship with them that pays off big time and those student teachers and interns then see, wow, this is a place I'd like to be. >> You know, a big part of the hiring

097matrix up here was ESPs and those educational support professionals. They don't get the money straight from the legislature like teachers like you're saying. This board decided to give a substantial raise a few years ago and it has changed the entire game when we're trying to hire a custodian or hire a pair of professional or hire somebody that works in the kitchen. That that raise has changed everything. We are we are very much market competitive if not beating the market. we get people to come. >> Any other questions? All right. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Flanigan. We're going to go ahead and move on to our U population analysis committee update. Um because we have so many people here who are eagerly anticipating this item. I just want to make sure that you understand this is

098not an action item. The board because of the nature of this, it is an information item. We cannot take action on this tonight. Our action item will come in November and December. So, we are just getting an update tonight. I'll just say quickly thanks Patrick and he's being very humble. Yeah, there are many things that impact our our retention, staff retention, teacher retention, all that, but uh he he's done an amazing job he and his team in that area. So, uh, board president McDermott, Vice President W, board superintendent, superintendency, and and just really everyone else. I'm not sure who all behind me or uh, is joining online, but uh, as a representative of the pack, thank you for allowing me to come tonight and and give this update. By the way, if it's okay with

099me, if we want to go back and watch that Harbickson video one more time that just puts a great uh feeling in the room. We'll jump in. I am going to go pretty quickly. Um and and a lot of these slides are not for board consumption necessarily because you've seen these many many times and a lot of the folks behind me have seen them, but some have not and and many people like to go back and look at these and review these slides. So, um, more for partial historical record. I I put some of these on there. I'll go quickly and as necessary, I'll stop or go back and go over those. Again, this is one of those some of the highlights that we've had since the beginning. Highlights of patron outreach. U pretty self-explanatory.

100I'm not going to read over all of these, but uh feel free to go ahead and go over all of those anytime. These are highlights, again, not everything, but highlights of what we've done as patron outreach. Generally speaking, since September 2nd since the recommendation came out, um I believe I've been at every one of these and some are shorter, some are longer. Um if you were there, you know what I mean by longer and uh that's fine. That's part of the process and we want to be able to answer as many of those questions as we can in addition to the uh I just use the word numerous. That was being nice, but a lot of emails and follow-ups, phone calls and other meetings with patrons and and we'll continue to have those. of course

101this and all of our other meetings almost everything we do uh public meetings are video recorded and put on the website and of course there is more to come so the process most of you are familiar with the process again almost a year long we are in the home stretch as I'd like to call it and um we it's a little unusual this year in that from today to the first reading on November 18th is a little longer than normal but uh after talking to a lot of people on on all sides of this issue. Um maybe there's a feeling that maybe it's a good thing to give all of us a chance to take a deep breath and and look and think and study and um and have a little more time time to

102do that. This is one of the maps. Um I I want people to see a couple of things. Obviously, I want I want people to see and notice Immigration Canyon there, but also as a reminder, if you look most people don't look at our entire district and the size of our district. Um, the northwest corner of our district goes up as far north as Centerville. Now, there's a lot of lake and swamp and and areas out there that that was kind of the county or the municipal line at the time, but if you look at it, and a lot of it is quite frankly uninhabitable. If birds were students, we'd be the largest district in the country. We know that, but they're not. So, but I will say that parts that were considered uninhabitable a

103few years ago now are not considered that. and we're starting to see growth up in that area closer to Davis County schools than a lot of ours. And so, um, it's it's an interesting map when you take a look at it. Anyway, I want to make sure absolutely that, um, we see that, you know, when those students are picked up, they have to come back um through Salt Lake District up on Sunnyside and down Foothill and so on. Now, this is a map that we've used for the most part. It again, it acknowledges and has the note on there about um um why we haven't always put Immigration Canyon on that map, but but know that we know and and every time we talk about it as a pack, it is very much mentioned and

104as a reminder, we're aware of that. These other slides, same area, just junior high boundaries, high school boundaries. These are the factors just like it says include but not limited to but generally speaking these are the things we look at. Um these are the data points. I won't go into all of these right now and I can later. We've talked about these quite a bit but enrollment is absolutely an issue and boundary enroll enrollment. We've talked about the difference between inboundary and out of boundary enrollment and program enrollment. um school programs whether it's DLI, ALC, SPED, um STEM, all of our programs are part of that the FCI and so on. Again, you can see those things that we look at and I can tell you that u every study is different and in each

105study, each one of these kind of becomes weighted differently. Jump right into the first recommendation that we've had since September 2nd. And again, there's there's I changed one thing and I'll show you in just a moment, but again, the proposal at this point or the recommendation from the pack is that the school boundaries here of Eastwood and Oakidge be combined. Um, and this is the rationale for those. We talked about the central location, especially closer to uh uh Churchill, a slightly larger capacity, the pickup and drop off, which has been greatly debated, but it's simply just I underlined that part. as enrollment is increased. Um, we're aware that with 230 students is not as much of an issue, but the pack talked quite a bit about with 500ish students, it it becomes more of a

106challenge. Um, I'm I'm sure we'll get a chance to explain that or talk about that more with a lot of folks that uh um agree or disagree or we can agree to disagree on that point. I I did change this one part also, the lack of interior. Just note I added that word and it's fair. I I had not put interior ADA accessed earlier. Um technically it Eastwood is ADA accessible. By law it is u but that was part of our thinking was the interior access for ADA. Some of the side by side again same slides that you've seen a few times. Um the some of the higher numbers are in red and um you see um I believe some of the lower numbers I don't have highlighted here but we have kind of two

107highs and two lows split classes in each school and one sometimes two classes per grade level. This is kind of gets to the heart of the matter in most of the things we look at. Again, the goal if we can achieve it as three teachers per grade level and not just three teachers per grade level, but if we can balance out classes at the same time, we want to be able to do that. Try not to have those peaks and valleys. This is the busing map. Can you go back to that slide, Steve? >> Yeah. Just want to reiterate what you just said there. I'm looking at OEK at Eastwood with 16 and 15 kids. We we understand I think the board is fairly cognizant of the fact that we allocate FTE on total school

108population. We divide that by the appropriate ratio K to2 1 to 24 and 3 to 5 27.25 and it's up to the local school to decide how to staff that. Right. Correct. So with respect to that, you just said something there I want to emphasize here and I think is is where we're seeing some challenges and difficulties. We're not just trying to enhance u capacity issues in our schools, although that is an admirable goal. We're trying to make it so that we don't have these inordinate class sizes in some of our smaller school populations like the 36 or the the 16 and 15, which is obviously a local decision on how they want to allocate that staff, but yeartoyear can create challenges. Is that fair to say? >> That is fair and and accurate >>

109on this. Also I just just because I asked the question when I was there is Eastwood Eastwood is not officially it's only nine and a half teachers. Is that correct? It's not 10 teachers. >> You know I'd have to check that. Honestly I didn't I don't it's not on this slide. So I'll double check that. >> Okay. Because it was my understanding that the kinder they had the two in the morning and then um had the one of them left. It was only half day that they had the Kinder in the morning. >> Right. And I don't remember on the Kinder and the half contracts. I can't remember which one of these schools used their soft monies, their TSSA or land trust to subsidize that last half FTE to balance out their staffing to create

110a whole position if that makes sense even though it still creates a split in the division. >> And talking to principal Graham, he did say because I asked because the the two numbers, the 240 and the 243 are very similar and I said, "Why does they only have nine and this one has 10?" and he said, "Well, we only have a half uh for kindergart." >> So, Oakidge may have supplemented theirs with the other one >> with their local funds. The reason I bring that, sorry, do >> the reason I brought that up, I'm literally responding to a kindergarten teacher at one of our other schools who because they have the correct proportion of teachers allocated based on the district formula and from state funding, uh, but they have 30 in each of their kindergarten

111classes. And that was a local staffing decision, right? Um and so we don't we don't directly impact that. We leave that up to the local school community council and the principal to use those resources at their discretion. Is that fair to say? >> Correct. It is very fair. >> Thank you. >> Again, the map um a couple of reminders and clarifications on this. Yes, currently Eastwood specifically has is uh one bus and that one bus comes out of Immigration Canyon and then goes up to their boundary that is south of Mil Creek. So then before they go to the school they pick up many students that are bus eligible in that area that is u actually a little closer you see on the red line to Oakidge but they they make that loop and then

112go back. If this change, as we're discussing now, is is um approved eventually by the board, there would be two buses, one strictly just for Immigration Canyon, therefore they would get to the school quicker than they do now. And then the other bus, I heard a comment earlier about how can we possibly fit all the students in this area on another bus. What we have committed to was uh picking up all students that are north of Mil Creek Canyon. According to our data, we believe transportation believes that can work. But if we've committed to it, there are more then of course we would have to we would have to honor our commitment. >> Now I've heard that from Dr. Dave Gaddy, our director of transportation. I'm just reiterating that data is coming from him as

113an independent part of our population analysis committee. Is that correct? >> Correct. >> So just reiterating what you've indicated here. the current immigration route, comes out of the canyon, then drives up to the southeast portion of the Eastwood boundary, which is actually technically closer to Oakidge, and then heads back to Eastwood, which is why it's a longer route currently. We believe that under this proposal that would be a standalone route. Is that what I heard and understood? >> So, it would actually go straight to the school. >> Correct. And then we would have another bus uh for uh pretty much north of Mil Creek Canyon as a separate route altogether. And we believe we have the resources and to be able to do that according to Dr. Gaddy. >> Right. Correct. >> Now, I want

114to be clear because one of our um one of our parents asked a very challenging question and appropriately so. We're not guaranteeing you anything at this point in time. This is our proposal. This is based on the data of current writership that we're basing this analysis on. Obviously, we can't predict that a 100% of those K kids will be able to participate. So, I'm just making that acknowledgement for the board to understand that we believe I'm just quoting you. We believe we will be able to transport with a courtesy stop everyone north of Mil Creek Canyon >> based on the current writership rates. >> Correct. And it's based just writership rate or in other words um historically how many students that live in area what percentage of those students that live there choose to access

115the bus. >> Correct. And so and that's a little different in different areas but uh um that's what that's based on. >> Another question that we had come up at the the recent Eastwood meeting was with respect to transportation options to Oakidge. And we did press on that because it was a a good question. And would you mind responding uh how many routes we've had actually going to Oakidge in past history and that we currently have field trips accessing that property so it is feasible. Do you want to speak to that at all? >> Sure. Um I know as far as field trips Yeah. buses do come and go from that property, right? Um for different reasons. Now they um I'd have to go back and look at my data. I can't remember all those

116numbers, but how many um if they even currently have buses, but we've had buses up there. you and I have been on a bus up in that area recently and buses can get in and out of that pull through with without a problem. So all of that is is accessible. >> I I believe that data that this was a good question from one of our patrons and we wanted to be very transparent about that. Uh upwards till about the early 2000s we did actually transport kids via bus to Oakidge. Um some special education kids were directly transported to that location. We still obviously have field trips that go out in and out of that Oakidge drive-thru currently. >> And we used to do sorry that that came from a Jordan district um years ago. A

117number of those that went to Oakidge and Church Hill and even Eastwood. >> Yeah. >> So >> was there also a group that came from Karns? >> Correct. >> Yes. >> So that was for for a little bit of history. Um, long before I was here, uh, back in the the high growth high western growth, we used to actually transport a number of kids from the west side up to the east side, um, to to fill those schools and and retain populations in there and make it feasible so we didn't have to build new buildings. So, we have had buses come in and out of this area. It's a good question and we would obviously make some modifications if this proposal were to go through. >> Correct. Okay, next slide. The uh proposed boundary changes

118uh to Rose Crest and that's part of the Morningside boundary at the top there, the so-called North Morning Side and the approximately 40 students there. Uh we believe when the dust settles, we could see as many as 40 that end up at Rose. And then also on the other side, you can see the other arrow, 15 to 20 students from Wilson uh that currently go Wilson Evergreen Olympus. This would keep them all in the same feeder. Again, when we get the chance, and it works to clean up a feeder, we do that. It doesn't always work. And sometimes, just like in this study, we sometimes create split feeders, but in this case, it it does what uh we hope it would do. >> Can you remind me, were those Wilson students that will now go

119to with this proposal go to Rosest, were they the ones that were from Redwood or any of those area closures or boundary studies? there was part of the area of it and I looked up visit the same students. >> So I looked up um because it was three four years ago I think we had two two of the same students that may be impacted. It'll depends on if those two are even still around next year. >> Thanks. >> Okay. >> That's the busing. Um the busing up in that um east portion really is it comes out it shows a striped or hatched area but there are no homes there. So it is just simply how it shows up on the transportation map. The only residential homes or students are on the left side closer to

120that uh Wilson area and the west portion of Rose. >> Just for clarification sake that that's currently all part with the exception of the far west portion of that boundary currently being transported to Rosest. Is that correct? >> Because that's already their boundary. >> Right. Right. >> Okay. This isn't really a new route except for picking up a few additional students west of >> Brick Brickyard. >> Correct. In this case, not adding a bus route or bus or anything like that. Using the existing bus to do the same side closure. Um why combination of all of these things? Again, not one but a combination of all. Lower in boundary school utilization. We've talked a lot in this study about school utilization rates and how in some cases those are important but really the important part

121we look at is inboundary. We can discuss that we have quite a bit and and we can surely discuss it more uh the non-ontiguous part of the boundary. Then we have of course a lower not the lowest but a lower FCI score. Then what I'm referring to is the school cluster which I'll show you in the on the next slide. It's just areas, groups, schools that are grouped together geographically rather closely. The impact on traditional classes, this one is huge and and uh again I hesitate to say at the top of the list, but it is right up there. It may be balancing out enrollment in other schools. It helps do that. And of course, Morningside students from this area would become boundary uh to Driggs in this recommendation. And then then there are also

122of course no junior high boundary changes. All of these students currently go to Church Hill and they would continue to go to Church Hill. Many people have asked why this area would not be parcled out differently. Why perhaps the the northern part of this section, you know, choose your street, wherever you consider the northern part, could not be taken to a boundary to Upland, the central part, if you will, to Driggs and this southern part maybe below 4500 South to Cottonwood. Would that help other schools? Would that help Upland and Cottonwood more? Yeah, quite. Yeah, by the numbers. However, um if you remember back in my the factors that we look at other factors that are important and that come up in each study in this study, our junior high numbers are important specifically at

123Evergreen and Churchill. Churchill, I believe, is our uh smallest junior high in the district. By splitting up those boundaries to three different schools, we believe the pack believes that we would have many more students that would follow that boundary in this case to Wasach and then Olympus Jr. uh versus staying together for the most part and remaining at Church Hill. And and that's we we spent a lot of time and it's it's a big deal in this in this study. So just to clarify what you indicated there because I don't think I fully understood um this until last week when we discussed it further but the intent behind this recommendation in short is to preserve the the feeders for the junior highs and maintain the size of the the junior highs. >> Correct. That's one

124of the driving forces behind that. Otherwise it does make more sense to try to um parse these out if you will. The smaller number we found over the years that are split that becomes a split feeder two different schools. The smaller number by percentage we found those students tend to remain with that group they're in. So um and the larger number they'll tend to remain with that traditional feeder. This is just simply what I mean by this school grouping or cluster as we commonly call it. Um it's we see this throughout our district. um why we did this 50 60 years ago because it just seemed to make sense and we had smaller schools and more people walked but um from Crest View up to Oakidge is I think it's just over 2 miles and

125so it's just geography sometimes there's a geography lottery and you win it or you lose it on occasion and and that was a factor again not the factor but it's one of the things that we looked at and again referring to the classes You can see of course the French classes, two French DLI and one ALC in every grade. But uh then our our first responsibility, if you will, we want all of our programs to succeed. We want ALC and French DOI to succeed. But our traditional classes here are suffering. And and this has been one of our our guiding principles for a while is trying to make sure that we can provide that If those students are boundaried then to Driggs, these two areas that are currently in Driggs that we are have been

126proposing be boundaried to Cottonwood Elementary. There are approximately 70 students that live in the one and 30 students that live in the other. They'll continue to have like all students have the ability to open enroll in the school of their choice. and um and we've had that uh meeting recently at Morningside to discuss what that looks like and and how that will work. Couple of others, the same map just with streets, street maps or names of streets. Same area for busing. Again, that that area, not exactly, but very similarly, is a busing area now to Driggs. and it it would not change again slightly. I'm sure it has changed but to Cottonwood and again I I'm I'm going to hesitate on this one a little more than the other but Dr. Gaddy and looking at

127this thinks that all of the students in that area um should should easily be able to fit on one bus. Finally, the the current recommendation has been to have this French DLI standalone school be housed at Morningside. Uh we considered this recommendation a two school closure, two school boundary school closure. Um we understand the nuance there but it is important one with both being boundary schools and a program being housed at uh at Morningside. Now we have um one or two more things. Now remember of course we we had originally talked about consolidating ALC. We did update that and have committed at this point to study it a little more but in the meantime especially maintain two ALC's and the question has been and still is so far where would the other ALC be other

128than Woodstock and that's just simply this is word for word that went out in the email to the community about that update and this is just simply a reminder the new location for the current Morning sight ALC program is yet to be determined we are looking at that so I've got two more slides slides, a couple more. And I'll just say that again, we want to take it, the pack wants to take advantage of this a little few extra weeks that we have between the September 2nd recommendation, all of this, the uh meetings we've had and the November 18th meeting. Yes, we feel like we need to take a deep breath and and just let some of the dust settle and some of the data and the emotions and the and everything and the meetings,

129but here internally, we're still going to be working. We have agreed and and I think rightfully so to to look at andor revisit some of these ideas. One of the ones that's come up a lot is is something we will take a look at in our pack meeting next week. This is not a new idea, but I wanted to give you a little preface before I um I show you this next slide. >> Before you go off this slide and go to the next, I just want to highlight that um PAC is very much taking into consideration and listening to community feedback. Um that community feedback has prompted this move with ALC. It is prompt the next consideration that we are headlong in having conversations in the hallway and having conversations in pack um because

130the community feedback matters and we are definitely listening. >> Absolutely. Thank you. So, one of the things on our um um agenda, if you will, for for next week, we meet again next week, is uh just based on that feedback, we will revisit this this new ALC and French DLI locations. And one of the considerations we've been asked to review is what it would look like if ALC were be were to be moved to Eastwood Elementary and then French DLI would be moved to Oakidge Elementary. You can see the table there. That's just simply um our projected enrollment giving those moves and what the building utilization ranges look like. I gave a range just like I gave on the building capacities to be fair. Um what that would look like. Now I are there still

131some concerns? Yeah. Yeah, there are. I mean, and I'll just go back to the same slide, and we've talked about this, um, is is just the current classes because understand if you add ALC to Eastwood and and, uh, French DLI to to Oakidge, you still have some of these concerns. Does your overall enrollment go up? Yes, it does. Does your bidding utilization go up? Yes, it does. And then we have to look at and and we're charged with look at looking at uh our traditional classrooms and the impact there. Can those programs sometimes increase a little bit your current your traditional classes when siblings come? A little bit but but not typically by more than um 10 to 15 students schoolwide is is the numbers we've seen. So So that's just one example of um

132one of the things that we will revisit in in pack meeting next week. So just to to clarify for the board's sake, uh what I what I just heard is that uh we're going to the pack is going to go back and revisit that discussion, but the underlying concern still remains that we're not solving the ultimate problem with inordinate class sizes in our traditional program. Um even though you're adding more kids to the building, we would up our build our building utilization. and you showed some percentages there that uh um address that that primary problem, but we would still see class sizes potentially in the traditional program of 36 or 16 and 15. Um am I understanding that correctly? >> Correct. >> So, so with respect to that, uh we're looking at some additional questions

133and taking some of that uh back to some of our already planned meetings and seeing what some of our community members think. We're obviously still taking into consideration public feedback from our other surrounding schools, but the current recommendation still remains in place even though PAC is looking at this again. Is that fair to say? >> Sure. >> Okay. I just wanted to clarify for the audience sake because uh I did want to reiterate what our board president had indicated. This is not an action item tonight and the recommendation is not being formally changed. It's just a report out. It's just a a a report in and of itself. And so this does not change the formal recommendation at this time. So if there was some sort of a desire to change that recommendation uh by

134PAC um we could obviously hear that in two weeks at our study session or in November. Is that I'm looking at our attorney as well? Yes. >> Okay. Just making sure everybody's aware. >> Thank you for the clarification. And then of course, as we mentioned, follow-up meetings um October 14th. We know we have one for the DLI and traditional um folks at at Morningside coming up next week. And we have several pack meetings, either full and/or subcommittee parts of our pack meetings. And as mentioned, the November 18th and then December 2nd board meetings and public hearings. So, we already have one change that we're still trying to evaluate in terms of the ALC program and where that could be housed. Could you provide any additional information to the board on the discussions you've had or

135that PAC has had in terms of where that could potentially be located? I know there had been some discussions with respect to keeping it in a specific network or attempting to, again, this isn't just about elementary schools, but maintaining strong populations in our feeders as well. Is that correct? >> Right. That'll be part of our pack uh meeting next week. Also, I'll just say that. Sure. We've had a lot of phone calls and emails with um suggestions from communities on where they believe the ALC program should be and and it's all of the above. Um we've had um folks from some communities and very much in support saying yes, we want that program and others saying, you know, we we we're not comfortable. We want students, but we don't necessarily want to divide our school

136between programs and traditional students. And so I I think that's a fair assessment of of what we're hearing so far. >> I appreciate that. The uh and and I I'm interested in the rest of the board's uh impressions in terms of this information. Um, I would dare say that we have never had a pack study that we haven't made at least some sort of alteration from the initial recommendation to the final outcome because we do want to be responsive uh to the uh the community's feedback. So, we would encourage the the remaining members of these this area 5 study to uh look at all this information and we are hearing a great deal from both Eastwood and Morningside parents and we're grateful for that. uh but also want to know what the potential impact is.

137We have a good letter here from that was shared from one of the commenters from an Upland uh terrorist parent. We need to hear from some of these other community members as well. Is that fair to say? >> I I think that's a great point. Let me add um yes. Are we hearing a lot from the schools that could potentially close or see changes? Yes. But we're also hearing a lot from almost all the schools um in some way. Hey, we want more students or this or or please consider that uh solution. So, even though they're maybe not quite as vocal or loud or we don't see or hear from them as much, there's still a lot of activity throughout the study. I don't want to provide any undo influence over any process, but I

138was swayed by arguments from our community members that with respect to the DLI magnet that we're trying to attract more students from out of boundary as opposed to just shoring up our families that have been committed to our their neighborhood public schools, which we certainly don't want to take for granted. Um, can you speak to that DI magnet option a little bit more? And uh why that that I've never fully fleshed that out with you, I guess, and I don't know if this is the time or place, but might as well. Right. >> Right. I I I think I can give you a basic framework and the same that we've discussed in our meetings. One, we're excited about the possibilities that we've seen from Dos Mundos. We know of course the differences. Spanish is different

139from French, but yet um at this time last year when the decision was about to be made, it it's a little nerve-wracking because it's something we had not tried before and and we were quite frankly hopeful for 300 to 350 students and we started the year there with 450. So we see with some um good marketing that uh and we've learned some things about how to market these types of schools that we can do that now with currently about 250 students in in that French DLI program. If you add uh the two kindergarten classes, which we believe um is very very doable, then you're already at 300 to 310. If we can attract even another 50 to 75 throughout the district um and in certain parts or excuse me, throughout not throughout the valley really

140um then there we're at a school of 375 give or take 15 or 20. feel very good about that and and it gives us some unique advantages to even other DLI schools around the valley that have French. There are a couple, but to have only that program and to be able to do some unique things that way, um we think is is uh something we're excited about. >> Thank you. >> As you take this back to pack, well, first, no, I'm not going to start with that. Okay, let me start over. Um, I just want to be very clear, um, as we've attended these pack meetings. Um, very good questions and we truly appreciate everybody for coming out. It does mean a lot and we know you're passionate about your schools, which actually warms my

141heart. You know, that's that's what we are. That's what we're about, neighborhood schools. Unfortunately, sometimes we just have to come to some hard decisions. And this is like my least favorite ever topic. Um, but I've sat through meetings where I've been told that my mind's made up and I just want to set the record straight. It's not. I'm speaking for myself. This is fluid. We have more information. We're currently requesting pack to go back and look at a few more things. And the reason we would not be requesting that if our minds were made up. So, I just want to set the record straight. The speaking for myself, I haven't made a decision on this. I'm still sifting through and if you've emailed me and I haven't replied, I'm sorry. I'm still reading through all

142the numerous emails. Um, but I do read them. I promise. Um, so there's a lot of data coming our way and and in a couple weeks we're even going to get a new wave of data as we're requesting. Me personally, as far as the ALC goes, I hope when you take it back to pack, what does ALC look like at this school? What does ALC look like if it's at Eastwood? What are the pros and cons? What does ALC look like if it's at Oakidge? What are the pros and cons? So, I'm hoping as a board member, I'm hoping that as you take that back to pack and you're discussing these programs and you're discussing where they could possibly land, um, including schools that may may or may not be up for school closure. What

143does that look like at those campuses? That's the information I personally would love to see and I need to see in order to make my decision. I need to be able to see that in a couple weeks. So, I don't know if I stand alone in this. Board members, if you want to chime in, um I just wanted to make my point. Number one, I haven't made my choice, so stop saying that. And number two, um I I I want to see options. I want to see options. I want to see pros and cons of where these programs land at different schools. >> I'm going to jump on right on with that, Karen. I agree. Options, please. Um, I understand that we go through this process and we arrive at a recommendation. I would like

144to see maybe why we didn't recommend this one or what would this look like if we recommended that. Right? So just as Karen described different options that different things what the impact would be of going different directions um where different programs land up um if we had looked at a different school for closure like things like that to show us the the data behind all of that. Thanks. >> Amen. >> I'll just reiterate Karen does not speak for me. I do not speak for Karen. But similarly, I have not made up my mind one way or the other uh on any of these decisions. I recognize how um significant they are um and with and and treat it with the utmost respect in that regard, but I have not made up my mind in any

145direction. >> And I want to say the same thing with Karen. There is so much um information that we're asking for and um as difficult as every year is um to make this decision, we personally I want to keep the most important in mind is our children and they are flexible and they go and they enjoy it. But we need to make it so that they can enjoy a school and focus on the very best outcome for them. Um I have also not made up my mind of what would be the best scenarios here. I I need more information of why Pat came to these recommendations for sure. I think we we're missing some of the story. I think we're missing some of the points of why this schools these schools were chosen and and

146the effects of this. Um I also I have answered some emails. Um we have a lot right now. So if I haven't answered you, I apologize, but also we've asked Nicole to if they emailed the whole board, we've asked Nicole to respond. So, I hope that is um accepted well from our public. Um because there is so many emails right now. Um also, I would love to hear from schools that are in this area that they're they're not up for closure, but they might be affected by this. It would be nice to hear from some of those parents also of of what that looks like for some of the surrounding schools um and their experiences. That is helpful information as a board member. So, thanks, Steve. Um I I feel like I'm in a very

147different position than everybody else in the board here because since February um this pack study has become my entire personality and I I can't leave the house without talking about it with somebody. Um I can't go to the grocery store without somebody telling me what they're concerned about where this is um uh you know concerned. And so this has been on my mind. I've been dreaming about this since February. I've been thinking like up at night, you know, I'm a lot I I'm a I've had a lot more time to really let all of this sink into me, right? Um that said, I I am committed to keeping my mind open to any and all options. I think that you can't vet what we're doing enough. It's too important to me and my community. I

148appreciate that. this is your attitude. Um, and um, you know, I'm I'm gonna have if we close a school, I got to pass it for the next 50 years. You know, I mean, it's it's a big deal and it matters a lot to me and um, my community is important to me. Not only that, but like I I know people in these places and and I I have, you know, I care about them and I know you do, too. But um, anyway, so that's where I'm at. I I'll just push back on one one comment that um and I speak only for myself, but uh there are others that are losing significant amounts of sleep over this issue. >> Thank you. >> Every every week, every night, especially after coming back from community meetings, board

149meetings, conversations at the grocery store, Costco, sporting events, you name it. We're we're all experiencing that. >> Thanks. I I do want to point out though also that Julius just said that she's going to live to 100. >> You go girl. >> Um having having done this bravo Julie. Um having done this for this is going on I think our ninth clos 10 10th closure. We've done this a lot and we've seen this is not an easy process. I hope you understand that. It is not something that we take lightly. Um, Clark is correct. I I realize that you all out there have have lost sleep over this, but we have to. And it's not even, you know, this is not our personal communities, but we want you to know that we do take it

150very seriously. It's not something that we look at lightly and we do our very best to make the best decision for children. Um, we do see what the problems are. Um, and we've seen it for the last eight years and we've watched communities struggle with these things for eight years. So, it's not something that we just picked up and went, "Oh, this is what we're going to do." Um, I just wanted to emphasize that because um, while this is something new to your community, this is not something new to us and it's something that we still take very seriously. And I do appreciate the other board members who have spent time, a lot of time, a lot of time um at some of these meetings and to listen to the public. Um I hope you

151understand we are sincerely looking for a solution that will help your community and your children. That is our deepest desire. Um and we will continue to do so until we we have a final vote on this in December. Um having said that, uh if there's no other questions, we're going to go ahead and move on. Could I just add one additional piece of information? I I appreciate the the board's thoughts and comments on this. I >> having served on PAC previously, I can assure uh the board um the genuine efforts there to watch out for the best interest of children and uh in in spite of having to make difficult decisions with respect to school closures. Um, what I heard uh from our board members just now is a desire to get some additional questions

152answered and I believe PAC would love to have the opportunity to respond on those questions. So, I know PAC will meet again in the next week or two. I don't remember the exact date, but if we could get those uh questions submitted uh directly to Steve, um you want those to come through you or >> Yeah. Will you please board members if you have specific questions? I know we we've chatted about um the possibility of doing a shared dock. that makes me nervous as far as open meeting law. So, if you'll please submit your questions to me and then I will compile them and we'll get them to Steve and we'll make sure that we get those questions answered >> and we'll we're happy to share that information on the website on the the board

153questions as well once once those are done. And for the members of the public here, this presentation will be available on the website tomorrow as well. Is that correct, Luke? Thank you. Thanks, Steve. And thank uh the good work for for PAC as well. >> Thank you. Thank you, passionate parents. We appreciate it. You are always welcome. So, thank you for being here. We're going to go ahead and move on to our first reading and invite our general counsel, Mr. Doug Larson, up for our first reading on a policy, which is a new policy proh prohibition, excuse me, prohibition on discrimination. This is um 5C1. You're welcome to stick around if you >> Yeah, policy is the best part, you guys. >> Just kidding. >> Um, thank you. >> Um, President, >> uh, yeah, the

154the, uh, first reading that we have tonight is, uh, article 5C1. This is discrimination and harassment. Um, this is a policy that is coming before the board tonight. Um, we've taken the opportunity. There's been a lot of upheaval um with respect to civil rights law over the past several years. Uh lots of new um regulation that's been written, a lot of litigation that's happened in the courts. Um we happen to be at kind of a lull right now in some of that and we've taken the opportunity to update our policy and make sure that it complies with federal and state law. Um this policy um is accompanied by two separate memoranda. Those memoranda provide the process by which someone um would um uh or the process by which uh we would conduct an investigation under

155any civil rights law including um title 9. We have two separate processes. one for civil rights generally and one for Title 9 specifically because Title 9 has specific uh statutory requirements. So, um this policy brings us up to uh up to speed with respect to state and federal law. And if you have any additional questions about the policy, I'd be happy to try and answer. If we start, >> I just want to confirm on the record, Doug, that the language, definitions, all of that that's in this policy is pretty much straight from code. Correct. >> I mean, yes. I I will say it's um pretty much from code. Um much of this is literally lifted from code. Um, I will say that there are some things that are a little bit convoluted in the code

156and we've had to distill that. So, it's not word for word, but it is a distillation of the law. Um, nonetheless, and that and that comes from that comes from mainly from federal statute, federal regulations, and court cases. But yes, to answer your question, yes. >> Thank you. And I I just had a I'd asked you for links to to code. You know that. Um >> so I'm not >> I and I'm >> pointing fingers that I don't have it yet. I'm just saying we've we've brought it up already. So I'm pointing out the reason I'm asking that. There were just a couple of things I wanted to >> Yeah, please >> see both sides and make sure I follow which part of the law it's coming from that kind of thing. So >> sure.

157This is just a first reading tonight, so I think we have time, but it's pretty much >> And I've already I've already started working on the email back to you with links to um to the code themselves. Um it is fairly dense and and and and kind of there's a lot to to sip through, but I'll do my best to do some of that sifting for you. Okay. >> And maybe I can send you maybe some more specific questions than we'll be using. >> That might be helpful. Fine. Thanks. >> Thank you. There any other questions? If there's no other questions, I'll entertain a motion. >> I move that we approve as a first reading article 5C1 uh discrimination and harassment policy. >> Second. >> All right. We have a motion and a second to

158approve 5C1 prohibition of discrimination, harassment, sexual harassment, and retaliation as a first reading. Are there any comments on this? Comments? All in favor, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? >> All right. Motion passes. All right. Second reading we have tonight is our student travel policy. >> Yeah. Article 818, student travel. This is a policy that we have discussed at length um with just about everybody uh with board members uh in in law policy. We've discussed it in committee. Um we've discussed it with student body officers. We've discussed it in um uh a uh we've had focus group online. We've really vetted this policy. Um I understand that um this policy doesn't necessarily let me just say it this way. This policy tries to strike a balance so that we can maintain some flexibility while

159creating a framework by which our um educators can do trips, take students on these trips that are that are useful for their education, but also that will keep kids safe and that will allow um for uh sufficient um uh um boundaries and guard rails um for uh to make those trips successful. Um that's kind of the best way I could I could summarize this. Um I do understand that there's some disagreement on certain points of it, but we've tried to we've tried to keep this policy um somewhat flexible so that we can uh accommodate specific circumstances at the same time trying to um develop and maintain those guardrails that are so important to keep our kids safe. With that, I'd be happy to answer any additional questions about the policy. >> Before we get to

160questions, we did have public comment. Um, and because it was an agenda item, we went ahead and moved it to this right now. >> That's great. >> Uh, so that we had enough time for other people also at the beginning. So, we're going to invite uh Miss Leah Terren, who is here, I understand, representing a slew of teachers, a plethora, what's a good word for it? a symph a symphony perhaps >> a murder of teachers >> something I'm so thankful to represent so many of my peers and colleagues I'm Leah Tarant teaching choir at Taylor'sville High School and I'm in my 28th year at Taylorville High School and um I am currently planning my 30th tour so I have done this for a number of years We as a group of performing arts teachers and

161these oh hey they came right behind me and we also have some booster parents here as well um are here and we are grateful for the support you provide us and our students. We know that you work tirelessly to develop and implement policies which will enhance the school experience for our students in our large and diverse district. This letter addresses the pending re-evaluation of student policy. Traveling with our students provides a unique way for them to bond with each other as classmates, serve outside the community, experience the world at large, and learn from interactions beyond the borders of Salt Lake Valley and the state of Utah. We are so happy to see this is a priority for the board, as well as evidenced by the proposed changes to the travel policy. We recognize that like

162anything worthwhile, risks are involved. We educators prioritize our students safety above everything. This has led us to enforce our own policies to promote safe practices when traveling. For example, most of us require our students to travel in groups of at least four or more during the trips. We also conform to the chaperone policy and make sure students are walking around cities in large groups with designated chaperons. We wish to express some concerns we have about the current travel policy. As stated in the memorandum to school administrators, section C, accommodations.1 states, student accommodations shall include one student per bed. We believe this guideline has not benefited our students during the years it has been in place. We wish to express how this has decreased safety, narrowed opportunities, lowered student participation, and widened our socioeconomic divide. First,

163having one student per bed decreases safety for our students. We agree that three students to room is better than two, but we know that finding hotels which provide with three beds is more challenging and much less common. Many destinations only have accommodations which include two beds per room. A number of administrators and teachers have become aware of allegations such as altercations between students that could not be substantiated because they were only there were only two in the room and therefore no witnesses. Past students have also self-reported having sexual relations during school travel because there were only two to a room. We wish to avoid these negative outcomes. Second, the policy has narrowed student opportunities. On a trip with a 100 students, a hotel needs to be procured that has either 34 or 50 vacancies for

164students. That does not include the rooms for bus drivers and chaperons. Just this past weekend, drama programs from our district were not able to stay in Cedar City for their field trip because the number of rooms needed to do due to the policy was more than one hotel could accommodate. A problem which could have been overcome by allowing two students per bed. Instead, students had to lodge in Hurricane and St. George, both almost an hour away. This leads to more time on the road and less time for rest andor educational activities. Other programs have reported having students lodged in multiple hotels and larger distances than even an hour by bus. Bus drivers are struggling to remain in compliance with CDL regulations as at least 8 hours of rest will later uh nighttime arrivals and early

165morning departures due to larger distances to find adequate hotel space. We also wish to help to improve the health and safety of these drivers. Third, one student pered policy dramatically raises the cost of student travel, decreasing participation and widening the socioeconomic gap that we have in our district. Many programs have planned to travel during the spring for multiple days have reported lodging cost per students ranging from $400 to $500. By any stretch, this is expensive for all and proh prohibitive for many families in our district, even when accounting for fundraising efforts. If our goal is to achieve greater equity between east side and westside schools and provide equal opportunities, lowering cost for our students needs to be at the heart of our decision-making. A $200 decrease in cost through different lodging rules would allow many

166more of our students who wish to attend, but are worried about the unnecessary higher cost. We know that our district has a lower socioeconomic base than others along the Wasatch front. We believe the price of our trips needs to reflect this reality. We realize that incidents which occur cause us to reflect and change policies over time. We would like to address some of the concerns that have been raised by the district which have led to this policy being implemented. As we understand, here is a list of those concerns. Comfortably sharing a bed, hazing such as an older student telling a younger student to sleep on the floor, parents complaining about their student not having a bed to sleep in after paying full price. We believe that we can address these concerns through different means rather

167than enforcing the one student per rule. Many Utah districts provide approved consent forms which are given to students and parents for overnight travel. Consequences for bad behavior are clearly stated and families must acknowledge this or their student will not attend. Providing clear expectations to our families in a unified manner from our district administration mitigates risk and ensures accountability from everyone involved. Adopting similar approaches will maximize our students experience and help protect them. Many of us have lived and worked outside the state of Utah and have found the practice of having two students per bed is still the norm today. All of the following surrounding districts allow two per bed. Jordan, Canyons, Murray, Park City, Davis, Ogden, Weber, Alpine, and Provo. We in the Granite School District have a decadesl long history of lodging our students

168with two per bed with very little if any incidents. We believe that returning to this practice or allowing flexibility for our large programs will maximize student participation, increase safety, and overall provide experiences which enhance the public school experience for Granite School District students. Thank you so much for your consideration. Sincerely, your performing arts teachers. [Applause] >> Thank you. And thank you all for being here and being patient and waiting. >> I do appreciate that a lot. We have had um conversations with performing arts folks for um on a couple of occasions. And so what I wanted to point out is that the one person per bed rule um isn't actually in the policy portion of it. We've we've we've left that to be an administrative decision and one that we can make and and and

169codify in our administrative memoranda or me memorandum. So I thank you for the feedback. will continue to obtain feedback and um and consider that question a little bit further, but that shouldn't change anything with respect to the policy this evening. Does that make sense? >> Okay. Yeah. >> And I guess we're having a meeting with you on Friday. >> Awesome. >> Are there any other questions? Yeah, I have one. So, for clarification, that is not in our travel student policy. It's in the memorandum. >> It's in the memorandum. And so we are giving flexibility. So if that is >> so with the memorandum administrative I just want clarification about that. We have had we we've had um there are several things that we have pointed out in the memorandum as best practice or as um

170requirements for for the trip in order to maintain safety, maintain the the the boundaries and and and guardrails that I discussed earlier that those specific items have been left to the memorandum where the policy itself is broader. And um if the board would prefer that some of those issues are imported into the policy, we can do that. We can we can set them in policy rather than administrative memo. But right now, this policy has been um vetted by the board and vetted by um teachers, students, etc. because it doesn't contain some of the issues that that that have been brought up tonight. >> To to simplify, Chris, think of it this way. So, the policy is pretty broad and we if we pass the second reading, >> it's the final reading and it goes in.

171But the memorandum is equally I mean, >> you know, faculty members need to follow the policy, but they also need to follow the memorandum, right? However, there's more flexibility in the memorandum because that's coming with that's coming through the administration. And so if there were to be an administrative change then Ben um can can reach out to the board and say do you know is there an interest in changing this piece of the memorandum because there's flexibility >> in board policy before we look at this again it's like another 12 months right >> unless there's a super majority so >> I guess I'm talking to certain what I'm trying to get at is the memorandum can be much easier it's it's changed it could be changed a lot easier and more frequently than the policy

172which is why we leave the policy >> to refct best practice. >> So if we pass the policy we're fine with that but then how do we change the we don't personally change have any influence over that or >> we can give them direction and we have visited this inlaw policy and this is why we brought it up is because yeah >> it is we have we do look at the memorandum and that's why if you remember that I sent out that email and I said please review this memorandum um because I knew that we would have some people that were addressing this. We don't necessarily do it. It's not a board action because it is an administrative memorandum. So, it is up to Ben to change it. We can as a as a board

173if we have concerns or questions or or feel strongly about it, we can direct him in that way. But that is it's not part of the policy because we are more about the what and he's more about the how. So, >> that's a perfect way of saying it. The the policy is about the what. um the memoranda about the how and okay and and so those details are taken care of there >> and I guess my other question is then if does he have to have how many board members to say can you look at this memorandum is that even a >> no >> we don't have to do that kind of >> there's no formal vote but then how can one board member say I want you to look at this and >> yeah

174you guys do it all the time >> let's just say We do it in correct procedures. >> We're definitely inclined to take that direction from the board members. >> Well, now you have another one. >> Well, here you go. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Did you Anybody else? >> Kim, did you have something? >> No, I was just going to ask if we could make sure we do or is it in law policy and discuss the memo again? >> Yep. >> You guys are okay with that? I'd like to if with respect to that take into consideration the feedback we've received work with Doug to alter that and our executive team and bring that back to law and policy to see if there's any additional questions and before we sign that um

175certainly the rest of the board can share their thoughts and opinions with me directly violating >> which we also do all the time apparently >> or you can share it also with um Julie or Kim or I because we are in the law and policy committee or with Doug as well but It would be helpful for I think superintendent course to know just so that he understands because it is his memorandum. >> I I have some thoughts and questions but I I can save them for my executive team. I've gotten alterior uh other information from from my conversations with superintendent. So I would like to clarify either way we all agree that we want to make these as most costeffective and impactful to our students especially in uh when we do have at risk kids

176who do do not have these types of opportunities. So, I appreciate you coming tonight and sharing your expertise and your feedback. And >> if you don't mind, I request a copy of the letter just so that we have kind of the talking points from that. There we we have received Thanks. >> Yeah, we'll send a digital copy to >> Okay. Um, >> like I say, we have received a lot of feedback. So, this is this is great feedback. Uh, and we'll take that under advisement along with the other feedback that we've received as well. This was helpful, by the way, but I think the most impactful feedback we got on this policy was straight up from our student body officers. They were pretty blunt and they weren't worried about any repercussions for their thoughts or

177opinions and they told us straight up what they thought. So, that was helpful as well. >> Agreed. >> I will say that I took their feedback to um a couple of classes at Skyline High who were like, "Dude, those guys must be so strict about getting straight A's. Like, what are those guys doing? we can miss plenty of school. Like they were not on the same page as those officers at all. They were not on the same page. >> Um I wanted to just say I know that you guys already work a lot of nights and I'm impressed that you are here. That just shows I'm like so touched by the dedication that you have to advocate for your kids and I know you love them. Um beyond just the desire to be an effective

178teacher to them. I I really think this is a beautiful demonstration here today. And um I also want you to know that um we've debated this very issue a million times. So when you brought this up, all of us on the law and policy committee were like, "Oh man, okay, here we go again on this." So um we really appreciate you weighing in. Thank you very much. >> And I do want to point out we've got teachers from all over the district. Um I I know our Olympus teachers have advocated for this especially and you would think that those are the ones that are not as affected by this but I know they've they've talked to me and said we have kids who are affected by this equally just as much as any kid from

179Cypress or from um Karns or from Taylor'sville. We have kids all over the district that this affects. So I think that is a significant reason for us to to take pause and listen to this. Is there any other questions? If not, I will entertain a motion. >> I move we approve article 8A18 student travel. It's a second and final reading. I'll second. >> Right. We have a motion and a second to approve article 8 A18 student travel as a second and final reading. Is there any further comments on this? Right. All in favor, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? >> Thanks board. Thanks visitors. >> Thank you. We're going to go ahead and move on to our superintendent report. >> Uh I just want to thank uh the members of the public for joining

180us tonight. I think this was a very impactful board meeting and helping us know and understand um the direction that the board should take on a number of important and critical issues. I just have a few brief items. Um, I wanted to point out that for the first time in Granite School District history in our strategic plan, we have met our goals and that's a huge deal. So, we will uh take the opportunity to celebrate with salt and uh more broadly with uh our principles, but we have uh we we set out to and created a strategic plan under the direction of Dr. Nye and this is the first year that we have actually met those goals. So, we're very excited about that. Um, as uh Dr. Dr. Flanigan mentioned uh we are fully staffed

181at this point in time with just a handful of openings. We did have to go back and make some fall staffing adjustments. We had some inordinate challenges this year with uh reconfiguration in two and a half of our networks. Um a couple of school closures to uh work through and a new homeless shelter in one of our boundaries um where we didn't have good data to be able to ascertain what that population would be of students. And so we actually still despite all that uh our conservative projections tended to work in our in our favor and we only ended up having to make adjustments uh with seven staff members, seven teachers. I visited uh in person with almost every one of those. And Jessica Dunn from GA also joined me for a couple of those

182visits. It was good to visit with them, express our appreciation for their dedication to their profession, um and get and obtain feedback on our process and procedure. And so I want to give a shout out to those teachers uh for their commitment to their craft and uh their desire to serve students and uh their professionalism. Um we have been holding our senior staff meetings in schools. Um that's been a little bit of a change and I get some groaning faces from some members of my staff. Not going to throw anybody under the bus, Doug. But uh just kidding, Doug. But what that has allowed us to do is uh go out and be in a school, go visit and observe obstruction uh instruction, not obstruction. That's that's a Doug thing. Um instruction for about 20

183minutes and debrief with the principal about what is going well and what they need help and support on. And uh I I'm rather quite pleased at the things that we've been able to see. And then we hold our staff meeting in that location. Um, and hopefully we get done in time for lunch or otherwise we all get a little hangry, but uh, it's working out well. And I just wanted to extend appreciation to the schools who've invited us to come and be in their locations thus far and the classes we've gotten to observe the instruction. We're very appreciative of our teachers and the good work that they're doing and again the chance to come and visit their classrooms. Um, our site visits are also this fall ongoing. We have visited every junior high thus far

184in most of our boost schools and now starting with our high schools. And again, that's an opportunity for us to visit in uh the in and observe the instruction that's happening in our schools and see what we can do to help and support um those schools in meeting their continuous improvement plan goals and uh how we can better facilitate uh those supports as a district uh to meet those respective individual school needs. And so grateful for those site visits. It's been very informative on what we can do as a district to remind ourselves not only of our purpose which is we exist to serve schools um and not the other way around uh but to directly see the impact that our our teachers and our school staffs are having on on individual students and it's

185always great to be with kids and particularly in elementary getting that unsolicited hug from a kindergartner is always precious. So that's my report. >> Thank you. Um Julie Um, in terms of committees, um, the evaluation committee is meeting tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. to finalize our superintendent evaluation and timeline. So, that should be coming, um, with a final, um, presentation or discussion uh, with the superintendent of the evaluation in December. So, put that on your radar. Um, we also, let's see, um, district community council has not yet yet met this school year and that's coming up, but I can't remember the date, but it's coming up and you'll you probably have a calendar invite. >> Yes, we do. Kim, >> don't have anything to update. We did meet the Salt Lake County Parks and Rec Advisory

186Board did meet last month, but nothing new was discussed. I don't have any updates for you. Thank you. Um, we have a USBA meeting this month, but we also have I don't know if it's this Friday and then oh wait, Friday and then we have one at the end of the month, too. So, we'll have two. Um, but we had the convention, so we need to put in if we're going to go. Um, Stacy, send an email out today. >> And I have I have uh the the reservations right here. So, if you have a spouse that you'd like to be included in any of the meals or if you are not going to go, will you please let Connie or myself or Stacy know tonight? I since you said there's also another one at

187the end of the month is there's a JLC meeting on October 24th and so if you would like to join into that it's at the USBA offices at well I have 10:00 a.m. But I get these things wrong. So verify, >> please send invites. I I don't recall seeing that invite in invitation come through on the calendar. So >> yeah, it has not gone through the calendar. It's >> understood. >> Can I count on you on that? Thank you. >> Is JLC is it the whole group or is it just the chair? I mean, who's that one? >> JLC we have like um certain people, >> but is it the delegates is what I'm saying. she is our voting member, but everyone is invited to come and share in the discussion or >> you know

188uh be educated about what we're doing, that kind of a thing, but we only have one voting member. >> Yeah. Well, I'm also a voting member. Thanks for clarification. >> Chris, >> um we did not have a budget and finance committee meeting this month, so we don't have a I don't have an update for that. And um just waiting for district community council. I think it's November October 28th. I mean October 28th. It's moved. It moved once. So, um I think that's all the committees right now that I have to report on. So, that's it. >> Is that convention the leadership academy thing? Is that what you're talking about? >> No, this is the one in January. The leadership one was the one that we just went through, but this is the USB one. >>

189You're talking January's. Got it. >> Pre-legislative. >> Yeah. >> Bruhaha. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. >> Okay. Um I sit on the benefits committee and we had a meeting and I wasn't there because I was out of town, but I did get a summary. I asked for a summary. Um and so the what I'm going to highlight because it's almost 10:00 is that open enrollment employees is going on and the deadline to um to opt in for your benefits is October 15th. So please fill out your open enrollment paperwork. We also discussed where we are with our benefits. We're currently at a 93% medical loss ratio, which is good. An 103% dental loss ratio, not so good. Um, but we're we're looking we're we're diving into those. Um, and then I will have another meeting

190um next month. >> I have two things uh tonight. One, I think it was worth noting and it it I it I came to realize during the uh Harvickson school presentation that the song was all about eating people that are purple. And I couldn't help but look at Kim and think she didn't get the memo. And then and then I looked down at my own shirt and it's purple, too. So, I just thought I'd acknowledge that um that the end is near Kim for both of us. Um, >> wear red for ed, wear purple to eat people >> to be eaten. Yeah. Um, on a much more serious report side. Um, I think you're all aware, but I think it's worth reminding you u tonight that we we have a a hotline of sorts um

191uh that a patron or or anybody can call into our hotline. Um and that is received by um our internal auditor who who reports to the audit committee which is uh myself uh as the chair and Nicole and Karen. Um they can also patrons or or individuals can also report online in an anonymous fashion as well. So we do receive reports periodically uh of things that we have in fact investigated uh um and vetted out. Um some things um require more investigation um than others. Um and we'd love to report back to people um about those, but it is anonymous. Um they're able to remain completely anonymous, but we do uh investigate every single um uh uh call or complaint that's that's lodged um and thoroughly vetted. So, I just wanted all of you to

192be aware of that. That's an ongoing process. And sometimes we go months without any type of of complaint or submission. Um, and other times we get a couple within a week or two. Um, it just varies over time, but we do vet each one out. >> Nicole, I forgot one thing. Go ahead. Um, I just this is what I forgot is I want everybody to know, and I know we only have a few left here in the in the audience, but maybe we have some online or maybe somebody listened to this back. I don't know. But I want to bring the attention that Ben is here tonight even though his son landed home from his mission 6 hours ago. So he was I just want to say the absolute sheer commitment Ben has to this

193district. He knew this was a vital meeting. He knew many important topics were being discussed. So he basically gave his son a hug, maybe had some dinner. >> Need some moettas. >> Moettas for the win. and then his and then his son went home and and he came here. So, I just want everybody to understand that they have a committed um superintendent who who prioritizes things that are good for kids >> and a committed superintendent's family. >> Correct. >> And I I apologize. I did not excuse him at the five o'clock meeting, but I should have um because of his family commitment. So, but yes, thank you for being here tonight. Um, really quick, our eight hour workday committee, we uh found out that eight hours is a hyphenated word in workday is one. That

194was what we've done. Just kidding. Um uh no, we've done more work than that. Uh this this week we did talk about um having a getting a calendar together and kind of going through and making sure that we have mapped out what our goals are. Our our desire is to be ready by the time we go into negotiations. Uh, and so hopefully that I think that looks really good from what we came up with. Um, lawn policy. I already gave you my update via email. Um, and we'll continue to discuss some of these. We've got some really hot topics that we're going to discuss, but it sounds like we all want to take bring back the memorandum. So, we will continue to discuss that. So, >> you also mentioned that we're meeting with PTA and

195GA. >> Oh, yeah. We we uh have a small committee that we meet with. It's Julie, myself, and Chris are invited. I think Connie is invited. The PTA and GA as well as superintendency and Todd. Um, we just we have a we're meeting with them so far once a month. >> What's that? >> Oh, not Connie. My apologies. That's true. That would be in violation of open meeting law. Um but just as we talk about as we come into our legislative session, uh we've talked about some of the priorities, some of the shared interests that we have, how we can support each other. Um we appreciate our partnership with both the PTA and the GA and um the support that they give us. And so we are meeting right now once a month just to

196kind of discuss some of our priorities as we move into this session. And we are happy to give you an update on that as well. So with that having reached the end of our agenda with no objection we will go ahead and be adjourned. Thank you. >> No objection. >> Thank you clerk.