SLCSD Board Meeting, August 5, 2025 5:30 PM

001Where's Amanda? >> Touchdown. >> Oh, hi Amanda. >> Hi. >> All right. Thank you everybody for joining us this evening. Uh sorry we're a little bit behind schedule. Uh today is August 5th, 2025. We're here for the purposes of a Salt Lake City School District Board of Education meeting. Um the first thing I would like to do is to welcome everybody that's with us this evening. Thank you for being here. I also want to take a moment to acknowledge our association presidents who are either with us in the building um and in the meeting room or joining us online. For our buildings and grounds, we have President Aaliyah Compo. Child Nutrition President Tanya Slaughter. Transportation, we have Audrey Benali. And then for our SLEA for the Salt Lake Educators Associ education association, we have President

002Mike Harmon with us. Um and Slassa, our Salt Lake Association of School Administrators there, represented by Tom Luthie. Um, thank you for for all you do for our employee groups um here in Salt Lake City School District. Um, we have all board members present except for board member Bade who is excused this evening. Uh, we'll move on to the pledge of allegiance. And I have a very, very special guest. She's in the back of the room. Her name is Ivy. She's a student and daughter of one of our teachers who's going to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Are you ready >> 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. >> Thank you I

003that was really really cool and really really brave to do that. It's not easy in a group of a bunch of people you don't know, huh? Perfect. Uh, moving along, we have our consent agenda. Um, we do have a board member request to pull item number nine. Um, and move that to our action agenda. Um, other than that, did I understand your requests, Ashley, to be accurate? >> Item seven and item nine. >> Item seven and sorry. Okay, perfect. Thank you for that clarification. Um, so moving along, I would entertain a motion including items number seven and nine from the the consent agenda. >> So moved. >> Second. Perfect. Any discussion to the motion? >> All right. Seeing none. >> Oh, sorry. >> Okay. Um I am happy to approve the Mckin Street item which

004is item B. Uh it's attached exhibit 2B1B. But I wanted to share that I had sent an email which I'm happy to supply to the minutes because I'm discussing it publicly um about the need for a cost benefit analysis on this aspect of the sustainability plan um because it's my understanding that some of these expenses would come back to us for us to review and balance our desire for sustainability with our ongoing fiscal responsibilities. Um, our business administrator, Alan Kersley, suggested by email that in October, there's an annual report and the presentation of a costbenefit analysis of the growing expenses for ground source heat could be best included in that report. So, I just wanted to bookmark that potential date in October and the need for some additional discussion on ground source heat. >> Thanks.

005>> Um, hearing the discussion, could I just kind of give like a thumbs up if folks are good with that? Make sure we get that scheduled. Okay, perfect. Thank you, Ashley. Further discussion. Any further discussion for the motion? >> Brian, this would just go to the um purchasing report. Alan, I just like a clarification when I'm looking through that there will be um requests for like $49,000. Um, and I know the benchmark is 50,000. When they're making a request for I mean it looks like it's very close to the 49,000. Is there documentation showing that or are they building are they trying to build in some do you understand what I'm saying? >> Right. So the 49s are often I mean they're based on either a bid if it was an RFP process estimates and

006just to note in the event that there was a change order needed and that PO would increase and would make it over the 50,000 then it comes back to the board with a different with the $50,000 process. Sometimes you've seen that on the change orders. >> I have seen that on the change but I I just wanted a clarification. >> Yeah. So even though they're below the 50 and if they end up being above then they're coming back and they're going through the Any other clarification part of the discussion? >> All right, seeing none, we'll start with a roll call vote. Report member Longwell. >> Band Longwell. Yes. >> Yes. >> Charlotte F. Jefferson. Yes. >> Ashley Anderson. Yes. >> Brian, yes. Motion passes. U we'll move on to the next portion of our agenda

007and revisit items seven and nine um on the action agenda. Um so our next portion is our request to speak. Um I do want to read a brief statement that the board has asked me to read um governing your all's comments here tonight. Um the board enjoys the opportunity to hear from the public during the comment portion of its meetings. Before we begin, I'd like to take a moment remind you of our board rules governing your comments. The total time reserved for public comment is not to exceed 15 minutes with all speakers or groups limited to three. The board will not allow public comments during board meetings that are slanderous, obscene, or otherwise violate state or federal law. Employees and or their representatives may use the public comment period to address issues that should be

008raised through existing formal communication channels or established grievance or negotiation procedures. I'd also like to explain that unless the speaker's topic is already on the agenda, state law prohibits the board from taking action on items raised during the public comment period. However, if it seems appropriate to the circumstances, I may direct district staff to follow up with the speaker on the topic discussed. Um, our first speaker this evening is Matthew Tui. Matthew here to talk about closure of several courtesy bus stops including the one that impacts my kid kids on Kennedy. Um it it took quite a while to get this information, but after a productive discussion with executive director of auxiliary services uh Isaac Ael, I understand that basically this boils down to a budget issue. The district's been paying for these courtesy stops

009out of a general fund for several years and about a year ago, a little over a year ago, uh it was decided that one way to cut costs would be to get rid of them. Um I have a problem or I guess concerns about that for two reasons. First, as I read the administrative rules, there is a provision that would allow the district to apply for funding from the state uh in a way that wouldn't impact its operating budget. If we look at R277-600-11A, it says when undue hardships and inequities are created through exact application of these standards, a school district may request an exception to this rule. And this is the entire administrative portion of the code governing bus stops, basically transportation funding. you can request an exception from the state superintendent. Uh in

010my discussions with Isaac, he said that that was not explored and I think it probably should be, right? But second, even if it's not uh an option to get additional funding, I think I and many other parents are concerned about decisions to cut back any type of student services in kind of the financial environment that's existed over the last several years. Right? We have year-over-year increases, substantial increases to pure per pupil funding. Uh, COVID gave a bunch of money injections into the overall budgets. And of course, it's been enough to build this $58 million building to raise executive administrative salaries substantially. The administrative suite alone salaries over the last five years have gone up more than a million dollars a year. And I'm not criticizing any individual administrator. I would assume this is the market

011rate. and I've looked into many of your backgrounds. Very impressive. But I think everybody would agree that the optics are pretty bad when we build $ 58 million buildings and cancel bus stops. Not just in my neighborhood, which is quite affluent, but I understand that the first step was to cancel a bunch of stops on the west side, which I think probably face more undue hardship than the kids in my neighborhood should do as as a result. And so to that end, I'm going to uh follow up with this statement by emailing each of you individually and asking that you support my effort. One, to explore the option of applying for state funding from the trans transportation fund, and two, that we get a better and more detailed explanation for why we're facing funding challenges

012at all given the way that education funding has gone over the last several years. Um, and I I also want to say with my last few seconds here that I know most of you probably had little if anything to do with the situation that we're in, right? I think the longest tenure here for the board members is two years and nine months. And I know that these things take time, but again, the optics are quite bad and I think it's the parents deserve an explanation. So, thank you and I'll follow the >> Thank you. >> Our next speaker this evening is Judith Alano. Judith. We know you have a translator. Thank you. I've been reading some observations that I have and this is this is in regards to the traditional school system and private schools

013and that are on the the school district in Salic City. They are not designed for kids with autism. >> Even though they have a lot of therapies and individual plans, there are so many things that supposed to be modified for this especially for this kind of environment. They have to be appropriate for our kids. The routines are not flexible. >> The schedule is kind of packed. >> There's a lot of external noise. Uh the classrooms. There's not enough space for outer regulation. And all this I know it has to do with the system how strict it is. A lot of kids need some sensual um adaptation >> or some alternative methods of communication >> like AAC breaks in every um chore or work that they have to do any assignments. We don't have that time

014and there's not any like individual um plan adapted to each of our kids. We know that everyone is different. But my question is this part of being included? It is inclusion. to have them in an environment that is not designed for them. >> We need to have our kids in a different area so they're not with labels. We don't want to have them under stress, >> anxious or like some of us call them a misbehave. As a mom or autistic children, I want to raise my voice. So, can I bay for them? and let you know that I am informed of everything that's going on right now. I want to ask you to see if you can review the system so we can have more training for the professionals that are working with our kids.

015Maybe the um like to reconstruct the structure of the school, >> the sensory area and I think it's very important to have some cameras at the classroom because of Autistic children, >> especially the ones that cannot talk, >> they are exposed to be abused. >> And that's what I'm asking for. Please pay attention to all those things that I'm saying. As a blue mom, I'm raising my hand so I can advocate for them. Thank you. >> Moving to our next section of our agenda, we have the report section. Um the first item of business that we have there is our T or 2024 25 title N report student participation. Dr. Grant, >> if we have three presenters, so this is our annual report um to the board. So um Emily Southerntherland who oversees our athletic

016directors Tina Hatch who oversees title one and I got your name off >> I'm so sorry. >> Okay. Hi everybody. Um we're excited to present some of our findings from for this Title N report from last year and we'll go through a number of different things. Uh I will say it's interesting what a collaborative effort it takes to compile all of this information. It is very much a multi-ep department effort between um business administration and TINA's compliance work and then athletics. Um it just takes a lot of people collaborating and coordinating to put this report together. So um we'll we'll go ahead and get started from there. >> Thank you. Um so as you may know we do this annually now. Utah law requires us to report on this. you received the report and we're

017just going to highlight a few things tonight for you. Um, I can't see the Are we on >> Oh, are we not plugged in? Sorry. >> We do have a PowerPoint. So, I'll give Emily just a second here. Sorry about that. >> Yeah, sorry. >> The technical side. >> Go ahead. >> Okay. So, under federal title N regulations, there is a three-prong test to help us measure and to ensure that we are being equitable in athletics. Um, as a district, we every year send out a survey for student interest to our students in 8th through 11th grades to find out what athletics programs they want to participate in and to get a little more information from them. It's actually really informative. Kids will give you a lot of information when you give them an opportunity.

018Um, this year our survey went out. We have sent it out to student email addresses in the past and it has just gone out and they've opted in and made their, you know, time their decision to participate. This year we actually pushed it out during advisory periods or Yeah. advisory periods during our high school classes. And as a result of that, we have twice as many students who opted in this year as in the previous years, which is great. That gives us more information, more ability to meet the interests and needs of our students. So, really happy about that. And I believe that moving forward, we'll get even better numbers in our responses and percentages um as a result of using our teachers and class time to encourage kids to respond. Um as a board

019in several years past, you know, we have added several sports that were sanctioned by UHSAA as a result of these surveys and knowing that our students are interested. Um the most recent was boys volleyball and this year esports has been added as an activity and our kids were highly interested in esports. So as a board you've approved something that kids are really excited about. So that's fantastic. Um this year our kids were really excited about rugby, skiing, and hockey. None of those are sanctioned currently by UHSA. Um, we do have some skiing clubs that kids are involved in and things like that. But, you know, as the people who oversee all of this, we'll be paying attention to UHSAA, see if there's more interest. If clubs start to kind of push on them to push

020rugby in or hockey, we'll hear about that and take steps, bring it to you if it's something that our kids are interested in. Um, this year, one of the things that the surveys do for us is give us a chance to see where there are some concerns that kids might have, barriers to participation. One of the things that they came back with this year, and this was in person with a couple of students even before this survey, is that with the later start times, students miss an entire block of their class schedule to go participate in sports. And this can happen multiple times over a couple of weeks, the same class. and it is impacting these kids and their ability to keep up with the curriculum and with all of their academic, you know, needs

021in their classroom. So, we will be talking about ways that we can address that. You know, we may come back to you and ask for some input at some point in time, but this is something that kids are concerned about that they're missing these classes time after time. Um, and the other thing that kids expressed that was a concern was that publications in our schools, you know, basketball is exciting. When our kids go to a state tournament, it's exciting. We hear about that. It's on our social media. The kids know about those things, but they don't necessarily know what a golf triyout is. And so, um, Emily and Nomani have put together an advertising plan, publishing plan that they're going to work with our athletic directors to implement through parent square and a couple of

022other methods. And we're going to make sure that kids have more information about all of our athletics activities. So, that's going to be great, I think. So some of the highlights that we just wanted to bring to you, you may notice that there are some numbers that seem really disperate in the report that we provided. There are reasons for some of those things. For instance, when a football team has to have new helmets or reconditioned helmets, that can be pretty pricey. Those helmets are expensive, a lot more expensive than say a baseball helmet or a lacrosse helmet for the girls team. And so you'll see differences. And Title N doesn't require a dollar fordoll equal number. It requires that we're giving equitable opportunities and we're giving the equipment that the kids need, that we're providing

023the things that they need to be able to play and play safely. Um, so those numbers may not look the same, but that's one of the reasons. Another reason could be that teams participate in many clinics or you know maybe they go to the state tournament and the next year they get invited out of state to participate in a big tournament somewhere and those travel costs can make those numbers look you know really different but that's an opportunity that they've had sometimes for their success. So that can make it look very different as well just to consider as we move forward tonight with the rest of this. So we do allow equitable opportunities. We make sure that every team is able to fundra that they have opportunities for camps, that they have opportunities to, you

024know, participate in different trips and activities. Um whether the coaches determine that they'll participate in those things comes down to the individual coaches. So that's one of the differences you may see. As you all know, the next highlight um we updated fee schedules this year. They're very different than they have been in years past. We talked to the board last year about examining those fees for our UHSAA activities and athletic events and that some of them seemed a little bit high with all of the changes this year. We're going to continue to track that and see if more changes are necessary and pay attention to that. And um the foundation Our last highlight on this page has been working with several entities at the clinic at West High School to ensure that our students don't

025have a barrier for getting physicals for athletic events. And we have provided more than um physicals for students at our clinic, which is fantastic. And that's since they opened and we expect that number to continue. And for students who don't have access to health care, that is a huge barrier that is removed so that they can participate. So really pleased with that and you know really thankful that we have the community members assisting us on that. Um as far as expanding our co-ed offerings this year for the first time drill team is co-ed and so that is something new. I don't know if we will have any young men who participate this year. We will advertise it so that they're aware that they can participate. And I have to say that we had a West

026High School student who talked to UHSA a continuously and really wanted this to happen. And I'm sure he's celebrating although he's probably a little sad that it didn't happen in time for him. But that is a new thing for this year. And our unified sports program. Um, we're going to go into that a little bit more, but it is also expanding and we expect to see some really good things from that. >> All right. Thank you, Tina. Um, and I've had the opportunity to sit in many meetings with Tina and Emily and had conversations with parents and students and our athletic directors and coaches to help shape training and to make it more consistent across our district. And so we offered one in this room just two weeks ago. Had a great turnout. Learned a

027lot of things from that. And we're going to be offering two more this year. And so um in years past we've offered one, but being able to get ahead and being um being able to roll out coaching requirements and agreements consistent with some other districts and best practices that we've seen that uh in those um trainings that we offer. We'll definitely go over some things that they they may be familiar with with policies around fundraising, um overnight trips for our athletic teams and activities. And um also something that will that is new for all our coaches to have consistency with communication with not only their coaches but with parents um and their students is that they are so Sam has been a great help in uh getting parent square out which is a requirement for

028all coaches. So in past they've were using all sorts of platforms, one that was even specific to a school and now we're having consistency being able to monitor that by doing some parent square and then also having coaching agreements that they're going to use parent square. And then we're requiring these for not only our head coaches but different requirements for assistant coaches as well so that they're they're trained and feel comfortable um working with uh students and teams and especially just having consistency across with our like background checks, fingerprinting. Um so excited to to roll that out and appreciate all the help with our principles and and athletic directors and um keeping coaches compliant. And so, uh, some things as Tina already mentioned, excited for esports. I know that's not, um, a sport, um, considered,

029um, by UHSAA, but it is an activity and does allow more opportunities as we've already discussed this, um, from the last time I was here. And, uh, unified sports. And so, as Tina mentioned, um, we're being able to offer that consistently across all schools. And so, uh, we currently have a posting for East High to be able to hire their head coach and so excited to be able to hopefully have unified sports at East High School as well. And then, um, more importantly that there's funding. So, in past years, they were acting more of like a club and did, uh, their own fundraising, but we're excited for not only one-time funding, but ongoing funding to support our, uh, student athletes. And then some changes um within our district is uh as you are may may

030or may not be aware of uh West High School is in a new region. So region four so they'll still be in 5A uh classification. And then East High and Highland High School will be in region 10. So they'll be in 4A and excited about those opportunities and to be a part of those conversations and see how that plays out in the next two years. So, as mentioned, I already went over um uh how they're funded this year. And so, thank you all for um being able to to push that through and hopefully we'll start seeing uh increased participation with um our students in in a variety of different activities and athletic opportunities. So, and then I'm going to jump into facilities and rebuild. So, um, we we met with Isaac, and so Isaac will

031go over more of this information, um, on the agenda, uh, later this evening. And also, um, having conversations with Emily and and our superintendent, making sure that our schools, communities are aware of some of these changes. And so, we we've met and we're going to um, meet with our principles and athletic directors to be able to offer these town halls. And then also uh Yandre has invited us to be able to give us resources with communications to be able to best field questions for any of our um parents or community members that's just wondering what's going on with some of these updates. And so we're excited for these changes and I know that they'll come with some challenges as well. >> Okay. Um you may notice on the report that we had a significant increase

032in spending for swimming and we're the district shared in the funding of new scoreboards at all of our swim facilities. So that's reflected on that report. Um so there's a you'll see new scoreboards at Northwest Fairmont and Steinert and those are partly from the district in our agreement with those facilities. middle school. Um we our community ed program is continuing to run our afterchool sports program and right now we're still not charging any fees and we do have a grant that will cover this coming year uh so that we will be able to have our students participate again um without charging fees. So, we're excited about that. And um Don uh the area director over our most of our middle schools is is integrally involved in that as well. And oops, sorry. Those are ba

033that's basically the highlights from the report. Obviously, the report we submitted to you is goes a lot more into detail on those things. Um but do you have any questions for us? Um I have two one you commented on if I understood you correctly that your communication you're trying to consolidate down to one which would be parent square however I know um currently a sport high is using group chat still or group spot um and so what's being done to help motivate that consolidation of communication streamline that would be lovely Yeah, that is a great question and a challenging um opportunity. So, I know people are invested in using especially uh group spot which is specific to Highland and I get it. If I had an app and I rolled it out, I'd want everybody

034to use that. Um but we do find some challenges. there is student information in that and so and then they also are receiving benefits as um we've had conversations with that coach who is um involved in group spot and so um staff had a communication out and so the thing that we are doing is trying to change that culture and so we've sent out several communications with our principal and athletic director uh Swede Robinson to be able to push that out and then um I mentioned a coaching agreement which is a contract an annual contract in there, they um will click on it and say yes, I agree to use Parent Square as the official platform for Salt Lake City School District. Um so I know not everybody will be on board and it will

035take a culture shift, but we think being able to have consistent AC consistency with communication across all our platforms will be definitely helpful and I think parents will really appreciate it. I know Tina and I sat in a meeting and parents are like, I have no clue what uniform to wear specifically for Highland High School for a game. And so being able to have this that we can monitor, better monitor these communications with our coaches and parents. Um, and also all parents will get a communication that's sent out to their students. So they'll be able to see the communication that coaches will get. Hopefully that answers that question. Yeah, that I I appreciate the effort to consolidate because um as a parent there was a time that it was very overwhelming trying to keep track

036of all of the different communications. So as the district is consolidating down, it helps especially when you have multiple kids and a lot of different things. >> The other thing is regarding unified sports, um I guess my question there obviously it's newly supported by the district. This will be the first year that we've got paid um and assistant coaches and whatnot. Um, and having to help build it up in some of the other schools. I know you know the parent that really worked hard with the Highland High School set up. Um so my my ask there is um what efforts are being done to um think of the wording but basically coordinate with the standard sport that correlates with the unified sports so that there can be a um instead of relying on the peer

037tutor program and the special education classroom for those kids that are volunteering for that to be Unified sports partner for the kids with disabilities actually partnering with the like sport like track, soccer, etc. and getting students that actually are playing those specific sports to come in and participate as a unified partner. So, if you haven't already thought about that, it's a way to help this um be successful in all the sports versus just hanging out on a few kids um to support the athletes in the sports arena. Does that make sense? Dustin, feel free to ask questions. >> Yeah, it that completely makes sense. And I I'm excited to see how to get gain more experience with unified sports throughout this year. And I'm hoping that with more like district centralization and funding and support

038that we can start to make inroads with with some of that those practices. >> Also have two questions. Um, recognizing that federal grant space is always insecure, but probably more insecure right now, what would be the plan to support middle school sports if that tap? >> I knew you were going to ask that, so I'm so prepared. Um, so I I did actually ask uh Don about that, like what would we do if that what was the plan B if that funding went away because that is a a concern. Um so his response was that um we do have some concerns about that and that if we don't have that grant we don't right now we don't have any like district funds earmarked for the middle school sports. So at that point um I know

039right now the grant for example doesn't cover referee fees. So I know the Salt Lake Ed Foundation is picking up those costs for this coming year which we really appreciate. But if that grant went away, then we would definitely be looking for if the district were interested in continuing middle school sports and having a conversation about how we could continue that. Um the other thing is we could start to to charge fees. Um we do have it in the spend plan that we could um charge our middle school students participation fees to participate. So that would also be something that we would have to look at. >> Is it hard? I think it's important for us to be thinking about that because Most of us are so fee averse like in fact we did away

040with fees above and beyond what was required by law but also meeting after meeting it seems like we're tasking the foundation with more and more potential expenses and it's not possible the foundation could achieve them all. So I think it's really good to discuss. Um, you've also talked about how there's some disparities in expenditures for a lot of reasons like kinds of jerseys that you need or the cost of your equipment, but it's also appears to be due to some coach turnover. Am I correct in understanding from your presentation that this is why the trainings are increasing so that sports that are starting the year without a current coach will have access to that training before their season begins. >> Yeah, that's definitely the hope. Um, I think having a new coach, they may not

041be as familiar with, like for instance, having a new head girls or boys basketball coach, they may not be familiar that they do a tournament in like December um or similar to wrestling. So, they may not be as comfortable if they're hired uh in fall or summer to be able to put together um you know, figuring out transportation and and figuring out logistics to get them there. So, we'll definitely as we have coaching turnover, we'll notice kind of some uh behavior and spending and that's pretty consistent across all three schools. But then there's um also consistent inconsistency. I know that's kind of a contradiction um and them um purchasing uniforms or doing big purchases every few years. And so, yeah. >> Yeah. There's just a lot of policy like procedures policies and procedures that they

042need to know for fundraising and overnight trips and things for them to do things properly so our kids are safe and you know our our finances are in order. And so we just felt like it was a much better practice to have several trainings because we have some coaches who don't come on board until January and and we need to make sure that we're having these rolling trainings so that they're getting the same information. >> I actually realized just now I have a coach film from a title N perspective I know we're required to offer equal opportunity. Right. coaches. Does that change our entitle >> compiance for the subsequent >> for the subsequent year >> like for you giving us the recap right now? So the next time we did that if we had an

043instance where a sport did not run because there was no coach would that impact our future child >> I think it could but I don't know that we've had an instance where we haven't had the sport run you know at this point in time that hasn't happened. I know we've had concerns this year over lack of participation for instance in lacrosse um and that was West High School right that was concerned that they were and struggling to get enough students not coaches but we've worked with our athletic directors to ensure that those teams can go ahead and play and we'll continue to do that and if there's not a coach we're going to find a way for the kids to participate. We wouldn't want them to lose the opportunity. Um hopefully we have an assistant

044coach in place. Typically we do. Um but that's going to be a case by case basis. >> No, I I was just thinking about possible funding and working with like rail Salt Lake or different pro athletes, but the foundation does, right? >> Yeah. So I did have a question about popularity of sports like um I I think I heard it east about soccer soccer teams um how I couldn't I think it was about how to how to give more players opportunities to play soccer if they're on the varsity. I mean, is there something have you thought about that? Is that being addressed? >> I think I know the pro the problem that has come up about soccer is that we have more we have uh more subvarsity teams for girls than for boys. And that

045has been the the concern from our community at East is that like there's a lot of boys who want to play soccer at East and we just have fewer opportunities, fewer teams. It's not for lack of wanting for lack lack of student interest. >> Um, but that does end up becoming a a title n issue, right? It's it's been over several years, you know, it's keeping this equitable opportunities in in balance. And so, one of the things that has been done to keep us balanced is no freshman um soccer teams for the boys at this point in time. And, you know, if we have a lot more female sports come up, we may be able to make some shifts in that, but at this point in time in order to keep that balance, we don't

046have the freshman boys soccer teams relative to the survey that you students um is what we're seeing with the interest in rugby and skiing and hockey are those similar trends that we're seeing in the state of Utah amongst and school districts and student bodies. And do we anticipate that UHSA might actually adopt some of these like we saw with sports? >> I haven't talked to UHSA individuals um about the interest yet. I do know rugby is huge right now. I don't know if the club coaches who have put together teams are interested in working with schools. Um, I know our lacrosse teams, lacrosse had a big push several years ago and became a sanctioned sport and it's been very different for those coaches who came into our schools to abide by UHS UHSAA's guidelines. And

047so sometimes I think they wow this is more difficult than we thought. I haven't heard that the rugby community is doing that. I do know that rugby is growing almost exponentially among a lot of students, teenagers, club teams, and so we may see that UHSA has kind of got their, you know, fingers on that pulse of what's happening with club teams and we kind of pay attention to that, but that's a bigger conversation that we can alone have. So, any other >> first of all I appreciate um well Charlotte's comment about the soccer question and I appreciate your awareness of that is something that's on the minds um I guess going along with that a little bit um I know that you have limited freshman from the um soccer But there are other sports where

048freshmen can participate. And one of the challenges that I'm hearing is, oh, and this was also brought up by Anderson. I mean, when we lose coaches and all of those things, it's devastating in many ways to keep everyone in the loop and um get out notices and all of that sort of thing. I'm glad to hear that Parent Square is where you're focusing on this. Um because there what I'm hearing is there are freshmen that aren't being made aware of like schedules. So they don't even know like what the football schedule is at East and how do we get that information out to them? We've got to have a plan here on how people get the word. >> Yeah. So, just two two things. One, in terms of freshman uh participation, I just want to

049clarify that freshman can try out and play >> for JV or for varsity. They we just don't have a designated freshman team. So, just to clarify, it's not like they can still play, right? Um, and then regarding regarding the advertisement of like opportunities, um, I would really like I I've thought of in addition to parent square, four different ways that we would like to require schools advertise these opportunities. Um, >> I'm really keying in on this. >> Okay. Are you ready? >> I think we want to hear this. >> Okay. So, I'd like to make sure we have a designated tryyout bulletin board at every school. I I'm guessing I know I've been around the schools and there are lots of spaces that are designated to athletics, but I would like to have a very

050specific one designated to tryyouts and auditions for um UHSAA activities and athletics. Um in addition, obviously PA announcements, uh I think we do a lot of those already. Um and I should I I should say too, I want all of this in English and Spanish um right from the bat. So, we need every time there's an audition or a try out, a a an announcement over the loudspeaker. A lot of our schools do these every day anyway, so make sure we include those. Um, it needs to be on our social media and it needs to be on our school website. So, and again, that's in addition to parent square. So, really five ways I want the sports the the opportunities advertised in English and Spanish. And I think I think it is making like our

051sports are making appearances in all of these places. I just don't think it's consistent. And so I want to make sure that it's like the when you have a new, you know, when there's a a try out or an audition, please make sure you check off these spaces that these things have all been covered. >> I really appreciate hearing that. I think that consistency across the board because there are some people like grandparents do. They don't have access to parent square or I mean having those other sources makes it so that everyone would have an avenue to find that information. >> Right. >> Um seeing no other questions, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you >> for being prepared and um all that you do to impact extracurricular activities in our schools. It's

052really a big deal for us. >> Thank you. >> Moving on to item number two of our reports agenda. We have a regular update on construction progress and athletic fields. Um it's my understanding that Isaac Aile is out for personal reasons this evening and so I'll turn the time over to our business administrator. >> So I'm going to pinch do my best. Uh, largely the the memo that's attached that was written by Isaac is is very detailed on on some updates. So, I'm not going to rehash everything that's in that memo. Um, so I'm just going to highlight a few items. Uh, high school rebuilds, we continue the process. Uh, as noted, uh, we're still in the design development phase. Um, we hope to be able to have, um, conceptual drawings out for the public,

053you know, soon after school starts. as the architects continue and and he mentioned something in here that I want to make sure is very important that as we design these buildings we have to design them within a budget you know we can build everything we want but we don't have that kind of money when we went out bond we went out for a specific amount and we have to stay within those specific amounts so that's part of what they're doing with the architects is as they design they also look at the cost and okay is there something we can do to to bring the cost down if it starts getting over budget so They'll continue to do that and we hope in the next months uh to be able to start having some public uh

054information out there. As far as the temporary athletic fields for the rebuilds, we continue those processes, continue working with the city for um West uh baseball and softball um and with other contractors to make sure that no sports teams miss a season, that there's a field available for them for their their seasons over the life of rebuilds. And I also want to highlight the Rosen Heights um uh athletic complex is nearing completion, but it is not yet done. It's still a construction site. Uh we've had the public get on it and we want to make sure they know it's still a construction site. Uh I also want to make a public plea and you'll see signs there if you go up there. Please keep your dogs off the turf park. um turf and dogs don't

055match very well. And if you do bring your dogs to the other grass part and this is a plea for all of our properties, please clean up after your dogs. That's a plea to the public. Um everything else I'll just leave there in the memo. If anyone, you know, the memo is very detailed, but if there are any questions, I will do my best to answer them in the meeting or defer them when I get more information from ask you my questions, but I will say I do have a couple of questions that I think would be best answered by Isaac. What is the best way to answer those questions given this report? And then would it be to settle in advance and have them prepared for the next report? >> Yes, that would be

056that would be the best. >> And then the only other thing you may be able to answer is I had someone message me a question right before our meeting so I couldn't ask in advance, but this memo indicates that Highland High will play in spring 2026, but I didn't understand that to be the timeline. Do you know if that is >> Yeah, the memo there was some I that might there was something weird on the memo that I needed to ask Isaac for some clarification. >> So, because we can't answer it in the public meeting recognizing that probably not all of the public cares about where Highland baseball will be playing in spring 2026. there is a dedicated group of people who care and perhaps we could um direct an answer to them prior to

057the next meeting. >> Reach out through the athletic director through the high school with that information. >> Just is that is the timeline as reported in the memo. Is that a mistake? >> It's a mistake >> because the field will be in place for this whole coming school year. The current field at Highland High School will stay in place through that early process. And There's no need to move the baseball program in this upcoming school year. So by the second school year 26 27, am I right? >> Yes. 26 27 then we'll have the divorce field. So that's so that we could clarify that and then other questions I would just send them in advance and they could be built into the next. >> Correct. >> Thank you. I just want you to know that

058Isaac confirmed that through He's listening in. Confirm that. >> Um, poor Isaac Allen. Um, I miscommunicate something to Isaac the other day after clarification after that meeting, but ultimately just a an ask is the this is specific to Roslin Heights. It can apply to anywhere. I know that they're still under construction or whatnot, but where they're asking the the students and the coaches to honor the time to get off the field so it can be locked up properly. There was a moment where uh the kids were pushed to get off earlier than their cut off time wasn't by a chunk, but it was enough that it kind of threw a curveball as they were trying to get through all their seating competitions and stuff like that. They were a little conrated. So, just the students

059will work better at it and those that are locking up try to just honor that cut off time and not get excited about shutting it down earlier than what was already previously allocated. There any other questions for Isaac? Um, Jennifer Mill, I know you weren't here for personal reasons and celebrations and family last meeting, but we did extend a thank you to you and for all the efforts that you made with the city and coordinating with our district and making all these possible for our students. Thank you again. Now that you're here, I just wanted to highlight for what you do for our students and our our partnership. All right, moving on to the discussion agenda. Um, the first item of business um is our process for new board member interviews. Um there is a

060memo that um I was just going to read out loud um so that the public and the community has a sense of of how we're doing this process. Um and so as you know with the recent resignation of board member B um here is a brief summary and we can have some discussion if we need to as a board um about our process. Um in accordance with Utah code 208-1-511. The board is beginning the process to fill a midterm vacancy in precinct 5 created by the resignation of board member Mohammed Bay. Starting tomorrow, August 6, 2025, applications will be available for those interested in being considered for the precinct 5 board seat. In order to be qualified to hold the seat, state law requires that the individual have lived within precinct 5 for at least

061one year immediately preceding September 2nd, 2025. The application will be available online or a printed copy may be obtained from the superintendent's office located at 406 East 100 South Salt Lake City, Utah 8411. All applications must be completed and returned to the superintendent's office by 300 p.m. on Tuesday, August 26, 2025. Applications will be screened to verify residency within precinct 5. And then the board will interview all qualified candidates on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2025, starting at 5:00 p.m. in open meeting. The board will then discuss and take action on candidates. A swearing in ceremony will be held for the newly appointed board member that same evening. The new board member will serve from the time of the swearing in until December 31st, 2026. The precinct 5 board seat will be up for reelection in November

0622026. If you have any questions or need additional information on this process, please contact superintendent or board president prior to 5:00 p.m. on August 5th, 2025. Any questions from board members? Sure. >> Has there ever been a problem of having too many candidates? >> No, >> probably not. >> And I don't think that would be >> thankless job >> wouldn't be a problem for us, you know. I think it shows an interest. >> I'm gonna add just a touch more information to that. So the application will be available tomorrow on our website um and as well as information about the opening that was presented here by board president Salazar. We've also created an application that is electronic so applicants can fill it out and submit it electronically. The due date still stands whether it's an

063electronic application or you choose to come in paper version in order to complete the paper version. Thank you, superintendent. And the one thing that um I would add that um isn't listed that we've shared with board members um is that the interview questions will be sent to all qualified candidates um August 29th, 2025. So if you're anticipating on applying and you're qualified and meet those requirements then that help you just a piece of clarification since I went through this process myself four years ago um my question is are they as part of the application are they expected to provide a response to those questions or we just asking those >> yeah so the application has three questions on four questions, excuse me, originally three, but through board members feedback on those documents that we sent

064out um when we knew that this was coming up. Um one of the questions from the So there's two different sets of questions. There's the application which do does require written responses to four questions and then we'll be asking each candidate four questions, one of which has been updated based on the feedback. So, um, if you do have board members questions that you would like to be reconsidered as a part of that for, please let Brian and myself know and we'll take that under consideration as well. >> I have a second part of the question. Will board members receive the responses to those questions of the interview? >> Absolutely. Cool. Thank you. >> Just clarifi clarification. You said if we have any suggestions for the four written or for not not for that >> for

065the interview. >> Okay. So that's not said. >> Okay. We'll move on to item number two. Strategic plan for student achievement revisions. [Music] We're really not presenting anything new here in the strategic plan. You'll see that um we can answer questions. The team is here that can answer those questions but not presenting anything new. We shared with you answers to questions that were raised at the last board meeting about the strategic plan so that you have that information in the memo as well as um what the strategic plan would look like again that handout. So if you have any questions, we'd love to discuss those and then would also like to get your approval to um move forward with the strategic plan that's presented. >> This would be a comment just to begin with. I

066don't know if any of the rest of you have problems, but the links that were provided in there, I don't have access to them. makes it difficult to follow. When you click on it, it just circles and circles and then it says >> is that true of all the questions one or >> the plan itself. >> Dr. Could you right now all the board members that plan as an attachment. >> That would be great. But I also think that it would be helpful for the public to be able to fix. >> Yes, we do. >> See that it should say anybody with the link. >> Yeah. Somehow the permissions got mixed up on that. We also have in the last two three board meetings had that same strategic plan there. So, >> right or at

067least the because we made one change um to it. So that should be up there for people in public even though this link isn't working. We'll get that fixed right away. >> Okay. Um you gave an explanation as to like the development of the pillars very beginning questions. When were those pillars actually I mean the pillars were there when I joined the board but I just I'd like to know I mean you're talking about committees were convened when we were in the process of working on this particular strategic plan and we developed these pillars. I just chronologically like to know when that was. >> Dr. is running it through her computer of a brain right this >> she has a computer brain and if you don't have it right now >> it was 2023 when

068the uh strategic plan was approved in spring 23 or seven months that's Um in part of those answers um you talked about different um assessments that would be done to ensure that the strategic requirements would be met. You talked about school walkthroughs and I mean there was a list of like EAP was ECAP revised recently or is that >> it was revised for teachers. Any other questions for Dr. We'll start with Ashley. >> My first question is is in looking through the answers to the questions the power school was referenced and it says it's replacing panorama but I wanted to clarify we don't have panorama right now. So is this referencing a different tool or >> No, that was an error. Some of the some of our staff have used panorama when they worked in

069different districts. So there was with it, but we have not had a tool in our district. >> And then because we're talking about using a power school tool, there's a task force convened at USB right now that would consider preventing uh leas from choosing their own SIS like powers school. Are we considering at all how changes at the state board level could impact the platforms that we use? >> Yes. Um they've had that conversation for a couple of years. There's an interest in the state in all school districts using platform so that their data collection is simpler. Um, one of the they would they have talked about reducing the number of platforms but not not creating one single one because they're able to work with one or two or three from what I understand. Um,

070that decision's not been made but power school is used by enough districts that it's one of the ones that they were thinking to keep. So that's preliminary discussions in what they're doing. Um that would change things up for us drastically. It's a really hard thing for any district to migrate all of its information into a new class form. So all of the districts are um a little dismayed at the prospect that they may have to take on that work which um even the what work we've done with our website to update shows you some of the complications in the school information for the student information system gets even worse. So we'll see what happens. I know the state wants to move in that direction but we're not sure that they would take away power school

071as an option. And just to follow up, if they did take away power school, what would be the process for amending question or we're going to bring the pillars to you on a regular basis through the school year almost any um I have two more questions. The second is about why two and it talks about the issues that Yandre raised in last meeting about what a survey that was sent to likely voters. So it's not really getting the information that you wanted. Was there any response to the feedback about the stakeholder survey in terms of survey design to make it more effective for use? >> Do you know we looked at um I asked around a little bit. Do you want to speak about validated surveys or just how to make it more useful generally?

072I mean I think validation is one of the parts to try and get more response a higher response rate particularly or understand who's respons I do think we get that information if I got a survey person I don't know if that would be Dr. if I can bother you for a moment. Um, >> we're still trying to figure >> You're trying to figure out the link. Thank you for digging in on that. Um, just survey responses on our stakeholder survey. I'm not sure which of our experts can answer that best for me. We do get uh an understanding of who has answered the survey, right? Do we have a demographic profile or some understanding of numbers on survey responses on the stakeholder survey? >> Will you come if you got something there? >> Yes. Apologies.

073Um Dr. Hall and Sam Quants can correct me if I'm wrong, but I would u defer to Jeff from our newly named data team who official name I cannot remember at the moment but um he I know has the expertise to to analyze that survey data and so I would lean on >> but do we capture those do we have markers about who has answered the questions and who has not we get an a raw number of responses so we have a percentage but do we get other information about which schools >> I believe we do um Sam are you in the loop on that I think I'm gonna invite y'all up if I could. >> You have this fancy new table as >> Yeah. Once again, I'm gonna lean on Sam. So, if I

074mess this up because I talked with Jeff Le is our data analysis on our data analysis that's in the data and assessment department. It depends on which platform we use. if we're using Qualrix versus Google forms or versus Microsoft forms and it also depends on whether it's an anonymous survey versus a label survey. So what will take place is we can track by email addresses for our non-anmous surveys. So we would know due to each one of the distribution addresses that we send to or the group address that we send to. We can track through that mechanism. You know what I'm saying? I'm going make them says, "I got to." >> Yeah. So, there's there's a couple of ways you can do it. You can do it just like Dr. Taylor described. You can do

075if you want more information. There's always that risk, right, wanting to do perform an anonymous survey, completely anonymous, where you're blind, and you can ask questions like, "What school do you attend? What grade, what grade levels do you have, whatever." Um, but then that provides people the opportunity to respond multiple times, which throw off the survey. So you could also perform a secure type of a survey which we do limit it so only people could um respond once but then the data is secure so only a couple people nobody else sees besides those who are provisioning. I'll add one thing too from um not well verssed in the platforms but in previous surveys that we've done we did have a way to um for the families and stakeholders within the district so employees uh and

076families only we wouldn't be able to do this for general community members um for each person to have a unique survey link um and then in the past when Dr. Dr. Amio at the department, we would be able to follow up and send a reminder email only to the individuals who had not yet responded and we would be able to track which school, what role, etc. while still keeping confidentiality um externally, but internally that would help us to follow up as well. We can't do that with general community members, but we can do that with our own folks. >> And we'd want to continue keeping a fairly anonymous survey with just some designations that may help us understand who's responding. It's something that we'll look into more and give you some more information on that

077board member. That's really helpful and I think you know just knowing the plan obviously all those components are going to be written into this plan. That's part of what you're trying to do is reduce it. Um my only other uh concern is that I think you you responded to all the information with the tools different amendments were made based on the discussion. My only concern about approving this personally is that has not been active for everybody to confirm and also for the public to confirm and raise additional questions. So would it substantially delay work on the strategic plan to approve in a subsequent meeting >> or I think if I'm getting a read from the board there aren't substantive changes that we would like to see so far that it would throw off the work

078that we've already so we're fine up agenda. Yeah, we'll get that right. additional questions. >> Thank you. >> Um I I guess clarification there's on the first page of the intro section it says per board direction we include the original measurable outcome regarding gender neutral bathrooms under page 13. I'm not seeing it. I'm not Is that on the one that was just sent to you? >> Yeah. >> And page 13 doesn't have the change. >> Well, it's the page is different. Let me go back to the website. >> Sorry, Dr. Ruiz. We made the change to add the piece about the gender neutral bathrooms. That shows up on the new document on page 13. I got it under four. >> I just don't remember. It's under outcomes, measurable outcomes, pillar four. >> This one the

079the by 2029 what you're trying to accomplish because what I see is long-term facilities maintenance plan backlog for capital budget and that's it. Okay. Um, you know, it could say to you is it will be in the one that you look at next time for a vote >> because that was agreed upon and we're putting that Okay, >> I'll do that because I always run out of time anyway. >> Um, and then a a point of I don't know the right word, frustration. I appreciate that it's being pointed out that were involved in this process. I was on the last meeting and there was a group of parents that we all around hoping to have meaningful conversations and my frustration lies in that there's a lot of statement around it like it was this big

080robust meaningful impactful conversation and parents left it and quit participating because it was not and that's the best I could say about being really mean. So I'm I'm grateful that there is an effort to do committees, but whenever it's stated in such a way that it implies that they were these like amazing collaborative, impactful, embracive, like all of these things that really tend to apply. I've been on a few of the committees and um >> they need to live up to that. >> Yes. And so they did happen, but um I wouldn't I don't I I'm slightly embarrassed having my name on this list. >> Do you know it's no longer in the new strategic plan that we have provided the slim down version. We took out that front piece that had that listed. >>

081So we didn't describe all the committees and things that were participating. We didn't have all the names in that. So we simplified it. So it's no longer on there. >> And it's less about the name. It's more we're going to have committes on whatever it is not just related to this let's make sure that it's meaningful people give a lot of time to participate because they really care and so whenever it's relatively lackluster like parents are like they kind of I guess for lack of better words kind of like it's a joke so it's just in the bigger picture it's just something I wanted to call it now because it's come up a few times and I really I really wish that they would consistently be what they're represented So that was more of a

082comment. >> Agreed. >> Yes. >> So if you go, this is the shorter version of the plan, the one proposed from June. I know. No, I tried it, but there's not a connected >> dangle and I don't have with me. Um, right here under objective 1.1, new construction of district buildings will have gender. >> So, it's on the updated one. It's not the one that if we were to vote on today, it's not actually listed. We would state as >> it will be on the one that you're voting on. should be on the one that you have the link to >> that we're still working on >> because we're getting you the updated version so access one of the objectives >> there and then two other pieces I mean I made my comments about it

083in general and it is what it is I'm not going to argue that I would say with the testing a parent brought up this um piece that some schools might a subject per day or something like that when they're doing these testings versus others might just do this big long hall. The kids are exhausted. Um, and so the allows schools to choose how they want to do it, but the testing outcomes may be swayed. So if you're comparing school one to school testing outcomes, but the one kind of pacing the kids and giving them that breathing room versus another approach like how um that could It's not comparing apples to apples at that point. The kids are tested differently on on which are you thinking >> which test? >> Yeah, the state tests are you

084thinking particularly? >> I'm not sure which one it was, but that was not >> I'm um is there research on how tests are conducted in terms of students stamina and being able to test all sections in one day or across days. And and what that says about this the variation of testing outcomes or testing outcomes, but testing patterns across our different schools, how they choose to looked at that ourselves with the most recent day where we did our ACT testing in one day and we did our Aspire Plus testing in one day. And the three high schools, I know this better than I do, but the three high schools um gave different subjects in different order, but it was very interesting to see that the one that was the last of the three tests universally

085was the one that was scored less. So there is a point of time where there is only so much testing that you can do in one day and then it's a diminishing return. So we are looking at that in terms of scheduling for next year. that circuit was like a school that is coming in a way that pays the kids better. So you don't have that exhaustion piece to it and then subsequently they're scoring higher versus other schools that's an option if it's an option and then their school may consistently be testing lower because of that piece of >> and I'm sorry was this elementary or middle or high? >> Uh these are elementary. So yeah, the other the other thing that can happen there is that we have very wide testing windows. So the

086testing window could be anywhere from three to six weeks long. And a school for instance who chooses um to test early in the window may have a different amount of instruction that's occurred before a school that's tested late in the window. Sometimes that's um unavoidable because we only have so many testers and we can only you know, we we have to start and we have to get through to the end of the window before it closes, especially if it's a state test. And so, um, both of those, both the placement of the the school in the testing window and the length and duration of the test will make an effect will have an effect on students. >> Figuring out a way for that consistency outcomes can be relevant to each other. I have one minute.

087>> Let me do this. Anybody have any other questions on the first round? >> We'll move into the second round. Amanda, your two minutes start. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, my other comment was just on the data. I've heard a lot of concerns regarding the tech help um and the general support with the testing. And so given that's a piece of this conversation and a piece of the the whole dynamic like figuring out how to ensure that that support is appropriate to help those involved in that process feel like they're set up to successfully help these students. >> If you would do a favor or two when people raise those concerns could you have them reach out directly either to me or and I can direct them to staff member or I can capture the

088information in a way that we have enough detail to make to make a change >> because I don't when they call for help there's not always somebody that answers the phone to help them >> with the testing >> when they're in the middle of the testing. So I know that is one of the things they run into but yeah I can work to get better details and send them on people But we can do that. that would help us out. >> I just wanted to make a comment and that was I really appreciated how you addressed the uh PBIS um question that I raised in the last session. I think that it's important when we're dealing with all of these acronyms that the public understand what it is, not just what it name is, but

089what that is working to accomplish. So, thank you for putting that in there. And it goes um also I asked the question about seal and I appreciated your explanation, having a welcome, all of those sorts of things. I think it's nice for the parents to understand the directives the teachers will receive. >> Thank you. >> Any other additional comments? It sounds like we're going to be pushing this to a subsequent meeting. Sure. >> Um under pillar two, are we looking to in I was trying to find out looking to increase graduation rates. Is that part of our part of the Are there any objectives like that? It's always a goal graduation particularly for each school. And I was specifically thinking about the equity piece about raising graduation rates between the disparities between specific populations that

090have lower rates of graduation. such differated groups. >> Dr. >> Yes. Hello. >> Welcome back. >> So, we do have that goal under pillar one. equity uh access and student support goal and is 90% of high school students will meet college and career readiness benchmarks before graduation. So that will include graduation requirements. >> Okay. >> Week four, we threw you right into it, didn't we? >> Excent for obviously more review in the meantime decision hopefully soon. So um seeing no other questions um we'll move on to item number three of our discussion agenda. Dr. Ruiz board thank you as well um for the discussion. Um item number three is new board policy P14. It looks like um Miss Kindle's coming up to the to the the table up here. Um before we get started is

091there a representative from the polic this before our discussion begins. >> I think I'll just have a go at it. All right. How about that? >> Um, and just for our new board members who maybe haven't been through this process of having a new board policy submitted to the board. Um, this is a board policy that will have accompanying administrative procedures. Um, and those administrative procedures will come before the subcommittee. And then if the subcommittee approves them, they will come before the whole board for approval. So it's unlike um and and that happens the first time. Um we propose administrative procedures so we can ensure that those administrative procedures are implementing the board's vision in um adopting that board policy. Um but we don't draft um obviously administrative procedures until the board votes to approve

092a board policy. Um so in this case um board policy P14 salary supplement for highly needed educators um i.e. the shine program um is a new policy that's required by Senate Bill 173. Um a district is required to have this particular policy in place. Um and as I indicated in the board memo the shine program is replacing the teacher salary supplement program. All educators who qualified under the TSSP are qualified under the shine program. So the administrative procedures will be just um indicating how we will be administering the shine program. But no teacher will lose their eligibility for a stipend or a supplement um who previously had it under the TSSP if that makes sense. Um and for our district the um categories that we have identified as being hard to fill positions um so

093for the educators who are receiving these supplements or um these stipens um it's uh secondary math um computer science uh all sped teachers um secondary math science computer science and um special education teachers. So those are our four categories. Um, so given that, do you have any other questions? And obviously I should say that I did email um this policy around to all the members of uh the board policy subcommittee um and they agreed with the language in the in the proposed policy and recommended that it be placed on the agenda for discussion. short secondary math, science, computer science, and special education. >> Yeah. My only question is that state law changes a lot and it doesn't always require that we make a new policy and I don't know that we did have a policy

094for TSSP. So, could you frame why this is an item that we would choose to enshrine a policy rather than just a general operational practice of the district? >> Because Senate Bill 173 requires an LEA to adopt a policy to implement the shine. Perfect. Thank you. >> um, really quickly, um, you only asked one question, so please continue. >> Oh, I was going to ask for next steps and time timeline, but that's after the discussion. [Music] >> So, I'm glad that you listed which teachers it included because I read the SB 173 did not stand out to me which ones it was relevant to um and so I'm glad to hear the special education teachers are part of this um there's usually concern about special education um being funded outside of special education dollars and

095if I understand correctly this um the salary supplement is a funding stream from the special education funding streams. >> Yes. >> And so I guess have you figured out how you're going to like account for that? Because generally speaking, your special education teachers are coming from one funding stream and then a portion of that now this other which So explain to me how you're going to do that to ensure that it's truly coming from this funding stream and not from the special education budget. >> Yes. So, like like was said, this is replacing the teacher salary supplement program, which has been around for years. And what it is is it's not built into their contract salary. It's individual payments. Um, with the old program, the teacher could select twice a year, once a year, four,

096three, four times a year. So, it comes in on an individual separate time sheet that gets coded to the account coding that the state gives us for this particular program. And then when we report back at the end of the year to the state, we reported under that program reporting. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> And the change the state used to designate the categories of teachers. Now they have given districts the opportunity to designate the categories of high needs >> teachers. And so that's out. So that's what our school district is determining as our >> So HR takes a look at that and and determines which ones are the hard to fill positions typically. incentivize applicants in those positions. >> How how often are you reooking at that list? Theoretically, hopefully not all of these

097will continue to always be the case. So, >> I believe annually. Is that right? >> So, this is the first time we've been given the opportunity to make our own designations, >> right? to my question and I know depending on the policy over my experience over the years the process can can change which is totally fine that are we looking to make a decision tonight or are we waiting for the APS to come in >> No we're not looking for the APS to come in I think sometimes this board depending on the complexity of the policy or wanting to get feedback on it um um has wanted a second read obviously state law would like this policy to be in place by July 1. So, if um the board is comfortable just moving it to

098action and voting on it tonight, that would be great. If they'd like a second read, we can put it either on the consent agenda for the next board meeting. It's certainly just up to the board. But those are the options members. With that information and discussion, I would entertain a motion or more feedback. >> I make a motion to the discussion agenda. >> I second. hour. >> Yeah. So, thanks action. >> All right. So, we have a a motion from Amanda from Is there any further discussion? >> All right. Seeing none, we'll take a roll call vote starting with Williams. >> Bryce Williams. Yes. >> Charlotte Ferson. Yes. Ashley Anderson. Yes. >> Thanks. will revisit this on the action agenda. Um, number four of our discussion agenda, we have long-term closure and district reconfiguration recommendations.

099Dr. Grant, >> so our G5 administrator, Brian Connelly, will be presenting the district's recommendations under this policy. >> Welcome, Brian. >> Board, thank you for having me here tonight. Will you pull that close to you as you So again, thank you board for having me here tonight. My name is Brian Connley, uh the boundaries and planning director for our district. And uh tonight you will see recommendations regarding our grade level reconfiguration and long-term closures following policy G5. Uh G5 was amended a bit about nine months ago and then the administrative procedures saw quite a bit of change about four months ago. So um you'll see and hear some of that why I'll be describing part of the process as we go as well. Our aim is to build vibrant learning communities and use resources efficiently

100for student learning. And uh we do believe that um as a district we can do this uh regardless of our student population whether that's increasing or decreasing. We really uh think that our focus needs to remain on trying to have u that robust learning community multiple uh classes per grade especially in those elementary schools. uh and that really works we think best for uh many aspects of what we're doing uh as a district to help student learning. Today we're going to talk about three schools and their programs that we do want to study further. So this slide that you see in front of you right now um is a bulleted list of the long term school closure process. Uh the administrative procedures for this policy are about six or seven pages in the administrative procedures

101and not all of it is just about closure process. that uh wanted to highlight these uh seven points along uh in this process with the first one being that the information gathered to present to the board at least 90 days prior to board vote is some of the information that you're going to be uh seeing today board would then make and approve the motion to initiate the process. So uh this is these are requested actions. The requested actions that you're going to see are going to be coming up here later in this presentation. Then district personnel myself along with uh other people where depending on which which uh sites we're looking at and which programs we're looking at um will be uh studied further. But before that happens, we will send through uh Yandre Chantwin's

102office the required notifications uh to really begin the in-depth study of the factors to determine the viability and appropriateness of closing the identified schools or school. Um, there will be a public opportunity to review the in-depth study for a minimum of 30 days and proposed closure will also be presented at information sessions or a session. State law requires a public comment opportunity and that a school closure decision be made by the board prior to December 31st. We have a uh recommended timeline that we would be following that I'll be showing you as well. And uh if circumstances require an extension of any specific time frame, you the board will be notified with an explanation in a public meeting. So the first recommendation is to study innovations early college high school for potential long-term closure. On

103this slide, you see the timeline we plan to follow. Um you can see looking at this timeline uh the public if um if if board if you as board members say yep let's let's uh study this further the public would first see the in-depth study in early October. Uh we're doing a November vote to meet the board expectation of letting families know as soon as possible even though the state timeline is December 31st. Uh there was quite a bit of discussion over the past uh few months uh in the spring about hey let's try to let families know as soon as we can about the work that's going on. Um this presentation is about having us do an in-depth study. Again we're not asking the board to make any final decision on what to do

104with innovations uh early college high school right now at this moment. We just want to start that study. Not starting the study now pushes the vote to December and that gives families less time to know what to do. So a little bit about uh Innovations Early College High School. A little bit about the background here. um innovations opened in the 2012 2013 school year and uh there was um in this model a few pieces that we had either seen very limited or not at all in our district at the time um one of them that we had seen but again one that was a focus for innovations has been access to onampus concurrent enrollment opportunities for students that third bullet down um And something that we hadn't seen too much of in 2012 2013 up

105to that point was the blended learning model described in bullet number two. And uh it really one of those uh one of the purposes of innovations was to try to re-engage students who had disengaged from our traditional high schools. Um, and it uh there were also homeschooled students that were um we were hoping to also be able to um bring back into public education from their homeschool experience. Our rationale for wanting to go forward with an in-depth study is that um and the reason why we recommend this review of innovations is to access whether it continues to fulfill its original mission of offering a unique instructional model. We suspect it's not meeting its original intent. Um preliminary data uh would point to that. The low enrollment is one one of the factors we saw as

106you can see on this uh graph as well and limited utilization of onampus uh Salt Lake Community College concurrent enrollment courses. You can see uh what the numbers look like over the past uh six years here. Um I will say that though they did were up higher in 22 21 22 23 we also had higher school enrollment at that point too and that's been dropping off. So, our requested actions are to approve a motion to study Innovations Early College High School for potential closure and to initiate the district sending the required notifications in accordance with state law and to direct staff to hold an information session for stakeholders at Innovations Early College High School. Uh we do have um um uh with work that Dr. Ree has been doing also with uh with um our

107executive uh director Chhatwin having that timeline really spelled out specifically about notifications and when they'll be sent. We also have a recommendation here to study the magnet special enrollment program at Washington Elementary for potential closure. Uh I this is something that uh I know has been on your agenda uh in the past year. We do believe that in order to comply with state policy, we need to go through the study and get to a November vote uh get a vote on the program. Um the pilot was uh was determined not to be uh renewed but uh in looking at state policy we wanted to go through with this because uh G5 does cover process for closure of a special enrollment program. Now you can see here again the um proposed closure for this would follow

108the school closure process outlined in section two. So, so you'll see that it's very similar to the other timetable that we just gave trying to keep those aligned, but also it states right there in our G5 administrative procedures that it does follow that same process and a little bit about our magnet program background and rationale. Washington was originally opened as a three-year pilot program and as we uh as I mentioned previously, board discussions last year led to nonrenewal of the pilot program. Sixth graders at Washington in the in this magnet program will be the last grade in the current school year. So don't have fourth or fifth graders there right now in that magnet program, just sixth grade and they'll finish up this year. So, our requested actions would be to approve the study of

109Washington magnet special enrollment program for potential closure and to initiate the district sending the required notifications in accordance with state law and to direct staff to hold an information session for stakeholders at Washington Elementary School. Last, we have a recommendation to reconfigure Nibi Park Elementary as an elementary school rather than a K8. Um even though this process here does have um has a there is a different possible timeline on this process where we would like to align it to the others presented tonight. Doing this earlier than we might typically see because that would give parents families more time to uh to uh make the adjustments that would be needed if that were to if uh this reconfiguration were to happen. Uh this is a process that is also described in the G5 administrative procedures and

110um the superintendent do superintendent ground will make that recommendation to the board and made at least 60 days prior to any board action. So if this recommendation does have the support of the board, the board could hold a public would hold a public comment period during an upcoming board meeting to gather public input on this recommendation. And you can see here, whoops. I somehow have a couple uh wrong dates, right? See here. Should have said 2025. I I've got some wrong year a wrong year on there. So, my apology a little bit on Nibbi Park background. uh looking um that back on February 18th both uh Dr. Hall and Don Miller presented what came from the middle level group report and it identified concerns with the current K figure configuration. Example of that was limited

111access to a full core curriculum for grades seven and eight due to low enrollment resulting in reduced course offerings. And music, fine arts, PE, and STEM are delivered using an elementary model limiting the depth instructional depth appropriate for middle grades. And there was no access to honors, accelerated math courses, or world language instruction at Nibi. Bottom line is um the rationale for looking at this as you may recall was students not uh in this report where students were not receiving equitable learning opportunities compared to peers in other middle grade settings. Little bit of the history of 78. You did see this last uh in the springtime when it was presented. Our 202526 anticipated enrollment uh is 64 students. Um, I believe 18 of those 64 would be seventh graders. That's what's anticipated for this coming

112year. So, most of them obviously being eighth graders out of those 64. So, Nibi Park's enrollment has not supported staffing a full team of highly qualified secondary teachers to meet ST course requirements. and Nibi Park seventh and eighth grade students reside within the Hillside Middle School boundaries. Currently they um some students who live in the Nibbi Park boundary choose to go to hillside. Some do open enrollment for other schools as well, Clayton and others. Uh many of the students do choose to attend a traditional middle school rather than remain at Nibi. Majority of them looks like Hillside but uh some to other middle schools as well through open enrollment. So our requested actions for Nibi would be to direct staff to move forward with further study of grade level reconfiguration to begin the 2627 school

113year and to hold an information session. One was held in February of this year um but to have another one this fall for stakeholders at Nibi. So as a summary here is a summary of the action requests. um that we're making and uh we won't read through those again. You've seen them on the previous slides, but wanted to summarize it on one slide here. And with that information be open for any questions, comments or discussion we could have on this. >> Um I was wondering about innovations if um there is still is there still support from Salt Lake Community College for this partnership. Is it um or is that kind of a waning? >> That'll be one of the a great question to to answer in our in-depth study. >> Oh, >> we'll be this

114is really >> Yeah, this the purpose of tonight is really to just get that get that in-depth study going based on >> the information that we have right now. >> And just to clarify, we've not seen a support from Solid Community College. >> Okay. Um, you included enrollment from 20120. I wondered if you could give us enrollment numbers from 2013 from when it was when it started. It would just be nice to see the whole picture precoid, you know, pre pandemic study. >> Thank you. >> Um, so in recent months, the board approved a new CTC to go to Riley Elementary's campus starting next fall. And when we had those discussions as a board, we talked about how the current programs in that building's site, which does include innovations, could move turnkey into the Riley

115campus. What changed between the board recently approving the CTC and the recommendation for this study? >> You mentioned that again. I didn't count turnkey. So, what were you >> in our discussions? We talked about how the programs housed in the current building, which includes innovations, would move into a new campus. So what changed between moving and the recommendation for study? >> So there's the two programs there in the slate campus. On the second floor is the innovations early college high school. On the ground floor is the CTC. We only approve the plan is only to move the CTC, not to move innovations or the college high school because those are two such distinct programs. I guess that wasn't to me when we had those discussions, not least of all because the reason students enrolled in

116the CTC is because those are the kinds of courses they were taking. So, um, with that confusion in mind, I am supportive of the study. That's how we learn what we should do, you know, is by studying items. But I'm a little concerned that we're asked to approve a center with this subtext that now we left the center empty. So perhaps that necessitates this program not being able to continue. And I think it relates to concerns I shared about Nibbly Park in prior meetings that when we don't have really direct conversations about the order in which we're addressing board directed programs with new district initiatives, it means that in the case of Nibi, we had a board-directed K8 district specialty programs were moved in that did not require board approval and that resulted in their

117loss of physical classroom space. And in this case, it's the inverse of that where we discussed moving programs out of the building that houses this And now that leaves this in a potentially empty building. So I'm a little concerned that when we're not upfront about the relationship of those things with the public, it gives our community an ongoing feeling that our decisions about school closure and changes to programs are predetermined or it validates a description of intent that is probably unlikely. Um or there's a feeling that programs are maybe allowed to fail to enable other changes rather than just talking about the sequence of events we want to have happen. And I think a consequence of doing business in that way is we miss out on analyzing some of the direct tradeoffs between advancing some

118of our programs while planning to discontinue others or thinking about discontinuing others. And our public comment tonight indicates that the loss of courtesy stops as a long-standing promise to our district families is just one example of what happens when we don't learn about the direct costs of some of the changes we're making like CTC or DI relocation or expansion. So I think Again, I want to approve the study because the study is the way we will learn what to do. But I do think we should take special attention that the study address enrollment, enrollment trends, transportation routes, and costs that are disagregated by the programs that both of these sites house rather than just the program we're recommending to reconfigure or close. Um, I think again a big consequence we need to consider as a

119board is we anticipate declining enrollment across the board due to factors outside of our control. So, it's really important that we think about the community having a lot of trust in our school closure process or our reconfiguration process rather than continuing to feel how they feel, which is that you know what we NibLy Park family said in the last community meeting that they think the fix is in. And so I think it's important that we consider how all of these things are part of larger systems as we go through the study process. >> Thank you. And we can bring more information on this and the difference. I think particularly one of the challenges in this all the way along has been that people have conflated the two programs in that Salt Lake Community College center

120there so that they mix what is the career connected learning and the innovations program. It has all been kind of called innovations as a shorthand. Um but we this is very clearly just about the innovations program separate from the career connected learning program or CTE career and technical center. So we'll clarify that some more. I think that's important because people get mixed up and that the board is confident that what they're what we have brought to the board is disconnected from the CTC work. There is the possibility that innovation could stay in the Salt Lake Community College space for the next I believe 90 something years is the least that we have in that place. So that there shouldn't be a conflation of space concerns when we're looking about whether or not this school site

121continues. >> I just want to add to Dr. Grant's explanation of the separation of the innovations early college and the CTE conversation and my understanding um was that the CTE move was just for the CTE center and I did go over and do a walk through of the innovations early college. So how that um laid out compared to the CTE and how that function um and that helped give me a visual perspective as we were going into that CT conversation and that CT um move and understanding how innovations was that collaboration intended to be a collaboration with the community college but from my understanding because their basic their focus was more arts that's added a little bit of challenge to that like partnership program so um I just wanted to say that I The intent

122of that CT was for CT only and that innovations wasn't discussed at that point. So I see where we're coming from in this conversation question. >> I would just like some clarification on the action that's required. Can you expl again why we are being requested to act about reconfiguration and potential closure of a program or sorry potential clo closure of a program and potential closure of a school but we do not act about grade level reconfiguration we only hear the recommendation and hearing it alone kicks off the study is that correct >> uh in uh yes there there's a different uh in the G5 administrative procedures areas for grade level reconfiguration. Um within schools, u it's a much it's a much shorter described on um on page five of those. Um so it is it

123does fall under a different set of a different process um even though it is all under the same administrative procedures. >> So what it asks is that the district brings to the board essentially there's 60 days to make this decision. We decided to go on the time frame of all the other work just to make it simpler for the board to manage and to give plenty of time. So, we're using the longer time frame and then it says on G5, if the recommendation has the support of the board, the board will hold one public comment period during an upcoming board meeting and then make a decision. So there's we're asking just for the board's thumbs up kind of your direction to move forward so that you're comfortable with us moving forward with the process and

124then the decision itself is the board's decision. >> Sure. You're not seeking an actual motion. You just want to help. This one's written differently. To do grade level reconfiguration within our policy is a different process. We're linking it up timewise with the other ones so that we give the community members um enough time to weigh in private feedback to the board as well as enough time to make any changes board requests to to get these decisions made as soon as possible. Um, so we're linking them up, but it's a it's running on a different process that doesn't need actually a vote to move it forward, if that makes sense. Just as written, it says if the board supports the recommendation, then we'll continue the process. >> Question. >> Um, I just wanted to mention that

125um, I agree with Amanda that that I thought it was just the the CT CTC center um moving, but I do understand what what Ashley was saying about how decisions we make affect other programming, you know. So there there is you have to think about the consequences of things and the way things Any other questions forend? Seeing none, I I think now would be the time to indicate whether we would like to move forward with the reconiguration through a motion to move the other two remaining recommendations to the That's the majority. So, Dr. Grant will go ahead and move forward with that. And then we'll look for a motion to move um the two other recommendations regarding innovations in Washington special enrollment program to agenda. >> I move that the board discuss it relate to

126the potential long-term closure of innovations early college high school and Washington Elementary special program to the action agenda. >> I second. And then that was just innovations, correct? >> That was early high school and Washington. >> Okay, perfect. Sorry. >> Got a motion on the table in a second. Is there any further discussion? Seeing none, we'll start with a roll call vote with board number. >> Charlotte Ferson, yes. Ashley Anderson, yes. >> Salazar, yes. >> JSON, yes. Longo. Yes. >> Yes. Motion passes. Thank you board. Thank you Brian for being with us this evening and Dr. Grant for walking us through the policy and the APS there. Um moving to our action agenda. We have four items. Um the first one being consent um agenda item number seven. And u I'll just recap what we

127have there. Consent agenda item number nine. We have the new board policy P14 and then we have the just the motion that we just made regarding um early college high school innovations in Washington Elementary special program >> and consent agenda item number seven >> okay thank you um so we'll start with consent agenda number seven is there a motion on the table to start the discussion potential action >> and we're going to do the consent agend agenda items separately. Right. >> Yeah. >> So I have a motion to approve the human resources service report exhibit 37. Is there a second? >> I'm sorry to approve it for discussion. >> Second motion second. Any further discussion? >> Ashley. >> Um the reason I wanted to bring this to the public meeting is to ask the questions

128in public. rather than, you know, just electronically. And I'm wondering given the time-sensitive nature between this meeting and the start of school, if we can hear about how many administrative and teacher vacancies we still have after ratifying this report, and then what the approach will be of the district to fill those vacancies given that the board cannot ratify new HR reports prior to the start of the school year at this point. Hello. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to come and speak to this. Uh we do have one uh additional administrative opening at Emerson Elementary. The interview team for that position is interviewing initial interviews later this week and uh the final interviews are scheduled for early next week. So, I'm hopeful that we'll be able to have an announcement for the Emerson principal, which

129is our last administrative vacancy for the year or for this coming school year by the end of next week. Uh, I reported yesterday that we had 21 uh teacher positions on our job posting board as of yesterday. Um, six were in process of being offered contracts yesterday and we offered two more uh special ed position contracts earlier today. So, that brings us down to a total of 13. So it's not abnormal for us to have openings at this time of year. In fact, we had five teacher resignations just last week and so it is a moving target at this point. But u the HR department and uh hiring managers in the schools are moving forward as quickly as possible to fill these positions. Um, and specifically to your question about how we move forward in

130that process is board policy P13 provides the superintendent and myself as the human resources representative to move forward in the hiring process with final approval pending upon board approval u for those particular hires. So, we'll move forward in processing and finding the most qualified candidates for those positions and making referrals uh to you as the school board to make the final approval at the the next available board meeting after that. >> So, followup question to that in an e situation, especially with an administrator, especially an administrator of a school where there's a specialty program, a special education hub that obviously requires potentially more expertise than the average elementary school. Um, what would be an emergent solution in our district procedures for ensuring that students have a principal at the start of school? >> That's that's

131a good point. We would either name an interim principal or find a suitable substitute to be able to start the school year. So, just like any classroom or school position, we want to make sure that those are filled in any way that we can. And so, depending on the circumstances, we would make sure that there's a a suitable substitute there. And then um just to use the rest of my time, I think you have been really great about explaining to us, you know, the way in which we're trying to change our practice so that we don't have this amount of vacancies or we don't see so many resignations right before the start of the school year. Are there any updates to how we're addressing these cascading effects of employee attrition or transfer as we go

132through the summer or would that or is there a time of year at which that would be most optimal for the board to discuss? My staff and I are looking into well I want to separate that into two different procedures. The written agreement that we have with our Salt Lake Education Association uh outlines teacher transfer processes in in order to make any changes there, we would have to do so through the negotiations process. And I feel that our transfer window u we have addressed that over the last few years, actually just a few years ago. Um and that's made improvements in terms of uh internal teacher transfers impacting the openings that we have in classrooms. Um and so I think we're in pretty good shape there. We can't control when people leave um for various

133reasons, relocations or just thinking the grass is greener somewhere else. Um, we are seeing a increase in volume in hires. Uh, I believe we hired a third more employees overall in the district this last year than we did just the year prior and that was an increase over the year prior to that. So, we're seeing an a continual increase in the number of overall turnover in all of our positions. Um, so with the current climate in the universe, I think that we're expecting to more and more of that in the years ahead. Uh, as far as the administrative turnover, um, my staff and I are looking into ways and also having conversations with Dr. Grant, Dr. Taylor about what will be the most optimal way of initiating administrator hires for the upcoming for the preceding

134school year after the 2526 school year so that we are being able to be more proactive and hire in a earlier in the season. >> Thank you so much. >> You're welcome. I appreciate you're saying that you're trying to look at that administrative side because this does seem to be kind of a recurring problem. We had the same challenge last year and I mean I don't want to get into how we had assistant principles that went to West and then left vacancies and junior I mean it's that cascading effect that Ashley's talking about and it seems like this would be We're looking at is there a dynamic here that we can start earlier or something so the cascade comes earlier rather than later? >> That's certainly the hope. >> Um on those five teachers um

135that resigned, >> do you know whether they're going to another school or do you know that they just decided that now's their time to retire? I don't know of any retirements. I I know that one is moving out of the country. There's a variety of of reasons, but I'm getting out there and we've talked a little bit about this in the past as well. That's >> there are other school districts that offered quite an incentive back in January, December, and Allen's over there smiling. Um, of course, all of this costs money, but I guess when I hear resignation at this point, I'm also kind of thinking, okay, maybe this individual that decided to go out of the country or whatever, if there had been a greater incentive back in January, maybe that would have paid

136for them going out of the country. They would have said, "Oh, yeah, you know, I'm going to draw on that particular incentives." I don't know if that's Maybe five isn't that large enough. I'm I'm just saying our program is competing with other programs that give substantially more. >> Well taken for sure. the business administrator to make a change that way. >> I would like to state that I prefer to pay my employees that are working for me the money versus those that are leaving. Okay. >> I just I want to respond to that more generally if I may. We have tried different things. We tried changing tried getting people to to let us know earlier. We've tried to cut down on the number of cascading effects there are in people moving around and we'll continue

137to do that. This fall together to begin particularly the administrative positions and how administrative pool in hand so that we can make appointments as quickly as possible. So we are looking again at another option and that which we've used in the last two years. >> One step in the right direction in that vein is the implementation of the new administrative interim position that we just recently hired for West High School. Um so we're I I think that is going to help us have an internal pool that we're able to draw from as well. should be able to help us in filling some of those internal vacancies. >> Thank you. And that leads me to just one last question and Logan, while you're here, um you know, the board's been talking a lot about efficiencies, norms,

138and how we follow up to these things. Do you both have a recommendation on when we might want to revisit that? I guess it's kind of like a pilot, right, where we're starting kind of small and seeing how it plays out. stand upon or what have you. Is there a time frame how this has worked this intern program has worked out at West the candidate that's taken that position? >> Um, one person might be hard to give too much. It's not quite a pilot because it's just one person. So, our idea is um that we would look in this coming year to implement a broader assistant principal type training program which would be this intern position. Um so we want to hire that for the coming year. So we don't quite have a pilot in

139place yet for that kind of position but >> yeahward in fact we could probably give you information on how we want to set that up in the spring. >> Yeah. I think I would want to look at that in two two ways. one when we're looking at the new budget for the next school year as well as around the summertime of next year to see like how it went with the one position that we have, but also looking earlier in the early winter to be able to see what funding might we have available for the upcoming year to implement a more robust program. >> Um, if there's no further discussion, >> I was gone so I if this question was asked, but do we know if our like our title one schools I'm just wondering

140about are are those schools somewhat difficult to to keep all of the teachers in? I don't know. >> That's the million-dollar question. The It depends on the position to be honest. Um like was mentioned earlier, the positions that are most hard to fill are special education, secondary math, secondary science. Um those really are the most difficult and it's primarily because there are fewer qualified candidates in the state than there are positions. Um so it's easy for me to say those are the ones that are hardest because there there aren't enough licensed individuals in those areas um to really fit the need of all the schools in the state. Um, but your question to title one schools versus non-title one schools. Uh, I don't know the exact number or ratio of the current positions that we

141have open. It does typically take a little bit longer to fill positions at title one schools. It is we we have good success in filling those positions. Um thankfully the federal programs for teacher loan forgiveness help with uh incentivizing early career educators into those positions because they have high u financial incentives to work in title one schools. Um but it is a challenge for sure something we're constantly looking for. >> Of course with that I'll go ahead and start a roll call vote with board member Anderson. >> Ashley Anderson. Yes. Johnson. Yes. >> Amanda Williams. Yes. >> Bryce. Yes. >> Charlotte F. Jefferson. Yes. >> Thank you, Board. Moving on to item number nine, reclassification of the construction project manager position. >> I move that we reclassify the construction project manager position as attached in

142exhibit 3B, 3B9. >> Is there a second? >> Second by Amanda and discussion. >> Ashley. I asked that this be pulled just because I wanted to make a point of clarification that in February our board approved the title and probable lane of this position. And when we made that approval, I understood the implication to be that this would come back for discussion when we had approved the actual cost. Not because I think the discussion would be controversial or people wouldn't want to reclassify this position. It's obviously well explained in the memo that it's revenue neutral, but especially because our district is so often criticized for having administrative expenses. to whether or not that's always justifiable as our business administrator will regularly point out in his presentations. But I think it's important that when there's an

143ongoing addition of an administrative role, um there be a public discussion about how it will be funded with public tax dollars, even if that discussion will be really limited and just give our business administrator a chance to explain um the way in which this was neutral and the job study that was done, however briefly. I think that there's two ways that that could happen based on our current governing structure and one is to place it on the discussion agenda so we can describe what happened um to the public and then make a decision as board. The other would be that our finance committee is tasked in our handbook with the form and content of financial information that comes to the board and advising on other information items as needed. So if it was preferable to

144consent rather than discuss, it'd be helpful if at least three board members kind of owned this decision so that board members who weren't part of the discussion would be able to have their questions answered and there would be some institutional memory about how the job was created, why it was changed, and some accountability to the public. So, with that in mind, obviously, I made the motion to approve it because I think it's really reasonable, but I'm hopeful that our business administrator would be permitted to just speak quickly to why the lane was changed as a result of a job study and explain for the public that what we had previously um given approval for in February is revenue neutral despite the increase of the overall costs for the employee. >> Just clarification, you use the

145word administrative salary. I just be clear this is not an administrator sometimes that gets >> correct >> administrative position meaning non-educator >> position >> thank you >> um so first so when when this was approved as noted in the memo was approved on lane G of the >> the exempt salary schedule is what it's called uh so we posted it as as that lane with the qualifications that were required in the job description and we didn't attract any qualified candidates to fill the position and you know since that was February this has been several months so we um we reconvened a discussion looked at the qualifications and looked at the salary and because the best test of are you at market salary is put it out there and see who applies. So we were we

146determined we're low. So we're recommending uh the the two-lane change to that. In addition, there's another position uh income is currently retired. We we've reallocated some of the the qualificate some of the um tasks of that position and we've lowered that position before it gets posted. Um that's technically it's a net savings of a couple hundred dollars, but that's close to net zero. So, so there there's no additional budget required by this position because any increase is being absorbed by the decrease in. >> Thank you. >> Any further discussion, questions, comments. >> Seeing none, we'll go ahead and start with a roll call vote with vice president. >> Ryan Jensen, yes. >> Amanda, yes. >> One, yes. >> Charlotte P Jefferson, yes. Ashley Henderson, yes. Thank you, board. Moving on to a new board policy

147P14. I will entertain a motion. >> I make a motion to approve board policy P14 as posted. >> Second. >> Have a motion in a second. I don't have any discussion. Seeing none, we'll start the roll call vote with board member Williams. >> Bryce Williams. Yes. >> Charlotte F. Jefferson. Yes. >> Ashley Anderson, yes. >> Nick Salazar, yes. Yes. >> Thank you, board. Um, moving on to our final action agenda item, uh, which is the, um, >> yes, um, the long-term closure and district reconfiguration recommendations. Um, per our policy, we need two separate approvals or action taken. Uh, we would need one for innovations and we would need a separate one for Washington. >> Um, I I move that the board approve the further study of Innovations Early College High School for potential long-term closure.

148>> Is there a second to the motion? >> Second. >> Any further discussion? Seeing none, we'll start with a roll call vote. >> Charlotte Ferson, yes. Ashley Anderson, yes. >> Yes. >> Brian Johnson, yes. >> Amanda, yes. >> Bryce, yes. passes. Thank you. And a motion regarding Washington. >> I move that the board approve the further study of Washington Elementary School program. >> Second motion to second. Any further discussion? >> Um I I know we've got to finish this one. I would ask that we clarify the motion that that is for the some proper terminology there. >> I thought I said magnet school. Is there another term? >> Well, magnet to me is >> Oh, it's our new name for the ELP program, >> but it's the program. >> The AMP, it's magneted. Just all

149right. >> Forget >> it's a yeah a name change. >> Yes. Our board governing documents indicate that it's important for people to identify the reason for an abstension. So I wanted to remind both my colleagues and the public that because I have a student in the magnet program at Washington, I choose to abstain from voting on this program as a potential conflict. I realize this is a procedurally required redundancy and the program is already discontinued, but I'm behind. Any further discussion? Seeing none, we will start with a roll call. >> Ryan Jensen, yes. >> Longway, yes. >> Bryce, yes. >> Charlotte Ferson, yes. Ashley Anderson abstain. That motion passes. Thank you board. We have concluded our action agenda. We will move into our report section being that we have a little bit of extra time

150uh than we anticipated which is good. Super >> I do have a few things. Um, first just to give a shout out to our team, um, our district leaders, our executive directors and directors for the really impressive and effective administrative institute that was held this last week, Monday through Thursday, was training for all of our school administrators. Um, they heard from most of the district offices and um, was a really I think it was an effective event and I Just want to give a shout out to the team for all the work that goes into preparing for that. You know that our teachers are back on Tuesday. Um we have plans too for professional development those first days for teachers as well. So that'll happen on the 12th and the 13th. And I can give

151an early shout out to the team for all the work they've done on that. They've been planning for months to have meaningful sessions available for teachers when they return on the 12th. Um, also a shout out to the team that put together the website um and got us up and running with the new provider. Uh, our contract with the old provider ended so that we had to start August 1st, which isn't an ideal date when we're also trying to register students. Um, but I know they've been working hard on that and the new website looks good. We're going to continue to update some pages over the coming days and get that going. I also wanted to mention to the board there's the committed to excellence um breakfast with stakeholders and administrators Thursday morning. Um encourage

152you to attend. It's a nice event where we also get to honor our teachers and counselors and classified staff of the year. Um those folks who help make this district tick and make us unique. And so it's a nice time that way. There is one more thing I want to raise and that is the registration challenges. I appreciate the board members who have let me know and have been so clear with our IT department about what the actual challenges are. I wanted to give you a little bit of background and let families know that um we have received requests for support on registration. Um 174 of those have been closed. So, we're out on six of those requests. I want you to know that you're hearing from people who are frustrated and deservedly so with

153some of the problems that we've had. One was the website dropped off. That was our provider who had an internet internet dropage. That wasn't on us, but the provider did. So, the website was out um for too long during the registration um time right now that we're in. 98,000 students. 9800 Let me say that again. We we've really grown 9,800 students. Over 50% of our students have registered. We just have 1,400 registered today. Um and if parents are unable, if families are unable to get their students registered, I appreciate board members have been directing them to the web page where there's a form to submit. That's the one that the IT department is getting on and trying to provide feedback to families um about what's happened. I also wanted to say some of these problems

154have come because we've um asked families to put in a new person personal identification number, their PIN in order to access the registration portal. Um, we're not doing that to bug everybody to get their PIN changed, but rather because of the recent P school breach that happened last year, as well as the audit that the IT department has held to try and understand our security um, weaknesses. This is one way to fortify our student data. So, we're asking families to put in a new PIN so that we can upgrade our security on their data in particular. So, we know it's an extra that's kind of bothersome um at times uh but also it's meant to be help student um data secure. Please continue to reach out to the help get desk fill out forms if

155you're finding trouble with registration. Also our registars and school secretaries are back today. So this is the first day that we get the rest of the complement of employees that are supporting this work, including our middle school and high school counselors. So again, they're just beginning now. So now we have the people in place that can help start to solve some of the challenges ahead and make sure families are able to get registered. And um please know we're trying to fix the problems as fast as we discover them. And I appreciate the board members are helping us see those so that we can respond to them. Okay. I just wanted to um I told you I sent out an email about the Salt Lake Education Foundation that I attended as leadership was. I I thought

156that it was a a very um productive meeting. But to me, one of the things that was really wonderful is to see the support of the foundation, how they unanimously, the board unanimously approved supporting these three projects that are before us right now. The Highland and West High Clinic Health Clinics, the rebuilds, the track and then oh yeah the CT excuse me. Um there was a conversation about each of those and we were tasked with being on a project board members. So I'm reporting to you that I am on the island and west wasn't there. So >> you're covering this on the CTE. >> Okay. Then the other um report that I would it's not a report but just a reminder past USDA experience would dictate there is a policy webinar tomorrow provided by USDA

157and I think those are really beneficial policy >> I'm wondering if maybe we could start at that We always start here and then sometimes I take other board members. >> I still >> along with the conversation about the website switch over and the struggles with the registration process. I would just kind of emphasize that to the school counselors um extra patience with the students as they're trying to look at um their um school schedules and restructuring them. For example, today was the first day at H High School that they had a three-hour block for students to go and address um their schedules and get them corrected. And after three hours in the weight line, it got shut down with students not being able to meet with their counselors. So, there are much needed changes outside

158of just because um and so just hopefully being really patient and really working to help these kids get the schedule that they really need for their future interests and whatot. >> Brian did steal my thunder. So, no, you're totally you're fine. And the only other thing I was going to bring up is the uh issue with registration which the superintendent addresses. >> Yeah, I have a couple things. I don't have specific committee business to report because the committees I serve on have not convened since the last meeting. But I did want to with the precinct 5 vacancy, we should be considering potential associated shuffling of our committees and our thoughts. Um, I also appreciate the attention paid to the website rollout difficulties in the superintendent report. And I will confess that I have not been

159able to successfully register either of my kids because not all the required links are active in powers school for their school handbooks, which I'm required to say that I saw. Um, I think my house has two local six unresolved tickets, but I do appreciate that it staff are using the comment box and correcting items as quickly as possible. But I did want to note that as a schoolboard member, if I have challenges despite having the best the best access to the latest information and the staff who can help, I think there are certainly a greater number of parents having difficulty who may not understand who to reach out to. And if there are things we can do as board members, part of being an elected official is ensuring our communities have access to information with

160things like big changes. So I would just implore um the district office use us as a tool to be able to get the word out to comm community to the community even that changes are coming so that we can better describe like things that will be happening. And in related news, I think that it's been a challenge that some of our comprehensive high schools have released student schedules while others have not. And in many cases, I've opposed in these meetings top down directives. I know our schools need flexibility, but realistically all of our high school students should have access to their schedules and counseling services at the same time so that that equivalent access can ensure their needs are met as the year kicks off. And I think I don't want to dis diminish how

161hard everyone has to work at the start of the year. I just think we we keep hearing the next solution for this is coming. It's coming. It's coming. And it really I can't stress enough that as a parent if I have not been able to register my two kids I know that this is a challenge for people in the community. Um the last I want to express some jealousy. I have noticed on peer board social media pages that a lot of boards are invited to things like admin institute and welcomes to faculty and I would love to be more included in that to celebrate the administrators and teachers who are coming back to our buildings. Thank you. Okay. Well, I'm looking forward to going to some back to school nights and um in my district

162and also just starting the year off um really, you know, intentionally trying to um um form get to know the admin um and the SEC chairs and when they meet and get on that schedule so that I can really go to all all the schools in my precinct. And I was recently um invited to attend um kind of a summit. I guess it was they there was a group of of education um advocates who or organizations that got together and our assistant superintendent um Dr. Ruiz was there. Um so it was called Utah Thriving. Um there was they issued a report that started in under the governor's office in the multicultural affairs department. Um and this was the second one the part two. The first report was about workforce um development but this is about

163education and specifically reducing disparities through legacy strategies. But what I liked about this is that um the organizers um it's the Utah Center for Economic Opportunity and Belonging and Utah University of Utah College of Education and University Neighborhood Partners are brought together cross- sector um working on collaboration cross- sector and bipartisan um to to support to make sure our students are getting, you know, all students are getting their needs met in our state. And um but one they they they have like seven different strategies for for helping our students thrive. And it's to create an environment of belonging for all to support families and bolster communities. Focus on early childhood opportunities. Provide mental health supports. Enable postsecondary opportunities. Enhance experiential and career connected learning. Improve data collection and access. And this is this is all

164at all different levels of education, state, district, and our, you know, our our district. So, um, a lot of it we're doing and working on, but I think there's ways things we can improve on. And so, I'm hoping that our district is going to be a part of it. And, um, I don't know if um, Dr. Ree wants to talk about it if we have any time. I don't know. But that's all for now. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I'll go ahead and use my time and just remind board members that we do have the third post session um after board member reports. So sit tight. Um I have one uh board member report for myself um and then one um representing board member B. The first one representing myself is we had a really really

165good um board retreat um just a few days ago on Saturday. Um we we met here at the district office um which someone was like that's not a retreat name that's just another board meeting but nonetheless we actually did talk about maybe changing the name of board retreat for next year. Um but we talked um in bulk about our board norms which includes a lot of communication efficiencies um how we operate work um amongst ourselves with our superintendent, our VA, um all district personnel. Uh we conducted um a board evaluation. We got to hear the results for that evaluation on Saturday as well. Um which in the same vein is what you just presented, Charlotte, there's always room for improvement. Um the unique element uh for me, which um I know our board members talk

166a lot about without actually having some data to back it up, um is community engagement. that was the one category um that we all identified as board members where we can do a much better job as a board and as a district. Um so we'll be working on those things um moving forward and throughout um this coming next calendar year. Uh we did decide that we would host um board retreats at least until there's a better name um and schoolboard evaluations as well every June. So um so nonetheless um I'm really excited about that. That's something that um a lot of us have been working on for a while. So thank you for your initiative and your participation in that. Um my last u piece here for my board report um and board member Bade's

167final action as a board member being that his uh resignation goes into effect um this evening. Um he asked me to read just a brief statement um since he wasn't able to be here tonight. Um so this is from uh to the community, friends, family, students, and community of Salt Lake City School District. After months of financial, emotional, and mental strain, my family and I could no longer carry the weight of the long legal fight and the risk of trial despite my innocence. While I will always treasure having been elected to serve our community, I will no longer be participating as a school board member by the end of the day today. Please keep my family and me in your prayers as we heal from this painful experience. And with that, I will seek a

168motion to move into close session. >> I move that the board go into close executive session, discuss pending a reasonably imminent litigation in the deployment of security personnel, devices, or systems, and that the board adorn immediately upon the conclusion of close session. >> Second motion, a second on the table. Any discussion? Seeing none, we start with a roll call vote with >> Bryce Johnson. >> Charlotte, yes. Ash Anderson, yes. >> Johnson, yes. >> Amanda Long, yes. >> Motion passes. Thank you community, everybody that's joining us online and in person for your participation in this. Thank you.