Issaquah School District Board Meeting 01/29/2026

001Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Okay, we will begin our agenda tonight with public comment. Uh public comment is an opportunity for the board to receive public statements on items not listed on the meeting agenda for possible board action. If you have a point of view for the specific agenda items, um I'll ask you to hold your comment until that particular agenda item. Public comment time is not intended to raise an issue unique to a particular student, staff member, or an administrator. Rather, it is your time to provide your insights on issues more generally and of a wider concern. As a general rule, the board will not respond to public

002comment. I ask you to begin your comments by clearly stating your name in your attendance area. Please limit your comments to two minutes. We will be using a timer and the board neither endorses nor censors any opinions expressed during public comment. Please keep your comments civil and respectful and avoid personal attacks on others. In a place of applause, you can acknowledge a speaker by lifting your hands and wave in a waving motion like this. And we will start public comment with those in the room, then go to those um whose hands are raised in Zoom. So, let's start here. And if I'm if I mispronounce your name, please correct me. Okay. Uh so we will start with Patricia Matthysse. >> Hi. Can you Is it on? Yeah. Okay. I'm Patricia Matisse. I'm here um from

003the Liberty High School attachment area. I'm going to read this because it's very emotional for me, so I apologize in advance. I am here tonight to address the board to ask you to drive for change. On January 13th at 8:15, we received a message from the principal via an email about a thread. I followed up with my child, the teachers, and the principal. Isn't school district didn't call law enforcement Tuesday. Parents did. We love these kids. Studies show that a supportive environment and gun locks prevent school shootings. I'm asking the board to analyze the current plan. I don't need the same polished message. I need a clear explanation. I need to know that law enforcement has been notified and they can enforce an extreme risk protection if needed. Terrorizing loving parents with pre-prepared standard templants

004doesn't feel like a supportive environment. and not engaging law enforcement certainly isn't going to get a gun out of the hands of a child who needs help. I beg you, please don't tell us to trust you. Show us that we should trust you. Thank you. Next up is Veil Crane. Hello, my name is Vale Crane. I'm in my 30th year teaching ma math at Isiqua High School. I'm here today to address the OE14 monitoring report discussed on January 15th. On page 8, section 4.3, it states that the instructional program should offer students opportunities to develop talents and interests in specialized areas, including accelerated courses that lead to equitable learning opportunities beginning in 9th grade, and access to unique opportunities, college in the high school, and advanced placement at all comprehensive high schools. This was interpreted

005to mean that all progressions for mathematics and sequences in English um include for the comprehensive high school's AP courses. The OE14 report specifically cited that the addition of AP pre-calculus at Isiqua High School this year was evidence of progress. I'd also like to paraphrase a board member who said it is about the students, not the adults. With that in mind, it is inexcusable that AP pre-calculus has been removed from Isqua High School, which is clearly the desire of many students, families, and the community. Data from IHS shows that fewer than 15 total students, which is less than 5% of our pre-calculus enrollment chose to pursue CHS credit through Belleview College, while 119 students have signed up for AP pre-calculus exam, which is 45% of our pre-calculus enrollment. Curricular decisions should be made by the experts

006in the field. Yet, professional teaching staff at any high school were not involved in the decision to convert all onle pre-calculus to college in the high school. The IHS math department this fall brought to the district a proposal to bring back regular pre-calculus. We were told that was not an option. We aren't this um why aren't the staff that are teaching CHS or AP pre-calculus being asked about removing the option for students? Why haven't educators of CHS been asked by leadership if it's feasible to merge AP pre-calculus content? If it was asked, our staff would explain that the pacing and breadth of content covered by CHS leaves no room for adjustments. Please reconsider your directive. >> Thank you. Next is Leah Caples. >> Carpeno. Oh, I'm sorry. Good reading. >> Good evening. My name is

007Leah Carpeno. Uh this year I have the opportunity to teach the new offering of on level algebra 2 at Isqua High School. I have formerly taught algebra 2 before the change in offerings happened this year. Reflecting on my experiences, I am deeply concerned with the district's unilateral decision to only offer CHS pre-calculus at IHS. This will result in a bottleneck of students who wish to study calculus deeply and those who just need pre-calculus on their transcript to be competitive for their desired college. Prior to the school year, teaching algebra 2 was always a challenge due to the diverse range of students abilities and post-secary plans. Classes had a mixture of students grades 9th through 11th, and they sometimes included eighth graders and seniors in the same classroom, too. Imagine trying to bridge a gap of

008five grade levels in the same classroom, all while teaching a jam-packed pacing of Common Core standards. If that isn't hard enough, imagine doing that at a level so that all students could take pre-calculus their next year. The single offering of algebra 2 created a bottleneck resulting in a lot of challenges for students. This year, the new offering of onle algebra 2 has been a great decision to support students by introducing more pathways. Students with no desire to study AP calculus or major in STEM can still meet the NCAA requirement for of algebra 2 for being university ready mathematically. Students who do want to study advanced math classes can opt into advanced algebra 2. I applaud you for adding more pathways to equitably support students. But please learn from this case study of pathways for algebra

0092 and the former bottleneck. Listen to my colleagues who will talk about how important it is to have the choice of AP pre-calculus for our advanced students. Honor page 13 of your OE14 monitoring report from two weeks ago that uses the addition of AP pre-calculus at IHS as evidence of meeting O14. Thank you. >> Thank you. Next is Roshelle Eisenberger. >> Hello, my name is Michelle Eisenberger. I'm an Isiqua High School math teacher and I'm here to talk about AP pre-calculus. I have taught pre-calculus every year at IHS since I was hired in 2004. That's about 1,600 pre-calculus students over the last 22 years. I confidently say I'm an expert in this field. AP pre-calculus at IHS in its first year is hands down the best preparation we have offered our students who intend to

010take calculus-based courses. Over the years, we have tried to adjust our onle pre-calculus to better meet the needs of the collegebound students and also for those that do not want to be APbound. The scope and sequence for AP pre-calculus does not cover the breadth of the Belleview College course content. Instead, it adds rigor and depth in essential topics like rates of change, algebraic manipulation of functions, and communicating the why behind the mathematical phenomenon. This is far more than any pre-calculus course goes in depth at inqua school district or Belleview College. I have also taught calculus at IHS for the last 13 years. I am so excited to see this group of AP pre-calculus students transition to calculus. This group demonstrates depth of understanding, strong communication more than I've ever seen in my 22 years. Removing

011AP pre-calculus is a disservice to our students. Currently, we have four sections of AP pre-calculus students and invite you to come and meet those students and see the rich learning opportunities they have. And if your decision truly is based on student experience, please know that I am one of your students. I excelled at Liberty quite a while ago, earning A's in math through pre-calculus and then I struggled when I got to AP calculus and I did drop the course my senior year. If I had access to stronger pathways earlier, I believe I could have completed calculus in high school instead of waiting until I got to college. So, as a former student and an experienced educator, please hear this. Don't take this opportunity away from the ISD students. They can push themselves and be better

012prepared for future calculusbased courses. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Ben Reed. >> Hi, Ben Reed. Uh, math department Isqua High School. I have 23 years of classroom experience and have taught nearly every uh level of mathematics at IHS. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. I'm here tonight to advocate for students and equitable access to prep to college preparation. I urge the board members to reconsider the decision to eliminate AP pre-calculus. This decision was made in the name of equity and alignment, but denying opportunities to students who are wellprepared to rise to that challenge does not create equity. It creates barriers. Equity means we provide clear pathways and robust supports, enabling all of our students to pursue their goals. Staff were notified of this change after the course proposal deadline. We had no recourse

013to adjust course offerings. We appealed to the district and asked for an additional offering and we were told there was no such avenue because the decision originated from this board. Skyline has IB math pathways that serve the same purpose as AP pre-calculus which we cannot offer at Liberty and IHS. Eliminating AP pre-calculus leaves us with one pre-calculus option. This year the district recognized uh the various abilities of students. Eliminating a pre pre-calculus contradicts that approach and it restricts student choice and it weakens student preparedness for calculusbased coursework. You are taking away the preferred option to earn college credit from what is likely 45% of our pre-calculus enrollment next year. If your decisions are about serving students and not the agenda of certain adults, members of this board included, then IHS students have made their need

014and desire for this course unmistakably clear. The solution is simple and equitable. Offer AP AP pre-calculus at our comprehensive high schools. Let student enrollment determine demand and task leadership with allocating resources to meet needs. More broadly, please stop removing valuable learning opportunities from our students under the guise of equity. Equity and uniformity are not the same. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, next is Lauren Bartholomew. Good evening. I'm Lauren Bartholomew and I'm here to talk about High School 4, which you guys have on the agenda again tonight and I'm super excited to see this conversation continue. When I went to review what you guys are going to review tonight, I had a visceral visceral reaction and a little panic. Um, having advocated for this high school for 12 years now, seeing that it may be

015a choice school, I think is a choice word that doesn't feel good. It feels exclusive, not inclusive. It feels some, not all. It feels small classrooms. This doesn't change the experience of all of our high school students. And I'm concerned about that. So, what I'm asking is that the board um do what they have talked about for such a long time. for each student to be known by name, strength, and I forget the third thing. >> Need a specialty high school doesn't necessarily do that. I can dream big, too, and I can dream with you, but it needs to more than anything relieve the crowding at Isakiqua High School and Skyline High School. And if the expectation is that it's a one teacher to 30 teacher ratio at those high schools, it should be the

016same at this high school. that those exper those experiences should be the same regardless of programming. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh next up is Ayam Faker and Aush. Hi. Uh, my name is Ion Sacker and I go to Pine Lake Middle School and I'm part of a local robotics team called Future Martians. I'm here today because students like me are interested in STEM and robotics, but we're running out of space and opportunities to explore it. Right now, the st the the demand for STEM is growing. Robotics teams, coding clubs, and and engineering programs fill out almost immediately. Many students are turned away, not because there's a lack of interest, but because we don't have enough space to support all these students who want to learn about STEM. >> Your concern is for the school.

017>> Most robotics teams start out of garages, borrowed classrooms, or temporary spaces. Some teams had to reject dozens or even hundreds of students. uh and others travel hours away just to practice on a regular robotics field. That's time that we could be using to strengthen our learning about uh collaboration and build. This isn't a motivation problem. It's an access problem. As our community grows and develops, we need learning spaces that matches the interests and ambitions of students today. Not just traditional classrooms, but environments that include hands-on learning. What's up, guys? I'm Aush. Um, I'm also on the same robotics team as Ayon. And today, we're asking you to consider making the new school a choice STEM focused high school with the district-wide tech center open to all students and robotics teams. Imagine a shared space

018with robotics shops, computer science labs, maker spaces, and 3D printers, which are collaborative classrooms and open areas where students from different backgrounds and interests can work together. This new STEM focused school wouldn't just support robotics. It would support creativity and innovation across multiple different disciplines. A STEM school and a tech center would also support equity. Right now, there are classrooms full of kids who want to do robotics and don't have the resources to do so. This would level the playing field and give every student access to highquality STEM experiences. The smaller footprint of the new school, it isn't a limitation. It's an opportunity to think differently and design intentionally. With all that said, our community is ready to help. We've spoken to so many parents, engineers, mentors, and even local companies who want to partner

019with the district to make this successful. You know, we're asking you to be bold, to listen to the students, and to invest in a future focused school that reflects who our community is and where we're going. Thanks for your time and support. Thank you. Next is Molly Peterson. Good evening. I'm Molly Peterson, Skyline High School Humanities Department co-chair. I'm here to object to the conditions that the school board has placed on the manner in which the superintendent and the district interprets OE14, which mandates AP courses at Skyline High School. I was informed by my principal last week and it was further clarified by Rich Melish from Teaching and Learning Today that the district is being required to interpret OE14 in a manner that directly leads to the elimination of Skyline's block model starting immediately for

020the 2026 2027 school year. The decision by the district to eliminate the integrated learning model known as the block model to meet the demands outlined by the board has been made without teacher, student or family engagement. Let me be clear, this is a fundamental alteration to the way humanities courses are structured at Skyline. Students will no longer have the choice to pursue integrated learning as a pathway to success. As a total aside, the building was physically, literally designed for this method of instruction. I object to this decision. I am sorry to all the Skyline families who will find out about this terrible loss in just a couple weeks when they go to sign up for their classes and their students are unable to register for the classes they had been planning to take. I am

021asking that you change your conditions for the implementation of OE14. Let us work together to offer students the right kind of choice. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you. Uh next up is Stephen. Uh good evening. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Steph Tolenin. I'm a national board certified educator at Maywood with 25 years experience as a classroom teacher and five as a parah. My daughters also attend Maywood and Liberty. My professional background has shaped my understanding of how systems must function to protect those who are most vulnerable. I'm here because I believe in this district's commitment to safe, respectful, equitable, and inclusive learning environments for all students and staff. District Regulation 3207 prohibits harassment, intimidation, bullying, and retaliation. Regulation 3210 requires prompt and effective action when discrimination may create

022a hostile environment. These are not optional ideals. They are board adopted commitments. Yet since 2023, families, students, and staff at Maywood continue to report serious behavioral and safety concerns that are inconsistently addressed or just dismissed, particularly when harm occurs across student groups and staff. This reflects system level gaps in supervision, implementation of behavior plans, reporting, and follow through. When reports are minimalized um minimized rather than fully investigated, truth erodess, fear of retaliation grows and students and staff experience ongoing anxiety and distress and report feeling unsafe. This is not about individual incidents. It is about whether our district's values are upheld in practice. I respectfully ask the board to ensure families and staff can rely on clear and trustworthy reporting, that district policies are followed consistently, and that a neutral third party reviews the evidence, verifies

023compliance, and tracks outcomes over time so problems are actually fixed. This duty of care is written into policy and grounded in the public trust you hold. Tonight, I ask that it be fully met. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you. Next up is Michelle Bennett. >> Greetings. My name is Michelle Bennett and I have three students in the Isqua School District, including two at Maywood Middle School. I'm writing to formally raise serious concerns regarding student safety, discipline, and the overall learning environment within our school. I have worked as a law enforcement officer for the last 35 years, and I'm surprised at many things happening at my children's school. Students are being placed in an environment that is increasingly unsafe, both physically and emotionally. Ongoing security concerns, a lack of adequate supervision, and repeated failures

024to intervene have contributed to escalating incidents that were predictable and preventable. This represents a clear breakdown in the school's duty of care and reflects negligent oversight that can no longer be ignored. Discipline and accountability have eroded significantly. Inconsistent enforcement of policies, a lack of meaningful consequences, and zero follow-through have created a culture where misconduct is tolerated rather than corrected. This breakdown in discipline has fostered a climate of impunity, undermining both student safety and the integrity of the learning environment. Bullying and harassment are ongoing and pervasive. Reports of chronic bullying, intimidation, and targeted peer-to-p peer aggression have gone unressed, creating a hostile environment for affected students. There are growing concerns about retaliation, which further discourages reporting and allows harmful behavior to continue unchecked. These failures disproportionately impact marginalized students and contribute to an uninclusive school environment.

025Many students no longer feel a sense of belonging. Trust is eroded and the environment has become emotionally unsafe. This is a systemic issue, not a series of isolated incidents. The mental health impact on students is profound. Anxiety, fear, and emotional distress are becoming normalized, and students in crisis are not receiving adequate trauma-informed support. Student well-being is being actively compromised. This board has a responsibility to act. What is needed now is transparent communication, immediate corrective action, and a data-driven response that includes both short and long-term solutions. Oversight, monitoring, and measurable outcomes must be implemented to ensure accountability and restore trust. Our children are entitled to learn in an environment where they are protected, supported, and able to thrive. At present, that standard is not being met. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, next is Jeannie Walford. >>

026Good evening. I'm Jeannie Walford. I am a parent. Uh had a student in this district um since he was in kindergarten and now he attends Maywood Middle School. Uh I also have 29 years as a career law enforcement officer and express some of the same concerns as Michelle. Uh I'm speaking today because I'm deeply concerned about the ongoing threats and bullying at my child's school. And what I see is a lack of consistent administrative followup for when these issues are reported. Uh my no child should go to school feeling unsafe. Yet repeated incidents of bullying and threats have created an environment where students and families are very anxious uh unsure of whether or not the concerns are being taken seriously or resolved effectively uh to the point where they're actually calling law enforcement before their

027law enforcement is aware of a situation at the school. uh when reports are made uh meaningful action does not follow and it erodess trust and uh students are left feeling like nothing is being done. I am worried about my child's safety but also about the safety of the school, the teachers and the other students at the school and the staff as a whole. Uh schools must be proactive, transparent and accountable when it comes to threats and bullying. Clear communication and timely intervention and consistent enforcement policies are essential. They're not optional. I'm asking the board to ensure the administrators at Maywood are held accountable for responding appropriately to these incidents and that safety protocols are reviewed and enforced and that parents are informed when concerns are raised and addressed. Families need to know when we speak

028up, our voices matter, and we want our children protected. Our students deserve a learning environment where they feel safe, supported, and heard. I urge the board to take these concerns seriously, and take the steps to address them. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, did I miss anyone? I feel like I may have missed someone. Did anyone in the Camille, right? Yeah. Someone else, you were on the list. Come up to the podium. introduce yourself. Sorry. >> Good evening and thank you for the opportunity to speak here this evening. My name is Julie Hartell and I have been teaching high school math in the state of Washington for 35 years and the last date being at Isiqua High School. You earlier heard statements, statistics and logic from my colleagues. So I would like to leave you

029with a few final thoughts. If district and board decisions are to be data-driven, it is incomprehensible that the board's directive is to prohibit IHS from offering AP pre-calculus. The reason given to the IHS math department was that it would be unfair for Isiqua High School to offer the course when Skyline could not, particularly since offerings are meant to reflect student choice. However, the three high schools already differ significantly in their math offerings. Skyline is allowed to offer two additional pre-calculus courses, SLMath 1 and preHL math, while IHS is being restricted to a single CHS college in the high school pre-calculus option. This means Skyline students will have three pre-calculus options next year while AHS students will only have one. How is that equitable or fair? So, I am left with these unanswered questions. Why the

030district decision was made without input from students or the community. Why the district decision was made without input from the staff teaching these courses and supporting the students. Why the district decision was made without supporting data that indicates only 5% of pre-calculus students want college in the high school whereas 45% of pre-calculus students want an AP option. why the decision contradicts the monitoring report delivered only two weeks ago listing AP pre-calculus as a class planned and launched this year along with AP music theory and AP African-American studies and why most importantly this decision limits students opportunities thereby eliminating the preferred course option for IHS students who will take pre-calculus next year thank you very much >> thank you Camille Ray are you in the room yes okay thank you. Sorry I I missed you on

031the list. >> Good evening, Camille. Wright. Um I'm here as a middle school teacher at Maywood Middle School to talk about what is happening in our school. We're hearing about and seeing more fights, more bullying, more unsafe situations, and many of them are predictable and preventable. There is not enough supervision, and when problems happen, students and staff are not consistently protected. We're being asked to teach and learn in a hostile environment that is physically and emotionally unsafe. Harassment, intimidation, and peer-to-peer aggression are ongoing. Students report what is happening, but it often goes unressed. Many are afraid of retaliation by their peers, so they stop speaking up. Targeted students are left in classrooms where they feel threatened instead of supported. Staff are also placed in unsafe situations without clear backing or consistent response. Discipline is inconsistent.

032Some behaviors have consequences and others do not. Policies exist, but they are being not being enforced. This lack of follow-through has created a culture where bullying and disruptive behavior are tolerated and misconduct becomes normal. That puts both students and staff at risk. This is taking a serious toll on mental health. I see anxiety, fear, and emotional distress in students. And I see burnout and frustration in staff. Students who should be focused on learning are focused on staying safe. We talk about trauma-inforced care, but students in crisis are not receiving it in a meaningful manner. This is system is a systematic issue. It requires clear expectations, consistent consequences, and transparent communication. We need immediate action and long-term plans with oversight and measurable results. This board has a duty of care to both students and staff. Right

033now, that duty is not being met. Our school deserves safe classrooms, consistent discipline, and a climate where people feel protected and supported. Thank you for listening. >> Thank you. Is there anyone else in the room that wanted to give public comment that did not sign up? Please, yeah, introduce yourself at the podium. >> Good evening, everyone. My name is Ashley K. Smith and I have two um sophomores at Skyland and a previous graduate. Um I am excuse me I am commenting on um asking you to revoke the idea of um I don't know the actual term the ueI or it was something you said UE I don't know O I think um but to to overturn that my daughter currently is in um the block honors class and she is thriving. She absolutely loves being

034in that class and being able to navigate the conversation between English and history is so important um to her. Um and so um I don't know other students experiences. I know my daughter's and she she has A's in both those classes and um and not only because she has A's but the way that she shows up at home of in those conversations that we're having about the things that they're learning in class. And then on the flip side, my son is in the individual class. I don't know what it's called, the unblocked class, and he is struggling in English um as it relates to his history. Not struggling as in like he has Fs or anything. He has a B, but he is um missing the importance of that conversation between um English and like

035history and how important it is in our society. So, I'm asking you to undo that um decision that you made without community and parent support and teachers and students. Stephen, is anyone on Zoom? No, no public comment. Uh before I close public comment, I uh neglected to open with an agenda item, which is to um state that January is school board recognition month and Superintendent Talek will read the governor's proclamation. >> Great. Thank you. Um as a preface to the proclamation, I do want to on behalf of students, families, and staff of Samish, Isiqua, Newcastle, Reton, Belleview, and other parts of King County that make up the Isiqua school district. I want to thank and appreciate the isqua school board for your dedicated and unwavering service to excellence, innovation, and student success and belonging. Um,

036and now I'll read the proclamation. Proclamation for the state of Washington states, "Whereas the mission of Washington's public school system is to ensure that all students achieve at high levels and possess the knowledge and skills to be responsible residents of democratic society and enjoy productive and satisfying lives." And whereas Washington's 295 locally elected school boards and nine elected educational service district boards are the core of the public education governance system in our state. And whereas the districts and regions they lead serve more than 1.1 million students, have a combined annual budget of over 16 billion and employ approximately 120,000 people. And whereas school directors play a crucial role in promoting student learning and achievement by creating a vision and establishing policies and budgets and setting clear standards of accountability for all involved. And whereas school

037directors are directly accountable to the residents of their districts and regions serving as a vital link between members of the community and their schools. And whereas school directors and educational service district providers provide a passionate voice for advocacy for public schools and the welfare of school children. And whereas as it is appropriate to recognize school directors as outstanding public servants and champions of public education. Now therefore, Bob Ferguson, Governor of the state of Washington, does hereby proclaim January 2026 as schoolboard recognition month in Washington and encourages all people in the state to join him in this special observance. Um, in honor of your service, you have care packages that were carefully um crafted and assembled. Um, I thank our team, especially Nancy Francis, for that support, um, and providing you with a special recognition to

038brighten up your day and to continue to bring light into your life, um, for doing the hard work of serving as a public servant and as a school board director. So, thank you and I will, um, wave my hands in appreciation for you all. >> Thank you, superintendent. Appreciate that. Um, okay. We will close public comment at this point and we will now move on to the next item on our agenda, which is the approval of the consent agenda. Um, the consent agenda is a meeting management tool tool whereby the board is able to pass multiple items with one motion. The consent agenda items have been reviewed by the board prior to the meeting. Any board member may remove an item from the consent agenda and place it on the regular agenda for discussion. Do

039I have a motion? I move the consent agenda be approved as presented >> and I second. >> It has been moved and seconded to approve the consent agenda as presented. All in favor, please say I. >> I. Any oppose say nay. The consent agenda passes. Uh, next up is the establishment of the regular agenda. Superintendent, are there any changes to the regular agenda? Um there are no changes to the cadence and the topics on the agenda, but I do want to note that in this morning before 10 o'clock in the morning, we updated the presentation on the capital projects update. Um this morning with a revised detail uh regarding uh the window of time for which the hearing examiner in Isqua city of Isqua would be reviewing um an appeal process and the window closes

040next Friday instead of tomorrow. So that's the detail that was updated. Okay. Great. Next up is uh a report out on the day of uh on the hill. Um members of the school board and ISD administrators and our student uh representatives attended uh the Isiqua school district's day on the hill in Olympia at the state legislature on January 27th, which was Wednesday, right? Tuesday. Tuesday. Tuesday. Tuesday the 27th. And uh now we will report out on our experiences. Do students perhaps want to start somebody? Yeah. So it was really um an incredible opportunity for us students. We got to specifically talk to legislators about uh concerns in our district and we specifically talked about special education, transportation, um as well as other concerns that we have and that our community has. Um the conversations were

041very beneficial and we had a lot of really good discussions with our to understand exactly what's happening. So that was an incredible opportunity for for us. >> Yes, Rex. Um yeah, I just wanted to share a similar sentiment. Um it was a wonderful opportunity that that we had. Uh each of us as student reps, we got to um learn a little bit more about a specific legislator and learn a little bit more about their background, their specific interests, and we were able to build personal connections, which I really enjoyed. I really appreciated seeing the personal side of the people meant to represent us to the United States government and I was just really appreciative of the whole experience. >> Great. >> Yeah, I had a great time at Down the Hill. It was awesome um

042getting to learn what it was like to go and talk to these legislators and get to express our point of views on different concerns that the board had on different subjects for our district. Um it was really great to be able to talk to them face to face and make it less scary to um talk to people who are in charge in our government and get to like get get to actually use our voices in those places. It was really nice and I thought that was really great of an experience to have especially in high school. Anyone else? Well, Milo, yes. >> Um, I mean, I think everybody kind of hit it on the head. Um, but it was really amazing to be able to go down to our state capital and talk to seven

043of our legislators. It was super fantastic. Um, and we got to talk to them about our specific district issues. um which are I mean very relevant for us right now um like our transportation our MSOC our special education funding sort of things that we're always working towards and we got to read into some of the bills that are going through legislation right now and I mean us as students got to learn a little bit more about the legislative session what goes into that what our representatives do um and so it was definitely a fantastic experience I mean I think everybody should go to Olympia that was Hey, my board colleagues have any? Yeah. >> Okay. Director Anderson. >> So, this was my first time going to the Capitol building. Um, I really enjoyed it as

044much as I'm sure the students did. Um, we tked around about five miles uh around the Capitol building uh going back and forth. I think the highlight for me, the picture came up earlier, we got to uh go to uh the Senate floor, well, not the floor, but look down at the floor. Um and so uh meeting uh Senator Victoria Hunt there um was really neat. Um the student reps did a fantastic job presenting to all the legislators. I couldn't have done this at 17 like all of you did. So um great job. Um thank you to Director Coin and Mullins for uh getting them prepped for it. Um the personal stories that you guys shared I think really hit home with the legislators. Um so great job on preparing for that. Um because this

045is a short short session. Um I think coming in with our asks was a little bit difficult for them um because they're, you know, having to address the entire state's budget problems. Um but we're very lucky to have the representatives that we have because they come from school boards, they come from our city councils. Um, and there really are our partners in Olympia. So, um, I think strengthening our relationship and our partnerships there, um, goes a long way. Uh, one thing President Taylor really pushed on with the legislators is hoping that, um, someone will put forth, uh, or sponsor a bill to address the retail sales tax on temporary staffing services. I think you brought that to every single one of them that we talked to. Um, and that's part of the big three that

046I talked about in our last board meeting. So, I was really glad that we were pushing that because um someone needs to do something about that and get us exempt uh from those sales taxes. So, that was my experience. >> Thank you, >> Director Coin. >> Um I'll just probably uh you know, second what Director Anderson said and what our students said, too. I have such huge respect for our students. They did such an amazing job speaking to our elected officials in Olympia. Um, I also want to note too, just I realize that not everyone gets the experience to go to Olympia and walk through the Capitol building and meet with our, you know, with our legislators. And, um, you know, I think oftentimes I reflect on, gosh, it just seems like legislator, our elected

047officials should be able to flip a switch and just, you know, help us with education funding. But when you're in those halls, the amount of people that are there, I mean, we only had 15 minutes with each of our elected officials. Their days were full. It wasn't that they didn't want to meet with us longer. It's just that they're meeting with so many other constituents and um a lot of different interest groups. So there there's a lot that they have to weigh out and I think again that's why it is complicated. Obviously education funding and support for education is hugely important. But I do know that they're weighing out a lot when they make those decisions and appreciate all that they do. And as Director Anderson said, you know, it was fun because many of

048them obviously have connections to our school board to some that actually graduated from our our schools. So, it was fun to be able to make those connections, too. So, fun day. >> Bullies. >> Um maybe what I'll comment on is our final meeting of the day. So, we did have the opportunity to close the day with uh Secretary um Sen and talk about the joint responsibility, the joint accountabilities we have for Echo Glenn and how we continue to look at um the experience at Echog Glenn, how we provide education in that um at that location, how we make sure that uh all of our students are all of our students. And that takes a bit of a more complex partnership uh as it relates with um the department of I I'm always going to use

049the Chicago references but child and family services um uh and but it's really encouraging six years later to see how that partnership has grown to see the openings um and the openness to how we can continue to improve the services that are offered at that location at Echog Glenn. the process by which we do many things in our programs at that location. Um, so I think that was a really really important conversation. We talk about many things in our district. Uh, but it is great to make sure we're spending time on Echog Glenn because those are our students as well. Um, I just say personally, you know, six years in, it is very different going down to Olympia now. now that I'm like the old one of the old people in in this crew and

050uh watching those relationships build over time and how we uh navigate that it's very rewarding to see our student reps and their preparation um and their engagement with each of our um legislators as I shared with them they are the celebrities in this conversation and to treat the meetings as such their perspective their experience and how it relates to how we fund schools is really important so that legislators not only are looking at the numbers but at the stories behind those numbers. Uh it's obviously we have deep shortfalls in their state, but specifically in our district on how we fund special education, how we um fund all of our kind of operating services that are all impacted by the same inflation that all of our households are impacted by as well as um how do

051we fund all the transportation over 110 square miles in the district. So really um grateful for those conversations, really happy to spend some time on Echo Glenn and really proud of our student reps. >> I like experience not old. >> Okay. U and just a few comments from myself. Um first of all, just uh wanted to let the public know that we had an opportunity to actually meet with seven legislators, which was fantastic. all three of our legislators from the fifth legislative district, all three from the 41st legislative district, and then um Representative Burquest as well. So, um thank you to all of them to make the time for us. Uh and I will say they were all very much engaged in our conversations, which was uh really great to see and uh again thankful

052for their time, uh that they gave us. Also do want to say again how immensely proud I was of our student reps. um you all gave very thoughtful comments to our legislators and I will tell you what that uh in each of the meetings the legislators just primarily want to hear from you. So um and and you did a really wonderful job of landing your points. So um thank you for that. And then the last thing I would just say is that as a takeaway that I took from those discussions was is that all of those legislators were um very dedicated to education in our state and educational funding. And it's the first time I really heard, I think across the board, a recognition that our funding system is broken and that there is a

053desire within the legislature now to try to find a fix. It's a long-term play. It's going to take a very long time to think about what a new methodology for funding might look like. Um, and that of course will take a very long time for the legislature to work through, but it's on their radar. I think they understand the problems and are um hopefully once the budget issues with the state are uh resolved. Um they can they can pick that up and we'll get a get a fix. So um uh Superintendent Talette, did you have any comments? I just want to echo the deep appreciation and excitement I had in getting to witness the brilliance of our students um during all the moments uh of the day, not just in the meetings, but also just

054in our dialogue at different moments throughout the day. And you know what's great too is that we have incredible legislators who have direct connection with the Isiqua school district either as alum of our school district, current parents, um other relatives that attend our schools or um have alumni now of our schools. And I think that that deep connection and experience personally and directly with our school system and individual schools really um gives that extra boost to the attention they pay to um to the students currently and they have context for what you share. Um and it does help and aid in them being able to formulate um helpful policy and legislation that does directly have an impact on our students but also can benefit the students across the state of Washington because they have to

055take both hats. So uh appreciate the board for their leadership um in that your leadership in that and also appreciate Martin Turney and Marcel Hower for also joining in the day to provide um support and content support as needed. So thank you. >> Great. Any other comments? >> Okay, we will move on to our next agenda item which is the uh work study recap. Uh the board had an opportunity to meet um this afternoon with the ISD administrators to discuss our results to academics report and the data sets that support them. Uh and I will now open the floor for any comments. Well, I should say actually we we discussed two topics. We also discussed uh the new high school and an update on the new high school, but we're going to have a discussion

056about that a little bit later uh in the evening. and we will uh recap that discussion. Then anybody like to comment on results too? Director Mullings. Uh yeah, so you know, work study time is always a good one so we can have deeper conversations, have a bit more opportunity to uh have a bit of a back and forth and to hone in on um ideas or concepts or things we're looking for. I think uh particularly as we on board new board members, it's helpful to have work studies to give us a little bit more time to go through you know either the policies more in depth or or in preparation for monitoring ports. One of the things I think is I want to comment on just because of some of how public comment has worked

057tonight. I don't normally do this but it is really important to note that all of our monitoring reports are a year in a rears. So they are comments on a year ago, not on the current uh school year. I know that can be confusing. It still confuses me when I want to talk about what is happening right now. And uh the monitoring reports are about a historical view. Um that aside, I think our opportunity this evening was really uh as we look at those monitoring reports, they can be very lengthy, they can be very data heavy. Um last work study we talked a bit more about what we wanted to see going forward particularly in that result in the results uh monitoring because it is the culmination of are we doing the mission of the

058school district? Are we making progress in general with and for our students and staff? And so I think our opportunity tonight was how do we start to um talk about what we can step away from? How can we exit it? you know all work takes um all like all analysis takes work all it all takes proofing it all takes time it all takes new data sources and so I think tonight was helpful in at least starting the conversation of what can be taken out what isn't what is no longer serving us what are the most important things to look at as far as our our results go so uh always helpful conversations and again monitoring is about a year ago Oh, >> thank you. What else? >> Yeah, I I will just uh add to

059that point too that you know I think over the many many years um the administration's done a wonderful job of providing us information when we ask for that data sets collecting different kinds of um data that we can we can analyze. But over the last many many years we've asked for a lot. So, this was an opportunity to really start to think about what are the really important um indicators that we want to look at when we're talking about academic achievement in the in the district. And it was a good conversation in that regard. Uh, Superintendent Talik. >> Um, as we continue to prepare for the actual monitoring of results, too, um, coming up at the next board meeting, it was just a helpful opportunity to see if there's any other lingering questions from the

060work study that happened earlier in January and to um, partner on what matters and what's helpful for evidence and also ask additional clarifying questions because there will always be questions and I think it's good to make sure that we get to surface those along the way. Great. >> Okay. Moving right along. Next up on the agenda is works in progress and I will turn it over to you, superintendent. >> Great. Thank you. Um I'm going to start by talking about um uh what we're hearing from our work and efforts to support the levy with information and engagements across the district. Since we don't have a formal update on the levy right now, I thought I would take this opportunity to talk more about that as as a beginning topic. Um we have heard we've done

061extensive outreach and really heard a lot of feedback from the community um since since the fall and I said before in either updates that we were planning to have more than 60 meetings but now we've had more than 60 meetings across the community and a lot of common questions are coming up around what happens if the levies do not pass. And the answer is pretty straightforward that these renewal levies do work together to fund our core operations. Um, if any one measure does fail, the district must backfill that loss from the general fund, requiring significant reductions that would impact every single student. Um, as a reminder, you know, these are renewals, not new taxes, and they do fund basic education that the state does not fully cover. Current funding from existing levies expire by the

062end of 2026. These were based on identified needs um and do not request uh the full levy authority. again not a new tax and uh and we do not project an increase in the in the tax rate and that these are not being used to build any new facilities or schools. Um and the levies do fill a wellocumented gap in state funding for the EPO or educational program and operations renewal levy. It supports basic education needs which is about more than 70 million each year to fund nurses, counselors, security staff, substitute teachers, custodians, academic supports, underfunding um uh funding the back bill for the underfunding for special education, athletics, clubs and more. Um topics come up around uh strong fiscal stewardship and transparency and we do take that very seriously as as as we are

063stewards of public dollars dollar dollars. We maintain one of the strongest credit and bond ratings among school districts in the state. We keep our administrative overhead among the lowest in the neighboring districts. Each year since I've been superintendent, we've also strategically aligned our spending to student needs are very budget conscious and implement lean and efficient measures to reduce waste. Uh we've had we've talked a lot about in all the budget meetings for the past couple years since I've started about the start, stop, and continue method as we look at um budgeting overall. Our work is regularly reviewed by state auditors and guided by community oversight groups such as the capital projects oversight committee and the financial advisory core team and these reviews and controls help ensure funds are managed responsibly, transparently and in alignment with

064community expectations. Um also uh community investment um you know does have a very clear action step for us as with every election we remind registered voters to participate in the democratic process modeling civic responsibility. Uh this is important as we prepare all students become engaged citizens and civic engagement as as stated on our wall and future community members um that contribute um beyond being a student. All ballots have been mailed. Reg residents may register through February 2nd online or in person by February 10th. Um must return ballots um by February 10th. I think a dropbox is a very effective method for using that that we've talked about and reminded people of. And all of this information is available at our website. Um and it's one of the first uh sort of tags on the website

065itself. Um and then I there's been a series of great stories that we've been talking about just remind ourselves that it's really the people behind the work that the these levies do support and making sure that we are reaching uh and teaching all of our students in an effective manner and supporting our staff as well. And so there have been lots of different um videos and pieces that have been pushed out. One of my favorites is about Dusty. you haven't seen this one yet. Dusty um at one point in his career had started at uh served at Isqua Valley Elementary and and now is serving at Git Gibson Neck as a custodial um staff member and team member. And I do see him from time to time when I visit there. He's always proudly wearing

066the different um gear uh that reflect the educational model of Gibson. And um he talks a lot about how a student that he had um known at IV came up to him and remembered him um when they arrived at Gibson. And so those kinds of heartfelt stories about the the long-term impact and relationships that all adults in our system have and hold with our students is such a powerful reminder every day of what we do. So um I wanted to just call attention to a lot of that work and thank you to our team members who are willing to share those stories in a heartfelt authentic manner and to our communications team for helping to capture those as well. Um the other big thing that's been happening since the last board meeting is that we

067had a professional development day this week for all of our teachers. So uh people must know that their students did not have a school day. Students know they did not have a school day on Monday. Um and that we are you know grounded and certainly thinking through all the things that we can um focus on as we bring people together for those that are very important u professional learning day. Um, Monday's teacher professional learning day reflected, you know, our efforts and really incorporated the newly adopted portrait of a graduate to ensure that every student leaves our district prepared to learn, adapt, and thrive in a changing world. Elementary educators engage in focused learning on benchmark literacy curriculum implementation, strengthening literacy instructional practices across classrooms. Um, I was able to, uh, partake in and witness a

068professional learning opportunity at Briward Elementary School where, um, the focus was on you can develop fluency, um, that's portable and that can be taught in lots of different ways, both for numeracy and literacy. Um, and that debrief and that conference opportunity with students to have reflection about their partnership and work together on teams and in the classroom is a huge component of being self-aware. And that opportunity to discourse is no longer just an optional kind of component in the lesson, but actually mandatory as we think about developing the kinds of collaboration um critical thinking and self-awareness that will help bolster students confidence and competence as they move through the educational system at such an early age. Um at the secondary level, teachers and administrators participated in AI literacy professional learning experience focused on digital citizenship

069um artificial intelligence and the implications of AI for assessment, curriculum and instruction. The morning began with a keynote um learning by Dr. Terara Natras, uh, innovation strategist for education at Lenovo. And that was followed by breakout sessions facilitated by 18 industry experts representing nine different career clusters. And each of those industry experts were able to talk about how AI is being used um, in their respective industries and how technology related but also other durable skills will be needed to um, to be successful and also entry into the workforce. And it was great to hear I heard from someone who works in the sales industry and how much you know AI is and technology use is changing sales. Um but there were uh representatives from Blue Origin and other industries as well and other companies. So

070that was fantastic. Um and then our teams continue to work collaborative collaboratively on school improvement in the afternoons. Um talked about how their work and look reviewing of data especially using our PowerBI data tools to analyze um student progress and examine effectiveness of instruction and to adjust plans to meet the needs of all learners. Um one exception is that Isiqua High staff participated in a different differentiated school specific day of learning building on insights from the XQ student druneries workshop last spring. um and they spent time thinking about the question of how can we transform high school. So uh all students graduate college and career ready. They reviewed data, they talked about root causes. Um what was great is that many of our staff members facilitated a lot of those small group conversations and then

071at the end there was uh a pitch. So if the topic was how do we improve student engagement and by the way there were 18 students also present as part of this day who who gave up their day not being in school to be in school um to learn and discuss alongside our teachers which was amazing but I heard some amazing pitches on how might we think about um improving student engagement and that was uh pitched by students and and staff in partnership together. So they have a list of uh lots of ideas that were co-designed during that day and they'll they'll talk through what's immediate and easy to implement and what's also longer term and of interest and worth the effort to pursue. That's great. Um and then a couple other uh notes just

072to highlight across the system which I think is always uh fun to just share a little bit of a snippet of what's happening in other spaces. Um, Gibson remains a leader in contributing and growing the under uh to understand what competency based learning is and they're actually hosting a competency based learning in action which is co-hosted also with the mastery transcript consortium. Um, it's a deep dive into student centered learning. Um, it's a one-day experience and there's information about that um on the various websites uh for other professional educators and leaders to be able to partake in and learn from. And then um some exciting news from our food services team. uh they continue to be pioneers in trying new items on on the menu and that are aligned with our strategic plan and creating

073spaces and environments where all students feel affirmed in their identity and a sense of belonging. And um personally, I believe food is always a great way to do this. Um this week, Belle's Thai Chicken Curry was served at all secondary schools for the first time. Um that was on Tuesday. And then I'm very excited about this because I've had a preview taste of this which is Lorna's Indian doll will debut on the secondary menu on Tuesday, February 24th. Students, are you taking note? Because these are very exciting things as well. Um uh Tuesdays. Then the third recipe in the series, which is a Japanese chicken and vegetable guoza soup, which was inspired by student voice at Liberty High School, will appear on the secondary menu for the first time on Tuesday, January uh January 24th.

074That's in the past. Uh will appear for the first time on Tuesday, March 24th. And um each dish will be offered a second time before the end of the school year to further gauge popularity. Um, and we are continuing to think about how we consider globally inspired dishes for our menu. And our food services team has also been recognized by um by OSPI for their trailblazing work and really thinking through how to um continue to evolve the offerings that meet family and student interests and identity. So, um those are just some highlights which I thought that was a fun one to to share with the group. >> Thank you, Superintendent. Next up on our agenda is a update on the new high school. Um, as I mentioned earlier, we did have an opportunity and work

075study for the board to meet with ISD administrators and discuss the new high school and we will provide a recap of that discussion. But I believe first we are going to have a short presentation um from ISD staff. >> Great. Thank you. I'm actually going to kick us off on this one. So, um, we are excited to, um, well, actually, let me ask ask our team members to introduce themselves, and then I'll kick off. So, you can state your name and your role. >> Hi, I'm Julia Bambber, uh, principal on special assignment. >> Hi, good evening. Jacqueline Downey, assistant superintendent, schools and academics. >> Great. And Sher Cox is listed here, but she is unable was un able to attend the meeting tonight. So, um, it'll be the three of us that are sharing, uh,

076information for you this evening. Um, first and foremost, uh, this next high school is a solution to overcrowding, and we also believe it can serve as a model for the future and help our students be future ready. This is a recap of what was determined last spring in terms of uh, our our work going forward um, to be able to move forward with um, not the full plan, but a a smaller version uh, and smaller footprint for the school to serve up to 700 students. So that was what was uh decided and determined last spring uh to move forward with the money that we have available to build um partial building. Um and then last uh meeting we talked about how this next high school will initially launch um as a choice school. And that

077choice school I want to make sure is is clear there are lots of different terminology uses for the word choice but um and we do have an example of a choice school already which is Gibson. And this is meant to serve as a site that has um really focused programming that we will continue to explore with our community and offer things that are not currently offered in depth in our in our school district. Um as well as ensure that we have the opportunity to provide that option for for students in a in a very specialized and or selective manner. And so we'll hear from the board about some of the recap of discussion when we get to that section. Um but we are eager to move forward and continue to um start to do further

078engagement. we've been doing it along the way and you'll hear more about that. And then these are just the potential pathways that continue to serve as very high interest in our community and serving as inputs right as we continue to provide and get testing and input from our community. I do want to highlight in particular that environmental sustainability which does include agricultural um a agricultural and technology because those do go hand inand right now and will continue to um but also networking cyber security and robotics and engineering are offerings that um you know we don't have as much robust pathway programming for and so this is an opportunity to really think about the unique offerings that we need to continue to build out that are that can be made available through this um for the

079entire district um as well. So our purpose right now is really to just review context and history um share current progress, gather feedback on some highle um parameters and guidance from the board uh that recap also the work study and help with um how we will go forward with our design and engagement process. I'll be very brief on this where we've been um it's been a 10 plus year timeline. So the goal is to open um as as early as fall 2027. That's what we've been saying based on you know current plans and we are going to take every single step at a time and that's that's our goal. We have also been taking lots of inputs research and engagement and done a lots of engagement over the past three years in particular as we've

080uh as I've stepped into this role lots of different mechanisms for gathering feedback. Um on this next slide here you can see the different efforts a lot of it also came up during the strategic plan. So I don't want to I would be remiss if I didn't talk about these three years worth of data gathering and input and data has both been in terms of hard data but also qualitative data um and also understanding there have been massive shifts in sort of the workforce and technology that we are also taking into account as we move forward. This is a summary of that. Um and Julia, do you want to step in on some of these engagements this this year that have been happening just under that and are underway right now? >> Yeah, I'd love

081to share um more. We've been working really hard to engage and elevate student voice throughout this year. You can see some of the engagements that we started um this summer with some summer school students and then have continued with this. Um I also want to point out we have a student voices project um which is in process right now. And so our stu student board reps have been engaging with um they've had conversations with over 50 students and they're currently in the insights and uncovering um insight process of that. And so we're excited for them to be sharing out an engagement report based on their student conversations. Um and then a couple other really fun ones just um having student conversations with small groups really casual. And then of course our micro school and our

082career kickstart pilots with informing um small project-based learning environments as well as how we can continue to expand our career connected learning. >> Thank you. Yeah, we've uh relied on actually the good graces specifically of many different partners and institutions that have and are leaders in the work but also provide additional capacity. These partnerships and collaboration for us um have been in many cases most cases pro bono work um at a high value to our district uh bringing expertise and facilitation um exposure to new ideas wrestling with how you think through different design pieces and showing proof points of what's possible in lots of different ways that align with our values and our direction. Um, in many cases, some of the work has come in the form of grant funding directly to us or a

083co-investment of learning experiences. And so, that value is very high and there's been a good return because there's a there's a a phrase steel sharpens steel. You want to be able to be with high quality um individuals who help inform your thinking. But take that and make that um directly applicable and take in the context of our own community because our own community has very high expectations for what we are learning, but also um preferences and needs for how we go forward. So I want to say it is about collaboration and it's not uh over dialing on this but we are adding cap adding capacity and making sure we're bringing the best ideas forward for us to be able to test and adapt and to use in our own in our own space. Um as

084I said we've taken a lot of also research and data from lots of different sources. Um our board over time has also looked at lots of different data on uh post-secondary information including how we think about um living wages, post-secondary opportunities, where the sort of industries were going and that is just additional helpful data for us to have. And um finally we are also anchoring and making that connection to the portrait of a graduate which I'm grateful for the board for um uh taking the mantle on and really helping lead on. So this is really helpful to think through as we consider what are the most important durable skills as I talked about earlier that will be helpful and we are thinking about that close connection between uh making sure that our learning is uh

085relevant and that we are having that exposure to industry and preparing young people to be able to thrive after they graduate from our system. So, building off of the portrait of a graduate, we want our students not just to meet high school graduation requirements, but to have those durable skills to lead the life they want to lead after they leave our doors. And so, to really fulfill that promise, we want to look at what is our design in high school to cultivate those skills and prepare for post-secary success and life success in our rapidly changing world. So, we've taken the feedback from all of these different sources, the um the focus groups with students um the last two years, the strategic plan development as superintendent Taik said, and we've heard very clearly from our students

086consistently that they are looking for learning that is collaborative and relevant and inspiring. This could look like hands-on learning that's project-based where they get to be creative and think critically about real world problems. And they want to be known and supported and really known as people preparing them and having educators prepare them for their future. I'm going to turn it over to Julia who's going to share even more of those deeper insights from our students and what they're looking for in their school experience. Okay, thank you. So, what are our students here um saying to us and what are they sharing through all of these um engagement efforts um through conversations or design sprints across a few of our high schools? Um I see our future Martians out there. Maybe we should have an engagement

087session with you guys as well soon. So, feel free to give me an invitation. Um but we just know that overall like our students genuinely they love their schools. They really do. But they also are excited to have conversations and start to dream big. And so I just like to share a few highlights of some of those things when you push students outside of what they know of high school and what high school is to them. Um and what they're sharing about if they were to dream big or had the magic wand, what are some things that they're saying um about their experience. Um I also want to share not only are do they love their school, but they are so grateful to their teachers and the adults that support them, their peers. Um they

088just overall their coaches. They really enjoy their experience. um they'll share some things they don't like if you push them a little bit, but that's not their first go-to. They want to share and things that they're really proud about. Uh so, first thing is just the learning environment and the spaces that students are in. They would love to see more creative, inspiring learning environments, hands-on technology spaces that signal like we want you to be creative thinkers. We want you collaborating. We want to see teamwork. Um not just one classroom after another. So for us as a design team is thinking about how do we use the design of the building and set up spaces to signal to students that they should be inspired that they should walk into spaces and have very positive energy. Um

089so we're really excited just as a team to keep looking into uh the design of the building as that comes together. Um the other thing is just students I love hearing how much passion they have for one another and how much care they have for their uh not only their peers and their friends but their staff as well. Um, and so just continuing to center center on prioritizing our student wellness. Uh, our students, they love to have a positive relationship with that with the adults in the building. Um, they really love having like one or two because once you have as like a seven period day, sometimes having more expectations from adults and too many different routines can, you know, students are sharing that that can start to become very overwhelming. um it can also

090just um be confusing to them. And so really centering on again those adult relationships and mentors. Okay, my favorite question to ask to kick off conversations is if school disappeared tomorrow, what would you miss? The number one thing like kids don't even the students don't even hesitate. they say friends um and then meeting new people and then they kind of you know that's immediate like good energy and then they'll step back a little bit and they say oh I also love learning new things and I also love um working with passionate teachers that are really fun and engaging um and they also love just having the structure and routine that schools provide but number one no question um friends and so it's always um interesting that we have school systems that often keep students isolated

091away from their friends >> I will add to Um there were a couple data points that were shared uh in the presentation of the keynote speaker at the Monday professional learning session for our secondary colleagues that uh were make this social connection and teamwork even more important. Um the data that we get back about how many close friends um young people have now compared to x time ago um it has dropped. The number of close friends uh the uh number of minutes that our young people between the ages of 15 and 24 spending time daily with their friends has also dropped by uh a significant amount. So when we think about when we utilize and have technology right at our fingertips to be able to do and accomplish lots of things, what is the impact

092on that for our ability to make that human connection? So I think there's an important aspect of that this is surfacing that also has implications for how many opportunities our young people get to be able to be in discourse with each other which is why that point I made earlier around students at the elementary school being able to debrief together after a team or collaborative project is no longer optional. it's mandatory in terms of how we prepare young people to have that kind of conversation. So I'm heartened by all this um as well because uh when we think about the uses of even AI um last year alone the the some of the top reasons for using and going to AI included for research generating ideas and therapy and companionship and now a year later

093the top one is therapy and companionship um and it's also about helping to organize one's life and then I'm looking at my notes here the third top reason is finding purpose so again as we think about social connection s um that's it makes it even more important for me to think through how that is prominent in the experience for all of our young people frankly um but it is coming up in the context of this conversation right now. >> Okay. And a couple more just highlights from the engagement efforts from this year. Um I chose these photos because I think they show the engaging environments and they show personalized pathways and different choices that students can have. Um but also thinking about the agency, the choice and the personalization that I heard through these conversations

094is that students continually express the hope to get away from grade obsession and make school more about meaningful learning um and growth and not just about the grade. And again, learning taking learning in the classroom and connecting it to the real world. Um love this photo from our Maywood Community Micros students. We took a field trip to the Gates Foundation not too long ago and they made it up on the big screen. So, it was a um a awesome time for the school to get out. And then we did several design sprints. And so, these are just two prototypes of schedules to help us really start to think about how can we get away from a seven period day and think about the chunks of learning and time a little bit differently just to spark

095again new ideas and what could be possible with the design of a new schedule. Um, and then I'm going to just share students are not afraid to share that they would dream of having a later start time, longer breaks, more flexible learning time, um, and then parking for everybody. So, >> um, great. Just to highlight where we are now, some of these, uh, points we talked about earlier, but the goal will be to have a core team for planning selected at some point this spring, which is consistent in, uh, with how we've launched other schools and learning sites in the past. um this would be a little bit earlier because this is a bigger footprint and um a bit different from the prior schools that we have launched. Um our facility work is in progress.

096And then when we think about um our academic program foundations, we will in the next slide anchor on durable skills, the feedback we've been getting on career connected pathways that we've uh previewed some really top options that have been coming up, how we think about connected integrated courses, um additional experiences with real world experience and credentials. And then we've seen this before in the next slide, the facility design snapshot. It's a it's a smaller footprint to start. Um here's a sample of the uh types of spaces that we would have for learning. And then when we think about what's next um really this is where we sort of are able to hear from the board about the work study. And these are just starter questions for parameters that help us further progress in our process

097for developing different um uh areas to test to get feedback on but also to get some guidance from the board on on moving forward. So this is the opportunity um President Taylor to pause, turn to you and um invite some discussion from the board. >> Okay. Thank you. Would any of my colleagues like to start with some comments recapping what we discussed earlier or anything that's come to mind now? >> Oh yeah. Uh Director Anderson, please. >> I just have a quick question. Um, so earlier in the presentation it says there's 23 classrooms planned and then in the facility design snapshot it says 16 but then there's like some labs included. So is that what the 23 is or is it actually 23 classrooms and then the labs? >> Yeah, we're including um so this

098how it breaks down is the 16 classrooms including and then we have the labs and science labs. So those are all in the classroom count. >> Okay. >> Just highlighting the variation in those trying to signal like they're not just standard classrooms. We have a lot of variety and flexibility within the design of the building. Now, um we actually are at about 25 to 26 classrooms. There is a space that could possibly open into a larger space. So, that gets us right at about the 26 classroom mark. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> Anyone? Director Gallinger. Oh, sorry. Uh, so I'm really excited for the opportunity for us to be able to think about what we want for students. And this allows us to dream or how we can provide students those career connected learning opportunities

099and building those durable skills that they will need for however many times they may change their career path. Uh so certainly about credit flexibility, I would hope that we get as much flexibility as we may need both on day one opening and as we develop and the school matures from the state board. I hope the state board has gotten confidence in our district for all the work that you led for mastery based learning. That is what is Gibson. It is wildly successful uh both locally and nationally. So, um I am curious about how part-time and full-time options look and how that nests within other within our our high school ecosystem, I'll say. And uh I think for me, I would love for this to be a school that or a place of learning that layers

100on to what our our high schools currently offer. Um but for us to focus on pathways that we don't have. I think when you go to slide 22, uh, I'm excited to see a schedule like this where you blend together learning and you block things together that make sense, which just as an aside, uh, in case anyone's wondering, uh, we have as a board no impact on whether a school is blocked or unblocked from a schedule, uh, standpoint. And I know personally for me the more we can integrate learning the better. The thought of having like a isolated like focused like January term or something I love that you're thinking like differently about how we spend 180 days and I'd rather us look at like how can we maximize 180 days of learning not seat

101time and like these distinct classes or credits. So this is what really excites me. uh and I uh want to do whatever we can from a policy standpoint to help with the state board part so there aren't barriers to flexibility and innovation. So I'll just start there and >> director coin. >> All right, I will go. Um thank you. uh always exciting to uh talk about what's possible and what's next. Um and I think for a lot of people in the room and for folks on the line hopefully they're also very excited about this. uh you know I'll just note kind of a personal reflection then I have a question at the end but um you know I think back 12 months ago and um you know we had to regroup um in terms of

102how we think about this new high school and I have always loved the concept I know it's become very popular now but this idea of scarcity and abundance and I love how the district is really leaning into that abundance mindset around again what is possible and how we think differently and being in this, you know, this crossroads that we're at. And I would ask our community, I'd ask our educators to also think about that too, that, you know, this is going to give us significant opportunity. And I, in our last board meeting, I mentioned that so often that there's two themes that I hear probably the most from members of the community is choice, but access to some of our best programming across our district. I hear this time and time again. And I think

103what this ultimately does is it's going to give us that opportunity and it's going to give us an opportunity to really showcase those programs. And I would ask members of the community and particularly to our educators that help us those wonderful programs that we have across our district help us to elevate those. This is just a call to action I guess I would say. Um this gives us that significant opportunity. It gives us this opportunity not only with this specific school site, but it gives us the ability to move kids, you know, through this learning center or whatever it ends up becoming. And it frees up space at Skyline. It frees up space at a high. It frees up space at Liberty. And I just I want us to think big. I want us to

104think about staying in this abundance mindset. I know sometimes it's hard, but I would ask folks to think about how exciting this is and consider this a call to action. again educators spe you know I'm asking you to think about that too but members of the community I I want we want your your ideas um and your thoughts on this and this leads me to my question I know Julia you mentioned kind of earlier you know obviously already having conversations with students members of the community I know we have folks listening we have folks in the room that want to share ideas what does that look like and maybe I guess that question and then if you want to be a part of that core team what does that look like if you're a member

105of the community >> I'll just jump ahead a couple slides so you can see a quick overview of the um design phase process that's coming up. Um you can see we're ready in February and through March and April to engage with the community in different ways. Um core team applications would open up in the spring and we'd work with to get more information out about the details for that. Um and then again working with the core team on more detailed planning so we're ready to open in 2027. A few examples of some community engagement that might happen over the next couple months. We're working through those right now. Um, but I do want to highlight that CTE is ho, um, hosting a nationally recognized film called Multiple Choice. Um, look in the bulletins and school

106bulletins coming out over the next few weeks and you can find a way to sign up to attend that event or show up at Isizqua High School on February 26 at 4 at 6:30 um, in the high school theater and there will also be a tour um, of our CTE spaces there and some different in um, engagement efforts with the students. Um, we also may do a community design sprints. We've done these recently with students and administrators. Uh two years ago we did those with uh community members at each of the three comprehensive high schools. Um and then engaging with students again just in prototypes and example our schedule a pathway and then really going through a process with students they can provide feedback on prototypes not a full school design but small aspects of

107that so we can start to gather more detailed information and then design from there. And if this is wonderful, if they have current feedback, what would be the channel or should they wait on it until the website's live or what what would that look? >> That's what I was just going to say. We're we're working on getting the website probably before the end of February. So, um we'll be able to have access for how to provide information then. >> Perfect. Great. Thank you. >> Yep. >> Director Mullins, >> thank you. Uh so I'll do a little bit of look back to the work study I guess and the question I think um in in this uh board guidance slide that we were looking at was really you know in looking at the material to date

108and how we're going forward what were some of the things that jumped out to us initially and so for me I would just share what I shared during that session which is um I had an immediate reaction to the selection of the word choice, a choice school. Um, and that reaction I think is because um I want to make sure in how we move forward we are uh because we have the the luxury frankly to do this as time that we are a bit unbound by what that means. So choice I think people have some initial um assignments of what that could mean. Uh for me, I probably will will from now on use the term magnet. Um I think uh choice in Isiqua and our surrounding schools has some very specific applications and deployments,

109some of which I maybe am not excited about reproducing. What magnet says for me is that we have the opportunity to look at how we leverage the space, the lovely um flexibility of space, the innovation of the space to really act out what is the spirit of OA14, which is what we did, what we were talking about last week, which is about our our instructional program. Um the value that the board has, which is it should be about exploration, acceleration, as well as remediation all at the same time. And so I think the opportunity we have with opening up a new campus, a new learning site, a new magnet school is first and foremost for me about solving um what I think is one of our paramount blockers to doing that, which is being over

110capacity at the other high schools. So first and foremost um I want to make sure that we are driving toward um maximum utilization. I know I keep making that number higher. I don't know if Tom is someplace of what that number could be. Um but that first and foremost it is about programming and an approach that maximizes um that location because then our opportunities provide all of those opportunities you list and throughout our system. So that is first and foremost what's what's really important to me is about capacity and capacity building across the district. I think as we look at the flexibility of program, I love what's in the design which is about creative spaces, flexible spaces, the ability to use um uh the footprint we have in a much more modern way to facilitate

111different types of learning. Um and again I just want to make sure we are not solely looking at that the list of potential pathways as at that location only that it should be about how do we open up those pathways to all of the students across the district wherever they may be housed and by making capacity building capacity across the system by opening up a new campus that we're we're able to do that. Um, I would also just say that when you show your example schedule, what I hope people take away is what is critically important to me and I believe critically important to my board peers if we talked about it is creating more opportunities for interesting instructional um delivery, not less. And so there is at no point in any time that I

112know as a board member I would have made an instruction on changing or restricting an instructional program. Um and that any way in which we lessen choice in that would be uh deeply against uh my desire as an individual board member and anything I've ever heard for this board. So I just ask as we may see challenges as we move forward in innovating on our system in modernizing our approaches we are going to see implementation challenges. We're going to see maybe communication hiccups. But my hope is that what we can stay grounded in is that the opportunity is more choice, more interesting um uh combinations of how we provide academic opportunities to our students. not less and in those cases where there are less those are things we have to revisit um because that is

113uh antithetical to what I think we're trying to do here. So um super excited about the new school. Again, first and foremost, it is about building capacity in the entire system, offering multiple pathways across all of our buildings and then putting in the support structures, transportation, etc. in order to facilitate uh ubiquitous access across the district. Yeah. Dr. Anderson. Um, just representing my Southoun folks, uh, I want to hone in on the transportation and access. Um, for me, that was one thing I wanted to make sure that, uh, we have that available to our Liberty pattern if there are uh, curriculum at this new school that they want to uh, take. So, that was something I honed in on because I want make sure that um we're we're taking those students into consideration so that

114they can get up there. And I think most of my if not all the the uh fellow board members agreed with that. Um I loved what uh director Mullen said about creating more opportunities rather than less. The way I stated it uh was limiting options makes it less and less a choice school or a magnet. Um, so I definitely want to uh continue to make sure that we're creating those opportunities. Um, and one thing I want to put out there is I think an opportunity we can look into is trying to push towards uh steam instead of just STEM. I'm also the art board member. Art is very important to me and so I want to find ways of trying to get more art trying to get more art into um either the uh individual

115schools or um as other opportunities um at some of our um choice schools. So that's my thoughts on that. >> Um I'll offer just a few comments. My initial reactions to it was great conversation. It is all very very exciting. Um, and I think I would say that the first, you know, two themes that jumped out immediately when we started the conversation is reiterating uh, director Anderson's point about access. We really want to make sure that this school uh, is accessible for all of the students in our district, high school students, across as many grade levels that make the most sense. And of course to make sure across all of our geographic area. and that's going to be tricky, but you know, I I know we'll try to put the effort into it to make

116that that happen. So, that was the first thing really this desire for for access. And then again reiterating both the points that director Gallinger and Mullings made about flexibility and you know what will be available what how and when we can teach these programs you know and thinking of teaching that is aligned with their portrait of a graduate and uh emphasizing durable skills and all the things that we're hearing our students talk about too about you know more opportunities for collaboration and project based work and all of those things. Um, so you know, it's going to be a journey. There is definitely a lot to sort out logistically and programming and even these ideas of of where the opportunities are to partner with our community and our business community um to potentially have them help

117sponsor programs or lean in to um our educational programs as well. So um that's really all like I said really exciting. And the other thing that I think that is enlightening and that I want to emphasize that director Mullings was saying is the great benefit is here is our schools are overcrowded and if we can take some of our kids out of those overcrowded environments, open up space across the entire district, we're not just talking about innovative programming in one building. We're talking about innovative programming then being available across all of our buildings, all of our comprehensive high schools everywhere. So, um, that's I think the real opportunity here that I hope that we have an opportunity to cash in on, so to speak. One other point I want to make just because I had

118a conversation with a community member um directly after the work study and I I can't be any more explicit about this, but I think there is a small I hope small contingent in the community that thinks that some way we're not being genuine or that we're still contemplating a comprehensive high school on that on that property in 2027. And we are not. I I mean I hope this presentation shows that and I hope people realize that the footprint that is being built there just simply can't even accommodate a comprehensive high school if we wanted one. So uh again I just hope we can put that to rest and we are moving beyond that onto this conversation about innovative programming and all the ways that we might be able to accomplish that. So those are my

119thoughts. Uh, director Gallinger. >> Uh, so I think we've spent time talking some philosophical things. Now to get into more uh direct with the questions asked. Uh, here I think one that's not on there that I have but want to kick off is when I think about structure, I think of if we're talking about a high school, I usually think a diploma associated with it and I think what's the name going to be on that? And so for me, I would my preference would be at least early on and I could be convinced I don't feel super strongly about this that this is some sort of a a learning center place for people to go rather than like hey this is like like a comprehensive high school or a mini high school or something like

120that because I want this to be open to all of our students across the district. And so I think my desire would be that students go in nth grade to their feeder pattern high school and then have the opportunity to enter in as 10th 11th and 12th graders because they're choosing a particular pathway there at the same time uh so meaning like okay so I would see their diploma being whichever high school their feeder pattern is associated with but at the same time while I think that I want us to launch by offering pathways that we don't have currently robustly like robotics and engineering as well as cyber security and network. Uh I'm very sensitive to what um director Anderson said and I don't want to be so focused that it it's to the exclusion

121of the humanities. So I want our students to be able to graduate and be educated no matter where they are with a robust education that would include the humanities. and we want it not to be so narrowly focused that they would not have the education that we would want for all of our students in our district. So, um especially since you've heard this board have so many conversations about what sort of baseline core curriculum and pathways academically we want for our students. I would want to make sure that it does offer those same things that you've heard us talk about too much. I'll respond to to that. I think that's a very valid question as it relates to how we might think about where your home tie is, right? And it could that as we

122work through and test out some of those concepts that it could be maybe both and or either or, right? And that's to be determined, I think, by some other pieces that we fall into place as these fall into place as we march through time in this in this process. So noted about the question around whether or not um this is a learning site that um students would go to and then be able to receive the kinds of additional offerings at a theater pattern school um for arts and the other opportunities um or this maybe starts one way and then becomes something else in the future. There could be lots of different options, but I'd rather think about where where as we continue to go forward what the goal is that we want this ultimate school

123to be and then we can start to backwards map for that with some staging. Right. >> But a good topic that we will put forward on as our next uh question for future future discussion. >> You had a comment. >> Uh yeah. So I just wanted to say two things. Number one, um I definitely think that like integrating more choice into the kind of education each student receives from their own end is like something that I'm really excited about. um primarily because I've always thought about how we have IB and we have AP, but like we don't get to make that decision as of right now as students. Um the one thing that I would think about though is if we have our students attending their theater pattern school for their freshman year and then

124needing to transfer out of it as a sophomore in order to kind of get a more specialized education or get a more u get an education that aligns with their interests more. That also means that we're kind of separating them from the friends and the relationships that tend to form as freshmen, especially when there's so many new students in a school. And I know that you guys were also talking about the importance of those relationships to students. Um, and so I just want to make sure that in the process of creating choice or the magnet school, we're not also upending some of the parts of our schools that are already so valued by students. Rex Um I just wanted to first say um it's great presentation. It answered a lot of questions that I had

125had a few months back um about how the new high school would function. Um, I have one question that I think should be um added to this list and it pertains to the continuation of our student representative program as I hope it continues to go into the 2027 2028 school year. Would we be adding two new student reps with the addition of the new high school? >> To be determined. Very good question. Director Coin, >> I just have a a quick um comment actually and and more so for the community and ask for them. So, the pathway sponsors and partnerships which is interesting as we think about this school and for members of our community. Obviously, this is going to potentially look very different than it does at our three comprehensive high schools or Gibson.

126And I would just ask again through the website that'll be available very soon because February is upon us very this weekend. Um, if you have ideas, I >> think she said late. >> Oh, well, late February. True. Well, it'll be it'll be soon be within the same month. Um, but if you have ideas, because I I I find that fascinating, but I would love to hear more from the community on those connections because we would be leaning in on our community members to to open those doors for us. And I I think this is fascinating to think about this and other districts are doing it. I know you've shared ideas, you know, across the state. So, um, I I I guess as a board member would love to hear from the community on that idea

127and what doors they could potentially open for us as a district. >> Lia, >> um, again, yeah, thank you. Like everyone said, that was a great presentation and I love everything. Um, I just, so a couple things. Um, one regarding if it should be a full-time or a part-time school. Um, I don't I was wondering if you maybe have any idea what it might look like if it was a part-time school because I'm sort of having kind of difficulty thinking about what that would look like and what that would be. >> Um, I can give two examples of what we have in place and have. Um, we have part-time running start students. Um, there's also a Wik program where students can attend for part time of part of their day. Um, but I think exactly

128what you're bringing up is when we go through some more engagement with students and kind of wrestling with some of these ideas that we can start to get a clearer idea of what could that look like um, if it was a possibility. >> Right. Okay. Thank you, >> Director. Wouldn't be sad if that focus is a shakeup in how our high schools currently work across the district. >> Director Mullins. Um, so I would just say that I my perspective on the opportunity for the site is maybe the polar opposite of uh director Gallingers, which is the fun of getting to do this work. And so for me, I um I think there's an opportunity for it to be its own home school. I think that would be the best case scenario. It's an opportunity to

129build its own unique community versus it feeling more temporary. um passing through I would also offer it's funny because now I've been sitting here what I offered in the work study is and I've offered in the past is having attended a magnet high school I I think there's a lot of value in um creating a community with those from your broader ecosystem not just the same um students I understand for some that's very important I I have my neighborhood friends I have my neighborhood schools I see a lot of incredible value and what I've seen for selective enrollment for magnet schools in the past and I think there's a a huge opportunity for us to explore what that looks like and think about what new and incredible opportunities to create new connections by bringing students

130from all across the district and what that cross sharing and cross learning um and how you really drive innovation by mixing folks up. I also as I was sitting here realized that when I went to college I also did what is an unusual college program. So, I did a two plus two program at Penn State. So, at Penn State, they have satellite campuses all around the state of Pennsylvania, you can do a two plus two program, which is your first two years, freshman, sophomore year, at one smaller campus before you metriculate to the larger main campus. And as people bring up again concerns about what does that friend group look like? Those are people I have traveled with for I won't mention how many years, for many, many years. And so I'm just going to

131keep offering that we we believe we believe the systems we have today in this district are systems we need to keep deploying. And I will continue to be the voice for saying if we're really talking about innovation that includes who is connecting with who, what the campus structure and community is structured to do and to um be tethered to a neighborhood high school um configuration and say we're innovating for me is like it's not all that innovative. We know how to do neighborhood high schools. We know how to send, as you mentioned, we know how to do Wanik. We know how to do Belleview College and Reton Technical College. And so, I will continue to press us to say the model matters. The the integration of students from across our district, I mean, if you

132were to check today, how many deep friendships do we have between students at one end of our district at Skyline and and Liberty, I think you will start to see we, you know, we we have an opportunity to really change what that looks like. and create a community of um a new type of community. So again, I'll be the all the weird experiences of the two plus two at college of the magnet school uh married to someone who went to high school without walls. And so I think we have an opportunity to really think about if we're talking about innovation, the model in which we do it matters and I will continue to press that, yep, neighborhood schools are great and we've got them. What else do we add? Yeah. >> And then sorry, just

133one qu quick um last question about the school potentially. So on the um design snapshot, it talks about an outdoor learning space and then kind of with the decision of it being part-time versus full-time, would sports be included in the full-time school? And then if so, what would that look like? And if it was part-time, how would the students be able to um contribute in sports if possible? >> Currently, no, we are not planning on having sports at this high school given that it's not a neighborhood school and it's much smaller in size. Sorry, I will add though students who attend this school will have the opportunity to engage um in athletics at their neighborhood high school. >> I think it's important to note because the facility is not built in the same way that

134we have facilities for lots of different sports teams at Isiqua High, Skyland High School, Liberty, uh we wouldn't be able to run that same level of offering. So we in the spirit of making sure students have access and choice to those kinds of athletics and even maybe some activities that there's that that connection back to one of those three campuses. >> Yeah. But I just want to make sure we're we are not missing the point that we still schedule sports all across the district and where there's facilities that can and should be used for any activity or any sport where we again space is our limitation that we should be using this space to do that. So I think the question you're asking is will there be named mascotted teams to the whatever this new

135school is? I would say not to begin with but is there an opportunity to leverage space fields etc to deal with the capacity challenges we have across multiple schools I would say the answer is yes or has to be yes because that's another one of our again thing one is the capacity >> director co and just to to uh to tack on to that too when we think about our capa our u facility uh constraints right now as director mulling says this opens the door for more opportunity for more facility space. I know we've heard a lot from robotics, you know, they need more space. Again, this building opens us up for that. Um, which is which is exciting. I I'll just note too, you know, I think with all of this conversation, there's so

136many things for us to discuss and to work out. And frankly, again, all of this is exciting. And a lot of what we've discussed today, I think we could figure out there's not one way or another way. there could be something in the middle that creates pathways where you have a learning center, but also maybe it becomes a high school, you know, a full-time high school for some students. I think there's there's so many possibilities and that's why I go back to my original comments. I want to make sure our community knows like lean into this. This is exciting. We want to hear from you. Um we want you to make connections for us particularly as you as we think about pathway sponsors and partnerships. Um and um this just opens the door not only

137at this building but again at our three comprehensive high schools for additional space programming for um innovation. Um exciting. It's exciting times for our district. >> Any other comments before we move along on our agenda? >> Okay. Thank you very much presentation. Okay. Next up, we are going to have a capital projects update. And I believe here comes Mr. >> Yeah, we do have Tom Mullins and Martin Turner coming here to the podium. But um uh as Tom makes his way and introduces himself officially to the to the board meeting. Uh I want to thank Tom for his work and recognize that you might have seen a couple of retirements on the consent agenda. This is not Tom. Just be just to be clear. I'm not making some announcement about Tom because he was not

138he was not on the agenda. I saw I saw I saw everyone perk up just to be clear. Uh but but that there there are two retirements in the capital project team. And in particular, I want to start off by recognizing I don't normally do this, but Royce Norat has been with the district for over 40 years. And so you saw his name and he started in the maintenance department as a carpenter in 1984 and then he moved to the capital projects department in 1989. So he has seen all of the life cycle of the growth, the footprint, all the buildings, the reimagining of buildings, the building of new buildings, and then I'd like to give opportunity for Tom and and and Martin to comment if you want to, but you know this this is

139a this is a a shakeup to the team. >> Yes. Yes. big loss. Lot of history there and knowledge. Royce likes to come in. His kid, his wife went through the district and he's had the opportunity to to tear down every one of the schools she went to and rebuild and his two daughters went through the district and he's remodeled or worked on every one of their schools and uh so he's quite proud of that. So, another retirement in the capital projects department is Debbie Rosson. And Debbie's been with the district a little over 10 years. She started out subbing at the schools and at the admin building. And she started with the capital projects department in 2015. She's worked hard for the capital projects department ISD. Some of her favorite challenges were the large

140moves associated with the new schools. She was as the construction specialist. She was involved in those and she's been an integral part of the capital projects team in ISD and will be very missed. All right. Capital projects update purpose. We're going to do the final status update on the 2018 levy projects. We'll talk about the 22 briefly about the 22. Um update on the larger general fund projects on um outline the status of active grant efforts. Um latest updates on the new high school and a short preview on the upcoming capital projects oversight committee. Um 2018 final update. All of the 2018 levy projects are um complete or substantially complete with the complete with the exception of Challenger and Newcastle Elementary Schools HVAC recommissioning. They were we put them on hold the board put them

141on hold in Juda 23 for um to do those projects when they're if and when they are needed. and a reserve has been set up to complete these two projects in the future should the need arise. 22 work related to all the 22 levy projects is continuing on an as needed basis. And just a reminder, these will cover critical repair needs that arise between now and the end of the four-year levy cycle which ends in um this year 26. Oh, actually 26. Yes. Active grant opportunities that we're working on. We have the large energy efficiency grant through Department of Commerce over at Isiqua High School. It's um it's a project to recommission the building, bring the uh HVAC system uh recommission the HVAC system, add some components to it that have um will and already

142are saving lots of energy. And uh we had a small hiccup with a part that didn't arrive on time and we're pushing it out till midFebruary to finish, but it's not going to affect any of the any of the funding or anything, just the date of completion. And the other one is the Department of Ecology electric bus and infrastructure grant. Those uh this will probably be the final update on that. The charging infrastructures infrastructure is installed and in use. New high school update development commission, city of Isqua development commission um approved unanimously the amendment um the major amendment in mid November. There was an appeal filed by a community member. We are currently working through that appeal process. A decision by the hearings examiner as to whether the appeal is allowed to move forward is

143expected on Friday, February 6th. And the we still have a target construction date uh start date of March 1st of this year and expected opening date remains August of 27. Um this is an updated schedule for the for the permitting process and start of construction. And just a note that that that the initial 61 days of the uh that the appeal has added on to the major onto the project will not affect the start date or the or the opening of the school date. But if the appeal does move forward, that could um affect the overall project schedule. Just keep in mind capital over capital projects oversight committee. Um we delayed the meeting in December and are having it on uh the new date is February 11th. It's uh going to be a there's going

144to be a presentation by the design build team on the new high school. That's Scanska Building USA and Betetti along with myself. Um we'll we'll present information just kind of do because this is the first big meaty project for them to dig into. Um go over the design build process, how the estimates were arrived at and an act an overview of the actual project estimates so they can see that and construction market update as well as other general updates to the project. Any questions? Any questions from the board? >> Dr. Mullings. >> I have a couple. Yeah. So, on the I guess I'll go back to the um like the Isiqua High School the energy efficiency. What is the current state of some of the I guess clean buildings uh items? Are they of expectations

145of us for that? >> I don't know. to that as that question. >> So, the district applied for exemptions. The first buildings that will come up for um to meet have to meet to meet the code were the buildings over 200,000 square feet, which are the three high schools. We got exemptions for those for 5 years. So, that puts us out till um June of 20 or 2030 2030 or 2031. So, we're good there. And the next dates will be basically our middle schools 90,000 up to 200,000. We'll go through the same exemption process and request an exemption for those and then followed through with the uh elementary schools until such a time we can gather funds in the future to make those improvements that will help us meet those clean energy performance standards. And

146to confirm, I uh looked this up for you, uh that it's 2031 for campuses. >> Um and the middle schools for 2027 >> um these are upcoming deadlines and then the elementary schools 2028. >> Yep. Thank you. >> So will the looking at this item, the energy efficiency grant at Isaqua High School, >> is there any relationship between the two? Like does this help us start to meet those? >> Absolutely. >> The energy efficiency grant that was done at Isakqua High School would be the first step we would do at almost any one of the buildings. It would be recommissioning the building and um and you know repairing anything that needs to be repaired, tuning everything up, getting the system running the way it should be was designed. buildings tend over time to fall out

147of that ability to do that and it's quite an operation to recommission a building. It's not something that can be done um quickly or easily and it's in its cost. So, >> okay, I have one more which is on the the new high school. I understand we're saying you had built in time. Um, but if we go beyond to the appeal, is there any buffer left between February 6th and when we start to push out the date? >> Yes. And the my guess would you know I've talked to the contractor about this and they're working through that schedule right now but I'm guessing you know if we could start midappril >> it's a going to be a push because we really need that time in the summer when the weather is dry to get that

148site work done >> much past that it starts costing us quite a bit of money to work during the winter on that the earth work done during the winter is a much more expensive effort so it starts costing the project money. >> Great. Thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Anybody else? >> Thank you, Tom. Thank you to your staff for great work. Appreciate it. >> Yes. Okay. Next up is monitoring report for operational expectation number nine, communicating with the public. Uh we will start with a motion. next one >> which is coming eminently. >> Oh, maybe not. There was the other one. >> I no longer have network access, so we just >> Oh, hold on. >> Uh, great. I move the board accept the monitoring report for operational expectation 9 communicating with the

149public OE9 as presented. I second. >> Thank you. Okay, I think we will have a presentation from Mr. Sherwood. >> Great. And to start us off, I'll frame us up um the about the Oh, did I Okay. >> Okay. >> All right. Um just a note about sort of this monitoring report and some of the process and some of the uh work here on this one. And I think it's important to note that again, you know, as uh director Mullings mentioned that and I still also have a similar challenge of looking back a year in a rears especially once we turn the corner in the calendar year here. Um so this is for the work completed done uh in the 24 to 25 school year and this is meant to reflect whether we have the

150monitoring report itself. The purpose of that is to to show where we have evidence and examples that meet the board's operational expectations for me and therefore the district and based on my interpretation that includes you know how how that gets translated into how I uh and our team thinks about that work. Um, as a note, the operational expectation 9 some short history is that this one has actually changed recently with the updates to the coherent governance model and that was changed actually I think a little bit more substantially content-wise and some of this updating and tweaking to modernize language in July of 2024 officially was adopted but was being presented throughout the spring uh of that 2024 timeline. And so this is actually the first monitoring year with the updated um expectations that were set

151forth in that policy. I think there was originally just three points but there's uh been expanded points here which I think are very helpful and so this is our first time kind of testing out what that evidence looks like uh and examples with the board and uh it is our belief that we um meet the expectations of this operational expectation without exception and eager to hear of that conversation as well but um excited about this and and a note this used to be called operational expect or uh executive limitation nine annual report to the public but this has been shifted to communicating with the public. So there's been a shift there even in that annual port two to communicating with and so uh as we take the input and feedback and discussion from the board.

152We're eager to continue to obviously improve and um make progress in that effort. So I'll turn it over to my colleague here and you can introduce yourself officially. >> Sure. Thank you superintendent and board. Uh Mark Sherwood, the executive director of communications. Good evening. I'm uh pleased to present the Isqua School District's OE9 monitoring report for the 2024 school year. OE9 communicating with the public is an annual operational expectation report that ensures our community is well informed about student performance, district programs, and our financial condition in a clear and accessible way. Based on the evidence, the district is in compliance with OE9. However, we remain focused on continuous improvement as conditions change and as we consider feedback from students, families, staff, the schoolboard, and the communities we serve. In the first section in 9.1, timely

153and strategic communication highlights how we intentionally share information with the community and seek meaningful feedback. In 2024 25, the district used a mix of traditional and digital channels to engage families on secondary innovation, equity based budgeting, and our school construction bond measures. Surveys and advisory groups, including the family partnership and language access groups, provided input that helped shape district decisions, and supported community outreach. Family survey responses remained strong with over 8,500 respondents and consistently high ratings for district performance, school quality, and communication efforts. At the same time, feedback also highlighted areas for improvement, including opportunities to streamline messaging, increase clarity, and reach community members who may not regularly engage with the district communications. Last year, the communications department conducted an audit using the National School Public Relations Association rubric and framework. The district earned an

154overall rating of established across seven critical function areas. And together, these insights and assessment baseline support continuous improvement and guide communication plans aligned with our strategic plan priorities, ensuring families receive timely, accessible, and meaningful information. In the second section, 9.2, Two, family engagement shows how the district tailors communication to meet diverse family needs. Highlights include hosting multiple family information nights, the district's first back-toschool resource fair, and the launch of the Black and Brown Excellence Summit. The family partnership team also served as a key connector between schools and families, helping new and historically underrepresented families better understand district systems, build relationships, and access resources that support student success. The language access program expanded translation interpretation services, supported families during graduation, and strengthened statewide collaboration about best practices with other districts. In section 9.3, community partnerships demonstrates

155the district's efforts to connect with local organizations and leaders. As primary example, the district partners with the Isqua Schools Foundation, PTSA Council, Swedish mental health, communities and schools, the garage, and the circle to provide additional support for students academic, social, and emotional needs. These partnerships were critical during specifically emergency events such as the November 2024 bomb cyclone and helped maintain communication and services for families. In section 9.4, sharing district success highlights the variety of channels used to celebrate achievements. The communications teams continue weekly in special bulletins, horizons, and focus publications, student art calendars, podcasts, social media, and direct mail. In June 2025, we mailed a postcard to all district residents with key statistics, a thank you to families for supporting students and staff, and of course congratulating the class of 2025 and with a little

156reminder about the first day of school in August. Overall, engagement metrics showed significant growth and the department earned three ENSRE awards for excellence. And finally in section 9.5 alien reporting ensures the public has access to key data. The 202425 annual report was published in January 2026 pro on the website provides student achievement summaries program and service highlights and financial information. It connects to monitoring reports, strategic plan priorities and school level dashboards for transparency and accountability. Looking ahead to the 2025-26 school year annual report, we anticipate continuing improvement in communication systems and processes, better connection with families hard-to-reach, expand outreach to non-parent community members, refinements to family surveys, and increased visibility of district successes through digital print mailings and audio platforms. Our next OE9 report, likely shared with the school board and community midyear, will build

157on this year's work while provide providing uh updated evidence of progress. I do want to thank uh members of my team and I want to thank Elena Seatison and the executive director of equity, belonging and family partnership in preparation and support of the modern report and just all around great support and helping for me in my first full year being with the district. So that's all I have to say for now. Open to coin. >> Thank you Mr. Sherwood. Uh, Director Coin, >> uh, thank you, uh, for all the great work that you and the communications team have have done. Um, and, uh, particularly since we're monitoring the prior year, but, you know, obviously for the prior year and currently. Um, so, thank you for that great work. Couple things that I wanted to just

158highlight. So, 9.2 on page three. Um I want to just acknowledge the work that the language advisory and family partnership uh advisory groups have done. I think um notable in terms of the outreach that they've done in the you know Chinese, Hindu, Latinx, Hispanic communities is significant and I know that you know the team continues to do more of that outreach. I just want to applaud that, you know, you and the team for that great work. And then 9.3 I wanted to highlight too you know developing connections and strategic partnerships throughout the community. I know this also, you know, this particular section notes the work that you've done and connecting to other groups in the community that may not necessarily be tied directly to the school system. So, trying to, you know, specifically outreach to

159individuals who may not currently have have students in the district. I guess a question for you because this is as board directors, we hear this and we hear this here in board meetings a lot from members of the community who said who say, "Gosh, I don't hear I never hear anything from the district um unless they want money." And how would you as you think about because there's a lot of great communication that's going out. There's ways to access information around um the great work that's happening in the district. But from your standpoint, from a communication standpoint, how would you say we what's the best way to respond to a question like that? >> Well, I I think we have to use multi-channel. So, it's not just one particular channel. Um, you know, in the

160previous when I when I came here, we were doing like two to three mailings a year. We've increased that this year to six. So, we know to get to our non-parent family members who may not be connected to us digitally. We're not in a in a high market media coverage, so we're not going to get a lot of television, a lot of radio. Um, so it's it's we're gonna have to use some old some old school measures. Um, we've also with our with our PTSA and we know that the me the membership was a big focus, but was also trying to use our our our our reach of our voice through through a lot of those members. So going to a lot of those council meetings, a lot of those PTSA meetings to share, you

161know, word of mouth. We we hear it. It's, you know, firsthand, tangible. hearing it from somebody is a lot more I'd say respectable or taking for you know as as good information. Um digital campaigns we're definitely doing a little bit more digital on open enrollment and opportunity not just in the levy. So some people think it's just selected measures that we're doing some digital campaigns. We have to balance it for PDC compliance. Um so that's also expanding the the radius and the outreach and then also starting to look at geo targeting uh basically some some specific neighborhoods. So trying to hit them when they're on their phones, when they're on their laptops, um to get them into from a digital perspective, trying to do some media outreach, it's tough. I'm telling you, it's not it's

162not easy. Um you know, calling people saying we have some really wonderful great grad rates uh in this day and age there. You know, the news cycle is um you know, the old saying was if if it if it bleeds, it's going to lead. Um and honestly, that's where we still are in in the media forefront. But we did have some we're getting some national coverage on some stories now. and some pickup. So, I'm feeling a little bit better with that. So, um I think I think we're just going to have to do a lot more outreach. Again, um all of our key groups, um enlist our student board reps, our board members, our PTS members, and all the partnerships. Elena's team does a wonderful job of trying to connect with different family groups. And

163sometimes they're not exactly an organized group that that you might hear about. It might be, you know, from a cultural responsive group that just might be gathering. Um, so I think it's going to be a multi-channel effort on just for us to just continue continue to go forward. >> Absolutely. No, thank you. And and continue to let all of us know up here, our student reps, our community members who listen to board meetings too, who are part of this, what we can do to continue to have those conversations with our neighbors who may not currently be directly tied to our schools. >> And and I and I've challenged my team and whenever somebody said to me, "Oh, it's bad communication. It was just poor communication." I was like, "No, let's get into it." Was it

164the message or did the message not connect with you? Are you a part of my target audience? Were you not part of my target audience? You know, I I So, anytime somebody tells me that, I I don't I don't take it for granted. I really want to kind of get to understand where you may be or where, you know, where where I can reach you. So, even tonight, I a close associate here tell me like, hey, I haven't heard from you guys in a while. And trying to find out where where they are and that just tells me I have more work to do. So, >> Well, well, thank you. We appreciate you and the team. >> Yeah. >> Can I add one thing to that? So, uh, just a bottom line is direct mail

165is a very important way to get our information out. Um, and as uh, Mr. Sherwood mentioned, we've increased that direct mail. The postcard that he mentioned at the end of that year, we kind of made sure that was part of the evidence for last year because it came in June and we that was our first forward into trying different kind of formats as well that we wanted to test out and and we did see some positive feedback from that. I do want to mention that we also listened to the public comment. So, we had heard last spring from a person who was in our community that um had not been receiving information from us and he was very emphatic about his points around um to your point, Director Coin, letting him know what we're up

166to because he's no longer a caregiver of or a parent in the district. And so, he actually sent an email uh recently and said, "Hey, do you remember me?" And uh I was very clear about my feedback from uh the bond cycles last year. And I want to let you know I just received the levy information. Clear, concise. Thanks for listening. Great job. And so I I just want to say that, you know, that's that's a recent example where we are showing our progress, but also that we are continuing to make the efforts to reach our populations that are not, you know, currently involved by nature of just being either working here or having kids here. Um, so I just wanted to highlight that >> and I probably should add trying to add uh information

167into like HOA neighborhood publications. We're trying to up that up because we know that's another another avenue in particular neighborhoods in our community. >> Dr. G. Sure. >> Uh, so bottom of page five 9.4. Uh, I appreciate hearing that you've increased the mailings. I think I think we just can continue to get better at this like on a either frequent or more predictable basis. But there's so much to celebrate and I feel like this place we spend more time talking about what's not going well just because we're monitoring. But really, I mean, every school all across the district, there are amazing things happening. I mean, we're leading the state in graduation. Not only that, but our scores all the way up, marking to that moment, uh, are, you know, outpacing all of our surrounding districts.

168And I just feel like it would be great if there was uh continued emphasis within social media platforms for that on a more frequent basis which would highlight either graphically or ideally graphically so that people don't have to read the words but less words more a picture and figures on like just like how businesses do to highlight all the things for why you should you know like them. I think that also would help if we had them come similarly time through the intra district things for our parents and uh so they could see that and feel like they could share it too if they wanted. Uh, but I don't feel like we talk enough about that to where people that I know are aware of all of the successes of the district. And I think

169that's part of the challenge of why then some people get the sense of like you only we only hear from you if you want money. >> Fair enough. And I and I definitely think um you know the old adage that content is queen is king, but frequency is queen. So, I think we have to do a better job of making sure that our our the the materials are not they might not you might be looking at your social feed in the early early in the morning and you might not be getting it into your into your into your algorithm or into your posting cycle. Um, and same goes for somebody who might only be looking at at night. So, I think we just have to get a little bit more comfortable with multiple placements of

170similar information and not not understanding, you know, the the law sevens and the repeatability and the frequency. We we as a department, we got to do a little bit of a better job on that versus just saying, "Ah, we did it. we got it out there. Moving on to the next thing. So, I think that's just part of our process and systems we need to work on. But, thank you, >> Director Mullings. >> Thank you. >> Y um I this report represents a watershed difference in how this district communicates watershed. The communications prior to this year, which isn't even what we're doing already, our current year again monitoring is a year ago. >> Yeah. um is just dramatically different. I was a a heavy critic. Um our community is a heavy critic. I think even

171the concept of what we were trying to do was constricted by a couple reasons. One, I think just a mentality that we didn't have to communicate as frequently to your point about frequency. Also, I think as we went through, I'd say the most dramatic era of budget um challenges, communications took a backseat. So, I think one of the things I want to make sure as we, you know, as we get questions, I see some communication, some chatter online is I think the comm's uh approach, the comm's plan has been highly responsive to feedback. It's been highly responsive to reaching new and broader communities. It's been highly responsive uh to a quality bar of what communication looks like. I think we've actually taken a step forward in the mixture of um dense update celebrating successes and

172infographic presentation. I think that the quality there is a lot better. I think it's important to note that those things are tied directly to things we've asked for in the strategic plan of the district which is to have more authentic um communication. So where things show up uh the fact that we are being more promotional in nature the fact that we I see um nature of my work I'm probably on social more than the average bear but I think what we are doing on the multiple platforms of social is just reams different it's it's a it's a different ballgame than what we were doing before this year so 2020 2020 2020 20 whenever I've been around the first four years I was around I also want to note that that is an invest investment shift

173and difference and it's intentional one >> because in order to reach people like the gentleman who sent his thank you note when he came up here and said hey I'm not getting anything those were budget uh choices to say okay we'll communicate less frequently that means there's budget added in these areas to make sure we're reaching people further and I just it's really important for me um that our community sometimes isn't isn't so good at recognizing when they ask for And then when different shows up saying why is it different? So this is an area where the push has been communicate more better and different which has meant uh investing differently in how we communicate investing differently with the quality and frequency of that communication and therefore that translates into investment differences and that is

174with knowledge and with purpose and I just commend you with high skill. >> Thank you. Thank you. Bet. >> Hi, I I just wanted to ask a question about like the scope of this. Um I'm not sure but would you know if like teachers are encompassed in this uh communicating with the public because I don't see anything really about communicating with teachers and I know that teachers are students first line of exposure and then students are obviously the community's first line of exposure. So I was wondering if there was anything about how teachers are informed about the board and just generally the going ons and or like some data about how in well informed they feel if that's in the scope of the moderating report. >> Yeah. And um I mean certainly from a distribution

175of the information yes the teachers are now I we have great open rates and I shared this earlier. We have great open rates, great clickthrough. Can I get you to actually read the words in your email and and absorb what you're actually reading? So, that's that's the other issue, and that's not just about teachers. That's about anybody who opens up like a bulletin that we might send out. Um, we also look at the data that we're getting from our staff surveys to try to understand where they are, if they're in a a confidence level with us, uh, or promoter score level with us. And, and I so I look at that, we look at that, not just me, but our other team members look at that data when we're trying to understand what are areas

176that we can improve in terms of communication. So, um, yes, they are our teachers, all of our staff are are considered. Um, I think you realize I'm a feedback hound. I'll take it from from pretty pretty much anybody because I, you know, this is my target audience. The biggest, the biggest audience connected directly besides students are teachers. That's the next biggest audience. So, yes, they are part of the equation. Could we do better work? And I put it in there. Yes, we probably have to do a little bit better work of capturing their feedback as we go forward. But I work closely with the HR team on some of their their survey work they do. >> So, I just want to call out just specifically because I'm not sure which year it's in. I think

177maybe just to be really specific you there because again previous feedback was one building level of comms needed improvement and so I think it's important to talk about how that's changed over this year but also the internal comms I don't remember when the insider launched. >> Yeah. Um it it launched before I got here so but I think >> so I think that's I'm I'm not finding it really quickly but I think that was also an important item that maybe would be helpful to explain that there's specific internal communications We can talk a couple a little bit about that. So the uh ISDN said there was a need to have actually more cohesive just consistent communication for all staff. I think staff members were getting different emails from different departments at different times. Sometimes asking

178for action sometimes just as an FYI it was hard to sort through that. So we streamlined that um through an ISD insider which goes to all staff. Um that's all staff but then how different information and uh details reach through different levels. we have a cascade effort where through different department leads. So starting with our cabinet um and then flowing through different departments we uh do our very best to try and make sure that that does get cascaded. Now um cascading efforts sometimes can go a little bit funky, right? Because we all have different variable uh patterns for how we communicate, rhythms for how we meet and when we meet. Um but we try to do our very best to make sure we are coordinating as much as possible. It does take a lot of

179work to try and coordinate on a cascade effort. um as well and and >> every Monday we're sending an internal uh leadership so to the principal leaders and the department leaders key information that also might when we're talking about cascading informing them first a little bit about something be coming up before it appears in the insider too. So there's a little bit of it's not a principal is not learning about it at the same time as maybe a teacher will will. So there's there's always work to be you know sharing that information and that information is coming from different departments. It's not just communications guessing. So I'm getting information from other cabinet leaders >> and just to highlight it just so FedE can find it. So on page five of the report in 9.4 in

180that evidence you'll see all the individual vehicles including um the insider the twice monthly bulletin etc. So those are called out at the bottom of page five. >> Dr. Anderson, >> when it comes to communication, I I struggle on this topic in the district and I'll tell you why. I feel there's great efforts in communication and I've seen improvements in my world, right? I I live in the elementary world right now with my children. It's going to expand next year. Um, and it's obviously expanding being on the board. Um, I think where I struggle is the quality of the communication, especially when it's coming directly from the schools to the families, and I hear that from my constituents. I have shared that, and I appreciate the the review of of what I've shared and comments

181back. Um, I think it's there's some great opportunities uh for improvement in that. Um, but something too I think we need to look at and I I think Director Gallinger touched on it is is social media um and finding continuing to broaden the ways that we communicate um with technology um and just the methods that families want to be communicated, you know, to or how how they want to be communicated. Um, I've brought up, you know, could there be an application, you know, some type of app that pushes notifications like Levy and and things that you could sign up for and things that uh you would want to know about. Um, because I think that will help again broaden, you know, if if I'm not at Maywood yet, but I'm going to be, can I

182get alerts so kind I can kind of know what's going on now? You know, that kind of thing. Like I I do get the new I'm starting to get the news bulletins. They started in January. So I was like, "Wow, I'm getting Maywood information now." Um, and we're not even going there yet. But if there's other ways of trying to continue to push different methods, I guess is just what I'm trying to say. But I applaud the work that's been done. I just the quality is the piece that I'm struggling with with the communication to families, especially when there's incidents and things like we heard tonight. Um, so that's yeah, that's where I'm at. >> You're referring to like crisis communication. Uh yeah, or just things going on um in the community. Yeah, >> I

183just think it'd be helpful to kind of hone in on like >> Yeah. I was I was gonna I'll take this in three parts. The I'll start with if you if you don't mind, I'll start with the quality of communication. So, every school we have a bulletin maker and it's not a full-time job. It could be a classified or certified person who's providing that information. Um what it probably is we could do is work on some of our our PD when we do our training with them to talk about improving the the message and how they're sharing out the message. So they've been trained on the platform. They do reach out to us. We do hold office hours. We do do like a quarterly training session. But I think we can you know instead of

184just being functional, we we start talking about what is what does quality communications look like and reaching your your community and are you you know getting the feedback and and then enacting the feedback um from that standpoint. So, I just I wanted to say that we're we're not managing all the schools at the district level. Um, and that also bleeds into social media. So, obviously we we have a we we manage our social media accounts. We don't manage the some of you'll see something like the ASB accounts or some of the school specific accounts. Those are kind of man those are managed at the school level. I don't have a dedicated social media person. Honestly, everybody on the team is doing a little bit of everything. Um, I wish I could have a dedicated social

185media team because I do get a lot of feedback from constituents who said, "Did you see on this page that they said this, this, and this, and this?" And these are usually private pages. Number one. Number two, I would probably we do have some base scheduling software, but the the scheduling and listening software goes up exponentially when you start wanting to get into a lot of different pages and then do the analytics to understand like, am I seeing something that's very high concerning? And then all of a sudden now we're being very high level on inter getting into into into conversations that we may not have the context or have the ability to share if it's student privacy data. Um from that standpoint on the crisis side um crisis communications I I've gone through the

186FEMA training and all all the things you can imagine at at the state level and other districts and I've gone to seminars for school shootings and Parkland and Coline. So, I've gone through a lot of different scenarios on what you do and it's I will I will say you're you're it's it's always a difficult situation no matter what. Um especially when you're getting into um student privacy information and people want more. They want to know exactly what happened and it may not be it may be too much that we would release that might target the child or children. So, we have to be very careful with that. I do re I do recognize though when you get something that that might feel like you you didn't acknowledge it as much as you should have that

187we have to have a little more empathy in the beginning of our messages to understand that there are fears and we have to might to remind our community members and our family members that on the end of a like a a crisis like a real or a false threat there are consequences that are at the district level or possibly at at the at the criminal level. So, I might have to start sharing that information to remind them, but I can't share the details of what those that information is. But I do appreciate the feedback on crisis comms when it's not connecting or or it's uh you know that people want to know about timing and whether you know they want to get it right now. It depends if I'm in a an a direct threat

188with requiring like a 10-minute protocol every 10 minutes. and providing an update of possibly don't come to the school, stay tuned for instructions until the threat has been mitigated and then we can provide a closeout uh information. But I appreciate the feedback and I think just the sensitivity of of people what they've heard. Um I've acknowledged it. We'll we'll work on that. >> No, I I really appreciate what you just said because I think those are good reminders to the community. I think if you as a parent you put yourself in the shoes if if that was your student that was in an incident, what would you know h how should that be handled in a sensitive manner? And so um thank you for addressing that. >> And I have been in an incident where

189a chief of police called me and said um we have an active shooter at your daughter's school. And I've told people that story and it still hits me and I still think about and thank God it it turned out to be a false threat at the end of the day. But I was dad first. I wanted to go in and grab every kid in that school, including mine. But I also knew I had a job to do and I had to go through the protocols and work with the security team and work with the school leadership and law enforcement. So that's and I and and I and I understand uh parents uh emotions are all different across the board when it comes to a crisis and I'll do my best to be responsive but I

190also have to follow the right steps and ensuring that the information is first accurate because that if I don't provide accurate information or accurate instructions then it becomes chaos. Yeah. >> So >> absolutely thank you so much. Following up on Director Anderson, you know, I agree with Director Mullings that uh overall communications has been at an inflection point and improved dramatically. When it comes to crisis communications, I would say it hasn't changed much at all. And uh I think the hardest part for me with this is the unevenness by which I can see competent crisis communications shared in our district and not so because I'm on almost every ene I see really good examples of crisis may be the wrong word in sometimes, but a day of offcycle like urgent communication to a parent community.

191I see building leaders who have improved dramatically over the past few years in how they can communicate and I see some who haven't changed at all. And so I do feel it is incumbent on the district to have a standard by which all our building leaders are held to with regard to how they handle these emergent communication both in how and what they communicate because it should be at least a standard expectation for what comes through. And you have some you have some people in this district who do it really well. And so I encourage you to lean on them and that could be part of whatever groupings that they do as far as all of our our sectionals that do that. And we have ones that could really improve. So I would hope that

192as you look into this rest of this school and next year is spending a little time on that because you probably have the numbers behind this but you could communicate well x number of times and then the one time where you don't that's one that will be remembered that people will get that in front of that lectern and then tell us every time for the next however time period and so that's why those emergent communications are so important. And I think sometimes they get overlooked by our building leaders who are trying to do all sorts of things, but they have to realize that that moment is not just words on paper for all the people receiving it. >> Y >> and I think that like there's so much emotion attached to the processing of whatever

193few words are there. I I really think that that could be really strengthened and really is part of what we believe should be the isloud brand and I think that everyone has a collective responsibility to meet that standard. >> Thank you. >> I would I would agree. Cons we crisis responsiveness and consistency um certainly uh trying to elevate our game across the board. Um so definitely work to do and like I said anybody comes up here and shares their emotions of what how they're dealing with it. They're all unique. I respect every one of them and uh I want I want to be responsive in a way that they get at least understand what our process is or get the adequate information for them to process the situation. So room for improvement. >> Dr. Cohen,

194>> I want to end on a positive note because there were two posts this week that I want to elevate that were on the school district uh page. one was um want to improve tween social uh skills, enlist senior citizens. It highlights the relationship between Cougar Mountain Middle School and Timber Ridge. Um and I I've really seen over the last year in particular the district's ability to highlight some of those positive stories because we we're in an environment now where we need to some good news on occasion. So, thank you for that good work. and I saw a post and of course I can't find it but it was either the day it was earlier this week but it was on I think um kindergarten um information night and it was I somehow noticed it

195and was reading all the comments and all the parents saying oh we're so excited to go to endeavors uh you know information night or challengers and we can't wait to meet you and it was really fun to see so um I've seen those those posts have been have have really improved so thank you >> yeah I really wish every post had a kindergarten in it cuz >> I know. Yes, true. It's really hard to It's always positive. >> I go in a different direction with a with a cute little kid. So, >> okay. I actually get the last word. >> So, I'll keep my comments very short because I think Director Mullings actually um stole my thunder and commented on every point that I wanted to make, but that's great. So, I just want to

196re-emphasize though that I really think that this monitoring report shows just tremendous strategic thought and effort, which I very much appreciate. There's lots of noteworthy advancements in my mind across all of the uh sub subcategories and therefore evidence of compliance with the report. Uh just a three quick points. you know, I just I'm very appreciative of the efforts to engage the community, but more than that, I think it's the efforts to allow the community to engage us. >> Yeah. >> Uh through the advisory groups that have been formed and the feedback we're getting from those, I has just been very helpful. Um and also the efforts around family engagement and particularly the outreach to segments that uh in the past we've maybe had some difficulty reaching, Chinese community, the Hindi community, Hispanic community. Um, thank

197you for those efforts and I'm I'm glad that we're we're we're getting better at engaging um those families. And then lastly, I just want to congratulate you on your success rate on your click rate on your bulletins. I mean, it's I can't think of a greater indicator of >> um the the ability to share with our community, but the community also obviously very eager to get that information as well. And you know I wrote down here if you build it they will come and you have. So um thank you very much for all of that. Any other closing comments superintendent? >> Uh communication is a very important topic for all of us and uh and we can always do better. So I think that's a recognition because and and the world keeps evolving. So uh

198we are in the space of continuous improvement and I'm just very grateful uh to have a colleague like Mark and um and and the team that's also sitting here has assisted in many ways with the partnerships expanding our reach our efforts. It's not one person, it's the communications team, it's all of our colleagues and we are uh building our muscle and capacity together. So thank you for the constructive feedback and we um look forward to continuing to improve together. I probably should have started with this but um do we have any public comment in the room or online? I'm not hearing any. Okay. Uh so we have a motion to accept the monitoring report for operational expectation 9 communicating with the public as presented. Uh all in favor please say I. >> I. >> And

199all in favor? Any oppose? None. Oh, it is accepted. Great. Thank you very much. >> Okay. Now, moving on to our next uh item on the agenda, which is our legislative matters. This is an opportunity to share legislative updates. Does our legislative representative have anything to add? >> Um I just wanted to Well, yeah, a couple things actually. Um, so President Taylor and I met with the superintendent and Martin Turney who provided support as we completed a handoff uh of legislative representative duties to me. So I'm very excited about that. Um, and something off of your plate. >> Thank you. Um, I want to thank DI district staff who engaged in several legislative advocacy efforts um, uh, focused on protecting district resources, improving funding, and ensuring student safety. Um, superintendent, I stole some of this

200from you, so um, some of this is your words. Um, we have got House Bill uh, 2432 and Senate Bill uh, 6222, which is surplus technology. district staff uh provided testimony before the House Education Committee um on Tuesday the 20th. And these companion bills address the dis uh disposition of surplus technology and are sponsored uh by Representative Callen uh Hall and Victoria Senator Victoria Hunt. Um no update on the Senate bill, but the House bill is scheduled for executive session in the House Committee uh on education on February 2nd. So that's good news on that. Um, we also have uh Senate Bill 5918, which is MSOC uh funding a staff member uh I'm sorry, MSOC funding. A staff member signed in uh as pro on behalf of the district for uh Senate Early Learning and

201K12 education committee hearing. Um the bill is sponsored by Senator Wellman addressing funding for MSOC. It's currently scheduled for executive session in the Senate Committee for Early Learning K12 on February 3rd. So, both of those uh are under review. Um and lastly, uh my fellow board members might find this interesting. While we were on the Hill on Tuesday, um each of the representatives in their office have bill trackers. And while I was uh in one of the offices, I noticed that there's one mentioning uh school board directors. So, I looked it up. Um it's it's Senate I was like what what's a schoolboard bill uh school board director it's bill 5860 um and it has a the Senate that's the Senate bill and the House bill is 2366 and it's in regard to schoolboard compensation

202which hasn't been updated in 40 years so since the 80s. Um the bill is sponsored by representative Kalen, Tai, and Zhan and along with others around the state. Um and were filed by the request of the superintendent of public instruction. Um both bills are being referred to the committee of education. Um so you can look it up if you want to see what that's about, but I thought that was interesting. >> Interesting. >> So >> I'm hoping that this is what we want to hear in the legislative matters. I think um kind of keeping track of some of the important bills that um impact education. Um so I will continue to do that. >> Yeah. >> And I know the district is as well and that's where I get a lot of my information from.

203So I'll continue to share that. >> Great. Thank you, Director Anderson. Appreciate that. We'll definitely want to keep keep our eye on that MSOC bill. It's I think as we were discussing with other legislators could mean as much as $2 million towards the district's funding gaps. So that would be great. Uh okay. Next up, we have announcements and correspondence. Uh, do we have any to share? No. No. Okay. All righty. Moving right along. Time for the calendar of future agenda topics. Uh, let's see. We have uh time to get our phones out. Looks like we have three things to discuss. 2026 2027 board meeting calendar draft. Let's start there. >> Want to start with the motion? Yes, please. >> Uh, I move the board approve the 202627 school board meetings calendar as presented. >> Second.

204>> Thank you. Okay. I haven't even looked at it yet. This is it. Got it. Okay. >> Wait, are we doing district calendar? I'm hearing board calendar. >> Um, on the district calendar, it's the green. >> Oh, okay. >> Highlights for where the board meetings would fall in this year. >> It's the overlay >> somehow. I got it. >> Okay. >> First and last day of school is fascinating. >> That is kind of interesting, isn't it? >> You might notice that on in January um it's a Wednesday versus a Thursday. >> Yes, I was going to ask about that. Um, it's before a long weekend. Uh, also the 14th is my birthday. >> Well, if we're talking about birthdays, there's one on here that lands on mine. >> Um, but but to give people That's

205where that was uh adjusted, but we can certainly adjust it back if >> needed. You want to ruin your birthday? That's But um but Director Anderson, did you want to comment on on your >> Oh, I just wanted to ask I don't know if we're done talking about um what was it where we were even talking about J uh January with the Wednesday April. I only show one. Is that just normal because of spring break? Okay. >> Exactly. Yes. >> Um yeah, this is fine with me. >> Just to stay on that. So you'll see that there's a couple of places where it's only one. So, February >> Mhm. >> November, >> April, >> July. >> Um, >> November. >> July and December. >> Yeah. Sorry. >> Oh, November. Yeah. >> July, November, December. I

206was going to talk about July. July is also >> that's where my brain was cuz that's my favorite one. July is also um it's the only one. It is usually remote and abbreviated consent only. >> Gotcha. So, um, it's really like and and often daytime. It's usually very busy >> or in the morning in your pajamas. >> Yes. So, that's really where I was going. So, you see a number that are one per month, but really July is uh minutes long. >> I I don't have any concerns about what's here. >> Okay. Are we ready to vote? All those in favor of adopting the 2026 2027 school board district calendar say I. >> I. >> Hi. >> Okay. Uh what's next? Board retreat agenda. Do we have somewhere? I don't think we have Is there

207a copy of it? We're supposed We have a copy of the board agenda. >> These were these were attachments to your Friday update. >> Second time we've seen it. >> Yes. And uh the request of the last board meeting was to propose just sort of uh general statements to help uh guide shapeshift the agenda purpose but also give some suggestions around what kind of information would be prepared for in advance and then as a launch pad to have further conversation um with you all. So that was attached as an agenda item. Uh we're always walking the balance of print out, don't print out. Uh so sometimes we want prints outs, but people definitely don't want print outs. So we will we will get the preferences down and we will we can accommodate. >> I looked

208at it in the Friday update and I didn't have any changes. I didn't know if there was something else since then. Sorry. >> I'm fine with it too from what we looked at. >> Well, I I actually had something. Um, so when we were talking about it last board meeting, I wasn't connecting what Director Coin was saying about DISC. Um, but after kind of digesting it, I also kind of feel like we need to put more formal time towards that because we are investing in that. Um, we're only doing 45 minutes and it's kind of in overflow passing time. Um, so again, trying to see if maybe there's somewhere else we can fit that or maybe we could carry the conversation into um the second uh retreat date in that overflow time because it's not

209filled. I just want to put more focus on it because I think especially with me coming in and kind of learning the the discs of all the um uh cabinet members and then the board. I don't know. I just feel like too it's it's a little too informal for what we're investing in. I'll be candid. I think finding more time in the day is going to be very difficult. Um, but that doesn't mean that we couldn't table I mean begin the conversation and then look for an opportunity later in the year to pick it back up. >> Okay. >> Yeah, I'm certainly open to that >> because our second retreat day, we don't Yeah, I mean it's >> Yeah, we've got meaty topics this as we usually do, but >> yeah, >> I would be

210fine with that. Yeah, we'll be planning another retreat as well in the fall, too. So, >> yeah, >> might be an opportunity there. Any other comments, issues, problems? Okay, very good. Uh, and then lastly, the digital promise league of innovative schools. This is exciting. >> Um, yes. So, the digital prom league of league of digital promise league of innovative schools spring 2026 convening um is occurring uh here in Washington state with the district being a host to welcome um visitors to our schools um as part of that. The duration of time that that's happening is kicking off on Monday, March 16th and concluding in the evening of Wednesday, March 18th. And so, um, we wanted to make sure we let the board know that there's different ways to be involved. It's different from just participating

211as potentially a board member would do if we were visiting another convening elsewhere, but since we're co-hosting, it will have different opportunities for the board to be involved. So, we would want to just preview right now at this point that we will share that detail with you and that you can start to think that through and there'll be different ways to engage should you want to participate um, in different parts of that time. And since we are hosting also at some of our sites, if if you wanted to be actually stationed at one of the sites, you know what I mean, to greet people, it's also helpful to spread out that way. Uh but again, we will provide that detail information as we continue to formulate um in partnership with others those days and wanted

212to make get you starting to think about that. And if there are any other questions right now at this point, happy to discuss that. >> I hope to participate. >> Okay. And then obviously we know what portions um board members are attending. we can notice appropriately that there's more than uh three or more of you. >> Okay. I am looks like I'm not traveling during that time at least right now as of right now. So I'll look forward to hearing the schedule. >> Yeah, me too. Yeah. >> And what we will do is just put an Outlook calendar um just the span of those days. So it's just on that uh work uh board calendar for yourself to as a notification reminder. >> Great. Anything else top of mind? Anything else to schedule? Anything else

213on anyone's mind? Okay. Not hearing anything. I believe we are ajourned.