001elected to the office of Isiqua School District number 411, director, district number two. >> Do solemnly swear that I will faithfully and impartially >> Do solemnly swear that I will faithfully and impartially >> discharge the duties of this office as prescribed by law and to the best of my ability. >> discharge the duties of this office as prescribed by law and to the best of my ability. and that I will support and maintain >> that I will support and maintain >> the Constitution of the State of Washington >> the Constitution of the State of Washington >> and of the United States of America >> and the United States of America >> and laws of the state of Washington. >> Congratulations and please join us at the dis We will now swear in Oh. >> Oh.
002We will now swear in reelected board director Sydney Mullings. Sydney, please join Superintendent Talia at the lectern, which you've done. You did a great job on on your own. >> Um, please repeat after me. Say I. State your name. >> I, Sydney Mullings, >> having been duly elected to the office of Isiqua School District number 411, District Director District number four. Having been duly reelected to the office of Isiqua School District number 411, director District number four, >> do solemnly swear that I will faithfully and impartial impartially >> Do solemnly swear that I will faithfully and impartially >> discharge the duties of this office as prescribed by law and to the best of my ability. >> discharge the duties of this office as prescribed by law and to the best of my ability. and that
003I will support and maintain >> and that I will support and maintain >> the Constitution of Washington >> and of the United States of America >> and laws of the state of Washington. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you. >> We will now pause and have all current board members take a group picture. No, like two steps this way and then two steps out. >> Ready? One, two, three. This becomes the word for the next four years. >> One, two, three. >> Thank you. Thank you. By law, the board will reorganize for the coming school year. We will now conduct the annual election for board president. All right, I'll be passing uh the next step to myself. I would like to thank Marne Moraldo for her 16 years of board service and this past year as board
004president. and I'd like to give you a commemorative gavvel to honor your time on the board and to thank you so much for your service. Thank you. And now I get to leave you all. I'd like to ask if there are any nominations for board president. I will state this three times. Are there any nominations for board president? >> AJ Taylor. >> Are there any nominations for board president? Are there any nominations for board president? With that, we have one nominated person and name for the board president, AJ Taylor. We will do a roll call and you can state who you are voting for for the Isiqua uh school board director board president for 2026. I'll start with Sydney Mullings. AJ Taylor, >> Matt Coin, >> AJ Taylor, >> Harlon Gallinger, >> AJ Taylor, >>
005Natalie Anderson, >> AJ Taylor. >> That's a majority vote and I will hand the meeting over now to the new president, AJ Taylor. from here. >> Yes. And then I guess I get to still be by the time >> a whole new perspective go there. [laughter] Yes, that would be nice. Okay, so then we're just moving on down through the list here for legislative representative. My son's like spacing out. >> Yeah. [laughter] Very good. Okay. >> How we doing? Are we all situated? >> Yes. >> Okay. Uh we will now move on to um the election of our legislative representative. Um this will be a one-year term to then go back to a two-year cycle. Is there a nomination for legislative representative? I nominate Natalie Anderson. >> Are there any other nominations? >> Okay, I
006will close nominations at this time. Uh Natalie Anderson has been nominated to be our legislative representative. We will now vote with consensus. Director Mullings, oh, I'm sorry. Director Anderson is now our legislative representative. Congratulations. >> Yeah, that was that easy. [laughter] Right. >> Okay. With um Director Moraldo vacating his seat, we will now have the election of a Federal Relations Network representative. WADDA's Federal Relations Network is a joint undertaking with the National School Board Association. It provides a communication network among NSBA uh WADA government relations staff and FRN members in each congressional district. The WASA F FRN actively supports the NSBA's efforts to influence federal legislation by making regular contact with the Washington Congressional delegation. This is done by sharing information, resources, and perspective regarding the impact of federal legislation on school districts. The WADA
007FRN also alerts NS alerts NSBA and Washington's members of Congress to state issues affecting education, particularly those related to the actions of federal government. Is there a nomination for the F FRN representative? >> Okay. >> I nominate AJ Taylor. >> Any other nominations? Okay, I will close nominations at this time. And uh myself having been nominated to be our FN FRN representative, uh we will now vote. All those in favor? >> I director Taylor myself is now our F FRN representative. >> Okay. >> Oh, I don't have my microphone on. Sorry, apologies. Okay, moving along. Next, we will have uh board appointments for the following positions. Student representative liaison leadership meetings with city electeds financial analysis core team representative and new director mentor and WIAA. So for our student representative leaison do we have >>
008nominate director Mullings. >> Any other nominations? Uh, we're going to continue to have two. Correct. >> Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yes. >> Then I nominate Director Coin. >> Excellent. Okay. All those in favor? >> I I Director Coin. Director Mullins will be our student representative liaison. Thank you. Um, we also need a fact team liaison. Do we have a nomination? I nominate Director Coin. >> Any other nominations? All those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> And Director Coin will serve as our fact team liaison. Thank you, Director Coin. Um, and then new director mentor. We need a mentor for uh new director Anderson. Um, do we have a nomination? A nomination or someone to volunteer? I guess it' be a volunteer, right? If someone that would like to serve in that role for director
009Anderson. >> Can I say or do someone? I would like to serve in that role. >> Okay. Thank you, Director Coin. Um and now lastly, >> we have the WIAA. Is is there somebody that would like to serve as liazison with that organization? That would be director Gallinger. And do we do we vote on this as well? No, we don't vote on Okay. Thank you, Director Gallinger. Appreciate it. >> Oh, thank you. >> Leadership meetings with city electeds historically current and the excuse me, it has been historically the current and the past president. This year will be a little different because our past president just left the dis. So, uh we will need to decide who those folks will be. Um it would be myself and I have someone else that would serve in that
010role with me. Yeah, I mean I think we should just probably keep it as passport practice like I think I'll serve as a role of past pass okay president. >> Okay, that'll be director Gallinger and myself. >> Fantastic. Okay, so now we will move into our agenda for the day for the night. Um we will start the meeting with public comment. Um, public comment is an opportunity for the board to receive public statements on items not listed on the board agenda on the meeting agenda for possible possible board action. If you have a point of view for the specific agenda items, the monitoring report for OE12 um the school improvement plans or the 2026 2027 budget development guidelines, we will take public comment on those uh during the regular agenda time. Um, public comment is
011not intended to raise an issue unique to a particular student, staff member, or administrator. Rather, it is your time to provide insights on issues more generally and of a wire concern. As a general rule, the board will not respond to public comment. I ask you to begin your comments by clearly stating your name and your attendance area, and please limit your comments to two minutes. Uh, we will be using a timer. Uh the board neither endorses nor censors any opinions expressed during public comment. And please keep your comments civil and respectful. And in place of uh applause, we can acknowledge a speaker by lifting your hands in a waving motion. And we will start public comment with those in the room and then we will go to those on Zoom. Do we have any public
012comment? Yes, we do. Thank you. Um Samantha Veraha Variah. Thank you. >> For agenda. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Better. Okay. >> Um, my name is Samantha Variah and I have been teaching at Maywood Middle School for the last 12 years. I would like to speak to the board about the lack of additional adult support with our students identified as needing additional support in the classroom. Inclusion works best when students receive the level of assistance that they need to access learning and participate safely. Yet, teachers are consistently left without pared educators or LRC1 support required for students who have higher needs during direct instruction and worktime. Significant behaviors despite the teacher's use of modified tasks, breaks, and non-verbal cues are making it difficult to deliver instruction and maintain a stable learning environment. There is a
013mismatch between what students need and the level of support that they are currently being provided with. Without additional adult assistance, even welldesigned accommodations and scaffolds break down quickly and attempts at redirection often escalate into bigger disruptions. This makes it a challenge for the teacher to stay focused, provide consistent instruction, and support the rest of the class. I'm an art teacher. The hierarchy of education inappropriately puts my courses and other elective courses at the bottom of the pecking order. In multiple ways, I am shown and told that my classes don't matter as much as everyone else's. Electives are rarely included in par education and LRC1 coverage. Those student needs remain just as significant regardless of the classroom setting. This leaves the teacher managing high impact behaviors that would normally require a second adult to ensure safety,
014access, and meaningful participation. The quality of the education that other students received is diminished when significant class time is spent on the few with the highest needs. I'm going to give myself a few more seconds because the microphone wasn't working. Um teachers value inclusion and want every student to experience success. Additional para education support and LRC1 support would help ensure that that inclusion function as attendant. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I don't think we have any other comments in the room. Do we have any comments online? Okay, great. We will move along then to the approval of the consent agenda. The consent agenda is a meeting management 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 this meeting.
015Any board member may remove an item for the consent agenda and place it on the regular agenda for discussion. Do I have a motion? >> I move the consent agenda be approved as presented. >> I second. Uh the motion has been moved and seconded to approve the consent agenda as presented and amended. All in favor, please say I. >> I. I. >> I. >> Consent agenda passes. Okay. Next up is the establishment of the regular agenda. Superintendent, are there any changes to the regular agenda? >> No, there are no changes to the regular agenda. >> Fantastic. Moving right along. This is a good clip. [laughter] Uh report out on the WASDA annual conference. Next up is our report out on the uh annual conference. The board, superintendent, ISD administrators, and board student representatives attended the
016WASDA annual conference on November 20th and 22nd in Seattle. Uh and we will now summarize the event. Do I have anyone that would like to start? Oh. >> Oh, director Anderson. >> Um, well, I was only able to attend the first day. Um, uh, but I went straight into new director uh, boot camp, which was very informative. Um, they covered the basics of schoolboard governance and standards, monitoring progress, and working with data, open public record, and meeting acts, which I received my certification and training on. Uh, tons of great resources for new board members. Um, I was surprised by the sheer size of the conference and the number of attendees. Um, with over 1,400 board members across the state, I would say there were two or 300 new board members in the boot camp. Um,
017and I was able to connect with some of my fellow candidates that were running uh at the same time as me that were elected. So, that was neat. Um, so I look forward to future WASDA opportunities. >> Great. Thank you, Dr. >> Uh, sure. I'm happy to go next. Uh, and I will welcome student rep uh comments as the student reps were able to were um joining us as well. So I um we have a few opportunities throughout throughout WASDA to one connect together as a board and learn together and have learning opportunities. also to connect with um board peers from across the state in many different types of districts. The sizes which always amaze me going from tens of students in some of our school districts statewide to us being in the large grouping
018of school districts. Um it's just always a good opportunity. We had um you know external speakers come in, performances from students from um around the state uh which is super impressive. And so uh for me it's that kind of reconnection period and getting to do a little bit of mentoring of new school directors um even in other districts. And so uh that was awesome. >> Director Cole. >> All right. Well, thank you President Taylor. >> [laughter] >> Um just I guess uh four things that come to mind when I think about the WADA conference and I I will just say for board members many of us um don't have an a background in education. We're kind of education adjacent in some ways like myself who comes from a family of teachers but we're definitely not
019educators. So this is our opportunity as I say this to a group of educators I know in the room. This is the opportunity for um us to have professional development. So, it's very very important um to be there and have those those conversations, be those be there, you know, for those learning sessions. Um as Director Mulling said, the ability to connect with other board members across the state of Washington. It's fascinating when you're talking to board members that um represent smaller school districts, some that represent single schools um across the state and maybe they have 80 kids there and that maybe is on the high end for those. So, very interesting to get those different perspectives. Um, I spent a lot of time in sessions really leaning in, frankly, on passing bonds and levies and
020how we ask our community to support uh the funding of our schools. I thought it was really was fascinating and I felt like that was something that would I would benefit from listening in on and took had a lot of good takeaways uh from that. Um, particularly our opportunity just to continually educate, not just to, you know, when we need money to be asking for money, but to always be educating. So when we're we're to a point where we're asking for money, we've we've sort of essentially set the stage for that. And then lastly, um hats off to Director Gallinger for this, but um he um organized a wonderful presentation um around our school improvement plans, which I know we'll give an update on um that we all had an opportunity to contribute to. But
021it was fascinating in that presentation too to hear that the way that we run our school improvement plans against you know some of our other districts in the state were unique and the time that we spend on that and the care that goes into that that. So thank you for putting that presentation together. I thought that was wonderful. Thanks >> Director Gallage. >> Yeah. So, thank you to our superintendent and to especially uh Rich Malish for all of your work and support in doing that presentation and being there. I think it was uh helpful for other directors across the state to get a chance to see what we do. Uh, and I think there's so many things that our school district does really well and uh, other students across the state would benefit from. So,
022thank you for doing that. >> Great. >> Um, >> I will say that. Yes. Uh, yeah, just a couple other things then. Um, I I do want to point out the fact that uh, the board was able to um, did receive a board of recognition um, again, which is how many years now running that this board is? seven 17 years of recognition for this board as a board of excellence. So, um we should feel very proud of that. [laughter] Um and then I I wanted to um a couple of other things just mention that you know it is an incredible opportunity to be able to spend several days with 1,400 board members from across the state and I find almost uh such rich conversation having just sitting next to people in in um various sessions
023before they start having a thought exchange learning about things that other districts are confronting how they're addressing issues things like that um so it's really a fantastic opportunity and to that extent I did think um director Gallinger and the district's um presentation on SIP plans was really well received and you could see folks in from other districts I think walked away from that presentation with a lot of ideas for their their own districts moving forward and how they can make those conversations very enriching um for their districts as well. So, uh, that was great. And then I wanted to mention one other session that I thought was fantastic where we sat in on a session led by the former principal from I believe North Carolina um talking about the value of the one minute meeting
024and that this principal had um taken on an initiative essentially to every school year to make sure that she sat uh one-on-one with her students for at least a minute to have a conversation, a genuine conversation with those students. um and to you know make sure that that student is seen. We talk about it all the time in our district about wanting our students to be known by strength, name and need. And it was just a wonderful example of that kind of um act activity in action and it was just very powerful and the impact that it had on that district and those kids. So that was a great session too. So nice opportunity. Okay. Anything else? Do our student representatives have anything to say? Oh, yes, Rex. >> All right. So, um, being a
025new student representative to the board, I thought that that meeting was so cool. Like, our district is really so small. We're just one tiny fish in a big pond, big ocean really, of everything that goes on in just Washington State. And I thought it was really eye opening. I got to see a lot brand new perspectives. Got to meet a lot of really cool people that I'm excited to hopefully see again at the laws of legislative conference in January. But um I think the the biggest thing that I took away was in our meeting with I think you're the name Dr. Hempill when she talked about our human doings versus our human beings. And for those of you who maybe don't know what I'm talking about, she broke down how we identify ourselves in two
026different ways. Our human doings, which are our occupations, our responsibilities, the things that we would put on a resume, and how we often identify ourselves. Like those are the things that we are. But that's not what we are. We're human beings. So what are our human beings? Our human beings are what we are put on earth to to fulfill as a mother or a father or a son or a hobbyist or whatever. >> And I think it's her point was that we should make these students feel like they are their human beings and not just their human duties and not just the students but the teachers and everyone involved in education. And she went further and said that we need to ingrain these human beings into what the kids are getting out of education as
027well. Not just learning how to be employees, but learning how to add things to their human beings, how to learn new competencies, how to learn how to be adaptive and resilient and have a fluency in technology and all these things. And I think that goes right hand in what we're talking about with the profile of a graduate and all these things that I've gotten to be involved with. And I thought that experience was just the coolest. >> Great. Go ahead. Yeah, definitely share the sentiment of thinking that that meeting was so cool and being able to talk with other students from across the state and kind of just seeing how different it could be and kind of seeing like how differently you can approach this um this role and I've gotten a lot of new
028ideas from other students and other members from around the meeting and I've definitely come to this role now with like or from the meeting to this role with a new perspective on things I want to do. I'm inspired and I want to really extend my reach now that I've got these ideas and perspectives. >> Great. Thank you. Oh boy, so many people over here. Okay, [laughter] let's go with Micah first. Go ahead. >> Okay, is this thing on? >> Okay, great. Bring us a little bit closer. Um, there are so many different things I learned through the the WASA conference. I feel like the biggest thing that that became a part of what I took out of it is the community and the fact that I was able to meet these different people from all
029these different districts, students, directors, um, superintendents, just people from all these different point of views, seeing how they do things, how they do their things differently and how they um, want to share that with other people. There were a whole bunch of different classes I went to um that they had there. Going to hold this a little bit closer. There you go. Um a whole bunch of different like classes that they had where they would teach like these different things like um like leading in turbulent times, like things like that. And I feel like those weren't just good lessons for helping lead a school board, but it's also just really good leadership lessons to have by yourself for your own character. And I feel like that was something that was really good for me. And
030also just meeting these students, these different student reps and seeing like how they do things differently because having two students per school was weird to a lot of people there. They're like, "Oh, what? We have four schools. If you have four * 2, that's eight reps." I'm like, "Yeah, that's what we have." And it was just really fun to see all these different point of views from people. >> Great. Thank you. Anyone else? Chris, go ahead. you. I'm going to try to keep this short and sweet. Um, but it was really nice getting to meet a lot of superintendents and board directors and not just meet, but really sit down with them for, you know, a couple of hours really and discuss challenges within education today and how what approaches they're taking, what's working for
031them, what's not. Um, and seeing how, uh, students across the state of Washington have similar but very differing experiences within their schools as well. More importantly than that, it's always fun to get to meet new students and see what things they're doing in their districts. Um, and there is one quote that really stuck with me throughout the entire conference. Uh, and it is the litter of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. And I feel like that's just something that stuck with me after the conference so much. And it's it's really come uh and become really prominent as my life. So, >> thank you. >> Okay. Yeah, I think we've gotten a lot of perspectives and I definitely agree
032with all of them. Um, but something I would also bring up is just that we're in a lot of spaces as student reps where either we're in a place like this where we're at a board meeting and we're interacting with other reps and the adult board, but we're just kind of within our district or we're just interacting with our peers. But I think WASDA was an amazing experience in that it felt so integrated between the reps and schoolboard directors, schoolboard members and educators from across the state. So I think all of those perspectives are also really valuable. Um, and it gave me a much more in-depth understanding of the challenges that like adults in this space face, that directors and educators face. Um, so I think that kind of respect and collaboration was amazing. And
033then of course there's the piece of seeing how other student reps run their districts. Apart from kind of like the numbers or the size of the districts that they're in, they also ran lots of different programs. We talk a lot about expanding our reach to um further encompass more kind of types of students within our school and we saw so many other districts that had set up programs where they truly were serving as liaison with this wide net uh that I just thought were really inspiring and I'm really excited to take forward. Um I also want to echo what everyone else said. Um and then also I think just wanted to reiterate the fact that the conference was amazing for us students because there was so many workshops meant specifically for students and we learned
034so much because of that and also having like real and critical conversations with adults and other students from around the state really brought at least so many new perspectives for me and I learned so much about what it really means to be in this role and the impact that that I can have. So, I definitely have come back with a new perspective on what this truly means and the impact that that I can have across the district. >> Video go ahead. >> Um, yeah, I agree with everybody as well. Um, just something I really took away from the conference was the amount of people we have here, student reps. Um there's eight of us and I saw people getting a lot of stuff done with just even one or two and that they were really
035making like a lot of like events and functions and I realized how kind of good we have it here with the eight of us. So I really felt like we can um maybe uh do a lot with our collective um reach and that just made me think of all the things we can do to help students feel better in this district and it was just a really enjoyable experience. Great. And superintendent. >> Great. Thank you. It's always a good opportunity to um be in fellowship with uh lots of different leaders across the state, superintendent, students, board of directors, and there's other representatives that also help lead in different ways through the organizing bodies that help support each of those groups. Um the one thing that I wanted to highlight that uh is is additive to
036what has already been shared about Dr. for Mary Hemple who was uh led the one minute meeting session which I really appreciated and several of the quotes from um student representatives also reinforced that powerful um time with her. she was the keynote and the topic heading was futurep proof leadership and um there was a specific governance action that I thought was quite powerful to help really ensure that we were doing um that kind of development work for our young people um as well as to really center on what it means to be a human being in this current age and the governance action toward purpose was about codifying your portrait of a leader and I think that's a a powerful way to consider um what a unified leadership identity is for every adult in our
037system to complement the work of a portrait of a graduate. And the future proof question that was um that was posed is what leadership behaviors must every adult in our system consistently model to prepare learners for the world they are entering, not the one that we inherited. >> Okay. Thank you. Next up on our agenda is now a board town hall recap. We as a board had an opportunity to um meet with the community on October 8th, which was this last Monday, up at Beaver Lake um middle school. This was actually a rescheduled um town hall as we originally were set to meet in October, but at the height of the Mariner playoff run and we were concerned that we would have zero people in the audience if we had moved ahead at that time.
038So, um we moved it to December 8th and uh were fortunate to have a very nice turnout. So, uh, just wanted to turn it over to the board if we had any comments on our town hall. >> Director Coin, >> you know, one of my, uh, favorite quotes from, uh, the WASDA conference was um, if you're not at the table, you're on the menu. And, um, it's really sat with me a lot. It's interesting. I, from folks that know me, I talk a lot about community engagement and making sure your voice is heard. And um I think I reflected on the fact that it was wonderful to have at all three of our our um town hall meetings having people come there and have their opinions be heard. I I know in particular at our
039last uh town hall I had a group of neighbors who came to me with an idea and I said hey come to the town hall meeting. Um and they did and I was really proud of them coming and sharing their thoughts um for you know the for the new high school and um I think for again for hopefully I know we don't have folks many folks here in the room tonight but folks that are listening in it's important have your voice be heard that's why we have these these town halls that's why we have public comment this is the opportunity to come and not only have the board hear you but our community hear you and so I just I want people that that idea of if you're not at the you're on the menu
040just to sort of sit in with people because it's important. We live in a democracy and we want people to be heard. So those are my thoughts. >> Dr. I appreciated us being able to reschedule it and to really even though we have now adopted what we believe is our uh portrait of a graduate to be able to sort of have that uh reflected and get sort of people's perspective. And as far as the durable skills, I was looking at comparing the three different listening sessions and just we have more similarities amongst our uh three feeder patterns than we do differences and how highly valued communication is and adaptability and collaboration. And I think that a lot of what I took away was what we were sharing resonated with uh the community. of about 40
041plus people there and how they valued uh each one of the five elements of the current portrait like almost equally highly. So I thought that was good. >> Okay. Oh, you weren't there. That's right. Absolutely right. Nilla, do you have a comment? >> Yeah. Um, as someone who hasn't attended a town hall before this one on Monday, I think it was really nice to see community members be able to come together and like a more casual atmosphere and like not only share their concerns, but also their passions and ideas as community members. And I think that if like any community member wants to have more like influence and more engagement, I think that's actually like the town hall is a really good space for that. >> Great. Thank you. Good day. Go ahead. >> Yeah,
042this was also the first town hall I went to and I really felt um I really liked to see how the community was um kind of uh able to express their ideas and their sentiments. And I really thought um that these town halls are a good represent um a good method I guess of communication which is like what we're trying to emphasize and um yeah I think it was just really cool to see everybody talking so passionately about what they want from the district. >> Thank you superintendent. >> Great. It was always wonderful to see um the school board being able to lead in a different forum and format with our community and there was a very strong attendance by the community which I appreciated to see um all the voices and faces in the
043room. Um and it was great to hear the passion in particular for the topic of robotics and sort of the hope for the future not only in terms of the durable skills but also in terms of the potential of really uh awesome types of activities and learning experiences for young people to to continue to help them thrive. So that was a really important part of the meeting for me. >> Great. And then I'll just uh add I'm just going to reiterate things I think were already said, but did want to make the point that um first of all, great turnout. 40 people I think in the room, which I think is the most of any uh attendance we've had in any of the town halls since I've been on the board. So that was great.
044And I did have two people come up to me after the meeting and ask specifically to Director Coin's comments about how can I get more involved in the schools or have my voice heard. And you know that was exactly the those are the opportunities that I hope our community will take advantage of. Come to our town halls, engage with us, tell us what's on your mind. It's a great opportunity us to hear what's top of mind for the community. And then also come here to our board meetings, take advantage of our public comment and um also just want to make a plea for folks to feel empowered to get involved in the schools, get into the schools. Our schools really do welcome our families. Um there's lots of volunteering opportunities being voice mentors or some
045schools have parents on the playgrounds or or what have you, but look for those opportunities and uh I think you'll find it very rewarding. So, and then lastly, I just want to say I think across all three of our town halls that we had, we heard pretty strong and consistent support for the concepts captured in our portrait of a graduate, which is um really heartening. I think we're on the really on a a good path of trying to imbue those durable skills throughout our system, throughout our curriculum and to make sure that um our our graduates are wellprepared for a very dynamic world that they will face. So um okay, I think we will move along then now and it'll be uh next up on the agenda is works in progress. Uh this is a
046standing opportunity for the superintendent to provide a brief status report on various project and activities in the district. So I will turn it over to you. >> Great. I'm just going to start up with the upcoming events um and recognitions of special celebrations and as well as holidays for this uh uh December time period. So as you can see, we're celebrating a lot of different holidays. It's a busy month. We know that this upcoming winter break is such an important time for families um and friends to gather and and celebrate, but also just take a nice rest. So, we do have the full two weeks and three weekends. And so, that's an incre incredible opportunity to just rejuvenate oneself and come back into the new year refreshed and excited for the uh next part of
047the school year. Um, I can move into some of the works in progress. And I do want to first and foremost start off with a weather update and context for today because that's always an important timely um topic. And today's really uh was an interesting set of weather impacts. And uh it's helpful to always share that our district does take a lot of uh time to monitor the kinds of uh weather impacts specifically in this case water levels and even possibly wind damage. But we are assessing those conditions to ensure safety across our schools and the ability to both get to school and to have a warm and dry environments. Um the severe weather did produce very localized flooding across parts of the district, particularly near the Holly Street campus and Isiqua Valley Elementary School.
048Um the rising water levels required us to close the Holly Street campus for the day and um Isiqua Valley remained open because um the building and general access were safe, although arrival and dismissal were modified due to flooding in parts of the parking lot and drop off areas. Um, I was able to join the team out there, Jason Morris, um, uh, uh, Neil Asher as well as Dave Talvo, just to help redirect with traffic and make sure, um, both families felt comfortable driving in that area and and encouraging them to be safe during the drop off time period. Um, all of our other schools remained open because conditions allowed for safe access to buses uh for buses, student drivers, families, and staff with an understanding that there would be some delays uh likely um and
049that we would just have patience as that many people were navigating sort of a more messy uh and and unpredictable morning commute. And then we also know that some staff and students might not be able to attend school or or show up at work due to um their own personal circumstances. and uh those absences for students would be excused understandably and that our uh staff are able to take advantage of um emergency leave so that they can take care of what they need to in their personal lives. So with any weather event we're constantly monitoring, we will continue to monitor. Um we did work with the city of Isiqua to stay in touch as well as our county partners to track the different Isiqua creeks flood uh flooding levels and and rising levels. And I
050am um pleased to share that there was significant progress with uh less less rain today and some reduction of that uh rising water level today at the creek. Um it did crest in the early afternoon and then um has been going down since then. So um we'll continue to monitor that as needed. Um earlier week in this week though our operations team had prepared sandbags and we're clearing drainage areas of course because there's fallen leaves recently due to the fall activity of of our trees. Um and we were able to quickly um activate different plans in place for um for the community. And I do want to thank all of our teams and our staff members who supported efforts around the clock and throughout today. Um and specifically thank Jason Morris who does lead our
051operations building grounds, transportation and safety team um for the early morning um assessment of our road schools and to prepare for the school day. Um last night on a different note, I did attend the um final finance information session at Pine Lake Middle School where Chief of Finance and Operations Martin Turney and executive director of finance Mariah Bonassic and other members of our team shared facts about district budget and how local levy dollars help cover the gap between the funding we receive and the true cost of educating and supporting our students. This was the third of three sessions to continue to provide current information to the community about our finances which was a practice that we did start last year. Also this week um in fact it was also yesterday um we uh welcomed several
052team members from uh Microsoft to participate in um an hour of AI to introduce and allow students to explore um different ways AI could be leveraged. And it was pretty awesome to welcome those team members and um President Taylor was there to help welcome those volunteers and to um shepherd them uh around our schools and our our students really had a nice time and it was just a good start to continue to explore the world of technology as as that unlocks new opportunities for our young people as early as elementary school. Um this fall I do want to share that we just wrapped up a survey for the district and it looked a little bit different. So, the district shifted from embedding the parent survey within the larger enrollment verification process, also known as EVP.
053Um, and we did launch the standalone family and caregiver survey. So, parents had shared previously feedback that EVP was too long and also needed to be streamlined. And we also wanted to gather more specific and different feedback while school was in session. This updated survey was improved and the process and flow for parents um was also modified. It removed different identified um biases and used standardized questions aligned with K12 best practices. The survey did launch November 13th and ended up closing end of last week and November uh December 5th and which was a oneweek extension uh due to the Thanksgiving holiday. And we did receive more than 4,000 responses um and representative of every single school across the district. So staff will be analyzing those results alongside other survey data uh where questions align and
054we'll report part of those findings in our operating expectations or operational expectations 9 which is about um communication with the public and that will be in January. And some items will also serve as new baseline for future surveys while early indicators show really encouraging trends. you know, we're we're we're looking at that um net promoter score, which is a new measure for us and is quite favorable and there's some strong marks for welcoming um environments in our schools that they have good family involvement and effective communication. And then there's a lot of feedback about where we can also improve and so we'll be looking forward to digesting that and making that available um in a deeper detail in January. Um we are also in the stage of just wrapping uh wrapping up for this calendar
055year and winding down. Um it's a time also for reconnecting and checking with in with our administrators and across the district. Our all administrators monthly meeting is next week prior to the end of this calendar year that allows us to set up in preparation for next year. And then there's a series of celebrations. As you can see, the celebrations extend uh into our schools in many different ways and honoring the very different diverse perspectives and cultures across the district. Um there's also fall recognitions and so that's all part of this time in December in our schools. They're very very busy. There's choirs, there's performances as well. And um as we think about returning back in January, I do want to preview a few of those works in progress. We will have three levy propositions on
056the February 2026 ballots which we'll hear a little bit more about later in this agenda. We will be um in earnest kicking up our efforts on budgeting for the next school year. And budgeting is a process that happens all year round as I'm reminded by um executive director Benassic. And then uh we will also have a refresh of the strategic plan using and building upon the portrait of a graduate. And we'll also later um in the spring start program conversations for the next high school. So that's what's happening and a bit of a preview for what's coming next as we enter 2026. There's a lot happening. Um, okay. Next up on our agenda is a levy update. I'll turn it over to you, superintendent, and your team. >> Great. I'm just going to, um, uh,
057welcome up Martin Turney and Mark Sherwood to the lect turn and, uh, allow them to take it away. >> Thank you, superintendent. I'll just wait a second while we get it teed up. All right. So tonight uh we are going to give you an overview uh actually an abbreviated version of the engagement slides that we've been uh presenting the factual presentation uh as we've had our meetings with different groups. The full presentation's available there's a link here uh it's available on our website and so that links directly to where we have our 2026 levy information on the website. Uh and then Mr. Sherwood is going to give an update on uh our communications here later on. So, we start by reminding people what the focus is for this cycle uh of renewal levies. So, uh
058the four-year educational programs and operations levy. It's very important um way that we fund our programs on an annual basis. Uh we discuss the four-year capital levy and make sure people understand it's in two parts, technology and critical repairs. Um and explain the one-year transportation that we typically do on the front end of this uh levy cycle. Um we are doing our best to emphasize the uh communitydriven process this went through uh in September so people know that this was something that um we engaged the community on and collected uh feedback. So then we like to make sure that we go through the details of each proposition. So proposition one being that education programs and operations. We like to start with the visual giving that look at the 16.6% 6% of funding that it represents
059um to make sure people understand uh the relative nature of this local funding in terms of our annual budget. Also go over the areas. Now, we do this in a little bit more in depth than the actual slide deck, but here we make the point that we're tying uh these example investments to three areas of the strategic plan. So, student well-being with examples like nurses, mental health counselors, uh extracurricular activities and such, academic opportunities with the seventh period high school day, dual language, Gibson Eck, shout out to Gibson. And organizational effectiveness being uh how we you know we overinvest in teachers to make sure we have uh manageable class sizes and we have additional positions in um you know custodial transportation operations so that we make sure um we are doing an efficient um operation
060on an annual basis. We round out the detail on this one by um reminding people that we projected this out to be below our legal authority and that there are areas if given the opportunity that um the committee advised um the board and and us on what would be uh likely areas for expansion or valuable areas. So mental health counseling, early learning programs, dual language specifically around Mandarin and safety and security were important uh to that group and was the feedback. So then we moved to proposition two. Uh we reemphasized the two parts technology and critical repairs and with the technology um start off by explaining that you know the the state does not provide us in our general fund money for technology. So things like onetoone laptops, the teacher workstations, all those things that
061we come to expect um and we think are valuable in in the student and staff experience. Um we continue to strengthen and maintain our cyber security and modernize our infrastructure. And then we want to have um an air in an allocation for innovation over four-ear cycle. We want to make sure that we're keeping up with technology. And the second part obviously we explained that critical repairs uh are really meant in this context to be those highest priority items that we need to maintain our facilities and and fields and such in a baseline uh way that keeps staff and students warm, safe and dry. Um and again these are things like roof improvements, HVAC, safety and security, sports fields. You know, when we think about today and this week, we start seeing where roofs, you know,
062may have leaks and we need to have funds to take care of those things or or take care of them in advance so they don't become issues for us and they don't become a draw in our general fund. We do like to point out, you know, the curiosity perhaps around um where the critical repairs investments are in each feeder pattern. So if you can see here the Liberty feeder pattern represents about 36% of the investments, 34% of the Skyline feeder and Isiqua High at 23%. And so the explanation there being that is high had some turf work done and some of those higher ticket items have already occurred in that feeder pattern. Um the roofs are a little bit newer. Um so we have some investments to do in the uh the other two feeder
063patterns. Uh and then of course as we cycle through and we come to four years from now we will likely see that um inverse. And then finally the third proposition that will be on the ballot the school bus levy. We're pointing out that this is how we replace um our existing buses. And we do have an opportunity here with the the uh Proposition three to explore a pilot into electric buses uh over a five-year plan uh to see how they perform for us um and make some inroads into our sustainability goals as a district. Uh and then we make sure they realize this one's a little different being a one year on the front end of the four-year cycle. Then of course we want to explain the tax rate information very important when we talk
064about levies. Um this of course we're talking only about the Isiqua school district combined um tax rate. Uh so other you know there are other portions of a tax bill that people will see but we want to make sure they understand this is just the local portion of the school district. Uh we had that parameter of keeping the tax rate stable and so this is meant to show how we stack existing bond debt that we're paying off with these levies that we just talked about to get to that stable tax rate. And so that's been done purposely. And of course, we round out by reemphasizing the stable tax rate. The levies cover those funding gaps from the state and federal government that we do not have. Uh and we want to maintain the programs that
065we are able to uh maintain. These three levies work together. I alluded earlier when you have things like repairs that you can't pay for, it hits the general fund. It means we can't do as much uh for the classroom. Um works the same way for technology. So uh really these work together uh to make sure that we are operating efficiently every year. We also emphasize no new construction in any portion of these levies and that it was a communitydriven as I mentioned earlier process um and we collected a lot of feedback through that process and I will hand it off to Mr. Sherwood to go into communications. >> Thank you chief attorney. Um most of the board member board members you know about the calendar but I definitely think that the the community definitely needs
066to have an update. Um back in September through October we are we met with our levy committee on a number of meetings and had a great process to get their feedback that became these recommendations um that you uh you approved in the resolutions um was on October 9th. October 10th, we that's when the day my work really began at heart getting heart and heavy in terms of taking the information from the committee, starting to digest it, put it into more easier understandable information, get our web page up and going. So, we've been working on a lot of that information and that'll continue obviously all the way through until the actual ballot day. Ballots will be mailed on the on the uh January 21st. Around that same time, or just prior to that, the district will
067mail it. It's it's one and only per PDC requirement. We have our own direct mail piece that we can send out that's related just to the levy. And then the last day to register is February 2nd and the election date is February or February 10th and all ballots must be turned in by then. As another couple reminders that the landscape in Washington, some good news in November. Um a lot of school districts passed their levies um which was good. A lot of it was in the mid-50s, some even into the lower 60s and and mid60s in terms of percentages. Um those were definitely good things to see and uh they were focused on a lot of mental health which you saw chief attorney talk about in our own EPO and safety and security and CT.
068Those were the the highlights that voters tended to to support. There certainly is some tax sensitivity and skepticism and concern for property values that might might affect uh people and drive their votes. An interesting uh tidbit I do I've been sharing at board meeting or not board meetings but PTSA meetings is PT uh public school moms tend to vote a little bit higher in favor versus public school dads. Um so at about about a 14% clip. So um just making sure those conversations are happening at home between partners. And um in our meetings uh the majority of the commentary and the sentiments I think going into the holidays, it's been a little bit light, but a lot of the members of the community have been asking questions about what will the impacts be if this
069if these if these levies don't pass. They really want to get dive into when they're understanding specific items that might be cut, programs or staff. And as we know, we can't really deal in hypotheticals. We can only deal in facts. So, you know, we have been certainly instructing them that, you know, the superintendent and the board would have to review if that situation occurred. and pretty much everything is on the table. We've also given examples of the EPO is well over $70 million uh making up almost 70% of our budget. That's a significant impact to our budget and would there would have to be significant reviews by the superintendent of the board if if we were in a situation um that we wouldn't have that kind of funding going into next year. Uh the biggest
070uh on the online commentary has been very moderate right now which is I I again I think this is we're in the holidays and I think people want to coming out of the general election aren't really excited to start arguing and you know getting the fire up but I would imagine January 2nd we'll start seeing it get pretty heated in terms of whether support or opposition turn to to the levies and uh right now we're certainly just driving our strategies around facts uh reminding about the gap funding going into the overall arching of the of the levy packages in each of the propositions and then kind of diving into each of them individually and you'll see a lot more of that as we head in towards the holidays and into January. Um, other thing is
071bridging information gaps. Um, and making sure that certain communities that we're meeting with know where to find this information, access this information, and being able to share it amongst their their own groups. And then again, like I said, there has been a lot of uh misinformation at this point in time, but when people have asked us questions, we've definitely been driving them to the website. As you can see, this is a big list of items. I'm not going to read it, but we we my team has been extremely busy and also I should say not just my team but other members of of the cabinet. We've been doing a lot of engagement uh sessions with PTSAs uh advisory groups, parent groups um during the day and in the evening. So we're in we're in that
072gauntlet right now until the holiday break and then we'll be picking it up uh rather quickly. Um, also we're developing our assets, our videos, our um our printed materials, our fact sheets, our talking points, and we'll be distributing mo most of our toolkit information by next week to to our staff to ensure that they have that information. We've been providing training also at all admin meetings and continuing repetitive updates and simple, easy to understand messaging for our staff. um going into next month continuing uh local associations and connections with nonprofits uh some media outreach and then definitely we'll be doing all of our dig already started our digital campaigns on on our variety of social media uh pages. >> Just to jump in I want to emphasize the the fact that there have been 30
073over 30 presentations to staff community partners PTSAs uh departments uh as well. So, that's a that's a lot of activity to get out the information. And then we have over 30 scheduled uh upcoming once we hit uh 2026, but I know that many more will be scheduled because we're still developing that calendar as well. So, just a lot of activity from our team. Kudos for all the different nights and mornings and shifts and schedules that we are making to accommodate those other schedules to to show up and and be able to share information and answer questions. So, thank you. >> Thank you, Superintendent. And I'd like to thank the team because they've been very flexible. And I would put the entire calendar up now, but I can tell you sometimes we're getting calls like, "We're
074sorry, the meeting is not tonight. Can we move it till tomorrow?" So there's a lot of shifting and flexibility among the team to make sure we're we're attending these meetings. And they've been very wellreceived definitely at the PTSA meetings. So thank you. And again, we these are just a handful of meetings that we've done in November and December. We still have through up and through next week. Um we have more in January and February. If there's a specific meeting that any board member, students that you guys want more information from me or my team, we can definitely share you a little bit more specific on that schedule if you'd like to to attend. I can tell you at all these meetings, they love hearing student voice. They want to understand what the experiences are from
075the students today. Um, as much as they like to hear from Martin talk about taxes, me talk about community engagement, they don't want to hear about my student experience as a high school student or or Martins, they want to hear from you guys. So, if you do have I know you're very busy. Maybe it's not you. Maybe it's some of your peers who are interested. They may not be doing this work, but they'd like to talk about what the experiences are in today's schools. Um, so you can we also have we're meeting with some uh some individual unique uh communities certainly within our district. And these are just a handful of the assets where they're they're getting pretty far into development. Some of them already done. Um lawn signs you'll see eventually go up. Um,
076I do know there's been some some discussions on when is the right time and the appropriate time. Um, and the the resounding word from the levy committee was just give us the holidays. Just give us the holidays. And um, so we're we're trying to respect that without delusioning or putting a lot out in in in the community, but we'll definitely you'll see some of these lawn signs definitely come out after the holidays. And you'll start seeing more information in terms of our website and our social media starting to really kind of heat up right now. And with that, anybody can download some of the information as as Chief Hearnney was talking about. The presentation is on our website. Great frequently asked question. Uh there is the the King County property uh site. It's not that
077they have not activated their information, but it's up there and it's ready to go, but we will definitely share that information out once King County updates their information. And I will stop and take questions or allow the board. >> Does the board have questions? Director Anderson, >> I have a comment and a question. Um, I know that you guys aren't putting down uh and giving yourself credit. Canvasing is also happening this month and I am signed up to help with that and I think it would be great to have some students if they want to help canvas because I think having those conversations you know just coming off of my campaign um really helps having those conversations and people talk and you get the word spread. So I know that's activities that are happening. Um
078I just have a question about the transportation levy. Um, I see that uh we have $2 million allocated for that. Um, I'm trying to wrap my brain around how two million is enough for 17 buses and the infrastructure to sustain the charging them up. Um, do we have already buildings that those are going to be in or and so it's just equipment or like how is that $2 million allocated for that because that doesn't seem like enough to me but >> Sure. Yeah, great question. We um so in terms of the transportation because of where we are as a district, we you know we've kind of shifted our need to replace as many buses uh just because we have less routes at the moment. And so there's a there's a shift in what we need
079in terms of replacing diesel buses. So we have a little bit of a surplus that we can work with and we can combine it with the $2 million to leverage things like electric bus grants and some other things to replace the electrical buses likely at the same cost as a diesel. So, we're actually going to leverage what we already have. We're going to add a little to supplement um what we have and then we'll be able to replace. So, when I say 17 electric, it's not an add-on. It's actually a replacement of buses we already have. So, the state provides us um annual depreciation payments as well. So, it's a combination of those things. Uh so we just need that little bit to kind of uh help at with the edge that it takes to
080purchase an electric bus uh to be able to to do a 5-year plan uh that way. So hopefully that answered the question. >> Yeah, that makes sense. Thank you, >> Director Clling. >> Thank you for the presentation, good information. Um and thank you for hosting those threeformational sessions, too. I know. Um good opportunity for the the community to hear more about how we fund public schools. Um, three observations. One, I just I want to make a note and I know was noted on your presentation, but I want to make it sure that the community is clear that none of the three levies include money for new construction. And I just want to have everybody pause on that regardless of what you might hear in the coming months. That is the fact. So, want people to
081be aware of that. That was interesting, too. Um, with the um Oh, reaching. >> Oh, you're just switching the slide. Oh, to back to that point. getting slid back in case we need a reference even better. Yeah. No. Yes. Yeah. Makes the point. Um it was interesting too I think Mark your note around >> the difference between support between moms and dads. Um and I reflect on years ago we used to do for the squad school foundation we used to do a phone bank. Um this is how long I guess I've been around where people come to the admin building and we'd call donors in the squad school district. And I remember the script that we would give students is if someone answers the phone, ask for the mom because she will support schools. And
082um it was this yeah it was but I would just say that dads can support schools. There's three dads up here on the dis on our school board. We're supporting schools. So just and a lot of us are dads in the district like Martin yourself. So um I would just say dads you know step up. I think you know it's it's time to support schools. Um, and then lastly, um, you know, I I made the point at WASDA around making sure that we're, you know, really telling this the the story to the community around our schools, the success of our schools in Istqua, how we fund schools. I actually brought this tonight. This is the mailer. I'm sure a lot of folks got in the last couple of weeks that does a great job about
083talking about our schools, promoting the things that we're doing. Has a link to our website. I know we've heard from some members of the community that have come before saying, "I don't know anything about the district. no one that reaches out to me. Well, this goes to every resident in our district. So, I just want to make sure people know that. And again, there's a link to learn more um about the good work that's happening and um just really appreciate the communication strategy because I think that is really obviously going to be key um in terms of getting the information out and just letting people know how critical these these three levies are. So, thank you. Uh I have a question, couple comments. The first is I I hadn't heard participation in the three sessions.
084Did people come? Did they what was the volume and like what was the theme of questions, feedback? >> Sure. So we had the first um session was online and I'm trying to remember maybe we had um >> I think it was over 20 >> over 20. So we had over 20 online. So that was pretty successful. Um the second one we had a little bit less uh show up at Liberty and I think you know some of that has just has to do with the circumstance of the day. Uh and then we had um let's see how many did we have about six or so um uh >> I think it was six in person and uh maybe four or six online. >> Okay. Yeah, that's right. We had a combo. So we did the
085the hybrid version on the last one. Yeah. So um yeah, thought it was it went pretty well. Um we had some good questions. Um, we got some things we hadn't heard yet, you know, that we don't typically have on our frequently asked questions. So, it was nice to be able to answer those in the moment. >> Can you give me just some color on like what were the questions, what were the new the new [clears throat] inquiries. >> Yeah, some of it had to I remember we did go into some folks who, you know, didn't realize about the seventh period of day for example, right? So, it said you know um this is the first time we realized that we do something extra uh in terms of the seven period day. What does that mean?
086what you know just getting an understanding of how that benefits students in our high school. So that that's one of the first ones that comes to mind from the recent one. Yeah. >> Um thank you. And then so a couple things I maybe want to talk about reiterate one is um because we had a com couple commentaries last board meeting about one not having detail on the levies. Obviously they're here. it is not buried. It is now its own menu item on the front page um of the website. So that it should be very easy to find not just the promotional materials but also all the way back to the detailed meeting conversations options that were discussed details all the details people could want. So all that is not only now available but has been
087available for the last several weeks. So I just want to re reiterate that um that comment. I know Mark you said that people will ask what is the what happens if the levies don't pass and you know the district stays in a factual state that we'll talk about it later well I I want to talk about what is the impact so the district has uh because I don't work for the district the district has over 400 positions over 400 positions funded in some way shape or form by these costs so if they do not pass that causes a that will absolutely cost and yes we'll discuss it. There'll be lots of iterations on it but it is a significant um impact to the operation of the district. Um so I just want to make sure
088I give voice to that because I get I get to do that. Um, and then maybe the last thing I will reiterate, um, what Director Coin just said, and I think it's important that you cover it in these conversations is um, because we've already started to hear frankly ridiculous comments about what is included or not included in the levies that there is there is nothing about the construction of new buildings because that's not what goes in levies. So, there's nothing there. um regardless of what folks would like to say what is in there and I think it's interesting we're doing this on the anniversary of the bomb cyclone of last year on today having floods and roads out and people not being able to move around our very complicated terrain in the district what is
089there is I'd love for people to focus on what does it cost to replace your own roof at your own house and know that Isiqua High School is what 200,000 square feet >> over that am I So imagine it's 300 I'll go to 300,000 ft. But if it costs I know the roof on my house when I had to replace it not too long ago. Um which is nowhere even in the multiple of the size of an Isqua high school. Um you know they're huge sums of money. And so the goal is to keep schools warm, safe, and dry. And maybe people haven't thought about the seven period day, but certainly if we cannot heat up our schools, um we will be thinking about that every day. And I don't think anyone in this community
090um hopefully uh would like to disrupt children being warm while they learn, children having access to mental health care and supports and so or being able to transport them around 110 square miles of the district. So I just want to um make sure that I am giving voice to some of those things. Thank you. >> Can I add one thing to that? A lot of time we said extracurricular activities in those meetings. They were then saying like can you describe those those clubs and those sports? So as soon as we said sports and athletics some ears perked up and we're like okay so this would impact athletics across the district. >> Yes. As a as a lifetime booster member which I am at is aqua high school. It's important to know that we will cancel
091sports programs. That will be the first that will be one of the first things we discuss. Um, so we got to soak that in. >> Rex, go ahead. >> Um, and I think that sports thing kind of ties into the question I was about to ask because because like you said, that's the thing that people have that emotional connection with. As soon as they heard sports and clubs, all of a sudden you have their attention again. Um, so I was going to ask like [laughter] Yeah. Um, I I was going to ask you, what are your main talking points that I should use my voice in reaching out to people? Because I've had some very interesting conversations with teachers, with parents, with my parents' friends, things like that. When they've been asking me about like,
092what am I going to see that is tangible, that I'm not just going to be taxed on my property for nothing. I think they just want to know what they're going to be able to see and feel and hear about from their kids. >> Sure. And certainly chief attorney can add, but I think um having a stable tax rate, it's a renewal. That's the other thing. This is not this is not a bond. This is a renewal tax rate or a tax property tax. Um and it's it's to continue the types of services that our families and experiences that they want and expect um that they've had up until now. So, I think that's very important to understand that without the renewal, then there's there's significant impact as some of our board members have been
093talking about tonight. Um, and this is covering a gap at the state level. There's a significant gap from state funding to to school districts across the state. Um, we're not fully funded. Um, there are other items and areas where we provide in um it's like $9.5 million above for special education services. That doesn't mean that we would if it doesn't pass that we have to stop special educa special education. That means we would have to go to the general fund to pay for all our mandated federal and state required services like special education. But those those would be monies that would have to be impacted in other areas. So just understanding that it's significant in terms of what this funds and what this supports and it's a renewal. Um I think also as we have
094you heard have you if have you heard from the other board members there is no new school construction dollars in this levy and that's part of I think some of the misinformation we have heard and some chats and from other folks just kind of reminding people no that that that bond didn't pass but if you go to our website you can look up information on previous me ballot measures that did pass that do support new school construction but these levies have nothing to do with that and the decisions here that you're seeing these are communitydriven and a lot of it based on student experiences and trying to remember that that the student voice was really key and central to this and also looking at what innovation in in areas early learning dual language. I think
095those are some two areas that the levy committee really wanted to hear and see from us in this package. Not sure if the superintendent or anybody or chief attorney would like to add to that. does make me wonder if it's helpful to put a a couple talking points together for students um or even see what you thought about that and maybe even convert into your own language and get some feedback from us for either facts or details or factchecking. >> Well, we'll I'll definitely share our um our talking pack or talking point uh toolkit with uh Mr. Hower so we can share with the student reps to get their feedback. >> Yeah. Because I think just as like um as we're trying to get this information out to as many people as possible so they
096can be as knowledgeable as possible. I think breaking it down maybe not in the simplest terms possible but giving people like this levy will do this this and this and they can vote for that instead of voting for paragraphs of words that might be harder to break down and might not make as much sense. And yeah, something exactly like that. Sorry, I was waiting for the slide to come up while I was talking and I didn't realize it was ready to go. >> Any other questions from the board? >> I just uh want to just reiterate one point which is again about um the tax rate and funding again. Um it is very important that the community understand that this is a stable flat tax rate. Um, and the district's really trying to be good
097stewards of our our tax rates. And I we understand that there's a lot of concern in the across the nation about affordability and things of that nature. But this is a renewal of a tax rate that's in existence. Um, so really crucial that folks understand that. But I also want to talk about the fact that this is 17% of our funding. And we we've mentioned that uh we have a deficit in state funding that is not covering gaps that we have in the district. But these funds are even a little bit more fragile now given that the state of Washington is facing a $4 billion deficit. And when states face deficits, they can either raise new revenues or they can make cuts and that could lead to further cuts in our in our funding. So
098without levy funding on top of what could be even deeper cuts in state funding, this money is just crucial. Same thing as I think a lot of us know is true with federal funding. Federal funding for education is in jeopardy. Um so we really really desperately need these funds. And the other thing I'm going to mention or again reiterate is I think there's a perception by some folks that levy money is for the nice to haves in our district. This is not nice to have programs. These are fundamental programs for our kids. If we talk to parents in our district, their number one concern is mental health and the well-being of their their kids um mental health. This levy money funds those programs for our kids in our district. Same thing we just talked about.
099It is foundational, fundamental that our kids are warm, safe, and dry. our kids are not going to learn if their basic needs are not taken care of in the facilities that we're trying to teach them. So, um this money is very very important. I and you know I'm willing to spread that message far and wide as much as I possibly can. So not hearing any other comment though I think we will move on to the next agenda item which is [laughter] uh monitoring report to operational expectation 12 the learning environment. May I have a motion? >> I move the board accept the monitoring report for operational expectation 12 instructional program OEE12 as presented. I second. >> Okay. We will have a presentation from the administration now followed by public comment and a student report. >>
100All right. I'd like to welcome up colleagues uh Rich Melish and Sher Cox and with support from Jacqueline Downey. >> Right. Good evening board directors. Um executive director Sher Cox and I are here to bring forward the report on operational expectation learning environment. I forgot to say I'm Rich Melish, executive director of teaching and learning services. Um, operational expectations 12 speaks to several key focus priority areas of recent years, providing an update on efforts to strengthen the ways the district crafts the learning experiences for our students. This report shares some highlights, some work, some progress, and acknowledges that we are not where we want to be in all areas on behalf of our students. The district is committed to continuous improvement, building on the bright spots, and addressing two identified ex exceptions. With regard to
101grading and homework, this report provides an update on the district's pursuit of clarity and consistency of practice while strengthening responsiveness to students and their range of learning needs. This report provides updates on the way the district is improving supports for student pathway through CTE offerings, expanded online learning opportunities, and strengthening interventions and support systems for students. Highlights in these areas include robust CTE offerings, which is leading us um which led us to the addition of an aerospace manufacturing program at Liberty High School this fall. We have a growing online learning program that is leading to the opening of a new online high school in the fall of 2026. and are increasing um the opportunity for students with individualized education plans to learn in general education settings. Social emotional learning and mental health supports are areas
102of continuous improvement. The district has established a baseline of instruction and improved access to counseling and mental health supports at all levels. Yet, we recognize the need to strengthen our approach to social emotional learning to be more authentic and more impactful to our students, especially at the secondary level. We are committed to continuing the development of social emotional learning as part of developing multi-tered systems of support. Knowing you have read through the report, we'll keep this intro short and executive director Cox and myself are here to support your discussion of this reporting of executive limitation 12. turn on my microphone. Got it. Thank you. Uh we will now have public comment on this agenda item. Is there anybody in the room to comment? Is there anybody on Zoom? Okay, not hearing any public comment. Uh
103I believe we have a student report as well. Micah Thank you for having me. Um, are you able to hear me through the mic? >> Okay, great. [clears throat and cough] So, this report is on OE12 which focuses on learning environment. Something to keep in mind is Gibson is a mastery based school and relies on competencies instead of regular grades. Competencies are given through evidence of personalized learning. I sent a Google form to all the adviserss to distribute to their students on December 1st. Adviserss are our way of saying teachers and and 35 out of 205 students responded. The questions asked were, "Do you feel your competencies accurately reflect your learning? Do you believe you have enough opportunities to earn competencies through your DAB and projects? Do you feel the opportunities to get competencies are
104consistent in every advisory? Do you feel the overall workload is considered when getting assigned work? Are there enough opportunities to pursue self-driven learning? Do you believe Gibson provides adequate resources for social emotional learning? Do you feel Gibson neck provides adequate access to counseling and mental health supports? Would you and would you say students with IEPs, 504 plans, or any learning differences are provided with the same opportunities as other students to receive adequate support? With the questions provided, students students responded mostly positively. A large majority felt that our school offers many opportunities for self-driven and personalized learning. When asked directly, all responded positively. The majority of students also felt that they had good mental health and resources with the majority feeling with the majority agreeing or strongly agreeing. This was also true about how students felt
105about receiving opportunities with IEPs, 504 plans, or any learning differences. The only outlier was about comp competency consistency. A small majority responded negatively. So this prompts more questions that could be asked about the equity of competency distribution. Great. Thank you, M. Okay, I'll open it up to board comment or questions. Would anybody like to start? Director Gallinger, [laughter] >> I have to start. Uh, so I appreciate the approach to this one with uh transparency highlighting the parts where there's work to do still. Um, thank you for that. I think the first thing though that jumps out of my mind is under 12.1 where uh the it says ensure that grading practices are equitable and based on a comprehensive and objective review of best practices research. And that bullet two says students should have multiple opportunities
106to demonstrate and achieve a grade that reflects a high level of understanding of course learning objectives. And so my question and reflection of the superintendent is for the most recently approved collective bargain agreement which limits that as a threshold of C minus. I I don't think any of our students here tonight would agree that a C minus is reflective of a high level of learning of course objectives if that's the the ceiling for retake. >> And so I would like some reflection on like how do we reconcile that? The first part of my comments and then I'll invite in uh colleagues to to add to that is that that is this is our first time drawing a sort of line in the sand around what this actually means and we are at a starting point
107on that conversation. So, I'm really pleased with the work that um we've been able to accomplish through our collective baring agreement between our team and and the Esqua Educators Association to be able to say, "Hey, let's actually create this starting point." And I assume and believe we will continue to assess how that's going. And I think we have heard some feedback already this year from our families and our community um and our students about about that. And I think that will be taken into account as we continue to see how that's going. Um that is something that I we do have uh covered I think in our grading practices committee and some other opportunities where we have linkages with our IEA partners but I'd like to invite um Rich Malish and Sher Cox to add
108more to that. >> Okay. Yes. I just I do want to um indicate that yes, the the defined criteria for recovery of a threshold of a C plus or lower is um was something that we we bargained with in the CBA and um that is that is for the recovery portion. I I think one of the things we're trying to do as well is expand the conversation about grading beyond recovery because there's a lot of proactive ways of giving multiple opportunities so that um the hope is that very few students need the recovery side. So they've actually had more than one opportunity to demonstrate proficiency before they're getting that final summit of assessment. um and we're not overrelying on recovery as a way to reach that multiple opportunities to demonstrate um uh their competencies in
109the class. Um that is that is something that we also indicate that we're working on ongoing engagement in the grading practices committee um to to really define and put more definition to the the many components of grading that can get us to multiple opportunities to demonstrate high levels of learning. Oh, I'm sure I'll have more later. I just was kicking it off. >> I have a lot on this topic tonight. So, I'm trying to work my through way through it in the most uh practical process. So one I absolutely appreciate and and I'm grateful for the way in which the report is structured. I think it is um clearly written in a way that indicates what the goals are, what the progress to date has been and that there's more work um to do and
110then clarity on what some of that that more work will be. So I was very happy at that structure and so thank you. Thank you for that piece. I would also even say um as as now just as an individual parent going through my second high school student um I appreciate that at least now there is a bar on the recovery side where that was not present for my first going through and I do see that as positive progress. Um, I think it's ineffective and I think it is not sufficient, but I respect that it is progress. Um, I'll just get that off my chest. As I look as I look at the um I think where I'll get to eventually at the end of this is I do wonder and maybe the conversation I'd
111like to have amongst the board is is yearly monitoring of this policy sufficient and that I believe um because I it's a good reflection of last year um and I now after six years like I see the momentum I see that we're moving And I want to make sure we stay in that vein because I think that if nothing else, like for all the adult processes, for all the adult procedures, what I care about most in this work is hope and agency for students. And I think that's what we lose sight of in this work is that all of the math and the percentage points, it's all very arbitrary. Um, and at some point what I what I'm hoping to get to is a point where all the adults in the system can align to
112the fact that hope and agency is the goal, not the numbers. So, one what that's I like to table for conversation is moving to maybe it's a by-early monitoring um to make sure we continue to break down some of these barriers and embed processes that move us forward. Um I guess I've I guess that's where like I don't have to get into like I just feel I've recognized the progress. It is woefully insufficient um for getting to the point of students students being able to move throughout their multi-period day and multi-period experiences with teachers and understand the expectations of them and [clears throat] continue to make it through the gauntlet of that with hope and agency. >> Uh Director Gallinger, >> I couldn't agree more. Uh, and I don't know it has to be formal
113monitor or not, but I think it needs to stay at the top of mind for us because it just seems at um inconsistent with our desire for students when we think about what the portrait of graduate is when it's about agency to learn and adaptability and resiliency. And yet we know I think every one of us that's sitting up here and all the students sitting there that don't go to Gibson that we can talk all we want about this but the reality is is if they want to get a good grade on their transcript they have to performatively get it right the first time. And I don't know of any student in our district that would be okay with having a C plus on their transcript as their first goal in a class. And if
114that's the bar we're shooting for, like that is going to be inconsistent with what we want for our portrait of our graduates. And I think that's for me the the rub that I have. And yes, I agree with you, Dr. Mullins. I do want to acknowledge there is incremental progress, but if we truly are looking to refresh what our strategical plan is and we truly want this comprehensive view of students to be able to think bigger picture about what durable skills they want, we have got to give them breathing space to where they don't have to be perfect because the reality is the high schools at least that I know of in our district, you have to get it right the first time if you want to get an A or transcript. And that's just
115too much pressure for every one of our 14, 15, 16, and 17 year olds. And we've got to get to a place where we truly can accept that we are a learning institution and students should be able to learn and recover. and what they get at the end of the course should be reflective of what they've done throughout that course, not what they did in September and October. So otherwise, like why do we even bother with finals? Like if finals aren't going to be a reflection and can't be supplanting grades, then what's the point? Is it just to add more stress? Because that's all I see and live in my household. So I think we really need to step back and think like what are our assessments and what meaning do they actually give for
116the courses and for the students because we're not using them as you would expect in the state of okay so you may have struggled through you you may have gotten B's B+es B minuses through the course of it and it finally clicked for you as you spiral through your math curriculum and you understood it and you aced the final. So why is your grade still a B+? It's it's those types of I think real conversations that we have to have if we really want the portrait of graduate to move the needle for what we want our students to be and to believe in for themselves. And so I just want to just to underscore why is this topic made me so frustrated. It is page 10 and it is the student survey responses to the
117question what best describes the purpose of work you do at home [clears throat] and that answer um p is your page 10 my page 10? >> It's page 10. >> Go up a little bit on that page. Yeah up there. Right there. Um, so if you look at seventh grade, the seventh grade survey, 2% of that time is spent on preparing for new learning. If you look at 9th to 11th [clears throat] grade, it is 4% of time that is spent on new learning. That screams at me as we've got something upside down in what in what we're what we're doing. Finishing the largest and both finishing something we started in class. What hope what hope does a student have on being prepared to excel at the next topic? If what time they spend at
118home is two or 4% on preparing for the next piece of learning, they are by definition working behind the clock every day. And I I just continue to feel as though this topic goes as the crazy thing the board cares about and not looking at the answers from our own students. I know. I can tell you again the only the the best grades I've ever seen, any kid I know, all kinds of learning styles and ability is that they have the ability to work ahead and actually see and understand and look at something and then go into class and feel prepared for a discussion or prepared for further learning. where in this case what are we what are like what are they literally doing with their time not us making it up but them answering
119it and if you go throughout this report of student answer percent of time spent on their homework etc they they are speaking in these numbers and so I I continue to be hopeful although I am losing ground that the adult and adult choices will will say how do how do we write the ship? >> Dr. Coin, >> can we just uh comment on that one because we did have some uh uh back and forth on this one in preparation for this uh time. So, uh so uh Dr. Downey, >> thank you, Superintendent. Yes, we also noted the high number of students both in middle school and high school that say homework the purpose of homework is to finish something that was started in class and that made us curious uh what's behind that? Is there
120more work that is assigned uh intentionally to be done like what is the intention behind it? And so in the plan we talk about creating guidelines for homework um so that it is clear what the purpose of homework is at the secondary level and that is a key question um that we intend to give guidance around as we create that with our teacher leaders um and as a district once we get clear on purpose it shouldn't just be finishing something we started in class without intention so thank you for those comments director mice >> I also know that That comment is usually backed up by, "If only they were doing what we told them to do in class. If only they weren't chatting." Again, I I I totally get that that's what the adults will
121say and I reject it. >> Yeah. And I and I will say that um in and asking about this and being curious about this, one of the things in the last time we looked at the homework research that we we looked at is being careful to make sure that homework is um focused on things that they have learned and practicing skills that they've been taught. Um has been a big part of the research that was put forward. Um and that came out of some of the equity work around homework in um not putting students who to go and learn new things without supports because that creates inequities when we do that. And so I think it's I think that as we look at the homework guidelines, we need to refresh that research and and articulate
122very clearly the research on on homework and the most effective uses of of homework. um so that we are building off of the best practices of today. >> Director Coin, >> um I I would just say back to ditto to everything that's been said completely and I have a lot of thoughts and I don't want to be redundant on things, but I to what director Mulling said, you know, the crazy thing that the board the perception is the crazy thing the board might be focused on is frankly the thing that we hear the most from our constituents. It's always 12. We always hear this. Um and so just one note and then I want to talk a little bit about 12.4 in the report, but um on 12.1 I'm always astonished when we look at
123enrollment numbers, our number of students that take the Running Start path and and I think that's a viable path for students. I'm not I'm definitely not saying it it's not. But in talking to parents in the community, the idea that it's an option as an off-ramp because of this idea of hey, I don't have hope and agency potent, you know, in the my home high school, so this is a way to to um to find a different path, something that that would um sustain my GPA. And you know, and there's a lot with that. Again, it's it's an option for some students, but it also changes the community. I hear that time and time again from parents like hey this is it's different my you know there are so many kids that are in running
124start it's a different experience for my child at skyline or at high and so I think that's an opportunity for us and I think fully agree with this idea of um monitoring more this more frequently than a year yearly I I think this requires more um attention from the board and then just really quick on 12.4 for I want to just note and this is on page 12 13 14 a lot of conversations I have with folks in the community on this one the idea of hey this is great we're offering more options this particularly the CTE options but at our comprehensive high schools that aligns to and equates to more work and more rigor unfortunately um we have to figure out a way to be able to add more options for students so they
125can explore without adding more rigor I just I can't stress that enough if the if we can just as a district identify that because kids want options. They want to explore things at the high school level, but if it equates to more homework to more rigor, they're not going to do that. And I think there's some missed opportunities. And then I would just say on um page 14, I hear this a lot. I know we talked about these are some of our offerings, but the inconsistencies of some of our elective offerings again across our high schools, particularly at the middle school level. I hear that frequently. Um I've heard that before I was on the board. I hear that frequently from members of the community. Um I know there's [clears throat] challenges with that. I
126know we were able to offer more when we offer more choice, which may be something that we'll be able to offer um you know, in the future. Uh but you know, when we think about school choice specifically in the district, but that continues to be something an area I continue to hear from constituents. if if there are solutions where we can figure out how if something's really good at one school, how do we emulate that in another so that not just one group of students who happen to live in a specific geography in the district are getting that opportunity. So I would leave us with that and again I'm not expecting us to have any answers to that but I think that goes back to the point around more frequent monitoring of OE12 I think
127would help and I know for me as a board member would really help because I would like to be able to go back to constituents and say hey we know there's opportunities and we're and the district's working on this. There's some really exciting things. We're addressing your concerns and I think that more frequent monitoring again would allow us to do that. So thank you. Uh I'm going to chime in real quick because I just want um the message to be very clear from the board and across the board particularly on back to 12.1. I've been on this board now coming into my third year in this issue was with me from day one and it's still with me now coming into my third year and with what appears to be very little progress over that
128time period. Um, so it's clearly a problem. I think there's a conversation maybe we need to have as a board for a little bit more clarity as to I'm hearing my colleagues say and I support the idea of more monitoring or more reporting or more I maybe maybe we need to be more explicit is what I'm trying to say as to what that is because I think we all want that. But I also want to make the point to me when you read this report a lot of it is about solutioning around data data reports data studies. This is not a data problem to me. This is a human problem. We need people in uh together collaborating to try to figure out how to get this right. Um and I don't know how and I
129know what the response is going to be and I do understand there's only so many days for collaboration with our teachers particularly across district and things like that but just because it's difficult doesn't mean we don't need to make it happen. Um, but that was that's my major takeaway is I I we we've got to start communicating in solutioning and trying some things to write the ship here. So, um, that's the point I want to make. And then one other this is a very small point, but I on page 11 there is this question in the eighth grade exit survey. It says, I believe the amount of school work I have outside the school day is reasonable for the grades I want to earn. My question is is how on earth does an eighth grader
130know that? I mean they are in a system a certain system. What's the comparable? How would an eighth grader know whether that's reasonable or not? Oh, is that a fifth grader? A fifth grade. Eth I'm sorry. I'm looking at the eighth grade number. Yeah. So I would just maybe ask the district to rethink that question. I or maybe my colleagues can tell me if that resonate. It just doesn't make sense to me. But anyway, I bring that up as a very minor point. So, I will go back to the conversation. Director Mully, >> I think the question you bring out highlights my point that we continue to ask kids how painful it is to fit into our adult processes. >> Yeah. >> How like how painful how bad is that for you? Like that's what
131that question says. >> Yeah. >> So, I I so I will just tell a story of this morning. I am not normally the single kid antidote story, but I am aware and I talked to a family this morning. I am on page 15 of the what are the main reasons for online for online enrollment and I will add one which is because I couldn't recover my classes in at Isiqua High School. So instead of losing my entire first semester of my sophomore year, this family has decided to unenroll their child from Isiqua High and enroll them fully in online so that they can try to recover the first semester of their sophomore year uh at the a pace the kid is able are they a functional f you know I'm sure they have their own
132issues but I I I think we're missing the point like if a kid if a family has to choose to remove their child from our high school and take an online option, which [clears throat] again just had this conversation this morning, which is part of why I'm fired up about this topic. I I don't know where we think that falls in these categories, but what really happened is the kid had no hope in recovering the first semester of their sophomore year, and so they're no longer in our high school. And yet, uh, there are many students that are varsity athletes across our high schools that feel like they cannot do academics in their high school and be a varsity athlete. >> Correct. >> And that is >> I even I >> like we we shouldn't
133be setting up a system that is like that. That is also inconsistent with our vision for what a portrait of graduate is. And when I've heard teachers get up and speak and they worry about grade inflation and it >> it boggles my mind if the average SAT score is 1300, which is already the 90th percentile in the country out of the, you know, million graduates we have a year across the country. I'm just confused how any teacher in our district would be worried about grade inflation for students that are already outscoring the whole country. And I don't understand how if a student gets a five on an AP test, I don't care what their grade is in class. I know what it should be. So, I I I just don't I don't understand. I feel
134like our students are being held hostage and I'm just tired of it. I'm just tired because they deserve to be able to be everything we want them to be and have fun. High school doesn't have to be what it is. And this is the vehicle that we believe is going to go towards change because we truly do care about the learning environment for our students and we're just not getting there fast enough. >> Yes, I see that. Sorry, I was go ahead. First of all, I want to echo everything that's been said. I feel like you guys are speaking to my soul right now. Um, I think that there's a couple things uh and I'm going to circle kind of back to some things that were discussed here that shocked me a little bit in
135terms of like the way that we are kind of approaching this. First of all, two to four percent of students not or feeling like they're working on homework retroactively instead of preparing doesn't surprise me at all because throughout my entire educational experience, my understanding is that that is generally how it's supposed to be. the work that I do where I'm finishing either assignments that were not supposed to be completed in class or that I didn't complete in class or material that I didn't understand in class that I'm studying for an upcoming test like and I want to be very clear that I didn't survey this or anything. This is just me personally and the conversations that I've had. That is what I feel like students kind of view as homework. anything that we do to
136like read ahead or um try to study or understand topics beforehand is like extra work on top of our homework. And I think that that so deeply reflects the mindset of what work at home should look like and what being on top of your work or being on track in your classes looks like. Um and I think that also comes from the way that like we assign work or the nature of like some of these assignments. Uh the other thing I would say about recovery is that I know that like most of the time when students are taking online courses from the people I've talked about, it is for recovery purposes, I that's reflected in the data. Um or as soon as a student feels like they're slipping up in a class, they're immediately thinking,
137okay, how can I recover this? And I think that there's often times this stigma that comes around a student trying to kind of recover their grade where it's like, "Oh, well, you didn't do well in the first part of the semester. Now you're doing well in the second part of the semester, but that's just because you realized that you were in a tight spot and you finally like clutched up." Um, but but I think I think part of the issue is it it's take it takes time to understand how to navigate a course, especially when you're getting into sophomore, junior, senior year. you're taking harder classes than what you're used to. Um, and I'm I I see so often students being penalized for learning over the course of the semester, if that makes sense. Um,
138and it's just very frustrating to me as a student. >> Oh, yeah. Okay. Um, I know we kind of went away went away from this. Um but I do just want to continue to highlight the issue of inconsistencies in grading and even in Gibbs neck with our competency distribution. Um it causes so much stress and is I feel like a big mental health like problem for a lot of our students. Um, I know a lot of people personally, I don't have the high school experience, but in middle school, um, there were like good and bad teachers to have for both grading practices and homework practices. And so, like I knew people who like we were we were applying like we were going to the same course, they got a different teacher, they were crying, they
139dropped out of the class. Like that is not an uncommon experience for students to drop a class that they want to do because it doesn't have the good teacher. And I feel like we should never have good or bad teachers when it comes to grading or homework, especially if they're in the same course in the same school. That to me just feels ridiculous. Um and uh even now I just I hear about it in the high schools that like you get a certain teacher, well too bad. um they just all have different expectations. Um and like I said, that does carry over to Gibson a little bit. Um because we have competencies, it's often it's up to the advisor's interpretation of what like mastery means to them. Um because it's so qualitative and not quantitative.
140Um, I personally don't know how to fix this, but I do know that a lot of the Gibbs neck advisors are like getting together pretty frequently and discussing and having like scenarios being like, if the kid showed me this work, what competencies would I give them? And they're all coming together. And so, uh, obviously our teacher time is super limited because they are constantly on the move and doing stuff. Um, but if we could just kind of try to push more conversations where we talk about like what we would do to push that equal grading and homework practice. Um, and then I also just have big issues with um the amount of students that were talking about how homework they feel like was totally just them getting stuff done that they couldn't get done because
141I feel like that is probably a decent equity issue. Um, I know in our district, we focus a lot on supporting our low-income students or our students with things going on outside of school. And if you are a student who has to work because your parents can't make enough money, then you don't have time to do all that homework. And if homework is being used um as like this huge grading piece to make up the classwork, then you're not going to be able to get it done as easily as students who have an easier access to home supports. And so just rethinking a decent amount of that portion. Um yeah. Okay. >> U go ahead. I'd like to echo basically a lot of things that Milo just said um especially about the unequal um the
142differences between specifically teachers because I know I actually had a conversation today that mirrored this exact sentiment about um the as even if everybody is struggling at least it's good to know that okay I'm this is what the course is supposed to be like but when one set of group of people are struggling and one set of group of people are you struggling less. Um, it tends to really feel unequal and it tends to really I've seen this just in like my personal life and uh people around me. it tends to really like make people like feel upset. Um because uh it's um I guess a way to say this is that like inequality is more like even if everybody is trying to think of a way to say this that I want to [sighs
143and gasps] um basically I think it's a big problem in Skyline and maybe in other schools too obviously where there is significant differences between teachers and even though they're the exact same course, you can end up getting two different outcomes based on nothing of your own choice. It was just random chance and that can feel really unfair and um disorienting to students. And then also I'd like to circle back to the thing about uh a lot of students not learning new material at home. And I just wanted to clarify that um whether we wanted students to be introduced to new material at home because I find that most students enjoy um being to introduced to new material while they're with a teacher because um it can be really confusing or uh overwhelming otherwise. And if
144we're asking students to learn new things on their own, then that might really like perpetuate uh inequalities cuz some people have access to a lot of different resources or the time to learn those things versus at school kind of everybody has an even even playing field. So, uh if homework was relegated to like learning new stuff, then I feel like that might um negatively impact some students more than others. >> Leia, go ahead. I wanted to echo what uh Viday said as well. Um I think uh for me when it comes to homework and even grading I want to reiterate that we can't really generalize this because it really depends on the rigor of the course that you're taking. Um and if students are choosing to take more rigorous courses then they do have to
145expect more homework and stricter grading policies. Um, but one thing is I think uh for me at least, this is just my perspective. Um, having like as a homework piece, if I have something that that I didn't quite push in class, for me that's a lot more manageable than having a whole new assignment at at home. uh at least for me that just helps me learn better because I we went over that um in class with the teacher and then we're taking it home to kind of go over it again and then you know do anything that we didn't get time to finish in class. So just kind of a different perspective. And then um on the topic of grading again I do want to stress that it really depends on the kind of course
146that you're taking. But I do think that within um AP teachers and honors teachers there should be a a uniformity so that there's not significant grade inflation in one class whereas another class has nothing. And also, I do like the point about um your AP score affecting your grade in the class cuz some teachers do change that and some don't. So, I think it'd be nice to implement a uniform policy to to to say that we would change our our grade after the AP exam or we wouldn't rather than that also being pretty um inconsistent. >> Thank you, >> Rex. So I want to share a little bit of a different and very uniquely Isqua high school perspective of this specifically in the math department. The math classes have been very reworked this year. There
147are new curriculums in the pre-calculus classes, the algebra 2 classes. Uh there have been changes to grading practices in the AP calculus classes, calc 34 classes, and no one's happy about it. There have been it it's very different than it was last year and people did not know that going into this year. And the first test of the of uh in pre-calc CHS this year had an average of around 50 to a 60%. For a first unit test in what was branded as the online level math course, I don't think that that should be the grade that is expected or desired by any student. And now that we are entering that last bit of the semester where we're looking at finals, we're going to be held to that same standard that we were back in
148September. And I think this is going directly with what Director Gallinger was saying. We're going to be held to where we were five months ago and not to where we're going in the future. And I think that's the exact same feeling that's being held by the AP Calc students who have had their AP grade bumps taken away with the teachers giving no method for recovery that's consistent and stable. It changes from test to test. And so what are all of these students doing? They're looking immediately to this online course to replace that grade. And when you look at so it's that's 19% of or nearing 19% of all students that are enrolled in online courses from the year of 2024 to 2025. And of that 19% 90% of them are going through the family pay
149option which is inherently making this a pay to- win system. If students are going to be able to just pay to have that grade taken off and to redo that, what does that mean for the students that necessarily can't pay? And I and I understand that there are avenues for them, but in a world where we already have these disparities in SAT taking, ACT taking, AP test taking, where you can take it as many times as you want if you have the funds to do so. I think this is the last thing that we should have be a paytowin system. >> Director Mullins. >> Um, so I just want to clarify because the question was about preparing for new learning. They're actually two separate questions. One of them is am I using my homework for
150new assignments that are expected to be done that were not assigned in class? Which is I think what you're talking about that seems high risk and unsuccessful. And in that one in seventh grade, 36% of students are reporting that as their circumstance. Um, in 9th to 11th grade, it is 20%. That's different than the one I was bringing up, which is do students have time to prepare for new learning? So, are they able to take a breath and get ready for the next subject or are they busy working on the things that have already piled up? And that's the ones that have two and uh 4%. So, I think what what I hear you raising is like getting introduced to new content would be not successful as homework. And that's over a third of seventh
151graders who are having that experience. >> My hands are up again. Chris, go ahead. Cool. >> You um I kind of want to take a different avenue and there's something that we've kind of been dancing around as we've been going through this discussion and it's the profile of the graduate and really there's one question that sticks out to me here. It is what best describes the purpose of the work you do at home. Uh, and I get that there were predefined responses, but nowhere do I see or in any of the conversation I've had. Has a student said, "The purpose of homework is to help me build skills that will help me in the world beyond or to help me learn how to manage my time or to embody any of the skills outlined in
152the profile of the graduate. And it's one thing to make it, but if a students don't know what skills they're getting out of a course that they're taking, and b when they're in that course, they're feeling like they're trying to catch a train that's never going to stop for them. Is that really setting that up? Is that really setting them up for success? Or is that, you know, I feel like that's the exact opposite of what this district's trying to do in, you know, and making that profile of a graduate. And even if students realize what skills they'll have after, do they even have the opportunity in the first place, right? Because I think at least for me, and this is my experience only, but the ways I've learned the best are through failure. And
153more so than that, being able to correct it and move forward, right? No one's going to get everything right on the first time. But after that first time, after you fail, that's when you realize what didn't work and now what does work. And so if we're so focused and you know we want students to have those skills, we need to give them the opportunities to build those skills in the first place. And you know right now just going through the report and the questions and especially the data not not a lot of it is surprising to me. I'm not going to lie because at least for me um earlier even before the day the purpose of homework for me was never to prepare ahead for any classes. That that thought did not cross my mind
154until I just read the report. So kind of just want to struggle and tie this back to the profile of the graduate and take a different avenue. >> Maya >> clarifying question uh what director Mulling said. So the preparing for new learning is that more of like students like read ahead or study ahead and then they learn the next content or is it just like they have like space to like take a breather before the next content is taught in class? Is that >> I think >> it's something other than the other categories which is depending on the students. Some would read ahead, some wouldn't I would tell you in my house it would be a reading ahead though always worked better for my kids if they could read ahead but this percentage represents the
155experience which is either most of their time was spent on finishing something or new stuff that no one had ever taught them. >> To me didn't feel successful and it wasn't. Sorry, I was just going to say I think one of the things that I'm reflecting on is that this was a limited choice response question and I'm wondering if the right choices are being offered to get the feedback that we need from students on this question. Um, I'm not I'm not sure that the choices are well understood by those taking them and I'm not sure that we've offered enough choices to really get at what we're trying to get at with this question. >> Yeah, I think I think I think yeah, I think that might be part of the issue then. Yeah, >> go
156ahead. Yeah. So about this softsklls survey, obviously it's a limited option and looking at it just now as if I were taking the survey, I would interpret um maybe preparing for new learning as sort of a flipped classroom. I know a lot of um newer um like different teachers have different methods of teaching and one of them is like learning the content at home um which tends to go hit or miss with people. And then I kind of interpreted the new assignments as something maybe that was related to the content from the class but just wasn't assigned and given work time at school. And I feel like that is definitely something that I've experienced and I've been okay with even if there weren't weren't wasn't work time in class. Um it would still be related
157to the content we did in class. So I would still feel prepared to complete those assignments and be able to you um versus maybe a flipped classroom which would be more overwhelming. >> Sticking with page nine uh the table. Thank you for doing the disagregation of the data by school for homework. But for me, what jumps out is Skyline students, almost twice as many Skyline students, and by sheer numbers, 200 versus 50 at Isakla, report that they do more than two hours of homework per night. I'm assuming you guys stopped at two hours because maybe you believe that that should be the most a student does. Mhm. >> I think if you asked three and four, you might be surprised by the results. And I'm not encouraging that you do that, but I would like
158to know what is what what is the range of acceptable homework that you believe? Meaning, you outline sort of the way you're going to go through the process to work on some alignment, but you don't actually say what the target is. So, I would love to know actually what are you going to be shooting for when you talk to teachers globally about how much homework and as you continue to do to ask this question, I would encourage you to ask one for what percent of students do homework on the weekends because I think you would be surprised by the number. >> Director Quinn. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Sorry. >> Okay. I had one thing to add to that too. Can I just add one thing because I think you make a very good point. I
159think that the two-hour mark is way too small. I would say I think we need to ask four, which might be mind-blowing, but I would highly highly recommend that we ask for and then I want and and see what that number is. We we don't have a defined target at this point and that is in developing the homework guidelines. What I hear is and I and I think we'd heard this in the work study as well that we need to develop we need to look at the research we need to be thinking thoughtfully through what we're desired targets are um so that we can develop homework guidelines around desired targets so I I hear that um and I don't know if yeah but we don't have one that we have defined >> I will say
160that this is another point that we actually did discuss in preparation for tonight is saying we need to talk about it So this format here is less discussion based because it's about monitoring. And so I do think that there is actually a really good opportunity to engage in deeper discussion with the board and our team in a way that we can prepare because these are questions that we are hearing for the first time. And so now we can take note of them and then move those forward in a way that um help us uh prepare and gather additional information and other inputs as well. And so maybe where I'd like to go is uh to get back to the idea I put out which is um that for me once a year seems un sat
161unsatisfying answer. I would like to establish an in year maybe it's you know at the hat second semester sort of time frame but I will I don't know how anyone else what anyone else thinks about that >> is is the question about monitoring or is it about actually discussion and ability to hear about what's when I hear monitoring as as I think about our current governance model I mean it is it is about a year in a rears right so either there's a different placement of time potentially as we look at the past year. >> Yeah. >> I also think the discussion part is what matters most. There's so much passion and energy for this topic and our system is not something you just turn the switch on easily, right? So I want to make
162sure that we are able to have those discussions in a in in a query based way but allows us to sort of discuss a question, gather information, come back, have an a different point of view, see what gener generates from there. And that that kind of discussion to me feels very helpful as we progress through the year so that we don't get out of alignment. Right? So for for me the monitoring is about how aligned are we right in our progress. But for me the day-to-day work is around where are we in managing that together and then being able to have that discussion on what we see where we can course correct. Uh because you know the year monitoring is is a bit of a challenge there. So I'm just trying to tease out discussion
163learning cycles of improvement and cycles of feedback versus monitoring and points in time that are more static. >> It's 100% a fair question and just to give some more context since we have a new board member I think we have a couple of different kinds of conversations available to us. the conversation on like discussion and inquiry for me is a work study conversation which we can take that time to dig more deeply into what's happening to explore certain topics. I am actually asking for a monitoring of progress conversation. Um it feels as though on this protect this topic in particular that we go a year is too long and yes it's in a rears. So I'm okay that it becomes the last 6 months like in a rears but that it's a shorter cycle to
164say what is practically different. So as you lay out here here are the things we go we're stating we're going to go off to do what I'm saying it does not feel sufficient to me to wait a year to understand the progress against these statements of what will be different. So I am always happy to have more of a work study conversation on kind of collaboration or ideiation but I am actually asking for making instead of a year in a rears conversation a six-month inner rears conversation. So we can have more practical checkpoints. >> And I think maybe there's also another point of clarification or I'm asking actually is I think we're saying further monitoring of 12.1 not necessarily all of the subsection >> that's fair for the exceptions for where there are currently exceptions
165maybe. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Director Galling. >> Yeah. So I mean I I think what I'm curing is so what's I think sometimes dissatisfying about the reports is they are in a rears and you're wanting to do an emergency monitor nearing and you're kind of like signaling to the district in the springtime. We would want to monitor this again for the current year to so you actually get an update because different than results where is the district making reasonable progress towards operational expectations are that unsatisfactory supposedly black and white thumbs up thumbs down like either the district is meeting the standard or it's not meeting the standard >> and that's how the vote is. So I guess I think of two pathways. Either this gets not approved and not accepted >> and then therefore there's
166work to do and it has to come back and then we decide based on conversation with the district when it would come back. >> But the concern I have with that is this is monitoring based on last year. >> Correct. And so I think for me I would feel most comfortable approving this highlighting the work that's already been done >> and then to fast forward [snorts] and say >> we want some sort of formal update and we can decide how that is >> through board conversation. >> Uh but I I do think we we probably need to separate those. >> Yes. from this current >> 100 I 100% agree and I think the term I'm trying to avoid in my request is the emergency monitoring because that feels like something has occurred and so now
167we need to monitor it whereas now I'm saying I think we procedurally need to be updated more frequently so it may I think I'm just I am being careful around the word emergency but if that's the right term then that's the right term >> I don't think that means has to mean that it's an e It's just that's the >> um I think and again I'll go back to my first comment. I appreciate that this document is clear that it calls out the exceptions. It calls out where we're going. So I I actually don't have issue with approving it in its current state. I just think that's our conversation is what's our way to make sure in in a more frequent way than a year from now that we're having that conversation. So if yes,
168if we schedule in emergency monitoring, which seems nuts, that's what like my brain can't do both. Like that's what um then I'm perfectly fine with that. Can we go to page 19? And can you answer for me is this bottom table for the number of advanced classes in the breakdown by school. Again, I appreciate this disagregation. Is that for in a given year or is that in their high school career? >> The the question as the students had seen it is listed above. So it says if you decided to take your challenge yourself to take advanced classes, let us know how many advanced classes you are taking. So I I think the intent is for them to say that you are currently taking when they when they filled this out. Okay. If that's the way
169I hope that's the way that it was. >> I just so again it jumps out at me that at Skyline three times the number of students are taking five or more advanced classes compared to isqua and this is why disagregation is important as you join us now for everything and so I would say sometimes to pretend you're getting the question just now because we didn't get this updated report with what we needed until today. So, um I I don't know what is right or what is not right, but this feels a bit too there's too much gap here between our high schools. And I know we are in a district of self- select. So, students are choosing this, but are students, this gets back to the whole IB part, are students choosing this or is
170there really no other option for them? And that's why I continue to be concerned that we aren't accelerating AP coursework offerings into Skyline fast enough because they don't actually get a choice. It is an all or nothing game for them which then we see that cascades into how much homework they have which we see how much anxiety that drives. And so we as a system need to look really closely in the mirror and say what are the parts we're doing to contribute to the anxious generation. This is why AP course work at Skyline is a hill that I'm going to be willing to die on. This table tells me our students don't actually have a choice and they don't actually have agency. Forget about hope. >> Yeah. And it uh these numbers jumped off the
171page to me as well uh on 19. And I have a question maybe for my more senior board members or the superintendent which is when or why are we a self- select district and at what point do we have a real an obligation to step in and protect our kids? I mean, a third of the kids in the high school level according to this survey are taking three plus advanced classes and then these numbers of course in Skyline are just to me nuts. So, I'm just curious as how we got to self- select and I'm not necessarily saying I have a position one way or the other, but I'm curious. Well, you heard my concern. So, how did how did this happen? Do we do we have any I think that's how it's been and
172maybe more veteran tenure team members can share a bit more. I I at this point, you know, we we haven't pulled up the whole history and that's actually a worthy question, I would say. And >> uh I predate that that does predate my lived experience in this district. I've asked around and some perceive that to be a board priority to be a self- select district. Others think it has a different history. I don't know that we I don't I I don't know. >> Okay. Well, it just makes me wonder if there's not We want people to be able to choose. I I understand that we want we want choice, but at some point I wonder if you can cap choice. [laughter] >> Yeah. >> For the sake of mental health. Yes. Director Molson, >> I
173So, I'll just do an experience as now my second high schooler both at IHS. And I would just say I I think at IHS there is a fairly active um advising process that works with kids each year talking about their plate and their plate holistically and what fills that plate. And so I think I don't know what that looks like at the well I guess I'll just say Skyland because uh Liberty is kind of in range basically in ranged of IHS but I know that there's an active discussion at the time of registration now having my second IHS student that spends time specifically having students go through the mental exercise of athletics work um other personal commitments academic rigor in helping to have an encouraging conversation about course selection that I found to be quite
174satisfying as a parent that doesn't that maybe even gives a little like what are the potential negative connotations of like being overrotated in one of those areas. I have I have found that to be really helpful. I don't know if that same practice exists in the others, but I have now seen that in place through both of my IHS students. >> Judge Coin, >> I know I've I've mentioned this before, but I'm going to repeat myself because I think it's fascinating. So, um when I was um the parent of an eighth grader going in, you know, having my son start at Skyline, you go in for or parent orientation night, they give you the different breakout rooms. the IB breakout room. You physically could not fit in that space. That's how every parent went there.
175And I think director Taylor, you bring up a really good question. I have wondered this for quite some time, particularly since I've been on the board and particularly when we think about OE12. We think about OE14. When did self- select h happen? I I talked to so many parents who were saying, "Well, my child isn't doing well in this course. Their sibling did." Well, just because the sibling did took it didn't doesn't necessarily mean that there's that their other child will do well in it. I think there's this this sense and it's the community that we live in and I know we you know many of us you know there many parents who who push their kids but I it just seems contradictory to us talking about student mental health when we see numbers like
176this and we have the self- select option. It just I I don't know. I find it mindboggling and I think we just that's where and this obviously I mean we could probably talk about this all night because I I read this and I get it just it it's frustrating. I think about as a board member sitting up here and thinking gosh if we are trying to make a positive impact and I look at these results I think about this and I know you all as educators are feeling the level of frustration. I know you are. It just feels like we collectively could do a better job. So, I like the the this like this conversation around further monitoring, whatever that looks like. I don't think it is the emergency monitoring option. I just think this
177deserves more conversation though. >> But I think this also highlights because when you look at the end and the totality of what a isqua high school graduate and a Skyland high school graduate, they end with the same number of advanced classes in general. And so this is the problem though. Skyline have to fit them all in in their junior and senior years. And it is they can pace themselves. And so you see most Isqua students >> in the middle and they're pacing themselves over the course of three or four years that they're taking advanced classes versus shoving them all in in two years. >> Thanks. Um, I just want to bring I guess some school student perspective to uh self- select and like the counseling process that we were just talking about. I think that
178as someone who always like gets their classes checked off by their teachers and my teachers look at me and most of my peers and go, are you guys going to have a social life? Like [laughter] what's your plan for this? Um, I think students feel like if they're limited on the kinds of courses that they can take in school, one of two things is going to happen. Either A, they're just going to feel further restricted by that lack of choice. The students who were going to do more anyways are going to feel like they could have done more. Um, or B, they're going to find other ways to do it. Um, if we look at the case of Skyline where students who want things like AP credit and don't have direct access to that in
179schools are just going and like taking AP tests, uh, it makes me think that if we are doing things like capping advanced classes, we're going to have more students who are just like self-studying AP classes and signing up for those tests. And so I think this speaks to a much larger issue of not only how can we use policy to shape the way that our students perceive their education, but also how can we shape the culture of our community and how can we adapt to the culture of our community as opposed to kind of swimming upstream and working against it. So yeah, uh >> I do want to be mindful of our agenda. >> [laughter] >> Um, do we have another vid? Do you have a comment? >> I'll make this quick. Um, so I'd
180just like to Okay. Um, sorry. Um, just one thing I'd like to add is that um, at least at Skyline, I know that people want to do the most that they can and people const it kind of like Ava said, it speaks to like a larger issue than just Skyline in general, but just like of lately like this like desire to constantly perform uh, like above and beyond or try to do the most that one can. And I feel like the restriction or I mean the potential restriction of let's say honors classes in order to limit um like the course load or rigor that these um people are taking on themselves would kind of is it's only like a small part of like maybe a larger like movement to want to do the most. And
181then let's say maybe offering more courses in freshman and sophomore year, at least specifically at Skyline because we don't do so right now. Um I wouldn't I would want to wager that people would still try to do the most that they can in freshman year, the most that they can in sophomore year and in junior and senior year. as I feel like trying to use a policy to kind of maybe put some limitations on the amount of honors classes that students take wouldn't act it wouldn't help students um like manage their course load. It would just um kind of they would find other ways in order to push themselves further. And whether that's in uh taking on more extracurriculars or more outside courses or trying to do dual enrollment, um I feel like no matter
182how many restrictions you put on uh students in this like who want to do the most, they'll still find ways to do the most. >> So I think in front of us we have a motion, but I also just want to follow up. I get the board's opinion on this. I think maybe the path forward is a work study to discuss what further monitoring in this space would look like. >> It's a great retreat topic. >> A great retreat topic. Something of that sort. Okay. So, I do have a motion in front of me. And I think actually the next step is do we have a student advisory vote? What's happening? There it is. You had the results. They went away. >> Oh, brushing. I see. You can just tell us. >> Yeah, you can
183just tell us if >> 6 no one abstaining on the advisory vote. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Uh okay. So we have a motion to accept the monitoring report for operational expectation 12 learning environment OE12 as presented. >> All in favor? >> I say I >> I said I >> I uh all in opposition same name. >> Nay. >> Okay. And with that, the motion fails and OE12 is not accepted. Okay, moving on to our next agenda item, which is school improvement plan report out and approval. Next on our agenda is the uh SIP report. Um, the board met with ISC administrators and building leaders on November 4th, uh, December 2nd and December 8th to review the school improvement plans. Do I have a motion? >> I move the board approve the 2025 2026 school improvement
184plan SIP for each ISTD school as presented. >> I second. Hey, thank you. Now, I think we'll move towards public comment. We have a couple I think I have a couple folks in the room. First, uh I'd like to hear from Stephanie Tolenin. Is that correct? Yes. Thank you. >> Hi, I'm Stephanie Tolenin, a 26-year educator at Maywood and a parent of students at both Maywood and Liberty. I need you now to kind of shift your high school grading focus to more of a inclusive model, middle school. Um, my comments come from genuine concern for students and for the direction of our middle school student improvement plan or SIP. This is not criticism of anyone's effort. It's an attempt to address challenges staff are facing and to advocate for goals that more accurately reflect student
185learning. The current goal that all students all students earn a C or higher sounds positive, but tying school improvement to a single letter grade has created unintended and harmful pressures. A grade can also be shaped by attendance, trauma, language needs, disabilities, gaps in foundational skills, and inconsistent grading practices. A C does not always represent what a student truly knows or can do. Um, this push to get every student to a C places some staff in a conflict between maintaining grading integrity and meeting expectations that don't align with student reality. Um, effects are being seen. In some cases, teachers grade books have been altered without their permission or knowledge. These incidents reflect an unhealthy environment where the grade, not the learning, becomes the goal. And for these reasons, I'm I was hoping that the board would
186be rethinking and holding off on approving this type of school improvement plan. Thank you for your time and for commitment to ensuring students grades accurately reflect their learning. >> Thank you, uh, Camille Wright. Good evening. My name is Camille Wright, 30-year educator in in the Isqua school district. My feeder schools are Maywood and Liberty. We serve a wide range of leaders of learners, many of whom require significant support to access grade level content. Because of this, I've seen how a grading based goal places the heaviest burdens on teachers who work with the highest need students. Students learning English, students with IEPs or 504 plans, students who are chronically absent, and students experiencing trauma or instability. These teachers often have the largest number of students who have not yet mastered essential skills. And at the same
187time, they are the ones most frequently question about failing grades. This happens even when they are diff differentiating instruction, retaching content, providing accommodations, and doing everything possible to move students forward. Instead of feeling supported, me many feel scrutinized simply because they serve the students who need the most. The students are ultimately the most affected. When grades are raised just to meet a number, students can move on without actually having the skills they need to be successful. Those inflated grades hide real learning gaps, delay important interventions, and unintentionally widen the inequities we're trying to close. What looks like improved data on paper doesn't always reflect true readiness. We all want the same thing. Students who are learning, growing, and genuinely prepared for what comes next. To achieve that, I believe we need to consider goals based
188on goals based only on letter grades and shift toward a more meaningful measure. mastery of essential standards, documented growth over time, increased engagement, stronger attendance, and real demonstrations of skills. Thank you for listening and for your continued commitment to our students, families, and comm community. I hope this helps open the door to a more balanced and real realistic approach that supports both effective teaching and genuine learning. Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay, now we will move to board comments on the SIP meetings. >> I'll kick it off. Uh >> oh, thank you. >> First, gratitude to our superintendent and your team for Oh, >> I forgot to check online. I am learning as I go. [laughter] Do we No online comments. Back to you, Director Galler. for this is a a heavy lift that you
189have done that is I believe transformational in alignment and I heard multiple building leaders talk over these three times about how appreciative they are of the data sets and being able to then know and see and experience how the district can drive supports to them for these things and before when it was every school doing their own thing, it's really hard for a school system to drive those consistent supports that you deliver through the multi-tered systems of supports. So, I really really appreciate it. I really grateful for the conversations that we have with our building leaders and I encourage in the future our students to attend one of them. I know you would miss part of a school day, but I think it would be really valuable for you just to get to see this
190that we do three separate meetings, like half-day meetings about these tells us how important they are to it. But then I'm going to now build off of what director Mullen's for the last one. I also believe that these are so important that I do believe we should have a spring touch point as a board in a work study format uh to talk about uh some of the plans or some of the some of the schools that we had questions about to get sort of a again a midyear check. And while at the time I wasn't really all jazzed about moving SIPs from the spring to the fall, I do actually now see that this gives us the opportunity to be able to ask questions and reflect on how the rest of the year went. So,
191uh, I am fully supportive of what has been presented to us tonight and would like for us to consider as a board. Um, so I'd like to hear my board colleagues about that to add a session in the spring that we talk about either through work study or through a board conversation. I I'll just add to that because one of the things that we had uh discussed as part of our preparation for the school improvement planning process this year was to um be able to have a a chance after the school improvement plan uh conversations were had which are very much focused on the schools less about the system. I think that pairs well with a sort of what's our systemwide response andor point of view based on the conversations and topics that were asked
192about which might include also a spotlight of where are we seeing progress for some schools and also other other places where there were questions that do um uh lend itself well to some follow-up. Uh I think that makes sense for us in terms of that's a good vehicle to do that kind of systemwide piece because you once you see alignment in the data and information and formatting for schools to reflect on progress then we have to talk about what are we doing as a system not just on individual school or feeder pattern level. >> Anyone else? >> Yes. Lots lot to say about SIP meetings. So uh deeply appreciative of the amount of work that goes in the thoughtful reflection in each school in which they are setting what is the goals for their building
193um and based on where they are and where they believe they're trying to go to improve performance ready students for the next level um engage more in the school day. And so the [clears throat] the school improvement plan meetings are a a really interesting opportunity to get a sense in each and every one of our buildings. What is the kind of great to greater story to great story whatever you call it for their particular building. Um it is an opportunity for us as a board to hear how that building um their staff, their leader team is looking at their results, their students and telling us about that plan as well as an opportunity for them to learn amongst themselves what are they seeing um that's working in their individual schools that might be shared. Uh
194how in particular in this case were we focused on having the feeder patterns together? How do we see the importance of transition from level to level working prek into elementary, elementary into middle, middle into um high school. And so it really allows a while we have all the data to reflect on the school improvement plan meetings are really uh have become I think and and in a better way very conversational in learning about each school community and where they're seeing success and where they're seeing challenges and it helps inform um you know where we might want to talk about supports in aggregate or programs in in aggregate. Um it is not a time in which at least I as a board member go through and set any sort of plan or goal for an individual
195school. Um I frankly am learning about that community, what it's setting for itself as a goal and how they're moving through that process and how we pull themes themes out of it. What is wonderful to see in these plans then are very kind of personal stories of the student population, the performance over a period of time in that building. Um setting aggressive and yes maybe sometimes feel may feel unachievable goals but ones that I believe um indicate a dedication that all of our students can excel and and achieve. and then talking about not as a not as a failure or a success but as a progress toward this greater um version of how we create acceleration and growth for for all of our students. We have the opportunity to look at um disagregated groups of
196uh students and to see if there are patterns of performance against certain groups. We have the ability to also look at how cohorts of students may be moving with their performance through a series of years. So the same students through let's pick a series of third, fourth, fifth, 7, 8th, 9th, right? We can see how they're moving and if there's additional insights we might get from uh students as they move through the process. But again really it's about learning across building sharing of what is being tried um what is [clears throat] being experimented with what maybe is working and what maybe isn't where we've set lofty goals and maybe haven't reached them or where we've uh you know gone over them with leaps and bounds and then how do we replicate those successes across the
197the system. Um, so for me, I think it's it's just a really important time and a dedication of time certainly of us our staff, certainly of our building leadership and this board to take the time to wallow in all of that information as well as the successes as well as you know where we think we need to go forward. But it it isn't a it isn't some like scorecard doing great doing not great. it is it's much more nuanced conversation than that. So, I greatly appreciate the vulnerability it must take as a building leader to share that data um to talk about what they hoped for and maybe sometimes where they might have missed and use that again to work within their buildings to recalibrate for the next year. Um, I agree that having kind
198of a midyear time point, I I think that that's great so we can get a sense of what did those buildings hope coming into the year and what are some of the things they're hoping to put in place going for the rest of the year. And um, frankly, it allows us as individual board members to celebrate, which is what we do and part of the agenda to celebrate what we're seeing as progress in each of the buildings. Um, so I am uh I am always uh just really honored and impressed by having those as a moment to look at how the administrative team comes together to support our buildings, to look at how the programs are getting launched and used to hear the stories of individual students who are trying and striving. um as well
199as to look at how the data tells me our students in in mass are are moving and yes to look at benchmarks to make sure we're being honest and reflective of if we're doing the right thing. So I am uh grateful that I get to participate in that process and I'm really appreciative of all the work. >> Right. I'll be quick because I I want to help you to stay on track with this agenda today. First meeting is as is our new board president. Um, I would just say really quickly, first and foremost, I want to thank our building leaders for the great work that they put into the school improvement plans. It's a lot. Um, and and we really appreciate that. I think with the structure this year, the feeder pattern structure, I think
200as board members, it's really helpful for us to be able to lean into the uniqueness of each of our of our feeder patterns. That is very, very helpful. Um, and so I always come away with new learnings and thoughts. I think for me um you know we have one of the focus areas that's included in each school improvement plan is family engagement. How are we engaging um the families in our community very helpful to hear I I I came away with a lot of new learnings this year. And then just one last note we had a really good conversation our last SIP meeting with the Isiqua High feeder pattern around attendance and several of the plans talked about if a student feels a sense of belonging they will come to school. It's simple as that.
201And so good dialogue around that and I and I've that's sat with me. Sometimes I think we think about the complexity of getting kids to school, but really at the end of the day it's just if they feel like they belong, they'll come. So thank you, >> Director Gallinger. >> I'm going to go off topic only because I know we're coming up to 9:00 when our students are going to be leaving. Yeah. >> To do that homework that I think we've talked about. Uh but I went into the last vote and I had already said even earlier in my comments that I was planning on supporting that. This is the first vote that your advisory vote impacted how I voted and it changed my opinion. And so since we don't actually usually reflect on why
202we vote the way we do, I did want to say that that advisory vote actually had meaning and impacted my vote. So, um, I don't know what to do about it now because in agenda planning, but I I I just wanted to acknowledge that. So, sorry to go off topic, but because I know they'll be leaving, I want them to hear that from me >> in real time. >> I will just know that as my first vote as president of the board, we failed a motion, but I'll [laughter] leave that as a separate. So, um, I just want to just a few comments too on the SIP plans. Um, [snorts] Director Mullen's mentioned the fact that, you know, it is an opportunity to really wallow to get down into the nitty-gritty of each of these
203schools. Um, but when you surface from that, what I find amazing is, and you take a step back, you can really see some trends across the district. Um and just a few that come top of mind for me that it inclusionary practices I think the initial um results of what we're seeing it is working that our our special education students are are doing better in their testing and scoring. Um the use of success blocks in our elementary schools seems to be very valuable and doing very well. and then efforts across the district in family outreach and engagement really stood out to me and that the schools are making a really strong effort to engage their communities which I think is fantastic. So those were uh kind of some top of- mind uh things that came
204to mind. And then the other thing when I was looking particularly at the schools um just for the public each one of us board members we kind of divide up the schools and we do a deep dive on the select schools that are assigned to us and then have a conversation directly with the um building leader as part of our SIP process. But um another thing that came to mind to me was is that our building leaders are incredibly thoughtful because even when we are seeing some of these programs that are being very successful, the buildings are not satisfied with that necessarily. They are taking the time then to further fine-tune, think about how to fine-tune the programs that are working, hone them, and try to see how they can even have more impact. So
205that I was very appreciative of that recognition I guess or being cognizant of that hey let's not be satisfied with that necessarily. Let's continue to to strive forward. And then the last thing I will say is um I do love this new format that we have gone to particularly because in the middle of the SIP plans through these nine hours of conversation that we have. We do carve out time significant time an hour or more to cover certain topics where what you really then really see in the room is this thought exchange that is going on and problem solving and group think that is all happening uh because of that forum and of us all being able to be together and have those conversations. So, um it's just really really informative as a board member
206and I I look forward to it every year. Um superintendent calls. >> Um I just appreciate our school principles and our uh assistant principles and other staff who help support all of our students every day. I think it's uh reflective of the the alignment piece of looking at data and looking at sort of common questions, common data sets and looking at common structures and systems that support our students um is, you know, a superintendent's dream where we can think about cohesion, right? we can think [clears throat] about having the kind of conversation around best practices um and how that could be shared across a district and also how every different school building is a bit different and how there's new ideas that get generated and that's really important to honor the um things that can
207come up organically that can help drive towards the common purpose and so that kind of exchange is so powerful. So really kudos to our school principles and all the staff that help support make that happen and then our team helps create that backbone um for that to be able to help and we adjust course obviously as well as a result of what we hear and learn. And so um I do think we're in a stance of cycles of inquiry in a different way and I know that that's something that again makes a superintendent's heart sing that we can continue to improve our entire system through those cycles and open dialogue. >> Great. Okay, it's almost 9 o'clock, but I think we have time for an advisory vote unless director Gallinger had a comment. >> Just
208one more thing is I I don't think we said is uh along with these plans is the the PowerBI platform that you have developed for us to see has made the interpretation of data so much easier for us. My only request for that is can we add Gibson E to our high school one? Like they obviously they won't have every one of the platforms, but like algebra one graduation rates for the ones that that does make sense for them uh to our high school dashboard would be helpful. >> Thanks. Sorry. >> So we do or do not have an advisory superintendent. We we do not have >> no advice. It's not >> not a monitor report. Okay. Thank you again. Learning as I go. No monitoring report. Sorry. Sorry for the fire drill. Okay. Um
209do we have any other comments from the board? Okay. Hearing none, we have a motion to approve the 2025 2026 school improvement plan for each ISD school as presented. All in favor, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? Not hearing any. The motion passes. >> Back to 500. Yes. [laughter] Okay. Moving along in our agenda. And students, if you need to make your way out, we completely understand. Uh, next on our agenda is the 2026 27 budget development guidelines. May I have a motion? I move the board adopt the 202627 district budget development guidelines as presented. >> I second. >> Thank you. Do we have any public comment in the room on this issue or online? Not hearing any. Thank you. Um, superintendent, I will pass it on to you and your team. >> Great.
210I'll just sort of preface that we took the um discussion and converted it into redline version for the board to discuss and to uh take action on and hopefully this represents the um discussion and we can also make modifications potentially as a next step with uh any suggestions or amendments from the board on this on this. So um thank you for your discussion. Budget is as we know just an important topic overall. happens all year long. And um as President uh Taylor was speaking earlier about the uh variable sort of economic and macro environment, we want to make sure that we're paying attention and super intentional in this process. So we appreciate your attention to this. >> Is that it? Okay. >> We can if you'd like we can walk through some of the changes
211publicly, but I think we can also scroll and have you talk about it. >> Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, I'll go ahead and open it up for questions from the board or conversation. >> Director Gallant, >> I'll say thank you. Uh, I think this really encapsulates the conversation a lot and I hope I think by seeing what you wrote, especially for the ones talking about the $20 million reserve >> and scratch that >> forecasting that it may actually result in, >> you know, an exception ahead of time. Is that to a middle ground where you your side feels comfortable with that? Because I think that's what we were trying to find that balance by stating what our hopes and dreams were and yet understanding potential financial reality that you want to plan for. >> Thank you.
212Uh uh Mariah Banis, executive director of finance. Yes. um it's it meets that need to be clear uh as we're doing our OES and um so it's clear in this document and and we we'll continue to report on that throughout the springtime as well um if there's you know if we feel like we're going to drop below that 3%. Yeah, if we can just go to to show that Stephen on the on the page here uh which is on the second page and the bullet point on this it's the second to last bullet point which is in red. It says enhance multi-year forecasting and then there's yeah one above it. I think the transparency uh to capture that discussion uh is helpful. I think just making explicit uh the the goals and aspirations but also
213what that could lead to and also what the reality might be. >> Director Mully's >> uh it uh I think it captures what I was hoping for from the last conversation. >> Any other comments? Okay, hearing none. We have a motion to adopt the 202627 budget development guidelines as presented. All in favor, please say so with an I. >> I. >> Late the late to the voting. >> Wow. And look at that. Now we're moving on to legislative matters. Um, and I will just say um, Director Anderson, as you've joined the board here, uh, this is a carveout we have during every one of our meetings. so that in your new role as the legislative representative, you'll have an opportunity if you have any news to report out that we can go over that. Now,
214um I as the former [laughter] legislative rep, I do not have anything um this time around other than noting that the um legislative town hall on educational funding on January 7th is moving ahead and um both Chris and Rex are going to I think speak at that event and share some of their student perspective on funding issues. Um, so that should be great and I hope as many of us can attend that as possible. That's the only thing I have top of mind right now. And I guess I will just note that the legislative session is opening on January 6th. So that is around the corner. Anything else? I guess our expert on NSBA is left the building. Uh, okay. So announcements and correspondence. Next is announcements and correspondence. This is an opportunity for the
215board members to add any other correspondence they have received that is not already reported. Is does anyone have anything for the record? No. Okay. And now comes the fun of calendaring and future agenda topics which is a lot. So does everyone have their handy yes >> calendars in front of them? Okay. We are going to start with work study extensions starting in January of 2026. >> Oh, I need a motion again. Do I not? >> I think >> Well, what should we discuss? >> We would need the motion once we have the date to actually calendar. >> Okay. So, we Let's see here. We >> This one is extending the start time uh for the two board meetings to um in January to include additional time for work study. uh with the transition of a
216new board member sort of making sense of some other topics. There was a request for some OE14 new interpretation from the last monitoring report. So we already had uh results work studies for part one and part two. So it would be adding more time. Uh if I'm misremembering that director Gallinger, please help me. But I think that was the goal was to start at 4 for both of those two January dates if that's possible. >> I will make it happen. And so let's see. Sorry, just because I'm trying to do both at the same time. This is the start at 4 on the 15th 29th. Correct. >> Correct. >> Okay. Well, before I get too far in front of myself here, >> both of those work for me. >> Same. Both work for me. >>
217I can make both work as well. That's easy. I know. >> Did director Gallinger did those work for you, too? >> Well, yeah. I was on the >> Well, yeah. I know. I just I was like, this feels too easy. There's got to be some >> Hold on. I haven't I haven't weighed in yet. I might be able to I might be able to throw a wrench in the whole >> production. Oh, I was looking at the wrong dates to begin with, but yes, they work. >> Yes. Yes. So, now I need a motion. Am I correct? Can I move? I'm not I >> I want to move. >> Can we not move for >> work studies? I don't think we need to. Is there not formal? >> My script has a motion. >> Yeah,
218exactly. [laughter] >> Okay. No motion. >> Done. Next. Uh let's see. We got the regional town hall uh that we just talked about. January 7th >> from 7 to 900 p.m. I will be in attendance. >> Uh okay, you skipped. >> Did I? >> Oh, I What did I skip? ISD day on the hill. >> Oh, okay. We'll come back to that. >> Okay. Reach town hall January 7. >> I'm planning to attend that. >> Okay. >> I would love to. I bet I >> I have that on my schedule, too. So, >> Oh, that's great. >> I'll be there. >> That'll be a good great opportunity to really touch base with a lot of the legislators. Good thing they're >> I am going to lean tentative. Yes. >> Tentative. Yes. Great. >> Yeah. Look
219at us so involved. >> Mhm. >> Um we do need a motion. >> Yeah. >> Oh, when we have quorum. Okay. >> Um >> because we have three of us. >> It's not business meeting of our board though. >> Yeah. >> No motion. >> I'm going to try to pass a motion on everything. [laughter] >> Just we're learning together. That's right. That's right. Okay. We need to calendar the ISD day on the hill. Oh, and this is an interesting question. I don't know. Do are we back to is there a day where there are multiple districts going to the hill or are we back to everyone picks their own? >> So, is hosting an educational day? >> Yeah. >> In late January, actually on our last board meeting day in January. So that >> the
22029th is they're hosting it. We can or we cannot. I would encourage us probably to not do that day. Uh so but what we would like to do is to choose a day where we can go down and then we want to align a visit with DCYF. So that's why this is important is they're waiting now on us >> to calendar with them. >> Yeah. because as part of our day on the hill, we also want to have a y >> touch base with uh the secretary and staff about echo. >> Yep. >> So, I think that there's great momentum and superintendent has done amazing work in that alignment and we want to continue to foster that relationship. So, >> okay. >> Having a day would be really helpful. >> Yes. Do you have I
221mean can we start with superintendent because I mean you're this is since it's a daytime thing so I would love you to probably kick off what days are available or what days you're not at least >> I think there's a day of the week is better so I if I'm misremembering the day of the week that is probably better for legislator it's probably a Tuesday through a Thursday not a Friday. >> Um >> does it does it make more sense for students to be out on particular day? Oh, I don't have the high school details also if there's a a a high point for them as well. Oh, actually parents of high school students know that as well. Yeah, >> all of January. >> I mean, >> I was going to say after finals is
222when I want want to do that, >> which is what date >> it need to be late. We'd probably need to look at the last week of January. >> So, we're getting into the board meeting. >> Yeah. I mean the 26th is a possible date then if that's the you know looking at that last week uh as a >> as a Monday. Uh >> what does the 27th look like for people for the 28th? >> 27's pretty good for me. >> Is it an all day thing? What are we talking? >> Yeah, because we have to go. It >> depends. Uh it depends on how many meetings that we get scheduled with the legislators, but I would generally plan for all day just since the drive down to get and back. >> It feels all
223day butter wet. >> Yeah. >> 126 is the non- studentent day. >> Oh, >> which is like helpful, right? From a kid perspective. >> Yeah. >> Travel perspective. >> Yeah. I'm wonder I mean that is a good point. I'm just trying to think is the first week of February better? I was thinking about our students. >> Well, I believe isn't that when director Gallinger might be in Washington DC. >> Oh, okay. That would work >> because that's the that >> I am out first week of Feb. >> Okay. >> I think the first week of school would be better for them first week of the new semester. It would be probably less intimidating before the workload starts. >> Yeah. Which is when >> that. So, which would be the 27th? >> The 27th. The 28th.
224>> Yeah. >> I can't do the 28th at all. Prior commitment. I can make the 27th. Where? I think the 27th. I think >> the 27th. I think I could try to >> navigateating towards the 27th. >> Yeah, if we can get on the calendar. >> Okay. I can only take offline one other one staff member. We have a [clears throat] prescheduled cabinet visit with a school uh with an outside facilitator um on equity and courageous conversations. So, I can only probably take offline myself and another person. >> Yeah, that was not a date I was proposing, but that's fine. Not. Okay. >> But I mean it's it's a training. I was I'm just saying the only two of us can probably come. Uh myself and another team member. It'll probably be Martin. >> Okay.
225>> Have to let our school site know and our facilitator. >> Okay. [clears throat] I'm moving on. Uh we are going to schedule the winter board retreat. >> Wow. >> That's really exciting. >> It's kind of turning into a typically has been turning into a spring retreat because it's been happening in March lately. >> But we do have to calendar, the one that we just did because that one is a business meeting. Yeah. When we talk and advocate on behalf of the school district. So, that one actually does have to be >> Oh, we have to go back. Oh, sorry. So, we need a motion. >> Need a motion. >> Yes. >> So, you want to Sorry. I just want to make sure we want to calendar it >> without having any confirmation on the
226legislator side and then come back and change it if we need to. >> Okay. That's okay. I just want to make sure. Um I want to make sure I have my motions right. Let's see. I move that the board will assemble in Olympia for a day on the hill uh on January 27th, 2026. >> I second. >> All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Okay. So, winter board retreat, which maybe is springboard retreat or when did we retreat? When did we retreat this? >> It was It was March. >> Been the >> No. When was the last one? It was September. >> Oh, September. >> Yeah. September. >> So, wouldn't we want to do March? Like six months out. Yeah. >> Yeah. So, so >> Oh, wait a minute. Am I gone in
227March? >> Okay. So, someone let me know what's the commitment here. >> Two full days. >> They don't have to necessarily be consecutive. >> Yeah, that's true. We can split them. It's true. It's kind of nice if they're consecutive, but it could be split up. >> Yeah, it's easier to I find it easier to >> I am not available the first two weeks of March. >> First two weeks of March or out >> um >> So, when are you available? Sydney, you want to >> I'm just about to ask. Sorry. March is >> the third week of March is the League of Innovative Schools convening here. >> Okay. And that's [clears throat] >> not going to work. >> That's not going to work. Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you for acknowledging that. Thank you. >> Then
228we're looking in the week of March 23rd. >> Is that >> uh the >> Oh, that's can you >> week of March 23rd? >> I mean that's a that's a fine week. >> Yeah, it's a board week though. [clears throat] >> I could get one day done that week. >> Board retreat. >> When when is the day after we can start looking >> for me? >> Superintendent Superintendent Superintendent. Oh, I mean after the week of the 16th basically or uh because that's the week that that happens. So >> after after the week of the 16th or after the 16th? >> Uh a starting the week of the 23rd. >> Starting the week of the 23rd. Thank you for reframing that. >> Thank you. >> I can definitely do I can one day the week of
229the 23rd will work for me for sure. The 20. It is it is hard because that is a board meeting week but >> 24th maybe. >> What about the 30th 31st? >> March. >> Oh, sorry. Am I back from >> I work unfortunately. >> Okay. So, no Harland. >> Okay. Is there one day the week of the 23rd that was viable just so we can start to even piece apart the days because it sounds like this is going to get hard. >> Yeah, >> I uh this far out I could make the 23rd and where am I the 23rd and the 24th work? >> I cannot do the 24th. >> No, 24th. >> 24th. >> Okay. So, how does 23rd look? 23rd. >> I think I could do the 23rd. Hey, as we get into
230April though, that becomes I that's going to be harder for me. I could do the 23rd. >> Same. I'm good for 23rd. >> Well, let's just do 16 hours on the 23rd. [laughter] >> They're sleeping bags. >> Okay. >> So, we got one day. >> I'm When is When is our spring break? April >> April 13th 13th through 17th and I am gone. >> 13th is pass. >> Yeah, we got a couple conventions that week. >> I could pull off the 31st. >> I can do the 31st. >> 30 of March >> of March. We do have an external facilitator coming in for our cabinet retreat or cabinet meeting that day on the >> 31. Get to that one. >> Can we do later April? What about April? >> I I hate to I don't
231want to separate it too much. >> April. >> I don't want to be like 30 days on a part like >> Yeah, April. >> You could do April 1st. >> April Fool's Day. >> Yeah, I could do April 1. >> I can do April 1. When is ASU GSV? >> Uh, it's the next week I believe. >> That's the week of the 13th. 12th to the 14th. >> 23rd. So, sorry. >> So, March 23rd, April 1st, >> we're waiting on that. >> Let's Yeah. That's going to be tough, but let's let's do it. I'll I'll see if I can try to make that work. I'm just trying to >> We have a couple team members going to a retreat, so I think we can we can handle the content covered for across a team to
232back stop. Martin, I'm looking at you and specifically we can backs stop for Mariah. Yeah. >> Okay. Wow. >> Okay. I'm I'm going to make my motion then. I move that the board convene at the ISD admin building for board retreat on March 23rd and April 1st for a 9 to 5:00 p.m. retreat on each day. >> I second. >> All those in favor, please say I. >> I. And I know it was tough getting this late to schedule these, but for understandable reasons, there's a reason why we didn't and couldn't schedule them till tonight. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> Absolutely. Yeah. >> Good sense. Makes sense. Makes sense. >> Okay, moving along. >> The superintendent evaluation. I can't believe >> we're going that far out. >> Jeez, >> I know. >> Yeah. May, right? >>
233Right. Is the first meeting early May traditionally? Yeah. >> Yeah. Because we generally want to give three weeks uh between the two for >> the draft >> for the tired president >> and then the feedback of the draft. So then we're essentially doing a second draft >> right >> at the second meeting. >> Okay. That that far out makes it easier for me to get and it's an evening so >> for May. >> Yeah. Flexibility. There is a board meeting on the 7th of May. >> It'd be nice if we could yeah balance out if we're doing evenings. >> So we have May 7th a board meeting and May 28th a board meeting. >> Couldn't [laughter] we do that? I think >> we did one. >> I think we did last year. >> Yeah. that
234far out. I'm pretty wide open. So, I'll leave it to you folks to tell me when I need to >> make it happen. >> Yeah, I am too. >> Same. >> So, how about fourth or fifth? May fourth or fifth? >> How about How about the fourth? Well, I could do either one, but let's do May 4th. >> Yeah. >> What time? >> Yeah. What are the times? >> Oh, uh, 6:00 to 9. 6:00 to 9. >> Could we do the fifth? Because I have hip-hop class on the on Monday. [laughter] >> We can do I can do the fifth if you >> I hate to miss Mike's that close to performance. >> That's fine. Yeah, >> we can do it at my house this year. You like? >> Okay. I move. >> Oh, go
235ahead. Go ahead. >> Oh, we need the second one. >> So, second on the 25th or 26th. >> Oh, wait. 25th is Memorial Day. That won't work. So, 26th. >> Oh, that's hard though. Um, okay. >> We just a condensed week and then we have a board meeting tomorrow. >> Oh, we have a board meeting. Okay. Well, uh, >> could we do the week before like the 18th or 19th? get maybe later in the week. 21st. >> Wait, what are we talking about? >> Is it okay? Thank you. I will. So, what about June 1st? >> We're getting enough time. >> Oh, the second we do it for the superintendent. Okay, gotcha. >> 11th. >> That's the next thing we have to reschedle. Well, yeah, we have to reschedule that cuz graduation, >> I think
236so, too. I mean, that would be better. I know. Just looking scheduling wise, could we do like the first >> um >> you're going to have the complicated schedule this June probably is that? Do you know at this point when >> I can do June 1st? Yeah. >> But again, yeah, if this is evening I >> Oh, would June 2nd then? Yeah, I can. Yeah, >> we do June 2nd. >> June 2nd's hard. >> No. >> What about the 3? >> Third. Third works for me. >> Third works for me. >> June 3rd. June. You're okay. H. >> Okay. I move uh that the Isiqua School Board will convene for the purpose of superintendence evaluation on May the 5th at 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. uh the home of Director Taylor and again on June 3rd
237from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. >> I second. >> Uh all those in favor please say I. Hi. Hi. >> Hey. Is that it? Are we done? No. Oh, >> no. Something else. Oh, just the rescheduling the >> reschedule the 11th. >> Reschedule. Yes. Okay. We need to reschedule the June 11th board meeting and that's because of graduations or something. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> What did we do last year? Did we move it to a Tuesday? Because we didn't do it the graduation, right? >> It was a Tuesday. >> Three graduations in one. >> You'll find out. They're all back to back. Yeah. >> Back to back to back. It's the whole day at mobile. >> It's pretty crazy. >> And it's three days. Don't we have graduations on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday? >> Yeah.
238So that Wednesday has the act graduation later in the evening. So that would not be an option for the board. >> Yeah. Unless you want I mean you don't typically do a board meeting on Friday night. >> No thanks. >> Nor will we start under >> Okay. [laughter] And Yeah. So, are we looking? Can we do the 9th or is that is there a graduation conflict that day? >> I can do the ninth. >> I think that is I mean I might just I might not be able to go. I think that's Skyland Baloria. >> That is about Yeah, I was just going to say that probably is. Would we ever do a Monday? >> That's generally been tough on staff. Uh they've they've asked us not to have meetings on Mondays. >> Okay. because
239of the advanced notice and then any changes and then it's just really tough to do that. >> Do we want to do we want to tenative tenatively do the 9th then? >> 9th works for me. >> Yeah, I can make that work. >> Yeah. >> The nth. >> June 9th didn't have a graduation. >> No. >> Okay. June. >> You just Yeah. Yeah. Oh, we might not have a uh so June 9th, I move that the board uh that we reschedu the board meeting from June the 11th um 2026 to occur on June the 9th, 2026 at the same times. >> I second. >> All those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Okay. Are there any other items to bring up on the calendar? No. >> Is there anything else for the good
240of the order? >> No. >> Okay. With that we are ajourned.