2023 School Board Candidate Forum

001or come on up we're getting ready to start in just a minute foreign Welcome to our nonpartisan School Board candidate forum for the Hudson School Board election coming in April on behalf of the Hudson School District pair groups we want to thank you for taking time to come out this evening again if you have questions that come up in your mind while we're going through and having the candidates answer their questions feel free to flag down one of our parent group members or sneak up to the front and grab one of the cards on the stage at this time we would like to remind you to silence your cell phones and we would like to welcome our moderator Mr Michael Bros who will explain the format for tonight's forum thank you good evening again and

002welcome to the 2023 Hudson School Board candidate forum my name is Mike Rose I will serve as a moderator for this forum there are two seats open for this year's spring School Board election be held on April 4th I believe there are four candidates are seated here at my right the candidates as they will appear in the spring election ballot are Megan rozowski Heather Logan Randy Lawson and Aaron Gerlach off to an okay star oh yeah oh yeah so here are the ground rules that were given to the candidates before this forum each candidate will present an opening statement of three minutes a question and answer period will follow with written questions submitted by the audience at any time audience participants here are encouraged to raise their hand in a volunteer will find you you

003can give submit a written question to them they will then deliver it up here to the podium the same question will be presented to all four of the candidates questions that pertain to one candidate will try to weed them out but if there's a question that pertains to one candidate it will not be asked each candidate will be given two minutes to respond we have time Keepers in the front row down here who will be alerting the candidates when there are 30 seconds remaining on their two-minute answer period and when it's time to stop the question and answer period will end at 8 15 pm and after that each candidate will be given an opportunity to present a three-minute closing statement with that I'm going to turn this over to the three-minute opening remarks and

004we're going to go in the same order as they are seated left to right your right to left I guess and begin with Megan roskowski rozowski I'm sorry that's okay okay is this on okay yep do we need it I think okay so hi my name is Megan rozowski thank you for being here tonight um I want to tell you a little bit about myself I grew up in River Falls Wisconsin so not too far away from here um where I attended Public Schools K through 12 and got a great education there starting in a small Elementary School Greenwood Elementary I then went on and went to college got a Bachelor's degree in economics at Carleton College and then I earned a master's in public policy at the Humphrey school at the University of Minnesota

005since that time my career has focused primarily on higher education policy research and Analysis so I'm a big numbers and data nerd so I'm used to being the person like behind the scenes crunching the numbers and sharing the data and not as used to being here talking in front of everybody so this is new newish for me um so I live in St Joe with my husband and we have two daughters my daughter shark is in second grade at Holton and my daughter Rosa is going to be three very soon she would want you to know that I started to be get more involved in what's going on in the school district where more discussion was coming up about closing Willow and Holton elementary schools and I started to pay more attention to what's going

006on met a lot of great parents getting together talking about this started advocating for our schools got to go to more school board meetings see what was going on and I thought wow I'd really like to be more involved in what's happening here I'm really passionate about education and the role it plays in providing opportunities for everyone to be able to follow a career path that aligns with their interests and their skills and um in my work I work at the Minnesota private college Council which is a Consortium of 18 private nonprofit colleges I serve on a lot of working groups with the state of Minnesota that look at sort of the K-12 higher ed Workforce pipeline looking at what our economy needs where they're going to be gaps what are the high demand jobs

007nurses welders HVAC technicians construction teachers do we have enough people in the pipeline to fill those jobs because these are so crucial for our economy for our communities that we have the workers that we need and all of that starts in K-12 all of that starts in uh in our schools here in Hudson and I just want our schools to provide the quality education that every kid needs so that all of our kids can feel safe and happy in school and learn and launch into the life that's that's great for them and then great for our community thanks Heather Logan I have an older microphone hello everyone thanks for being here this evening and thank you parents for pulling this together I think the reason that so often although audition but folks don't run for

008school board when they have yet when they have young kids it's because it is some of the busiest times of your life so thank you for all the work that you put into being on the PTO and organizing forums like this so I have had the uh the the honor of serving on the school board for the past six years [Music] um my my interest in running for the school board actually was peaked quite a while ago I grew up in a small town in southern Minnesota and my parents were both Public School Educators and they let me know when I was kind of contemplating future paths that they did not think I had the Constitution to be a classroom educator and I would need to find a different way to impact young lives if

009that was something I wanted to do so um I have ended up I went away to college and ended up coming back here because I realized I was a midwesterner at heart and ended up moving to Hudson because I recognized I was a small town girl at heart so Hudson has been my home now for 18 years and I am really lucky in that I now have a job that keeps me focused here in Hudson and here in the valley really working on bringing people together to connect resources and passions with needs and there there's a parallel between that work and the work that members of a school board get to do um you know over the past six years I've had a chance to do some professional development as a school board member and

010those resources are there so if we end up with two brand new school board members there are great training resources provided by both the district and the state but have really come to understand and there's a lot of research on this about what effective School boards do best and the answer to that question is they govern they stay focused on the high level Visionary work that boards are charged to do that effective school boards understand and use data they make student-centered decisions that are driven by this data they align and sustain resources they recognize that supporting and retaining great staff is one of the biggest drivers to a great district and great outcomes for our kiddos and they also recognize that to be effective they need to engage and communicate with the community that's the

011work of the school board it's that Visionary policy driven accountability work my my experience professionally as a leader in the nonprofit sector I think has really prepared me well for that although I am always learning and growing but I do really enjoy the work that the board gets to do where we hear from school leaders and try to hear more from those closest to the classroom try to hear more from our teachers and our staff about what's really happening in our district where where things are going really well and where we might need to think about realigning and redirecting resources um so that's uh that's my passion I support Public Schools I've had a chance to attend private public and private public and parochial schools we have a great Public School System here in Hudson

012and I'm happy to be part of it thank you Randy Lawson hi I'm Randy Lawson and I am running for school choice parental rights and fiscal frugality with regards to school choice I noticed that um well actually the school board meeting this week we found out that one out of eight students in the Hudson School District are being educated in private schools or being homeschooled I think one of the Civil Rights issues that we need to be addressed in the 21st century is the hostile environment that the public schools are creating against families who have Traditional Values and religious values that aren't being addressed in the public schools we the social compact that we created when Public Schools when we when we created public schools has been broken Wisconsin happens to be the very place

013where Public Schools were first instituted when and they were instituted in the Northwest Ordinance and in the Northwest Ordinance it says religion morality and knowledge being necessary for good government and the happiness for mankind schools and the means of Education shall forever be encouraged and yet we have one out of eight students in this school district whose parents feel like they're not getting the moral religious education that they were entitled to with that moral contract that the social contract in the Northwest Ordinance I'm also running on parental rights we have what the school board refers to as controversial issues in our curriculum and what I'm finding is that when there's a controversial issue the parents aren't shown what the controversial piece of the of the topic is they're told what the the books they might

014be reading that might be controversial parents need to see exactly what the controversial stuff in the curriculum is not just that there is controversial stuff and they need to be able to opt in if they want their children to get it rather than opt out when they're not even told what is really in it and thirdly is fiscal frugality and the school district in my opinion needs how to learn how to do more with less and so we've got to figure out how to how to run our budgets so that we can do things like keep two neighborhood skills schools open without having to to borrow money to do it foreign I'm going to read a story that I have about mine so I'm not going to be as first as they are up here

015my name is Aaron gerlock my family has strong roots here in the Hudson community I have lived in Hudson almost my entire life I attended St Patrick's Catholic School grades k through eight I am an alumni of Hudson High School my husband and I chose to build our home here and raise our three children in the community that we love right down the road from Rivercrest School our oldest daughter attended K-5 there and went on to the Hudson Middle School our middle daughter also attended River Crest key and one where she started off great but in first grade she was being bullied and the bully situation affected the entire classroom to the point of the school count the school counselors were not only in their counseling our children but the entire class without our parent

016knowledge at the same time this was happening our family encountered the boundary lines being redrawn the district relocated our family from the school that we chose and built our home around and guess what the kid that was bullying was relocated to for the same boundary reasons when we wrote our case to the state at Rivercrest to the school board no action was taken in fact we had to hire a psychiatrist just to write a letter of Separation to the school and the bus company so they would recognize it and separate these kids because my daughter was coming home with bruises on her body my daughter was reluctantly moved to Hudson Prairie and everything was okay over there this was also the year though that covet hit and closed all the schools so when people ask

017me why and I've had a lot of y's on this why are your kids going to Trinity Academy that is my reason because my child needed to have stability and friends after what she had been through my kids now choose to stay at Trinity because of their friends I enjoy seeing the downtown community every day that I drive my kids to school watching the families walking their kids to St Patrick's to Trinity to Willow River it's a very welcoming Community downtown it really brings a smile to anyone's face who drives down there in the morning time our oldest attends the Hudson High School where all of my children will eventually attend I'm passionate about our kids getting the education and the support that they need in order to thrive and prepare for their Futures and

018other children who are struggling as well aside from my full-time marketing job I volunteer my time in the community as an events coordinator and a fundraiser for different groups I'm used to working within tight budgets and getting creative where I need to to make big things happen I'm currently the president of the PTO fraternity Academy because I'm an involved parent and I enjoy connecting with other families in the community and for all of those reasons I am running for the Hudson School Board it is important that our school board is transparent and represents the parents and the taxpayers of Hudson by listening and working with them to ensure the best possible outcome for our community we need to work together to support our children thank you all right we'll start with the questioning I have

019been provided eight or nine questions that were pre-submitted or as people assembled here this evening um and I'm making no decision about what order they're asked I'm going to ask them in the order that they're handed to me the order of questioning initially will be in the same order that the opening remarks were just given Ms rosauski Miss Logan Mr Lawson and Ms Gerlach and then they will alternate throughout the course of the night um so we'll begin one two three four and then we'll go four one two three and so on and so forth to give everybody an opportunity to go first and to be heard last and then when we get to about 8 15 as I mentioned before we'll go to closing remarks the time limit as a reminder the time limit

020for answering questions is two minutes and then the time Keepers on here in the front row will be good about demonstrating their signs to us so first question MS rosowski what experience do you have with education financing what can you add to experience for dealing with financial challenges there we go thanks for the question Mike um so I have a lot of experience dealing with higher education financing both at an Institutional level I worked as a consultant for a while out of graduate school where I helped private non-profit colleges put together their financial aid and and scholarship plans and do budget projections based on expected enrollment retention completion to build long-term uh budget plans for institutions of course frog in my Throne also in my current role I I deal with a lot of sort

021of complicated higher education financing within the state of Minnesota related to Appropriations following what is happening there at the state level looking at what's happening with different Grant programs Federal programs how that comes in and helps colleges and universities I'm just learning more about K-12 finance and had a great meeting with the finance staff at the district recently because I I looked at the formula for higher education per pupil funding in Wisconsin and I was like oh my gosh this is so confusing I don't understand how to calculate it so had a great meeting learned a lot about how it works when we look at um tax money that comes from the state and then what the taxpayer is expected to pay to supplement that and one of the shocking things I recently found out

022this week was that when you look at the aid that the state of Wisconsin gives to Hudson on a per pupil basis it's declined by 27 percent in 10 years so our school districts is being asked to do the same and more with less money than what they're getting from the states and I think they've done a pretty good job I mean 27 cut think of that in your family what that would do just balancing your family income so um I like to learn and I like to dig into the numbers so I think that's what I'll bring to it thank you mrsowski Ms Logan I'll ask the question again just to remind the audience and cue you as to what it is what experience do you have with education financing what can you add

023to experience for dealing with financial challenges um your question makes me think about my experience when I was in the MBA program taking an accounting class and being told we aren't training you to be an accountant we're training you to read financial statements and ask smart questions I think that you know in my job as a as a manager of a nonprofit which has a budget nowhere near the district's 100 million dollar budget um I think that that that is a good approach to take is that we really do need to yes review the financials and then ask really good questions of our team one of the benefits of having a larger district is we have really talented staff we have great staff many of whom are sitting in this room by the way thank

024you for being here um but I think um to Echo Megan's frustration uh the way that we fund K-12 schools in Wisconsin is really challenging and it's especially challenging right now for a community like Hudson because the formula ends up taking into account how much property wealth is in your district and the more your property wealth goes up kind of the less age you get because the assumption is you can pay for more and then how many students you have in your system and as the number of students in your District go down it's also it's a negative impact so we have this double whammy going right now where the community of Hudson is growing um the the property both both home value and and Commercial is growing um but the number of kids in

025our district is not growing so that's a challenge that we can't do much with aside from a change a complete overhaul to the way schools are funded in the state of Wisconsin added on to that is that we are in the business of people the people we serve are little people and the people who do that service and comprise about two-thirds of our budget are the adult people in our schools so it is really tough I think one of the biggest opportunities we have as a school board and as a district is really then to be communicating with our district and with taxpayers about what the reality is and still what they are getting for their tax dollars because we have a great public school system that yes our costs are going up but we

026are also doing an amazing job with these students preparing them for a world that they're going to live in 10 50 100 years from now well I don't know any of them will live 100 years from now um and making sure that we have good strong um local local folks in our communities so that's I guess what I bring thanks Mr Lawson I'll repeat the question what experience do you have with education financing what can you add to experience for dealing with financial challenges so I have never been on a school board before have only looked at the school board budget however I have been on numerous National local boards for non-profits and so I think the the significant difference in terms of how do you meet Financial challenges is that the school board has

027to go grab it out of your pocket a non-profit has the luxury if you can call it a luxury of having to convince somebody that the good that they do is worth the donation that people provide but in terms of in terms of looking at budgets and and understanding the financial constraints that you're under and looking for Solutions of how you can do things better with less money I've been doing that for a long time thank you Ms Gerlach what experience do you have with education financing what can you add to experience for dealing with financial challenges well I think education financing also works for parents too so I will speak on that sending my kids to a private school and finding a way to make that possible on a tight budget is a big

028deal I think in private schools most of them around here about five thousand dollars a kid and those schools are funded by the parents and we make our schools work the public sector I believe is somewhere around fifteen thousand dollars per kid that you're getting through tax paying dollars we are severely out of budget in ways that I think I can add to these challenges I'm used to working in a tight budget for my jobs when I do event planning when I do marketing there's lots of different areas where I have to stay within budget or beat that budget and sometimes you have to get really creative to make that happen that's it that's my answer thank you all right question number two uh this one first goes to Heather Logan if Mike all right

029for the following items vaccine requirements fast Bridge testing at risk behavior surveys mind sets curriculum any other non-required student survey and any optional non-curricular speaker would you support a streamlined opt-out process for parents and why could you repeat that list we're not going to do you know what I'm going to do I'm going to hand it to you and then you can pass it down that'll make it ever easier for everybody to have it in front of them because it's a there's about six six different things that are enumerated unplug them so the reason I'm hesitating is that the items on this list are really different starting with one like vaccine requirements where there already are processes that are very scripted through which that parents can use to things that start to get into when

030is this something that a parent might want to opt out of and when is it not I mean I think that in our district right now the way that we're approaching controversial subjects um is that we're we're notifying parents and we're giving them an opportunity to ask questions and opt out I don't think there is a way because of definitions because what one person might call controversial someone else calls history to identify everything that a parent might want to know about and create a streamlined process for opting out so I'm intrigued by the idea I don't I can't imagine how we could operationalize it we obviously want parents to feel like they are involved in and can know as much as they want about what's going on in their kids school environment and we need

031to trust our teachers we need to set policies at the board level I read something recently that said um the board provides the board provides guidelines for curriculum and teachers are the ones who deliver it it's not our job as board members to be in the weeds delivering and delivering curriculum so I guess I guess I I again feel like we need to at some level trust that we have Highly Educated teachers in our district we have an incredibly High number of teachers who have degrees that are Advanced Beyond The Bachelor level they are trained to do their job the same way that nurses are trained to do their jobs that firefighters are trying to do their jobs we need to trust them so we need to keep talking with parents to hopefully create a

032level of comfort and trust with what's going on and so they know how they can ask questions and know what's going on um but I don't see a way that we could streamline a process that would meet every parent's um every parent's needs when it comes to but someone might deem controversial thank you I'm going to read it again and get it in everybody's mind because it is a long question and I've provided to Mr Lawson for the following items vaccine requirements fast Bridge testing at risk behavior surveys mind set curriculum and any other non-required student survey and any optional non-curricular speaker would you support a streamlined opt-out process for parents and why this is really easy I say you inform the parents of exactly what you're talking about and let them opt in not

033opt out uh Gerlach you have the question take your time to review it and then they'll they'll start the time it is quite the question isn't it I would agree that there is there there's a lot to unpack here and they don't necessarily all belong in that same category I I believe that I would say if they have the option to opt out that would be great I also support the idea that if everyone were to say vote on this that they would have a opportunity to opt in it's it's just it's a really touchy topic when you're putting and lumping all of this together I I would be in favor of of saying yes to opt out of these things as long as they're being discussed and laid out ahead of time if we

034know what's being talked about in the classroom and it's a controversial issue what is a controversial issue just laying out the curriculum so parents can look for themselves saying hey we're going to be in contact with parents a lot more often here's what's going on in the classrooms here's what your kids going to be learning about this week here's the books we want them to read and if you look at it and you you're going to have to do research as parents and say I don't want my kid part of this then pull them out of there but there needs to be room in the guidelines to make that happen so these kids aren't being penalized when their parents pull them all if that's what they feel is best for them thank you Ms rosalski

035do you have a question reminder would you like to see it again um so like our fellow candidates have said it's a it's a long list so there's a few things from my understanding vaccine requirements I think the the form and the opt-out process is the state of Wisconsin process and I don't think that the school district is able to overwrite that process I would guess it's similar for for the fast Bridge testing if that's done at the state level that's probably again some sort of State form it's not clear what would a streamline process be is it is the form available online and easier to submit that would be one thing but I don't think you could have a process for all of these things that is one form because they're so different um

036I think you know what I learned uh recently and I was looking at the the big Handbook of policies and reading those last night and I had a great meeting with Dr grambo at at the district office and the district currently has a policy that parents are able to opt their child out of any lesson they can they can opt their kid out and it doesn't have to be a controversial issue it's human growth and development in the state of Wisconsin it's an opt-in parents get a notification and they have to opt their children into that but parents are allowed to choose for whatever reason it is some lesson some unit some book they're able to opt their child out and there are no repercussions for that that's a parent's right that's a Parent's Choice

037um so I think that that um that that is in place in our district and I'm not sure how you streamline it um when we're talking about issues that have state or federal requirements we just can't get around that as a district um so I don't I can't answer the part about streamlining I'm sorry but I I tried to answer the other parts foreign question number three this will go to Mr Lawson first uh it concerns the operating referendum and I don't pretend to have a clear knowledge of what that is and so the people who answered the question may want to Define it to help the audience both here and who are washing at home because I understand that the operating referendum is also going to be considered at the April election period And

038it involves the ability for the for the district to exceed the revenue cap um that's probably not very helpful to most of us but that's the the basic understanding I have of it the question is as follows if the operating referendum does not pass we could have teacher and staff layoffs cuts to programs and increased class sizes how would you address these budgetary concerns and how would you prioritize spending Mr Lawson foreign first off I'm not in favor of their operating referendum and the basic reason I'm not in favor of it is because what the school district is telling you is that they don't get enough money to do the job that they're hired to do and I don't think that's the case I think the case is that they have not economized in ways

039that would make them make them more efficient what I really find disappointing is how the school board has put this to the parents of Willow River and Holton schools going to the parents and saying we're going to close your schools unless you go out and pass our referendums to me that is very unethical to put the pressure on you as parents to do their work for them and that's all I have to say about that Miss Gerlach I'll read it again if the operating referendum does not pass we could have teacher and staff layoffs cuts to programs and increase class sizes how would you address these budgetary concerns and how would you prioritize spending just to clarify we're only speaking about the 8 million referendum not the 29 million correct so we're we're when answering

040this question I just want to be sure what I'm answering here the operating referendum is eight million dollars so we're saying if the 8 million dollar one doesn't pass are you talking about the 29 million dollar one passing also or no okay so just this one I am in favor of passing the operational uh referendum for the eight million dollars um I think that based on numbers that were given earlier and I've seen myself the state has not provided proper funding to match inflation over the last several years and I know that you can see that these numbers are important and that they're infecting the school it is not within reason to expect that when we're given the when the school district is given a lower operating budget in one year to be able to

041match that new budget and to work within that that dumb that lower amount it takes a couple of years to get back up to that same par so in looking at this it is a lot easier to see this on paper for the record when you can properly evaluate what you're looking at and how to actually put what it is that you need to see in budget what those expenditures are I have not seen that list of expenditures on what the overage is but if I am on this board I absolutely will take the time to look through those more deeply so I can answer that question a little bit better but I more research is needed on that I am in favor of that operational referendum thank you so I I this wasn't quite

042the question but I am strongly in favor of the operating referendum I know um like I said that per pupil funding has gone down by 27 percent over the past 10 years our schools have been trying to do more with less there's not a lot of fat to trim in these budgets and we're getting great results with with what our schools are working with um and unfortunately because the state isn't doing their part it shifts the costs further on to local taxpayers through the form of property taxes but I just want to put the the operating referendum in perspective I think it's important you know it's a pain to pay taxes it's a pain when taxes go up but if you have a 300 000 house if both the operating and capital referendum pass we're

043talking 84 a year on your taxes seven dollars a month so that's a couple cups of coffee right so like I can find a way to cut seven bucks a month if I need to to invest in our kids in our schools and our next generation of workers homeowners our community I just I can't think of a better way to spend an extra seven dollars a month where am I going to get that return um if it doesn't pass you know I'm I'm worried I'm worried about what that that impact could be in our schools and uh I haven't dug as deeply into the spreadsheets as I would like to yet to understand where where Cuts could be made but the there like I said there's not a lot of fat in the budgets and

044so what would need to be cut could impact our school quality we could end up with closing Holton and Willow River and having four large elementary schools and then when you start to see the quality of your schools go down then our property values may start to go down people won't want to move here and for most families at and for mine our home is our biggest investment that's that's where we've put our our money that's where you know our biggest investment for our family and so I think strong schools equal strong communities equal strong economies and I think at you know seven bucks a month or 12 bucks a month if you have a little bit more expensive house it's a good bang for your buck thank you Ms Logan well so I'm a

045current member of the school board and I voted to send this to referendum I would not have voted to send it to referendum if I didn't think we need it so I support the the operating referendum um I want to be clear that it's not that the district hasn't been making Cuts we have cut numerous instructional and administrative positions over the last five to ten years when you look at two-thirds of your budget being your people do we cut teacher salaries and benefits because they're not going to stick around they can go somewhere else right now we have support staff that we're having a hard time recruiting Because it's hard to be competitive with what someone can make if they go work at quick trip I want good people in working with our kids supporting

046our professional staff our certified staff um I I would just Echo there is not a lot of excess in our school budgets and um at this point I the board has not actually spent a lot of time or asked staff to spend a lot of time running scenarios because I'll be honest we have confidence in this community and we believe this referendum is going to pass if it doesn't pass then we'll start to ask staff to come to us with what are the options some of the options would be increasing class sizes right now we have class size guidelines that we only want 18 to 22 kids in grades K one and two and we'd like to have no more than 28 kids in grades three four and five I don't think we want those

047class sizes to grow I don't think we want to stop taking care of our buildings I don't think we want to turn the heat down in the winter so I I guess I I haven't thought a lot I'll be honest I haven't thought a lot about as a school board member what cuts I would support because I am confident that this community is going to come through and vote Yes for this referendum thank you Mr uh Miss Gerlach will answer the fourth question first and the fourth question is as follows what is your plan to attract retain and support quality Educators in Hudson I would first want to look at what they've been doing for advertising and marketing from somebody who does that um a plan to attract I would say has to start with

048teachers feeling comfortable in the school and speaking highly of it um that would attract some other teachers from other districts to want to come here I think that we also would have a need for parents to support that as well and want to bring their kids here and that has a lot to do with the education and what they're being taught and what our teachers are being asked to teach I think that on a side note we could probably use some Billboards up over in the Woodbury area and across the river to start advocating for our schools in other areas and start seeing some local advertisements come out that would support positive learning in our schools if that's what in fact we are teaching and promoting thank you um same question Miss rozowski what is

049your plan to attract retain and support quality Educators at Hudson thank you that's a great question well I think one of the uh clear steps to take is to follow through with I'm not I think it's the Raider Compensation Plan a group of teachers recently presented this at a working group meeting um for the school board teachers have been working on a while at for a while on creating a new Compensation Plan that moves away from what's currently been done at the district for the past several years uh teachers as a group have come forward to to make a plan that they feel will increase morale will make it clear what steps they can take to increase their um you know what sort of professional development they will be doing how they'll get credit for

050it and it will feel a little bit more of a cohesive thing amongst teachers instead of fighting or not fighting but feeling put up against each other in terms of who gets bonuses what which year who gets a raise when it's a pay for by performance and I think um you it's very hard to judge performance in some ways in classroom like a teacher can be doing a great job and kids didn't do great on a test right so like how do how do we measure that I think we have great dedicated teachers in this District I think we need to listen to them in terms of what they need what sort of professional development opportunities are they looking for what would help them to do better in the classroom what do they think our

051kids need um so I again when it's not my area of expertise I like to talk to the people who are closest to the issue I'd like to hear what's worked what hasn't worked what's worked in other areas and um learn more thank you Miss Logan I think we don't underestimate the power of of of personal relationships teachers talk to teachers um with all due respect I'm not sure Billboards are what teachers are looking at when they're looking for jobs they're talking to friends who have moved to other districts who are working to other districts teachers want to be in a district where they are supported and recognized as professionals that's what we need to do as a district is we need to support and recognize that our teachers are professionals who know what they're

052doing and need support and yes of course they want compensation and benefits that are fair but beyond that they want to work in a work environment that feels good and we have a lot of things in place in Hudson right now that are trying to do that even in an environment post Act 10 where we had a lot of teachers leave for Minnesota because they lost a lot of their power at the table as Professionals in our district we have a teacher advisory committee in our district teachers are involved with curriculum selection we recently got the recommendation for our new social studies curriculum and and teachers vote on it you know there's a committee of teachers who are involved in the selection and recommendation of of curriculum so I think um to make sure that

053we continue to have great teaching staff in this District we need to be looking holistically at how does it feel to be a teacher in this district and do I feel like my work and my success is recognized and yes that student achievement and that's a lot more than student achievement thank you Mr Lawson and I apologize to miss Logan for not repeating the question prior to but what is your plan sir to attract retain and support quality Educators in husband so first off I I don't expect that I I can have a plan that uh right off the bat because there's a lot of people on the board but let me tell you exactly how I feel about this and that is we run our schools like a commune we pay the teachers pretty

054much the same and there's no incentive to excel there's no Financial incentive to Excel and I was a teacher for uh you know back in the dinosaur age and I've heard this from teachers once since when my parents were teachers and when I was a teacher and all through through my kids being in school is that there's no way to determine who's a great teacher and how can we incentivize great teachers to do better what kind of bonuses Etc most of us you know outside of the education system work in Industries where we ins are incentivized to perform we're incentivized to accomplish goals we're incentivized to get to make companies profitable it's the same way in education if you had teachers who were incentivized to take more students to do new things and we paid

055them for those incentives Merit merit-based pay has been discussed in education and squashed by the teachers unions and the teachers colleges for decades it's time we change and start incentivizing our teachers to perform thank you all right question number five I'm going to read this question as it was written and I think we'll all understand what yes back to you yeah I'm sorry so I'm going to read this question as I was written and uh uh everybody's writing in their laps here I'm sure um and and then I'm I'm gonna I think try to frame it in the same spirit that the question was intended um in my effort to make it a little bit more clear but so first of all as written and then I'm going to attempt to clarify um I hope

056I don't blunder so the question is written as this as a school board member how would you work to ensure secrets about children such as gender identity are not kept from their parents and I guess maybe the way I would appraised it perhaps and I don't want to change the question and that's why I read the original one but as a school board member how would you work to ensure the confidential information about children such as gender identity is shared with their parents foreign question and I know that this has been um a source of a lot of discussion at school board meetings I um you know I think that I understand why parents are concerned about the policy that if a child speaks to a teacher or counselor about questions about their gender identity

057that the parent is upset that the school is not telling them right away I'm a parent I love to think that my kids will come to me with anything when they're teens when they're working through something difficult but I also remember being a teenager and my mom who's here was a very open accepting mom who said you could come talk to me to anything about anything and she meant it but I still didn't sometimes you're a teenager you've got a teenage brain and even things like when I thought about quitting marching band I went and talked to a teacher about it first it can be big things it can be small things right but to me if my kid isn't going to feel comfortable coming to talk to me about something that's big in their

058life I want them to have another adult to go to I want them to have another adult a teacher a counselor an aunt uh an adult to go to who will help them feel better who are tell them that they are loved that they are important who will help remind them your parents are there for you how can we help you talk to your parents because the counterfactual of telling kids if you talk to a teacher about your gender identity isn't oh I'm gonna go tell Mom and Dad because they're scared to go tell Mom and Dad sometimes it doesn't mean mom and dad did anything wrong but it can be scary to talk about big things the counter factual is the kid may lay alone at night in their bed with that icky feeling

059in their belly with feeling bad about something I don't want any kid to fall asleep at night feeling like that I don't want any kid to just have internet chat rooms to turn to when they're trying to work through something I don't want a kid to carry around a secret that they're maybe not ready to tell their parents yet when talking to another trusted adult could give them the confidence and the support they need and help them move forward to that conversation with their parents thank you I'll ask the question again it's Logan as a school board member and this is the edited version as a school board member would you work to ensure confidential information about children such as gender identity is shared with their parents I think this is a case where it

060is really hard because even as I've talked with folks who in general are really supportive of of kids going through tough times including kids who are lgbtq kids who who are questioning their gender even some of those parents have said to me but Heather if it was my kid I'd want to know so I get that I'm a parent I have a 16 year old I have a 20 year old I would hope they would come talk to me at the same time I would hope that if they didn't think they could come talk to me they could lean on the staff at our schools who are really well trained to support kids and encourage kids and help them build up the confidence to go talk to their parents and I would hope that throughout

061that process that could could be treated and respected at their place at the place where they are right then so I think to talk about and I mean the question was asked with words that point keeping secrets this isn't about keeping secrets from parents our school district is trying at every level to engage parents our school district is trying to help kids get ready to bring their parents in to really tough conversations and in the rare case where a kid is dealing with something that they really feel like I can't talk to my parent about this I don't think we should be forcing that it just would end with a statistic we've referenced the the youth risk behavioral survey the most recent data from that survey came out recently lgbtq students were nearly four times

062as likely as their heterosexual peers to attempt suicide within the past year with more than two in ten students reporting this experience I would never want our schools inability to support a kid to be the reason that we had a kid attempt suicide we need to be supportive thank you Mr Lawson I'll read it again as a school board member would you work to ensure confidential information about children such as gender identity is shared with their parents the easy answer to that is absolutely I think this Heather probably explained this really well in terms of the of the difficulty of the situation like this but my feeling is completely different from Heather's because these kids usually grow out of this by the time they're through puberty but by sending them to a counselor the the

063National Association of school counselors has been training counselors how to keep this from the parents and so I I don't trust the counselors because of what's been coming out of the National Association of school counselors but these kids are at risk these kids are at risk this is this is incredibly incredibly risky behavior that most kids grow out of and even adults who've gone through transition the latest studies say 30 percent of these adults who go through through transition regret that they've gone through this procedure I think there needs to be adults in the room that can explain to them that this is this is this is something that people grow out of this is something that people regret having gone through and my personal feeling is the reason people are suicidal is because they

064have done something that's biologically antithetical to who they are foreign thank you Ms gerlock as a school board member would you work to ensure confidential information about children such as gender identity is shared with their parents I think the school needs transparency with the parents this is a really slippery slope that we are on and we do not need to be putting teachers we shouldn't be putting teachers and staff in that kind of position to hide or skirt issues from parents that are important parents trust the schools to educate our kids while they're within those walls not counsel them however students do need to feel safe and they and support it and they need to have somebody other than a parent once in a while to talk to that's okay it's when the talking becomes

065every day and there's a bigger issue at hand and the parents aren't getting involved in it I think that we need to have that transparency and where that line is drawn I'm not sure but maybe a second conversation if it comes back up is where that needs to be and I would really hope that this whoever is giving advice at the school is going to be helping these kids to learn how to have tough conversations because being a kid is really tough and being an adult is very tough and we have to educate these kids so they can talk to their bosses about things later on in life they can talk to their parents and we need to give parents an opportunity to love their children and be there and to support their children before

066the school gets too far involved in it thank you all right next question will be to Ms Logan first um and I didn't even know this was a thing a touch I am sign of the times I think this must have to do with internet learning and and uh just busy parents um it has to do with snow day learning when I was a kid that was called going sliding um but it's a real concern I guess on people's minds cheese the question is this Ms Logan how would you like to see snow day policy learning handled I'm going to take a leap and assume that that question is asking how would we like to see snow days handled making up for snow days not snow day learning policy I'm just so anyway the question

067literally yes okay it struck me okay so we um as you all know it's been a winter in fact if any of you have campaign sides in your yards they might have been pummeled by snow plows the other night so pick them back up um so we've had to make some adjustments right and so we do build into our school calendar we we build days in because we live in Wisconsin so we assume there might be a few snow days the question is really about what happens when there are more snow days than we'd expect um over the last 10 years I think Dr alllett shared at a recent board meeting that over the last 10 years there have only been two years they just both happen to be recent where we've had this problem

068where we've had more snow days than we had built into the into the cushion of the of the day um so there are a lot of different options and although if you were looking on social media you might think that the school district did not consider any of them but in fact Administration considered a lot of options and made a recommendation kind of the least bad of bad auctions so we looked into as an example do we extend the end of the year do we push the end of the year up which is tough if people already have plans for the end of the year one of my staff members said my kid won't be there he'll be at Hockey Camp so people plan for the year right another option is to send kids to

069school on days where we didn't plan to have school and we've done some of that so we took away some days that were planned non-school days another option is to extend the school day and build extra minutes in which is the option we went with and then a final option is to look at remote learning there are a lot of folks who don't understand why we're not doing remote learning because other districts are doing it the reason we're not doing remote learning is because it's not Equitable it's because not all kids have internet access little kids how do you do remote learning with with first and second graders give them a packet to color is that really instruction is that making up for time in a classroom with teachers so what we are going to

070do next year is that we're going at the beginning of the year have a plan for the whole year that lets parents know here's what we're going to do if we go beyond the days so that at least parents can know that and build that into their planning that's that's and I support that plan that's what I would do thank you you guys have done an awesome job with the snow stuff if you haven't been to a school board meeting this is this topic is discussed almost every school board meeting because of the winter we've had and Heather just pointed out the problem is that everybody has a different idea of what they want their kids to do and so there's no you're going to disappoint two-thirds of the of the students no matter what

071you decide to do and so I don't think there's you know I I do agree you guys are doing a great job at trying to work through that was good luck can you just asked the original question I'm a little confused as to what we're answering here I'll read it literally could you please yeah and how would you like to see snow day policy learning handled well the first thing I would do is survey the parents so we get an idea of what this two-thirds looks like that other people have mentioned up here and the second thing then I would do is take away early releases that's pretty normal and lastly for the following school year I would be building more school more snow days into the schedule so we don't have to necessarily do

072the online learning I would agree after sitting through these school board meetings listening to a lot of comments there is not a one-size-fits-all for this virtual learning is not something little kids are well versed at and extra homework packets are very frustrating for parents who have nine to five jobs and aren't even there with their kids this is a really tough thing I think personally the best solution is to leave snow days as fun days for kids and parents are already stressed out enough trying to find child care for their kids that day and if you throw extra learning in on it are we really getting a benefit I I don't know that's why I would like to survey the parents and I would also like to look at other what other districts are doing

073and how they're handling it because it just doesn't look the same for Pre-K and and one two three four five versus what the high schoolers are doing everybody thinks that it's so easy to do virtual learning well that's because the upper grades are on a virtual program but do you want your kids sitting at home on the internet and screwing up in class I've seen how these virtual things have gone I was not very impressed with it and I really didn't feel my kid was learning anything so I think we need to be careful with that and stick to fun things on those days thank you mrsowski yeah I'm going to Echo a little bit of what everybody else said I mean like the look on my kids face every time there's a snow day

074I mean I don't think back you feel like you won the lotto right and like when we were kids we'd have to sit and you'd watch at the bottom of the screen and you're like oh they called Ellsworth or we next you know and it's like it is fun for kids to just get that prize and play outside and build snowmen and I don't want to take that away from kids that's their Lottery right and then I have a a second grader and a three-year-old and I'm able to work from home and so I'm able to do some work still but if I had to manage making sure my second grader was doing the things she needed to do on her computer at certain times while I'm trying to do my meetings while I'm trying

075to stop the three-year-old from like pushing the Chromebook over like it would be such a nightmare instead of like okay why don't you go outside and play for a little while and then we'll have Coco and then you can watch Frozen and yes it's a bummer to add 10 minutes to the beginning and the overall to the end of the day but it's 10 minutes five to the beginning five to the end I mean my kids walking out to the bus five minutes earlier she's getting home five minutes later it's I think the school district has done a good job with this there is no easy answer if they could control the weather they don't want to shovel and snow blow anymore either right like we are all done with this but um you know

076we you never know what winter is going to bring us in Wisconsin right very good thank you so I think under the rules we outlined at the beginning we have time for one more question and answer um and I've got about six or eight more questions than I'll be able to get to and so I you know told in the rules that I have that I have the discretion to not necessarily take them in order if uh time considerations permit the question I selected is one that seems to be a pretty common theme among a number of the submitted questions and it's brief and so I'll I'll uh I'll I'll ask it and it goes to Mr Lawson first and the question is this what are your priorities for supporting our students Mental Health this

077is to me this is really easy we do not have mental health professionals in the school district we have school counselors you refer mental health issues to a mental health professional it's Gerlach one more time for me could you read it again yes I'm sorry I should have what are your priorities for supporting our students Mental Health I think that all kids need to feel welcomed and accepted at school I think that teachers and staff need to feel welcomed and accepted at school going out of our way to teach kindness going on a way to bring in speakers that can speak on these issues to kids maybe find somebody in there that could make an impact even on two or three students would be helpful I think that kids don't need to be bombarded with

078social issues that are surrounding our school right now and that makes even positive kids unhappy it makes positive teachers unhappy and I think we need to get back to focusing on Reading Writing and arithmetic and life skills and working on friendships and being kind to one another I think that that's what's going to help mental health it's putting that in that positive attitude giving high fives to students down the hallways saying kind things to one another slowly but surely you'll get there thank you Ms rosowski I'll read it again on the past and the mic what are your priorities for supporting our students Mental Health it's a great question I am not a mental health professional um I am very concerned about mental health of students the youth at risk survey Heather had referred to

079it earlier it showed that up to 25 of female students in Wisconsin had seriously considered suicide in the past year for lgbtq students it was almost 50 percent um the covid years were hard right people were stressed out the economy you didn't know what was going to happen people were losing their jobs parents were stressed teachers were stressed kids were stressed right it's been a rough few years and I think the world is a big stressful place and kids feel it right they feel that when they're out in the world so I think it's really important that we create a safe welcoming environment for all students in our school I think bullying is an issue that needs to be worked on you're never going to stop teasing right it's always going to happen but I

080think we need to make sure that we're making sure all our students feel safe at school so that they can learn because I know when I'm somewhere and I'm really nervous I can't do my best job so how does that feel when you're 12 13 5 years old right I think that we do have great counselors in our schools I think they do great life skills and I would include learning how to handle your emotions as part of your life skills like my kid has done worksheets that just show what to keep in your head and what to say out loud when you're mad and they cut it out and they paste it on the side of the paper and like yes that's busy work but you got to work on your scissor skills in

081first grade right and it's just these things of our feelings go with us everywhere we go and learning how to manage our feelings will help us in our lives in school and professionally and help allow us to be happier people thank you Ms Logan what are your priorities for supporting our students Mental Health so I would start by saying I'm really proud of the work that the Hudson school district is already doing to support student mental health across the Spectrum from prevention identification and early intervention to referral because Randy is right we don't have all of the right staff in our schools I will also tell you there are not enough professionals outside of our schools to deal with all the students who have mental health diagnoses and mental health issues especially if you're including

082kind of regular common diagnoses like depression and anxiety I think on the prevention side the work that Megan's talking about is so important and I know it's the work of every Elementary classroom teacher that while they are teaching kids yes to read write and compute they are also teaching them how to be good people how to be able to name their emotions how to communicate and cooperate with other people and those are the soft skills that employers are saying they are looking for today they are looking for employees who can collaborate who can communicate who can pivot when things get rough and we're teaching our kids that starting in Kinder Garden into identification and intervention Mental Health First Aid is something that we are offering to staff we are offering to high school students it

083is not pretending that as a mental health first aid interventionist you know anything about mental health that's treatment oriented it's kind of like regular first aid if you come across someone who appears to be struggling how can you help them get them connected with the resource that's going to help intervention and treatment we do have some in-school professional staff and we have staff who come into our schools to provide school-based Mental Health Services especially for those kids who might not otherwise be able to access those Services either because of insurance limitations or because of Transportation challenges and yes we are referring kids to Providers outside of the schools as well I think to pretend that we can just stop dealing with kids mental health issues within the walls of our K-12 environment is not realistic

084with today's world and the challenges that today's kids are facing again I'm not saying we should be all of these kids therapists I'm saying that we need to be working both proactively and in an identification and referral phase to make sure that kids who need outside treatment get it and that kids can benefit from supports inside the schools are getting that as well thank you all right that does it for the Q a now each of the candidates have an opportunity to give a three-minute close you might remember at the outset tonight identified the candidate's right to left Megan rozowski Heather Logan Randy Lawson Aaron Gerlach and that's how they will appear on the spring election ballot I'm told uh let's flip it for closing arguments to give Ms Gerlach the opportunity for Primacy and

085then we'll just come left to right down the panel great thank you to the parent groups for coming up with these questions and organizing this event and thank you to Willow River for hosting and our moderator you've been great thank you for filtering those questions and um making what you do of them and for everybody at home watching and and who took time out of their night for coming tonight education is the most important thing our children should be focused on while they are in school I am passionate about our kids getting the education that they need in order to thrive and prepare for their Futures we need to get back to basics Reading Writing arithmetic and life skills and getting these kids in and out of high school to be able to function in

086society to hold a job to have tough conversations with their parents and their peers because as I said earlier being a kid is tough being an adult is way tougher and they need to be ready for it the next few years are going to be really challenging in Hudson as we navigate through some serious budget issues staffing needs potential school closures which I am not in favor of to include the boundary line changes which I have been part of before while continuing to support our children it is so important that our school board is being very careful with spending money that is not theirs transparency with our children's education and costs and represent the parents and taxpayers of the Hudson community talking about closing schools gets parents really fired up and I see a lot

087of parents very engaged and I want to thank that those parents groups for being active and getting involved presenting the ideas and the potential solutions to the board that you have they need your help please continue to do that on April 4th you have the opportunity to vote first new school board members if you want to see change I encourage you to do just that my name is Aaron Gerlach I'm writing for the school board gerlock for hudson.com thank you Randy Lawson I too would like to thank everybody who came out this evening and to to hear what we had to say and uh I also want to give my appreciation to the other school board candidates this is a uh this is an interesting thing to that we have jumped into and you really

088don't know what you're getting into when you start this but as I'll conclude with what I was mentioning when we started and that is that I believe that the thing that is most important within this school district is school choice that there are one out of eight students who whose parents feel like they were not are not getting the service through a public school and decided to go elsewhere to get their education that most likely most usually when I talk to them it has to do with religious or moral reasons that they've taken their children out of the Hudson Public Schools and that tells me that the social con contract that we we have as a community with our schools is broken or at least breaking we we have to find a way everybody deserves

089a public school education with public funds if we decide that we're going to have curriculum and activities that violate the religious or moral convictions of a family the school district needs to write that parent a check when they leave the school district so they have a choice we don't have to wait for the state to tell us we're going to have school choice the moral the correct thing to do as good neighbors is if we decide we're going to have something a public education system that doesn't accommodate you the good and moral thing to do is to say here go go where you want to go and we'll write you a check or we can we can develop a magnet school here we want to take one of the elementary schools and make it a

090classic Academy where it's only academics we don't have any of the things that are causing parents difficulties with the current school system you create a magnet school of a classic Academy when I mentioned that to people when I'm out talking about this School Board Race the reaction I get is that would fill up in five minutes Miss logelin so I'm running for re-election to school board people ask you why are you running for reelection but they don't ask it like that they either ask so why are you running for re-election or they say why are you running for reelection I would say that while there isn't a single issue that initially sparked my interest in running for school board or that is keeping me running now I do want to acknowledge that there are a

091couple of really tough issues that drove my decision to run again because I feel passionately about the need to address them and I think I'm a good person to do that one is definitely Financial sustainability one is attracting and retaining great staff and the other is continuing to strengthen the work that we're doing with academic and career planning Financial stability is no surprise we've talked already this evening about the financial challenges and we need to continue to find a way to provide a great 4K through 12 experience to all students within our district within the financial boundaries set by the state through their funding formula and our community through its willingness to have taxes raised attracting and retaining staff is another clear priority we know that quality instruction is the single's largest predictor of students

092outcomes we have a great staff here our challenge is to continue to provide them with a work environment and with rewards and recognition that make them want to stay finally our world is changing and we need to be preparing our kids for the world they're going to be living and working in in 10 25 50 years not basing our decisions on documents from 250 years ago the world is very different we need to make sure that our academic and career planning program is constantly changing to prepare kids for Success After High School and that whatever path a kid chooses whether it's a four-year University or a technical school or military they feel like their choice is validated and supported and they are prepared to be successful in that career path because we all benefit when

093our kids are ready to be contributing competent confident members of our society those are three of the most important reasons I'm running for school board I'm running for school board though not for my kids not for the kids I know not for my neighbor kids I'm running for school board for all the kids in this community because we need to make sure that our district works for all of them thank you Ms rosowski thanks um I am running for school board for a whole slew of reasons um and I think I'd be a good asset to the board I think that my experience in education policy and research my number crunching data nerd tendencies that will spend send me down rabbit holes and spreadsheets and try to find what some other district has done and

094look up a recent research paper like I like to find data to support what works and I like to talk to the people who are on the ground with our students to find out what they need I like to talk to parents to hear about what they think that would help their kids in school what do they like to see change and I think that it's important um you know it's hard with little kids to be doing this while working full-time running for school board but I think it is helpful to have someone with young kids kids in our community elementary schools my kids are going to be in these schools for a long time looking along the way because you know sort of like whatever age your kids are that's what's in your mind

095when they're in middle school you're the middle school stuff when you're in high school it's the high school stuff and it's hard to remember what it was like when they were four or five years old I'm extremely passionate about education and believe that it is the key to a thriving economy democracy and for opportunity we can provide quality education that gives all of our kids the access and opportunity to the post High School career that would work for them and like Heather said I agree we need to make it clear any path that's right for this kid we support you want to go on the military that's great you want to go to a four-year college and then go become a veterinarian that's great how do we help you find what's going to align with

096your skills and interests what's going on at the votech school I just think that we also really need to make sure we have a school that all at all of our schools where all of our kids feel safe a society and even Hudson Society we are not monolithic we have families of different religious backgrounds different different practices people who believe different things and it's sort of like I feel like my kids learn start to learn professionalism at school right but the second grader it's like no potty talk at school like it's at home but as time goes on you need to work with people different from you you do not know who is going to interview you you do not know who your boss is going to be who your co-workers are going to be

097who your client's going to be if you don't agree with the way people live their lives you zip your lip about it you get the job done with someone you mind your manners and you learn to work on a project together and that's what a democracy and a pluralistic society is when we have all the freedom to live the way that we want to live and that's what makes this country super exciting that's what makes the world so exciting and it also makes it a little scary that we're different from each other so I don't but I'm not scared I don't want to end on that's what makes it scary sometimes but I think it's what makes it beautiful as well all right very good that concludes tonight's candidate Forum I'll just like to add

098I'd like to add just a personal note I really have an admiration for people who are willing to serve and people who care about the public good all four of these candidates appears to me um meet those criteria and I'm thankful for that I want to thank the audience also thanks [Applause] I hope it was for this audience and whomever might watch it on the cable television that it was interesting it was helpful let people have information about the decisions that they need to make coming up in April we heard different perspectives but it was a polite conversation and that's heartening to me so thanks to you thanks to these guys and good luck in April everybody [Applause]