McFarland School Board Meetings 5/6/2024

001e meeting to order at 7 p.m. on Monday May the 2024 uh we've got some consent agenda items uh um we have minutes of the April 15th Schoolboard meeting and the April 11th Schoolboard special meeting work Retreat um some professional staffing recommendations and some co-curricular staffing recommendations and uh some professional uh positions no need to vote so I would look for a motion to accept the consent agenda item as presented I so move thank you Megan I can second that thank you Bruce all in favor please signify by saying I I I opposed motion carries 5 z um and that brings us to public comments my understanding is we have someone here in our exciting so I will do my little reading while you're getting set up in accordance with Schoolboard policy 167.5 the McFarland

002School Board welcomes public comment during regular meetings from individuals who are present at the meetings or who have sent an email to the board president or superintendent participants are required to register to speak upon arriving at that meeting State their name address and any group affiliation before speaking address only topics within the legitimate jurisdiction of the board recognize that the board will not respond to comments during the meeting unless the item is on the published agenda limit their comments to under five minutes or 250 written words and maintain decorum the floor is yours please introduce yourself all right thank you my name is Melanie robach I'm a parent of two here uh with fun with a funding comment for the community I want to make a direct ask of the school board to approve a

003simple way for community members to give one time or automatic monthly donations directly to the district's fund balance so that at any time there's an easy way for people to give on their own initiative I'm participating in this sort of referendum next steps engagement group and from our first meeting I've learned a lot already um some takeaways so far the district is facing a $5 million fiscal cliff for this coming school year in very simple terms here's why a 1993 state law set limits on how much our property of our property taxes can go to our schools and then 15 years ago the limit stopped accounting for inflation uh districts need approval by referendum to exceed this limit at all so they try to work within it but we know how prices have gone up

004the actual cost of Education now and anything is way higher Federal covid money helped fill things in but that critical boost is gone exposing the gap for real the outdated calculation leaves us a whopping 3 million short of what's actually needed to maintain the basics for our kids plus another 2 million needed to catch up on the salary and benefits side so we can be competitive average teacher pay in McFarland is 15th out of 15 in Daye County it's hard to keep and attract good teachers with lower pay during a national teacher shortage that's the $5 million fiscal cliff and since inflation is all always running in the background the district will have to keep asking voters for permission simply to maintain basic operation you'll actually see on your tax bill that the amount that

005went to our schools went down from 2018 to 2023 even as property values went way up our sharply Rising property taxes have provided increased revenue for the village but not for the schools so we can talk about belt tightening which is always smart but when the cost to educate hasn't been adusted for inflation in over a decade and the amount of property taxes going to the district has actually gone down each year since 2018 and we consider the many ways the district has grown and developed in this time not just in numbers but also in programming reputation R ranking you realize that the belt is not only tight already but it's old and too small and this this really this district is in need of a more appropriately fitting belt that is capable of tightening

006and all indications are that our community of uh families can afford this new belt if only they understood the need and had an easy way to contribute Mount horb is fresh in Our Minds last Wednesday we all put ourselves there that devastating disorientation of getting a message like that during your kids school day good teaching is all about relationships we know this teachers need the B bandwidth to notice and connect around the variety of needs they see in their students sometimes dire needs teachers relationships with students and fostering healthy peer relationships are Far and Away the first line of prevention available to schools regarding any number of health and safety crises every teacher knows this the district's not going to say it because it's scary and sounds manipulative but it's the truth we can never

007control or predict these situations when 100% but there are steps that give us an obvious Advantage steps like smaller classes an extremely competent Vigilant socially Adept and not overextended teachers and paying teachers a wage that acknowledges this ridiculous risk and appropriately rewards them for sticking with it now the fund balance uh the fund balance is basically the district's savings account it's currently about $13.6 million and last year earned about 400,00 000 in interest a helpful source of free money to the district the balance actually fluctuates quite a bit during the year though because bills are sometimes due before funds come in if more of the money stayed in there all year the interest earn could be quite a bit higher without adquate Revenue though this fund balance goes down and so does the interest next

008year they anticipate half as much this fund balance could be like a pseudo endowment if we build it up as a community especially by opting into regular monthly giving we ACC accomplish a few big things one we provide more immediately usable funds for the District Two we build up the nest egg that's giving the district free money via the via the interest therefore multiplying our giving three we probably do not eliminate the need for referenda but those who can afford to pay more enable the school to make smaller asks of the whole Community through its future referenda and we can afford it um I'm going to skip it's Teacher Appreciation Week the referendum a mixed message so let's make sure to support that our support is loud and clear through notes and goodies this week

009and by being creative about closing the critical funding Gap that makes it possible for us to have such great teachers in the first place thank you your own clock over there well done nice timing thank you Melanie thank you very much I figure out what that mus play playing her off thank you okay that brings us to the high school brings us to the high school student report take it away oh can't hear we go got it all right our for the last three weeks it's been so some highlights pass over vow okay so first of all um from April 26 to May 1st uh members of McFarland DEA took 12 students to Anaheim California to compete in our International Career Development conference uh we competed in nine different events and visited Disney California Venture

010specifically and other parts of the Anaheim area congrats um to our team for a strong finish to the 2024 competition SE season and Shameless plug for social media because it's been a struggle running it next we had prom this last weekend at the Masonic Center in Madison with the casino night theme this year's prom royalty were CLA Dodie and brev Roth and then on top is all of our prom courts amazing work to the prom committee uh the prom planning committee for putting on a wonderful and fun-filled prom for All In addition we had the justify Summit on Friday where five students traveled to the American Family Center to attend the day County Equity consortium's annual justify Summit this Summit brought together leaders from 16 different area school districts to discuss Equity work uh Louie

011pigot and myself participated on the student leadership uh board since January and I was also a panelist at the event awesome and then our extracurricular acapella groups including kittens mittens and FID pleas had their annual local showcase on Wednesday May 1st so congrats to all those groups as well as Blue Notes on another incredible performance it was awesome and then Super exciting in our tech ed classes students and Autos classes competed in the Firestone challenge at medicine College um I think either a week ago two weeks ago uh they took third place in the team competition and first place in Partnership so congrats to them for that awesome awesome awesome performance and then some April April Throwbacks um so uh on April 19th the MHS BSU traveled to MATC along with other black student unions

012from across Dane County for the first annual Gathering of Dane County BSU at this wonderful event hosted by the MATC black student union students were able to collaborate and share ideas as well as make connections with other districts um so that was it was super super awesome and then also on April 19th our forensic team competed at the state level tournament in at DeForest High School so congrats to Ava Marissa Ava Grace Rachel and Maya for their awesome awesome performances and for meddling in their events continuing on on April 22nd the annual youth apprenticeship recognition night was held at Bona Grove High School this year out of all of the schools in Dan County participating in the ya program our high school supported the most youth apprentices almost double with over 70 this year uh

013big congratulations to Brook Clark and Izzy toin for earning a youth apprenticeship scholarship and to Miss Thompson for earning the school to Career coordinator of the Year award in April our Eco Club also traveled to first grade classrooms in CS to teach students how to plant sunflowers with some really cute pictures to the right also in April because everything happened in April our polyi apus history and AP United States government classes went to the Overture for a viewing of the performance what the Constitution means to me and then from the weekend of April 19th to the 21st The Importance of Being Earnest had three performances featuring an extremely unique take on the Oscar Wild play um in addition four student directors Nora low Abby and Charlie were able to Direct One act performances with other

014student actors each show being performed twice so congrats to all these young actors and performers for their um awesome performances um and directing and then um the Asian-American Student Association Multicultural Club meal so on April 12th they had a multicultural um meal with around 30 students in attendance it was a great bonding experience in potluck with teachers and students floating in to appreciate the event all students had to write a description about the food that they brought and its Origins so congrats to all it was a super awesome fun time and then our student council recently won do good Wisconsin serial Box challenge for a school of our size so they collected uh 1,1 boxes of cereal for the McFarland food pantry as the final count um and then filmed the schoolwide domino effect video

015at our assembly that happened maybe a few months ago um but congratulations on the awesome achievement um super super awesome for St our student councel Deca also hosted a CommunityWide book drive this last month and we collected over 1,500 books for a wide range of Ages from small kids to adult AED books all of these books were then donated to the McFarland op Optimus club for their cuddle up with books project in addition 10 MHS seniors are recognized at Oregon Joey's like smiling down at Oregon high school in April for their exemplary academic achievement uh the following 10 students are listed there as well as a picture from the banquet congrats to all of these incredible seniors I see two of them right there I can see both of you in addition um the next

016two weeks at MHS are not funfilled but we'll pretend like they are with students taking AP exams um there are over 200 stud students taking over 400 Collective tests this April or this may uh today was the start with apgov and AP chem and a huge shout out to miss wink our testing coordinator for all of her hard work in coordinating the extremely large amount of AP exams taking place these two weeks awesome and then may is mental health awareness month so our hope Squad is celebrating uh by traveling to other schools in the district including IMS to teach students about what hope Squad is as well as seps to play Recess games with our younger Learners to teach them about sportsmanship we will also be partnering with Grace coffee for our fundraiser for the

017rest of May so starting today if you purchase a restro vanilla Italian soda part of the profits will be donating to the MHS hope Squad and then MHS student council is hosting a cancer week awareness and fundraiser for Miss Neil IMS who recently got diagnosed with cancer they'll be having a bake sale this week as well um there are some of the dress up days and then the um are also fundraising for the teacher in Paradise fundraiser to T send teachers away for a block so super super awesome okay uh the week after that so cancer weeks next week the next week after that is culture week which is a CommunityWide event running from May 20th to 24th with lots of different events with all the proceeds benefiting next year's culture week uh we will

018have a bake sale at MHS on that Tuesday and then throughout the week week we'll be having a fashion show with different cultural clothing from different students on Wednesday on World Market night um on Thursday night we have three restaurants in attendance and hopefully I think our jazz band is playing again and then we will have conclude with a community movie night on Friday we actually have three food trucks since I wrote this at 10:30 a.m. um and a showing of the Elementals as well as we are creating a CommunityWide cookbook um where anyone can submit different recipes that mean a lot to their family and we're going to have Bell announcements in different languages so stay on the lookout for some culture week updates as for athletic updates uh last week at the Sten

019invite Julia akley and Isaac Ying both broke school records Julia reached 11 feet and nine inches in the pole vault while Isaac ran his 3200 meter race in 9 minutes and 20 in addition congrats to the boys team for taking first place at this meet and the girls for second place awesome and then a big congratulations to Ava Dean uh one of our class of 2024 seniors for becoming a recipient of the incredible WIA scholar athlete award at the ceremony in Stevens Point this past weekend and then um we're gonna finish it off with some student staff updates it is teacher appreciation week and for the past two weeks we have shouted Out Mr domac Miss Gunther Miss Miller and name is svi so congratulations to all of them shout outs are super super well

020deserved and that is it for [Laughter] today awesome that's all you got yeah I nothing else they cruised through that I think they covered it all Yeah well yeah PID any uh comments or questions just a comment you guys are amazing am truly remarkable not only do you go to school but part of your schooling is doing all these activities and events so if I could say one thing I'm the newest addition to the school board and I have been so thrilled watching you guys um everything you're doing especially with the Hope Squad that's very near and dear to my heart so kudos to you guys um one question though where can I see the video of the serial box domino effect is that on any of the Instagram pages I can't remember I feel

021like it do you know if it's it might be on the student council's Instagram page do you know about I don't think it's on the student council Instagram page but I do know you have a kid so it's in the Spartan scoop somewhere all right I I I do have a kid scoop all right I'll do some digging or I'll make him do it thanks Val somewhere in there I find it and I saw it on Facebook oh okay oh okay anyone else thank you for everything yep thank you as always you guys are great I don't know how there must be 500 of you guys running around some to get all of this done in a couple of weeks incredible thank youas leadership do we get you both for one more meeting uh think

022so or it's two sweet third okay all right two more two more we send off we'll bring some like Party Poppers or something thank you than you very bye guys thank you guys byee okay informational items School Board notice posting locations board policy specifies where the school board agendas shall be posted legal council has suggested that annually we indicate the locations that these notices are placed the following is a list of recommended po posting locations for 20 school year 2425 notices are also provided to our six municipalities uh and recommended posting sites are McFarland thisle Herald independent McFarland cable channel McFarland Village Hall Ed lock Library one Community Bank McFarland McFarland House Cafe school district of McFarland website McFarland High High School Indian Mount Middle School Waba Intermediate School Conrad alvian Primary School okay so

023I would look for a motion to approve those posting sites oh we don't sorry nice Sugg sure what about our Charter [Applause] School may we could I don't don't know that they're they don't have a high traffic I mean we certainly could inform them of the board meeting but in terms of posting itally electronically yeah could add them to the the list and these are um are these just the official ones do we post them elsewhere right no I think this is the okay this is where they go got it if you have any other suggestions yeah I was wondering about Grace coffee are we in we're in McFarland house right MH yep I don't have any problems they seem to have a nice partnership with the community oh I think they might only be

024open till four yeah yeah I've [Laughter] heard got a chance yet either Lily's ice cream shop or is that part of I think part of the cafe that's part of the cafe okay I think if no one no other businesses have requested posts to be there I think we're probably okay I'm seeing lots of eyes on me yes um traditionally if they have a like a a butin board and they show interest in we're more than happy to we've had other locations that community that have for instance Done Construction and removed their bulletin boards and requested that we dis you know discontinue posting there um but if if there was a suggestion and they had if we knew that they had a bulletin board we could certainly reach out and ask them if they're open

025to that and we can add it at any time right this is just our annual notice of our commitment to at least those places okay and this exceeds what's in our board policy yeah okay I thank you we don't need it's just informational okay next is parent Guardian survey results Mr T okay um so I am here for the annual now this will be the second annual presentation of our parent Guardian survey that was provided to to our families you have a copy of this in front of you so you can kind of look on it and make notes of interest um I'll also be displaying it on the screen for the community and the many viewers out there so we're what we're basically going to do is just I'll give you a little bit

026of background in information a little bit of responded information but most of the time I want to spend on the results and Analysis and I will tell you board members don't go too far ahead when you have something in your paper sometime in your paper in your hand sometimes you're I see you looking still on page one Aon yeah okay um all right so School perceptions third party that we use they've been around for a long time work with a lot of school districts the advantage of a of a third party is they they gather and organize the data um for us but but most importantly they do so in a confidential nature so we have no way of knowing who's who it is that are responding but this is our second year then this

027is our second year uh May 26 uh was the survey deadline we had 707 respondents that's a two 26% participation rate up a whole percent from last year one of the things um that I want to be clear on is this is determined by individual respondents so it's sent to All parent and Guardians that may include multiple members of the same house household so I know sometimes families will say oh you fill that out I don't need to so that does impact the participation rate are you able to see how many households we aren't okay no we're just able to know individual contacts in terms of the schools that the respondents kids attend um that aligns well uh with our student enrollment so a nice percentage there um as you can see you know we

028would expect to see a little bit more at the High school um because they are much bigger but it also fits what we see for Parental engagement grade love of your children's you can see that that children's um children uh is pretty evenly distributed across grade level so you I feel like it's a a pretty representative sample in terms of services this is a question that is asked one of the things that I noticed in comparing in these percentages with our district percentages particularly in the area of free and reduced price lunch that is definitely an under represented group in the data where you have 5% of the respondents um indicating that their family receives free or reduced price meals and that is about 15% for our district is there still a stigma attached to

029that free and discount Ed meals I know that was an issue of you know in the past that parents didn't necessarily want that information out for the public but yeah I would say it probably is I mean that the it is anonymous though right so you know I don't know I mean I suppose there may be people who don't want to acknowledge that on on the survey but and don't trust that it's Anonymous Maybe but regardless the results are are skewed in that regard are the other ones like special ed and five four plant is that pretty close it's pretty close yeah okay yep in terms of race ethnicity [Music] um generally fairly representative I would say the biggest one that I see under represented here is um those that identify as having more than

030one race or ethnic um I don't know the percentage off the top of my head but it is in the High Teens or in the teens so I'm I'm surprised that that's a bit now the one thing I wonder is that's for our students so it may be different for our parents that makes sense the person filling out the form because that's that's what I identify as not my child identifies as that's good point some considerations as Bruce mentioned this is our second year of doing this annual survey so we do have some comparison data to share um we get excited about especially when it's good it is helpful to focus on the percent who agree and strongly agree you'll also see comparison information and that is relative to similar size Wisconsin schools that also

031take the survey through school perceptions so be I don't know the specific number um of schools that are involved in that because it does change from year to year but small changes in responses can really have a significant impact on those comparison scores the data is also a districtwide data there is variance across buildings and buildings review their individual data as a building level team um so they they have done or will be doing that as well overall I just want to provide a lot of summary in the beginning um and then we can get into some of the details it'll get a bit redundant um but I think there's value in in recognizing some themes there were significant increases in all of the four indexes which I'll talk about in a little bit and

032all of the individual questions all of them 100% of the individual questions showed improvement from last year which I think is is amazing um the index percentage comparisons were high so we're talking upper 70s um or mid 70s to Upper 80s for comparison to the district so you had 100 districts lined up 75 to 89% that's where we'd be standing in the in the in the group um most of them um had um 80 plus perc I think there's 179% in terms of strongly agree so very high index is very um at or above four some of the highlights facilities continue to be a strength this was the same last year 99% strongly agreeing that they're well cupt um focus on climate with their child being treated with dignity and respect feeling safe at school

033and that they as as adults feel welcome in their child schools you can see those you know mid 90% um agreeing strongly agreeing certainly we'd like every one of these to be 100% um but that that is pretty impressive parent Guardian involvement 91% saying they know how to support their child's learning that's so important that's been an area of focus in our Communications 88% feeling like they have at least one staff member they feel comfortable contacting with an idea of a concern and 88% uh feeling there's opportunities for parent involvement again we're on strengths 94% feeling that if their child breaks a rule at school they are treated fairly 94% there feeling that their child gets help when they need it 90% there communication that's been a real focus on the district feeling it's timely

034and transparent 89% agreeing strongly agreeing and that um 87% say School communication is either good or great and I'll show you the comparisons of the Past coming up 91% feeling they're satisfied with how much their child learned this year so again of course there's 9% that didn't agree with that so that's something to focus on but overall very positive in those regards areas of growth for us a bullying um continues to be an area of growth 79% agreeing strongly agreeing they're satisfied with the school's efforts to address bullying I thought it was interesting that that number 79% places our district in the 92nd percentile compared to other schol schools so obviously um this is an area of growth for many school districts including our own we did Co up from 75% um last year so

035that's you know that's something but we are implementing our district Behavior response plan and um updating our bully we have updated our bully prevention and intervention plan done some training with our administrative team so we think that's uh partly uh in indicative of the results there and that we'll continue to see results as we expand that implementation in terms of culture 84% agreeing that there's a healthy culture at our school again 84% is is still a high percentage but certainly not what we would um hope it would be that is above the 78% that it was last year and feedback to school and teachers also 85% here so feeling that they have opportun unties to give feedback so we're continuing to expand those opportunities uh through through different means I think um we have work

036to do in that regard we've tried some things with some success resulting in that increase from 80% last year to 85% communication 87% strongly agreeing uh they're updated on how their child's doing so we we continue to and this will be a NeverEnding um area and just finding out how much is too much um providing consistency across teachers and buildings and how much they communicate about student performance that is something we'll keep working on how to use the tools that we have uh for families to access electronically progress now it's a it's an improvement from 83% but still an area of growth some of the comments continue to be some people feel there's way too much information shared and some people people feel there's not enough um so I don't know maybe that means we're

037doing something right but some of the areas we're working on as as a as buildings is being clear on when we email something versus put it in the newsletter that sometimes something deserves an email and families are asking for more emails and some families and then also um being clear on when we need to repeat something and when we continue to repeat it in every newsletter you have a thought there quick question was there a correlation between what age of students had what parents felt they were receiving too many emails versus not enough emails dependent on what age their kids were I don't think so okay I don't think so um from from our breakdown at a at a building level it was fairly consistent okay Ross buildings I think it is to be honest

038kind of an individual person preference I mean I love a good email like all over the place yeah more knowled better me put it in the newsletter so but I think we'll keep working on it I think we can be more clear and concise in our Communications always myself included I'm gonna look at the index with you now these are where they take several items and they put put them together into um one score on these four areas and um as you look at these a reminder of five is the highest that's strongly agree so both informed and included are part of our key performance indicators that we use to measure for our strategic plan so you can see the growth that we had in those two areas informed being up toate on your child's

039progress and what's happening and that is a a 4.1 average score there included feeling welcomed respected and part of the school experience so those are our primary two that we focus on educational Excellence about uh the child school being effective in helping them learn develop and succeed atmosphere but feeling safe and supported and also experience accepted respected and supported so you can see all of those scores you know right between the the lowest being a 3.99 up through the highest being a 4.19 with atmosphere you can see the growth is between three and 5% there and I think what's very interesting to me is the comparisons um compared to to other districts I think that really struck struck me so I mean I I think these are nice ways to keep track of our progress

040and given that we set goals on those first two indicators that's um progress to be proud of uh I'm going to just show you the top five scores and then then the bottom five scores it's a nice way similar to the summary you see that these are duplicated um in terms of the strengths there you can see these in fact I think I trust I shared all of these with you in that I think it's interesting to look at those comparison percentiles again the bottom five scores um this is an area I mean it's still at the high part of our bottom five scores but about schools teaching with materials and reflect my family's cultural and racial backgrounds that's something we continue to work on that's an indicator that we will break down by race

041we're able to do that um race and ethnicity to see because if if we look at those responses um and let's say 88% of our our white families are saying that they agree with that and the other 12% are all um people of color that's obviously an issue so that's something we do need to break down separately then you see the other ones that I mentioned in in the areas of growth previously moving on this is one that I think is a good overall indicator is how would you would you How likely are you to recommend our school to a friend or a family member so this should be a 10 it is an 8.08 Which is higher than the 7.67 that it was um and higher than the comparison but that's something I think

042we continue to work on we do you know we are in the upper area of this you know more green is good so now I'm going to move into some of the individual items and a reminder we're using that 1 to five um scale here this is about you and me so in terms of a school board doing what it takes to make our district successful you can see that percentage there um so very strong District administration doing what it what it takes to make our district successful that's tolerable um the district headed in the right direction so see those indicators right there but it doesn't break that down into specifics where they would like to see us go no it doesn't have open-ended comments in that part it does not how would you rate

043um Communications from school and this I talked about a little bit um earlier I will show you at the bottom if you look so last year's grate was 31% so that went from 31 to 36 and last year's good was 49% so that went from 49 to 51 so you can see that growth there in [Music] Communications this next one about receiving information is that that slide people are asking for emails that's wild I know like they just we're getting too many yes or not enough but but you think um a change in Administration has impacted this I don't know about this this one in particular maybe the communication one but last year the results were very similar people want emails wow so it's really just the amount of emails that was frequency yeah the

044frequency is what the issue is redundant emails emails became a cya function a while back and and I think a lot of people like the the concrete nature of an email it there's a Forever record of it well plus you could go back and you know reread things at your own pleasure and you know I always know how to delete School experience um school facilities being clear clean well capped um staff treating their child with dignity and respect um updated so these were strengths that we mentioned earlier I mean you can really see those High percentages and high comparisons and growth bullying we talked about breaking rule treated fairely we talked about most days my child um enjoys going to school that was one that as an administrative team specifically we talked about at length

045last year um because we just that 3.94 just didn't sit right um 4.11 89% feeling that way feeling like there's some growth in that area how much child learned we talked about that talked about school communication being timely and transparent so you can see that growth from last year child feeling safe at school certainly extremely important really feel that that 95% agreeing strongly agreeing as very high um opportunities for parent uh involvement and we talked about the materials having high expectations for their child 89% certainly a high number providing feedback to our school teachers and leaders having those opportunities that's something we got to work on continue to work on and knowing how to support their child's learning and feeling welcome at school so again this is a bit redundant but I wanted to make

046sure you saw those I think on this one um this my child is able to handle the emotional challenges of school that was something that that we were concerned about last year but felt confident that with the addition of the student services staff um and some of the structures of of the school day coming out of last year we felt really confident about that that would improve and thankfully we saw those results go from that 3.96 to 4.08 the others I mentioned earlier homework um the overall amount of homework is nearly identical responses from last year just right 71% so Goldilocks right there I'll take it um too little and too much so I I guess I I I mean I will editorialize I'm always surprised that there's only 8% that feel that it's too

047much um because our kids often will say it is too much but their parents don't feel quite the same participation in co-curriculars extracurriculars nearly identical as last year still still very high um and lastly access to Reliable internet outside of school that's good y continues to be I would say the other thing I would um note for you is we do an analysis of the comments um so we go through all of the comments and then also identify themes from that um this year we have been using our friend chat gbt who will develop themes it's really pretty impressive so that hasn't been done yet that's in process no it's done it's done yeah and I can share those with you those themes with you there um some of those I shared as we talked

048about about too much communication not enough communication um this you know there's there was a lot of conversation about school funding and our budget and just concern about that which you would anticipate right this was in March um but I'm happy to share those um themes with you as well were there any that the previous average I mean we we went down this year I haven't seen any NOP 100% of them went up that's really good I would think yeah right yeah it isn't bad no right pretty amazing sorry that was a little loud on the mic there I think isn't that exciting good I think as a school board member though I'm concerned about uh under leadership and communication the school board is doing what it takes to make our district successful you know

04986% I I'd like to know how people feel about how can we improve upon that what is it that we as a board have to understand understand or listen to or do to move that needle I suspect a fair amount just doesn't know they don't know what a school board is there for they don't necessarily watch meetings and I think it's just a lack of that understanding rather than you know a criticism but do they have a chance to uh click on I don't know mhm to that y yeah so I think oh there was one so I think would click B but but I'm disturbed by that because we are in a position to help lead the district and if the community or whoever took everyone that took this uh obviously you we have

050a lot of work to do especially Under The Continuous Improvement model you know what is it that we can do to move forward but but that was still up from a year ago yep it is and that's why I was wondering if there was any comments and the themes didn't reveal anything in particular I can I can share that I mean I can go over that with you now um it seemed like there was some interest among the people um the other board members the and I think the people in the public are are interested in that um so I think this yeah I mean I guess if there's in general the themes would be nice to see but if there's specifically ones related to to the board performance as the board yeah I didn't

051I don't feel like there's I'll share a couple things that may be related so um so leadership and communication this idea of communication and channel overload so I mentioned that earlier like excessive communication difficulty ma managing the volume desire for consolidation so I mentioned that a little bit need for clear and timely information so again that's related to communication like dates and events to be highlighted and easily accessible we try to do that in the newsletter but there's a lot of information there um and then I think this lack of timely updates I think this is where this one here you might oh no that's not what I want um you might be this might be an email one right is like oh can you remind me about that date coming up I need an

052email reminder about something I think this may be where you know what I was looking at and I probably get dinged a little bit for this one here I'm going to make this a little bigger um thank you thank you yeah sorry I didn't realize that it's great on my screen yeah um yeah so I think this one particular of District spending need for financial accountability kind of open book about financial matters I think that's probably it given the timing of the referendum yeah yeah but I'm wondering if again our most recent the the uh the community engagement that you've You' started we had the first one last week um for the you know by next year that's going to start King in cuz I I I would have said I think after that meeting

053there was a lot more sense that oh I think they we have been very transparent we have been or have not after our first meeting yeah we we had the refer people at that meeting who were collaborating the things that we had been saying and they were in a position to be able to collaborate it and it turns out I think a lot of people left going like oh it was to me it was fascinating I think that was both me yeah I yeah I was only there on Monday but anyway that's wonderful so that's good here you can see there was I would say this uh this area of diversity equity and inclusion uh partly relates to the human growth and development conversations true and you there were so many Polar Opposites yes in

054the comments that it's like some people would say you're not doing enough some people say you're doing too much A lot of it to be honest I wasn't specific you know there wasn't a specific thing or sometimes I saw something specific and I was like well that's not really even true but it just goes to show you a need to be clear um and more proactive on communication regarding that um in terms of this there were some complaints about handling of of incidents um lack of responsiveness particularly related to behavior even though those indicators were very high percentages some those were some of the comments and and I think you know those that weren't satisfied had some pretty strong emotion I certainly don't want to disregard that um you know questions you know always improve

055communication on discipline concerns about favoritism you know inconsistency and disciplinary actions one of the things I noticed in some of the comments is some it seemed like some of the comments about discipline were somebody talking about something that their child told them about and I can share all the comments with you versus something that their child experienced oh yeah do you understand like my this happened with to my child um and I I found that was somewhat interesting but I wouldn't be surprised by that though yeah I just thought it was interesting but I certainly there's always room for growth sure it is not easy um others you know gets a bit redundant down here in some of these themes and mixed opinions I mentioned on Dei admin varied experiences suggestions for so so um

056and then there's a bunch of other areas too like to me being involved in my child's education means awareness of communication support and guidance partnership with school this is why I didn't show this all to you it's pretty overwhelming advocacy and accountability empowerment engagement so that's just asking them what it because you know there's that question about being you know involved and engaged what does that look like for you and then the comments questions suggestions those themes are very consistent with these themes um up there um and then there's strengths and concerns so they got it gets a bit redundant in the comment analysis but I will I'm happy to share this with you no you answer my question Erin so thank you happy to do that yeah I'm trying to see if there's anything

057board specific I don't really see anything you know more frequent updates on their kids [Music] performance yeah very repetitive that's a sign of a good you know yeah what do what do we mean when we say a when we say we have a healthy culture I mean is that physical health is it mental health is it everything the whole student but is that what we're referring that it just seems a bit nebulous yeah I mean what what the people think it means so I guess that's of a fair care yeah what what what do we think the factors are I know when I see that I think of positive I think of healthy as positive a positive school right well and I guess even a high a high score in that would then indicate that

058regardless of what people yeah Define it as it's meeting their needs right like even though it might be different needs so that's probably a good thing are different needs help there and I thought the the fact that you know everything or virtually everything went up was was telling in that I would have expected it given uh the DI coordinator that we hired and the almost laser focus that you know the whole district has been putting on the the Dei initiatives so I I expected those would probably be up now the the that if we could do it again next year then that indicates that we're certainly on the right path yep and I feel like we are absolutely well that and and that's a good point because we talk about it a lot and we're

059just developing the metrics like last year was the you know yep getting the baselines and things like that but those really indicate that that idea that Equity work really brings everybody up like it doesn't just focus on marginal under represented so those are good that's a fact anything else not about that no okay thank you for spending so much time on that ER yep yeah well spent yeah that's a lot it's a yeah yeah there's a lot of comments I mean I wish all of them with you but all right set some time aside move on Mr Mooney the Spring weeva retreat okay thank you Greg this is a little longer because last week uh WEA had uh their second of two Retreats there's one in the spring and one in the winter uh the

060takeaways that I came away with is uh 20% of the enrollment at weeva are uh with students students with special needs but we knew that before the 2425 projected enrollment increase the anticipate a 13 to 23% increase up to 5573 students at 133% now present enrollment is 4573 enrollment projections for 2030 which is only six years away 7658 students that's a heck of a increase uh what they're uh doing now and will continue to do they're doing earlier onboarding for students in high school to make sure virtual learning is a good fit for the high school students uh they used to do it when once they got enrolled you know so they want to catch them even before they're enrolled and then they can make the decision whether or not eyes the students are could

061fit for them and vice versa can I I'm sorry to interrupt can I ask a question about that like what are what do they what does the onboarding look like do you know yeah I don't know it's I think it's a week long and it's probably running through sample course workor uh student work obviously uh parental support at the high school level uh the reliability and responsibility that the student uses during that short period of time because if they can't on board there's no way they're going to be able to be successful I see okay working more independently thank you um so hopefully in the future we'll see fewer withdrawals at the high school level uh due to disengagement uh 75% of we's overall budget for staff expenses staff expenses is 75% the we a

062budget who's that is about 80% 81% that's interesting looking ahead uh students taking State tests virtually in the future they're trying to pass legislation so students have to don't have to go to you spec specific centers across the state uh rather they'll be able to do it virtually uh probably one of the best pieces of item uh 1.4 million is what we've been uh receiving from WEA in the past it'll be 1.7 million this year again my suggestion is to designate that additional 3 300,000 towards a future referendum to cut down that cost more discussion later I'm sure uh stride K12 is in progress of creating a third grade greeing guarantee for parents via curriculum curriculum revisions coaching mentoring and Remediation tools for students in grade three who do not uh read at the third

063grade reading level that is quite the initiative so it'll be interesting to see how this all entails and much of it will take place during summer uh annual stride K12 conference will occur again in October uh aot of the time during the retreat this time they talked about health insurance bidding out we had two vendors come in if they talked about it once again uh the team of we a staff talked about strategic planning using the 3Gs you've heard me talk about it before growth engagement and graduation uh they're also working on what does a you know sort of their vision of a graduate you know what does a graduate look like sound like act like you know as a exit WEA with a diploma we worked on weeva goals for the next year and

064it was interesting cisa weeva and cisa have Partnerships in six of the cus I wasn't aware of that right now we have five to six Pathways uh uh presently we're adding education pathway for those that are think of becoming teachers which is great news for us in the Arts pathway starting 2526 uh WEA prom was 10 days ago highly successful that was held in Madison where was you know I'm trying temp oh that was our that's where our yeah I can't remember what they said they did tell us didn't they and I I see the picture in my mind but I can't I cannot remember somewhere local though and uh this is also uh imperative of how the staff is supporting students we have a students with disabilities ranked first in the state of in

065scoring uh performance in the sen state test all other sorry go ahead uh of all the other uh charters in the state of Wisconsin so what percentage of their students are are what the thing that the category you just mentioned special education no you you said they scored number one in what was the sayate Assessments in four special special needs special needs well there special ed need students okay okay but using the state assessments and that was my question I'm trying to but I don't know what percentage I wonder what percentage of their students are sorry but to ranked number one in the state being the largest charter school is remarkable wow and that concludes my report for tonight thank you Tom Tom you do amazing job you really do excellent it was really good

066and Aon was there I was there yeah yeah in one piece I did not mention is that they're doing more Outreach to school districts so if uh they can't find a teacher for example they will provide the teacher virtually and they're trying to establish some type of contracts with school districts to fill that Gap yeah and they and they have had success with that yes you know where districts were not able to find a teacher to fill a certain position and they have whole classes this this is is because I think I'm pretty sure the enrollment at weeva preco was 2,000 to 2300 something like that probably about right 2500 obviously uh the pandemic is going to have an impact on how you want to educate your child but well it's going to go to

0677600 by 2030 it's going to double again I mean it's it's amazing they're very ambitious time will tell yeah you know and a lot of it is due to the marketing strategies they've employed over the past year now yeah they were on both of the basketball tournaments I know the head of school I thought did a great job somewhat controversial with that yeah by other school districts yeah yeah so thank you Tom yep school safety written drill evaluation notification and review per Wisconsin State Statute 118.0 74 CP so you can see there's three notices for your review all administrative holds for student or staff needs sometime they're medical sometimes they're Behavior But ultimately it's about you know making sure people can get to where they need to and respecting the privacy of those involved so

068well done and I compliment the staff at each of those schools because every reports are thorough yes and what I like mostly is what did they learn from it and how can they improve upon it yep those are not easy decisions no when you're when you have when you realize I am keeping everybody in their classrooms right now and calling an administrative hold those are tough to say mhm now they're big decisions but but it keeps I would defer to my judgment of the teachers and it keeps all students safe I think so involved really is respecting that privacy okay District administrator report Mr tarer all right lots to share um uh it's been a while now but the the summer offerings for mrap came out so not sure if you saw that but Alicia

069and the team did such a great job they're so many amazing Recreation and Aquatics things so thank you to Alicia and Stu for that some of the new activities I always like to look at the new activities Cheer Camp adult freezer meal prep Workshop Golf Camp bricktopia Master's Builder Camp coding kiddos Camp robotic Scouts Bots Camp they just keep adding and adding and adding so lots of great things we've had a lot of music since we were last here I think um kindergarten and I think fifth grade um Kindergarten music and fifth grade art and music occurred I didn't get to go to either of those but people were raving I got emails about all of those things as was mentioned previously the vocal showcase that was last week uh in the heard great things

070about that too it's awesome video want to thank uh Christa brinkmeier and the Matt Splinter Memorial Tournament organizers for their generous donation towards a p purchase of a refrigerator to use at the McFarland baseball concession so thanks for that very generous and will be well is being well used um the uh congratulations to Brian Han who was recognized as a 20 24 Crystal Apple award honorable mention Rec so congratulations hundreds anony of n nominees five are honored and 10 receive the honorable mention so so an elite crew thank you to mbc5 for sponsoring congratulations Mr Hans it's actually so deserving yes very deserving it is it is on TV tonight so we're missing that so tune in when you get home um we'll be home before 10 the was previously mentioned two things have have

071been happening happening first of all we had the first set of referendum engagement committees so a reminder we were planning to have three meetings of 12 to 15 people we had so much interest we are having six meetings of 12 to 15 people really the first meeting that we had last week is focused on orienting people to our budget making sure they have the questions answered discussing why the referendum didn't pass and beginning to explore ideas for moving forward our next meeting will really start looking at possible solutions so it was really good real cross-section of people uh I think there were a lot of aha Mo moments yeah you know over the course of both of those meetings from what I understand yeah I certainly learned a ton certainly learned a ton and today

072we had our first staff additional but uh budget cuts committee additional budget cuts committee ABC committee um we met today and um it was it was interesting it's is tough we had a really great group a large number of Staff interested and engaged in the work and going through the suggestions and starting to prioritize them based on the impact they have on students and we haven't done this before so we learned a lot that group did today and we meet again on the 20th and then one more time on the 29th so we will will that will that be available to those to the Committees that are you know the community I don't think so I don't think the timing I mean we can give them updates but I don't think it'll be done the

073timing doesn't work to where it'll be done yeah cuz I'm sure you're going to get some really creative ideas some far things mhm yes exactly it was really fun good I mean it was really interesting but they there were some Growing Pains as we haven't done that before and there were a lot of suggestions so so that was interesting and good for us and good for us yeah really good for us I think yeah we'll see where we end up yeah we'll be end up whatever we do as I mentioned to them reduces whatever we need to use from fund balance or possible future referendum mhm um also wanted to acknowledge today started the day interesting here at McFarland High School and really want to acknowledge our custodial staff and Food Service staff who walked

074in to water spraying out of something in the kitchen and about an inch of floor in the c or inch of water in the cafeteria the whole floor the whole floor had about an inch of water that ruins my paret floor just we're working on it now if it's sealed right I'll I'll take you on a tour afterwards maybe you can see where the area is is oh man I know that's the worst so people so we had to turn the water off obviously so that meant and the kitchen was flooded so we moved they moved the cold breakfast items out into the hall and we had some seats of available you know there was some of the floor that wasn't wet but then they were with their I'd call them the zambonis um going

075back and forth and back and forth and there is a crew coming in today that came in today that is doing a special I what they called it like Zip blocking or something I don't know but they they they cover the walls and they I guess they like really heat the place up and then they shoot air under the floor or something I don't know but just amazing scramble this morning I bet wow you know that would be in contrast to the Middle School yes where they lost water up the Middle School lost water today boy they weren't expecting with the road construction yeah oh gosh for a little bit yeah for a little bit so diversity brings the best out of us right but the the toilets are flushed we're all okay oh God

076okay pH um something I wanted to mention coming up is and I just learned about this May 13th May 13th is community day that the seventh grade is doing so they are basically putting together like a service learning day with the seventh grade students so they're partnering with Community organizations they're going to start by going to first grades and they're going to um read with students as part of their literacy time and connect with students there and then there where kids are going to divide students are going to divide up into different options like creating a a middle school garden marking storm drains a trash pickup in the community resurfacing a park playground with wood chips in the community helping clean the children's area at the edock uh Public Library weeding the community garden preparing

077plants for the larssen house plant sale cleaning monuments at the American Legion so so they've got all these variety of activities cool that they're going to be doing so seventh grade seventh grade that's awesome the first time ever that's exting awesome I I think one of the you know huge strengths of our district is the amount of cross-generational experiences that the kids are having now from high school all the way down to kindergarten that's great to Prov I know when we when we were kind of bandying about Senior Center locations and things like that I know one thing that they talked about a lot was the interaction between if a if a if a place like um dual Library over there the after school Place Youth Center the youth center um if they can be

078near physically near a senior center there can be a lot of advantages to the cross-generational wisdom you know and that sort of thing but then there's other aspects of where a food pantry Maybe will want to be as opposed to a senior center and opposed to a youth center yes and I'm going to jump into some some pictures for you that that was a good segue Tom so so you have Juniors the Eco Club you know teaching the first graders they're planting sunflowers I would say I I don't know the numbers but it's been a dramatic increase in that cross-generational things CPS had that's pman my pocket event so they were walking around and reading a poem that they had in their pocket that was really fun see the student sharing there this was um

079some eighth graders I don't I don't know who it is I can't tell from the picture I should know but um take your child to workday they came over to C EPS so was staff members kid I guess a is that fun um whis family fun night was so much fun Bruce and I did a great job running our station and I can tell you that what was your station we were like finished the finished the song finished the so you'd start you'd pick up a piece of paper with a song and you'd start singing the lyrics and then the rest of your group's supposed to jump in oh that was a lot of fun then he later took out the guitar and started doing some riffs it was pretty awesome yeah we had we

080had a lot we find that on YouTube Miss it's not but what a great event so well organized they put so much time into that I know we've talked about that before uh the Middle School their annual Alternative Energy Fair where kids come up with ideas for Energy Solutions in in science in seventh grade great project if you ever get up there I don't know that an invite went out to you this year but I'll try to remember that for next year because that's really cool the Lance of allies they participated in a in a their own Polar Plunge with with the dumping water so oh gosh had a lot of fun there great group there a little cheering section at the middle school track meet it's always nice when students are cheering each other

081on and having a good time you saw this a little bit earlier I think what the Constitution means to me the classes travel to that that's pretty good I didn't get to see I've seen the like um movie documentary about that but very powerful saw this the frenic team nice picture there congratulations to them we mentioned Ava Dean um in that recognition one of 32 Statewide finalists and she's the first one in our school his I'm amazed I we've had some incredible yeah alums it's really cool yeah it's really honor her resume is yeah stag yep and that's for athletics and academics yep BSU attending that at Madison College great event you saw this um I think previously we've talked about the connect Club how they volunteer at the polls such a neat thing yeah

082registering voters right I think I mentioned this before last meeting I believe with the AFS International programs had an event here at the high school and so thank you to Brian Ward Marlo Connor and and Patrick tuy for speaking to these groups but I think it's really a neat way you can see our SLC Student Learning Center in action here and so grateful that for that and aroni um did a presentation yeah we're very lucky to have him in this community yes wonderful event just really proud to host it Earth Day misfortune's class is like this is physical fitness let's go on a fitness walk and pick up some trash looks like they had a pretty good day for it nice um professional development day sometimes after looking at disciplinary literacy student survey data the

083survey that that um I shared with you last board meeting staff needed to do some wellness and have some fun together so they had a lot of different yoga and and obviously you can see them doing some uh coloring there and some basketball that's a great beard man that's a good one no that's good lots of recognitions have happened you know volunteers recognition week thank you to all of our amazing volunteers and there's so many administrative professional stay um that happened on the 24th so an exciting day I was gone that day at the conference so that's why I was feeling like it was coming apart a little bit little so and I were both down there for a little bit um National physical education week so that is um 1st through the 7th which

084I guess goes part way into tomorrow I guess um first week of May must they must do what they do there but amazing team so hardworking and the job they do getting kids engaged it's just extreme of course we had School principles day as well our four principles there they got a lot of recognition from students and staff it's really special National lunch hero day was last week at the end of last week so I want to hug them all yeah they are outstanding they're just so positive they're so positive such an important part of our our student day hasn't changed for 50 years no the lunch ladies are always we love the Lunch Ladies everybody does but the food has changed in 50 years oh oh yeah I do still like that cheese pizza

085that you got in a rectangle that was the best day yeah salmon patties and of course it's National appreciation week so thank you board for your contributions um at the McFarland House Cafe that uh staff enjoying a coffee or ice cream and or ice cream so so that is my report uh any recognitions that the board members have to share I have a couple um one is very last minute because it was just today but we had to update one of my kids records and we brought in all the necessary paperwork um to miss walk and I think on Infinite Campus within an hour we were getting like the updated like things had been updated already and I was like oh my gosh that was so fast so grateful to the you know front office

086admin team the high school very fast um and then I know that the vocal showcase was highlighted but there was also the acapella Dane County Summit AT Oregon yes Oregon high school it was phenomenal I'm an AC capella geek that's I'm so I'm biased but um it was so fun to see I mean it was like eight or nine different DNE County Schools came together and their AC capella groups um and all and just the celebration of that was wonderful but or and let's say and um McFarland had such a strong presence like Paul Greg really helps the kids Embrace their love of music and then like there's student Le groups there's the group that he leads and oh my gosh and I I mean I'm going to brag a little but McFarland were really

087some of the best and our um Blue Notes had the only Standing Ovation I heard the standing ovation it was phenomen Al Under Pressure spectacular yes yeah under pressure by Queen o it was so good it's in the um there's a little clip of it in the Monday minute okay okay right or the Spartan spotlight spotl video for the high school it's cool it's cool yeah so I also attended that you did though but we came in at the last minute so we didn't have to pay we would made the donation but they had taken the table down but you're absolutely right Farland I say blasted the other schools of the water yes they did and that stand an ovation it wasn't just for a few seconds no people stood no for a long time

088yeah lot to be proud of and certainly Paul Greg you know a lot of things to be said about him another person I saw just today uh I forget what her name is I think she was the librarian at seps but I went into the library and she had the students in a learning area they all had these robots and there's like three pieces to each robot and she was teaching them how to move their robot with their iPads it was the first lesson for it so they had to go through a lot of requisite things but I was amazed at that and I couldn't decide if it was a first grade class or a second grade class but regardless either way it's something that you wouldn't have learn till High School many years ago

089yeah Amy Martin there that's amazing it is I know we mentioned prom a little bit but it's just so much work behind the scenes and I hope the students really appreciate all the work that goes into that um sounds like it was a great great event I heard just wonderful things I love seeing all the pictures know the capital was wild like our JD's group of friends went down there and I mean it was packed have you never gone down there for pictures during prom before no oh it's crazy it's so fun Wild it is fun it is fun we happen to be down there on Saturday night for other things and it's just always fun we just get get I'm such a people Watcher right I just love to see it's wild I mentioned

090going down there and I got a very hard no from the kid so that was fun you all listen to them yeah I know I just got to go the other thing I would mention it is national teacher and School staff weaton yes and um on one hand i'm opposed to that but on the other hand it should be every day yes throughout the whole year MH you know and it's too bad we have to identify one week because what they do is remarkable throughout the whole year including summer so and unless you're there you don't know know and I was think May yeah I mean we're usually we're starting to feel pretty good you know it's that should have it in January February February's a tough one that is a tough month in we

091should do it both times both times maybe we should make a McFarland official yeah appreciation week in February well Tom's been wanting to make a month I I think maybe quarterly would be good not a bad idea but yeah there's a lot going on this week by the way too we've got concerts band concert and crazy middle school high school choir concert next week for middle school high school they're so good our kids are sool day tonight yep that it right now that's it you're done Mr tarit sure okay we've got a few action items here first of all action on 66. 0301 Dane County new teacher project otherwise known as dcnp shared services agreement for the 2024 25 school year the Dane County new teacher project is the parent organization of our McFarland new

092teacher mentoring program the district is a charter member of the dcnp and renews our agreement with them annually Administration recommends approval of the dcnp shared services agreement for the 2024 25 school year if you are in agreement with this recommendation uh I would look for a motion sure I'll move to approve the 24 20242 D County new teacher project shared services agreement as recommended by Administration thank you do I have a second I'll second that man any other discussion hearing none all those in favor please signify by saying I I oppose motion carries 5 next is action on summer 2024 extended contract each Summer Staff with unique roles are provided compensation to complete summer work in addition to their existing school year contracts if you are in agreement with these recommended summer curriculum hours uh

093then I would look for a motion to approve I can make that motion thank you Bruce I move to approve the summer 2024 extended contracts as recommended by Administration thank you do I have a second I'll second that there we go she's on the board the further discussion yes I have a couple things here I think you know in light of what's happened with the failed referendum and in preparation for a possible future referendum I think we have to take a careful look at this uh proposal the board has control over this you unlike when we got together after the referendum you know teacher salaries and that you know we all agree to we're going to keep that in place this is something something that you know it it is a cost item um I

094think desperate times you know means St Desperate Measures uh I think we have to be uh responsive to our existing challenge future our budget challenges and the future deficits that are in front of us and I think if we place a referendum before the community again I think we have to be able to demonstrate that we have continued to make some some somewhere um so I have a different proposal than what's before the board right now on that on the the topic of summer school and extended cont contracts yes okay specifically the total amount okay yeah and that's just to be clear that it's not connected with summer school it's for teachers who have extended hours for different projects and things they do with staff in the summer I did look um um just to

095see we did make some reductions to this list before it got to you and that accounted for uh a 4% reduction in what was originally proposed to what you're seeing so there was some reduction done um so I just wanted to re to reflect that and and Tom I just like to make a comment had had we not pursued this kind of community um listening session or or I what is it called again exact Eng session referendum engagement session yeah I I would I would say you're probably spot on but I'm I guess I'm very confident that we're going to find the teachers will find things in many cases this is stuff that have been kind of agreed upon you know before the referendum and I just feel like uh it's also I think it's

096going to if we're really interested in maintaining our you know top-notch learning for our kids and I think in some ways this is all worthwhile so I mean I understand what you're saying but I just think in the end we're going to be able offset this pretty easily see but until I see what is being recommended I I would have a hard time continuing to spend all this amount yeah um seen as believing yeah and these the uh extended contracts during the summer many of them don't deal directly with kids I mean there's an imp somewhere down the line sure but it's not like they have face face student with the kids and I just feel that you know if it comes where the engagement group says know we just have to tighten our belts

097you know across the whole District to me this is a good way to start it I mean if we don't need to you know in a couple weeks or whatever yeah I would certainly Entertain You know a different sense to that but I just feel that you know that's that's 1559 hours well no less than that now because Erin said was 4% less um it's what you're seeing we reduced 4% to get to what you're seeing there hasn't been anything what you have in the exhibit is is what is for us now yeah they still have you know again I think as a board you it would behoove us to make some tough decisions and again a decision here doesn't directly impact kids at this point you know and maybe it's more you know the

098the saying don't work harder work smarter you know and I think there's always room how we can streamline some things and and at some point I don't know if this is you know the place that's going to happen but we are going to have to make some tough decisions you know and the and they're all going to be similar I would imagine to something like this where it's it doesn't seem like maybe it's a lot but we do have to be moving we do have to be showing the community that we are trying trying to add on to those savings that we have like I said there are going to be hard decisions and I don't know if this is is going to be it but this is the sort of thing we have to

099we really have to maybe reconsider some of the way that we thought in the past do we get a breakdown of how each one of these positions is utilizing their hours we can certainly provide that we we have that okay we have that you know and I think the the the question is what level of Engagement does the board want to have you know in terms of these numbers you know is it something where you know you would want to give us a directive to reduce them by a certain percentage you know and the administrative team works with the staff members involved to figure out what that is or individual items I can give you an just a general summary of some of the categories that that happen so when you see the student services

100members names that's primarily for interactions with new students and families registering so sometimes we don't use I mean it's up to these hours just know that but that is you know families that that come in and and need additional services or schedule those kind of things and that's a chunk um you'll see like the the tech ad Department that is really focused on maintaining those the machines and the the tools that they use and doing some some of the maintenance there and then the remaining ones that involve some of the coordinators positions that's where they're working with staff on different summer summer projects and I think that about covers everybody actually see what I what I would propose is a 20% decrease in the total number of hours so would be 311 hours fewer than

101what's been requested what is it 1500 1599 15559 but I'm not sure how everybody else feels about that well with that 20% that 20% across each line item or do we have the ability to say okay for example um you know the psychologist needs to maintain those 27 hours so we need to offset those hours somewhere else yeah I I don't think it's our job to identify how to do it our job is what is the bottom line okay when I'm suggesting 20% decrease let the a council decide how they want to spend those hours because theying the best position to know where they might be able to make some changes I think um I think you bring up a really good point and I think it has to be part of every decision we're

102making going forward I think back to our I don't know if it was our working Retreat when we went over all of the referendum Cuts initially and that 630,000 that we identified I mean in that meeting we committed to not reducing things that are going to be impacting students and this didn't come up right and so I W I would be concerned that that whatever impact we feel down the line that impacts students might be more than we want to give but don't you think we could say that about any cuts that we're going to have to make yeah I just don't know that we're there yet and I I feel like this is part of that commitment that we made to staff see I don't that as part of the commitment that we made

103previously what is the total dollar amount Associated I believe it is 77,78 [Music] M hours So 20% reduction would be about 15,000 yeah about 15,000 and it depends because different staff that have extended contracts have different salary am right yeah the amount getting there is it more important for ours or total dollar for the reduction because those are two different things and I know and I thought about that and I would leave that up to Administration but but from my point of view it would be total hours total not not total cost what um if we're if we're going to consider asking a council to go back and reduce this by 20% what does that mean knowing that we're on that it's May 6th and what does so what does that mean for summer contracts

104being offered so the contracts haven't been issued so we would have time between now and the next board meeting to come back with a revised recommendation for board approval and I apologize if I'm asking too many questions um did each one of these positions submit a proposal on why they needed them okay yeah and and to be honest these are longstanding okay okay my apologies there's nothing no apologies there's nothing on here that wasn't on last year okay so these are more like recurring mhm okay they have they have been it's $ 77,78 okay anybody else well we have a motion and a second um if there's no more discussion would all those in favor please signify by saying I I I I oppose no no motion carries 32 hope it doesn't back to haunt

105us action on recommended weeva destinations Career Academy Insight School of Wisconsin statute 11848 G student transfers to resident districts at this time WEA destination Career Academy and School of Wisconsin are requesting approval of the recommended student transfers back to their resident districts due to a lack of Engagement if you are in favor of this recommendation a motion is in order so moved okay Tom do I have a second I can second that again any other discussion of course for the second month of the role we have no K5 students on this list terrific um indication of the work that the weeva staff is doing we only have six um students in middle school that are on the list again that's quite remarkable uh we have seven 12th graders on the list which really saddens me

106because they're getting very close to that finish line to graduation even if it's just they're just beginning senior um you know I just wish there was something else we could do right now there's nothing we can do but hopefully in the future there'll be some other options for these kids especially when they can see graduation in their near future potential graduation that's a shame it is a shame anything else no the only thing I'll be taking a closer like to middle school and high school okay next year all those in favor please signify by saying I I oppos motion carries 5 Z and now we are to election of officers at this time Craig howy the board president serving as presiding officer will entertain a motion to begin the process of election of officers these

107terms as officers are for one year consistent with the past practice we will accept nominations for officers beginning with the president any nominations for president I'll make a nomination for Craig Howry thank you Tom position of President any others I'll make a nomination for Megan fesler for president okay how do we do this [Music] [Laughter] Andie I believe that you need to get you ask for a second I will take care of it ask it makes sense I don't knowa how thats when you have two nominations we did it we did it one time in the past with paper ballots we could do paper why don't you two both stand up and give us a little background no I'm kidding [Music] any advice District administrator nope um we have to accept I was going to

108say you have to accept the nomination first of all okay in order to proceed but I assume since I didn't hear otherwise that was what was happening yeah yeah and I'll make a second I I will second Craig okay as president oh well I mean we can just do it the way we do it well in full transparency Craig and I have discussed this a little bit so I think I will not accept my nomination would be an easy probably the easiest way to do it so um but thank you you're welcome um then I think we can just vote well okay right okay all those in favor of Craig Howry taking the uh president spot please signify by saying I I I opposed motion carries 5 Z vice president I would uh propose that

109Tom Mooney okay you accept that Tom I do any other nominations all those in favor please signify by saying I oh I yeah I need a second to the motion for Tom for vice president right oh I can say that Megan thank you all those in favor of Tom as vice president pleas signify by saying I I I oppose carries 5 z uh election of clerk I would nominate Bruce fer thanks I'll second that okay any others all those in favor please signify by saying I I I opposed 5 Z and Treasurer I would nominate Megan festler I accept thank you any others I just have one question to ask her are you good at money I mean I try to be okay all those in favor please signify I'll second yes please signify by

110saying I I I I oppose carries 5 Z thank you one and all all now we will move on to committees uh let's see do we have the Burbage for each of those here kind of the duties in the motion agenda in the board book one in the what which one okay okay uh first of all is uh Wisconsin Association of school boards the the Wisconsin Association of school boards delegate receives regular legislative newsletters from the uh uh WS WB copies of new laws and when deemed appropriate convey information about those items to the board in November the de delegate attends a one one day delegate Workshop in which together with delegates from all over the state and the Ws WB policies and resolutions committee members any policy changes and resolutions to be considered at

111the January convention are discussed and formulated before that meeting the delegate should try to ascertain whether the local board has concerns to be addressed in the workshop and I I'm I'm have served as our Delegate for a number of years and I'd be perfectly happy to do it again unless someone else would like to kind of start out there and uh learn to become the delegate on a more permanent basis at some point any other nominations any other wishes to be on that that committee if not I'll go ahead and do it again okay we'll do that we'll do that then thanks Greg you got that uh alternate who would who would like to be the alternate I could be the alternate okay Megan that's great that is a good idea okay the Village of

112McFarland McFarland School Board joint planning committee the school district of McFarland and Village of McFarland entered into a memorandum of understanding on February 2022 to formalize the Joint planning committee work to discuss issues of mutual concern the district shall annually appoint two members and one alternate from its governing board to serve on the Joint Committee along with the district administrator or design in the 2023 2024 school year this group generally were scheduled to meet every two to three months on the 2 Tuesday at 4 pm Bruce fiser and Megan fesler held these positions in 20 23 24 with Craig Howry as alternate uh any wishes to remove yourself or strong feelings about staying it like stay you both would like to stay this is the one area I really okay there a lot of opportunity

113this year especially I think I think maybe it would be best if I stay as alternate as well I agree so can we do that yeah okay all right so that'll stay the same cesa 2 annual convention representative pursuant to section 116021 c Wisconsin statutes and section 116021 A Wisconsin statute the Board needs to appoint a school board member as its representative to the 2024 cisa convention which is generally held in late June at 6:30 in Whitewater for 2023 Tom Mooney served as the representative to the convention and Kate green as alternate Tom would you like to yes I would do that again yeah the other opportunity is that you can also become uh be on the board of control which means you would represent um other area C2 districts like um manona Madison Oregon

114Sten Y and Deerfield Megan would you be interested in in an alternate spot for the ca 2 when is it oh which Meg are you talking to oh that's a good oh I'm sorry do we have some kind of code in place here that when I call on a Megan it's you can call me lady H is what we lady H yeah or just H maybe okay you're really taking it you're gra it the only thing I would caution us is that our viewership might want to know exactly who we are that's true I know Tom I was on was on Tom M or Tom a you don't think lady H is cuz I have an H in my name you do whatever you guys want you know she's got the extra flavor do you

115have anything you'd like that you have an interest in so I personally um would love to be part of the employee Relations Committee okay and then um the additional one at the bottom is the legislative liaison but we can talk about that but I mean I'm more than happy to be an alternate for the ca convention what date is it it's in June if we actually do have an exact date here they informed us that it shall begin at 7:00 on Tuesday June 18th in the Whitewater innovent Innovation Center is it one day one evening one even one evening oh I can be an alternate for that sure okay we'll do we'll go with that then thank you business and education partnership Council the business and education partnership Council oversees and directs the business and

116education partnership efforts in the district for the 2023 2024 school year the group was anticipated to meet from 2: to 300 p.m. in person at a community location four times per year Kate green served in this position in 20232 24 with Tom Mooney as alternate um does someone have an interest in taking Kate spot or Tom would you like to move up into Kate spot and look for a different alternate what day of the week do they meet again did you say I don't I don't remember them meeting it hasn't gone I don't think there's been one this is one that I'm more than happy to do that well she wants to do it okay unless you want to do it true no I I mean I would be interested in serving as the alternate

117okay okay so we get Megan Chapman perfect do you want okay no and Megan fesler is Alter yes Chapman and and this is one hope to see that it meets more I don't know the story because I know that this is one of our goals but you would be good for it as well right as you do I think I think both of you I think it's a natur employee Relations Committee beginning with 2024 2025 is it recommended that the professional staff employee Relations Committee and support staff employee Relations Committee combin into one employee Relations Committee to continue their work to serve as a means of representing McFarland School District professional and support staff regarding concerns suggestions and the overall satisfaction of the work environment its purpose shall be to allow representatives from each School

118within the district the opportunity to listen respond make recommendations and act as a voice on behalf of the employees when meeting and conferring with the board and administration for the 2023 2024 school year perser cerk has has generally met every other month around 3:45 p.m. Craig Howry and Megan festler agreed to serve on the professional staff employee Relations Committee for 2324 with Tom Mooney as alternate Megan fesler and Bruce fiser agreed to serve on the support staff employee Relations Committee for 20232 24 with Kate green as alternate um oh thank you yeah it's going to combined committee beginning in 20 24 2025 we would be looking to appoint a total two representatives and one alternate um I would like to be one of the representatives yeah I think on our board survey there were three

119of us that were interested y yeah um I think it's a really I it's a really rewarding committee to serve on and I um but I think it's also highly a great learning opportunity so I mean I while I'm interested I'm also um willing to serve as alternate or step off with Megan you said you were interested so part of my professional background is working with employee groups and you know really building camaraderie and taking feedback and so this is something that's near and dear to my heart is working with other people so that's why I would like to be a part of it makes sense and it seems like the the three yeses were Craig you and I so okay I took my name off it I mind being on it either so I

120I didn't put that on my but I defer for sure to either of you ladies if you like well um yeah we got to get an alternate either either one is is the representative and one's an alternate yes I think that'd be good how should we I can be the alternate thank you okay good there we are thank you both Megan uh Wisconsin virtual Academy's representative I'd be willing to do it again Tom you're so unbelievable I know you're very good at it learn so much from you just listening to the last few meetings about WEA well since no one else signed up for it you know I did it once before yeah I I know you on our on our survey I think it is very rewarding though it's nice to know what our

121other school is all about you are so thorough amazing well I'm I'm fine with Tom remaining in that position that's for sure same okay uh WEA three-year review Representatives Craig Howry and Bruce Fischer agreed to serve as the weeva review representatives for the last review which occurred in 2021 2022 for the 2023 through 2028 contract and representatives will be appointed in May prior to the next review process no representative are needed for the 2425 school year that's easy okay uh legislative legislative liaison should the board wish to appoint a legislative liaison this position would keep appr prised of pending legislation and serve as a point of contact with federal state Andor local legislators to communicate information on the Wisconsin or McFarland School District goals and needs we look for for a motion for to no

122no a nomination nomination Megan you said you would you don't need a nomination don't know yeah so I don't know if you knew this or not but my stepmother is a state senator and I have very close relationships with the state senators in our district as well as the State Assembly person and various other political Arenas oh maybe if you're willing that might be I'm more than spot for you and I like the adding this new committee to the board it's really needed it's a great idea I think well it was your suggestion Tom sort of but I didn't want to steal your thunder if you would like to do it you know representative is it representative representative kitchen kitchen he's from Appleton no but I did hear you talk about him he's the one

123that I spoke about last week that so my stepmom is actually the Senate minority leader okay um and so how can we use that to our advantage pretty well actually by having Megan as our legislative on and I think having your El to become the majority leader you know we're working on it uh but I mean I've I've been having a lot of interesting conversations regarding public education funding and this is a role that I'm uh very excited to have the opportunity to do it as long as you all say yes yes I think that's just fine and that uh brings the committee assignments to a conclusion and I would look for can I wait can I do can I say one other thing so it's not included on our list here because we don't

124think that they've met since 2015 or 16 this was the danne county Consortium right but is that the same thing that it's not that Val talked about okay great that b talk well the the annual Oh I thought you were talking about the Sun Prairie thing no the Dayne County Consortium Equity oh the like the justify thing yes the justify thing different yes so the justify is a student organized event for student equity and social justice leaders okay take care not an adult yeah well I mean they said it was hosted by the equity or something so I was just confused yeah I think it's you're saying it's not the same thing so it's fine it may be connected with it but I don't think that group has been yeah which group is it that

125we went out to was it Sun Prairie yeah that's a different that's a different Consortium right I don't think it officially has a name yet yes but you are right there is a connection between what is that what was that group called DC EC Dane County the equity Consortium mhm yeah yeah and this justify group I think that's where they're funneling their efforts but it no longer has Representatives all right that meet the way they did it in those first few years and I don't know did you ever maybe once or tce there was one there was one event because I was the liaison for one and I tried to get more information and there was one event um a student panel and then that was it so yeah so I just wanted to bring

126that up because I just thought well maybe they're actually active and we're not on some list but it sounds like no so not in that regard I I presume that farl students were not leading in that group that you were just talking about um no that there were only a few on the panel and it wasn't they were invited by um Percy BRS I perc Percy yes Percy Brown thank you sorry I'm sorry Percy um he he um coordinated the group or the event and led it led the discussion so like was only if McFarland students were supposed to lead it it would still be running mostly right now y so okay thank you for clearing that up I would look for a motion to adjourn well in the spirit of my predecessor I'll make

127that motion there you go I was hoping you noticed that a good for you yay do I have a second second Tom all those in favor please signify by saying I I I opposed carries 5 and we are adjourned at 859 look at that thank you so much for being so welcoming yeah welcome here yeah wait till next time okay I was just going to say honey