2026-3-25 Board of Education Regular Meeting

001Welcome St. Vain Valley School Board of Education meeting for March 25th, 2026. Please stand if you're able and join us for the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with justice for all. Sure. Mrs. Babs? Present. Mr. Berthold? Yes, present. Mrs. Gilligan? Here. Mr. Lechuga? Excused. Mrs. Solomon? Here. Mrs. Weiss? Here. Thank you. Are there ever any changes to the agenda? No, I'm not. Thank you. Okay, we'll start tonight with our visitors, Dianne Lahr, Direct Science Olympiads. Well, thank you. Good evening, Vice President Berthold, Dr. Capuchin, members of the board. It is my great pleasure to bring forward Mike O'Toole, who is our K-12 science curriculum coordinator. Not only does he oversee our science curriculum implementation,

002he also leads and supports a number of incredible enrichment co-curricular activities across our district. So with that, I'm going to let him introduce this amazing group. Thank you. Good evening. As Dr. Lahr mentioned, my name is Mike O'Toole, science coordinator here. I get a wonderful job. I get to work with K-12 science teachers around the district. This is amazing. I'm here tonight to recognize the district science Olympiad teams. We currently have teams at Eagle Crest Elementary, Erie Middle School, Niwot, and Silver Creek High Schools, as well as the team from Altona Middle School who's here with us tonight. Now, the funding for these teams comes from our STEM Explorers Program, which is part of our annual science budget and supports both in-school and extracurricular STEM programs district-wide. And as a content coordinator, we often challenge

003our teachers to make the magic happen. And in my case, with the sciences, to bring science to life and inspire students. As you'll see, that is exactly what's taking place here with Science Olympiad. So get ready to answer some questions and share your knowledge. I believe there are some prizes for correct answers for board members this evening. But at this time, I'd like to introduce Ben Polinsky, a science teacher at Altona Middle School. Right. Got to get a nice height here. Thank you guys so much for having us. We are thrilled to be here in your presence. My name is Benjamin Polinsky, and with me are the wonderful Sarah Barnett and the infamous Craig Atterbury, followed by the leaders of Altona. Guys, today we are here to talk about something special. We're here to talk

004to you about Science Olympiad, go through kind of what it is, what it takes to be a part of it, and also about the future of Altona. Now, I think we can all agree, St. Vrain Valley School District holds a special place in our hearts. And for us, Altona holds a special place to us. And it's because of Science Olympiad, we get to build family, build community, and share our knowledge and keep expanding on that every day, which is something very special. And we can thank you for that opportunity. Have you guys ever heard of the Olympics or watched the Olympics? Show of hands. Well, I have a special guest here to talk to you about what it takes to be a Science Olympian. Thank you, and good evening. This year, Altona had three teams

005participating in Science Olympiad with a total of 50 students who explore science far beyond the classroom. Students work in teams of two to three on 23 different events covering genetics, earth science, chemistry, anatomy, geology, physics, mechanical engineering, and technology. The events themselves challenge students in multiple ways. Some are core knowledge events, where students research and master content. Others are build events, where they design and construct devices in advance. There are also hands-on laboratory events that require critical thinking and real-time problem-solving, as well as hybrid events that combine core knowledge and builds. Science Olympiad is more than a competition. It's an opportunity for students to think deeply, work collaboratively, and apply their learning in meaningful ways. Here are the real stars of Science Olympiad, the students, and we'll begin with Altoni and Parker to tell you

006a little about their events. Hello, my name is Altoni, and I'm in eighth grade, and this is my third year doing Science Olympiad. Hi, my name is Parker. I'm also in eighth grade, and this is my first year doing Science Olympiad. Build events are events that require contestants to build devices or tools that fit the challenge at hand. This can range from levers and bridges all the way to helicopters and Rube Goldberg machines, which you will soon learn about. These events teach students patience, precision, and excellent teamwork, all of which they will need in order to get a podium finish. I'll be talking about an event called Helicopter, in which teams will have to build a rubber-powered helicopter and compete to see whose helicopter can stay in the air the longest. The helicopter utilizes elastic

007potential, converting to kinetic energy to lift off. Teams have to learn about the core parts of aerodynamics, such as lift, and will have to tinker with the different aspects of their helicopter, such as the length of the rubber band, the size of their rotor, and other variables. Building the helicopter itself takes tons of precision, and one wrong step can lead to the total failure of the helicopter. The thing I like about this event is the amount of patience and teamwork that it requires, and I feel that it exercises all the qualities mentioned above. Now Altena will talk about her event. I will be talking about a build event called Mission Possible. In the event, we needed to build a Rube Goldberg machine, which is a purposely over-complicated machine in which actions keep triggering each other.

008We had 12 options on mechanisms to add to the machine, ranging from simple or complex machines to knocking over dominoes, and at the end, our goal was to separate marbles, golf tees, and paperclips. The end goal changes every year, and we get a different amount of points for each mechanism we add. We had several different constraints, like supplies, dimensions of the machine, and a 60-second time limit. This event involved lots of trial and error, so me and my partner faced many challenges while working on the machine. Our biggest issue was probably making things work consistently and having the patience to work on the same thing for multiple days in a row. Despite the challenges we faced, we persevered and won first place at the regional competition. The thing I like most about this event is

009that we can be very creative with it and we're forced to think outside the box. There are two other groups of events, Core Knowledge and Lab Events, and next Iris and Harper will talk about what Core Knowledge events are. Hi, my name is Harper and I'm in 8th grade. I've done Science Olympiad for two years. Hi, my name is Iris and I'm also in 8th grade, and this is my first year doing Science Olympiad. One of the events I'm in is water quality. It's a knowledge-based event, which means you can use notes to take a test. But the amount brought in can be very, well, sorry. The amount brought in varies. For example, water quality is only allowed to have one page front and back of notes. For other events, for example, Solar Systems, which

010is another event that I have, you can have two pages front and back. And unlike other Core Knowledge events, we actually get an addition to making notes and taking a test. Aside from notes, we also have to make a cylinder meter, which is a device that measures the salt levels in water made with clay and water. These can vary in appearance, but this is what ours looked like. It may be clear from the amount of stuff we do together, but having teamwork is really important. It's what helped us not only just put a bunch of papers and notes together, but also helped our accountability, responsibility, communication, and leadership. So next, we have two questions for the board members, and whoever gets them correct can win our Altona Science Olympiad jerseys. So our first question will

011be, what is the average pH of rainwater? And the answers are up on the TV, and the answers are A, 3.4, B, 5.5, C, 6.2, or D, 3.7. Board members having? I'll guess 5.5. The answer is actually B, 5.5. Lucky D. Thank you. Our next question is, which river is home to mayflies, stoneflies, and the best school district in the state of Colorado? I'm sorry, I couldn't quite hear you. Correct. All right. Thank you. And our next group is Lucy and Shahita. Hi, I'm Lucy, and I'm in seventh grade, and I've been in Science Olympiad for two years now. Hi. Hi. I'm Shahita. I've been in seventh grade, and I've been in Science Olympiad since this year. And we're here representing the lab events, but especially Crime Busters. During our last competition, we were on

012the first place team. Well, we won first place. Crime Busters is where you get to a bunch of unknown powders and liquids, and sometimes cloth and hair, and you have to write down data to see who they correspond to in the crime. We used that evidence to find out who committed the crime, and we learned how to identify most common substances like yeast, flour, sugar, and et cetera. We also used that knowledge to connect the evidence and find who committed the crime. We were also able to have a paper front and back with our notes and research about fingerprints, shoe prints, and other identifiable evidence. We have lab kits. All lab events do. We have pH testers, pipettes, and a lot more. What I like most is that we get to collaborate and work on

013complex problems with other members, and we just get to get to know people who like to solve crimes with us. What I like about this event is that we get to learn about how to recognize different liquids by using simple methods, and I also like that we meet new people that have the same interests like us, and we get to have fun trying new things with them. And now one of our great Science Olympiad teachers, Mr. Atterberry. Thank you. They didn't do that in the practice, so that was kind of nice. Hey, great job, guys. I love science. I love Science Olympiad. I'm Craig Atterberry. I'm a science Olympiad coach and science, obviously, over at Altona Middle School, and about 10 years ago, I had a chance to talk to Jeremy LaCrosse, the principal there,

014and I asked him if we could start a Science Olympiad team, and he was excited and supportive from day one, and it's been a joy, an adventure, but a joy over the past decade to see how Science Olympiad has changed. We went from having one team to having three teams now, from having one coach to having three coaches now. We went from not doing very well in our events and not really knowing what we're doing to winning a lot of awards. So you see we have a lot of medals, we have trophies now, and that's a lot of fun. Winning is a lot of fun. But the reason I love Science Olympiad is because it really reinforces the ideas of a love of learning. It gives the students a chance to have a deep dive

015into science that they may not have just in the regular classroom, at least not quite as much. And one of the things that I know a few of our students mention, it really helps them to find a community of peers, and having that connection at the school is huge. So in those 10 years, we've grown, like I've said, but it's not just the growth at Altona. I love, as a teacher, seeing some of my past students going on to high school, on to Niwot, on to Silver Creek, and they've started Science Olympiad teams there as well. So this is something that's very important to the kids, and it's a great opportunity for them. And this expanded, like you heard, to other places in the district as well. So we have high schools, middle schools, and

016even an elementary school that are competing in Science Olympiad at this point. We want to thank you guys so much for the chance to be here. Obviously, the success of our teams is because of the hard work and dedication of the students, but none of that would be possible without St. Vrain Valley School District. So Dr. Capuchin and board members, we want to thank you for the chance to talk to you and also for your leadership within this district. I also want to thank Mr. Michael O'Toole and the STEM Explorers Program, which makes it possible as far as the funding. And finally, definitely need to thank the administration at Altona for supporting us all along the way. That's all we have, but if you guys have any questions for our students, they would maybe love

017to try to field them. Any questions by anybody? I just want to make a comment. This is, it's really good to see the students involved in science the way you all are outside of the classroom. A lot of people tend to develop that love about this age and go on into it, and sometimes this is where they get the most exposure, again, outside of the classroom. So just some of the things that you all went through and went over. I was sitting here trying to think, okay, the pH is this high. You know, I'm all getting this strategic thinking going on here. But it's really cool to see that you are all learning some of this stuff at such an early age, and also you're being able to be exposed really early, so you can

018see a lot of what you might see in real world careers and such. So I hope you're really having lots of fun, and then bring some friends. You know, they want to be your friend? You got to come to the Science Olympiad with me. And invite us to, I think I was talking earlier, invite us to some of your competitions, but we'd love to see those. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I did write the pH down, so now I know. Does the pH of rainwater ever change? Okay. Well I learned something new tonight. Thank you. Just a couple questions. Do you all meet after school? Does this last the whole school year? And where did you travel to for your competitions? Hey Lucy, you can come back here. We traveled to Fossil Ridge

019High School for our first regionals competition, and I think they're going to, first dates, they're going up to one of the, what do you call it? Colorado Springs. Oh yeah, Colorado Springs University. Oh yeah, we meet before school in the mornings. So on that, one of the cool things is they, if you come to Altoona at 7 a.m. on Thursday mornings you see 50 students showing up early to do science, so it's a pretty amazing sight. That is so cool. Thank you for all the leaders in the room too, and really instilling that leadership in the next generation. That's amazing. Do some of you have any fans here in the room? Like parents? Well thank you for getting your students to school early to participate in this, and students, we are so proud of you

020for your excitement in this area and your passion for learning and just the spirit of curiosity that you have, and I hope you continue to carry that through your educational career. And I'd like to say that I love kids who show up to do science in the morning. I really do, and congratulations to all of you for your hard work and your interest in a really, really important subject area, and we would love to get a picture with you so we can brag about you everywhere we go. Definitely. While they're breaking all this down, I need to apologize. I was so overwhelmed with all the students standing there and all the stuff in front of us, I forgot to make some announcement before we started the rest of the meeting, so I just want to

021welcome everybody again. This meeting is being streamed on our website, where a recording will also be available. If our live audience would please be sure that the device notifications are silent. We greatly appreciate it. And the meeting is being translated into Spanish, and headsets are available for anyone in our audience that will like them. I want to begin tonight's meeting with our district's mission statement, to educate each student in a safe learning environment so that they may develop to their highest potential and become contributing citizens. This mission provides clarity in our purpose, and our focus leaders make all decisions within that complex. And secondly, Dan, I would like to welcome our Student Advisory Council representative, Anna Johan, from Lyons Middle Senior High School, if you mind introducing yourself, and tell us a little about what

022your plans are and everything. Yeah, my name is Anna Johan, like you said, and I'm a senior at Lyons High School. Next year, I'm planning to attend CU Boulder and study biomedical engineering. Wow, you guys are always more ambitious than I am, but at my age, I don't have to be ambitious. Just get another day, you know? Anyway, okay. So that brings us up to our next set of visitors, Diane again, the exploration AI team recognition. Yeah, absolutely. And so, you know, the rapid acceleration of artificial intelligence has presented our district with a true real-world challenge, and true to fashion, we took a proactive stance early on to develop a coherent, human-centered, secure approach to expand academic excellence by design. A key element of our approach included a project called Exploration AI, which developed forums

023for discussing AI use guidelines, tool selections, and an array of robust professional development offerings. It's my honor to recognize the three leads of our Exploration AI team, who recently received an APEX Project of the Year award from the Colorado Technology Association. Those three are Jason Kelsall from our District Technology Services, Courtney Groskin from our Office of Professional Development, and Matt Moulton from our Curriculum and Instruction Department. You know, I do would also like to add that the St. Vrain Exploration AI Project was up against a number of Fortune 500 companies, and in fact, out of the eight award categories, St. Vrain Valley Schools was the only public school district represented, so the competition was stiff, but the rewards were high, and so I'd love to have Matt and Jason and Courtney come down so that

024they can just share a little bit about the experience leading this important project for us here in St. Vrain, and give you the opportunity to ask them any questions. I'm not sure where to put this. Those kids had lots of awards, but we do have this one. Thanks again for your time this evening. My name is Jason Kelsall, and I get to work at District Technology Services, and first we just want to really thank the board for your support, Dr. Lauer, Dr. Capuchin, Michelle, and Dr. Baker for their support in our Exploration AI. As Diane said, we were up against some pretty stiff competition, but we were very proud to be able to represent St. Vrain in public education in a forum in that way, so we were super excited. So, Matt, why did we

025win? That's a great question, Jason. We won, I think, because the award committees, they recognize the power and possibility that's present in public education, and they recognize that the students that we have and the opportunity, this challenge of making sure that we are future-ready, we wanted to meet that head on, and they see that in order for Colorado's tech infrastructure to continue to grow, they are going to need our students, and they recognize the work that we do as being very, very vital. Yeah. Do y'all have any questions or anything? I'm curious, like, what was the process of the competition? What were you actually presenting? What was the collateral and such? Sure. Yeah. So, Project of the Year, through the Colorado Technology Association, they put the call out for any technology-related projects in the state

026of Colorado, so we were up against companies like Dish Network and Google. There are a bunch of different parties involved in this, and what we did is we created this portfolio that shows all of the professional development that we've created, the amount of enthusiasm that we see in our teachers. We showcased a lot of the fun stuff that we get to do, the three of us, across our three departments in our regular jobs, and then also this additional job, this additional responsibility of the work. They reviewed all of the application materials, and they thought that ours was the Project of the Year. I would like to congratulate you three again. You might not outshine the kids in awards, but we beat Google, and we're not going to forget that, so I want to really recognize

027your ingenuity, your ability to inspire and motivate our staff to look forward and to continue to have public education be relevant in all of the things that we're teaching teachers, who are then passing those skills along to students, so thank you for your leadership in our district. One other question. Are any of your applications or anything published that we can see kind of what was presented and what the district is doing? Yeah, absolutely. They have our hype-up video, which is on their website, so we can find a link for that. There's also a really well-done article in the recent St. Vrain magazine around our ethos statement, which is our AI guidance, which is in St. Vrain, we believe that AI should be ethical, transparent, human-centered, opportunity-focused, and safe, so there's a really nice, well-done article

028in there with some other key highlights with that, so those are two good places. Great, thank you. We'll have this team forward the article, the award, or the application, so that you can read about their project and the video, and if you would send that to Christy, then she can forward all of that to the board. Sounds good. Thank you, I'd love to see it, thanks. Do we need another picture? We do need another picture. All right, now, come to audience participation, I know we have a couple of people signed up. I'll call their names, but first I want to ask, is there anybody else in the audience who would like to sign up to speak to the board tonight? Okay, looks like nobody else, and my list tells me we have two people already

029signed up, Kevin Hughes. I'm not Kevin Hughes. Well, I just need to give you some information. No, you're good, I'm Savannah Trujillo, I'm on the state manor, yep. So you're in place of Kevin Hughes? Yes. Okay, thank you for joining us. Board of Education greatly values feedback and perspective from our community. We're up to 30 minutes of non-agenda topics and up to 30 minutes of agenda topics per meeting, and each speaker will be limited to three minutes of speaking time. It is long-standing practice of the board not to address or respond during public comment section of the agenda. Please know that we are actively listening. Just before you begin, may we have your first name and please state your name and address for the record, please. My name is Savannah Trujillo. What did you say

030else? And address, please. 168 South Garfield Street. Which, in Longmont? No, it's in Denver. Okay, thank you. Yeah, so good evening members of the board. My name is Savannah Trujillo. I'm the state manager for American Driving Academy. It's the largest driving school in Colorado and we have locations across the front range and help more than 4,000 people each month work towards getting their driver's license. I'm also an alum of Silver Creek High School, so Longmont has always been home to me. Over the past year, we expanded into Longmont and opened a location here, along with completing a full classroom renovation. This was important to us because we want to provide a high quality experience for students in this community. We also understand the district's focus on preparing students for success and we believe safe independent

031transportation is an important part of that for many students here in Longmont. The main reason I wanted to come tonight was simply to introduce ourselves and share some information about an upcoming change to Colorado's driver education laws that will take effect January 1st, 2027. In Colorado today, driver education requirements depend on a student's age. Students who want to get their permit at age 15 must complete a 30 hour driver education course. Once a student turns 15 and a half, they can instead take a shorter four hour driver awareness course. And once a student turns 16, they can obtain a permit without taking any course at all. Because of this, many students simply wait until they turn 16 so that they can get a permit without taking and paying for a driver's education. Beginning January 1st,

0322027, that will change. Under the new law, every student under 18 will be required to complete a full 30 hour driver education course before obtaining a learner's permit. In addition, individuals between 18 and 20 will be required to complete a four hour course before getting their permit. The goal of this change is to ensure that all young drivers receive formal education before they begin driving independently. Because of these changes, schools and districts will likely start receiving more questions from students and parents about what these new requirements mean and how the licensing process will work. Our goal in reaching out is not to be sales focused, but simply to let the district know that we are here as a local resource. If counselors, administrators, or families ever have any questions regarding the requirements or the licensing

033process, we're always very happy to help. As someone from Longmont, I'm very proud to bring this to the community that I grew up in. And thank you very much for your time. Thank you. All right, we can move on. The next agenda is superintendent report. Yes, thank you. Well, happy spring, even though it's not officially spring yet. Or summer, I probably should say. We are in the thick of hiring season. And for our administrators, especially at the school level, we are trying to promote from as much within as possible so that we give our own dedicated and loyal employees some new opportunities. But that causes a little bit of a domino effect in our buildings. And what I'd like to do this evening is just give a shout out to our HR department team, as

034well as our area assistant superintendents who work all of these interview processes in the evenings. Oftentimes, for the last probably 8 to 12 weeks, I receive phone calls at 9 p.m. as they're driving home to let me know how those processes are going. And so they're spending lots and lots of time away from family. And they're eating takeout food, which isn't always the healthiest way to live our lives. But nonetheless, they are a very, very dedicated team that works well together and tries to secure the absolute best leadership for our schools. So I wanted to give a shout out to both of those teams this evening. I also want to give a shout out to our Innovation Center team. They have been hosting several visits. Apple has brought visitors in from the Americas. They are

035Apple-distinguished educators from across the world. And they visited our district on Tuesday. And then next week, we have a group of superintendents coming in from across the nation who are coming in to see our practices and the ways in which we utilize technology in order to engage students. And so I want to just recognize that team because they stop what they're doing to help others learn about the best practices in public education. It is a little bit of a heavy lift. We're always so proud to host people. But it is an added responsibility. So thank you to our Innovation Center team. I want to recognize our robotics teams. We have 23 teams that made the VEX Robotics worlds in, I think, potentially. I forget where they're going. I'm thinking St. Louis for VEX Robotics world.

036So we have 23 teams. We think we have the chance for two or three teams to actually win the competition. We will keep you posted on that and likely have them come forward to the board. We've had over 1,000 students participate in robotics. So we're just really proud. And again, when we recognize the students, I'll also recognize Alex Downing. She coordinates all of our district-wide robotics tournaments and helping these students get where they're going to go for different tournaments outside of our district and does a ton of work. She said she, I saw her yesterday and she said she slept all of spring break. So I'm proud of that work. I want to congratulate our Silver Creek High School basketball team. They made it to the state championship game. They did not have the outcome

037they would have liked. But we are still very, very proud nonetheless. We will be bringing that coach forward at a future date to recognize his leadership. It is his last year to coach basketball at Silver Creek. He's been there many, many years and we would like to recognize him as well. And then on Saturday, if you have nothing to do or are just really excited about interacting with our smart team students from Longmont High School, they are hosting a smart team statewide symposium at the Innovation Center on Saturday. That will begin at 9 a.m. and go on most of the day. So if you are so inclined, you might drop by and see those really, really smart kids. They are called the smart team very appropriately and likely. I think we saw them earlier in

038the year. They came in front of the board as well. So those are my updates and thank you so very much for allowing me the time, Jim. Thank you, Jack. Okay, now we go on to other reports. First one scheduled is our February district financial statements and Tony's going to take care of that. Good evening, members of the board. I am pleased to present to the board and our community the district's monthly financial statements through February of 2026. These financial statements can be found in the board packet tonight and alongside all of our other periodic financial statements will be available online at SVVSD.org. We had the opportunity to go through these financial statements a little more in depth at the board study session earlier tonight at 515. And in addition, these financial statements were presented

039to our finance and audit committee last Monday. The district maintains an executive summary dashboard and a green, yellow, red stoplight scheme to highlight any major concerns. We do continue to have the yellow triangle for this financial statement related to our nutrition services fund. To summarize the discussion points that we talked about earlier, we discussed in the general fund our lower cash and investment balances this year compared to last as a result of some heightened one-time amounts last year that we didn't have this year as well as our increased budgeted spend down of reserves. We touched on some other year-over-year variances. Such as a change in taxes receivable as a result of increased assessed valuation. We talked about increases in compensation and benefits as a result of increases in salaries as well as health insurance costs.

040And then we talked about things like amounts owed to one of our charter schools from their participation in the best grant program. We spent some time talking about the nutrition services fund as I mentioned to earlier. It's spend down of reserves along with some strategies that our nutrition services team is pursuing to control costs. Including savings through pursuing direct purchasing agreements rather than through a distribution model. Using up some existing inventory of non-food supplies and materials. And then not filling some vacancies and rebalancing their available position and labor availability in order to help ensure they're maintaining the level of service that our students need. Finally, we spoke about concerns regarding some financial challenges of one of our charter schools and the anticipated plan to help address that. I'd like to thank our top-notch accounting and

041reporting team for the aggregation and preparation of this report. Which again is available in the board packet tonight and will be available on SVVSD.org. It's my pleasure to answer any questions at this time. No questions. You did a good job on our study session. So that's all available for everybody to look at. Everything's transparent. So thank you, Tony. Thank you. Good evening. So next up is a report on counselors, innovationists, and ICAP report. And Johnny Terrell is coming up. Thanks, Johnny. All right. Good evening. Esteemed members of the Board of Education. Dr. Capuchin, senior staff, and all attendees. My name is Johnny Terrell, and I proudly serve as the Assistant Superintendent of Student Services in our district. Believe it or not, it's been nine and a half years that I've been here. That seems like

042just yesterday. We support or oversee 16 different offices and processes in our district. There are a total of 71 direct reports in our department with an additional 174 employees that we support and or train. Tonight, I have the honor of introducing Mara Brady McMullen, the lead counselor in our district. Mara supports and trains counselors and interventionists in all of our district schools. Not only that, but Mara is the lead for our crisis response team, a member of the district threat assessment team. She oversees the scholarship program, coordinates new teacher orientation, and supports engagement and wellness in St. Bray. Counselors and interventionists are invaluable resources in our district who are akin to a Swiss army knife in many instances. Not only do they implement a comprehensive data-driven school counseling program to improve academic, career, and social-emotional

043outcomes for all students, but in many instances, they teach, listen, direct, administer, and do just about anything and everything you can imagine in a school setting. In the next few moments, Mara and I will provide the board with a report that highlights the purpose of the ICAP and the roles that counselors, interventionists, and parents play in helping students realize their post-secondary goals. We do have some ground to cover. Therefore, I'll turn things over to Mara. We have a slide deck. However, do not hesitate to ask clarifying questions. And we'll do our best to answer and or direct you to the resources that can answer those questions. So at this time, I'm going to turn it over to Mara. So I'll take it away. Thanks, if I can make this navigate. Yes, there we go. All

044right. Thank you so much for having me. I'm very excited to present and talk to you about what our school counselors and interventionists do here in St. Bray. So as a counseling office or the Office of Counseling Interventionist here in St. Bray, we are obviously very focused on students' achievement and engagement. We have a couple of data points that we use every year to ground our work. And so we'll talk about that work today. And we have the big one that we use is our ICAP survey. So we administer this to all sixth through 12th graders every fall, sometime in September. And then we get that data back. And then we then start our planning for the upcoming spring semester and the upcoming year based on this data. This past fall, we had 83.5 percent

045of our high school students participate with this survey. And then with our middle school, we had 81.2 percent. So typically with this survey, we ask questions about their interest for post-secondary readiness, how ready they feel for their future careers, what kind of engagement they have with their school counselor, what kind of engagement they have as with the school in general. How are they feeling about just life being how stressed they are. And so that's one factor. And so then it really helps us focus for the rest of the year. So we have approximately 135 school counselors and interventionists in St. Bray. And I'll talk a little bit later on another slide about the work that they do. But actually on this slide, I got too excited. The academic planning and support. So we typically have

046three domains of that we focus on. And one of those is academic planning. So we work with students with their 504s. Most counselors are in on that process. We also support with IEPs when we are needed. We do a huge piece of that academic support is class selection and how we can help them with their planning. So that starts especially in middle school, sixth through 12th grade. We're helping them figure out what classes will support a future career. And that is a really critical component, as we all know. So that makes sure making sure that they are in advanced coursework. They're getting remedial help if they need that. We also do executive functioning and behavior support, especially at our elementary and middle schools. We're helping with that a lot. We also do a lot of

047with mental health. And so we're working with students in small groups. We are working with them one on one. And finally, with our college and career planning, that ties with the academic planning. But a lot of it is, you know, specifically meeting, introducing them to the military, two-year vocational, and four-year universities, or getting them ready for entering the workforce. Part of that ICAP survey are the top careers that students are interested in. So we have a lot of really wonderful data. We see that our high school students, 55% of them are interested in going into the business and finance field. 48% are interested in health care. And our 47% are interested in public safety, law, and working on a lot of the helping fields that are not medical. Our middle school interests are similarly safety,

048hospitality, and arts. A lot of students are interested in creating, having an art-related career. As we can see on the next slide, it's actually very interesting, and this was a big takeaway for us this year, many of our students in middle school are interested in art that drastically drops by the time they get to high school, which is unfortunate. But I think they, you know, sometimes those conversations where we're trying to make sure parents know, like, you can make money in an art-related field. We don't want to shut that down. But that drop is something that we, as high school and middle school counselors, are really interested in. How do we help them engage with that and keep that dream alive? High school students really want to learn about paying for their education and what

049their opportunities are, how we can get them engaged with volunteering or internships earlier on so that they can engage with that work sooner rather than waiting until they graduate. Middle school growth areas, we are very excited that this coming school year we're going to be working directly with our middle school students and our elementary students we're kind of backward planning. A lot of our middle school students, as you can see, 76% of them want help with goal setting and 75% want help with time management and 75% want help with stress management. So a lot of that is around executive functioning. So our elementary school counselors are really, we're working right now on curriculum development to help them with those skills. So when they get into middle school, they're a little bit more prepared. So we're

050doing a lot of backward planning that way. And, but some of the good takeaways is that 95% of our students know themselves and they feel comfortable with what they're interested in doing. So that part is really exciting that we know that we can then capitalize on that. So counselors and interventionists, I'm going to use the word counselors just as a whole, but our interventionists are really critical to this work as well. Their roles typically are a little bit more defined in working with mental health where our school counselors might do more of the academic planning. But a lot of the time these individuals in these roles, it's indistinguishable. They're doing all the work together, which is really, really wonderful. Our elementary counselors really focus on classroom lessons. And so we have one of those examples

051is our Someday project. We have a book called Someday that all the schools have a copy of. And this project is where students have a little notebook and they copy the book essentially where they say someday I'm going to be a great artist, but today I'm helping my dad paint the shed. And so they do that starting in kindergarten and that carries through fifth grade. We are also doing lessons on friendship, having your own physical space, personal space, where we're actually was on two meetings today on curriculum development. So we're really working on helping them develop those executive functioning skills as I mentioned. And then fifth grade we have a maturation conversation with all of our fifth graders and making sure that they're ready and they know what's happening with puberty. Middle school, we have

052targeted curriculum with ICAP, so our individual career and academic plans. And we are working again with that data with executive functioning, stress management. Many of our schools do one-on-one interviews with each student sixth grade through 12th grade so they can really know, the counselors really know their students. And then high school, we are really using our advisory system. So we have advisory on Wednesdays and so we push out information about college and career planning, social emotional wellness with our teacher support in our advisory lessons. We have, you know, a lot of still continuing that advocacy for 504s and we're still, we're just building on all the work that we have done in our elementary through middle school. And then again, those dedicated interviews one-on-one with our school counselors and our each student. We are really

053trying to help our families with especially around ICAP, how to have those conversations starting in elementary school with, you know, thinking about financial aid is a big piece. We don't want families to start thinking about how to pay for college or post-secondary opportunities. When they're in 12th grade, we want to get families thinking about it sooner. So that way they are prepared for what their student's career might, what kind of education that might entail. We are, you know, even just simple conversations at the dinner table. How can, you know, talk about your job and how can you talk about what kind of education you might need asking your son or daughter, your child, what do you think you want to do someday and let's learn about what that career entails. What do you have to

054study? Middle school, we really are trying to encourage our students to try new things, try clubs, sports that you might not think you gravitate toward, you might find something else that you're really passionate about, really encouraging our families to attend the open houses for our high schools and our CETC Innovation Center. So that way they can, again, know early about the opportunities St. Vrain offers. And finally, how families can connect. Again, we have many, every school has a financial aid night. We have many opportunities with scholarship help and we want to get those families thinking about that. It's never too early. And then making sure that families, if they have the opportunity, that they can visit college or they can help their students. We do a lot of field trips and do college and career

055visits. And so having those realistic conversations too about how we as a family can support you financially. And that's, you know, all of those conversations we're trying to increase with our families. And then finally, the last piece is just right now. I'm very excited to give a shout out. We have an amazing curriculum team that our counselors and interventionists are on. We have two elementary teams. One is working on our primary years and then our second group is working grades three, four, five intermediate. We have a middle school team and a high school team. And our plan this year for this upcoming school year is we will have four dedicated lessons that counselors will deliver to students to will be on wellness and engagement. So working with peers, navigating, changing social structures, stress management. And

056then the other two will be around their individual career plan or academic plan and will be utilizing our system Naviance. But we will also be pushing in and doing those lessons one-on-one. So I will, do you have any questions? But thank you so much for your time. I do have a question. Back, I think one or two slides, you had some actionable steps for parents. How do you communicate those steps or will you communicate those steps to parents? We know children may see it. The students might see it. But getting that information to the parents through the students is usually a little bit more challenging. So how are you communicating that to the parents and how often at what frequency? Well, that's a great question. So that's one of my development within the next school

057year is I would really like, especially around the financial aid, to partner with our Ed Foundation, the St. Vrain Ed Foundation, to create financial aid nights so we can talk about the 529 jumps plan so that we can get all elementary students up to the age of, I believe, third grade. It's creating that 529 savings plan. I would like to, a lot of that we're trying to push within each school individually, right? So into their newsletters, at their parent nights, parent-teacher conference nights, where when are we getting families already in? So they're open houses, having counselors do dedicated presentations around this information. And we don't have, I will be honest, we do not have an exact plan for the parent engagement piece because right now we're just working on developing the curriculum and the parent

058piece is the next piece within that scope. Okay. And then the other one, I think the next slide, you mentioned the college visits, which I think I've heard of those. How, again, with the communication piece, and this is probably similar to the answer you just gave me. How is that communicated to the families and how often? Because I know some students don't get to experience going off and visiting colleges and things of that nature, just due to, for whatever the situations may be. But if you offer that, how is that being communicated to the parents as well? So with that, we have, typically we'll do a shout point. And so when we have, and so when I worked at Mead High School, we would have, we would get the bus organized and we would say

059you can, we'd send the shout point home to parents to say we have a field trip coming up to Northeastern Junior College. Your student needs to get this permission slip in by this date. And we would then also put it in our newsletters out to families and send it out to announcements. Typically those are done in high school because some colleges are actually pretty averse to getting our elementary and early middle school students on campus. We have found the last couple of years, unfortunately, but we have, and some of those pieces too, like Sunset Middle Schools took all their eighth graders over a course of two days to see you Boulder and toward campus. So some of those programs are already just embedded within the school day. And some of them are done on with

060a permission slip basis. Are you working with any community organizations in addition to the methods you just discussed, the community organizations? Not that I'm aware at this point, but I, every school does things a little bit differently just based on their school culture. But is there an example that you have of that? Well, just engaging, you know, we have a lot of people who engage with their community organizations. So things like that, they may feel a little bit more comfortable when the community organization is presenting the information, or they may receive that information for whatever reasons, they may not see their newsletter, but they may see, they may hear that information from their community organization. So my point there was, are we utilizing all of our methods of communication to get to our families? I'm

061sure we're not in that sense. I think, you know, we do partner with the youth center, and so we work with them closely and we have different, and because each community is a little bit different, right? So we've got our Frederick versus Firestone and Meade. So I think we're, you know, a lot of those school visits, or I'm sorry, the college visits are at a school level. So it's what the school capacity might be on a given year to do that. So a suggestion for to be equitable, it might be a good idea to look into how you can, how schools, from a top level, how schools can incorporate those community organizations, just because we do a lot of that as a district already. Yes, and we do have the Futures by Design sites that

062we, you know, we're, as I'm sure you all have heard and is going to be launched. So we'll be working directly with our families to access those opportunities that way as well. And, you know, we're looking at doing an eighth grade career fair where we would bus all eighth graders. That's our hope. Or seventh graders, we're working on the outline of that right now. So we're working on how to get, again, exposure to different careers. Many schools host their own college fair where the colleges come in. And in addition to a career fair where it's not just necessarily two or four-year colleges, but we bring in industry partners into our buildings so that way students have access because we do know that not everyone has parents who are able to read or do get to

063the newsletter in time. So we do try to make it as equitable as possible knowing that we are, there's still good work that we can be doing. I don't know about anyone else, but no one was talking to me about what I was interested in professionally except for my parents until probably my senior year of high school. So I'm just so happy that our students at every level are having even a small conversation about their futures. And so thank you both for your work on this and for the team's work on this as well. It's exciting to see. Thank you. Yes, we have amazing team. We have amazing curriculum team and I am just so grateful. I would love to just give a couple of shout outs to a few counselors. So Alexia Peterson is

064at Highlands Elementary. She's fabulous. Last summer she sat on multiple curriculum development teams. In addition to last year, we updated our student suicide interview so that way we can have more robust conversations that are more up-to-date form. She was there. Amy Brown at Niwot High School has been really integral to that same form development and working with our students. She is wonderful and one of my mentors and people that I always call when I need. I'm like when I phone a friend, I call. I've got my five. So I just want to say we have so many wonderful people. We have a really robust, wonderful steering committee and this steering committee are our educational, our counselor leaders and educators, right? So we think about how we can support students at every single level. But those

065are just a couple of our student, I'm sorry, our counselor leaders. But I'm surrounded by really wonderful counselors. I couldn't do my job without them. So thank you again for your time. Are there any other questions? No, but I would like to thank you, Mara. We spoke about a year ago and you had a vision for this work and you got busy. You rolled up your sleeves and here we are today and it's very, very important work. So I appreciate your leadership in all of this. I appreciate that. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next on the agenda is our district enrollment projections for 2026-27 through 2030-31. Brendan. That's not a good sign. You know, always works that way. Sure, I can find one. Not another one. Where are your laptop?

066I've got a laptop. It looks like the Northern Lights. It's going to like you to not use that Apple Bungle. I'm straight into HDMI right here. I only have one HDMI. On the bright side, I know all the numbers and I can regurgitate them. It would not be as much fun. Yeah. And Mr. Berthold, I wonder at this point if we can stop and see if Anna has any questions or impressions about our board meeting. Good suggestion. What do you think so far? And if you have any other, any additional questions or any suggestions? Oh, I couldn't unmute it. I just think this is so cool because I've only been to the beginning of a board meeting before and I just like love seeing all the presentations and I like seeing how diligent everyone is

067while doing it. I think over the last two years of being in Student Advisory Council, it's given me like a new gratitude for everyone in the district and how much effort they put into making my education good. So yeah, that's all I really have to say. Thank you. We can do it next board meeting because we got a bigger problem going on. I was going to say this isn't. So would the board prefer that it is sent to your email and we review it this evening or would you prefer that we table this topic? This is our last presentation, I believe this evening that requires the use of technology unless our music curriculum is also going to have a present. Nope, music curriculum does not. So we can do that one or two way, one

068of two ways we can table it to our next board meeting or we can attempt to send it to your devices and review the information. And Brendan, what would you prefer? Whatever is most convenient or preferred by the board is absolutely. I'll go with whatever is. Any suggestions? How do you guys feel? Yeah, it's always a very enlightening report. Oh, there we go. Oh, that's cool. Give me a second to get this new cord. And Brendan, take your time. It's interesting. It is okay for you to kind of. Take a minute to. Take a minute. Figure all this out. You're on the screen right now. You're like a ghost on the screen. Yeah, we've got a little bit of an interesting shadow, but I think we can do it. I think we can make it

069work. Looks like it's working. So let's give it a shot. I'll make sure to talk fast and regurgitate a lot of numbers. Good evening, Board of Education. Don't talk too fast. Our instructors will come in with a slowdown. Interpreters will come down with a slowdown flag for you. I have had that conversation with them. I do tend to talk faster. Good evening, Board of Education. Dr. Caputian, senior district leadership staff. My name is Brendan Willets. I'm the planning director here for St. Mary Valley Schools. I'm here tonight to chat about the student enrollment projections typically five years out. And just wanted to dive right in. We're anticipating over the next five years about a 414 student increase in our overall population. Just for clarity's sake, what Tony talks about with funded pupil count is slightly

070different than what I'm talking about. We always have that slight disconnect between kids who are in the seat and the portion of those kids who get funded, and that's Tony's side of the house. So we are projecting about 414 student increase, like I said. Next year, in 2026, I have a slight decline projected, 50 students. Please keep in mind, I take a conservative look at our enrollment, so my job is not to over predict or have something on my screen. So my job is to be conservative with my projections, but I am projecting about a 50 student decline next year, district-wide, followed by four years of slightly higher growth. The table in the green, which I can see is not legible from here, we're projecting about 123 up in 27-28, followed by 89 increase, 116

071and 136. This growth in the district is not necessarily even within the regions, and it is worth noting that even when I project something like 50 student decline, we have such large 12th, 11th, and 10th grade classes for the next few years that even if we were to decline, say, 50 students next year, we're actually netting about 300 new students, just because of the large outgoing class compared to the smaller incoming class. And so that's why I use terms like stable or moderate growth, slight growth, things of that nature. So when I talk about the high school enrollment feeder systems, the table below shows the five-year past and then the projected five-year change with a trend line for the 10-year. You can see that the Mead, Erie, and Tri-Town areas will continue to grow. The

072residential construction really remains strong. That's one of my major influencing factors for what we run the projection models off of. It should be noted that there's a lot of single-family detached in the Tri-Town, Mead, and Erie areas. There's less multi-family. City of Longmont continues to decline in student population. I clarify it's student population because the overall population is actually increasing. And I'll address that here in a minute. And multi-family really remains strong in Longmont. There's a great deal of multi-family. As you drive around, you'll see new apartment complexes, duplexes, triplexes, things of that nature. The issue with multi-family is we simply don't yield the same number of students. It's sometimes less than half, often less than half the number of students that we would get out of a single-family detached. So as you look at

073the numbers and you see growth in Erie and decline in the Longmont area or growth in Mead or growth in Firestone Frederick, the construction is important, but the type of construction is important. And I'll address that here in a moment as well. But we do have growth over the next five years, but it is in pockets and regions of our district. And I know that there are a lot of different folks in the district looking at how to solve those complex problems. Really, one of the most important things that we look at is there's dozens and dozens of influencing factors. I'm only going to go through a couple that I think are important. And really, I view the influencing factors that push projections one way or another. They're really simply answering a question for me.

074And those questions are usually, I see a lot of construction. Why aren't the students coming? I see all these new houses. Why aren't the school, you know, why are you projecting down next year? I hear about the birth rates. I hear about how many student, you know, kids are being born. Why are you projecting 50 down? And so really, that's what I look at. To tackle it from the top to the bottom, projections for the population, the state is projected to increase 4%. So we are still growing over the next five years, 25 to 30. Boulder County and Weld County, I've got on the table there specifically, and I'll pick on them because they're the two largest that influence our population. Erie, for example, in 23-24 made the top 10 list of both percent and

075pure number growth. So we are seeing these really high growth areas, and that's the question that people usually ask me, is why aren't the students coming as fast as the population? So the table really shows that. The Boulder County is a great example. In the next five years, the overall population for Boulder County has anticipated increase about one and a half percent. The student age population, zero to 19, is declining six percent, and that's some of the influence. And even in Weld County where you have eight and a half percent growth anticipated over the next five years, the zero to 19 population is still set to increase by four percent, you know, it's 4,000 kids. However, you can see that at four percent growth, it's less than half of the overall population growth. So that's

076really what I talk about when I say I'm answering the question of, I see the construction, where are the kids? I hear about the birth rates, where are the kids? The housing is the same thing. Housing markets, we anticipate that we'll have an uptick. The blue on the graph is the single family. That is where we yield the most students. That's why we're seeing a slight decline in some of our pockets, is we're not seeing the single family detached housing units. Multi-family remains strong, and it will continue to remain strong. However, we don't yield the same number of students out of the multi-family. As a point of interest, it really helps with affordability in the long run. So we will benefit from that multi-family, but it doesn't yield the same number of students that the

077single family would. So that's why we see pockets of high growth versus pockets of decline. It's really the type of housing and the type of market. As we step back and look at regional housing, affordability should be no surprise to anyone in this room that it's tough. It's not affordable in this region right now. If you look at the graph in the top right, the blue line represents the housing prices from 2000 through 2024. The gray line is actually the personal income or the average income. This is for the state. We're worse off here in the front range of Colorado. It would look worse than this. But you can see a 200 plus percent increase in 24 years from the housing prices, and the personal income is just simply not keeping track. Household size is

078another factor. We talk about all these new houses, all these new apartments. The average household size is smaller, and while it looks like a graph that's changing from 2.57 to 2.35, it really doesn't have the impact for people. They don't understand. If I were to take the 80,000 households that are in our district, that's a significant change. If you were to take our 80 give or take thousand households, we actually have about 88. The population difference between those five years for the same number of houses would be over 17,000 people different. The flip side of that coin is that we would need 7,500 more homes in our district to have the same population. So really what I'm getting at is that it's a compound problem, but overall our population per house is declining. We're getting

079fewer kids out of each house. So yes, you see all this great construction, just simply not yielding the number of kids, and that's why you see a relatively stable enrollment. Again, slight increase of 414 kids over the next five years. The remaining influencing factor is really births age and migration. Births is a great example. We have really high live birth count here in St. Brain Valley schools. 2024 is the last year we have. It's the highest in well over a decade for live birth count. I focus on count rather than fertility rate or birth rate, because I care more directly about how many kids are actually born. And then those kids, I have a calculation to tell me how many of those will actually show up to our schools, give or take five years later.

080There was a nine news article that talked about the UC health here at Long's Peak had a baby boom. It wasn't a baby boom, but it was one of the highest number of kids recorded having births there. So we have these kids being born here, and that is why we're staying more stable as a district than some of our districts that surround us that are seeing faster enrollment drop. They simply don't have the birth counts to keep up with the decline in the household populations and the student yield out of each house. Migration remains an issue as it always has been. Post COVID, we saw an influx of people who wanted to work remote, and we saw a great exodus of the younger families who had kids because it simply wasn't affordable. And that trend

081is leveling out, but it is still very much in play. And the rest of the migration I try to stay out of because it's too heavy into either economics, which I leave to our finance folks, or politics, which I desperately stay out of. The key takeaways really is we have a slight uptick in our enrollment. 400 kids give or take in five years. We have a little dip next year. I hope passionately that I'm incorrect and that I have the wrong number next year, and we come in much higher, and I anticipate that would be the case. The 2024 bond projects are really relieving our high-growth areas and some of the capacity concerns and pressure we have in those. And we're keeping an eye on all the demographic shifts in the region, and we're taking

082an effort to ensure that how we're calculating projections and the methodologies that we're using are appropriate and adequate for the next 10 years, because post COVID, we needed a couple years of data so we can run some modeling. We have enough post-COVID data to run some modeling and really tighten up our enrollment projection methodology, and that's what we're undertaking to ensure that we're being good stewards of taxpayer dollars, and we're ensuring that our long-range plans are meeting what the projections are informing. So with that, I would love to take any questions. Shotgun Dacha. I have a quick question. I'm curious about the trend of multifamily housing not yielding student population. And I don't know if there is a way to anticipate whether or not that could change just based on affordability and people wanting to

083have a good education for their families and needing to make choices about how and where they live and prioritizing perhaps St. Frame Valley as a school choice and taking that single-family goal off the table. Is there a way to anticipate that? Do we see that happening anywhere? What are your personal thoughts on that possibility? Love the question. We dig into it quite a bit. It's actually fairly an astute observation because that is changing the trend of how multifamily, what we consider multifamily. So the short answer is yes, absolutely. We see the multifamily dynamic shifting. To be more specific on how we use that data, we look at every new multifamily unit. So if there's 300 apartments and I'm just making numbers up, we get the count. So I get 100 of those units that have

084one-bedroom count. I'm not going to yield students out of a one-bedroom apartment. Those are typically targeted for a certain demographic, which is not childbearing years. Or if we do have kids, it's one and it's a one-off. The two-bedroom we're starting to yield more out of and the three-bedroom, that's when I really start seeing a pretty high yield. So we take every new development. We receive every referral. We act as the referral agent on behalf of the district. We see every referral for every new subdivision, every new construction project come through our office. And then we break it down. So I discount my one-bedrooms and I really focus on my two threes. To go a little more in depth for your answer, we are seeing a difference in that trend. It used to be one and

085two-bedroom, some threes. Now we're seeing much more two and three sprinkling in the four-bedroom. And we're seeing multifamily units that are specifically targeting families. And that's not something you would have seen as much 20 years ago or 10 years ago. So yes, we're seeing more of it. Yes, we keep very tight track of that. And there's definitely a different yield, but that is some of the new multifamily that you see going up. It isn't necessarily just targeting the single dads or the single moms. It really is targeting families with more bedrooms. So there is a change and that will help with our affordability in my personal opinion. There is evidence out there for that, but that's me personally speaking. It really benefits affordability, which will benefit the region and help bring stability with those kids

086churning through where they stay in the system longer. Okay, thank you. I think you kind of answered that when you said the affordability. I was going to say the shift, it sounds like based on the conversation and some of the numbers that you presented that that shift in the multifamily is due to affordability, at least specifically in Colorado. I can't speak for every other state, but that's what it sounds like to me. It's a multifaceted, multi-pronged beast of an issue. But yes, even when I talk to my kid, I have a 20-year-old who's trying to adult. But that generation through the 30, that grouping, when you talk to them, they don't have the same opinion of multifamily as someone in my generation. They don't look at single-family, their little postage stamp lot out in a

087subdivision where they have to drive 15 minutes into town. That was my generation's dream of where to go and where to live and raise our family. The next generation doesn't have that same opinion. They don't look for that. So they are looking more at the multifamily and they stay there. Denver is a great example. Drive just down I-25. Those aren't the same one- and two-bedroom condos that we remember from 20 years ago. There's families living in a lot of those and they're having fewer kids, they're having kids later. That's the other side of that demographic shift. My boss will yell at me if I go too long on that particular topic. I noticed in the report that you worked with an outside entity and I just thought that was interesting and also it takes a

088certain level of humility to do that. So I wanted to thank you for that. I also really liked the trend lines in the report. I don't remember if it was in last year's report, but anyway, per individual school. So I really enjoyed that aspect of the report and I don't know about other board members, but it made it much more easy to digest. So thank you for that. Brendan, how close were you last year to your projections? I missed it by about 28. 28 students. And so you are very, very good at your job and it's a very important role that you play in our system and we appreciate your work. So thank you. Yeah, I missed the overall enrollment of 31,040 by 28. 31,000. That's impressive. Decimal dust. Yeah, decimal dust. We're doing everything

089to make sure he stays, right? If there are no other questions, thank you for the kind words and I hope you have a nice evening. Ann, thank you. It was very good again. I loved the graphics. So visual. All right, I can move on to the consent items. Did any board member like to pull any of our consent items? No? Well, everybody said no, so I would ask for a motion to approve all consent items as listed in our agenda. So moved. Okay, moved and seconded. Mrs. Babs? Yes. Mr. Berthold? Yes. Mrs. Gilligan? Absent. Mrs. Horanek? Yes. Mr. LeChuga? Absent. Mrs. Solomon? Yes. Mrs. Weiss? Yes. All right, I can move on to our action items. First on is recommendation adoption of resolution proclaiming April 10th, 2026 is Celebration of Excellence Day. We got Amanda

090to come up and do that. Yes. Good evening, members of the board and Dr. Caputian. It's with great enthusiasm that I announce the St. Rain Education Foundation's annual Celebration of Excellence, an important recognition of our district's commitment to honoring our extraordinary educators. We invite you to join us on Friday, April 10th, 2026 as our community gathers to recognize the teachers who profoundly impact our students' lives. This year's celebration will also be meaningful as we acknowledge the outstanding educators across the district. Their unwavering passion, creativity, and dedication to teaching exemplify excellence. They are mentors, guides, and role models fostering a culture of lifelong learning and curiosity. We express our deepest gratitude to the St. Rain Education Foundation for their dedicated efforts in organizing this event and for their enduring support of our educators. Together, we ensure

091our teachers feel valued, appreciated, and empowered to continue their vital work. We hope you'll join us on April 10th as we celebrate our remarkable contributions, dedication, and unwavering commitment to the educational excellence of our teachers. Thank you for your consideration. And there is a proclamation for you to review and read. Does any board members have any questions? No. Jackie, do you want to read the resolution, please? Celebration of Excellence Day, April 10, 2026. Whereas the St. Rain Valley Schools Education Foundation supports St. Rain Valley Schools District's strategic planning and provides supplemental funding to enhance teaching and learning in our classrooms. And whereas since 1984, the National PTA has designated the first full week of May as Teacher Appreciation Week. And whereas the St. Rain Valley Schools Education Foundation was presenting the 19th annual Celebration of

092Excellence event on April 10, 2026 that pays tribute to St. Rain Valley School District's teachers for this week of recognition. And whereas communities and schools will unite to celebrate the educational profession of teaching and show appreciation to teachers for inspiring a thirst for learning in our youth that will last a lifetime. And whereas the foundation's 19th Celebration of Excellence program, which includes recognizing a teacher of the year from every school and a teacher of the year for the district, provides the opportunity for students, parents, community members, and business partners to show appreciation to teachers who exemplify excellence in teaching. And whereas schools, businesses, and communities play a vital role to ensure the success of Celebration of Excellence program, now therefore be it resolved that the St. Rain Valley School District Board of Education proclaims April

09310, 2026 as Celebration of Excellence Day in our school districts. And we urge all staff, students, parents, and community members to support this event or take some time to show appreciation to a teacher for providing our youth with the gift of learning, adopted, and approved on March 25, 2026. Thank you. So look for a motion to approve the resolution. So moved. Hadley? Second by Meosha. Mrs. Babs? Yes. Mr. Berthold? Yes. Mrs. Gilligan? Absent. Mrs. Horanek? Yes. Mr. Lechuga? Absent. Mrs. Solomon? Yes. Mrs. Weiss? Yes. Okay, next up. Thank you. Next up is a recommendation elementary music curriculum adoption and the art of education renewal. Hello, Dr. Capuchin, members of the board and district leadership. My name is Janae Bird and I serve as the director of fine arts, performing arts, and physical education. Thank you

094so much for having me here tonight as we bring forward the adoption of our elementary music curriculum and renewal of our K-12 art curricular resource. We are proud to provide a comprehensive music curriculum for our elementary students. Strong arts instruction begins with a strong foundation. And over the past seven years, Quaver Music has helped create greater alignment across our district while still allowing teachers flexibility in how they meet the needs of their students. It has supported consistent high quality instruction across schools and provided students with engaging musical experiences through a wide variety of resources, clear visuals, strong concept videos, and interactive tools that make learning relevant and enjoyable. When elementary music came up for adoption, we conducted a full review process. After carefully considering what is available, we believe there is not a better option

095out there than what we're already using. Quaver offers high quality content, automatic updates, and meets the Colorado standards while also giving teachers flexibility in how they use the resource to meet the needs of their students. To help share that perspective, I have some quotes from two teachers who use this curriculum in different ways in their classroom. Their experiences speak to the versatility and value of the resource. First, from one of the teachers who served on our committee. My name is Bethany Rogers from Centennial Elementary, and I served on the Elementary Music Adoption Committee. It was a positive and collaborative experience. I love that Quaver is great at updating quarterly to meet the needs of students and teachers. My students are able to have individualized instruction in areas like ear training, rhythm concepts, melody work, and

096composition. It also allows for bilingual lessons, which has been so helpful for many of our schools. Because of Quaver, I can put a variety of instruments into every student's hand digitally. Students enjoy the songs Quaver includes in the lessons, as well as the activities that it allows us to do. When we were deciding which curriculum to move forward with, Quaver far surpassed the other general music curricula available and what it offers. I also wanted to share a quote from Lyons Elementary Music teacher Charlie Plahattie. Quaver is always creating new content and has been very responsive to teacher input. Their song content is thoroughly researched and can be used in a variety of different ways. So to wrap things up, in 2023, we were able to provide our K-12 art teachers with the Art of Education

097resource. And so included in this recommendation is the continuation of that resource as well. Our art educators are so grateful for the opportunity to use the Art of Education as an instructional support that strengthens student learning and supports high quality teaching across all grade levels. As always, I'd like to thank everyone in this room for supporting the arts in St. Brain. Are there any questions? I do have one and I was, I read through this and maybe I missed a bit. I know sometimes we have, what is it called? Help Me Write copyrights. Yes. Is that inclusive of this curricula as well? Yes. So what's awesome about this is anything that's a part of their resource, we can perform and use and alter and all of that. So yeah. Thank you. Great question. What else?

098Jackie, you usually have music stuff. Well, I mean, a quaver is actually, you can do a whole lesson on just the name of the software because a quaver is actually an eighth note and a semi-quaver is 16th notes and so on and so forth. So just the title of the software itself shows how robust it is. Kind of put me on the spot there, Jim. Yeah, I knew you had an answer about something in music. I mean, you're always so involved in music and anyway, okay. Well, it seems like a good operation. I have no comments. I love music and so sooner the kids, I mean, I was taking trumpet in first grade. So I understand the value of understanding music because it's more than the music. There's math involved and there's more than that

099and if you're dealing with script and stuff, then there's language learning and so music is a primary builder of, I think, a lot of most people if they can get that when they're young. Some part of it will be there when you get older and so that fits with me. So, Jim, I do have one question. Sure. How long have we been using these curricula and how often do we revisit and review? So the Art of Education resource we brought forward in 2023, so not very long, respectively, and then Quaver, I believe we've had for seven years and our hope is to keep using it. And how often do we revisit that decision or these decisions? It depends on how long every seven years. Seven years? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Interesting. Well, I'd like to

100look for a motion to approve. So moved. By Jackie. Second. Meosha? Mrs. Babs? Yes. Mr. Berthold? Yes. Mrs. Gilligan absent? Mrs. Horanek? Yes. Mr. Lechuga absent? Mrs. Solomon? Yes. Mrs. Weiss? Yes. Okay. Thank you. All right. All right, we come up to our board reports. Any board members have anything they want to report on, activity they've accomplished over the last week or so? I mean, I can report on spring break. I slept just like a lot of the students, teachers did. Sarah? Thanks, Jim. On the heels of the music curriculum update, I will say go see a performance. It's like I've been to a few, as many as I can get to the second half of the year, and they're just outstanding, to say the least. The work that is poured into these children, the

101opportunities that they have. I know orchestra was not an option when I went to school. They're just, they're endless. They're performing all over the district, all over the state, and there's so much to be proud of. So forget fighting the traffic to Denver, you know, for Broadway performances. Go see something in the district. It's beautiful. So many things happening that I don't have specifics on each performance I've been to, but I just want to encourage people to really go check it out. It's amazing. It'll speak for itself. And a perfect segue. I wanted to express my excitement and make sure it's on everyone's radar for little voices, big music, which will be at the Innovation Center on April 6th at 515. And I think it's targeted towards preschool and kindergarten. So if you want to

102see some really pure enjoyment in the fine arts, I encourage you to come check it out. I have a couple of things. We, along with Brandon Schaefer, we took five students to the State Capitol on, I have to congratulate them, the day, the Friday before spring break. And we had an amazing time. We started out about 730, 7, 730 that morning and went to about two. The students were able to sit on either floor, the House and the Senate floor. They met with some of their legislators in each of those respective areas. And they took a tour of the Capitol, the top part of the Capitol. And then we also learned a little bit about the library that's there. I think they call it something a little differently. And how they catalog all of their

103laws and their meetings and everything, which it's a lot. But it was really cool to see that. So the students that went, they were from our Student Advisory Council. And they talked to a few of our lobbyists that helped to lobby for our district. Some of the things that we are interested in as a district. And then also some of the grant writers, I'm sorry. Hillary was there, I guess I'm thinking grant writer. But some of the writers, the law writers. So they write a lot of the laws that are actually pushed out from each of the representatives and or senators. So that was a really good day. Then the following week, I went to the CASB Board of Directors meeting that we have quarterly. Some of the highlights from that is we talked a

104little bit about some of the laws that are coming down the pipeline for within this session. And not to get into the details necessarily of all of those. But we have one that we are, a couple actually, that we are supporting as a state organization. And then so for my board members here, look for a region newsletter for me. It's my turn to write it for this quarter. But that region newsletter is going to highlight some things that we are doing in a region, which will be inclusive of those, some of those laws that are possibly going to go on our November ballot. And then some extra stuff as well. So we're revamping our regional meetings to have a bit more of those throughout the year rather than one big one over the year. So

105I encourage you to attend those. We're going to try to make those virtual and in person. And then last, I'll tell Jackie this when she's back. There's a couple of meetings coffee with the president of CASB. So we'd love for her to take part in that. And then two more. Just yesterday, I attended the Student Advisory Council meeting. Oh, no, that was this morning. The Student Advisory Council meeting. And I was able to hear a little bit of the ideas that they had for the new high school as it relate to programs. So our students always have really great ideas. And we take those ideas a lot of times and we implement those. So we could go on and on about financial literacy. I think most recently giving students an eighth grade algebra credit. So

106all of that came out of the think tanks or the thinking from those Student Advisory Council members. And then last but not least, also on yesterday, I attended the Town of Erie URA, so the Urban Renewal Authority. Not much from a district perspective that came out of that. But I always sit in those to ensure that anything that impacts our district that I know about it and I get that to the respective district people. So kind of busy, but informative. Okay, well, that's over. So we can move on to our Student Advisory Council member and ask if you have any, you know, already made some comments, but if you change your mind after what you just heard a little bit. Yeah, I don't really have any comments. It was just so cool to watch. And

107it makes me feel really lucky to be part of this district. All right. Well, it's good. Thank you for being here. And yeah, I missed the meetings this morning. So I had something else I had to do. But anyway, okay. Our next meeting, meetings are April 10th. Be a regular meeting and then April 15th will be a study session. And with that, I'll look for a motion to adjourn. Meosha? Second, Sarah? All those in favor? Aye. Aye.