001Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Let's Hey, hey, hey. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Go. I said it. Hey, Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Oh, hey. Hey, hey, hey. We will call this regular board meeting for Wednesday, May 6, to order at 4 p.m. Uh before I request a roll call, please be advised that board members may attend and participate in board meetings electronically in accordance with board policy BEA and state law. Uh and we do have uh director role joining us electronically uh due to snow conditions. Melissa, roll call, please. Director present. Director Kerry here. Director Hazley here. Director Johnson here. Director here. Director here. Director Rule here. All board members in
002attendance, please join me as we observe a moment of silence. Director Johnson, can you please please make the motion to adopt the agenda? I move that the board of education adopts the agenda as presented. Second. Moved and seconded. Miss Olsen. Roll call, please. Director Bartlett. I. Director Kerry. Hi. Director Haley. Hi. Dr. Johnson. Hi. Dr. Jorgensson. Hi. Dr. Milka. I. Director. I. The eyes have it. Uh, the agenda has been adopted as presented. We do start today with executive session. Director Mel Packham, can you please make the motion to move into executive session? I move that the board of education convenes into executive session to discuss legal advice per CRS 24-6-424B particular matter communication and employee matters and negotiations per CRS 24-6-424E particular matter employee compensation second moved and seconded Miss Olsson roll call please
003director I director Hi, Director Hley. Hi, Director Johnson. Hi, Director Jorgensson. Hi, Director Mal Pakam. Hi, Director. I The eyes have it. We will reconvene downstairs in executive session for approximately 90 minutes before coming back up here. Uh, and Michelle, we're going to do what we can to make it seamless on your end. All right, I will see you all downstairs. Heat. Heat. N. Hey, hey, hey. Heat. Heat. Hello. Hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Everything. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Oh, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. I Hey, Bring Hallelujah. Heat. Heat. That's something. Heat. Heat. I don't know. Heat. Heat. Hello. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey. Oh, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hello. Hey. Hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey. Hey, hey. Hey, hey. Hallelujah. Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. Heat.
004Heat. Hello. Hello. Hey, hey, hey. Hey. Hello. Hey, hey, hey. Hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hallelujah. You Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. Heat. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. admitted the voice. Thank you. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Heat Hello. Heat. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, I do. Let's get the mic. Good evening everyone. Uh earlier this afternoon, the board adopted the agenda as presented. We have returned from executive session and there is no need to modify the agenda at this time. Uh before we move on to uh the business of this evening, um one thing I just want to say, this is mostly for my fellow board members and also for staff who are giving presentations tonight. Uh this is likely to be a long evening and so right this is kind of the final sprint
005towards graduation, wrapping up finals, wrapping up end of year grades. If it is at all possible, I would like to get our staff home in a somewhat timely manner. And so I would ask staff as you are giving presentations, please try to keep things concise. And I would ask my fellow board directors uh when you are asking questions, please try to keep things concise and gerine to the motion. Just because as we have scoped things out, we might be here until 10:30. I do not want to be here until 10:30. Our staff don't want to be here until 10:30. I'd like to get them home and get them uh in bed so they can finish up the year strongly tomorrow. So with that, we're going to move on to the pledge of allegiance. And I
006believe we have uh future Air Force Academy cadet John Corbett here to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Take it away, John. And anywhere is fine. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. Uh, also before we get started, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge uh and thank the Keller and Madison Elementary School students under the direction of Sandy Green and Kelly Evans for the prelude performance this evening. With that, we move on to awards and recognitions. And I do believe we have quite a lot of them, which is an excellent problem to have. Uh, and I will turn it over to Superintendent G. Yeah, this is
007not the last board meeting of the year, but for our students, it is the last full board meeting. And so, we have tons of students upstairs and downstairs to celebrate. And uh we'll be asking one student of each one of the groups that come up here to be able to speak for the uh strength of their program. So, please let's uh take a time and celebrate a lot of incredible um opportunities in district 11. Go ahead, Melissa. 2026 Pikes Peak Regional Elementary STEM Fair. Tonight, we are proud to recognize a remarkable group of students for their outstanding achievements at the 2026 Pikes Peak Regional Elementary STEM Fair held on April 25th at Tesla. This regional event brings together top elementary students from across the Pikes Peak area to showcase original projects in science, technology, engineering,
008and mathematics. Participants engage in real world problem solving, applying critical thinking, creativity, and the scientific method to investigate questions, design solutions, and present their findings to a panel of judges. Earning recognition at this level reflects not only academic excellence, but also perseverance, innovation, and a strong commitment to learning. D11 students demonstrated exceptional performance, earning nearly half of all awards presented at the event. From Edison Elementary, two students earned third place honors. Freedom Elementary s students earned both first and second place awards. Martinez Elementary students earned two third place awards along with the people's choice award. Scott Elementary students delivered an extraordinary showing earning two grand prizes, three first place awards, two second place awards, and two third place awards. These accomplishments are a testament to the hard work of our students, the support of their
009educators and families, and the strength of STEM learning across the 11. Congratulations. Big round of applause. Who's my student spokesperson? All right, I'm gonna come on down. Tell us your name, your school, and how this was important and impactful for you. Hi, I'm Sophie and I go to Scott Elementary. And um my favorite part about doing the STEM fair was um meeting other people um and um I forgot. Sorry. Um my Did you have a project at the STEM fair? Uh yes I did. Um my project was a laundry slide and I won third place at the regionals fair. And the most exciting part about building my project was building it. Um, what's the laundry slide? Um, my laundry slide was this had pool noodles. Um, PVC pipe and rope. So, it was kind of
010like this big bracelet coming down the stairs. It worked okay. It wasn't the best cuz it kept hitting the stairs. So we'll learn and make it better next year. Yeah. So what grade are you in? Fifth. Okay. So you wouldn't happen to know Mr. Peterson, would you? I do. Yeah. That's why you're standing here today, right? Yeah. Okay. Mr. Peterson, are you here by any chance, Tom? Please pass on to Mr. Peterson and all the staff at Scott and all the other staff that help represent these children. What an awesome uh event it is to be able to celebrate them tonight. So, thank you. Great job. Set it down. Set it down. Set it down. I'm trying to teach him how to send a high five down the line. They're going to get it. May
011you pass it down and you pass it down. And you pass down. Awesome. We did it. There we go. Thanks everybody. Go ahead. Raise that trophy up high on your way out. Go ahead. That way. Engineers never follow rules, so you got to give us a minute. All right, next. Colorado and National PTA Reflections Art Awards. National PTA Reflections is America's oldest and largest arts education program of its kind. The program was developed in 1969 by Colorado's PTA president, Mary Lou Anderson, to encourage students to explore their talents and express themselves. Since then, the reflections program has inspired millions of students to reflect on a specific theme and create original artwork. This year's theme is I belong. Why is arts education so important? It not only cultivates imagination, self-exression, and creativity, but also plays an
012important role in the development of critical thinking and problem solving skills. It helps students process their thoughts and emotions, which is critical for their mental health. Each year, students in grades preK through 12 and accessible artists are recognized for bringing the theme to life through film production, dance choreography, literature, music composition, photography, and visual arts. Students advanced through their schools, regions, councils, states, and national reviews. This year, D11 had four students receive gold awards and seven silver awards from Colorado PTA, with one student receiving an award of excellence from National PTA. Congratulations, Big round of applause. Erin, I think you're our person again. Name, grade, school, and how this program's been important and impactful for you. Hi. Hi, I'm Aaron Manchester. I go to DHY High School and I am a junior. And one of
013the ways this program has kind of impacted me is it puts you in a situation where you have to figure out how do I fit this theme with who I am, what I believe in. And it puts you into a very specific spot where you have to think like, okay, where can I go from here? What can I do? And I feel like when putting it into this place of like, okay, how do I make art for where I belong, which was our topic, it put me into this kind of situation where I had to think like, okay, how can I put this into music? How can I put this into a poem? Thank you. And I think this was PTA sponsored. Is that right, Nor? Come on. Come on. Come on. Take a take
014a lap with the kids, please. PTA, introduce yourself and tell everybody how long you've been doing this and how great it is to represent these kids. Hi, my name is Nora Brown. I'm the reflections chair for El Paso Council PTA and I've been doing this for at least 20 years. Um, and the reflections program is really important to me. It started here in Colorado Springs and became a national program and it's just a great way to encourage the arts and to encourage students to reflect about the theme and how they can interpret that in their artwork. So, it's it's just a wonderful program. Thank you. Huge round of applause. Thank you. Thank you so much. District 11 Winter Percussion Ensemble. The indoor stationary percussion division of the Rocky Mountain Percussion Association provides students with an
015engaging and educational performance experience where ensembles focus on musical excellence while developing skills in teamwork, discipline, creativity, and artistic expression. Performing in a gymnasium setting, these students present short themed percussion shows that highlight rhythm, ensemble cohesion, and overall musicality. This season, our D11 winter percussion ensemble exemplified those qualities, delivering an outstanding performance and earning an impressive fourth place finish at the RMPA state championships. At this time, we are proud to recognize these talented students for their hard work and achievement. Please join me in congratulating them as they come forward. Big round of applause. Uh Casey, no instruments. They didn't want to come in and just Not this time. There was right outside. Uh I think Kayn is our uh student spokesperson. So again, your name, your grade, your school, and how this is impactful for
016you. Hi, my name is Kayn Mueller. I am a senior at Dhy High School, and I would like to share a little bit about how this program got started. This year, DHY and Palmer had the opportunity to blend and make the D11 winter percussion. This gave us more opportunities to learn and grow while building a community outside of our home schools. This was an incredible experience and I cannot wait to see how the program continues to grow. Awesome. Plans for next year? Plans for next year? Um, I'm going into early intro to education. All right. Congratulations. All right. High five. We'll spread it down again. I'll sp you. I'll spread it down. Send it down. All right. All right. Thanks. Big round of applause, Casey. And is there another staff member there? Thank you so
017much from DHY. Right. Awesome. Thank you all so much. Okay. Thank you. Out that door. Congratulations. Next up, Dohy Color Guard. Color Guard is a dynamic performance activity that blends elements of dance, theater, and precision equipment work. Performers you use flags, rifles, and sabers to bring music to life through movement and visual storytelling. DHY High School's color guard program has a long-standing tradition of excellence, earning numerous awards and distinctions over the years. And now, after nearly two decades, they have once again achieved the highest honor, bringing the state championship title back home. At this time, we are proud to recognize and celebrate the outstanding students of the Dhy Color Guard. Please join me in congratulating them as they came forward. Round of applause. Can you show the stack of certificates of the rest of the
018color guard that's not here? So, although I know the two of you were critically important, it was not a twoerson color guard. I think Jackson's going to talk a little bit about it and tell us. Um, so color guard is really really fun because it just brings a ton of people from many many different backgrounds back like to the school. Um, and it just makes us all have it's just a really really fun time because our coaches are so fun and they make us laugh so so much. Um, but it's just it's just a really really good time because everyone is just so passionate about what they do and and it felt great to win state championships. So, and what year are you? Uh, I'm a senior. And what's going for you next year? I'm
019gonna go to CSU Fort Collins and uh I'm gonna major I'm gonna major in microbiology and infectious disease. Wow. All right. Congratulations. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks so much. Next up, we have the 2026 Colorado Science and Engineering Fair Award winners. Tonight, we are proud to recognize an outstanding group of students for their achievements at the 2026 Colorado Science and Engineering Fair held on April 9th at Colorado State University in Fort Collins. The Colorado Science and Engineering Fair is one of the state's most prestigious academic competitions, bringing together top high school researchers from across Colorado. Students present advanced original research projects that demonstrate deep understanding across scientific disciplines and are evaluated by expert judges on rigor, innovation, and real world impact. Recognition at this level reflects exceptional academic achievement and dedication.
020D11 is proud to celebrate four students who earned awards at this year's competition. Among them, Natalie Mero from Palmer High School was named among the top five senior division projects in the entire state. An extraordinary accomplishment. As a result, Natalie has earned an invitation to compete at the prestigious International Science and Engineering Fair to be held in Phoenix this May, where top student researchers from around the world will compete. Each of these students achievements reflect remarkable curiosity, discipline, and excellence. Congratulations to all. Round of applause. This is not Natalie's first time being recognized either, so please give everybody your long resume of accomplishments. Um, well, you're too kind. But, um, like I said, uh, we are here from the Colorado State Science and Engineering Fair. This year we all had the opportunity to do our
021own research and then present our own project at in Fort Collins at CSU at that science fair and yeah it was a really exciting experience to be surrounded by people who had also done their own research and are really passionate about science. So it was a great opportunity. And are you a senior as well? Yes, I'm a senior. I'm graduating from Palmer High School this year. And you're going and I'm actually going to Colorado State University. Awesome. Yeah. It's been exciting. Yes. All right, thank you to our uh our researchers. Thank you. CTSO is up next. Career and Technical Student Organizations or CTSOs provide students with highquality realorld learning experiences that extend beyond the classroom. These organizations empower student agency by giving students the opportunity to apply what they are learning in CTE through their
022courses, through meaningful hands-on experiences. D11 is proud to offer a wide range of these opportunities and tonight we are honored to recognize some of our outstanding CTSO students and adviserss. First up is VEX Robotics, a hands-on STEM program where students design, build, and program robots to compete complete scientific challenges and compete in team-based competitions. Using the VEX V5 system, students develop skills in engineering, coding, problem solving, and teamwork. The VEX V5 Robotics World Championship 2026 took place April 25th through 27th at America Center in St. Louis. Tonight we recognize VEX Robotics students from Sabin Middle School. Huge round of applause for Sabin. I'm trying to guess who's going to be the speaker is I think it's going to be Riley because Jackson is giving me a robotics signal that says uh you don't have to
023turn right, you just have to turn three lefts, right? Okay, Riley to you. Um yeah. Okay, so we went to the VEX Middle School Robotics World Championship. Um it was a really like great opportunity for us. We qualified through states. We were first in our seed. um which means we were well we went undefeated up until semi-finals and because we made it to semifinals is why we qualified to worlds. Um but yeah this whole thing has been such like a learning experience for us because I don't think any of us really expected this to happen. We had the confidence that maybe we could do it, but I think it felt so surreal to all of us when we were actually there, like, hey, we made it. We did it, you know, and then being in
024St. Louis was a really cool experience. We met so many teams from all over the world and it was a really, really cool experience. I think all of us, students, parents, teachers, coaches, we could all agree that it was really cool. That's awesome. So, give you the last word. Are you retiring? Is that right? Yes. So, I would love for you to just kind of wrap up. Um, this has come such a long way thanks to you and many of the folks on your staff that have helped get here, but really give us one last shout out for what this means for kids and how it's just really changing the way that they learn. Yeah, this is a a fabulous we real world opportunity for these kiddos. Especially when we got up to the level
025of worlds and you're qualifi or you're competing against kiddos top-notch 600 teams from around the the globe. It was serious serious competition. They have to think on their feet. It's not just about great engineering of a bot, great coding of a bot, but it's on your feet strategy, but then communicating with your alliance partners, communicating with other teams when you're looking at trying to build future alliances. I mean, the amount of soft skills that they learn to prepare them for the world outside of high school is just amazing. These kiddos are your future. Um, and I'm just super super proud of all of them. Thank you. All right, one last round of applause for our students and really Susan from from me to you. We've uh grown to be great collaborators. Every time Susan shows
026up, it cost me another five or $10,000. So, I precommit that to next year's team, even without Miss Forier advocating for you. So, thank you all. Congratulations. ProStart is next, a national career and technical education program that prepares high school students for careers in the restaurant and hospitality industry. Students gain hands-on experience in culinary arts and restaurant management. Tonight, we are recognizing students from Odyssey Echo's ProStart class who competed at the state level in a Top Chef style competition. Congratulations. Congratulations. And Gina, is that how you say your name? And Gina, tell us some more about the program and tell me a little bit about what Dish is and isn't here tonight. Good morning. Sorry. Good afternoon. My name is Anthony Koke. Um, Dish is a food truck that we did catering for this morning
027and uh I helped cater with it obviously. Um the competition, I was in the competition for two years. For my first year, I was manager and then for my second year, I did the cooking. Um I did the um the starter. I also help with the entree. And for my starter, I did um a family recipe that the judges did love, but sadly we didn't place. Um um I just want to give a thanks to my family and my teacher, Miss Aragon, for giving me this award. That's awesome. Congratulations. All right, big round of applause and thank you. Next time the food truck will start. We had a food truck that we were going to unveil tonight, but uh as goes with all good plans, the food truck didn't start due to the cold weather
028last night. So thankfully it's in a safe in a parking lot. Thank you. Thanks. HOSA Future Health Professionals empowers future healthc care professionals through competitive events, leadership training, and opportunities to explore careers in the medical field. The HOSA International Leadership Conference will be held June 17th through 20th, 2026 in India Indianapolis, Indiana. Tonight, we recognize HOSA members from Palmer High School. Uh, is that Amara? Yes. I think Amara is our student spokesperson. So, tell us a little bit about you, what grade you're in, um, and how this has been impactful for you in your studies. Hi, I'm Amara Dear Rosa. I'm a senior at Palmer High School and I started HOSA um, in sophomore year of high school and I've done it all three years. HOSA is a great of great opportunity for future health
029care workers to explore what they would like whether that's from veterary science to forensics or doing medical surge tech. Our not all of our team is here today but all of our participants um made it um in the top 10 to state level and four of us are going to internationals. And where are internationals? Internationals are in Indianapolis. in Indianapolis. Okay. So, it won't cost us too much money. No. Okay. Congratulations. Round of applause. Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you, Jacine. Let's go out that way. Thanks, DECA. Distributive education clubs of America prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality, and management. Students apply classroom learning through competitive events, developing skills in leadership, problem solving, and business decisionmaking. DECA students and advisers recently returned from their international development conference in Atlanta, Georgia. Tonight,
030we will recognize DECA students from DHY High School. All right, huge round of applause for our Spartans. Where is Sylvia? There you are. Sylvia is our student spokesperson. Hi guys, my name is Sylvia Po. I'm a junior at DHY High School and I've been a member of DECA these past two years and it's been great to see how the program has gone and grown, especially the fact that we had two people go and compete at our international conference and it was just such a great year for DECA and we really grew and I'm really proud of everyone up here. All right, go Spartans. Big round of applause. following up. Okay, you're FBLA, Future Business Leaders of America, helps students prepare for careers in business through academic competitions, leadership development, and networking opportunities with professionals across
031the country. The FBLA National Leadership Conference will be held this summer in San Antonio, Texas from June 29th through July 2nd. Tonight we recognize FBLA members from DHY High School. We would like to give special recognition to Sylvia PTO for being selected as the new Colorado State FBA president and to Dohy High School's FBLA and DECA adviser, Charmin Newer, for being named the Colorado Business and Marketing Teacher of the Year. Congratulations. Okay, Sylvia, tell us all about FBLA. Hi again. Um, FBALA, we had a fantastic year this year, especially at our state conference. Like we mentioned, I was had the honor of being selected as our next state president and Mrs. Newire received an award by the Colorado Business and Marketing Educators Association for being the business teacher of the year, which is a huge
032accomplishment. Additionally, we had multiple students qualify for nationals. Our school won the social media contest for our skills in marketing. And we had a freshman win the trivia contest in front of 4,000 people, which it takes a lot of confidence to step up on stage. So, I'm super proud of everyone up here. She wasn't ready for that. I am so proud of these guys. Um, I have spent um had the honor of spending um 25 years of my 30-year career in District 11. And um this is my swan song. Um I am leaving district 11 here in just a few days and I am so honored and so proud um of these DEC FBA kids and everything that they bring to the table. Every time we take them out um they make district 11 proud.
033They make their teachers proud and most importantly they make their parents proud. Awesome. Thank you so much and congratulations. Thank you for your service. I'll see you soon. FCCLA, Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America, provides students with opportunities for personal growth, leadership development, and career preparation. Students engage in competitive events that address real world issues and career readiness, including careers in culinary arts, education, entrepreneurship, fashion and design, and more. The FCCLA National Leadership Conference will be held July 5th through 11th in Washington DC aligned with the nation's 250th anniversary. Tonight, we will recognize FCCLA members from Coronado, Doherty, Odyssey Echo, and Palmer High School. We would like to give special recognition to Emma Bar from Dohy High School for being selected as the new Colorado FCCLA public relations and publications officer. Congratulations. Huge round
034of applause. Almost all of our high schools are here represented. Emma, tell us a little bit about the program. Hi, like I said before, my name is Emma Bar and I'm grateful enough to say that I was elected to be Colorado, one of Colorado's state officers. So, my role entails a lot of leadership just like our entire organization does, but it's a more hands-on role that we had before. And we are so grateful for the large community that we have and all the members that we've had this year and all of our national and state qualifiers. Okay, huge round of applause for all our award winners. Oh my gosh. And that's all that we have for student celebrations. Uh before we get to the next um set in the agenda, I pass it back to
035the board president. I just I I hope people heard some themes uh for our students. This is a district that is completely student focused. You're hearing students via a variety of different opportunities. some children in multiple opportunities taking advantage of ways to learn in different ways that we're not just asking them to sit and listen. Uh that's what we call agency. I think you saw agency come to life here tonight with our students. I think you also heard and saw a lot of students standing side by side from different schools. And so you're seeing schools find ways to work together. Uh America seems to find a place to wait uh seems to continue to find ways to want to pull itself apart. I think if we follow our students, you'll see that they want to
036work together. It's okay if they go to different schools. It's okay if they share a bus. It's okay if they share an international trip. They're learning together in ways to inherit the world that it's uh our great honor to be able to pass on to them. Over to you, uh Dr. Kerry. Well, I think I'm I think I'm kicking it right back to you because the next item we have on the agenda is our standout seniors for the spotlight tonight. Okay. Program spotlight. We're uh have a bunch of um uh scholarship winners and several service academy and ROC scholarship winners as well. So I think they're coming forward and if my staff member that is going to run this part of the section can please get up here and tell us all about all these
037amazing young adults on their way to inherit the world. over to you. Hi, good evening. My name is Jacqueline and I am the college and career counselor at Florida High School. This is my first year in district 11 and I am truly honored to be asked to recognize some of our district's most outstanding seniors this evening. In my many years in this profession, I can honestly say that I have never been more impressed with the caliber of students we are recognizing tonight. From Betcher and Daniels Fund scholars to Military Academy appointments and everything in between, these students have demonstrated exceptional dedication, perseverance, and achievement. I would also like to note that in all my years as a counselor, I have never had a student receive appointments to three militarymies, making tonight's recognition particularly special. At
038this time, I would like to invite our students to come forward and share a brief introduction about themselves. First, we have Luciano uh Terra Borelli, who was from Coronado High School. He received a full ride scholarship to the United States Air Force Academy. Hello, I'm Benjamin Lovado. I go to Coronado High School. I got into United States Air Force Preparatory School and I am planning to major in aeronautical engineering. Hello again. Uh my name is John Corbett. I go to Coronado High School. I got accepted into the United States Air Force Academy and I plan to major in aeronautical engineering. Thank you. Hello, my name is Matthew Harford. I go to Coronado High School. Uh the scholarship I received was the Chick Evans scholarship. Um and I'm going to CU Boulder and the degree I
039intend to go into is environmental design and architecture. Good evening. Uh my name is Carissa Rickard. spoken to you all before briefly, but uh I got the stamp scholarship, a full ride scholarship, and I'll be at the University of Oregon in the fall. So, thank you. So, my name is Robert Levi Turman. I go to Odyssey League College and Career Options High School, and I won the Daniels Fund Scholarship, the Sax Foundation Scholarship, and then also received a Burger King award. And I'm planning on going to Howard University to study chemistry and become a pediatric orthopedic surgeon. So, Hi, I'm Raven Spicer. I'm going to or I go to Odyssey High School. I got the presidential scholarship. I'm going to Roger Williams University and I plan to major in criminal justice and psychology. Hello, I
040am not Jason Simmons. I am here to speak for Jason Simmons. He is at PPSC right now taking his last class before final exams. Um, but I first want to say that the previous three students all fall on my co case load. I am Katrina Everett. I am a school counselor at Odyssey. So I am immensely proud of all of my students. Um, but Jason um has been accepted into Princeton. He has a full ride scholarship to go to Princeton and he will be studying aerospace engineering. He is also um Odyssey's first associate of engineering science recipient. My name is Sophia Malpacham. I go to Dherty High School. I have committed to going to uh with on full ride to uh the Colorado School of Minds on the Bacher scholarship. I plan to study biomed
041and chemical engineering while there. Hi, my name is Evelyn X. I go to Dherty High School. Um, I received a full ride Navy ROC scholarship and was going to go to CU Boulder, but now I'm excited to go to the United States Naval Academy to study aerospace engineering. Good evening. My name is George Miller. I was accepted by the United States Air Force Academy and I plan to major in biochemistry. Thank you. Hello, my name is Natalie Miro and I go to Palmer High School and I will be attending Colorado State University on the Bachelor Scholarship in the fall and I plan to major in mechanical and biomed engineering. Thank you. Okay, for the students that were not able to attend this evening, we've got Lucy Ruez Smith from Mitchell High School. Lucy received a
042full ride academic scholarship to the University of Denver and will be attending School of Minds. We've got Daphne Telles Guzman Mo from Mitchell High School. Daphne received full tuition scholarships to four universities across the United States and will be attending Pikes Peak State College. We've got Ashley Felicito Valdez from Mitchell High School. Ashley received a full tuition scholarship to Adam State University and will attend Pikes Peak State College in the fall. We've got Santi Keys from Dhy High School. Santi received the Sax Foundation scholarship, I believe a track scholarship, and will be attending University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. And our last student is Harper Kaitton from Palmer High School. Harper received the distinguished scholar award to Colorado Mesa University and will be attending CMU in the fall. So, let's give these students one more round
043of applause. Thank you. Okay, before we excuse our students, I'll call an audible. It is a teacher appreciation week. So, if I can get the first three who want to go to the podium and give a teacher shout out of an actual teacher in D11 that helped them get to the opportunities that they have in front of them today. And if you don't make yourself go, I'll call out the five of you that I know by first name. So, I don't want to do that. I'm start I'm Ben Lovado again and I'm going to talk about Miss Kimler Kimberly Concincaid, excuse me. uh she helped me a lot through my journey um in getting to this point. So, thank you. All right. And Kim, you're here, aren't you? I've got Bryce McClean. It's his last
044year at Coronado High School, and he really fostered my love of engineering. Awesome. Um I have two teachers. One of them is Donna X, my mom. She has supported me not only through my whole life but in this year especially. Um applying to the servicemies is not an easy process and she was there through blood, sweat and tears. Everything just all of it. She read my essays a million times and I love her so much. Sorry. Um so my mom and Miss Ortiz, my math teacher, she's amazing and also wrote over eight letters of recommendation for me. So thank you so much. Gentlemen, don't leave. Go back. Go back. Go back. Uh, Evelyn, you and I, although an Air Force grad and you are likely now to be an enson in the United States Navy
045in Annapolis, tell people a little bit about the process because you just recently found out and so I'd love to hear this perseverance and patience. Yes. So, it began in early September, August. I applied for the nomination boards. I did interviews with the senators and with our congressman Jeff Prank to receive my uh my nomination um from Jeff Prank uh to the United States Naval Academy. Um and through that you will also participate in adopt medical exam as well as the candidate fitness assessment. So you have to be medically fit as well as physically fit. Um and lots of other academic tests like the SAT, your GPA, your leadership, it all goes into it. Um, and you have to do interviews with each academy as well. So, it was such a long process, the waiting
046process. I was originally weightlisted to the academy. Um, and I found out yesterday that I was accepted. Hi, I'm Natalie and I would like to thank my teacher, Nathaniel Lman. He was my science research teacher and was able to give me so many opportunities over the last four years to pursue the science that I love. Awesome. Thank you. So, as we wrap up our program spotlight, I'll open up to the board if they have any questions for just this small sampling of excellent students that are getting ready to graduate and take on the world. So, maybe turn yourselves around and take the front row there. Uh, and then, uh, we'll let the board members ask you any questions if you want. I'll just jump in here first real quick. Uh, so I I teach chemistry
047and physics at the Air Force Academy prep school. So, Ben, I will be seeing you next year at some point. Um, and for the rest of you who are going on to the Air Force Academy, uh, if you ever have any trouble in Chem 100, just look me up on Teams. That's an earnest offer. You're not going to remember next year, though. Um, last piece of advice I'd give you is if you're looking to increase your pull-up score on the PFT, try weighted pull-ups. I'm serious. You don't get better at bench press just by benching the bar a million times. You do not get better at pull-ups just by doing tons of reps of body weight. Get a dip belt. Get some weight on there. Your pull-up score will shoot up. I promise. I've done
048it. It works. All right, I'll stop being self-indulgent. Bard, I'll turn it over to you. Director Hley, I don't have any questions, but I do want to give you a a piece of unsolicited advice. Um, you Coronado people, I don't know if you know this, but I was a Coronado person for a very long time, but I never had any one of you in class. So, that's too bad for me and and a little bit for you, too. Um, but I did want to say to to all of you, you're going to be moving away from home. Some of you very far away. I mean, Maryland's a long a long ways away, right? Have you ever you've been to Maryland, I'm sure. Do you like it? Yeah. It's beautiful, right? Have you been there there
049in the middle of July? Okay, you may not be so beautiful then. Um, but what I want to do is is tell you all regardless of where you're going, remember from where you came. This is your foundation. Okay? Everything that you build, you're building on top of the foundation that you have created at this point. And God bless you. You guys can't wait to see what you do. Congratulations. Director Mel Packin. Yeah, it's good to see all of you guys up here and I know several of you personally, including my own daughter that is up there. U I know a lot of hard work and sweat goes into what you have accomplished. So each of you should be proud of what you have managed to accomplish in your four-year journey. And over and over again
050we talk about district 11 being excellence and all about academic excellence. These are reflections of our academic excellence in district 11. So go forth, go forward and uh do your best uh in your future endeavors and I look forward to hearing great things from each and every one of you. Director Baka Barl, it's so exciting. Nice to see some of you. I've met some of you and uh in the in the election process. Uh so it's great to be here and seeing you and I'm excited as a district 11 graduate. Congratulations and do keep in touch. Let us know how it's going and I hope that you find that you have a community that's supporting you and sending you off. Congratulations on your work. Director Johnson. Um, first of all, I just want to say
051congratulations to you all. You guys decide to take on, you know, a K through 12 journey now into the real world. You guys will, you know, face a lot of challenges, but also a lot of great moments. And I think you guys have chose your path and the beliefs where you guys want to go and I wish the best for you all. And you guys, you know, you guys set the tone for the next generation of what could be possible for America and what what we need. So, thank you. Congratulations to you guys. All right, seeing no further comments. Thank you all. Congratulations. Best of luck. Give us a call if you need some help. And uh pass on all your juniors and sophomores and freshmen. Uh put the time in. We have all the
052staff to support you. If you don't understand something that's a challenge for you, go to your teacher, go to your adviser, go to your counselor. Heck, call me. Uh I was in uh a Palmer class today um talking about some stuff about uh 20th century history. So by all means every adult in this system is here for children and you all represent uh what that can mean for children as we go forward. So thank you. Congratulations. All right. The next item we have on our agenda is our superintendence report. Uh, Superintendent Gaul, what do you have for us tonight? Uh, if I didn't have the first thing, I would be right on time at 6:30. But we do have our we us um uh uh conclusion for our uh efforts that we made this year
053and a prize to give out. So, if I could get Dr. wise to come forward with our we us partners to lead us in this probably 10 or 15 minute presentation of which then I will move quickly through the rest of the superintendent report. We'll do the videos first. We can get the students out of here. Sorry, logistics. Hi, good evening board. I'm so glad to see you again. I am uh gonna knock on wood that my videos work this evening. Melissa is an expert now after a few reports. Um so it's my honor to present some students to you this evening. Uh earlier this year we launched a social media competition we are D11 the student spirit uh school contest. It was a district-wide contest built around one simple but powerful idea that every
054student in this district has a story worth telling and something in their school that they're proud of that is worth sharing with the rest of the district. So we invited students across the district to participate and we had a tremendous turnout. Um the contest drew 89 total video submissions. 13 different schools were represented. 250 students participated because we encourage groups of students to work together. And tonight we're here with the three winning groups of that contest. Now, I know not all of you are necessarily I don't I can't say, but I don't think you're online all the time. So, let me let me remind you that um part of the promise of this competition was that the winning teams will get to choose their choice $300 or a MetaQuest 3, which is a VR headset.
055And so, um all of our teams will be presented with their chosen awards tonight. So without further ado, I would like to introduce at least one member I think this evening is here from our first place team comes from Palmer High School. So we have Harlon Bunch with us here tonight. Haron is representing the TTV Goats. Is that correct? Um their entry received over 518 likes and 150 comments. Um, which is a testament to the energy, creativity, and school spirit they brought to the frame. So, uh, Melissa, can we play the Palmer TTV video? The Palmer guys, right? Of course, we play on the playground at recess. We are D1. Thank you. Uh Harlon, would you like to share anything about your experience making this video? Um yeah. Yeah, go ahead. Um I just love
056this community. I love D11. I love Palmer. And I'm very grateful for this opportunity and um other opportunities. We worked on the 150th anniversary alumni piece for TTV as well. And just thank you so much. And how are you going to spend your how are you going to spend your $300? We're actually planning on using that as a budget for a short film we're going to make this summer to hopefully All right, our second place team, um, which is a true honor, and thank you for hanging with us tonight. It's my honor to introduce the Taylor Elementary Basketball Bros. So, we have with us this evening, come on up, guys. We have with us this evening Lincoln, Bodie, and George from the team. And Bodie, your check is right here. And then, uh, Lincoln and
057George, we have your VR headsets. Um, Melissa, can we play the, uh, basketball bros? I love the 11 because of all the sports they have to offer. I love the 11 because they're basketball team. I love D11 because they're educational. I love D1 because it inspired me to play basketball. We are D1. Could I ask one of you to talk about what it was like to make the video? Feel a little shy. Okay, that's all right. We're very proud of you. Yeah. And then finally, our third winning team, I'm proud to say, is the quote Giggle Gang from DHY High School. Uh, their entry received 173 likes and 19 comments, and we're just really proud of them. So, Giggle Gang, Andrea, Flora, and Alina, please come up and receive your checks. All right, Melissa, the
058final video. I think you all were going to share something a little different if you want to share how it was making the video and then how you're going to spend your money. Um, it was really fun actually. We love editing. We actually submitted our video thanks to our marketing teacher, Miss Dismeck. She gave us the option to submit it and gave us time during our marketing class to work on it and it was really fun to do it. So, yeah. Thank you, um as well as she said um this helped us a lot like to get together and understand how our school works and how um a lot of opportunities Dory has for us and yeah it was fun and thank you to our teacher Bismac for um giving us the opportunity to work
059on this and giving us time. We're happy to show you guys our authority community and how much it impacted our lives. Thank you. We could get one more round of applause for our student winners. That would be very appreciated. And then I have one final award to give out and this is a big one. Um, the other promise of this contest was that the school with the most submissions would receive $5,000 to use uh as they as they so see fit. And it's my honor to say that Palmer High School was our $5,000 winner. Is Principal Burke still here? Okay. Yeah, you get up here. Christa, can you speak on behalf of Palmer? I think we made terror TV class a few promises that I don't know if they're going to hold you to at
060this podium right now. Probably are. I am just incredibly proud to be the principal of Palmer High School. I've seen so many kids cycle up here tonight, which just shows, right, that foundation matters. Uh, and go tears. Thank you guys. This has been a really fun experience. We're really thankful to our students for embracing this whole hard wholeheartedly and we're looking forward to next year of doing more and more of this to have fun with our students and interact and showcase how great they are. So without further ado, I'm going to let our students uh leave and pass it off to our partners at WESM to give you a highle overview of the campaign. Good evening everybody. Um, thanks for having me. I'm going to try to keep this concise as your questions as chair.
061So, um I won't take too much of a time, but we will go over some salient points about the campaign that kicked off November of last year and just ended the end of this April. Um but before I do, can I selfishly say that if any of those students are looking for jobs, please call us. We're always looking for fantastic talent. So, please uh um hit us up. Our information is all over. So, please feel free to do so. My name is Ashwin Cuddi. I'm one of the principles at BSM. Uh pleasure to meet you all. Um I'm joined by Fatnel Shazley, uh my co-principal and chief creative officer of BSM as well. Um so when we were brought on board we were asked to talk about or asked to think about how we can
062create the awareness that we needed for the district um more broadly as D11 but also think about some of the other elements which was around thinking about how we in our terms reclaim the narrative and how we sort of put the narrative out there as to what D11 provides and how it can sort of shape the future of the young people um in Colorado Springs. Um some of the things that we were thinking about was what was happening and we did an audit of um all the communication work that was happening here at D11. One of the things that we sort of hit on was it wasn't a question of quality. It was a question of visibility, voice and belief. And if you give me two seconds to sort of go over that, which is
063we want to make sure that the the content we put out there is actually seen by people. The voices that we have that we put out there as well is a reflection of the experience that we experiences that people actually go through here at D11. and then of course the belief and the trust that people have on what they're actually seeing and consuming as well. So those three were our tenants for what the c what the campaign actually took form um for in the future. So one of the things that we think about is when we think of marketing traditionally you think about campaigns and you think about you know developing a lot of ads putting it up and then hope to god that someone's actually going to look at it and then react through
064to it. What we wanted to do was we wanted to create something different. You have a lot of young people in this district, a lot of schools, a lot of representation. So, what we wanted to do was create a movement and shape the narrative of what that movement looks like. We can start the movement and that's what we have done here. And you'll see some numbers that will um hopefully uh impress you. Um but what we also wanted to do was make the movement not just ours, not just D11s, but everybody that is part of the community of D11 as well. So everybody can sort of shape it and sort of narrate it the way they want to. Um, and and this is the whole notion of community ownership of what the campaign looks like
065as well. I'm not going to play the Anthem video, which I really love because we don't have much time, but this was our key collateral that was put out. It was our number one asset um that went out there and it was the one that resonated the most with everyone. Um, if I can sort of hit the tenants as well of what we were looking at. Um, I'll leave the the content and the text up there, but what I wanted to sort of highlight was when this anthem went up and it was an always on video, which basically meant that it was available throughout the length of the campaign. What we got back was shock and awe. People were not believing that this was their school, this was their district, and they were providing commentary
066and feedback around, wow, I can't believe that this this is where I go and this is what this is what I'm part of. Um, we actually and and I got made fun of the other day for saying this, but we actually had a lot of crying emojis come forward as well to say that I'm not part of this and I'd love to be part of this as well. So, this was one of our key assets that actually kicked off the movement and kicked off the campaign itself. So, the marketing approach um that we took and we get asked you know sort of why did you think of using the platforms that you did? So if you think about social media, if you think about things like Amazon, if you think of think of things like
067Spotify or Google search and what have you, why did you use why did you use any of those platforms? It's because we did a lot of research around Colorado Springs and what the consumption patterns are. We look at how people actually consume information here in Colorado Springs. We look at how they actually take that and then act on it as well. So we look at not just consumption but we also look at conversion and those two combined is basically what drove us to the marketing approach that we put together and uh the work that we did across all those different channels. The campaign had about five phases. So we kicked off the first with the anthem that was our awareness. Basically we wanted to get people to know who who the VRD11 sort of or
068what the VRD11 movement is all about and what it's trying to sort of position it itself as. And I'm going to talk to you a little bit about that um shortly as well. And then the next phase was about immersion. So we wanted people to experience it. So we had a lot of content go in to basically show what the experience at D1 was like. The contest that you just saw the winners up here for uh kicked off in phase three. And really what that was was to bring together students to show their school spirit, get them involved in the movement and get them together to really showcase what D11 means to them. Phase four was to get into those um nitty-gritty details that was important, which is to talk a bit of the programs
069and the pathways that are very unique to D11 that are um so wide and so so diverse that there is something for everybody. And so we wanted to get um that information out there because now we actually had a captive audience actually listening to the content that we're putting out there. And finally, we hit a sub campaign um as part of the movement where we went from VRD11 to Vare D11. It was test time, exam time, and we wanted to be able to provide information that students could avail of themselves with regards to the supports that they had within the D11 district and also just sort of tie off the campaign and uh from uh all the sort of work that we had done into um showing how the student is supported all around um
070uh in in the district. Um I'm not going to spend a little a lot of time here, but um all the content that we had and all the content that was presented was studentled. So whether they were students interviewing other students, whether they were students speaking about their experiences, whether they were teachers and parents speaking about the students that they they get involved with or counselors that they are sort of exposed to, everything was from a student perspective and student voice and that's the content that went up lead generation. So we also built a lead generation mechanism which basically means that we wanted to have or use the campaign to drive enrollment. And so we built a mechanism where people could show their interest in joining the district at the various schools that were being
071presented through all the content that we had as well. UC is user generated content. That's marketing talk for basically telling us that we wanted people to be part of the part of the movement and we wanted them to create content as well which was great. It happened and it was there was some beautiful pieces of content that came forward and the school spirit that we were talking about really showed very well through all the submissions that came through. Um, I think that is a great sort of foundation that's been built here. Um, even with the contest that we hope to see come forward in the future. As I said, first person voices. So, we were looking at how individuals would speak about their own experiences, not scripted, not um pre-produced in any fashion. This was
072about people just giving their or or young people just giving up their thoughts on their experiences at D11. Programs and pathways. This is about sort of demystifying all the different programs and pathways that exist and giving a sort of a clear reflection of what the opportunities and possibilities are for any student that wants to go to the district and then looking at celebration and recognition. We wanted to also celebrate all the good things that were happening here at the district and showcasing all the awards, all the successes that young people were receiving here while they were having an education here at D1. So the baseline was zero. We started most campaigns usually, you know, take what the work that you've been doing in the past and sort of building on top of that. We wanted
073to sort of create a movement that was about voices, about the voices of the community. So, we built a platform that really started at zero. It was something that was quite frankly a bit of a um a scare because we we don't, you know, it was something that we we were hoping that it would work, but it did. Um and something like that when you start building it from from zero from scratch takes about 12 to 16 to 18 months to actually gain some sort of traction and awareness. Well about five and a half to 6 months later these are your numbers and this is a reflection of your district. Um I would say that there's a lot of work um sweat blood and tears put into this not just by our teams of ESM
074but in collaboration in partnership with D11 and the staff that have been here but this is a reflection of the community. 7 million people were uh we we reached 7 million people with the content that we put out there. Over 53,000 hours of video has been consumed. Please take that in. 53,000 hours. That means people have actually watched the videos start to finish and they've done it numerous numerous numbers of times. Over 500 enrollment leads came through. Uh in terms of commentary, people say that people don't want to comment and they don't want to put positive comments out there. We had over 2,000 comments. About 98% of them were positive. And this is phenomenal. It's a great testament to what you do here at D11. With regards to impressions, over 26 million impressions, which basically
075means that's how many people saw it, engaged with it, and went past it as well. And then last but not least, what I like to do because I'm a business guy, I like to talk about value that you received on the spend that you had for advertising. Traditionally, you for a good campaign, you have anywhere from 1,000 to 3,000% return. um when you hit a viral campaign and a viral movement you have about a 15,000% return. We hit 16,723% in just about five and a half to 6 months. So this has been a phenomenal success um of a campaign. And with that what I will close off with just saying is these are some of your top videos that were out there um across the various channels and how successful they were. The numbers speak
076for themselves. the content that was up there and the content that sort of reflects what the deep loving community is also very reflective in those um those pieces of content as well. And finally um um I'd love to take any questions. And no, you don't have to put your hands up. You can just um you know buzz in if you'd like to. All right. As the boards think any other questions, Dr. Wise, please join our We Ask them partners. And I see Emily's here as well. and and um I believe Allison's back there. Thank you. If both Emily and Allison and if we can all pretend that we can see everybody in the booth right now standing up, just a big round of applause for our engagement team who's had to think uh very differently
077about their work. So, take it out. Thank you to the board for questions. All right, we'll start it off with Director Johnson. Yeah. Um, I just want to say thank you for what you're doing to help spotlight District 11 and show the true authenticity of what D11 can offer to our community. Um, I'm a very social media type of person, as you can tell, compared to most people on the board. But, um, I I think it's important that, you know, we engage folks through through authentic manner of showing the the vulnerability of where D1 can be and where it can go. I think when you talked about the GCU of showing that true authentic storytelling of the students and talking to their peers and you know talking about the everyday interaction that they have. I
078think you know a lot of people can relate to that when they see that on social media. They can see a reflection of themselves. I mean I saw it all over YouTube when I was on my phone. I see that on Spotify. I shared a couple of couple of them myself. And so thank you for what you're doing. And I think that you know we're on the right trajectory and I think the board up here can create our own we are D11 type of video and maybe beat the numbers of hits that came in through. So absolutely. Thank you again for your leadership because that's really important and and if I can just add one thing, it's you know it's tough when we do what we do because we take we take on tough topics
079to sort of market and put it out there. But to have such great people talking about their great stories and the great experiences, it makes our job a little easier. Not a lot easier, but a little easier. Um and and it really does help. Thank you again. Absolutely. Director Jorgensson. Thank you for your presentation tonight. That was a a big ask in November and it seemed like not a lot of runway. So, I appreciate you addressing that tonight. I'm impressed by the the anthem was really cool. It actually brought me back to my Dohy High School assembly days of how fun those were and just knowing that we had some of the best assemblies there. Um, so seeing the anthem was great and then seeing those contact hours and the reach was uh beyond what
080I had thought you could do in six months. So, thank you, sir. It's a pleasure. Thank you so much, Director M Pack. Thank you. I'm not a social media person. I avoid social media. Uh but when I am working out in the gym on the treadmill, I do turn on to some of the YouTube videos and we are D11 popped up quite frequently. Wonderful. So while I was working out, I got to listen to our students. So that that was good. And uh it was great to see some of our student presenters here as well. Um now that this contract is up, yes, what is um your takeaway from this or what is um how do we continue this momentum? What is it that you can share with us as future steps? That's a great
081question. Um I'm I we don't have a lot of time but what I will share with you is that we've had presentations yesterday as well with staff and the executive and we have given them a lot of learnings that we've had through the campaign and as well recommendations going forward as well. Um, one of the recommend key recommendations is that the movement has sort of taken a life of its own and it's we we actually we were we were done 30th of April and I was just talking to the office today and we're still getting enrollment submissions today and so I think one of the things that we have said to the uh to the staff of D1 to the marketing communications team as well as the executive is that do not lose momentum just
082continue on with the momentum and then of course a whole bunch of other recommendations that have come forward with them and I leave them in great hands um with the marketing communications team and with the executive as well. I'm sure you heard about them in the future. Yeah, we'll provide uh through a Mars report some of those recommendations, especially ones that might change any next steps for the district. Uh Dr. Wise and we as them have a really good relationship and taking some of this to the how do we mo maintain the momentum and how do we actually rethink about our enrollment process through a a CRM and anybody in sales knows, you know, how many touch points do you need with somebody to actually close the deal? And so thinking a little bit differently
083even about our centralized enrollment to make it a cleaner, simpler process for families to navigate, still meeting all the requirements uh invoked by the state to make sure uh you know that people are able to enroll and that we get them assigned to the right schools and the right needs. But really simplifying that process is probably our next big step along with this idea of what you really saw today was something that we've been coveting and and we appreciate we us helping teach our children to teach us how to do that. The short snippy really fast ways um I forget the giggle team, the giggle gang. What were they from DHY? Like that was exactly what people want to digest on social media. A lot of us want to hear a story and we want
084a part five and but most of the public doesn't want part five. So um I think there's a couple of takeaways that we'll share with the board in a Mars report here especially as they implement any next steps budgetary or otherwise. Thank you. All right. Seeing no further questions. Thank you so much. Thank you. It's been a pleasure and an honor. Absolutely. All right, I'm doing pretty good. I got 20 minutes according to our pre-arranged agreement here to be done with uh student staff celebrations. Uh it again, not really our last board meeting, but our last board meeting where so many members of our community will be accessible. Uh really appreciate that summary. Uh again, our students are really killing and telling our story. Uh this uh I don't have the building leaders here because
085in the fall we'd kind of do the banner roll out, but we did have four of our schools go up to Denver for governor's awards. Uh Chapita and Odyssey both receiving the John Irwin award, which is about academic excellence. Uh remember uh if you can remember last year that Chapido was the highest performing school in all of El Paso County on the seamass last year with over 75% of their students achieving uh meeting or exceeding grade level expectations in math and ELA. And Odyssey Echo continues to lead our secondary portfolio. I think you saw that very clearly tonight again as well in both our CTSO uh award winners as well as our scholarship award winners. Big shout outs also to Scott and Taylor uh both of them winning uh growth awards and Scott on the
086governor's distinguished improvement award for the growth that they were able to achieve last year and then Taylor more specifically on a school where at least 75% of the students are identified as at risk also being able to achieve very strong longitudinal growth. So looking forward to those building leaders coming forward in the fall for what we call the banner parade uh where we'll be able to roll out these banners and some more. So, a round of applause for these four schools, please. And if I could get Jody Abrams and my students and my staff leadership from, uh, CH, um, Queen Palmer to please come forward. As they're coming forward, I might remind you all that in 2022, uh, upon my hiring, we made a formal relationship with the American Heart Association. I tell the story
087all the time of how both my parents died of heart disease. Um, which is why if you see me running up and down the streets of Colorado Springs downtown, it's in an effort to stave off that genetic predisposition. So, I am actively paying attention to my coronary health and we appreciate Jod and everything that you do. Over to you, Jody. Thank you so much. It's so wonderful to be with you all tonight. My name is Jod Abrams. I'm the vice president of school engagement for the American Heart Association in Colorado and Wyoming. and you have three students here in D11 um that are top fundraisers in the whole state of Colorado. And so we wanted to honor them tonight. Peragan, Oilia, and Julian. And um I'm just going to read something. Um they are not
088here with us, but they are here um in spirit for sure. So, Peragrin, Oilia, and Julian, on behalf of the American Heart Association, we want to congratulate you for being top student fundraisers in Colorado for the American Heart Association through Kids Heart Challenge at Queen Palmer Elementary for the 2025 2026 school year. The American Heart Association is incredibly grateful for your dedication and generosity by working as a team raising $1,539.26. 26 cents. You are helping fund life-saving research, advance medical care, and provide education that improves and saves lives for those affected by heart disease and stroke. Your efforts are all are also inspiring others to build healthier habits, creating a lasting impact in your community. Kids Heart Challenge is about more than fundraising. It's about learning how to take care of your heart while making
089a difference for others. You embraced that challenge and truly stood out, showing leadership, compassion, and commitment to helping people live longer, healthier lives. Your actions are also in have also inspired others around you to join in and be part of the fight against heart disease. Reaching this milestone means that you were the 14th highest fundraising students out of 12,753 who participated in this effort across all the schools in Colorado. Very cool. Yeah, you have a big round of applause. A heartfelt thank you to Principal Butcher and Brandy Nelson for bringing this program to life for the Queen Palmer Elementary community and inspiring the next generation of lifesavers. Peragan, Oilia, and Julian, thank you for putting your heart into this mission. We are so proud of you and all that you have accomplished. Awesome. I want
090to thank Coach Randy. I want to thank Miss Brandenstein and the Anderson family. I know that um Pippen, Oilia, and Julian are not here, but in spirit, but I want to thank them for their leadership, their commitment, and dedication in raising the $1,500. And I want us to close in one celebration from Queen Palmer. It's one John Cena. Ready? One, two, three. Hello. All right. Thank you all. Uh the district, we talk all often about our paid apprenticeships. Tonight I have just two short updates on some of our internships. Nisha, if you want to come forward and talk a little bit first about um some of our health pathway interns and if we can get those students to come forward as well. I think they're all sitting in the front row. At least I'm hoping
091that's what the scrubs are for. That is what the scrubs are for. So the first one we have is Briana Rainer. She is our first health assistant aid. It is a position that we created in the district. She worked at Jack Swigert Middle School three days a week. This is the first position that we know of created in the state. She was a CNA and she worked there in that position that we have typically hired parents for working with the students and creating that. This opened up doors for her that when she graduates this year because she is a senior. She was able to achieve employment on the trauma surgical ward at Penrose Hospital. And they actually asked her if she had received the questions ahead of time from the interview because she was able
092to answer every situation and it came directly from this employment. Since we created this position, other districts have asked us how we did it and are looking to us to create that model so they can duplicate it in the district. And I'm working with the nurse districtwide to try to fill all of the empty positions that we currently have that have gone unfilled all year with our students that are CNAs. And Briana has some pieces to say. Yeah. So, like she said, I'm a senior at Coronado. Um, and honestly, it was a great working experience because it really did help me build the bridge from being a CNA to working in the hospital. And nowhere will hire you unless you're 18 with your CNA. So, being able to work in a middle school and have
093an easier connection with students because we were a lot closer in age and had a lot more understanding was honestly a great experience. And I have sent many emails and essays to different districts neighboring. And I've helped many students in district 20 and all these different schools to do the same thing. And I think it's a great it was a great opportunity to build the bridge and help other schools do it, too. Any questions for her? Good. Thank you guys. Okay, our next opportunity We started a pilot program this year. We had six students that have been doing the pharmacier and pharmacier math curriculums through national healthcare association curriculum. We had them do it asynchronously through their curriculum and we have placed three Jackson Rehea and Haley with Walgreens. So we have a community partnership
094with Walgreens. We are the first high school nationwide to ever place high school students in Walgreens. They have received a provisional pharmacy technician lensure through DORA. They are able to actually be employed through that for 18 months prior to taking the certification exam for that. Then once they take the exam, they will be bumped up to pharmacy technicians. Walgreens has a program where they will pay for their bachelors and then if they continue to go on through pharmacy school, they will pay for that. Each year that they receive funding, they get to keep that funding. If they decide they no longer want to work at Walgreens, they have to pay it back at a lower rate than they would a student loan. We are the first program ever that we know of in the nation
095to create this for high schoolers. High schoolers can actually do this program at the age of 16, which is unknown by most people. They just have to take the exam when they turn 18 and are ready to graduate or be ready to graduate and not be 18. So, I'll let them talk about their extras. Um, hi, my name is Haley. I'm a junior at Palmer High School. Um, I know personally for me it was a really cool program because I'm looking to get clinical hours to apply to colleges and medical schools and I'm a little bit younger than the other techs and I know it's cool to open doors for me since I am younger and there aren't very many healthcare opportunities. This was a cool one that I was also able to participate in.
096Hi, my name is Amara. I'm a senior at Palmer High School. I was not placed at Walgreens because life gets in the way. But um I really enjoyed taking the online courses. Um and I really have been enjoying the math part and the drug reaction section. Um hi, I'm Jackson. I'm a senior at Dhy High School. And um I just want to the extership has been such a fun opportunity. I've only been able to go for two days so far, but it's been such such an such a great time for each of the for each of the days I've been able to go and be able and get actual hands-on experience in like a pharmacy and it's just been such an exhilarating experience. Hi, I'm Rehea and I'm a senior from Palmer High School and
097um I really appreciate this program because I have been always interested in like the healthc care field and I just didn't know where I fit or where I like what branch I guess I wanted to go into. And I really like that this gave me an opportunity to not only learn and actually get certifications but also um have hands-on experience you guys. And our last program is we received a grant from the mental health corpse America corpse and youth mental health corpse and trail head institute. We are the first school district to ever receive this award for two apprenticeships. So Diego is our first selected community health worker, which is a newly created position that takes real life experience and is a combination of social worker, mental health worker, community worker, patient navigator. It's kind
098of a lot of different hats. and he will receive training concurrent enrollment through either MSU or other programs as well as he will be placed at Adams Elementary and be working with our community partner of community anchor starting as soon as we get all the paperwork done with HR through district 11 and at the end of his 2-year apprenticeship which he will be paid the entire time our plan is that he will be hired on with community anchor and the other one he's going to help us recruit the other student. So we are the first in the state and we believe the nation to ever have a high schooler in this position. Awesome. Good afternoon everyone. My name is Diego. I am a junior at Tesla Educational Opportunity School. And I have to say I
099am very honored for this position because I have always been obsessed with like psychology and therapy and stuff like that. And it's a great honor to be able to be to be working with kids and get them ready for their future and to help them find what what's their calling. It's also a big honor that I was chosen to be part of the interview committee and I am very excited for this opportunity. Any questions on any of the programs or for any of my students? Director Rebaka Barlet. Um, this is the first year of the program. And how how did you connect with the students? How did you get the word out? A lot of work. Um, so basically I use school links. I use going to the schools. I send emails. Diego, I happened
100to be volunteering doing mock interviews. And as he was talking about things, I said, "Hey, have you ever thought about this?" Um, Haley, I'm going to be going on HOSA, which I went on HOSA last year. Um, I oversee all helping professions accept education right now. Um, and so I interact with a tremendous amount of different programs currently. And so I'm around a lot of different students in a lot of different capacities. And so anytime I have a new program, I search out students that might be interested. I also do helping professions events, UC career health fairs, any of those. And anytime I'm around students, I talk about the programs we have. I work with our future centers and help them get the words out. And when they have students, I go to the schools
101and meet with them and say, "Would you be interested? would you like to know more? And really try to fit the right programs with the right kids. And even if they hate it, I tell the kids that's great because now you know you hate it in high school rather than in college or after you've gotten your masters and spent a lot of money. So, a lot of different ways to be very honest. Thanks for getting working so hard to get the word out. Thank you. Yeah, I'll I'll jump in on the connector and the connections and the spaces. First of all, the future centers uh that the board a couple years ago helped support us put a future center in every one of our high schools where students can think differently. It's not just seeing
102the counselor. It's about asking questions about careers and jobs and opportunities. Uh that obviously you heard Nisha, thank you for that. We also have school-based staff that are super specific in it. I think Jacqueline's still here. So, if Jacqueline would just kind of stand up and raise your hand a little bit for uh some of our medical pathway work at Palmer. And then of course um Dwayne in the back. I think I see Dwayne in the back as kind of the keeper of all things CTE and pathways for the district. District 11 continues to lead in El Paso County as well as in the state. As you can you heard several times, first time ever, first uh time for a grant, first opportunity. Uh this is what we believe is core to of the 3812
103guarantee. This is part of that 12 guarantee. It says every kid graduates with a plan. And I really appreciate Nisha the comment of finding out what your plan isn't is just as important as exploring what you think your plan might be. So thank you so much to you the children here the students that are represented and all the staff that go behind that. So thank you. And now I heard Nisha say that she's over everything but education. So now I'm going to transition to education. And if Annie freeze Oh, go ahead. Hold up. We got one more question. Director Johnson, hold on. I'm so sorry. Hold on. Hit pause. Director Johnson. He should come on back. Mike jumped the gun on us a little bit. It's okay. Director Johnson. Yeah. No, first of all, I
104just want to say thank you for taking on this opportunity and for this being the first time ever to have this, I think it's truly remarkable. And to keep the kids local and in in our city, I think is truly inspiring. Um I was just curious, you know, um with most of these kids going into the pharmacy tech at age of 16, do they get college credits for this or is there any like type of reimbursement for them, you know, taking on these early challenges? So this particular program does not give college credit. It gives work-based learning credit, which is a high school credit. It also gives math credit because I crosswalked the curriculum um with Chief Rasmmanson. So they do get math credit because of pharmacy math um which is a high school credit
105at this time. They also get a state certified and nationally certified recognized um credential once they take the test by the pharmacy board. So, it hits two of the big three in that certification as well as then that workbased learning by being placed in Walgreens. Then once they're placed in Walgreens, they can be hired on and Walgreens will pay for them to move on for any pharmacy technician credits which we can get them through MSU and other programs because currently Pikes Peak State College did away with their pharmacy tech program. But there are other schools that are working with us and Walgreens so we can get them college credit through those. But we've already gotten them certification as well as work-based learning. So we've met two of the big three. Absolutely. Well, thank you. You're
106welcome. Any other questions before I walk? Okay. Thank you. All right. Now transitioning now transitioning to our education uh apprentices and interns. Miss Annie Freeze is going to talk about our shadow ed teacher day. Yes. Perfect. Hi guys. Um so uh as you guys know that um we have a lot of teacher cadets and early childhood students already interning in our classrooms. Probably around 60 of those students. This event is not those students. These are different students. They're shadowing a teacher. So it's a job shadow for a day. So um this opportunity allows kids to explore teaching without the commitment right away of signing up for a whole semester year-long class. So it exposes kids to careers in education as well as our grow your own pipeline of featured teachers in the teacher cadet and
107early childhood pathway. This year we had more than 70 students participate in the shadow a teacher day event across 44 of our different elementary schools, elementary and middle schools. And so what made this experience more than just a job shadow is we incorporated um an orientation that all the students had to attend in their future centers and they all got a lesson plan. It was a community service lesson plan. They got to choose between there was two elementary, two middle school lessons that they got to teach in the classrooms that day. Um, I uh wanted to give a shout out to all the people who made this event possible because 70 students across 44 schools. It takes a lot to coordinate that. So, we worked with our future centers. They're the ones who brought the
108kids down into their spaces for us to hold the orientations. I want to give a shout out to um D11 champion, former employee and volunteer Beth Austin. She really she placed found placements for all of the 70 kids. Um we had teachers fill out applications. We had over 70 want to host a shadow and so um she kind of matched them up with um what the kids' interests were, locations, transportation with the this um teachers. I also want to thank of course the host schools and the teachers for opening their doors and welcoming the kids into their classroom. The D11 engagement team. So we had um them come to the orientations and they helped all the kids register as volunteers and they said it's not just this day but you can go back and volunteer
109in our elementary schools. Um as well as the last shout outs I guess is um student pathways. So Dwayne Robersonson for you know and the board of education superintendent G for again supporting these programs. So, I think from now I'm going to just turn it over to some of the individuals and share kind of what this day meant to them. So, the first up I have a student Aiden Huitt from Palmer High School. Hello, my name is Aiden Huitt. I'm a junior at Palmer High School and I shadowed under Mr. Wolf at North. And I just wanted to talk about the experience. It was really really rewarding to get to go and experience what it's like to be a teacher and the struggles they um they deal with, but also get to see how students
110interact from the teacher's perspective. And it's really rewarding to see a student finally understand a concept. And it's very fulfilling experience. And um I think even though it was really rewarding for me, it was also great for the students involved as they were able to um kind of feel more connected to a younger teacher, if you would say. And um this has kind of inspired me to explore my teaching teaching options and I was never really I was kind of on the fence about teaching but doing this has been a great opportunity and I'm actually now going to be taking teacher cadet next year because of this program and it's uh it's been a great event that I got to experience. I was told I should shout out a teacher. So shout out Mr. Lewis
111from Palmer High School. Thank you for listening to me. Hello, my name is Nicholas. I am from Doherty High School. And so I got to shadow at Sabin Middle School with Mr. Dinardo in the band program. And it was a really experience. I really had fun that day. Um, I got to conduct the advanced and the ad intermediate band. Um, and it was fun since I do know I do want to be doing something in music in college. And I'm just really thankful for this opportunity. And I'm thinking about taking teacher cadet. And with that, I introduce Paul Dinardo. Hi there board and everybody. Honored guest. Glad to be here. Uh, this is I wrote it down so it's shorter. We hope. My name is Paul Donardo. I'm the proud band director at Saven Middle
112School. It's my fourth year at SA. My 16th year in education. Uh, when I heard about this opportunity to shadow, I couldn't send an email to these people fast enough. That's we, my wife and I have been mentoring uh, since we were all the way back in New York. Uh, I really feel like Nick took in a lot of really great uh, data for his future. I mean he he was he observed for a moment but then he kind of jumped in for the rest of the day as he mentioned he conducted these classes. We had to say goodbye to Nick. Of course my students were basically gushing about how excited and and engaged they were with this young man. And you know, I believe the secret sauce to teaching, as a lot of I'm
113sure you folks all do, is the community and student interaction, the connection, the deep passion, understanding of the uh content area, of course, right? And so, I just want to say thank you to Annie and the future educator pathway folks for spearheading this. This is so important to bring that uh talent from the inside and from our schools, putting our kind of money where our mouth is. that we invest so much in these children. Why not bring them into the classroom and mentor them as as the next generation? And um thank you to my students. They they were really open-minded with this young man, Nick. They had a rough start in the beginning of the year. They lost me for a couple weeks, but man, their resilience and character really shown through and how they
114welcomed and made Nick a part of our family at Sabin. So, thanks so much and we would love to do it again. So, thanks a lot. Appreciate it. And that's kind of it. Annie, just um we're going to figure out uh there's not enough people coming in and teaching in America. It's not a District 11 problem. It's not a Colorado Springs problem. It's not a Colorado problem. Right. If we can introduce kids to what a service career looks like, if we can continue to invest in compensation and benefits and make it in a space that a teacher can live as a young single adult in their own household and not have to be married to another um uh bread winner in order to make ends meet. I'm certain that these two young students here and
115the many dozens that they represent and the other programs that we run in district 11 can be a part of that pipeline. Thank you, Annie. Thank you. Thanks, guys. Okay, I'm over time, so I'm going to go pretty quickly through the last couple of items here. Uh, not finalized yet, but this summer we'll finalize uh a memorandum of understanding with AS and the National Museum of World War II aviation of a partnership at Mitchell High School. Uh, we're super excited about that. You can see the um the picture inlay there is the World War II Museum is actually doing a buildout right now of a new hanger space for them to be able to do what's called aircraft and power plant training. That's called AM. Uh the way to simplify that for our community is
116you probably pay make $40 $50 an hour by changing oil at a um car dealership. You make about three times as much by changing oil at an aircraft dealership. So we want to create an aviation pathway and have that solidified at Mitchell. Those of you remember Mitchell is the home of the Marauders named after General Mitchell, the original um champion for the birth of the Air Force out of the Army Airore. So super excited for that partnership to be coming to bear this summer when most of you will be on vacation and not paying attention. We will already be implementing a choose aerospace curriculum at Mitchell High School uh in preface to thisou uh and reminding everyone that we have the Air Force Junior ROC program at Mitchell uh as an award-winning program there. So
117very excited about offering our community and our young Marauders an opportunity for some more career pathways to explore. Also excited to announce a new partnership with the Colorado School of the Deaf and Blind. For any of our walkers around here, it's not far from our office. Just a couple of blocks to the east is the beautiful campus of the Colorado uh School and the Deaf and the Blind. You can see here that we'll be offering some Braille and some visual impairment opportunities for our students on site at uh at the School of the Deaf and Blind. This is the first ever partnership for District 11. It's just great to be able to tap into resources that might not exist traditionally within the district to be able to ensure that we can better support our students
118and our staff as well. I do want to go over again as teacher appreciation week, there's a series of coaching initiatives that we've taken to bear over the course of this year that we've been able to celebrate last week and uh then again this week. We closed out our induction year. You can see some of the numbers here. Uh 228 total inductees. uh just the total number of touching uh touch points we had with coaches. We've completely revamped induction to make sure that teachers are getting what they need when they need it. Instead of the age-old, you'll figure it out in three to five years. We want our teachers hitting the ground running. We hire between two and 300 new staff members every year. That's consistent by percentage with the rest of the county. Uh,
119but we're super excited to have had a great induction. And the feedback that we've gotten from our newest teachers at the end of their induction training has been that they're very pleased with the supports that they've gotten and they're super excited to continue that coaching when they are now uh out of the induction and off probation as full-time uh non-probationary teachers. Secondly, I had the great honor of uh sitting with our teachers coaching teachers cohort at a um at a endofear celebration lunch. Uh this year we were able to bring 17 retired teachers back on staff as temp workers. And kind of the difference maker here is that we're able to pay them at the daily rate at which they left the district. And so think about being a very senior teacher that you've been
120able to reach retirement. We're able now none of them want to work full-time. They're very clear that they want to be able to come give supports to younger teachers and struggling staff members at a time that is convenient to their retired life. And so with all great appreciation for that, we're able to hire them at a rate that is completely different than it used to be. We used have to hire these folks at a substitute rate, which is a bit of an insult to somebody who was making twice as much as that on their last year that they were here. We've got just tremendous feedback from the 17 that were able to join us. Uh and it's been such a great program. I want to acknowledge Dr. Carol Fry here sitting. I see her grinning
121on just what great program it's been that we're going to double the size of it uh for next year. And so we'll be up about two dozen to 35 uh teacher uh coaching teacher opportunities. uh to break down for people how this works is that we when we identify a staff member that's struggling with their student uh in the cl with their students in the classroom, we bring in a TCT who kind of does an I do, we do, you do type of 3 to four-week gradual release. Uh everyone knows that first of all, being a teacher is hard. Getting that license is super hard. But then being uh in front of children alone without all the supports that you might have expected uh can be a real challenge. So having a retired teacher stand
122by you in that space uh to give you that on-site feedback kind of OJT on the job training has just been a really tremendous support uh for our newest staff members. Excited for that. And then finally I believe tomorrow we're meeting with our teachers uh our our regular instructional coaching team which again has pretty much doubled in size over the last year at no cost to the size of the district through some of the other efficiencies that we have found. And we have over 25,000 coaching touch points for the district. And I'm telling you that the the idea of the number one way to student achievement is access to high quality instruction is proving itself. Investing in the classroom by giving our teachers who are new to teaching or have had challenging results at the
123first early indication has shown tremendous uh tremendous outcomes. I'll share that with you here. You can see that some of the coaching data here that'll show that our TCTs, 89% of those teachers had increased their MGPs. You can see 78 and 71% of our elementary and middle school math teachers who took our mission math possible training were able to increase their MGP scores with their students. And then in a hyper specific example, our sped teachers because one of our TCTs is actually a retired special educator was able to uh see an ELA increase by 14% and math by 9%. We will be growing these programs. This is the way to ensure that our students succeed that we never leave to chance the quality of the experience that any student has. That is our job as
124educators. We have great examples. We are excited to share in our next work session the end of year data. Pay particular attention to the buildings where we spent the most time in coaching and you will see not just better results. You will see dramatic results that where we spend our time and we invest in the classroom. That's not just in how we coach our teachers. Everything this district does is about investing in the classroom. When we make investments in the classroom, students learn better. We will celebrate that tomorrow in our first ever T11 teacher gayla in the evening of excellence at Widenner Field. This is a combination of several different ways that we celebrate teachers. We will have our Crystal Apple award winners. We will have our diamond award winners uh both sponsored by the
125Crystal Apple Committee and our Rotary that supports the diamond award and then our D11 teacher impact award winners that's sponsored by the Dakota Foundation as well as several school andor other uh off um other district level awards given that night. The idea is it's not the award that you got, it's that you've been recognized for your excellence in work. And so let's bring them all together instead of somebody gets a lunchon, somebody gets a classroom visit, and somebody else gets something to adorn their desk with. We celebrate all our opportunities for excellence. I want to really thank Dr. Weise, if she is still here, uh, and all of her team that's put this together. And again, huge shout out and thanks to the Crystal Apple Committee, the Rotary, and the Dakota Foundation for their support
126in making sure that excellence in teaching is celebrated and recognized. So, please join us board members if you haven't had that invite yet for a Gayla event at Widner's Premier Club. And then in closing, uh we have one more school to do, but uh with this year, we took on the idea of thanking our teachers one teacher at a time, literally one flower at a time. We have been to all of our campuses, but one. We will be the tailor I believe Thursday, tomorrow is it or next week? Next week. Uh and that was just because we had a staffing change that forced us to delay it. But we go to every one of our schools and we put a flower bar in the school and we let our teachers come in at lunch and
127make their own bouquet of flowers. While we're there, usually I am there and definitely uh the area superintendent and often a board member is there. That gives us a chance to engage with our teachers one on-one. Knowing every one of our teachers is as important as our teachers knowing every one of our students. Again, never leaving it to chance. Building individual relationships that are developed one at a time, not in mass, allows each one of our teachers to be celebrated, thanked, and appreciated. This has been such a successful program. We've given out over 3,200 bouquets of flowers, handmade individually. No two are the same. Uh I really want to thank uh my executive assistant Shauna Curts for putting this program together. We are uh literally running around twice a week all year long making sure
128that we can get there. And this is just a small segment of the uh celebrations which you'll notice most of these celebrations show a teacher or a staff member with a separate letter of appreciation. At each one of these events, the principal is asked to recognize a staff member who's gone above and beyond. Uh the flowers usually last about two weeks, but that single piece of paper lasts a lifetime. So, um it has been a real joy and a real honor to be able to engage with each one of our teachers. And every once in a while, you'll see that the kids smell the flowers and they kind of sneak their way in. We always have extras. So, anytime the kids ask for a flower, we make sure we give them that. So, um with
129that, I uh he uh yield the 15 minutes that I lost back to the board. Uh any questions of the board from our superintendent report? questions board. All right. Uh, moving right along. We have public comments. Uh, Melissa, do we have any public comments? All right. Uh, before we get started, I'd like to take a moment to remind participants of the board protocol for public comment. Each speaker will have three minutes to provide comments. A timer will be displayed on the screen to assist you. Please monitor the time and conclude your remarks when your three minutes have expired. Board meetings are primarily business meetings intended for the orderly and efficient conduct of district business. Consistent with the board's priorities, the board values community feedback and listens carefully to public comment as part of its commitment
130to trust and transparency. The clear expectation is that all comments be delivered civily, professionally, and courteously without personal attacks, disparaging remarks, or defamatory statements about district employees, and to maintain appropriate professional decorum in the boardroom. Also, as a reminder, the board's guidelines for public comment uh contained on our website prohibit comments on personnel matters. Uh further, there are legal restrictions on material the board may consider under the Colorado Teacher Employment Compensation and Dismissal Act. for an appeal of a teacher dismissal. The act prohibits the board from considering evidence or comments outside of the administrative procedure. So to protect the integrity of this process, we ask that you do not provide public comments on matters uh related to any teacher dismissal. If you wish to show support for a speaker, please do so by standing while
131the speaker is speaking or by using silent applause. Lastly, statements made during public comments are those of the individual speaker and do not reflect the views of the district or the board of education. Uh, and I've said this at previous meetings, but I'll say it again. Names are not my thing. So, if I mispronounce your last name or your first name, uh, I clearly apologize for that. We will start with Anton Schulki. Good evening, members of the D11 board and Superintendent Gaul. My name is Anton Schulski. I'm a retired social studies teacher with 41 years of service in district 11, including 35 years at Palmer High School. I've also served as the president and the executive director of the National Council for the Social Studies, the nation's largest professional organization dedicated to this field. I'm
132here to speak about textbook adoptions and the teaching of social studies. Reading through the citizen comments regarding these books is an interesting take on politics versus partisanship. Now, as you consider these materials, I encourage you to reflect on an important distinction. The difference between politics and partisanship. Politics is about choices. Your choice to serve on the school board, educators choice to teach, and families choices about where to live, and most importantly, what schools to attend. Partisanship, however, is marked by a rigid loyalty, bias, and oftentimes an unwillingness to engage with differing perspectives. Now, while teaching is inherently connected to civic life and therefore political and broad sense, the classroom itself should remain and must remain nonpartisan. Now, there have been discussions about indoctrinations in social studies classrooms across the country. However, research from the American
133Historical Association supported by NCSS has found no evidence of widespread indoctrination in our schools. Despite this, we continue to see growing pressure driven by public discourse around initiatives such as the 1619 project and the American Birthright standards, as well as trends amplified on social media. It is concerning when curricular decisions are shaped by perception rather than classroom reality. We've seen criticisms of supplemental resources such as the Zen Education Project and the 1619 project. Again, these are supplemental and these are not comprehensive curricula. At the same time, there are calls for full adoption of programs such as the American Birthright Standards uh or Hillsdale 1776 curriculum materials that reflect a distinctly partisan perspective. Now, many of these programs site histo site historians and political scientists, but often lack meaningful input from experts in pedagogy, the science
134and practice of teaching and learning. NCSS emphasizes inquirybased instruction. This approach helps students analyze primary and secondary sources, construct evidence-based arguments, and prepare our our students for informed civic participation. Curricula and textbooks that rely on outdated language or present in narrow political lens do not serve our students well. Adopting materials driven by partisan influence rather than by sound educational practice risk leaving our students unprepared for the complexity of civic life. I urge the board to prioritize strong pedigogy, professional expertise, and student learning over partisan pressures. Thank you. Nope. Nope. Nope. No clapping. Thank you. Our next public comment is Shane Foch. Fosi. My apologies. Oh boy. Good evening. My name is Shane Foshi. Um, I'm going to start by going off script a little bit. If we can accept the socialist nature of the military,
135police unions, fire unions, then we can accept that teachers unions are also part of the public good. That being said, tonight I come before the school board and more importantly before the board's constituents to touch on the following. We see entire sections of textbooks removed, historical figures cut from lesson plans, historical whitewashing, and biblical financial literacy. Dave Ramsey is not without merit, but his financial literacy programs are antithetical to the debt-based US economy. He does, however, provide explicit Christian messaging. If we were were to redact those references like we do health textbooks, it would have fewer objections. Prageru on the other hand has no place in public schools. They lack credentials and push explicitly conservative views often with whitewash and Christian slant. We can unequally invoke a religion and public institutions. It's all or none.
136Um, I was able to do a little bit on Savas, one of the proposed uh, curriculum uh, providers and I saw that they are owned by a private equity form firm that also owns Incur, which is a data broker and the uh, organization behind the ACT. Um, many of the sitting board members ran on anti-woke agendas, they also hired accordingly. When something is defined by a vibe and has no measure, the burden of proof falls on those who make the claim. So, I urge those who rail against woke education to define an objective measure of what is woke and what is not. If woke is radical, it must have a compliment from the right. We must protect our students from that as well. I want to address my concerns around the commitments of the board,
137their offices, and their constituents. We all have ide ideological biases. I I don't want that getting in the way of serving students from all walks of life. I hope this board is more committed to students and political allegiance or political careers beyond the office they currently hold. Director J D J D J D J D J D J D J D J D J D J D Jorgensson said during a 2021 panel with Churches for All Nations, "We work for the taxpayer. We are going to listen to you." And I hope that's the case. In closing, I served aboard the Mon Island. We drew our heritage from Carlson Raiders. He was influenced by Chinese Communists during World War II. Inspired by the motto of his raiders and later mine, we can harness the spirit of
138that mot. Thank you. Thank you. Our next public comment is Kumo Norris. Good evening. Uh my name is Kamiko Norris and I am a D11 parent and a member of the district's accountability committee. Um this evening however I'm commenting as a concerned community member regarding the establishment and co-occupancy of the East Hills Academy Charter School at Horseman Middle School. My first concern pertains to the use of Man Middle School's facilities. According to the East Hills Academy website, the charter school will be utilizing a separate area of the building and have its own facilities. It is unclear what exactly is encompassed in the term facilities and how those facilities will be arranged to accommodate the smaller bodies and needs of elementary and prek students. For example, bathroom access and retrofitting, food preparation and serving, and gyms
139and playgrounds to be used by students during their three daily recesses. My second concern relates to the impact of initial and increasing enrollment of East Hills to both Man Middle School as well as the surrounding elementary schools of Stratton, Ottabon, and Taylor in regards to their funding through site-based budgeting. I recognize that this district via choice enrollment seeks to meet families individual needs and preferences. And as someone who has and is actively utilizing choice enrollment for my children, I'm grateful that this opportunity exists. However, I worry that the district's heavy marketing of choice enrollment comes at the detriment of neighborhood schools experiencing decreased enrollment because of zone families choicing out. I see the introduction and coccupancy of East Hills Academy in Man Middle School having a negative impact on the enrollment and therefore funding of
140Stratton Attabon Taylor and Man Middle School. Further, available seats at man will be impacted as East Hills adds additional grades each year. I would rather see the district support man more through programs like um the middle school accountability system, the guarantee framework that was presented at the board's work session on April 15th and the coaching programs that have been implemented this year to better serve its student population and its teachers in growing enrollment at man rather than stalling it. It is unclear what problems or pro Yeah, it is unclear what problems East Hills Academy is attempting to answer that existing neighborhood elementary schools surrounding Man Middle School cannot. Thank you. Thank you. Our next public comment is Sarah Deusk. Good evening. I have two children currently enrolled at Trailblazer Elementary utilizing school choice. We chose
141Trailblazer because of the supportive community, wonderful staff, and their place-based learning system, and both of my children have truly thrived at Trailblazer. However, this is now being threatened. Next year, the D11 board has decided that Trailblazer will share their space and resources with Orton Academy. This charter school targets families of children with dyslexia using the likeness of a program called Orton Gillingham, a certification program for educators and a method of teaching children with dyslexia. Orton Academy is not officially accredited with this program. I bring this up because I want to highlight the lack of transparency D11 and Orton Academy are already showing. This merger has not been communicated with the families or the staff at Trailblazer before. where Orton Academy had already announced it was a done deal on their socials. This was a deal
142struck intentionally behind closed doors and without due process. Brad Miller is a well-known alt-right conservative lawyer who is openly exploring legal loopholes for using public tax dollars to fund Christian programs and curriculums hidden inside charter schools. He is legally representing Orton Academy and has already left a trail of destruction behind him in Woodland Park and PBLO. His MO is targeting schools with low enrollment, sharing space with them, and then within a couple of years, that public school is taken over by that charter school. Look up Riverstone Academy and Merit Academy. Between Brad Miller and his connections with Moms for Liberty and their alt-right agenda, and this board's charter school takeover goal for the district, is clear that Trailblazer is just the newest target for Christian nationalism infiltrating our schools. This merger will put enormous stress
143on existing staff who are already under too much pressure, underappreciated with no protections to speak out against this board. This will take space and resources away from children. Eighth graders will be roaming the halls with first graders. Teachers are already fleeing this district. Follow the money and you can see why this board is pushing for so much charter schools that are not held to the same standards as traditional public schools. This decision was done intentionally behind closed doors. They did not follow D11's own timeline and procedures. And it was done after school choice was closed, leaving no families a choice but to deal with it. And when Gaul was directly asked about this, he said he would get us enrolled at any D20 school we wanted. That was the superintendent of D11's solution to parents
144frustration while D11 continues to struggle with enrollment in part because of lack communication and trust with this board. Thank you. Thank you. Our next public comment is Julie A. It's been a minute. Good evening, Board of Education and Superintendent G. First, I would like to wish all teachers a happy teacher appreciation week and thank them for all they do. And next, I want to talk about a contract that may be coming to the board. In January, Director Jorgensson suggested looking into additional attorneys because of the expense of legal services. The RFP was posted and enough time has passed that interviews must have happened. Where are the recommendations for those legal services? Even if the board doesn't know who the district may be hiring, one attorney has been overheard saying he will be district 11's attorney.
145That would be Brad Miller of Miller Farmer Carlson Law. Brad Miller is quite the attorney. He is associated with bad legal advice, districts paying increased legal fees and fines, anti-transgender student policies, banning books, and introducing religion into schools so as to push for a Supreme Court test case. Brad Miller appears to bring controversy to every school district that hires him. Several districts have fired him or his firm and others are considering it from William Park and Montazuma Cortez to PBLO 70 and even 49 may be backing away. He has resigned from at least two other school districts. Further, as mentioned, he's also an attorney for Orton Academy and for the Colorado Springs School of Technology. His services in district 11 would be a conflict of interest. If you want people to trust you, if the
146district wants to be trusted and have transparency, integrity, and trust, then hiring this attorney who is associated with at least two violations of Colorado's uh open meetings law is not a promising move. Miller is also accused of a pay-to-play bribery scheme with a former board president of Pueblo District 70. That's not going to give you all great credibility. You should look into that one. The district wants the public to consider a bond question this fall. Again, that requires building trust. So, please ask yourselves, would hiring this attorney help you build trust? Would this choice help you pass a much needed bond? Does it help promote academic success? usually a goal of every board member or does it detract from it? How do legal test cases and fines help your bottom line? Will this coming back
147to the bond will this choice help you pass your bond? So, I know you'd like for speakers to come with suggestions and mine is do not hire Brad Miller or his firm. Finally, I want to acknowledge I have no partisan or personal gain in sharing these comments. What I do have is dismay that the board might choose one of the most controversial attorneys. Thank you. Thank you. Our next public comment is Michael Lcroy. Michael Lacroy. Okay. Uh, our next public comment is Karen Crossen. Good evening all. I'm Karen Crossson, District 11 taxpayer and 30-year retired teacher of District 11. I'm here tonight because I see that there is an undeniable gap between this board and the community that it serves. decisions are being made without clear rationale, without transparency, and without visible evidence that the
148community input has been genuinely considered. This has led, in my opinion, to a breakdown of trust. Right now, parents, staff, community members don't know where to go with concerns or if their voices even matter. Our current structures, including SAC meetings, feel insufficient as meaningful avenues for engagement. At the same time, pressing issues deserve open dialogue, not closed processes. concerns about graduation ranking, promise uh scholarship funding, the implications of the Chassel lawsuit, potential conflicts of interest, and the roll out of the Orton and Trailblazer uh school meetings are not what I consider minor matters. They affect the integrity of our district. Yet, they are being handled in ways that feel really opaque and disconnected from the people who are most impacted. When there's a perception of mismanagement, it becomes much harder to ask this community to
149support initiatives like a bond measure. That isn't resistance for its own sake. It's a reasonable response. People are asking important questions about stewardship and whether your decisions truly reflect our policies. A school board is a democratic party. It's a dem It's not the Democratic party. It's a Democratic body. It should listen, explain, and build trust. Right now, the experience that I know is going on is a top-down dismissive approach to governance. What we're asking for is pretty simple. Transparency, clear, consistent communication on how and why decisions are made, accountability, evidence that input from faculty and parents is meaningfully considered, access, clear pathways for raising concerns and confidence that they will be addressed. Good faith engagement is my last part. a willingness to collaborate. Collaborate rather than control. This district belongs to all of us and
150your decisions affect everyone. What we need is a shift from opacity to openness and from authority to accountability. Thank you. Thank you. Our next public comment is Lori McCauley. Hello, I am a D11 resident and I'm here to speak about stakeholder trust in board decisionmaking and the need for greater clarity and transparency in how major decisions are developed. My concerns are about the process, how decisions are shaped, communicated, and informed by the community. The recent Trailblazer Orton transition is one clear example. I struggle to understand when the decision was made, how stakeholder input was considered, and why key information was not available in advance. That experience did not just create confusion. It deepened my loss of confidence in this school board. and it reflects a broader pattern I've observed regarding the public and charter school
151changes and practices that have taken place. For example, agendas, meetings, meeting times, and supporting materials frequently are not released with enough time and/or detail for meaningful review. Again, specifically referring to uh the Orton uh trailblazer uh situation, decisions appear to be determined without public discussion, and opportunities for stakeholder input are not only unclear, but seem to be missing completely. These patterns of behavior will matter when you ask this community to support a bond measure. A bond requires not just financial investment, but public trust. Trust that decisions are made transparently, that community input matters, and that funds will be used responsibly and with clear accountability. Currently, I do not have that trust. for all decisions and especially for major ones. I respectfully ask the board to please provide timely detailed materials that allow for meaningful public
152review and discussion. To clearly explain and practice how stakeholder input is gathered, considered, and reflected in decisions. and to engage stakeholders early and often before decisions are shaped, not after they are effectively finalized. I want to be able to support this board and the district. But my support, including for any future bond, depends on seeing clear evidence of transparency, accountability, and meaningful stakeholder engagement. The Trailblazer Orton process is one of several examples of my trust being lost. Your steps are an opportunity to rebuild it. I appreciate your time. Thank you. Our next public comment is Candace Green. Good evening. Um, you know, I always thought the teachers union was created to support teachers, um, both members and non-members alike, so teachers can spend their time supporting children. That's why I was a union rep until
153last spring. But this year, I set out to enjoy my last year in the classroom teaching my adorable first graders. But unfortunately, the union members, many of whom surround host, sorry, many of whom hostily surround the members um and non-members, the teachers at the school. I say unfortunately because politics has no place in public schools. Union members made their presence well known, especially when everyone was expected to wear red on Wednesdays. It didn't take long for word to spread that I was no longer a union member and wanted nothing to do with their political agenda. the negativity, the harsh words against our school board, the dis disrespect of our superintendent, the dislike shown by union members for non-union professionals. It has been a lot to bear the union's words tear down rather than encourage. Rumors,
154silenced teachers, lounges, dirty looks, and more have welcomed me and others every day. This year has been challenging enough at our school for a multitude of reasons. It didn't need to be purposely made more difficult. Yet, this is the atmosphere the union created at my school. as I pour everything into teaching my students. Therefore, I am glad for the continued absence of the master agreement. I always thought the teachers union was created to support teachers. How wrong I was. Thank you. Thank you. Our final public comment of the night is Macy Pezarosi. Hello, good evening. I'm Macy Pzarosi, a D11 parent of a student at Trailblazer. Not very uh pleased with how that information has been released to us. It's been outside of the timeline of procedures and there's a lot of controversy surrounding it.
155There in general is an issue with charter schools. Taking public funding and putting it under private control creates unequal working opportunities, unequal work uh learning opportunities and that's something that we should strive to be eliminating. We've seen what happens this evening when we create opportunities for students. The lack of transparency leads to a lack of trust and further uh separates community what we want as a community and what we what the students need from the decisions that are being made. The thing that would help would be showing our support for our teachers and faculty and parents and and listening to the needs that they say that they have for their students, for their community. If charter schools are popular, big reason why is lower class sizes. We need to be giving the teachers the resources
156and support they need to to teach successfully. And the last thing I will say is that the union is not the thing that's creating a hostile environment for the teachers. It is the lack of support and resources that they are getting. We should be making sure that we reach an agreement with them. We heed their words and support them with flowers as well as contracts. Thank you. Thank you. That brings us to the end of public comment for tonight. All right. Special reports. First item on the agenda that we have here is a legislative report uh from our lobbyist, Miss Amy Atwood. Amy, are you in the call and ready to roll? I am. Can you hear me? Yep. All right, take it away. Okay, great. Amy Atwood, contract lobbyist for the district. So, we
157have one week left. We finish next Wednesday and really the budget is finished. Uh the only thing that is outstanding is the school finance act and there has been some movement today. Um I've gone back and forth with Dr. Comfort today as well on cost of living and so just some calculations that have come out from um the state or from department of education that are impacting some districts. it doesn't seem that it's really impacting negatively D11, but that has slowed down the school finance act by a couple days so that they can work that they can work that out, meaning the legislature along with the department. Um, but with the budget closing, it closed a couple weeks ago that the new school finance formula will be implemented at 30%. And if the district had
158declining enrollment, it would have been a three-year averaging, but because you've taken care of your declining enrollment, um the 30% implementation of the new formula is is good for the district. And so I I think that the district really is in a good position as we go into next year. A word of caution though as we depending on what the economy does there is talk of that if they have to there may be recisions at in January. That is always the case. It could always happen. I do believe that this year we have a better chance though or a better opportunity to know that that is coming because of the revenue forecast we get in June. We'll get another one in September. We'll get another one in December and we'll have a runway to know
159how the economy is going. We'll have a better idea if that is something that that is very that is likely to happen. We don't know that yet, but I want to put that on your radar is something that that could happen. It just depends on which which direction the econ the Colorado economy goes. Uh otherwise when it comes to legislation it has been a relatively um low bill count year in education and that's because of the money situation. So instead of spending money on new programs the money has really been put into per pupil funding. So instead of yeah just different different programs here and there and different grant programs the money really was put back into school finance act through per pupil funding. So with that are there any questions? Board directors director Malpachim
160thank you for the update. Uh I know it's been a long four months. Um in addition to the school finance act, we discussed several education bills. Is there any updates that we should be aware of pertinent to those education bills? Anything that uh the district should be prepared for in the coming months? I really don't think so. Um we haven't had bills of major consequence at all this year. Um the unfunded mandates, we we don't have unfunded mandates this year like we have seen in in prior years. So um I I think that I think we're in a good position and there there haven't been major major bills this year like we've seen in previous years. Okay. Thank you. Um there was something that I read in one of the publications about cuts to home
161enrichment programs. Um is that going to still does that have still traction? Is that going to and then I may have to turn to superintendent call if it's going to have an impact on district 11 any of our uh the negotiations. Go ahead. the negoti sorry the negotiations right now um are not that there will be no impact to school district or charter school funding for homeschool enrichment programs. So currently districts receive 0.5 so half a pupil funding for a homechool enrichment student. the discussions and the negotiations um center around programs that are not run by a district, operated by a district or operated or run by a charter school. So at this point, we believe that those programs are safe and that there is no intention to touch district or charter school homechool enrichment
162funding. Thank you, Director Jorgensson. Just to piggyback on Director Mel Pockham's qu last question there. So homeschool funding through charters and districts is safe, but you you did seem to mention that there's going to be some cuts to the state level funding for those programs. Is that the question? Okay, that was the question. No, sorry. Um, no, no cut, no cut to those for school districts and charter schools. There are some programs that are operated by other um entities that those are the ones that are being negotiated right now, but not the ones that would be through the district through D11 or through the charters. Okay. Is there traction for that to happen on the those outside the district? Yes. Okay, that's too bad. I have friends that run programs for those students um and
163particularly Kilroyy's workshop that does all the cool graduation swords for the Air Force cadets. Uh it's a great blacksmith shop, but they're losing a lot of their funding um for the many kids that they reach. So um that's disappointing to hear. Uh on a different note, well, and you know, we're a very prop parent board. Uh I've seen some concerns that my constituents have raised around House Bill 26139. And my particular um concern about that would be uh I'm just maybe more concerned about the vague statutory language that could erode the fundamental parent rights and expand that state discretion into those kind of personal family choices. So uh and if you need to maybe give a review of what that proposed legislation is and then respond that may be helpful for the general public listening.
164Sure. So this bill is is not um a K12 bill. The t it's 1309 uh be it is the title is abuse in cases of separation. So it deals with under current law the court is required to determine the allocation of parental responsibility including parenting time and decision-making responsibility based on the best interest of the child. Um and it requires that prior to allocating parental responsibilities and prior to concerning considering the best interest of the child factors, the court shall determine whether a party has committed domestic violence. So this really is is outside of the K12 space and in um public safety and the court space. Yeah, it wasn't really more about that outside the K12. It was more the course of control language that I read in the bill and how if you know
165parents are maybe trying to protect or or or have their child slow down in some of their decision- making as a minor that that might be looked at as course of control and and just more of the vague language. So I can connect with you more offline. I just was wondering if they put any more definitions or objectivity to that language in that bill that would support parents and we can talk about it offline. It's not something that I've been tracking for the district. Okay. All right. Thank you. Yeah. And I'll I'll I mean I'll just weigh in. I to me this one doesn't feel in our wheelhouse as a board of education, but I think if you want to follow it up on your own, you're more than welcome to. Director Johnson. Hello Amy.
166Um I was just curious about two updates. The first one is uh Senate Bill 2668, the modifying administration of education assessments. Do we know where we're at on that current bill? Yeah, let me pull that up. Which number is it? 68. 68. 168. Yep. So, modification administration of education assessments. Um, it continues to be Oh, it was laid over. So, it it it it has been defeated. It was laid over to after the last day of session. So, instead of having a hard vote against the bill, um, they just laid it over, which means that the door is open for it for some version of it to come back next year. even if it had had a hard vote against it, it still could come back. But um it is a subtle way of saying
167some type of bill like this will come back next year because of the way it was laid over. Okay. And then um and it was just laid over yesterday. And then for the update on Senate Bill 26103, um do we know where they're in where they're at with that process? Let me look. 26103 is the number for so this is another interesting one. So this is at risk public school program and public school accountability. This was another one we had discussed about um just about school district and school uh accountability. It continues to be laid over every single day since April 20th without a debate. It got through the Senate, but every day in the House, it continues to be laid over, which is another sign that um it likely will not pass. It will
168just lay over until what they call dies. It dies on the calendar. Okay. Thank you. Uh any one last question for me and maybe you said it already and I forgot. Um we've, you know, in our budgetary conversations, we've bounced around between we're going down in terms of finances this year. We're going to be flat. We're going to be going slightly up. You mentioned that the SFA is the only thing not technically finished. Do we have any timeline on that? And maybe you said it earlier and I just didn't write it down. No, it um it has to finish by next Wednesday because of some new that new information that came out today. It has been it was supposed to be heard tomorrow morning, but because of that new information, it's been pushed off to
169Friday, but in legislative time, next Wednesday is forever away. So, we still have plenty plenty of time to get that finished. Um, even though next Wednesday feels like it's around the corner, it really isn't here in the building. Oh, it doesn't feel around the corner for those of us working in academics. Okay. Okay. But so we don't meet until the next time we meet is the 13th. So that sounds like everything will be locked down by then. It definitely has to be. Yes. That's all from me. Anyone else uh any from the board with questions or thoughts? All right. Thank you, Amy. Okay. Thanks. Okay, that brings us to board member reports. Are there any reports by board directors? Director Jorgensson, I guess I can go first here. Well, with all the recent activity around
170here, I figure I was planning on saying something, so I'll just uh rattle off what I got here. Um, right now there seems to be, as we heard, a growing disconnect between what this board is focused on and what the Colorado Springs Education Association continues to prioritize or push. The board's focused on students. We have streamlined central admin, cutting another few millions in our budget this year, now close to $10 million over the past three years in central admin, responding directly to the years of concerns of bureaucratic bloat that I've heard from the union of the downtown people. So, um, we're taking care of that. At the same time, we're implementing student accountability because it matters that students can read, write, and do math at grade level, especially at critical benchmarks like the third grade,
171eighth grade, and 12th grade. That's the work we're looking at at focusing on right now. But instead of partnering in that effort, the union continues to attack, misrepresent, and distract. We hear claims that focusing on academic outcomes somehow harms arts and electives as recently pushed by CSEA. That's a false narrative. Strong strong academics are the fundamental foundation that allows students to fully access everyday opportunities, including the music, arts, and career pathways. Students at grade level are more ready and capable to enjoy all of our schools, all that our schools provide. We hear claims that this district has neglected schools like Jenkins Middle School, falling off a hill, as they like to still push, even though we're literally about to complete the seventh and eighth grade wing of a brand new building. The facts tell that
172story, not their narrative. Removed the long ignored failing infrastructure, upgraded core learning spaces, and are opening a brand new wing for our students next year. That's not neglect. That's not letting something fall off a hill. That's investment. That's responding to immediate needs of our community as soon as we were aware of of the need uh needing to be addressed. Let me also address something we likely hear in response to this work that you can't help students without helping teachers or that student learning environments are teachers working conditions or that teachers need a seat at the table with a contract. On that first point, we agree completely. You cannot have strong student outcomes without strong teachers. Look at our expanding teachers coaching teachers program. we learned about tonight. Excuse me. That's why our board is prioritizing
173the TCT, which we just mentioned, meaningful raises, which we'll talk about later tonight briefly, creating new pathways for educators to learn more and reducing bureaucratic overhead so much more resources can reach our classrooms. But supporting teachers does not mean empowering a single organization to speak for all of them. And that brings me to the idea of a seat at the table. Teachers already have a seat at the table on D11. In fact, they have many. They have they lead classrooms every single day. They work directly with our principles and school leadership. They contribute through district committees, sachs, DAXs, direct engagement with admin and with board members, which we welcome. We value it and we're committed to expanding it. What we will not do is return to a system where a single entity holds disproportionate control
174over district operations through a binding master agreement that limits flexibility, slows innovation, and too often puts adult interests ahead of student needs. A seat at the table should never mean a veto over decisions that are made in the best interest of students. Our goal is simple. Elevate teacher voice without compromising student outcomes. Because the most important seat at the table will always belong to our students and their families. As one person said, they choose to be here. We only get paid because they're here. You drive them off with poor behavior or or poor funding or poor environments, we're not going to have a customer. We're not going to have schools to teach in. We welcome every teacher who shares that mission. We value them and we're working to create more opportunities for them to lead,
175to grow, and to be compensated for the excellence that we are pushing towards. Our coaching practices are second to none and have led to meaningful support for our teachers. As Mr. G already shared tonight, we will not be detered by political pressure or misinformation that continues to be spread. Our responsibility is not to an organization. It's to our students. It's to our families and it's to this community. As we continue to work, including family future discussions around facilities and a potential bond, we ask our community to stay engaged, stay informed of the truth, not the spin, and support the direction that we're moving. Because at the end of the day, success is not measured by rhetoric. It's measured by whether our students are prepared for the next steps in their lives. That's the standard. That's
176the work that I will continue to do on this board. And the idea that a public funding is going to private control of charters is a lie. All those charter schools are our charter schools. They're public charter schools. They're not a private board. They're not a private entity that controls them. They're a board that's ran on volunteers just like us. and they are beholden to the accountability of a three or a five-year contract that this board addresses. They're not private charter schools, people. They're not private funding that we're giving. We get money to allow that portfolio to come into our buildings. So, the lie that we're somehow putting money into into private funds and somebody's benefiting somewhere, it's all right here. I'm reviewing a 50 plus page budget right now by line item. It's all
177right there. It's transparent. Look at the line items. Email me the treasurer and I'll talk to you about whatever line item you want and I'll give you more information as much as you need. That's the end of it. That's the transparency piece. I've said enough. I'm done. Director Baka Bartlett. Thank you. I've uh had the privilege of getting out in the community over the last month or last couple of months and judged science fairs. I've seen many of the students we saw tonight. Uh robotics competitions, couple of different companies that that we partner with for that. Um I I'm still getting a handle on CTE and all the programs that we've got. It is still an honor and privilege to be serving this community, voters, taxpayers, educators, support staff, and especially our students. I take
178this position seriously. I'm delighted to visit schools where I introduce myself to staff and administrators in all capacities. There is certainly a lot we have to guide or govern as schoolboard directors. We are one of the larger employers in the city of Colorado Springs. A great work environment will only support our students in their educational journey. I'm learning as I go. I've stated that I'm coming to this position without an agenda and respect for the careful work of the existing B board members before me. We are restricted to meeting individually one-on-one by law to open meetings because transparent so that we can be transparent to the community and the public is aware of our activity. We're a board of community members living in the district 11 area with various limitations on the time we can
179devote to the to the district matters. we do have knowledgeable administrators to guide us and inform us and I have taken advantage of that so that uh I would be able to speak tonight to some of the comments that that we'd had. Um I I still have the goal to get to know um each and every one of the board members. And I appreciate hearing back. It's a little clunky for us to be able to get get to talk to one another, but it's it's my goal. I know that we can we can work together. Um I've stated to the super superintendent that um it's my goal especially after hearing some of the presentations at the at the CASBY convention in December. I heard from school districts across in the western slope talking about the
180relationship that they have together as boards and to um and that the importance of that superintendent board relationship um for the good of the our students and our community. Um I want parents and staff and students to know that I'm listening and I do value your input. One anonymous letter we received from a Palmer High School parent wasn't signed. We couldn't reply. So, I'm taking the the moment to reply. Uh presumably was sent to all the student all the schoolboard members said that I we didn't care to hear student voices. There was a lot of passion. Um I want to say that I do I do want to ensure that all voices are heard. I have time for that. Those that I agree with, those that I disagree with. I also want to have my
181voice as a board director heard, which is informed by students and community members of all walks of life, which is why I'm working so hard to make those connections and attend as many events as I possibly can to talk one-on-one and really get a feel for how how our district is open-mindedly. I believe in public education and that we can govern this district with the best interest of our students education. attracting students, retaining teachers, and spending tax dollars responsibly is possible if we communicate well with one another. Um, I am I am dismayed it it does not feel that there are community voices heard, uh, student voices heard. We've had several controversial issues reach the media um from the shutdown of Boulder Street, changing graduation requirements and finally to the collocation of Orton in particular
182in Trailblazer and none of these were discussed in our last board retreat. We had an issue of of communication and I hope that we can continue to be able to have spaces to talk about that communication. Um but these issues of students and teachers weren't weren't discussed in depth. We learned instead that people don't like change and that's minimizing their current community concerns. And there's one final item I wanted to address as a as a district 11 graduate. My mother taught in the district for decades. I think it was 25 30 years. uh taught several of our administrators actually within the district. Um brought me here to district 11. I have my children in district 11. And from my experience as well as those in Mesa County, District 70 in PBLO, Jeffco, Woodland Park, I
183do not believe that Brad Miller is a good fit for our district. Pushing cases towards the Supreme Court. um bringing up more extreme views of religion. Um it does not improve student outcomes and I don't believe that this is a district priority for us. We need to attract and retain students and teachers and I don't know that this would be a responsible use for our taxpayer money. Thank you, Director Johnson. Yeah, thank you. I just want to echo what Director Bakartlet said. I think it's, you know, important. We're we're currently in a crossroads of trust and accountability. I think, you know, when we look at the media and we hear about Orton Academy and Trailblazer and other incidents of collocations, you know, it's it's tough for both sides. It's tough for the board to make
184those decisions of do we think this is the best interest of our students and for those parents, is this the best interest I want to put my student in? And you know, we heard a lot of people today that talked about we need to not just slow our role, but think about what our actions are trying to take going forward for the future of District 11 and where we're trying to make those improvements because we can always put our front foot forward and make sure that we have those opportunities for those kids. But when we have controversies tied up in political warfare, that doesn't truly solve the issue. That's that's truly a concern that I have for this district going forward and that we need to make the right accountable decisions of who we are
185hiring into this district and who we want to represent what D11 looks like. I would echo what Leam Bakabarlet said. Brad Miller does give me concerns about where this district is trying to head and if we are trying to hold ourselves accountable as one of the oldest districts in El Paso County in Carl Springs. I'm tooken back that you know we say this is local control and that we are voted in by the people but the transparency actions from us as a board I don't think has been fully there. Yes, we've had discussions of being able to how to find communication, how to better work alongside each other without you know always bickering of what side is better than the other. Um but we're we're truly in a crossroads right now where we need to
186just slow things down. I think we're not really thinking about what the interests of our kids are. I think we're but I think we're looking at the interest of what interests people want out of this district. I don't think that's the way we should be looking at we should be looking at what do our kids, our staff, our community need first before we just take outside orders and commands to be able to move this district forward. Um, but outside of that, you know, we just need to look in the mirror and look at ourselves and ask us where do we actually want to go as a district? Where do we actually see ourselves as not just volunteers on this board, but representatives of this community? Because whether whether we represent one side or the other,
187it's many others that are in the background that don't understand what's going on, that don't hear the conversations that we all have that we need to be able to be honest and vulnerable about. Yes, while we might not be able to say everything that is confidential, we need to be open about where we're at in the process. And I think, you know, if we can find a way to meet back in the middle, I think we will all find that invest interest for our students, we can all find common ground in that. I think that's just a reflection point that we could look at going forward, maybe coming back to the fall of 26 and just kind of think about where are we actually trying to turn the direction of District 11, not just for
188innovation and for excellence, but for the for the history and the foundation of what District 11 is known for. And so I hope that we can, you know, take these comments that we heard today and truly do think about them whether we agree with them or not, but try to find some productivity to be able to move move this stuff forward because we can't be we can't keep getting hold back by the community that we trust and that they trust us. And so that's all I have for uh Superintendent G. Yeah, I just want to uh make sure that we're all aware. I'm checking with my team. Um, I think we've entered and probably crossed the line of what our procurement laws allow for in actually talking about an RFP that has not been awarded
189or actually is not on the agenda or brought forward. Um, so I'll get a summary to the board on what the actions will be from that. Um but we might have just stepped into a space where uh people expressing an opinion on a company that has gone through the vetting and the RFP before we brought it forward might actually eliminate those board members from being able to vote on that RFP. So uh I will check with uh our procurement team and we'll get a summary email to the board. But I do caution that we try um and I'll defer to the board president on how to do this. We have traditionally not responded to public comment. Um, and we enter into a space where we are being singularly responsive to a one voice at a
190threeminut time which has now got I think the board in a precarious situation on an RFP that has not been brought forward for award at this time. Um, secondly, I do want to make sure that I address uh particularly for board members that might not agree to previous contracts until contracts are null and voided. existing charter contracts are our children. Um, and so I do hear a lot of uh our children in the context of just traditional run schools. Um, so there are existing contracts for a portfolio strategy. I have brought that portfolio strategy to the board of education. Um, and if there needs to be a change in that strategy, I'll look to the board president to navigate that conversation. But those um individuals that lead those charters are abiding by laws that exist
191by statute within the state. And every time we talk about them as not our children, again, I think we certain board members might be putting themselves in a position where they would have to recuse themselves from actually voting on the extension or the ending of those contracts by expressing a um a dis dissatisfaction for the law that allows for those charters. So, I just want to add some caution for board members as they're trying to express where it is that they feel on certain positions that those positions should be held for when those were votes and then your votes can be recorded. But expressing interest before might actually present a conflict of interest for you to then be able to uh vote your own will when that comes to a vote. So, to that I
192default to the president. Thank you. So, that's a legal question. I have not, this is obviously a new situation. I have not put any thought towards it. I'd have to look into the specifics. I think let's Oh, what is Melissa gonna get mad at me if I say this phrase? Let's put this aside for now. Postpone this for now. Uh we'll I'll I'll talk to the lawyers and I'll see if there's any grounds to this. Um yeah, Director Mal Pakam. Great. I will talk about some upcoming contracts as well. Uh, no, I'm kidding. I'm not going to uh I'm just going to give a brief summary of u some of the events that um uh I've been fortunate enough to attend over the past couple of weeks. One one of it I would would like
193to bring it to the attention of the board was the bond liaison session that took place last week at the Tesla building. I think it was Friday. Some of the board members were present as well. Um uh Dr. comfort was able to update the group that was there in the audience and the audience were several school bond liaons and along with several administrative people from the school as well. They he Dr. Comfort was able to provide that group the results of the last survey and there was good engagement with the group. There was good um uh energy in that room. Uh some dos and don'ts as far as communication what is allowed and what is not allowed by staff and community members were shared. I think the board may also get a document uh as
194to as we proceed further into considering a potential bond in November. What is it that we are legally allowed to do and what we are not allowed to do. Um uh some of the board leaans that were in the room expressed interest in inviting individual board members to their school level meetings to discuss with the community about the necessity of going for the bond and its impact on the taxpayer. I just wanted to throw that out to the board that you may see some of your uh respective schools reaching out to you. Uh moving on to another uh opportunity that I was able to attend. I think it was on the same day, Friday, was um a prek opportunity that was held at Tesla building. Um uh this was an opportunity to uh uh engage
195with our parents and also external partners and share with them the prek opportunities that are available in district 11 and that event was really well put together. I want to give a shout out to Sarah Carlson and her team. um uh wasn't academic campus was where this event was held and it was packed that afternoon. Um um so much so that I've had to park like couple of blocks away and walk and that's usually not happened. I've usually been able to find parking out there. So uh good engagement and it's good to see that uh the prek opportunities in district 11 what we are able to provide for our students uh stand out and this is an opportunity for us to attract students um three and four year olds and then hopefully keep them along
196uh for the rest of their K12 uh academic journey. Um there are several other events that took place. Some of them were uh we were able to recognize the students, the STEM events and the robotics events um uh that students were recognized. Uh and I'm not going to talk about that much, but I do want to give a shout out to um Dwayne Robersonson and Dwayne Hilur for putting uh some of those STEM events and robotics events uh in our school. Uh and lastly, um this weekend is an opportunity to celebrate mothers. Um so I want to appreciate and uh wish a happy mother's day to all the mothers out there. Um you play such a critical role day in and day out in getting students ready for school and supporting their extracurricular activities, volunteering
197in our schools, helping them out with their homework. You are a vital part of our D11 community. So, happy Mother's Day to all of you, including some of the moms that uh are sitting here on the board das to the right of me. Happy Mother's Day. Thank you. Uh, Director Rule, um, do you have anything that you would like to add? And I see Jill as well. Yes. Thank you so much. Can you hear me? Yes. Thank you. I'm Snowden working with some veterans in the mountains. Uh, but just wanted to say I had a chance to talk to Mitchell High School this week. two different classes and kind of give them an endofear um good luck with their next steps and it was wonderful to sit with the high school and hear of all
198the wonderful things that they're going to do next. Uh the second was just I wanted to make a brief comment on some of the flyers that were distributed outside of the school tonight. Um they've been circulating and I hear that taxpayers and families and teachers and students are asking for more transparency and that's what we're here to do. There's serious accusations in the flyers and our community deserves facts. The flyers claim that District 11 redirects taxpayer dollars for for-profit charter schools. And I just want to remind our taxpayers that Colorado law does not allow for for-profit charter schools in that way. Public educa education funding follows students through the state based on their enrollment. Colorado charter schools are public schools. They operate under state academic standards, public accountability requirements, and formal renewal processes through district
199or state authorizers. District 11 approved charter partnerships through public meetings and recorded board votes. Nothing about the decision happened in secret. Another accusation is that we are eliminating art, music, PE, and recess. And the facts actually show that the district has reduced nearly 10 million from central administration over the past three years and redirected those resources towards schools and studentf facing services. Arts, PE, recess, they all remain an important part of the student experience. The flyers also suggest that D11 is eliminating individualized instruction and pushing struggling students out of neighborhood schools. In reality, the district has expanded inclusion efforts, strengthened intervention systems, and increased focus on identifying struggling students earlier so schools can provide support faster and more effectively. The reality is that D11 has lost thousands of students over the last decade. Enrollment decline
200affects staffing, facilities, transportation, and and financial stability. Every district faces these realities has to make important decisions like merging schools. It's unfortunate when the news gets out before the communications plan was was laid forward. Reasonable people can disagree about these things in our community. Healthy debate is part of public education, but the community does deserve conversations grounded in facts, context, and honest representation of district actions. Our schools face serious work ahead. Students need stronger literacy outcomes, improved math proficiency, safe learning environments, excellent teachers, and stable schools that prepare them for the future. That work is what requires focus, collaboration, and trust. We are not perfect, and no large institution ever will be. But our employees, teachers, and administrators, and students of the district deserve public conversations based on truth, not fear, not political theater, but
201honest transparency. and I absolutely welcome any community member to sit with me and ask more questions. Thank you, Director Hickley. Um, did we not begin this board meeting by celebrating the incredible things that our students are accomplishing. We recognize students making meaningful choices about their futures as they step into young adulthood. We honored exceptionally talented students whose award-winning videos earn scholarships, technology, rec recognition, cash, money. We received updates on the many opportunities available to students as they shape their own educational paths and life goals. We celebrated students earning fullride scholarships to colleges and servicemies, including one student who earned appointments to all three servicemies. something I believe we were told has never happened before. Um maybe it maybe not in D11. I don't know if it whatever the case. And this kid was um very
202humble. In fact, he only mentioned the one that he accepted. He didn't actually mention the other two that he had been accepted to. There's a great deal of good happening in D11 for our students. This district is on the edge of meaningful change. And while change has not always been easy for us, it is opening new doors and creating new opportunities to better serve kids. That's why we're here. There's much to be encouraged by here. And I believe we will also soon hear positive news regarding upcoming compensation discussions. Okay. Uh which is another reason for optimism. So, I would ask that um you know, we're always talking about negativity and and division and that's exhausting. Can we just move forward with some positive and productive spirit? We all have the same goal to get our
203kids across the line and get them into their lives with some form of plan and that they understand that they have the support behind them. That's why we're here. Thank you. I'm debating whether to go on my own rant or just keep moving and try to get out of here on time. Um, I'm going to do it. Sorry, guys. It's okay. I joined this board, call it two and a half years ago, and it is I'm listening to all the public comments and I read the flyers that the union passed out earlier today and it is difficult for me to square the reality of my own intentions and what I've been attempting to do here with the rhetorical talking points from CSEA. So, I I want to try to I I really don't want to
204be negative here. So, I'm going to try to put a positive spin on this of in the words of um paraphrasing someone in public comment, in the words of it trying to explain, at least for my own part, what my values are and what I'm seeking to achieve here and how staff has then competently responded to those asks. Um, I have for my entire tenure here talked about the need for the district to be responsible with finances. It's become something of a running joke in staff. Uh my scariest graph in public education. You all are regulars here, so you all know what I'm talking about. The one that shows enrollment going up or excuse me, the one that shows staffing going up. It's late, guys. And enrollment falling off a cliff. That's not something a
205reasonable system does. And staff have responded by making highly necessary cuts to central administration. Um, we don't have full numbers for this year, but I'm I'm comfortable sharing that over the course of the last three years, the total amount of cuts in central administration is something on the order of $10 million. This is not something you are going to see any other school district in the state even try. I read an article uh for Boulder Valley School District, which is which is a larger school district than we are, and they're currently agonizing over a 1 million cut to administration. And it's not like anyone disagrees that this is a good idea, right? If you talk to nearly anyone in the policym space, in the regulatory space, or just anyone on the street and ask, "Why
206is education so damn expensive right now?" Oh boy, sorry about that. Why is education so expensive right now? Everyone's going to tell you administrative bloat is probably one of the top three reasons, but nobody actually does anything about it ever, except for in District 11, Michael Gaul and Dr. for Brandon Comfort and the team who have made highly necessary cuts over the last 3 years. I'm I'm very proud of that. What the board has asked for consistently is that we spend dollars as close to the classroom as possible. This is it. It is impossible to construe this board as being against teachers when we have consistently beat all of our surrounding districts in terms of compensation. We've done this year after year after year in part because we're the only ones who are taking an
207eye towards long-term fiscal sustainability and actually putting money where it is supposed to go, which is close to the classroom. I'm going to let our treasurer Jason talk about this later, but news flash, we're going to do it again this year. You'll see the numbers preliminarily tonight, and you'll see them for real in about a month when we vote on them in June. Um, in the same way we talk a lot about, you know, laser focus on quality of instruction. When I came to the board, I've shared this story before. When I came to the board and I was hearing, you know, district improvement plans my very first year, the quality of suggestions were terrible. They were just I'm just going to be blunt. They were not good. They were things that any system should
208be doing just as a matter of course. What Michael Gaul and his team have been working on over the course of this year is just tremendous. The huge pivot to coaching, the huge pivot to intervent interventions when they are needed and where they are needed. Again, I don't think this is something you're going to see a lot of other districts do. And I'm very proud of the work that has been done in district 11. The teacher feedback for the new way of handling professional development has been the highest. It's been the most positive on record. And every time we run a survey this year, we beat the record and it's once again the most positive on record. I think I think part of the problem here is that a lot of the talking points that
209I saw in the union flyer are a proxy for values difference. So the union flyer, for instance, talked about misuse of funds. You can't credibly accuse District 11 of misusing funds. We passed a totally clean audit this year, which is something that is not easy to do. As I said, we've made necessary cuts to district administration. We're prioritizing teacher compensation in a way that no one else really is. You can't credibly accuse us of misusing funds. But I think what that's a catchup, what that's a what that stands for is I don't agree with the way the funds are being spent, which is fine. You don't have to agree with the way the funds are being spent. The mechanism for governing a public system is the mechanism of elections, right? We're the elected officials. We're
210directing staff with our priorities. They're executing on those priorities. Period. Dot. And if we want to talk about values difference, this is I'm retreading old ground from a year ago now. This is my entire reason as one person for not wanting a master agreement. Authority in a public school system should derive ultimately from the will of the voters and their elected officials. I'm not interested in signing a contract that hands authority or taxpayer resources over to a labor corporation that's not accountable to v voters. Period. Dot. I said that last year. I'll say it again as many times as is necessary. Um I guess the last thing I would say is um charter schools are not private schools, guys. Charter schools are not for-profit schools. What one of three things is true. Either CSEA is
211just basically misunderstanding how public education actually works in the state of Colorado or they're intentionally misleading the public or they have a bad line editor. I'm I'm fervently hoping it's the last option. Sorry about that. Okay, moving on to the actual business of tonight. Director Baka Barlick, can you please make the motion to adopt the consent items? I move that the board of education adopts all consent items as design as designated in the agenda. The consent items are approval of April 1st, 2026 regular board meeting minutes. Second, personal recommendations May 6th, 2026. Second. Sorry. Moved and seconded. Melissa, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett, I. Director Kerry, I. Director Hayley. Hi. Director Johnson. I, director Jorgensson, I, director Mel Packham, I, Director R. I, the eyes have it. Uh, consent items have been adopted. Okay,
212first action item of tonight. This one I'm actually excited for. Um, uh, the first action item is a resolution honoring teacher appreciation week. Director Jorgensson, can you please read the resolution and then make the motion for action item H1? Yes. Resolution 2026-40 National Teacher Appreciation Week May 4th through the 8th 2026. Whereas America's greatest strength has always been an educated citizenry and that quality of cit citizenry in is directly attributable to our system of free and universal public education. Whereas the foundation upon that which that system of public schooling rests is the teacher who is challenged daily even now more than ever to reach out to every student to provide the assistance and guidance necessary for full intellectual development. Whereas the work of the teacher immeasurably affects the future lives of all students. Whereas Colorado
213Springs School District 11 has over 1,800 certified teachers who include our classroom instructional teachers, special service providers, counselors, behavioral specialists, and library technology educators. Our dedicated teachers support and care for the educational, social, emotional, and health needs for all of our diverse students. And whereas teachers are also necessary and valued coaches, including teacher learning and literacy coaches to provide professional support for our other teachers. Now therefore, be it resolved that the teachers of Colorado of Carlos Springs School District 11 be given the deepest respect and admiration of the citizens of this community and that May 4th through the 8th of of this year be recognized as National Teacher Appreciation Week. Seconded. I'll I'll make our motion. I move that the board of education adopts resolution 2026-40 recognizing May 4th through the 8th, 2026 as National
214Teacher Appreciation Week. Moved and seconded. All right. Um I open it up to the board for commentary. Director Jorgensson, did you want me to lead with some news? Yeah, that would be great. Uh to piggyback off of um President K's points earlier, being on the board since 2019, uh in all of our tenure, I can say that we have tried to get the best and biggest raises for our staff every year. Uh we've come to the financial table every year asking what's the best we can give while also being fiscally responsible. Uh this year is no different. Now, what I can share is that we are positioned higher and almost double than a lot of our neighboring school districts because of the work that President Kerry mentioned earlier. This board has made significant changes to
215the budget under Mike Call and his team to the point where we are managing not only a general fund that is still above where it was pre precoid levels uh to to calm the woes of some people wondering about how low the the um the budget's getting or the reserve is getting. Um, but also to look at us positioning ourselves as legislative updates change whether it where we while we move from a 5-year average to a three-year average and could potentially because of budget deficits go to a one-year average and and a lot of district be really upside down. We're positioned for whatever the state's going to throw at us because of a leadership of this district. So, with that being said, well, we'll have finer details and official numbers later this month. I know
216a lot of teachers are wondering usually around the end of April, early May, hey, what what am I expecting here next year, especially as I'm filling up my tank at, you know, almost uh over $4 a gallon at the moment. So, um without further ado, we are shooting for an estimated around 10% raise for staff again this coming year. So further and official details will be brought to you uh more from the board. But uh we'd like to proudly share that and maybe give some of the teachers a a deep breath, a deep sigh of relief that they've got a good raise coming for next year. Um which should be around the tune of depending on where you're at about $500 more a month. So on top of that paying for the additional district increase
217in healthcare. So we love you teachers. We are this board is former most of us are former teachers or still current teachers. I just don't get this animosity because of some minor beliefs on how we want to run things. We love you guys. I'm a former middle school science teacher. I know the trenches you're in, especially now with these devices even still after we tried to ban them, right? So, we love what you're doing. We want you to have a great raise next year. We're bringing it official here next month and uh thank you for all the work that you do. Director Mel Pacham, thank you. I appreciate it. Um, a shout out to all the teachers in our school district. This is teacher appreciation week. And to piggyback on what, um, uh, Treasurer Jurgensson
218shared, um, school district 11 is always and the board has always emphasized teacher compensation over the last several years. You can go back and look at even the lean years over the last 5 years. We have exceeded the compensation of any surrounding school district. And this year is going to be a per uh unusually tough year for public education because of the lack of funding that is going to come from our state legislature when all is said and done. But we are going to prioritize staff compensation and we are looking at preliminary numbers. More will be shared at the end of um uh this month. But I am want to assure our community out there that when it's all said and done, our staff compensation will beat any one of the surrounding school districts out
219here. So, thanks to all our teachers who do incredible amount of work out there. I know that several PTAs and schools are also appreciating our teachers this week through breakfast or lunch programs. So, all of you that are helping out with this, thank you. Tomorrow as uh Superintendent Gle said shared we will be um recognizing outstanding teachers at a Gayla event. Uh that's the evening of excellence in D1. Um um and uh six teachers were the recipients of Crystal Apple award uh Apple awards. I have their names here so I want to particularly call them out. Fa Ren from Rogers Elementary, Christa Cisk from Penrose. Clara Mielco from Adams Elementary. Amy Tomlin, Jack Swigert Middle School, Chantel Shik Jones from Tesla Opportunity School, and J Josh Galvan from Dority High School. Congratulations to all the
220above teachers. They will be part of the teachers that are recognized tomorrow at the evening in excellence. But thanks to all our teachers who day in and day out do an incredible job providing excellence in instruction in their respective classrooms. Thank you. All right. Right. And I I realize I steamrolled over my superintendent, so I'm going to talk toss it back to uh Superintendent Gaul and I believe Miss Harris to come to the podium to please talk about uh our teacher appreciations. Thank you. Good evening, Roy. It's my pleasure to be here tonight to present to you the resolution for teacher appreciation week. Well, we are excited to celebrate our teachers on an annual basis. I thought it was important to highlight some of the ways we celebrate our teachers on a daily basis here
221in D11. I think it's important to state that as a staff member of D11, everything that has been said in regards to what how we how we support teachers is absolutely true. We have um a competitive salary schedule that's built to put teachers first. This group of employees received a 10% increase in salary. 4% of that was recurring and 6% non-recurring this past school year alone. We continue to offer lowcost medical, dental, and vision plans. And after a long day in the classroom, we are proud to partner with Strata Wellness at the Garden of the Gods location to discover tailored health benefits to keep our teachers energized and ready for each day. We also have the D11 guarantee for new educators in which we offer all new educators the opportunity to be connected with a
222sitebased mentor, coached and engaged with full coaching cycles and supported. They have access to tools, resources, and relationships to help them feel supported as they enter D11. While I'm proud to announce how we continue to pour resources directly into our classrooms, let's be honest, there's really no better way to celebrate Teacher Appreciation Week than by hearing directly from our students themselves. Please watch this heartfelt video about the positive impact our D11 teachers have made on their lives. She's really awesome. She teaches social studies here and go. I don't really have a favorite. I kind of like all the teachers cuz they're all very supporting and they all like understand if you make a mistake. Some are very very kinder. Mr. Phillips is my favorite teacher here at Coronado. Um he's hilarious and he really knows
223how to communicate to students and get them wanting to do better than they already do. My favorite teacher is Miss Green because she's really awesome and she has helped me understand math a lot better than I used to. I would say Mr. Edens because he understands kids on a level that most teachers kind of wouldn't support me in any way that I go through and just is always there for me since like freshman year. Miss Kelling, she is the gifted and talented teacher and she's just been a really encouraging role model to me throughout my years here at Holmes. My teacher inspires me to learn more about nature. Teachers inspire me to kind of just um like keep going and kind of just keep learning. Big thank you to all the amazing teachers here at
224Palmer. You guys help all the students so much and you are what makes Palmer Palmer. All right. Uh, now that we've gone back to the correct sequence, I open it up to any additional comments from my fellow board directors. Uh, all right. I'll close. Oh, there we go. Oh, director Baka Bartlett. This is a bit injust but can we see that video again? I was that was great. What is it available to us? I mean I'm on social. Okay. Thanks Director Johnson. Yeah. Yeah. No, I just want to say that was a great video and very touching and um as a former student of District 11, I think, you know, it's truly factual that teachers do play a huge role not just inside the classroom, but being that true mentor and guidance for the next
225generation, what that means. And so, just thank you to every teacher that's helped each every next generation to be who they are and that education truly is valuable and that teachers do have the ultimate sacrifice to to show up every day and do what they need to do. So, thank you. Director Hickley, I wish um Annie Friezma was still here and um th those young men that were part of her presentation. Um that teacher shadowing program, that's the bomb. I mean to have kids think maybe I maybe I want to be a teacher and then go out to visit schools and we I think that anybody who's been in a classroom or sees sees a school it's it's it's heavily female to see two young men decide that they they think they might want to
226be teachers. That's a pretty great deal. Um, so, uh, I' I've said it before and I'll say it again. It teaching is a noble profession and it is a heck of a life if you hit it right. And most teachers hit it right. So, um, for me and and and and my my teaching years to you and your if if you're about to retire, if you are just brand new, uh, wherever you are on your on the teacher scale in terms of years teaching, I wish you the best and the most fun possible. Working with kids is the greatest thing ever. And one of the things that I'm gonna admit here is that it took me a while to learn how to work with adults because I was so used to working with teenagers. So
227when you get out of um when you get out of teaching, when you leave it for whatever reason, whenever you decide to do it, don't ever lose that sparkle when you see kids, whether they're walking through the mall, the grocery store, riding their bike down the street, it doesn't matter. Kids are why we are here. And um boy, my hats off to teachers today. Thank you for all you do. I'll close us out. Um, I didn't plan to go on the other rant, but I planned to go on this one, so I I'm going to indulge. When I was a student, um, you know, there was a a common kind of talking point of discussion was, well, why do we really need schools nowadays? There's Google, there are public libraries, people can get all the
228information that they want from there, right? What what is the additional value out of, you know, the formal public education system or any education system for that matter? And nowadays you can hear people talking about the same thing but instead of saying referring to Google and referring to you know just library books they refer to chatgbt or claude or LLMs right and I think uh probably this year in particular a lot of education systems have been looking at those technologies with a mixture of uh shall we say fear and trepidation. But I I as a teacher myself, I continue to believe that those kinds of concerns fundamentally misunderstand what it means to be a teacher because I think in some abstract sense it is the case that you know a motivated teenager could learn you
229know what they needed from Google and the library and chat GPT but in practice this doesn't happen because the essence of teaching and the essence of learning I fundamentally believe is ultimately relational that what motivates a student to show up and do their best every day is a teacher and frequently what motivates teachers to show up and give their best every day is the joy in seeing the growth of the students under their care. Um there is there is a common saying that I I absolutely despise which is those that can do and those that can't teach. That may be the case for a lousy teacher, but for a great teacher, that is absolutely not true. You have to combine mastery of your subject material with tireless patience in dealing with noviceses. You have to
230combine the ability to perform and improvise and keep people engaged with the ability to stay to a timeline and sensible pacing. You have to be a good writer. You have to be a clear thinker. You have to be a careful planner. You have to be an engaging speaker. You have to be an academic. You frequently have to be a comedian, an improviser, a manager, a coach. A great teacher combines a dozen different disciplines into one compelling package with the goal of getting their students across the finish line. And if you ask adults who the most influential person was in their life, most will point to a teacher. I I would put money that more will point to a teacher than will point to their parents, which is a little insane if you think about it.
231That's the difference we make when we do it well. And I this this is an enthusiastic yes vote for me because I I continue to believe that good teaching is foundational both to raising the next generation and foundational to our country. So a huge thank you to all district 11 teachers. And with that, Miss Olsen, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett, I. Director Kerry, I. Director Hayley. Absolutely. I Director Johnson I. Director Jorgensson I. Director Malpach I. Director Rule. I. The eyes have it. Uh, National Teacher Appreciation Week resolution has been adopted. Moving on uh to instructional materials. Director Hayley, can you please mo make the motion for action item H2? Yes. I move that the board of education approves the spring 2026 instructional resources as proposed. Second. Moved and seconded. Uh this information was
232initially presented during the April 1st regular meeting of the board. Superintendent G. What updates can you provide at this time? Uh I have uh Miss Utmer here. Our um Chief Rasmusen has a previously scheduled event, but we are well prepared. Uh well, let me start by thanking the board for the extended time to one correct the access and then the uh secondly the clearer direction on some of the other um options you wanted us to look at. Chief Amer, good evening board. I know April 1st was eons ago, so I'll just reorient us to the um curriculum adoptions that are on this agenda item. There is a high school economics component, a sixth through 8th grade social studies curriculum, a sixth through 8th grade theater, digital theater, and orchestra and band, and also a high
233school orchestra and band item. When we brought this item to you on April 1st, there were some questions that we followed up with as we were asked to. Um, some of those were to investigate some additional resources in addition to correcting a link that had been broken during the prior public review to correct that link, reopen public review, and get additional comments submitted. We did get additional comments submitted during that um second opening. The majority of them were around honoring teacher selection and feedback in the process and then around ensuring that the product in the final selection met the criteria in the RFP. That's critical here because we know when we publish this open there's some curriculum in there that isn't selected in the final piece. One of the key components actually two that we
234were looking for in this adoption is that there's rich robust online assessment embedded in the curriculum. You've heard as we've talked over time about we know that STAR is important to be that dipstick where we can measure in the fall, the middle of the year, and the end of the year, but we also need to be doing assessment in tighter cycles along our teaching continuum and using that data to inform instruction to move our students toward proficiency. So, all of the curriculum in front of you tonight does have rich, robust assessment built in with data dashboards that teachers can utilize to inform their instruction. Um the other thing is when you were reviewing last time there were some public comments specifically around a tool in the economics um it was called actively learn. We will
235not be buying that component and activating it. So just so you know we're only buying the base book curriculum. So some of the things that were available as resources in the demo account will not be available when we purchase. um that's a cost savings mechanism as well as it is something that we just don't need to turn on to get the base resources that we're looking at for the economics curriculum. With that, that's all the updates I have, but I've also got the director of curriculum and instruction here for any additional questions you might have. Questions from the board. Seeing none, Miss Olsen, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett. Hi. Director Kerry. Hi. Director Hayley. Hi. Director Johnson. Hi. Director Jorgensson. I. Director Malpachham. I. Director Rule. I. The eyes have it. Uh, adoption of
236curriculum. Moving on to action item three. Director Johnson, can you please make the motion for action item H3? I move that the board of education approves contract C 2026 100 102 to non construction incorporated for the guaranteed maximum price of 1,379,148 and allows additional 10% cost increase for any approved contract modifications without further board contract approval. The period of the the period of performance for for effort is June 1st, 2026 through September 15, 2026. Second. Moved and seconded. Um, Superintendent G, what do you have for us? Uh, Chris ODM. Thank you, Superintendent G. Good evening, board of education. Tonight, I'm bringing to you a construction contract to deliver an advanced manufacturing shop. I will cover three things. what this project will mean for our students, why we are using a design build contract approach and
237how we selected this vendor and a review of pertinent contract details. With us tonight from our capital program office is Jen Hoteling from procurement Chris Sandaval and from Nun Construction President Mr. Tyson Nun. Thank you for coming. Um I'll get started. What is an advanced manufacturing shop? Well, it's a state-of-the-art manufacturing hub that will offer hands-on learning to combine machining and welding with high demand technical skills that directly connect to workforce readiness pathways that are needed in our area. This project will transform an underutilized auto shop building at Coronado High School into a state-of-the-art advanced manufacturing hub. Currently, Coronado offers the only funded welding program in D11. With this renovation, we will offer modern industry relevant curriculum for our concurrent enrollment and workforce readiness programs. Furthermore, this shop will support hands-on learning in areas such
238as computer numerical control machining, robotics, additive manufacturing, mechatronics, and advanced welding. Now, I have to be honest, I have no idea what any of that is, but it sounds really cool. And Dwayne Robersonson from CTE is here if you have any questions later on. Mr. Robertson will be furnishing the necessary equipment using CTE designated funding. This offering will prepare students with high demand technical skills that directly connect to workforce pathways that in that include our concurrent enrollment, our studentbased enterprise or work-based learning opportunities and dual enrollment requests. Why a design build approach? In order to offer this program for this upcoming school year, the district selected a design build delivery method to give us the greatest control over cost, schedule, and quality. This approach reduces risk, minimizes disruption to students, and ensures accountability through a
239single responsible team. Just for a note, we use the same model when we did the renovations for the CSST program at the UCCCs campus. The design build contractor team will provide full architectural and design engineering, permitting, procurement of materials and all construction services to deliver a turnkey facility. The scope of work includes renovating half of the space to support the advanced manufacturing technologies and the other half to support welding and metal fabrication. The facility will include plasma cutting stations and multiple welding stations. Pivoting to the RFP process for the preconstruction and initial design phase, we received 10 proposals from general contractor and architectural teams. The evaluation team each um evaluated each submission against criteria in the solution using a best value approach. They evaluated experience, technical capability and the ability to deliver a high quality
240onsc. The non construction MOA architect design team was ranked as highest technical most competent proposal based primarily on their highly detailed preconstruction and design plan their demonstrated extensive experience with designing CTE projects and based on past performance reference checks. The pre-construction and design phase is complete and during this phase the architect and contractor collaborated to define a scope, a budget and a schedule. None construction has prepared a guaranteed maximum price that includes all project costs. The GMP represents the maximum amount the district will pay unless there's a scope change by the district. And rounding my presentation to the final contract overview, this contract does have liquidated damages if there's delays caused by the contractor. The construction schedule will start June 1st and go through September 15th for substantial completion. We are going to retain insurance
241for builder risk and design liability insurance with a $10 million umbrella policy. And once approved, none construction will be able to order materials, provide required bonds, and begin on-site work June 1st after receiving a notice to proceed from the contracting office. At this time, this concludes my overview and I turn it back over to President Kerry for any questions the board may have for this team. Questions from the board? Director Hickley, I'm just curious. I'm looking at the um the PDF. You know what I'm talking about? Maybe not the drawing. the Yeah. Yeah. What does SM AW, GM AW, GT AW, what do those things stand for? I'm gonna I have coming up. Yeah. I'm going to ask the expert. I have all this right here. It was in the packet. Dwayne, good evening board.
242Thank you for considering this um proposal. Each one of those is an acronym for a different type of welding technique. uh they represent the four major techniques um that are taught within a concurrent enrollment or a um a program of welding of this stature. And so a student competent in all four of those techniques u will be able to be job ready to a number of different industries and then proceed on to an AWS certification as their employer demands. Um, we don't certify students often under AWS because most of the times the employers have to have a specific technique that gets certified and so we teach general welding under those four categories. Will robotics have any any space in here or no? Yeah, the CNC machine um that that Chris actually talked about the whole
243name and some we all just call it CNC. will be doing CNC um which is you know in this case it'll be subtractive manufacturing and so they'll be doing CNC work in that space but the um large scale that you're seeing here the water jet the plasma most of that will be traditional welding as well does Bryce know about this yes and he's retiring anyway uh this stands to benefit one of those acronyms and don't tell me which one or I say which one of one of those acronyms is the welding of um aluminum and so the ability to uh accelerate aluminum welding stands to benefit the first robotics teams. It's probably their Achilles Hill which is they can't manufacture their own wel their own metal welds um because they often don't have the technique
244or the commitment that this will provide to be um aluminum welding which is the state of first robotics. Thank you. Great. That's great. Director Jorgensson. Yeah, just briefly also Dwayne, good to see you tonight. It's been a while. You too. Um, we we passed these and it's just like, yes, check. We were spending money. Did you guys read the background info on on our We're literally at a turning point for Coronado workforce ready welding and manufacturing skills, concurrent enrollment with Pikes Peak State's college specifications. This is amazing. and we're just, you know, it's a board action item, but how cool is this that Coronado is getting this cool space and we're using a local company to build it all out. I'm impressed. Thank you very much, Director Vaka Barllet. Thank you, Jill. I also thought
245of the first robotics team of Coronado. So, that is a that is yes, they'll have be able to have access. Um, and two things I I'd heard about just uh this $10 million umbrella program. Did I hear that correctly? I'll say it. It's just an umbrella insurance policy that we require the contractor to uphold and it depends on the complexity and the risk of each contract. Okay. Thank you for clarifying. Okay, Jill be specific. I'm sorry. Um, just please be specific that that's not $10 million added to the contract at the district's cost. Great point. It It is not. Thank you. We're I think we're also going to be talking about umbrellas later. So, uh, thank you for clarifying. And can you tell me more about the partnership with PPSC in this program? How that's
246going to look? Um, that's not it's not Oh, Wayne, can you come up and answer that, please? Even though Lance happens to be here, but he's here for another reason. Right. With every uh when we talk about concurrent enrollment, concurrent enrollment is when we have the ability to offer college level credit for courses. In this particular case, um unlike a concurrent enrollment in say US history where my classroom doesn't have to be certified to offer college credit in welding, my space has to be absolutely certified. we have to meet the community college standards. Uh number of students per welding, space between welding units, security, safety, those kinds of things. And so this with none construction, we will meet all of the community college standards, which will make us um a viable partner for community college,
247Pikes Peak State College, then to offer concurrent enrollment. The exact nature of that hasn't been ironed out yet exactly which courses are sequencing, but once this facility is set, um it'll be full steam ahead with a partnership with PPSC to expand our concurrent enrollment portfolio to include a vast number of their welding courses. Thank you, Director Mil Pekkham. This is um ex exciting opportunity. So, if I read this right, we have an underutilized auto shop in Coronado High School, and we are going to transition that into a state-of-the-art welding facility where students are going to learn state-of-the-art welding techniques that is going to provide them an opportunity to enter the workforce with the required certification. Okay. Yes. Yes. Awesome. That's I don't know what took us so long to get to this, but I'm really
248excited about this opportunity that is there for our students. And from reading out there also, we are hiring somebody that's an expert in this area, Mr. Charles Coington, who's been teaching at Pikes Peak State College, and he's going to bring his expertise to our students up here. Yes. Agreed. So that I'm just asking these questions so that the public is also aware of it. So for those of them that do not read all the information that the board is available for in board docs, exciting opportunity and Mr. Tyson Nan, I see you here as well. Thank you for being here. um uh and the work that you guys are going to be uh providing and the expertise that you pro bring um uh to this um is this going to be ready for the fall
2492026? Uh it said September 15th. Is this something students can start learning in the fall or is this going to be at a later point in time? Thank you for that's a good question. Um sorry I wasn't very clear in my presentation. Substantial completion of this effort is due to be completed by September 15th, which will allow this to be offered this upcoming school year. Awesome. Thank you. Um and then a last feedback to uh the leaders that are in this room. Um this is a wonderful opportunity for our students. It's not just for Coronado students, but for all our high school students. So make sure that the word of mouth through our counselors and the future centers this opportunity is made available for all our students. So I look forward to and let us
250know when this uh area is complete. I would certainly like to we always love a ribbon cutting. So yeah um I will offer as a side because this will probably come up in the next contract. Um I'll have Miss Hotelling work with uh Chief Otmer to make sure that we post um the capital's budget uh capital budget for the board. There are new board members. Uh this is new to the board now because it's coming as a contract, but this is not new to us and we've been working this for um Dwayne would probably make it even longer on how long the district has been working to make the conversion for this space. And a lot of that sits in the prioritization of the capital budget. And so sometimes these things feel new and I
251don't want to say as a surprise, but maybe just like they're out of left field. If you dig into the capital budget and if you have questions, we will make time for board members to sit with myself, Chief Bobber, uh, Miss Hotelling, andor Dr. Comfort as well to go over that portfolio of how we're constantly thinking about creating new opportunities, whether they be CTE pathways or even just new furniture in some of our uh, schools. We have a very detailed rolling five-year budget of our capital plans that um I think it would behoove the board to be able to um get access to that uh as we end up this week just to keep those things fresh. Okay. Uh so just to restate the guaranteed maximum price here is 1,379,148. And with that, Miss Olsen,
252roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett. Hi. Director Kerry. Hi. Director Hayley. Hi. Director Johnson. I. Director Jorgensson. I. Director Malpa. I. Director Rule. I. The eyes have it. Moving on. Director Malpach, can you please make the motion for action item H4? Yes. I move that the board of education approves contract C 2026-1018 to Hutsbath and Associates for 1,6,245.70 and allows up to an additional 10% cost increase for any approved contract modifications without further board contract approval. The period of performance is June 1, 2026 through July 15, 2026. Second. Moved and seconded. Uh, Superintendent G, what do you have for us? Uh, before I bring um, Miss Odum forward again, again, in the full context of the Palmer project, this is not new news to the district. It's just time to award the contract. Anyone driving
253up and down Weber phase oneish, which is the new academic wing, is nearing completion. This is in preparation for us to do the renovation of the existing 1939 building to make sure that we get the proper abatement. So just uh I heard people talking about misinformation. There is not a an asbestous issue at Palmer. That's not why we built the new wing. When you're renovating an old building, you have to make sure that you're taking the proper protocols. Um and so again, long planned and now just to the board because of the size of the contract and we can't award these contracts a year in advance before we know the work's going to happen. So this is on time on sequence and miss ODM. Thank you so much, Superintendent G. with us tonight from Hutsbath
254and Associates is Mr. Victor RmIrez. He is our senior environmental project manager and estimator. Thank you for coming. And then our team from the capital and procurement office. As part of the district's investment as the superintendent um identified to modernize Palmer High School, a critical enabling phase is to abate um hazardous materials within the original 1939 portion of the facility. This has been planned for this summer while the building is unoccupied since the start of the project. Asbestous products were widely used during the time Palmer was built. Left undisturbed, these products are not harmful and exist in several products we encounter in everyday occurrences. However, before beginning the remodel, we need to remove all contaminants. Colorado state law mandates that this abatement effort be performed by a certified independent abatement contractor that is separate from
255the renovation contractor to prevent conflicts of interest. Completion of this abatement project is required to secure necessary building permits and ensures the project remains in full compliance with occupational health and safety statutes. Following the abatement, a licensed third party will complete air testing and provide a site clean air clearance certification which allows the district to reoccupy the space so it is safe to proceed with the remodel. The scope includes abatement of asbestous containing plaster floor tile mastic, drywall, block filler, foundation sealant, and thermal system insulation. All abatement will be completed in compliance with applicable state and federal safety standards. Pivoting to the RFP, the solicitation was openly competed and we received two responsive qualified um proposals from Colorado firms each having lensure in this area. Each were evaluated using the technical and past performance criteria
256in the RFP and Hudsmith and Associates received the highest technical rating with the highest past performance confidence rating. Pricing was evaluated for reasonleness and completeness. The overall best value offering was provided by Hutsbath and Associates. Rounding the corner to the review of the applicable contract specific details. This is a firm fixed price contract. The period of performance is June 1 through July 15th. The contract does contain a perday liquidated damages fee. Proper insurance for this project is a $5 million general liability due to the high risk of this of this effort. This is a professional service and therefore no bonds are required for payment or performance. In closing, the overall Palmer renovation schedule currently reflects the first phase of renovation on the 1939 building to start this summer following abatement. Staff and students that are
257in these areas will be relocated to the west wing and in 22 classrooms classroom modulars until the completion of the new academic wing in February 2027. At this time I turn it over to President Kerry for any questions the board may have for this team. Questions from the board. Director Johnson. Yeah. So, I know it talked about the COP funds that were voted on back in 24. It's around 120 million, I think it was. And I know there's a limit of $100 million specifically for design and construction. Um I guess what is our I guess limit going forward spending outside of like the first phase of abatement being uh so the $100 million will cover all the abatement that we have to remove from the facility. Okay. So the limit that you're referring to would
258be for a contract approval. Um this is within budget of what we have set aside for the Palmer cop uh renovation effort. This was planned. This was a known budget line item and it's within the set aside um $100 million. Miss explain it differently on why this contract is coming now that it comes from the coop but explain the mechanism of why the size amount and the time limit of when we're allowed to award contracts so it's not confused as the abatement is something new and is an additional part to the project. Okay, I will do my best. Um this is required by state statute to have this occur at this particular point in the phase. We can't because we have students and other people working in the building. This has to come now. This
259is the safest time to do the abatement when it's unoccupied. Um is there any other points that I might be missing on this? Well, can I try to restate it real quick? You can tell me if I mess it up. So, the the coop funds a large pot of money. The renovation abatement is one of those things that we anticipated spending that money on. At this time, we are going to now spend that money, which we had planned for, on a specific firm, in a specific contract, and that's why it's coming to the board for a vote. Is that accurate? It it is. Okay. And it's in accordance with policy because the dollar amount. Sorry, Director Johnson, I kind of cut you off there. No, you're good. Thanks for the assist. Yeah. No, that information
260was helpful from both of you all. Um, but I guess I guess what I'm trying to get to is is this a one-time spending of that COP funds of 100 million for design? And if there is any other next steps for other phases, will we have to go back to the COP funds of design and construction to use? I'm not aware of any, but I'm looking for missile. So telling, can you come up and talk a little bit about the overall Palmer academic project? Certainly. So the hund00 million that the coop is affording at Palmer includes the design services. Um RTA is the firm that is uh working through that with Perkins Eastman. Um the other part of that is the construction services that's building the new academic wing. Um and as part of the
261um work as well, we're doing renovations to the existing academic wing. So the 1939 building, that building has a lot of asbestous material in it. So this contract specifically deals with the removal of that material before the construction teams can complete the construction renovation pieces of that part of the project. Does that help? Yeah, you're good. Yeah. Yeah. Perfect. Any other questions? Director Baka Bartlett. Um, just a comment. I wanted to thank you uh for your time because previously uh we we received this information on Friday. I start digging into it and I just wanted to thank uh the staff for being available to answer questions and and also setting up the time so that the public is aware that um that we have a standing time with an admin person close in the high
262upper level staff so that we can ask our questions and and that is because it does and superintendent G addressed this earlier that it does seem like a surprise. it does seem like a lot of money and and so being new I just I just appreciate you sharing and answering questions um if it if it helps at all. Um so before we tore down um the existing academic wing in the cafeteria space where the new wing is going, we had to abate that area as well and that was also a separate contract. So it's just how the pieces go for the different phases of the project. Um, and we had to wait till we get the new academic wing further along and the kids were done with school like Miss ODM presented earlier before we
263can start abatement in that space. Uh, abatement contractors come in with a lot of um, safety gear and they tape off all kinds of areas and you can't access the building the same way. Um, so we can't do that work with students in the building. Thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. So telling for the community that's listening, can you just give a rough rough estimate on how much money we this is a coop um funded piece but how big our capital budget is for every year because this is not the first time that um what we have gone through an RFP and is best and fair pricing and practice is sometimes heard as a very expensive project. So, what is the totality of your annual budget for capital? Uh, with the cop, the totality of our
264annual budget has been closer to 200 million. Okay. Um, but typically more around 20 million. Okay. Great. Thank you. You're welcome. Director Mel Pekham. Thank you. Just so that we have clarity because this has kind of had this discussion going on back and forth. This money is coming from the coop right one great thank you absolutely so there is no confusion that this is not like new source of funding or something that you are making a request it's coming from the coop correct great um the timeline that you have identified there it seems like it's 45 days in the middle of summer uh are we assured that uh the person that is st s sitting behind you from huts they can provide that assurance that they can complete this work within that tight timeline and
265none of the school operations are going to be impacted in August. We are highly confident based on the information they submitted in their proposal. There's always unforeseen site conditions, but we don't anticipate that to delay it beyond school start. Okay. Thank you. And we are working actively working several operational plans to mitigate any of the challenges that have come with the very uh complex renovation and investment plans at Palmer. Uh again we're going from a 2500 capacity building student capacity building down to around 1,200. So we have a lot of space as an advantage. Um I had seen an email earlier floating around last week about um the number of mobile units and I think that is 22 classrooms worth right how much mobile units two for four classrooms right two mobile units for four
266classrooms so a lot of times misinformation is though you're going to take over a whole city block full of mobiles again although the academic wing won't be open until the end of the first semester next year we already have the plan for our staff and our teachers teachers to be in spaces that are safe from the abatement or previously abated. And we have mitigated plans uh to accommodate any delays in that schedule. Anything greater than that, as we had to overcome at Jenkins a year and a half ago, we would be communicating to the board well in advance as soon as we were to know any of that. Thank you. Maybe you can move some of the mobile units from Jenkins to Palmer. Uh we are. Thank you. Great. Thank you. Good idea. Seeing no
267further comments, Miss Olsson, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett, I. Director Kerry, I. Director Hayley, hi. Director Johnson, I. Director Jorgensson, I. Director Malpachham, I. Director Rule, I. The eyes have it. Moving on to action item five. uh memo of agreement for authorizing agreement supporting the establishment of an innovation healthcare campus. Director Hayley, can you please make the motion for action item H5? Yes. I move that the board of education approves memo of agreement M2026-00003 to authorize agreements supporting the establishment of an innovation healthcare campus in partnership with Pikes State College at the Roy J. Wson academic campus. Second. moved and seconded. Uh, Superintendent G, over to you. Yeah. Uh, there's a bit of a sequence here. I want to make sure everyone understands. Um, what we're asking for from the board tonight is for
268us to start to do the feasibility and understand how it is at Pikes Peak State College. And thank you, Dr. Bolton, for being here. Joe, it's great to see you again as well. Um, for the uh, the advancement of the capital investment that they want to bring to bear for this. Um, part of where this all stems from originally was about a year and a half ago, maybe two years ago now, we were up at the state board and asking for approval for an innovation zone. That innovation zone started with the uh Colorado Springs School of Technology. Uh, its executive director, Nathan Gors, is here right now. Um, that was an award winner by Case uh this uh summer for the most innovation uh the most innovative student concept in schools that across the state.
269This comes in sequence as an expansion of that zone. So you're going to see a couple of things in sequence here. One, how it is that we relate to the feasibility at WASEN. And secondly, how do we go from CSST as being the singular definition of that innovation space and now create a zone where we add in a medical healthc care pathway. Absolutely. Okay. Good evening. So while those two things are connected, they're um not directly in the agenda. one right after another because this is going straight to action because this item is a memo of agreement. The other where we're going to talk about renaming the innovation zone needs to go non-action action. So, we'll address that one in a bit. But just to reorient you to this item on March 18th, 2026 during
270your work session, Dr. Lance Bolton, Pikes Peaks Community College President, oh, I said that wrong. State college president, apologies. And um Dean Joe, Dr. Joe Charleman shared the idea about the health sciences campus and their capital investment of $5 million. At the end of that briefing, the board tasked the admin with researching viable options to start to get this underway. Through that process, we determined the Roy Jassson academic campus as a viable location to locate this health campus. Tonight we're discussing the memo of agreement which would enable staff to move to the next phase of work to establish additional agreements and details about specific use of space inside that campus. So this is the first phase that would then allow the superintendent or design to start to go allocate the addit the initial space inside
271the campus and take on that $5 million investment to start the capital improvements. Next phases will still be coming to you. So, we've spoke that evening about the innovation plan and other parts of the high school. That does come to the board for approval, but you'll recall that evening we also talked about a zero-year planning for all of the components of the school. That will happen in the fall and you will see an innovation plan come to you and then if it's approved, it will go up to the state board of education following the same process that CSST did. With that, we'll open it for any questions. Questions from the board. Starting with Director Johnson. Yeah. Um, thank you. So, I was So, I know this is still in the process in the works, but
272with this being a simulation lab going to the RJ Black campus. How does this affect the alternative schools that are there or is does that play a part within that alternative campus that's currently at that location? It does. So all of the current schools and programs at Wasson will come together to talk with us about facility use space because we'll look at the pieces inside the building and make sure that we have the space that's necessary, determine um where we allocate spaces so that it's not breaking up the flow because we're just sticking with something existing. We'll bring Odyssey, achieve um adult and family ed together to have those conversations and determine the best use of the total space inside the building. thinking of all the areas we have access to. It would be possible
273if the board could get information about that event when it comes up to be able to attend that. Absolutely. Yeah. You want to talk a little bit about the uh design work next year on the AEC redesigns? Yeah, absolutely. So, additionally, in addition to this work, we will be working with um both the principal at Tesla and the principal at Achieve to look comprehensively at our alternative programming. We know that right now we have students with needs for that and it also triggers needs at our comprehensive high schools with our 12th grade guarantee. So those principles will be coming together throughout next year to redesign that programming as well to look at that online option and the need for in-person option and alternative programming. So there's multiple pieces coming that'll take multiple design lab sessions
274in the fall and we'll happily invite you to those as well. And I guess the other question I had too is because I know we also discussed like who would oversee this like would it be a outside board? Would it be like D11 looking at it? Do we know where all of those details will come forward in the innovation um plan because this can go under an innovation zone which is what we'll talk about in that agenda item later. It can adopt the exact same governance structures um as CSST has because they'd fall under the same zone. But all of those details will come forward next fall when you see the full comprehensive plan. Thank you. Director Baka Bartlett. When I'm I'm looking at the memo agreement and scrolling down to the bottom, whereas the
275lease has an initial term of 20 years. Is that correct? Thank you. Yes, that's the intent is to have a 20-year term. Those the cost of operations would be the tradeoff to have that presence in our backyard to be able to serve students so efficiently having them right there. And our current uh term with UCCCs for the not although not the same exact school, but CSST is a 30-year term uh to use the space at UCCCs. all these schools are still um accountable to the accreditation and the SPF at the state level. Um and so these are the real estate relationships that we have to have in order to be able to um have people make investments to do the tenant improvement on those spaces. But it doesn't mean that there's a 20-year free contract
276for the relationship without accountability to produce results for students. They're thought about kind of separately. So the contract for schools um is usually three to five years uh for them to then come to boards for the reapproval of those innovations. Yes. I'm I'm trying to get my head around the the difference in the timeline from the charter schools of five five years at a time to 20 years. Yeah. State statute for innovate. I want to make sure we see them as two things. Charter is different. This is an innovation school. Innovation schools are reviewed by a local board every 3 to five years depending on when um what type it falls under. Innovation zone is different than innovation school. But every three years it comes back to the local board. You get an update on
277what's happening and then you can determine whether we want to make any different actions, apply for any additional waivers or keep the ones that we currently have in place. So while the facility use is separate and it's a longer term, the superintendent is saying also you'll review um the demand for the school whether their SPF is working out all of those things um every 3 years. Okay. When you say local board, do you mean this board or a board yet to be determined? The innovation plan will come forward. That is one of the things that can be written in there under an innovation zone. So we'll see that in the fall. So we we don't know which the CSST model there is an alternative governance board. They are still by contract reviewed by this authorizing
278I put quotes because it's not a charter school. They that contract still comes to review to the D11 board as it sits right now. So their day-to-day governance is run through their alternative governance much like the relationship with a charter. But this board has ultimate authority that if it's not meeting their contracted obligations for student performance or enrollment or their ability to close the books at that three-year point, the board can say this is no longer in the best interest of the district. Okay. So the 20 years is is with is a relationship with Pikes Peak State College that for for the tenant investment of this space. That is correct. And there is a 30-year relationship in reverse with CSST and UCCCs. Um, if I use the example of CSST and UCCCs, if CSST were
279to no not be able to renew their educational contract, then it would be at the district to decide what to do with that space because we have a 30-year relationship to use the back part of that space. So, um I I wouldn't say like I don't want to I I would say like we could do this with this, but if I say it then somebody's going to say, "Oh my god, he said he's closing CSST and turning it into a a front." That's not what I'm saying. But it is then at the discretion for your partner who's put the investment into that space to think about how to use that space. Um I will direct the board back to uh space is not an issue in district 11. We're running somewhere in the low 60s
280utilization across the district. Um and so the better partnership use of space is uh at least in the superintendent's mind in the best interest of the long-term viability of the district and I think uh Dr. Bolton has proven to be a great partner not just to district 11 but to all of the local school districts in the county. Can you um tell me more about the process that you'd undergone to select was as the site say who was involved was this by committee how many discussions it started from the same frame of the capacity committee report that is due every November that shows available seats. So you'll see in the I want to use the right word because there's so many of memo of agreement. you'll see the numbers of seats available and then we
281do a viability and feasibility study. We walk several locations and determine um in this one in particular it was is there enough contiguous space to make the programming happen that needs to which limited the number of buildings available. Thank you director Mel Pakim. Great. Uh thank you. Uh so as board members we all got to visit your campus uh about a month or so back and we had a robust discussion about it at the work session. So for clarity sake the board gave you a thumbs up on exploring space options inside district lemon and you are right now coming and saying to the board that was an academic campus is the identified location. Nothing about the innovation plan at this point in time. Correct. That'll come in the fall. This is just facility use. Facility
282use. Um again for the interest of transparency because of all the public comments that we received earlier today. No specific spaces within that was an academic campus at this point in time has been identified as to this is where this healthcare campus is going. If the board were to approve this this evening, that's the next phase of conversations that we'll go into in the viability and feasibility components. Awesome. Thank you. And as you go about that process, you would engage with the current schools, alternative schools that are on campus. So proactively those conversations are taking place and you identify which schools best fit in which spaces up there. Correct. Perfect. Thank you. Um one clarifying question also um this opportunity when it's available for our students is this um when this let me step back
283a little bit. Uh when I visited your campus, it was not only an opportunity for high school students to receive concurrent enrollment credit out there, but quite possibly uh you know pursue post-secary education on that campus. Is this an opportunity for students to pursue post-secary education on that campus as well when it's complete? Thank you, Dr. Bolton. Good evening. Uh uh Director Malcolm, um just to be clear, are you asking will we have non-concurrent enrollment students who are attending uh classes in that space? Yes. Uh in particular, we are interested in being able to hold evening classes. So we already have an evening LPN program that is very robust, fills up quickly every semester at maximum capacity. and we anticipate continuing that program at this location. Okay. So, if students, high school students after graduation
284want to pursue an RN degree certification, they can still use that campus. They would likely need to go to our north campus for that. That we anticipate they will graduate from high school with an LPN and then they would be able to continue in the LPN to RN bridge program. but they have to go to your north campus for that as things currently stand and I expect that'll still be the case. Thank you. You're welcome. Seeing no further discussion, Miss Olsson, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett, no. Director Kerry, hi. Director Hley, I director Johnson. Hi, Director Jorgensson. I director I director rule I the eyes have it. Uh moving right along to action item six. Uh resolution for East Hills Academy. Director Jorgensson, can you please make the motion for action item H6? Yes.
285I move that the board of education approves resolution 2026-46 authorizing contract modification number two to East Hills Academy charter contract C2027-00001 and approves the coccupancy of East Hills Academy at the Horseman Middle School campus. The coccupancy term shall run from July 1st, 2026 through June 30th, 2031, aligning with the current term of the East Hills Academy charter contract. Second. Uh moved and seconded. Um before I turn this over to Superintendent Gall, I just want to frame this really briefly. I may be duplicative with what you're planning on saying. So, my understanding of the timeline here, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, we did a capacity committee report in late fall that identified available space at different schools. Collocation was called out as a specific next step by the committee. State law requires us
286to make charter schools aware of available space when we have it. Um, and the capacity committee identified man as having 484 available seats and committee recommendation was that you should be looking at schools with greater than 250 available seats. That's from the background of this agenda item. Uh my own personal opinion here is that we should be happy to kind of use space in efficient ways. We have various buildings and you know capital charter schools are I'll echo uh Jason's comments. Charter schools are our schools. They are a legally permissible vehicle for public education. And given that we authorize them, um, and given that this board is kind of the steward of public education in this geographical area, I think it makes good sense to be looking for ways to make efficient use of taxpayer
287resources and capital. But with that, I'll turn it over to Superintendent G. Uh, thank you, President Kerry. Uh, Dan, it's great to see you. I'd like to just remind the board, especially for new members of the board, that uh when your um uh original charter came for approval, uh comments, and I'll paraphrase were best charter application we've ever seen, mo most thorough planning, most complete idea on what you're going to do within your school. Um and so I applaud you and your board uh for the efforts. I'd like to give a special shout out to Legacy Institute for those that don't know. uh Dan and and a different charter member who's not colllocating but were on a year's fellowship to be able to develop that charter and so again to give the depth to um
288you are accountable to your plan and having a year's uh ability to think about it I think is is a is a great opportunity for you. I also think it's important that uh there's been so much charter conversation tonight that I'll take a little bit of a soap box here as well. Um our academic master plan and uh do we have a map in here? Yeah, there's one over there. You'll see the academic master plan displayed in the geographic map that's in the corner over there. You'll notice uh a smattering of uh charter schools and now at least one innovation school. That conversation uh for the innovation zone expansion will happen as a non-action item here shortly. Um, every time that we've made a recommendation to the board to review a charter or an innovation,
289we have done it as a complement to what we're trying to offer families as choice within the system. Um, the idea of a classical academy and how is you're taking a very specific pedagogical approach to what you believe students need and what you believe parents will be responsive to is exactly the type of choice that families are asking for. We are not trying to promote that. We believe that everything that Dan and his board believes is what should happen in every one of our schools. The tagline that we like in district 11 is there is a school for every student in our city right here in district 11. A previous comment that came forward today was from a founding board member of an allgifted and magnet school called Academy ACL which has been in our
290portfolio for over a decade and it has well served next to great GT teachers and great GMP programs that we have in traditional run schools. The need for variation and choice is not driven by the district. It is driven by what p families are asking for. The three largest growing sectors in Colorado and in the United States are homeschool online and charter. So with that I turn this over to chief opt to talk about the colloc collocation opportunity for east hills at man. East Hills has been a great partner in looking at the space at man. Again, I think the context has kind of been laid here, but um based on the capacity report that comes out late fall every year, we produce a list of available seats. MAN was determined as a possible colllocation
291site for East Hills. In man's unique setup, there's multiple buildings on that campus. So, there's an opportunity here for East Hills to be within their own building on the Man campus. There are a couple things that will be um shared space, if you will, but in a little bit different way. The auditorium will be scheduled intentionally, so there's no crossover use between the two schools. They'll have planning meetings to to set that schedule. Um for large motor spaces and recess, we do know East Hill students are a lot younger than the man students on campus. Again, they'll be in their own building and they will have their own separate playground and their own access to a large motor movement space that is a bigger classroom within their building that will act as their gym. Um,
292in order to not share the cafeteria between the two buildings, lunch will be um made in the kitchen in man, but there will be warming carts and a ramp installed to move the lunch over to the East Hills location um parking lot. We do not anticipate any traffic flow issues. However, if they were to arise, we could go out and do a traffic flow or a parking lot study, which our teams are used to doing. Um there they have different start and end times which will help with that flow. And then supervision wise, um anytime the East Hill students are out on the playground or outside in drop off or pickup, that will be supervised. And the same is true for man. And with that, I open it up to questions from my fellow board
293directors. Director Johnson. Yeah. I guess um just for more clarification for me, I guess what is the legacy institute's role within the charter or what's what is that? I guess in general, you want to speak to that? Sure. Hi, good evening uh everyone. Um, I know I've met some of you before. I presented here last year. It was right about this time of night as well. So, thanks for having me again. Um, a little intro for me, uh, for the new board members. Um, my name is Dana Jamian. Um, I'm a I was a D11 kid. Uh, I went to Palmer. Um, and so I'm really excited about all this talk about Palmer. Um, I got to see some Palmer teachers earlier tonight as well. Um, and then I was also an atrisisk kid. I
294wasn't born in this country. English is my second language. Um, I didn't grow up with a lot of money. Um, but I benefited from a charter school education, kindergarten through 8th grade, which is why I've spent my career in charter schools. So, all that to say, um, long story short, after uh many years of charter education, um, the Legacy Institute uh, created a new program to train charter school leaders, um, to open up new charter schools in Colorado Springs. Um, now they're doing it statewide as well. Um but I and one other uh fellow were part of the first year of fellows in that program. Uh so we've completed that program and they've set us up uh to be able to open up a charter school with a specific focus. Um East Hills is premised
295on being a school that works for working families. Um I know that school choice exists in Colorado Springs, but it only exists for families who can access that choice. If you're a single parent, if you're two working parents, if you're parents with young kids, it's very hard to access school choice. And I'm not talking about charter versus public. I'm saying you like a D11 school and you want to go to another D11 school, but you can't work out the transportation. That's why we have a bus, which is a non-negotiable for us. I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe we'll be the only charter school in D11 uh that's authorized by D11 that uses a bus. Is that correct? I think that's correct. But feel free to Yeah. Um, and so, uh, that's
296that's one premise. The other thing is having a family-friendly calendar and schedule. So, we don't do early releases, late starts, half days, random days off. We have a consistent schedule because we believe that what is best for families is what's best for kids. And so, you know, especially parents who are working hourly jobs in this tight economy. We want to have something that's consistent for kids. Um, because it shouldn't just be the kids with privilege who are able to access school choice. Thank you, Director Bakaba Bartlett. Uh, thank you and thank you for your clarification. Uh, I did watch last year's presentation at the work session. Um, and I I heard the comments from the board members that were very impressed by the application. And you just mentioned Oh, and and I hadn't recognized the
297piece before about working parents and providing transportation. It's absolutely something that I heard while I was campaigning for school board about the transportation piece for working parents. Um, and and just now you said no late start. How how is that handled? Sorry. Uh, we'll have late starts for snow days, but that's it. Yeah. Yeah. We don't have regularly scheduled. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. We don't have regularly scheduled. You know, some schools like every Wednesday they have like a a later start or something like that. Or a lot of charter schools like on Fridays they have an early release. That's really hard for working parents and that is a barrier for many parents to access this sort of education. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And also thank you Nicole for clarifying the space that was in
298a comment earlier this evening about it's K through two at a middle school. Absolutely. There's asurances in place and that supervision is critical. Thank you. Yeah. I'm not sure a lot of people know that we have an early ed center in the middle of Watson's campus, right? which is um and if anybody got there the other day when we did the prek day um we're very attentive to making sure that we keep like children by age group uh and then in these spaces where we have collocations like schools in separate spaces shared spaces are real uh we deconlict that through the schedule and the way that Miss Utmer uh presented our relation our potential relationship with East Hills at man is the same standard that we bring to all collocations uh We um put uh
299friends of the children in an open building at Swigert uh part that was what three years ago now. Same type of questions which is how do you have nonprofits there was it was a non-educational program but supportive of student services uh that was the first collocation that my administration had pursued but we always take that same piece to bear. Obviously, we have heard a lot from the community tonight of people wanting to understand these questions earlier. Uh this is the standard that we've always used. I think it's just the first time that it's been school within school. So, I think it's creating a different level of concern. Um but this is not new business for our business. It just um feels different sometimes based upon the community and how it's received. Director Mel Pekkham. Thank
300you, Mr. Jamian. It's good to see you as well. Um, couple of questions again for clarity sake. Um the way this is presented, East Hills Academy is going to occupy a separate building and the uh interaction between Eastil students and man students are going to be pretty much non-existent. Pretty much non-existent. The only place where we imagine that that might happen is in an outdoor setting if they if there was a playground. Again, there is a separate playground or at pickup or drop off just depending and in those places it would be supervised. Great. Um, have we received I know that we received one feedback from public comment today but any feedback from the man community itself when this was shared with the man community. I have not seen any more come across my desk.
301Yes. Thank you. Uh, as far as eastills go, would you since you are here Mr. Jamian, would you just give us a brief update on how your enrollment is coming along and um what your feedback is from your parents as far as occupying ban? Yes. Yeah, great question. Um yes, we are at around uh 60 applications so far um and still continuing to to grow. Um and so we're working on getting those families uh registered. Um the parents uh you know have some questions and actually they would be very interested in being able to um tour man. Uh so hopefully with your approval tonight um we would love to be able to show our parents the space. You know we've showed them pictures. We've explained that is it is completely separate and to clarify for
302the playgrounds there will be fencing and so uh there won't be any interaction whatsoever and then um there will be uh a complete separation in the internal part of the building as well. Um but yeah, parents are very eager to see the space and um district 11 has been very uh our conversations with um district administration have been very supportive. Great. Thank you. Thank you for that quick update. 60 students right now currently in the K through to correct. Yeah. who have who have currently applied. Um, and we're working through registrations for all of those. And there is space as you guys grow in there from K through2 to K through 5. Is there enough space out there in that man building to accommodate? Yes, there's enough space for us to be there for uh
303we anticipate about 3 years. Okay. And then possibly after three years, you would have to consider other options. Correct. Okay. Thank you. Great. Um I think um um my questions were answered. Um just so the community is aware to um um some concerns were raised about the communication process and just for clarity sake this was brought up at the very top of the meeting. This was communicated to the board in the capacity committee report about collocations in November. So as you undertook that feasibility study, this was identified as a possible location and um in the um board retreat that we recently had, one of the feedback that the board provided and the district was receptive to it is that as we uh explore these feasibility studies and you identify some of these big strategic changes,
304the board would be informed in a timely manner going forth. So the community is also aware that things are happening in a transparent manner and that's the intent going forward. Yeah, I believe that comments probably more directed towards me and my team than to Dan and his charter application. Uh they have followed every part of the statute. We did invite uh two charters that the board approved last year to explore collocation. Uh Dan and East Hills has taken that opportunity. The other which will remain nameless because it's not pertinent has chosen to rent uh their space. Um I also again since we're covering old ground uh this evening I do want the community to um re remember that uh the district has held their charter schools to the same account if not to a higher
305account than we have held some of the challenges that we've had in our own traditional run schools. uh Globe was closed uh two years ago for their inability to close their books and be able to um create a budget that was sustainable over time. Um and that is part of the charter risk. And I forget the name of the other charter that had been an approved charter but actually was not able to produce enough students to open and that happened two years in a row. The first year they were delayed to the second year to give them a second year to find um a community that believed in the charter they had put forward and then the second year that that came in still underenrolled a previous board then denied that charter. And so um
306while we are asking for a resolution for this space to go, Mr. Amigen and his board are ultimately accountable to filling seats that they're able to close their budget. And so, um, sometimes I ask myself, why do we not have the same accountability in traditional schools that we actually have in charter schools? Charter schools are under a lot more pressure every year to make sure they actually meet their projected enrollment, and I'm certain other people will insert their opinion on how they can be funded by by external means. U, but they are public school systems that actually have tighter accountability in them. And while we are asking for this resolution for this approval for a collocation, this is ultimately on Dan and his team to make sure that those families are there. If those families
307are not there, then this resolution will likely come back to the board that says, will you preserve this space for another year for them to go find more families. I believe the 60 that you have right now is a strong commitment for how late I know people commit. Uh but you are ultimately accountable to that and great. We wish you the best of luck on that. Yeah. It's always that's up to the board. It's always based on the demand uh and your ability to meet that demand of parents. My last question uh I think when you brought this application in front of the board, your intent was to get students from the southeast part of the community. And so that's still going to be to some extent your target. And that's why your transportation because
308one of the public comments that were provided today was the impact to surrounding elementary schools. Your intent is to get students from the southeast part of the community to the school. Uh yes, our initial I want to I'm going to jump in here. I I'm I the charter has been approved and so I think how Mr. Amigin finds families is a separate conversation. Um, and if the board wants to think about reconsidering that charter, um, th this idea of choice, we're not taking away from anything. We're providing different sets of choices. Right now, if you live across the street from one of our schools, you are not obligated to go to that school. This is a choice system and families choose the schools that they want to go to. This is a charter school that
309presents a pedagogical model that is not mirrored in any of the schools in that surrounding area. And I appreciate the fact that you are willing to bust people within boundary uh of district 11 to your school. But um I think we need to ask Mr. to be accountable to his enrollment to the charter that the previous board has approved and um then just discuss the collocation space at this time because again we are not um Mr. Omigen andor any other charter is not actively standing on the front door of existing schools and saying come to my school. It is the same challenge that we have internal on 1200 kids do not go to Mitchell High School within our own boundary. They go to Palmer, they go to Dherty, they go to Coronado. Okay. My intent
310in asking that question, Superintendent Gaul, was when this charter application came in front of the board, it was presented that the location was going to be in the southeast part of the district. Now, it's in a different location in the district. So, I didn't know if the plans have changed from their intent. The approval was provided to the board contingent on what was presented at that time. So, I'll rest with what I said. Director Vakabarla, do you have a quick followup? Yes. Uh, Director Johnson, I believe, asked about the Legacy Institute. I'm curious as well. I think we tried to answer that, but I'll try to provide a really brief summary. The Legacy Institute is involved because um the principles that brought forward the proposals for the charters that were already approved last spring were
311in a cohort to work on a charter school application. So they helped develop the application. They had a mentorship no direct affiliation with the district. Right. I'm unfamiliar. That's all right. They're a um uh I would call them a think tank for uh school leaders. Um Mr. Gorsch has spent some time uh traveling with them and auditing some of their cohort from last year in the development of the innovation zone that we currently have CSST in. All right, seeing no further discussion, Miss Olsson, roll call, please. Director Baka Bartlett, no. Director Kerry, I. Director Hayley, hi. Director Johnson, present. Hi. I or no. I or no? No. Okay. Director Jorgensson. I. Director Malpachham. I. Director Rule. I the eyes have it. And that closes out our action items for the night. Uh thanks to staff
312and all presenters and uh my fellow board directors for sticking with it. This has been a long night. We do have four uh non-action items. Um, the first one pertains to resolution 2026-39 regarding student fees, fines, and charges. This information comes before the board annually for review and app and approval. Superintendent G, what do you have for us? Uh, I'm going to have uh, Miss Callback go through this, but I am going to just insert and acknowledge uh, Miss Adair is in the back and she had sent me a really nice video of her students from Wilson, her ELLL students, uh, taking a free field trip. uh they happened to go to the Air Force Academy uh planetarium. Uh and in the video you just saw the greatest aha that many of those children uh
313certainly had never been to a planetarium and had no idea that they could feel like they were flying an airplane without flying one. Um and the comment that I had gotten from Miss Adair was this is great that our kids get to do things for free that we used to have to ask them to pay for. So Miss Callback if you want to take it from there. Sure. Good evening uh board members and superintendent Gaul. Um, that was a great summary, thank you, of the work. A few years back, this board tasked us with either significantly reducing or even eliminating student fees in order to increase student access to all of the amazing opportunities that the district and the community have to provide for them. And so I'm really thrilled tonight to be able to
314um give you a culmination of that work that lands in the things that you see on the screen. Some of you who've been on the board for a while remember that the packet of materials for this used to be four pages long. Different sheet of fees for every level. That is now down to one page. There are no more elementary or middle school fees and we've eliminated all band fees. We found that those were pretty expensive ones and probably a barrier for many families. Um the fees that you see left are mostly for optional items. A student decides that they'd like to purchase a yearbook, that fee is still on there. Um the others that you'll see are for items that are lost or intentionally damaged. Um and we do still find families for those.
315We do maintain a small convenience fee for the use of a credit card. um on those rare occasions when a family does need to pay for something. And then Miss Utmer is going to talk a little bit tonight about um some fee changes that you'll see in just a moment for some of our optional afterchool care programming that I will say even with those changes is still significantly less than what families would pay on an open market for an afterchool um child care. Nicole, can I turn it to you? Yeah. Okay. Okay. So the board will recall if they if you've served for a while or went back and looked at videos when ESSER funding was in place, one of the things we did was increase after school programming um with the intent of extending
316the school day a little bit, but also as a reenrollment strategy to some of the conversation we've already had tonight of the expansion of homeschool enrollment or alternative enrollment outside of our traditional schools during COVID times. We are at the point where ESSER funds have expired and we are looking at at the time we had called it D11 programming where it was $11 per child per week for the last couple years. Um and schools were still providing their own care after school. I'll show you a slide in a moment about why we've moved away from that. But these schools that you see on the screen will be eligible for subsidized care. Meaning if you at a full pay school site, it's about $80 a week. Depending on the provider, it ranges between $80 and $100
317a week for afterchool care. But at the select sites you see to the right side on this slide, it will be $25 per week per student because we will be subsidizing the cost of afterchool care. That's because we know access to rich afterchool programming can make a difference in students lives. We've talked a lot about the million-dollar investment that we made mid year this year where we expanded opportunities to tutoring for many students in our school buildings. And you'll see as we tighten up what afterchool care looks like in our schools. It is that opportunity for play after school, but also to make sure that there's academic opportunities to get that reading, that math homework, that fact practice, things like that done before some of our students get home at the end of the day.
318We work with several partners to provide afterchool care in D11. You'll see their logos on this page. Leading Edge is one of the partners that has more sites expanding right now, but we have expanded with other um providers too like Adventure Clubs added an additional site this year as well. You can see each elementary school listed here and what their pay structure is along with who their provider is for afterchool care. Here's the reasons that we're shifting to programming that is provider-led rather than being in districtled. Number one reason is there are different rules for compliance with child care licensing. Every space we use for child care within a school building even though we can educate students in it all day has to be rellicensed by the state for a child care purpose. So it
319is better to do that with an external provider. There's also a staff quality measurement tool we can use called the youth program quality initiative. Um Lauren Mason in Dr. Jess Weise's office um is working on this piece and getting it set up with all those providers you just saw on the last slide. Um this matters because those scores can help us go for grant funding in this space as well and continue to find ways to subsidize this programming for afterchool for parents especially working families who need a safe space. Sometimes it's not easy to pick a kid up at 2:30 or 2:45 in the afternoon when you're working a job that goes much longer than that. Um, student perception is also a piece that we can do with an assessment tool for out of school
320time to make sure that it's quality programming, preparing kids for their futures and giving them um access to additional programming that they may not have otherwise access to. So, some of our providers will also bring in STEM programming after school to work with robotics or there may be partnerships where we bring in um karate or different programs like that. And then all of our um provider-led programming will also have academic alignment. So, um, Lauren Mason will ensure as she's working with our providers that they are providing opportunities for to continue to happen after school, homework, help, tutoring time, reading, pieces like that that make sure that our students are getting the time again for play, but also for additional AC academic investment while they're still in care after school. on the fees sheet then to
321um area superintendent callback's point you will see um there is a increase in the cost for this from last year it is going from $11 per child per week up to sorry I'm going the wrong way in my slides $25 per child per week um in this subsidized programming it is not required it is of optin optional fee if families select programming at these schools they are very well attended. We've had the programming at at many of them already um provided through Leading Edge. Now we're just adding additional and changing that out-ofpocket cost from $11 per week to $25 per week to make it sustainable. Uh Chief Omar, can you summarize for the new board members kind of the evolution of afterchool care and previous board's attempts to hire full-time staff to provide that? Absolutely.
322So we were using internal staff when it was D11 programming funded by ESSER and we had a lot of gaps. The board heard about that routinely. Um when schools would come forward and do spotlight presentations or or other things like that, it was difficult to staff. The good news there is some of the staffing has stayed consistent and many of those staff members when we moved to an external provider now just get hired with the external provider and they get paid a little bit more and they have better benefits through that provider. So, usually it's a win-win. Um, staff that's typically taking those roles are those that are doing part-time work in D11, such as they may be a crossing guard and they may have um lunch or cafeteria or recess duties and then they're
323looking for an afterchool component as well to kind of fulfill their whole day. Um, additionally, when it was D11 programming with SR funding, one of the main um, drives there was for enrollment. And you can see with the tightening of what of using outside providers. Yes, we want to provide longer uh, access to our school buildings during the day for families that need it, but it's not only an enrollment strategy, it's really an enrichment strategy for our students to ensure that they're getting rich academic programming as well. Okay. Uh, with that, I'll open it up to the board for questions. Uh, before I do, I would just like to remind the board if we go past 11, someone needs to make a motion to do that. So, I I would ask that you keep kind
324of questions for the next uh agenda items concise, and if it if it can be answered in an email or a meeting, maybe consider doing it that way. Director Jorgensson, real quickly, as you shift from schoolled to provider and we offload that responsibility and hiring and all that, they're still using our facilities. Is there a rent? Are they going to rent from us then? There are. Yes, there's rental agreements for every provider. So, I figured Thank you. Okay. Um I don't know if people are holding their questions because of the thing I just said or if you just don't have any. Oh, there we go. Director Mal Pakim. Well, um thank you for making this really concise. I think the initial I was on the board at that time when we introduced this um uh
325after school program. The intent was to attract enrollment in neighboring surrounding it was in uh schools that were in adjacent to district boundaries with other adjacent schools. So after having this program for several years is there any feedback that you can provide? Was that successful in attracting students into the school? I would say anecdotally it's always successful in making sure that parents have options to not have to pick up at 2:30 because sometimes if they don't have transportation from that point home, they have to make a different school choice. But we didn't see a lot of saying that's the reason I'm selecting the school. But it was another maybe tick in that tally chart of why you would go there. Right. And this $25 charge has been communicated to parents or is it going to
326It will be it will be after the board correct approved. Thank you. That's all I had. Okay. Uh I'm going to ask this for all four non-action items. Uh is there any appetite for putting this one on the consent agenda? So, show of thumbs. Thumbs mean you are comfortable putting it on the consent agenda. And Michelle, there's a thumb emoji. You can click on the online thing or you can just unmute yourself and say, "I support that." I cannot find the emoji. I support that. Okay. Uh I'm seeing four. So, it's late. Hey Melissa, can you refresh my memory? Four is required to put it on the consent agenda or what are the rules for that? Okay. Um, regardless of Okay. So, let's let's do it like this then. If if we get a majority
327of thumbs, I'm going to put it on the consent agenda item. If you specifically object to that, shoot me an email and then I will pull it from the consentage item consent agenda. Okay, so four thumbs for this one. Let's move on to the next uh non-action item. Uh this is regarding a name change for the current approved district innovation zone. Superintendent Gaul, what information do you have for us? Chief Utmer and uh Director Gorsch, please. We alluded to this earlier. It's just out of sequence as a non- action item. Go ahead. So, this is pretty much explained in the agenda, but when you approve an innovation zone, um you can have a group of schools fall under that. That typically happens if they're located in a geographical area and you want them to be
328in a zone or if they have consistent programming. We want to rename the innovation zone. This does not change anything about CSST, but lifts the name up above so that other schools could go under this zone. We know that there's a potential proposal coming to you in the fall for an innovative high school healthcare connected that we just spoke about. It has similar characteristics to CSST in that it's a three-part partnership between K12 higher education and industry partners. Therefore, under the same zone, CSST and that school, if you decide to approve it, again, it will all come to you for approval could be under the same umbrella. So, we're proposing a name change in order to have the zone not carry the same name as one school that would be within it. Want to add
329anything? Yeah. And the name proposed is the uh D11 innovation collective. The idea being a collective is a group that's uh moving towards a common purpose together. So, that's why we had come up with that name. Questions from the board. I just want to add one real quick process thing. If or when the board approves this, the next thing that will happen is Nathan and I will send a notice to the state of the innovation zone name change and we have been in communication with them. All they need from you to change that is a resolution saying you agree to a name change. It won't change anything material. Okay. Very good. Um, yep. Uh, I'll ask it again for this one. Is there any appetite for adding this item to the consent agenda? All right.
330I'm only seeing one. Is it possible to Oh, well, it's non right now. Tonight is non- action. So, if you move it to consent, that's fine for the next meeting. Yeah. Okay. Any appetite for moving to consent? Okay, I am once again seeing four. Uh, so just as with the last item, I'll build this on the consent agenda item. I'll build this as a consent agenda item. If any board director has a specific objection, let me know and I will build it differently. Non-action item number three. This pertains to our annual property insurance policy renewal. Superintendent G, what information do you have for us? I think uh HR and the legal team's coming forward. Kind sir. Hello. My name is Hank Han. I'm the risk manager for the school district and we're bringing forth a
331property insurance renewal effective 71 of 2026. I'm going to be very brief and provide some actual good news. For the first time in many years, um the property insurance renewal, although renewing at $1,134,128 represents a 3% decrease in premium. um with no change in terms of con or conditions for that insurance coverage. Um as you can see in the memo that was provided there have been some substantial increases in the property insurance over the last four to five years. Um we had a flat rate in the rate for the premium and we also had a slight decrease of 2.8% 8% in the valuation of the D11 um buildings that are covered under the policy primarily due to the sale of one building to a charter school. Um we did have the broker market this. It
332was marketed to 23 different insurers programs and markets. Um of those majority would not even provide a quote because they couldn't match the the terms and conditions or the rate. three provided um quick looks, but the rate was slightly higher and/or the terms and conditions were not nearly as favorable. Questions from the board? Okay. Any appetite for adding this to the consent agenda? All right. I'm seeing a whole bunch. Very good. Thank you so much for your time. That brings us to our last uh non-action item of the evening. This is proposed board meeting dates uh for next year. Um so this is in accordance with board policy be. Um there's a PDF uh that was prepared kind of showing the proposed board dates. Uh what you'll basically see is uh we kind of kept
333the same idea of one regular meeting at the start of the month, a work session/sp specialcial meeting uh in the middle of the month. But then as per our discussion of about the policy manual update, we've added board retreats or policy workshop sessions to the calendar deliberately. Uh, I believe we have a break in October in reference to fall break, November, Thanksgiving, uh, December for the winter holidays, and then we pick it back up in January and February. Any questions or comments from the board? Director Johnson. Yeah, I guess my question is just for the board policy work. I know we discussed it in our last work session about diving them up each per month. Would that be categorized for each month of what policies or what policy category we'll be looking at during that
334time? Yeah, I'm I'm trying to remember exactly where we came down on this, so this is a little speculative, but I think the idea was as staff start to work through the policy manual revisions, we will give the board with ample time to prepare, okay, here are the list of policies we want to talk about in August. here are the list of policies we want to talk about in September. We give that information to the board well in advance and then we have a night where there's we try very hard to put nothing else on the agenda. Just arguing about policy and so you I don't know I don't want to commit staff exactly to what the breakdown is going to look like though they're going to need the summer to work but that at
335least is the rough intention. Chief Armor do you have anything you want to add? The only thing I'd add if you go back and look at that agenda item we grouped the policies by what we think will come forward together for time sake. So, we're planning to bring you them in those same groupings. Now, we just need to figure out which meeting will be which policy groups. Uh, I will ask one final time. Is there appetite for adding this to the consent agenda? I'm once again seeing a whole bunch of thumbs. We will build this uh on the consent agenda item for as a consent agenda item for next time. We're almost done, team. All right. Next on the list is future agenda items. Uh board members, are there requests for new agenda items? Director
336Jorgensson. Uh we had looked at during initial budget talks in February the board budget for CASBY's membership. Um, since our next meetings will be focused on budget, I wanted to make sure that maybe you got that back on your radar for um just putting on your radar really. So I I will I will be honest. I had completely forgotten about that discussion earlier. So noted we can we can definitely book time for that conversation. Thank you. Any other future agenda items? Um I'll I will just kind of mention one thing that there are two kind of large items uh not related to budget that we have to cover before we part ways for the summer. One of them is potentially a vote on a bond. Um there is I believe still some polling that we
337are waiting uh before we kind of put that on the agenda for certain. Um and then the second is the superintendent evaluation and goal setting for the upcoming year. Um my intention right now is to put those in a work session uh special meeting in midJune. I'm not 100% on that yet, but that's the current intention. Um so what I could use from you is assuming that we decide that's the direction we want to go. Would you please reach out to me in an email and let me know if June 17 or June 24 would be more preferable to you for handling those two items? And I don't know for sure that I'll end up doing either of those things. Um, but that's at least kind of one thing I'm thinking about in agenda setting.
338So, just let me know which of those dates uh would work better for you. Uh, and then the final thing I'll just mention just to kind of close the loop on something for much earlier. Um, there was some concern about commentary related to uh procurement and kind of the RFPs that we ran for legal assistance. I will I will look into some of those legal questions and if I discover anything where we have to kind of adjust the way we're talking about stuff, I will push an email out to the entire board just for kind of transparency. Um so I'll let you know what I find. Uh any other requests? Director Malpek. So just for clarity sake, in June you talked about June 17th and June 24th as the two possible dates. Is there something
339scheduled already on the books for June 10th? Why we cannot have this? The earlier that we complete the evaluation, I'm assuming June 3rd is going to be a board meeting. June 3rd is a regular meeting. This was going to come in calendar review. Wednesday, May 13th is a work session, special meeting. Uh Wednesday, June 3rd is a regular board meeting. I don't recall off the top of my head why June 10 was not something I considered. I I think when you discussed it with me, it was keeping the two week cycle of one week on, one week off, one week on. Uh there's no restriction to go to the 10th if the board wants to be done with board business. Um we're ready to make a recommendation to the board um on the bond based
340upon the last poll. Um and I'm certainly open to my evaluation happening at any time by the board. So those two items could just as easily happen on the 10th. When we looked at the calendar, it's normally first Wednesday is the board meeting, then a week off, and then the next Wednesday was normally the work session. Um, so that was why it was scheduled that way. Yeah. Well, um, a lot of times all of us make plans for the summer. So the earlier that we can adjourn for the summer, it would be better than having to push it to the 17th or the 24th. So the 10th is an option, um, at least for the superintendent's evaluation. I'm not sure when the bond conversation if that's going to come the final vote is going to
341come in June or if we are going to wait till early August to consolidate that. Yeah, I think our recommendation is that we would build a work session with a special meeting on the back such that the board could understand the work session and then be able to get to a space where they were ready to go. time is a ticking as uh as some would say and um there's still plenty of communication gaps between the direction of the board and the community at times. So um we uh will support uh any of those Wednesdays and Junes uh via the board board's direction. So 10 17 or 24 let me know if you have strong preferences and I'll let you know um as we kind of have our agenda sending conversations me and Vice President
342Hafley. Uh, so just to wrap up, like I said, board calendar review. May 13th, we have a work session and special meeting. June 3rd is a regular board meeting, and we will likely have one last meeting to close everything out. Uh, with that, we will adjourn this meeting at 10:27. Thanks for sticking with it, everyone. Get out of here. Get some sleep. Good night, Thomas. I actually I won't be here the 17th. Okay, just send me an email to remind me my brain is not working.