001Mhm. >> Mhm. >> All right. We are going to call our meeting to order. Thank you for joining. This is a very vibrant room today. This is great. Um if you may, please mute your cell phones as we begin the meeting. Today is Tuesday, May 12th, 2026. The meeting is now called to order at 6:12 p.m. Thank you for being patient. For those attending this meeting in person, live captions are available on a TV in the board room and in the lobby. To access the live captions in a language other than English on your own device, please scan the QR code on the screen or on the table near the entrance and select the language of your choice. The live stream of this meeting is also available in English and Spanish on YouTube. For links
002to these live streams, please visit the Board of Education page of the PSD website or PSDTV on demand on YouTube. Uh please Next, we're going to say the Pledge of Allegiance. Please join me. Thank you. All right. Uh next up, we have the approval of agenda. Would any board members like to make any changes to our agenda? Yes, please. I move that the board amend the agenda to remove item 11.2, board consideration of revisions to 20 student policies that are being a first reading, and place it on the May 26, 2026 agenda. Can I get a second? Thank you, Carla. Um Jill, can you please call the vote? Carla Blaze. I. Connor Duffy. I. Kevin Havelda. I. Scott Showalter. I. Dr. Andrew Spain. I. Jessica Zamora. I. Dr. Karinda Ziegler. >> I. Motion passes 7-0.
003All right. And just quickly, uh for anyone's awareness, we're moving these primarily so that we could really focus our attention for this board packet. We have a very important uh it's very important things we're discussing tonight, and so these will show up. Uh we're just postponing them for our capacity. Uh next we have our recognitions and reports. Brian, I believe we have some guests. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. Tonight we look forward to celebrating student excellence in both music and science, as well as staff excellence in multiple areas. Leading our celebration is John Cope, our executive director of communications. Welcome, John. Good evening, President Zamora, Superintendent Kingsley, board of directors, and everyone joining us tonight. We have a lot of extraordinary people and schools to celebrate this evening, so let's get right to it. We're
004starting tonight with Trudy Trim Bath and Rachel Buckheit, who have been recognized with the Community Partnership Award for the work they do connecting our schools with a broader Fort Collins community. Fire Marshall Sean McGaffin and Kevin Sullivan from Poudre Fire Authority are here to tell us more. >> [applause] [applause] >> Thank you. Again, my name is Sean McGaffin. I'm the fire marshal with Poudre Fire Authority here in Fort Collins. Uh inside our jurisdiction, we have over 8,000 businesses that we work with. Uh make sure the fire code's adopted, maintained, and and everything throughout the entire organization. Of all those businesses, uh Poudre School District is one of our biggest and one of the easiest to work with. So, based on that and the fact that life safety means as much to them as it does
005to us, we want to recognize some of the main players in that. And to do so, I've brought Kevin along with me, who works daily with these individuals. Thanks, Chief. Uh my name's Kevin Sullivan, assistant fire marshal. I have the privilege of leading our fire inspection services team and working very closely with the Poudre School District. Um it's the educator who works to foster the love of learning, not limited to mastering the exam or the grade, but rather so the student benefits throughout their life. The journey we we refer to as fire prevention and community risk reduction is no different. We aim to facilitate an appreciation of life safety beyond the fire inspection, beyond what is fire code compliant in the moment, but for the purpose of lasting community risk reduction at the community level.
006We know that this can only be accomplished through relationships based upon trust and collaboration. Where this happens not only through our words, but through our actions. We thank the Poudre School District team, and specifically Trudy Trim Bath, assistant director of facilities, and Rachel Buechheit, energy and sustainability technician, for their commitment to a partnership with the Poudre Fire Authority. As such, we would like to present the Poudre School District team with our 2025-2026 Professional Partnership Award. Thank you, and we look forward to being lifelong learners of life safety together. Thank you. >> [applause] [applause] >> WOULD YOU LIKE TO GET A PHOTO? WE'RE GOING TO TAKE WE'RE GOING TO TAKE PHOTOS AFTERWARDS. OH, I think we have a plenty trying to take a photo right now. And we'll also take another photo later with everyone. No,
007we can do both. Thank you. Congratulations to Trudy and Rachel, and thank you again to the Poudre Fire Fire Authority. Our next recognition, yeah, you can clap. >> [applause] >> Our next recognition is for the CMA CMEA award winners. CMEA stands for Colorado Music Educators Association, and these awards represent the highest level of recognition for music programs in the state. Here to share more about this is Melissa Flail. >> [applause] >> Thank you, Superintendent Kingsley, Board of Directors cabinet, and all of our community. We know you support our music programs in many, many ways, and we couldn't do this without you. Um if I could ask for our CMEA teachers, students, administrators who would like to come up, um we're going to recognize the CMEA um performing ensembles. And I do want to give a
008quick thank you to our communications team, and especially Mariah Wenzel, who helped create this beautiful program. And board members and cabinet, you should have that. If you get a chance to glance at the back, in addition to our performing ensembles, we had a number of um teachers who gave clinics and sessions during the conference, too. So, just our excellence of our our staff is really being shown off in really everything that they're doing. So, um Colorado Music Educators Association has a clinic conference once a year. Uh schools send in recordings in the spring, and then if they are selected as one of the top performing groups in Colorado, they're able to go and perform. And so, we are recognizing actually four performing groups, but with our music teachers being always performing and working with their
009students, we don't have every single one represented here tonight. Um so, our first group to perform at CMEA was Voices of Core Knowledge. It was a combined choir of Kinnard Middle School, Zach Elementary School, and Trout Elementary School. And we have Lindsay Batkin representing Scott Wheeler from Kinnard. He's at a concert tonight. Um Thomas Chen, who teaches music at Trout. Alyssa Johnson, who teaches music at Zach. And then, um the Lesher groups, although they don't have representatives, we have the Lesher Jazz Band under the direction of Megan Munoz, and the Lesher Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Lonnie Obluda. And then, Johnson Elementary Husky Choir directed by Breanne Matthias and um she has a few students here today as well to receive this honor and they are August Magnuski, Harley Newman, and Tilly O'Connor. Can
010we please applaud for our CMEA representatives? [applause] Let's give a round of applause for our CMEA groups. >> [applause] >> Thank you. And along with state honors in music, we also have groups who are recognized nationally. So um there is a festival in Indianapolis every spring called Music for All National Festival. That's kind of the national level of what our CMEA groups represent. It's a really really um tough bar to meet and we had two groups from Fossil Ridge High School selected to perform there um and they traveled performed with both of those groups. They were able to support financially any students who needed to go who needed help in order to be able to go and so um we're really proud of that in that program as well. So if I could have that
011group come on up. Um so the two ensembles that performed at Music for All National Festival were the Fossil Ridge High School Wind Symphony, which is under the direction of Aaron Herman and Hannah Peterson and then also the Fossil Ridge High School Percussion Ensemble, which is under the direction of Matthew Hauser. And they've also brought some students, Carolina Morris Dutra and David DeCrasta, who also were drum majors for the state champion marching band. And also Nathan Most. So a huge accomplishment and we want to thank for all of these programs, not only the community, the leadership of the district, but also their building leadership. These principals support these programs fiscally, with scheduling considerations, with prioritizing those classes, so that the students who need to be in them can be. And that's a huge part of
012the success along with parents, students, teachers who work tireless hours. So, if we could please give a big round of applause for the Fossil Ridge High School Wind Symphony and Percussion Ensemble. >> [applause] >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Congratulations again to our music students and educators. Next, we'd like to recognize Preston Middle School for bringing home the state championship from the Colorado Science Olympiad state tournament. I'd like to invite Bill Saint to the podium to speak to Preston's accomplishments. >> [applause] >> All right, Bill was a last minute couldn't make it, so good evening members of the Board of Education and Superintendent Kingsley. On April 5th, and I'm going to have the kids come in, the Preston Middle School Science Olympiad team earned its 15th Colorado State Championship. After losing last year by 0.5
013points >> [applause] >> After losing last year by three points, they won this year by a total score of 63 points, 53 points over the second place team, a feat that doesn't happen very often. The team placed first in 13 different events and medaled in 16 of the 23 total events. Students competed in a wide variety of STEM disciplines, including engineering, chemistry, anatomy, meteorology, astronomy, and genetics. This year's team has been incredibly committed from the very beginning of the season. Most evenings, you can walk through Preston and find students building devices, taking tests, making notes, testing designs, or even helping teammates prepare for events long after the regular school day has ended. Our practices run most evenings along with a lot of Saturdays. Lately, I've gotten a lot of slack from the kids because we
014haven't had as many practices. Although, I admit that pizza and donuts may play a big part of why they like Saturday practices. Um, one of the most meaningful parts of this program is watching former Preston Science Olympiad students who are now in high school or even college come back to volunteer to coach different events. Many of them simply want to give current the current students the same experience they had when they were in middle school. I also want to thank my assistant coaches, Shamy Beecher and Joe Melcher, along with the many families, volunteers, former students, my science department coworkers, community members, and Preston admin who help support this program throughout the year. I especially want to recognize the Preston custodial crew who constantly work around the students, supplies, builds, and all the messes while still
015somehow keeping the building running smoothly for all of us. They are amazing and we couldn't do it without them. What I'm most proud of is the culture that these students have built. They have made learning competitive, collaborative, and exciting. It's pretty incredible incredible to watch middle school students volunteer spend their evenings and weekends studying science because they truly love it. These kids are going to do amazing things in the future. Our team is now preparing to represent Colorado and Poudre School District at the National Science Olympiad tournament later this month at the University of Southern California. Thank you for your continuous support of the programs that give students opportunities to challenge themselves, pursue pursue their passions, and achieve at such a high level. So, I'm very proud of these students. They did such a great
016job this year. >> [applause] [applause] >> Yeah, and the kids I made it tonight, we have Chase and Ethan and Colin and Cosette and Adeline and Adele and Valerie and Clark and Laura and Janelle. And we had a couple of kids who couldn't make this evening, but this is team is just so great and they're wonderful and I'm very proud of them. So. >> [applause] >> Congratulations again to Preston Middle School. >> [applause] >> For our final recognition of the evening, we are celebrating 14 PSD schools that earned awards from the Colorado Department of Education. The awards we are celebrating tonight include the John Irwin Schools of Excellence Award. This award is presented to schools that demonstrate exceptional academic achievement over time. Honorees exceed expectations on the academic achievement indicator of the school performance frameworks,
017reflecting outstanding performance in English language arts, math, and science. The Governor's Distinguished Improvement Award. This award honors schools that show exceptional student academic growth. These schools exceed expectations on the longitudinal academic growth indicator of the state school performance frameworks, meaning students are making consistent and meaningful progress across grades grade levels. The Centers of Excellence Award. This award recognizes schools that serve a student population with at least 5% identified 85% identified as at risk and that demonstrate the highest rates of academic growth as measured by the Colorado Growth Model. This award was established in 2009 through the education accountability act and Colorado Blue Ribbon schools. The Colorado Blue Ribbon schools designation was created by the Colorado Department of Education to recognize schools that were nominated for the national Blue Ribbon schools award, one of the most
018prestigious honors in public education, but were unable to receive the federal award after the program ended before the two 2025 cohort was formally recognized. The state wanted to ensure that work didn't go unacknowledged. Now, please join us join us in celebrating the following schools for their achievements. For the John Irwin award, we would like to recognize Bethke Elementary. >> [applause] >> Dunn Elementary. >> [applause] >> Fossil Ridge High School. >> [applause] >> Kinard Core Knowledge Middle School. >> [applause] >> Kruse Elementary. >> [applause] >> McGraw Elementary. >> [applause] >> Shepardson Elementary. Tavelli Elementary. >> [applause] >> Trout Core Knowledge Elementary. Werner Elementary. >> [applause] >> and Zack Elementary. >> [applause] >> For the Governor's Distinguished Improvement Award, we recognize Laurel Elementary >> [applause] >> and Riffenburgh Elementary. >> [applause] >> We recognize Putnam Elementary for
019earning the Centers of Excellence Award. >> [applause] [applause] >> And finally, we'd like to congratulate McGraw Elementary for becoming a Colorado Blue Ribbon School after being nominated >> [applause] >> after being nominated for the National Blue Ribbon Schools Award in category two, Exemplary Achievement Gap Closing Schools. Congratulations to all of our amazing schools and their accomplishments. >> [applause] [applause] >> At this time, I'd like to invite our honorees, board directors, and Superintendent Kingsley to the front for a group photo. Can all of our fearless principals join us in the front? We're going to take like a couple photos with each of the respective groups, and since you're standing, we'll start with you if that's okay. So, if you come on up to the front of the dais, that'd be wonderful. Congratulations to all of you.
020>> [applause] >> All right. >> [applause] >> Can we bring the Preston Science Olympiad winners up to the front of the room? >> [applause] >> All right, everybody ready? Put your camera in the middle. Awesome. Congratulations to all of you. >> [applause] >> For Can we ask please all of our CMEA winners, and those that are acknowledged for their incredible music talent, to come up to the front of the dais, please. >> [applause] >> Can our friends from PFA, and those that are staff members that were recognized tonight, come on up to the dais, please. Excuse me. >> [applause] >> All right. We will keep moving along with our agenda. Next we have our action item. So first up we have a resolution support of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander American Heritage Month.
021Can I get a motion? I move that the board approve the resolution in support of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month for May 2026. Sorry. Thank you Karanda. Can I get a second? Thank you Andrew. And I believe we have guests. Yes, joining us this evening to introduce the students who will speak to this resolution is Abby Himel proud principal at Dunn Elementary School. Welcome Abby. >> [applause] >> All right. So good evening members of the school board superintendent Kingsley staff and community members who are here. Tonight is my honor to introduce a very special student from Dunn Elementary School third grader Mu Hai Chao as we recognize Asian American Pacific Islander and Native Hawaiian Heritage Month. Mu Hai is here to share reflections and experiences that help us celebrate the rich
022cultures history and contributions that he brings to our community at Dunn. Mu Hai is a thoughtful kind and courageous student leader and we are very proud to have him representing Dunn Elementary. Please join me in warmly welcoming Mu Hai. Good afternoon. My name is Mu Hai and I am a fourth grader at Dunn Elementary. I'm so honored to be here to share here with you my culture. I was born in China and I moved to the United States with my family when I was five for better education. I have always been proud of my Chinese culture growing up. Every year me and my family celebrate a lot of Chinese traditions like the Spring Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival. Spring Festival is also called Chinese New Year as well as Lunar New Year. It follows the traditional
023Chinese Lunar Solar Lunar Solar calendar which depends on both the Sun and the Moon. Spring Festival is the start of the traditional Chinese New Year. We celebrate with family reunions dumplings and red envelopes. The Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated in the fall when families gather together under the full moon and share mooncakes, appreciating what family means to us. These traditions keep me connected to my roots and remind me that culture is a gift. As an Asian student, I feel like I belong at Dana Elementary because I am lucky to be in this inclusive, welcoming, and supportive community. I make wonderful friends and I receive good guidance from teachers. Every Asian American, Pacific Islander, and Native Hawaiian, your story matters, your culture is a gift, and you belong here. Thank you for so much for providing me
024this opportunity to speak for Asian American, Pacific Islander, and Native Hawaiian Heritage Month. >> [applause] >> I'd love for you to look at your principal's face and just see how proud she is of you. >> [laughter] >> It's amazing. I love that you shared that your culture is a gift because I wholeheartedly agree agree and I think it's great that you've given us that reminder. Thank you so much for being here. Um are there any other comments that folks would like to make? All right. We can call the vote then. Thank you. Carla Baze. I. Connor Duffy. I. Kevin Havelda. I. Scott Schoenbauer. I. Dr. Andrew Spain. I. Jessica Zamora. I. Dr. Corazon de Ziegler. I. Motion passes 7-0. >> [applause] >> Keep doing that. Uh next we have our resolution support National Teacher Appreciation
025Week. Can I get a motion? I move that the board approve a resolution in support of National Teacher Appreciation Week, May 4th through the 8th, 2026. Thank you, Carla. Can I get a second? Thank you, Kevin. Tonight we welcome Haley Alexander, Poudre Education Association Executive Board member, who will speak to the resolution. Welcome, HALEY. >> [applause] >> GOOD EVENING, BOARD OF EDUCATION, Superintendent Kingsley, and members of the community. Thank you for this resolution and the recognition of our amazing teachers in Poudre School District. I want to begin with a personal story from last week. My name is Elizabeth Kirk. This is Haley over here. I'm a teacher at PSD Global Academy, one of our district's K through 12 schools. And last week, as I was getting ready for work, I was running a little bit
026late. So, I decided to just throw my hair up in a messy bun and skip the effort of putting on any makeup. Fast forward to that afternoon. As I began my third grade music class, one of my boys raised his hand and said, "Ms. Kirk, why does it look like you haven't slept for several days?" I chuckled like you and explained that I didn't have any makeup on, so my face might look a little different than they're used to. Without skipping a beat, another girl chimed in and with sincerity said, "Ms. Kirk, I like it. It makes you look rustic." >> [snorts] >> I have to tell you I love my job. Moments like this to me smile and laugh on a daily basis. And sometimes question where they get their vocabulary from. I think
027I can speak for all teachers that each of us has our own pocket full of stories. And these stories demonstrate the humanness of our job. Teachers show up each day to teach, yes. But they also do so much more. They tie shoelaces. They open difficult milk cartons and connect the last dots on that math problem that moments ago just simply could not be solved. And so many other unseen little day-to-day things. At a deep level, teachers hold the responsibility of tending to the hearts and minds of the small humans in front of them. They are the face that studies nervous hands, that notices the quiet kid who hasn't quite found their place of belonging just yet. And that celebrates the student who finally gets it after months of struggle. These hundreds of little things may
028never make it into a data dashboard. Even though we do very much appreciate the work of Dr. Schmidt. But the truth is teachers don't just teach content. They shape character. And they shape lives. They not only deliver instruction, they help young people discover who they are and who they are becoming. And those small humans they'll grow into being big humans who will in turn shape our future. The future of Fort Collins, of Colorado, and ultimately of the world. Some of them will sit on this board someday. Perhaps some of them will lead our district as our future superintendent. And hopefully maybe just a few will even become future PSD educators who will themselves educate every child every day. As we move into the coming years, years that will require difficult decisions and thoughtful leadership, I
029ask that we prioritize and hold tightly to the heart and soul of our district, our teachers. The people who turn ordinary days into the beginnings of extraordinary futures. Thank you. >> [applause] >> Good evening. Um, I'm Haley Alexander and I'm a proud fifth grade teacher at Tavel Elementary. And Elizabeth just so eloquently described our teacher perspective in regards to this resolution, and now I have the honor of introducing two students, a current and former of mine, Lily Wright and Niva Boone. Um, I recently was able to ask my current class why Teacher Appreciation Week was meaningful to them. And one of my favorite responses was from a student who said that it was a gift to give back to the teachers who had given to them all year long. These students are going to share
030why they believe Teacher Appreciation Week matters from their perspective. Hello. My name is Lily and I'm in Mrs. Alexander's fifth grade class at Tavel Elementary. As we celebrate Teacher Appreciation Week, it has made me think how and why does someone show their appreciation towards teachers? Teachers help kids like me in academics and with their feelings, too. They also help us learn and grow from our mistakes. They don't only teach, but they inspire us too. I've been at Tavel for 6 years and it has been awesome. Even though there have been ups and downs, it has definitely been an amazing experience because of all the teachers I've had. I would just like to shout out a teacher in my life, Mrs. Alexander, who has never given up on me. So, I would just like to say
031thank you. >> [applause] >> Good Good evening, everyone. My name is Niva Boone, and I am currently a sixth-grade student at Cash La Poudre Middle School. I love school for many reasons, and one of the main reasons is because of the teachers. They do not get enough credit for everything they do to teach and have an impact on many kids' lives. Teacher Appreciation Week is one very important and meaningful way to show how much we love and appreciate our teachers. They deserve to know how much of an impact they have had on us and how thankful we are for them. Many teachers have played an important role in my life, but one teacher in particular has always been there for me, and I will forever love her for it. Miss Alexander was my fifth-grade teacher
032last year, and she was the best teacher ever. Whether she was helping me navigate friendships, math problems, or even the transition into middle school, her care for me as a person goes far beyond the classroom. It is And it is something that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. Teachers like Miss Alexander are what makes school worthwhile, and while my mom would vote for it to be moved to any month other than May, Teacher Appreciation Week is one that we look forward to celebrating every year. >> [applause] >> Would any board members like to comment? Please. If I may, cuz it wasn't up, I thought um nothing I can say be more eloquent than what the four of you just said. But I do want to read the resolution that we're
033going to vote on momentarily, cuz I think it's it's appropriate and it captures a lot of the sentiment of what you just said. Whereas teachers build the foundation of our society in every walk of life, every single successful person is where they are today thanks in part to their teachers. None of us would be where we are today if a teacher along our journey didn't first teach us how to read, how to resolve conflict, or how to think critically. Whereas teachers are really good at hiding all the work they do behind the scenes to your point. From a student's perspective, everything is magically organized and ready to go at the beginning of the day. Classrooms are decorated, name tags are laminated and carefully placed, crafts are prepared, supplies are organized, class pets are fed and
034taken care of. Seating charts are strategically arranged. Lessons are planned, tablets and laptops are charged, tests are created and modified for students with a variety of needs, essays are graded, teachers are smiling and ready to tackle the day with our students. And whereas, this one really got to me. Our community realizes and appreciates all the formative work teachers do in making sure our community is equipped to handle life's challenges and celebrate our achievements. We set aside this week for honoring teachers and recognizing the lasting contributions they make to our lives. Thank you for reading that. Please. Yeah, thank you guys so much. That was That was amazing. Elizabeth, that was really well done and uh I even wrote down the big takeaway, prioritize and hold on to the heart and soul of our school district
035and I thought that was wonderful. So, great job. Thank you all. This is really special. So, um we all need to appreciate our teachers more. Thank you. Oh, please. And speaking to your point, I'm one of those PSD graduates that ended up on this board and I I I think it it it I don't remember all my teachers, but there's absolutely some that stick out to me and I just going to read a few quick names. There was Mr. Perry and Coach Wetzel from Lesher Junior High. Uh Mr. Olander, uh Mr. Leg, Mrs. Bacon, Mrs. Kern from Fort Collins High. You might recognize some of those names as even like streets or schools. These are impactful people that have made such a difference to our community and every single one of us is here today
036because of our teachers. So, thank you. I'd be remiss if I didn't say something, but I can't say a lot cuz I'm going to start crying. Um Mrs. Alexander, you're a favorite in my home. Thank you for what you've given Jet. You're going to make us all cry. >> [laughter] >> Okay. I think her Yeah, we're all going to cry. So, I'm just going to call the vote. >> [laughter] >> Carla Base. Aye. Connor Duffy. Aye. Kevin Havelda. >> Aye. Scott Schoenbauer. Aye. Dr. Andrew Spaulding. Aye. Jessica Zamora. Aye. Dr. Caronde Ziegler. Aye. Motion passes 7-0. >> [applause] >> All right. We'll keep moving along. >> [laughter] >> Uh next we have our resolution in support of National School Nurse Day. Can someone Is someone able to read it? I move that the board approve
037the resolution in support of National School Nurse Day, May 6th, 2026. All right. And guests. Got a second. Oh, sorry. No, it's okay. Thank you, Andrew. Now I'm distracted. Thank you for the second. Now we're ready for guests. Joining us this evening to speak about National School Nurse Day are Health Services Coordinator Kim Lowe and School Nurse Barb Gomez. Welcome to you both. >> [applause] >> Thank you, members of the Board of Education, Superintendent Kingsley, our community, and our staff. As we recognize the important role of school nurses, we are especially grateful to acknowledge and celebrate the retirement of Jennifer Wright and Genie Thelman, who have served our students, families, and staff with compassion and care, helping make our schools healthier and safer. We sincerely thank them for their years of service and compassion and
038their lasting impact on our community. They couldn't be here tonight, but my next acknowledgement is an even bigger acknowledgement. I want to thank three school nurses who went way above and beyond this year to achieve their Masters of Science in Nursing with an emphasis in public health. Um one of those nurses with us tonight, and you'll hear from her shortly, Barb Gomez. Another is Heather Haycraft, and the third is Sarah Hanson. As part of their Master's level project, this group worked tirelessly on bringing more access to immunizations to our students and families in Poudre School District. For the first time in many, many years, we had five after-school, back-to-school immunization clinics with the um Health Department in Larimer County, and that resulted in many more students being able to stay in school on November 1st,
039which is exemption day. Far fewer um families signed exemptions, and families were even to able to schedule follow-up appointments with the Health Department to get their next series. So, huge shout-out to Barb, Heather, and Sarah. >> [applause] >> Good evening, everyone. My name is Barb Gomez, and I'm, excuse me, >> [clears throat] >> grateful for the opportunity to speak with you on behalf of the school nurses. Regardless of our roles, we all share a common goal, ensuring that every student is safe, supported, and given the chance to reach their full potential. I would like to take a moment to thank you for recognizing a group of professionals who are essential to our schools, our school nurses. Recent research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in January of 2005 has shown that school
040nurses play a critical role in keeping students healthy and ready to learn. Their impact has been evident for more than a century, showing that schools that have strong nursing support continue to see better attendance, improved health outcomes, and stronger academic performance. But the role of of a school nurse today goes far beyond what many people might traditionally think. Daily, they manage complex and sometimes life-threatening conditions such as diabetes, seizures, and severe allergies, while also training staff to provide appropriate care. They oversee individualized health plans, conduct screenings, support chronic conditions like asthma, and help ensure students can fully participate in school. Just as importantly, school nurses serve as a communication bridge between families, staff, and physicians, helping ensure care is coordinated and understood, often preventing emergencies and keeping students in class. For many students, they are
041the only health care professional they see regularly, making their role essential for access and equity. We recognize that strong nursing support is essential to promoting student safety, health, and academic success. To all of the school nurses, thank you for the work you do every day that so often goes unseen but never goes unnoticed by those whose lives you touch. So today we want to pause and simply say thank you for your continued support of school nurses and your commitment to prioritizing the health and well-being of every student in our schools. >> [applause] >> Okay, now I'm going to let her start crying. Um with a child with one of those chronic diseases um who was diagnosed last year. He only had to miss um about a week of school because we could trust the nurses
042and the staff at his school to make sure that he was okay and if anything his school is probably a safer place for him to be at that point because they were knowledgeable. They knew how to support him in ways that we were still learning. And so much so that at this point he's doing amazing um but he's been able to participate in everything that school has to offer because he knows he's supported, he knows he's safe. His teachers are able to support him um it our family wouldn't be what it is now. I wouldn't be able to be even here if it weren't for his school support. So thank you so much for what you do. Please extend I mean I will obviously extend it to uh the nurses who support my own child
043but I know that there is a child in every single school, many who have that similar story and there is no way that a family can ever thank them enough. So thank you so much for what you do in supporting our nurses across our district. I just want to say thank you um there's so many things, right? When we think about the health and safety of our spaces, public health, and whatnot. I think about how um you know, just as uh President Smalls speaking, supporting kids with chronic illnesses. And I often think about the other parts of your role, right? Cuz sometimes the students come see you for one thing, and it's also just a safe space for them, you know, and um you provide that support. It may be that I'm sick, but I
044need just a little bit extra care. And I think that our students get sick in a lot of different places, and I often think about the security of that space, and how it becomes like a private space. And as you said, not every student is connecting with um health professionals, and what I appreciate about school nurses is the consistency for our students um that you provide. And so, I just want to highlight that like, you know, as I think about the teachers and how there's always so much more to a role of what people perceive that role to be, and the extraordinary impact that extends beyond that. So, I want to say thank you for all the things that people see and know about, and for all the things that you hold by yourself. We
045appreciate you. Anything else? Just quickly from one healthcare provider to another, honestly, thank you. And just to know that you are recognized for what you do, because public health is often so overlooked. And it is so integral, and I don't think we've had a TV show for public health yet. When maybe that's something we can work on fixing, cuz that's where it goes often unrecognized. Retirement job. >> [laughter] >> All right. Seeing no more comments at this time. Jill, can you please call the vote? Carla Baze. Aye. Connor Duffy. Aye. Kevin Havalda. Aye. Scott Showalter. >> Aye. >> Dr. Andrew Spain. Hi. Hi. Jessica Zamora. Hi. Dr. Caranda Ziegler. Hi. Motion passes 7-0. >> [applause] [applause] >> All right. Next we have our fourth resolution, resolution support of Jewish American Heritage Month. Can I get
046a motion, please? I move that the board approve a resolution in support of Jewish American Heritage Month, May 2026. Can I get a second? Thank you, Andrew. So, with us this evening to introduce a student speaker for Jewish American Heritage Month is Bethany Hampson, vocal music teacher at Webber Middle School. Welcome, Bethany. >> [applause] >> Hi, good evening. My name is Bethany Hampson, and I teach vocal music and theater at Webber Middle School, and I'm also a proud Jewish American. I'm here to introduce the magnificent Vera Simon. Vera is an eighth-grader at Webber, and I've had the pleasure of teaching her for 2 years in musical theater. Vera is the type of student that brings joy wherever she goes. Not only is she kind and considerate of all others, she is also an extremely talented
047artist and a beautiful singer. It is an honor just to know her, let alone get to be her teacher. So, please welcome Vera Simon. >> [applause] >> Um, hi everyone. I'm Vera Simon, and I'm an eighth-grader at Webber Middle School, and I'm so glad to be here, and thank you, Ms. Hampson, for introducing me. Um, I want to thank PSD for giving me the opportunity to speak, and also for acknowledging Jewish American Heritage Month. For anyone who watches the news, you're probably aware that anti-Semitism is unfortunately on the rise, and that's why it's so nice to be included in this recognition. Because it's often the case where Jews are dismissed or an afterthought, and I think that's because people don't know who we are. We are an ethnoreligion that only has 16 million people worldwide
048and takes up 0.2% of the global population. We include people of so many different colors and countries. So, it is my hope that people can use this month to learn more about the Jewish people. Not only for students like myself, but for educators like so many of you. I would like to share a story of something that happened to me earlier this school year that shows the importance of listening and learning about Jewish people's experiences. In class, we were tasked with choosing a story a short story from five options to write a theme essay about. I chose a story that had multiple Jewish stereotypes such as occupation, first and last names, clothes, food, and more. A student named Rachel Hortensky gets bullied and ostracized for her Jewish identity. Other students in the story who preached
049inclusion and justice earlier in the story actually join in on the bullying instead. Sadly, this exclusion is very common in our world today. So, for my theme, I chose to write about anti-Semitism. I submitted a planning assignment, and the next day my teacher pulled me out of class and told me I should reconsider my theme of anti-Semitism because it couldn't be proven. My teacher didn't see these stereotypes, so she couldn't be familiar with them. To her credit, she treated it as a learning experience. I explained to her why these stereotypes what I explained to her what the stereotypes were and how I saw the theme of anti-Semitism. I'm so glad that I had a teacher that was able to learn and change her perspective. So, in closing, when a Jew tells you that they see
050anti-Semitism, we should all listen to them. It's my hope that we treat Jewish American Heritage Month as a learning experience, just as my teacher did. I'm so glad that PSD PSD had me here tonight. Thank you all. >> [applause] >> Sorry, I had to finish my note. Um thank you for being here. Uh thank you for sharing part of your story and being vulnerable to share something that I mean happened this year with you and a teacher and being brave and willing to stand behind your ideas and what your thoughts are and being willing to teach others. Cuz I think we're all Well, I don't just think, we're all imperfect. We all have things to learn. And so, I really appreciate your willingness to do that, especially in school when you're supposed to be the
051one getting the education. Um and I think one thing I had to write down and I didn't want to lose it is kind of like that last sentiment of believing the lived experiences of others. So, thank you for that reminder, cuz I think it's valuable for us to have that constantly coming back to us and reminding us that that's where we need to be. And if you're telling us that's your story, that's your story and we don't get to question it. Thank you for being here. Um are there any other comments from folks? Yeah, please. Yeah, Vera, what you said really >> [clears throat] >> hit me. There was a couple thoughts all at once. Uh the first is that I'm continually amazed by how much our students and our young people can actually teach
052us. Um and to think that we've been on this this planet decades longer than you and see it, you're still inspiring and teaching us. I really appreciate that. Um and the one thing I want to say, I want to commend you on how you handled that situation, too, and that you could have resorted to anger, you could have resorted to uh righteous indignation, which you would have been absolutely justified in feeling. But you approached it in a in a way that I think a lot of people wouldn't, and that's to teach in that moment. And I know that throughout your life it may be exhausting to constantly navigate those situations, but I would encourage you to nurture that impulse to stand up for yourself, but also to educate and to try to through empathy share
053your experience with someone so that they can learn to do better. So I want to commend you on that and nurture that instinct. Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that. And I'll echo what Kevin said, advocating for yourself, well done. That was brave, not easy to do in middle school for sure. Um just a couple things that popped out, inclusion, justice, intolerance, that tolerance, that's what we talk about every day for PSD. There's no exceptions, and I think that's important no matter your identity, your religion, your values, and I think that's something that we all need to remember. So thank you so much for sharing that story. All right. With that we'll take the vote, Joe. Carla Baize. >> [clears throat] >> Aye. Conor Duffy. Aye. Kevin Hevelda. Aye. Scott Shambauer. Aye. Dr. Andrea
054Spain. Aye. Jessica Zamora. Aye. Dr. Carinda Ziegler. Aye. Motion passes 7-0. >> [applause] >> Please, can we get a photo with all of our resolution guests? >> [laughter] [applause] >> May meetings are long, but they're amazing. It's so much celebration. Um next on our agenda, we have our superintendent's reports. This is our opportunity for our superintendent Kingsey to make remarks to the Board of Education and to the community. Thank you, President Samora. Good evening, everybody. Again, I'm just honored to be here. Having an hour worth of celebrations is just an amazing way of infusing positive energy through this room, through our hearts, and through the district. I continue to just be so honored to be the superintendent here. Uh I want to continue celebrations and just say thank you to members of the board, all
055of our employees, and employee groups who came out to the Lincoln Center last week for our fourth annual PSD Celebrates. It was an amazing event each and every year. There are more and more uh people who come out to the Lincoln Center. We are determined to fill that place uh sooner than later, but it was just full of joy. I want to congratulate all the winners, the nominees, and I want to thank you for your incredible dedication to this district, to each other, to our families, and most importantly to our students. Looking ahead to next week, this is a season of celebration. Super excited to start our graduation season. John Cope and myself over the last 2 weeks have met with seniors from every one of our high schools and to listen a little bit
056to learn more about their stories and their experiences at the respective schools to help personalize their graduation experience over the next couple of weeks. So, I'm super excited about that and really hope everybody can show show out whether it's at the Lincoln Center or at the Mobia Arena and up in Wellington they have it actually at their at their school, which is another real special thing. It'll be the second annual experience up there. Our highlight video this evening is a feature on Teacher Appreciation Week with students and teachers from Beaty Elementary School, which is going to be awesome. But, before we play the video, I just want to take a moment to recognize the incredible dedication and commitment of each of our educators each and every day. I want to thank you from the bottom
057of my heart for what you do. I hope that you enjoy this video. It represents all of our incredible teachers in this district. Ready? >> [music] >> Let's go. >> [music] [music] >> Our teachers are fantastic and I'm pretty convinced all 2,000 of them got in cahoots with our 25,000 students last week and started collaborating with Mother Nature for a snow day. Uh I was well deserved. You earned it. I I did take some hits though as a result of that decision, but uh I'm I'm really grateful for everything that they do each and every day. Uh lastly tonight, members of the board and our community and community, uh this evening the co-chairs of our comprehensive planning committee will be presenting the important work of the committee specific to identifying the criteria that will be
058considered as a conversation about school closure and consolidation at excuse me, a school closure and consolidation continues. I want to thank from the bottom of my heart all of the volunteer members of that committee for the time that they have invested in this work. I also want to thank the thousands of members of our community including staff, parents, and community members who have provided incredible feedback over the last several months to inform this work and to inform our conversation tonight. I know that it will be incredibly thoughtful uh on behalf of all of us. So, thank you all for allowing me some time and space to address our community this evening. Thank you. All right. Uh up next we have our community comment. This opportunity for public comment is for members of the community who
059registered to speak by the designated deadline. Those people will be called on to make remarks in the order that they signed up. Each speaker will be allowed 3 minutes to address the board. Um Apologies. Let me just get my paperwork in order. First up we have Derek France. Welcome. Got stuff for me today. Good evening. My mom, aunt, and grandparents were teachers. My grandfather was also a principal and superintendent, while my grandmother was a founding teacher at Poudre High. My brother is a college professor at Nebraska-Lincoln, and I am a PSD graduate and 26-year teaching veteran, a former CSU athlete and a father of six PSD students and two grandchildren. While PSD publishes spotlights boasting about teacher retention, this district is in procedures to terminate a two-decade-plus teaching veteran, a double standard. In July 2025,
060the superintendent was quoted, "Every decision we make is guided by our top priority, the safety and well-being of our children, and we hold all PSD staff in high regard." But when our son was injured in a school activity on April 23rd, 2025, that so-called top priority was extinguished. Policy AC mandates an an environment of dignity and respect. Yet the current actions of the superintendent and district council are a coordinated tactic to shield themselves from the truth. PSD and district council are using disciplinary pretext to remove a local family of four generations. By your own definition in policy AC, retaliation includes intimidating an individual for raising a good faith concern. This policy and regulation AC-R2 mandates supportive measures to preserve employment. Instead, she has been met with selective enforcement and procedural violations by the cabinet and
061district council, ignoring the very regulations designed to protect employees from institutional bullying. While taxpayers absorb riff and closures, the central office continues to expand. In 48 months, the district paid over $200,000 to lobbyists. Yet, my April 24th, 2026 CORA request was met with a $2,145 bill and a 13-week burial. On April 22nd, 2026, the superintendent boasted of a 20 25% teacher pay increase. While his own raise While his own raise was the same 25% trajectory and pushed his base pay, not including benefits, north of 350,000. When asked if he refused that raise, he replied, "No, I did not." and chuckled. It's not funny. I'm demanding board oversight and an immediate independent investigation into the decisions of the superintendent, his cabinet, and district council. Board, you have voted unanimously to approve this leadership at every turn,
062but do not rubber stamp the destruction of a family tonight. Direct the superintendent to align with EL 2.1 and 2.2. Cease this pursuit of termination and return the fiscal resources to teachers and counselors in the students' classrooms. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Next, we have Jeff Meade. Welcome. Okay, hello everyone. My name is Jeff Meade. I'm a global educator speaking tonight on behalf of PFLAG Fort Collins on the power of modeling acceptance. As I looked around the room tonight, I noticed that everyone looked different. Different hair, ages, heights, skin color, genders. As humans, we value our own uniqueness, and it's most noticeable when we are with others. we want to be accepted and valued. The variety of people even just in this room tonight suggests there is no norm that we should be trying
063to achieve. How can there be a normal when we are all so unique? I've taught middle and high school English and social studies for 11 years, mostly overseas in international schools across Africa, and I've seen those differences on a global scale. My students came from all over the world with different skin colors, ethnic and racial backgrounds, religious beliefs, uh languages, accents, and belief systems. What made teaching and learning uh in international schools so impactful is that the differences were all around me all the time. Much like the variety I saw in this room tonight, there was no normal. We need to bring gender identity into this conversation as well. As a teacher of middle school, I see the natural course of human development over the over the a several uh several period of years. Middle
064school is when all the change happens. Brain chemistry affects intellectual development, puberty changes the body's physical development, emotional development starts to generate romantic interests that grow and develop as young people become adults. Global travel demonstrated how scary it can be for young people to grow into themselves. In many of the countries I've taught in, members of the LGBTQ community who expressed themselves openly could be disappeared. I've seen firsthand the importance then of creating safe spaces where young people can explore who they are and who they are becoming. A teacher isn't just academic. They create the norms and expectations within their classrooms. They are both teachers of content, but also leaders of acceptance. And as we've mentioned several times tonight, we're also the promoters of justice and tolerance. So, a teacher then is a role model
065that not only supports teens exploring the people they are becoming, but also demonstrates to all students how to accept and value themselves as individuals and the people around them. Thank you. Next up we have Tom Griggs. Welcome. Good evening, district directors, Superintendent Kingsley, and PSD community members. Let me just say at the start of this comment that I commend and deeply appreciate the board's efforts over the last several months to address the looming question of the district's budget crunch and the specter of school closures and consolidation. The outreach to so many different sectors of the PSD community has been exemplary under the circumstances. So, if we are now clear that the budget cuts for 2026-27 need to be somewhere under 2% of the budget, I strongly urge you to avoid school closures and consolidation at
066the present time. There's just too high a risk of doing the wrong thing with respect to this issue at this point. What if the reason PSD is such a highly respected and esteemed district has to do with so much more than CMAS scores and precisely more precisely to do with the blend of schools, school sizes, curricular offerings, and extraordinary staff efforts that are currently in place? What if the state demographer's numbers don't reflect the unique characteristics of our community, either in terms of the population growth anticipated by the city and county, projected and actual real estate development, and our often stated but not always realized efforts to provide equitable access to all of our kids and their families? Put another way, how strong in actuality is our commitment to improving our efforts to meet the
067needs of every child every day? Echoing my own thoughts about all this at the April 14th meeting uh of the Poudre School District the the community outreach efforts, I heard the term radical transparency used to describe what is called uh what is called for from one of you at the board's recent community engagement session on April 18th at Fossil Ridge High School. For example, why aren't teachers and other school-based staff themselves, not just principals, being asked what they think needs to be done to address the budget crunch? Why does it seem that the contradictions between Flow Analytics 2023 projections for declining enrollment and its very own acknowledgement of considerable student population growth in the PSD area in the very same report continue to be ignored? Why is there virtually no representation of the very schools
068that were recommended for closure and consolidation two and a half years ago on the district's comprehensive planning committee? School closures and consolidations still feel far too rushed to be resolved well at this point. There are so many other ways to address this year's current budget shortfall. Although it might not be the best place to make the necessary cuts right now, retirements alone with no new rehires to replace most of them would take care of the 2%. We have the time to do the right thing. So, let's do it. Thank you. All right. Next up, we have Lucy Lee. >> Madam President, actually the rest of our list has either chosen not to speak or has not joined us tonight. Oh, thank you very much. All right. Well, then we will move along To board topics
069and committee reports. Uh this agenda item is an opportunity for board members to provide an update on committee work or speak to board topics. Do any board members have anything they would like to report? Please, Connor. Thank you. School finance passed uh yesterday, which is a huge relief. Like uh it was a I guess now it becomes a status quo um fire drill with with all that and some way, somehow uh they did pass it and it's there um ready to go as well as Senate Bill 135. So, those were two um major initiatives that were taken up by our local legislators and um they're they should be commended and there's still work ahead, especially on 135, but I think everybody who's been part of the budget conversations here in the last 2 months understand
070the importance of it. Finally, I think is there a sigh of relief? Um are there other committee updates and reports? Yeah, please. Um last night was the last meeting of our district advisory board group and um it was a good I had a lot of good discussions. Uh just wanted to highlight that uh they'll be still as part of the consolidation process wanting to reach out to different school communities and community members. So, um so, DAB members are going to continue to do that. Um really trying to center around um an idea of uh understanding what folks believe all schools all students should have from their experience and can we um get deeper around that question or consideration. Uh also, they elected new officers last night, more new folks for the exact board. And I
071just also lastly want to promote that they are still looking um for adapt members for representatives and specifically I'm just going to name the schools that the elementary level bacon ice stone Johnson or Zach. They're looking for a dab map there middle school Blevins and Timnath middle high and also from early childhood or Fort Collins Montessori. So if you are interested in being a district advisory board rep or you know someone who you think might be good please share that message far and wide. I think it's a good opportunity for people to get involved in the community and since this is last year this the dates and times for that will either stay the same or look at changing. So it's a good opportunity to get in there now at the start for next year's
072session. Thanks. Thank you Chris. Not exactly a committee report but I did want to since we're on the tail end of the first [clears throat] part of the comprehensive planning committees recommendation and engagement process. I did want to express some gratitude both to district staff for helping to organize the many Board of Engagement sessions that we had. Also want to credit Brian and his leadership and others for holding those staff engagement sessions as well. Something that someone said at one of those sessions kind of has has been eating at me and so I'll I'll I'll share that question now which is you know some of the some of the sessions there were 30 or 40 folks that showed up others had a lot smaller numbers and so the question became how are you as a
073board going to hear all the voices in our community with all their thoughts and all their values that they want to bring to the table especially those that are unexpressed. And that's really been eating at me. I also want to credit Carla for her efforts too and doing additional outreach to our communities that may not have been able to come to those those engagement sessions. Um I don't have an answer for that sitting here tonight. Um I've been thinking about it for quite some time. Um I I do think though that even though I don't have all the answers, we don't have any answers, I think I believe that we're starting to ask the right questions. And the one of the appropriate questions is how are we going to be better at getting more engagement,
074getting more voices amplified into this process. Um I've looked forward to the conversation we're going to have tonight around the criteria for the first read. Um at least my own reaction to some of that was I I I saw a lot of traces of some of the conversations and the voices that I'd heard in those rooms and our email inboxes and from other places are now living in a document that will outlast this board. And so I think there's a tremendous amount of progress at least in that endeavor to try to include our community uh in this process. So I just want to express gratitude to those who showed up, continue to show up, and will continue to show up throughout. I wanted to I forgot to say this. That one one of the things
075that came up last night, I just wanted to share everybody, is they talked about what's going to happen in terms of the low over the summer, um and what we might do to support the community members. So right like tonight we'll hear information from the comprehensive planning committee. Then you know at certain point we don't have board meetings. So there's a concern of what will take place. Is that deep? Um what will take place over the summer? And so there's a fear that we'll hear this tonight and then all these decisions will be made over the summer and the community's going to respond. So there was a request of how can we communicate almost like a a a time stamp? Like here's where we are here and then further decisions or whatever will take place
076at this date. Just so folks can um be calm this summer and focus on themselves. Um and also to address that specific of um, decisions are going to be made without voices even though we've had all that impact. So, however we might do that, I think it'd be good to put some timestamps in place and say, "Here's where we're holding and stopping, and here's where input and considerations will continue." Okay, please. Um, I just wanted to bring up uh, stack. Uh, we had our last meeting last night. Jess, you could probably speak better than I cuz I showed up literally in the last 5 minutes. Uh, I was running behind, so I apologize for that, but we did recognize our seniors and had nice celebration. Really want to commend Assistant Superintendent Olsen on her leadership.
077She took over from Dwayne um, and has really uh, fostered a great environment of of letting uh, the students really take the lead. We have one of our members here sitting next to In Soon, and um, he's going to be a great leader. So, I'm very impressed with this group and and looking forward to what we're going to see in the future come out of it as it advances. I I learned last night that the first stack meeting consistently only had about three students, and now we're rounding that out uh, to quite a quite a few. Just added seven new members and and from schools that hadn't been represented before. So, very impressive group and great future. Yeah, it's taken a number of years, and I think again with cabinet leadership really hone in on
078what do we want to get out of this so that students' voices became something. They had amazing ideas, but we just didn't know where to go with them, and so we really needed that leadership to help it take form. Um, but as usual last night they they argued over cake a bit cuz that was fun, and how to cut it. There's an appropriate way and a wrong way. Um, but they also voted in their their next officers, and it was a lovely celebration, so. Um, are there any other updates? Yeah, please Carla. I just want to comment on what Kevin brought up um about communication and and what's happening in um and just as having wrapped the uh our listening sessions. I think that I just want to comment on something a big takeaway that
079I uh have found and I think that it will open more doors to communication and that was a lot of people have mentioned to us that they would like shorter snippets, like deeper sound bites of what is happening and what we're doing to feel like they're more engaged. Um I just wanted to to mention that cuz I heard it a lot. Um yeah, instead of like a a very long email, some bullet points outlining um the activities that are happening so that they feel like they can comment back. I don't suppose that came with suggestions on how to get those things to them. I um I I think that people are looking for email. Okay. Um and you know, this all comes with the idea of the dashboard and having access to um just very
080concise and brief Yeah. information. Totally. Did you have No. Okay. Share the other thought. Let's do it. I just also wanted to recognize something I've noticed this year um our communications team and how they've done an excellent job of highlighting all of our schools across the district. Um I really appreciate it the intentionality whether we've you know, used ads or highlighted pictures and events and stuff. Um I think it's good to give a good representation of the different schools in our district and that's something that I've just been noticing pop up in my Facebook and it's given me an opportunity to learn about the different schools and and if you all don't, I suggest that you all follow our Poudre School District Facebook page because you learn a lot about what's happening in the district
081and especially about our different schools and I think that's important at this present moment. So, thanks. Oh, and Insta. So, follow all social media accounts for Poudre School District. You'll learn about all of our fabulous schools, all of our happenings and most importantly you'll just feel better about your day. Thanks, John. I'd like to get a data point after tonight's meeting how many new followers any of those accounts got. I think that would be valid for all of us. >> you, John. >> [laughter] >> Are there any other updates or reports? I mean, that's a great note to end on. >> [laughter] >> Insta. All right. Um, we'll move along then. Next we have our consent agenda. Would any board members like to pull an item from consent? Okay, seeing none, can I get a
082motion? Thank you. Move that the board approve and adopt the recommended action items uh, recommended actions for the items on the consent agenda. Can I get a second? Thank you, Carla. Angela, can you call the vote, please? Carla Bates. Aye. Connor Duffy. Aye. Kevin Hevelda. Aye. Scott Schoenbauer. Aye. Dr. Andrew Spaulding. Aye. Jessica Zamora. Aye. Dr. Caranda Ziegler. Aye. Motion passes 7-0. All right. Awesome. Next we have up our action items. The first up we have Big Three CTE concurrent enrollment and dual enrollment program expenditures. Uh, can I get a motion? Um I move that the board approve expenditures in excess of 250,000 for programs detailed in the summary of concurrent enrollment and dual enrollment programs in PSD. Thank you. Can I get a second? Thank you, Kevin. All right, Brian. I believe we have
083a presentation. Yes, here to present the big three CTE expenditures are Tanya Alcaraz, director of post secondary workforce readiness, and Kristen Bessantini, concurrent enrollment coordinator. Welcome, team. Hello and good evening. Uh thank you uh for this opportunity tonight, Superintendent Kingsley, President Zamora, cabinet, um and our board. Also, Sauchet, our student representative. He's a junior at uh Fossil Ridge High School. We chatted a little bit before this meeting, and he gave me permission to uh share a few stories about his post secondary and workforce readiness opportunities. My name's Tanya Alcaraz, um and tonight I have with me Kristen Bessantini. She is the concurrent enrollment coordinator for Poudre School District. She's done amazing things to to grow our programs and provide more opportunities for students. Also tonight in the audience um Andy Little from Poudre High School,
084who's our IB director, is here as well just to answer questions and to show support. So, tonight we're going to take some time to provide an overview of some new legislation that's headed our way to help support our students in um obtaining more post secondary and workforce readiness outcomes prior to graduation. And then um we're going to dive a little bit deeper into the outcomes uh that our students have obtained during the 24-25 school year in our college credit concurrent enrollment AP and IB programs. So, first I want to start with the Colorado Department of Education earlier this year. They launched their strategic plan and in their strategic plan they set a goal. Their goal is that the graduating class of 2029, by the time they graduate, 100% of the high school students in the
085state of Colorado leave with one of three outcomes for post secondary and workforce readiness. So, that's our current freshman. Um this is not a new initiative. Uh we have been working on blurring the lines in high school junior and senior year to help our students not only um earn credits and graduate from high school, graduate with options and um understand what it's like to be a college student, understand what it's like to be in the workforce, and to think about their career path. And this board and our school district and Poudre School District has been all in. We've been working really hard on expanding opportunities for these big three opportunities for these big three outcomes. So, the first one we're going to do a deeper dive into tonight is post secondary and college credit. So,
086to achieve this goal, the metric now that's been defined is that before graduation students earn at least 12 college credits. I think Sachet earned 12 college credits before his sophomore year. He's taken seven AP exams this spring. Um he's also a Front Range student. He has earned Front Range credits through accounting classes, through his business classes. His plan and his goal as he's worked through his high school career is to move on into political science and major in business. So, how do we support Sachet in realizing that and and helping him understand you can do this in college, you are ready to do this and then advance in those college credits. Industry recognized credentials. So, Sachet has earned the Microsoft Office Suite certification through his intro to PC apps class. Also, Adobe and graphic design.
087And so, he has also met that mark of industry certifications. He is working on work-based learning. He's ready for an internship in between his junior and senior year in political science. Anyone out there watching, he's still looking. He's ready to intern this summer. And so, when he gets that internship cuz I know he will, he was already asking me about it. He's going to talk to Brian after. I don't know who else he can connect with. He'll have met all three outcomes. The goal I want to reiterate, the goal is that our students graduate with one, at least one of the three outcomes to support them in that transition and understanding and supporting that path and where they're going after high school. So, the new legislation that's been passed to support our students and to
088support us as a district in helping our students achieve these big three outcomes. The first one is related to accountability. So, our high schools get a report card and they are measured on outcomes. Most of the current outcomes that our high schools are measured on are um academic achievement, reading, math, science, and growth. Um there is a shift to put more weight on these big three outcomes for the high school report cards. So, these new indicators will help us better measure how are we doing in really supporting our students in our strategic plan goal of graduating with options. We know how we're doing on our graduation rate. How are we doing on the options piece for our students? It'll also elevate PWR to a core accountability metric, not a secondary one. So, what do those
089changes look like? They're not happening um next year. The timeline for this is debatable. Uh State Board of Education is still meeting defining some of these rules. Um but uh the old uh performance indicator includes counting the SAT twice. And there's no weight uh in the rubric or the school performance framework for PWR outcomes. Uh this legislation will now weight uh the big three. So, how many of our students we're we're going to every high school is going to measure measure how many get 12 college credits, how many earn a certification, um and how many participate in work-based learning before they graduate. That's new. Post-secondary progress has been measured, but it hasn't been weighted in the rubric in the past. That will now be weighted. In addition, they're going to continue to um measure our
090graduation rates and our dropout rates. Uh so, this new legislation is is going to put some more emphasis in how we look at uh what the outcomes are for our high school students um and how we prepare students. The second piece of legislation is the funding component. So, how are we going to find and support our high high in providing these opportunities for students because they're expensive. Your teachers to teach for Front Range have to get their masters in computer science. They have to have a masters in business administration to teach that accounting class. How do we support our teachers is so that they can be credentialed to teach for Front Range. The AP exams, those cost money. Um so the funding structure has shifted in the state. Um the dollar amount to PSD with
091the new change will actually be less. We will receive less funding um for the big three that that we had before. Um and they're under the old model, we had programs and now they're shifting to outcomes. So they were funding programs prior to this. They're funding the Ascent program. They're funding grants. Now they're going to shift to we're going to give you the money when the student completes the certification, completes the 12 credits, or completes the work-based learning opportunity. So a lot of our funding came from the Ascent program. We talked about that last year. It's a program that's going to be sunset. That was a expensive program to run that PSD, we were an early adopter and we were able to take advantage of that program and provide a lot of benefit for our
092students. We're still going to continue that. The impact is going to be uh great for our kids because now because of the Ascent program, we've expanded our community college credit options on our high school campus. Over the last 5 years, we have doubled the amount of college credit opportunities on our high school campus. We were able to use some of those Ascent funds to do that. So that's going to continue in Poudre School District, which feels good. Uh but we still need to figure out how we're going to continue to fund and grow the other opportunities with the reduced funding. And these are just estimates. Uh we don't know because the state of Colorado has a pot of money. And for next school year, the pot of money is $12.3 million for the entire state.
093The State Board of Education outlined uh their priorities based on how much money they're putting in each bucket. So, uh when Sacha passed that industry recognized credential, there were 673 students in PSD last year that also did that. Um and across the state when we submit those industry certs to the state, they've got a bucket of 5.1 million. So, they'll take that, divide it up, and we get a per student amount back. Last year, we got $270 back for every student that completed an industry cert. That industry cert that he took cost $90. And so, we use a lot of these funds to pay for the opportunity. The post-secondary credit bucket is the smallest. And then, work-based learning is the new bucket, and they're still figuring out the rules. What qualifies? What doesn't qualify? Um
094the State Board meets on May 14th where they're going to establish more of of what qualifies for these buckets. So, uh we can use these uh funds for certain established eligible expenses. We can use these funds to continue to support our teachers in becoming eligible to teach AP IB Front Range courses, um outreach, awareness, transportation, um course materials, textbooks, all are can be associated. Like I said, in Poudre School District, this is not new work. We have been working on this for over 10 years. Um if you want to find out more about what opportunities we have in our high schools around the big three in post secondary workforce readiness, we have a website, we have a space, PSD future ready. Under career pathways, you can see every industry certification. You can go look at
095the business pathway and see all the classes that Sachit took. Um, you can see all the courses offered for college credit. And then our partners, um, if you want to partner with PSD, you want Sachit to come out and do an intern with you, political science, click on that work based learning tab and we'll reach out and connect with you through that space. So, moving forward, we're going to have to collect data. We're going to have to work with our building leadership, our high school principals, um, and our all of our teachers and teams like I can't tell you how hard teachers work to implement these certifications, these opportunities for kids. Um, and we're putting the onus back on the student. So, I asked Sachit, where's that certification live? That industry cert. So, that you
096can use it in your job interview. He's not quite sure. Where's your resume? Um, I'm not quite sure. He told me I could tease him a little. Um, so what we're going to do is students as soon as they accomplish these big three that we added into their ICAP portfolio. Imagine what Sachit's resume looks like when he graduates high school. He gets to put Front Range and Fossil Ridge. He gets to put all these industry certs. He's on every advisory I know of in PSD. Um, and he'll have a really robust resume. That's graduate with options, right? That our students don't just get that diploma, but they've got a resume that they can take out and that helps to support them in their journey and life after high school. Um, so the other thing we're
097working on is collaborating with other districts across the state. We were selected by the Colorado Education Institute because of our leadership and work in this space to participate with seven other districts to create a data data tracker so that we can help counselors, we can help building leaders look and see where individual students are in their metrics of obtaining that 12 college credits industry cert or work-based learning. So with that, I'm going to pause before we go deeper into the college credit outcomes for a Poudre School District and see if you have any questions and if we ever want to go dig deeper into industry certs or work-based learning, we can do that at a later time or if you have questions, happy to answer those now before we move on. We might just be
098ready and anxious to hear what's next and looking forward. Fantastic. Okay. All right, Kristen. All right. So we are very fortunate. Our students have many opportunities to earn college credit in Poudre School District. Concurrent enrollment, dual enrollment, AP and IB. The difference between concurrent enrollment and dual enrollment is that concurrent enrollment has no tuition cost for our students while dual enrollment, defined by the state of Colorado, does have a reduced tuition cost. So it does cost the student a little bit of money. We have the AP courses which are those college-level courses taught in the high school. And the students need to score a qualifying score on the exam in order to earn college credit. IB is very similar to special program that is at Poudre High School and the students are taking internationally recognized
099college-level coursework there in the high school and they also need to get a qualifying score on the exam at the end of the year. So, when we dive deeper into um concurrent enrollment, we have high school select and campus select. High school select is what the majority of our students are doing. Those are the courses that are taught in the high school by the teachers that are credentialed to teach for the colleges. We primarily work with Front Range and Aims, and our teachers, like Tony was mentioning, need to have a master's in that area or a master's plus 18 in that area to be able to teach a concurrent enrollment class for that. Campus select are the classes where the teacher or sorry, the students are going to the campus or they're taking the class
100online, and we do pay for that class. So, PSD's paying tuition, books, and fees. It remains free for the student to earn college credit this way, but there is an expense for PSD of $600 to $1,000 a class. Our budget for this moving forward was set by the 2010 mill levy. It is 275,000. In the past, we have used some of that Ascent funding to help supplement this budget. That's no longer going to be an option moving forward. And so, we'll talk about a little bit more, but we've put some um boundaries into place to help us stay within that 275,000 budget. So, when we look at who's doing concurrent enrollment, and who's earning college credit in these four different buckets, we had over 4,000 unique students taking concurrent enrollment in the 2024-25 school year,
101which is really incredible. We had 9,000 completed courses, and the pass rate for those classes taught in the high school was 94%, and a pass rate for college-level class is a C or higher. We had 237 students take campus select, and that pass rate was at 86, which is actually a big jump from what it used to be once we instituted an application process. For dual enrollment, that's our CU Succeed, and that is taught at only some of our schools, but we did have 573 students participate, and they had a 98% pass rate. The students enroll with CU directly and pay the tuition directly to CU for that. CSU, we paid part of the tuition, the students paid the majority of the rest of it. We had one student that had a really hard year,
102so that pass rate was at 67%. AP, it is kind of incredible. We had almost 2,000 students take almost 6,000 tests. So, like she mentioned, Sachet's about to do seven tests or in the middle of. Um, some of our students only take one, some of our students take many. This is the number of the number of tests does not necessarily represent the number of students in those classes. Not all AP students are taking those tests. And some of our CU Succeed is run concurrently with AP, and so some of that is overlap. But, um, 82% of students did earn a qualifying score for AP. And for IB, those students are required to take the test as part of the IB program. They had 95 students took 358 tests, scoring 83%. Um, for a qualifying score
103four or higher on that test. So, when we look at our students overall, how many students did we have in the high school? How many were participating in concurrent dual AP and IB? And then we're looking at our different um, student populations. So, as you can see, we had about half of our students were enrolled in concurrent enrollment, which is really incredible. That number is higher than that 4,000 because this actually includes our Ascent and TREP students as well. And in the 24-25 school year, we were fortunate and had 250 Ascent students. Um, dual enrollment, that 573 uh, CU Succeed, AP, IB. And then as we move across, you can see our students with an IEP, we had 100 participate in concurrent enrollment. You could see we have some gaps here that we're going to
104need to work on. Our 504 numbers are actually really good. Our free and reduced lunch numbers are pretty good. Our GT is doing very well, but we do have some gaps, especially with our students on an IEP and our multi-language learners. That's that ML category. So, in general, high school select is really a great way for our students in these different subgroups to be earning and accessing the college credit opportunities. They are taught in the high school. It's got that 94% pass rate. It is free to the student. It's with, you know, fellow classmates, teachers are familiar with, so that is really a great option for students. So, the cost for PSD and students, again, high school select has zero cost. For Front Range, Aims does have a $25 per student per semester fee, and
105the students will begin paying that to Aims in the fall. And for high Sorry, high school select, there's no cost to PSD for Aims or Front Range. And then campus select is that tuition, books, and fees. So, it's $175 per credit, but it works out to be about 600 to 1,000 per class. Dual enrollment, there is no cost to PSD, but it is $77 for the student. And CSU was upwards of $500 per credit because we're only able to pay the community college rate. AP, it is $80 to $100 per exam, and IB, the students do not have a cost for the exam because it is a district program. So, there is not a tuition cost for AP, but there is that cost for IB because we are covering that test exam. So, when we
106look at how many credits students earned in the 24-25 school year and what that savings would have been if they were to take that out of college with assuming a $400 per credit rate, our students saved millions and millions of dollars. Concurrent enrollment saved alone almost $12 million. Dual enrollment 1,100, AP test scored saved almost 6 million and IB saved our students 360,000. So, it is kind of exciting to look at all the tuition our students are not having to spend while they are attending a community college or a four-year after graduation. Uh millions of dollars, so. When we go back to those four different buckets that students can earn those 12 college credits in, uh they must have a C or higher for concurrent enrollment and our partners are Front Range, Aims Community College
107of Aurora and we're going to start a partnership with Northeastern Junior College, NJC. Dual enrollment, they also must have a C or higher and our partners are CU and CSU. AP, they must have a score of three or higher and those exams will be in May. In in a AP world, if you get a five, you could potentially earn six or more credits at a college, but for the purposes of the big three, they will earn three college credits even if they get a five unless it is a specific science course, then they will get four. And IB, they do need to get that four or higher and the science classes will give them four credits, otherwise it'll be three. So, we did some data digging and it was kind of exciting to figure out
108that 42% of our 24-25 seniors did earn 12 college credits and that was by graduation. So, when we look at the whole group, it's not as high, but when we're looking at our graduating seniors, and this is only three years of data instead of the four, we had 42% earning those credits, so that was exciting. And for the big three outcomes, the data is actually going to be given to the state by the concurrent sorry, CDHE and National Student Clearinghouse. The AP exam scores are going to be given to them from College Board and IB scores are going to be given to them as well. So, we are not going to be collecting this data. The data is going to be given to the state. They will compile it and figure out who earned the
10912 college credits. But in just trying to look at how many of our students are on track to get there, 24-25 had 42% and that did not include the Ascent students. So, when we I want to give it back to Tanya to talk about ways that we can move the needle moving forward for our students earning college credit. Thanks, Kristen. Yeah, as as we're looking forward, um there there are some things we're going to be working on. So, we want to expand access to our AP programs and AP is dipping their toe into our career and technical education world. Sacha would probably take both of these classes of business and cybersecurity if they were available and they will be next year at Fossil. So, you can look into a few of those. Um and then
110at the at Poudre High School, the IB program is really exciting. They're also entering the career and technical education world and they're going to open up their IB courses and their diploma through their career related program. So, if a student is in a CTE program and they want to try out an IB class or two, they're going to have that opportunity to do that. They're also launching the bilingual diploma program at Poudre High School, which is really exciting. As far as our investment where we need to head, Kristen already touched on this. We really need to continue working on our equity lever of more college credit on the high school campus. That's where our students do the best um and and that's where they have the most success. So, investing in our teachers um to
111offer more concurrent enrollment offerings. And then also helping parent our parents and families and students find out about these opportunities. Sacha does a great job here. Like I said, he's at every district meeting. He knows all that He has a great social network, great social capital. I do think he's figured it out on his own uh for the most part. Uh but how do we help our parents and families know that your freshman year you can start earning college credit. Right? You don't have to wait. You can be a freshman in high school and you can be a freshman in college continuing that work. Uh then really course alignment across all of our courses for our college-level coursework. At some schools, you know, there's there's a few rules in place about when you can take
112this college-level course, when you can't. So, we're going to continue that alignment to open that access up um in the future. So, tonight what we're asking you to vote on essentially uh the the really the only cost we need you to approve is for campus select. So, when our students go off campus to Front Range, uh that's a cost to us. Um and so, the cost and and the amount that we're limited to is $275,000. Uh so, our MOU with Front Range uh will exceed that $250,000 limit. So, tonight uh we're asking for your approval for that agreement. And with that Any questions? >> [applause] >> Thank you. It's always exciting when you come. Good to hear all the final things. Uh does anyone have any questions or comments? This time. Yes, please. I want
113to just congratulate you two and your respective teams and school leaders across the district for normalizing excellence. When I think about what the state has done in terms of shifting their strategic plan, this was actually a presentation on our strategic plan. That's been in place about graduating with options and state policy decisions figuring out ways to incentivize more students to take advantage of that. Because of your collective leadership and our school leaders and incredible teachers, we have been at the tip of the spear of this. But I just when you think about this presentation, it feels normal. This is not normal. Those success rates are not what other districts are seeing, experiencing. Um just in the past year alone, we've increased the number of students taking AP exams in this district by 8%. Do you
114know how many more students are passing those exams? 17%. It's absolutely incredible when you think about when we put honor and dignity into all of these options and give choices and elevate our teachers to create experiences to nurture new students to come into the fold and experience success. This is to me is not just about our district and students, it's about economic mobility. We're creating opportunities that are cost-saving for families and for students. And taking you're more popular than any other student in this district right now, Sasha, but it's well deserved. It's clear that Tanya is your agent. Um [laughter] but it's we just need to continue on this effort in the fact that other districts in our state are modeling after us is a point of privilege and pride and it just it wouldn't
115happen without your leadership. So, thank you. Uh thank you. Yeah, I just want to echo that. I appreciate you saying that significance of this. I was sitting here thinking, um, you know, I've got some background on the college and right when students come in and having, you know, been advisory helping several students from all across the nation, internationally, different schools and whatnot, this is not common in terms of the level of participation of students and like what really even jumped out to me in the presentation when you spoke about the percentage of students like for their AP exam earning a three or higher in an ID for higher, like those are really awesome, um, numbers in terms of students outcome. There are students who can take these classes, but the ability to earn those scores
116and then get the college credit for it is phenomenal. And so, I just want to acknowledge that and say kudos to everyone involved in it and really great work. Yeah, I'm blown away by the, uh, the 42% number in terms of PSD students who've earned 12 credits or more. That is incredible. Um, I think if to echo, uh, Karadis's point, you know, this is not common. Um, I I think your teams, both Kristen and Tonya and and yourselves, your efforts shepherding kids through this and getting the word out that this is available is a direct correlation to those numbers. So, thank you very much for your work. Um, I did I I looked up Northeast, uh, Northeastern Junior College when you when you mentioned that, you said that's for a welding program. That's all the
117way out in Sterling. Are our kids going out to Sterling? How's that going to work? >> Yeah, yeah. So, um, we partner with lots of community colleges around the state and, um, we partner differently because of how they're governed and how their departments are governed and and how they make decisions as far as who gets to teach for concurrent enrollment or not. So, currently for our behavioral health program, those students are earning credit through the Community College of Aurora cuz they were first to get to the behavioral health pathway and cert- certificate. So, so that's why we're partnered there. Northeastern Junior College approached us. They have a really great model will they'll make adjunct welding teachers. And it was at a critical point where we were trying to decide, do we launch a welding program
118in our new advanced manufacturing space with one teacher and bus kids over to the Career Tech Center? Or now we have this option through NJC where we can offer 12 college credits for welding students in every single high school. So, we have awesome welding teachers. We have amazing facilities for welding. And so, the decision is easy when we start looking at the data. We know our pass rates are best and more kids are able to access college credit when it's on their high school campus. So, that's where we're investing and we're making data-driven decisions. So, those students will earn those credits. Those credits, if they want to go to Front Range, will transfer to Front Range. If they want to go to Aims Community College and continue their welding program, those credits will transfer there.
119Welding credits do not transfer to Colorado State University. They don't transfer to CU Boulder, right? But they do transfer really nicely in between our community college systems for students to continue in their welding pathway and their welding journey and save that tuition and get into training right out of high school. Um, is it [clears throat] Would it be possible Tony to get the total numbers of savings to students? I think you said it was roughly 12 million. Yeah, that's like Oh. Julie Chaplin has it. She She did the math. >> I do. I did the math. Ready? 19,219,390. And that's just at the average of 400 per credit. So, that's probably even could be We could round and say a good 20 million. savings to families in PSD. That's huge. That's huge. Um, and that's
120just last year. Just last year the credits earned only last year. So, a 20 million a year savings in the pockets of our families. It's pretty awesome. Pretty awesome. I'm now on your marketing team. I'm telling you. Well, I had to surf through a cacophony of data and numbers in order to get to that, but you know, You anticipated where I was going. I got to go. I'm just going to say because this is technically an action item and my mind is still not made up for the vote, but I would just like to mention to my colleagues on the board that we're being asked to expend 275,000 district funds for a return on investment of nearly 20 million to our students. It's a pretty impressive number. About 75 to 1. >> [laughter] >> I
121just want to thank you. Um, I have a junior at Poudre and she when she was entering Poudre as a freshman, we received um, lots of information on this. So, I think that you're doing an extraordinary job. Um, I think you mentioned Tanya uh, how do we get the word out? And you're doing it. I think that Poudre does an amazing job and to lean into what Brian said, um, the the expectation of excellence is it's so normalized there. And I feel like Zoe just was shepherded into um, what the her academic life that she has there. I actually texted her and congratulated her while you were talking and she has AP Lit tomorrow exam and so I'm like, you can go get them, kid. >> [laughter] >> But her AP Lit instructor at Poudre
122is incredible and she's chasing the aviation pathway and super cool, Poudre also paid for her to get her FAA drone pilot's license, which is extraordinary. So thank you again for making opening those pathways for these kids. And when her AP Lit instructor found out that she was to do aviation next year, she wasn't going to be in her class, she wrote her a postcard and it was just amazing. I just feel like y'all, everyone's going above and beyond. So that's my my big thank you and cheers. Tony, very quick. The What's driving the difference between the cost in the CU Succeed versus CSU? I see on the slide 17, yeah, it's $77 a credit to the student allocated to the student and then our home institution at CSU is $500 plus. What's driving the difference
123there? Yeah, great question. So CU Succeed, those courses are offered through their extension office through CU Boulder. And CU Denver and they that's been a partnership that's been set up for many, many years before concurrent enrollment. They were one of the pioneers of offering college credit through the the four-year college campus. The students that are choosing the five students that are choosing to go to Colorado State University are choosing to take on campus courses. So they're not through the extension. At CU Succeed, it's a PSD teacher teaching the course. So it's a Rocky Mountain High School math teacher teaching the course. So, that reduces the tuition. The $500, that is what it costs to go to Colorado State University um and attend a course in person. So, that those five students often times uh their
124parents work at CSU and they get a tuition discount. So, it's a little bit more affordable, but it's a it's a it's a reach. It's it's a really hard um opportunity for our students to Is there a wait list for the CU Succeed program? No, there's there's not a not a wait list. And like I said, it's offered at Fossil Ridge High School, it's offered at um Rocky Mountain High School and Timnath Middle High School. That's where we have CU Succeed courses. There is another piece of legislation, it's really exciting, that would allow our four-year institutions to become um eligible for concurrent enrollment, which then means there's the potential there's a road map for CU Succeed um to be tuition free, no cost to PSD, no cost to parents and families. Uh when we talk
125with CU Denver, they think that's about 9 months out. But uh if that happens, that's even more opportunity uh for our students. So, uh kudos to our legislators uh that that helped to to make that happen, to increase access to programming um in the state of Colorado. Colorado is a leader in this state as well with our legislative initiatives in concurrent enrollment. So, we got there first, though. Early adopter. I think I was one of the first concurrent enrollment teachers in 2009. >> [laughter] >> Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned that 275,000 was a limit. Correct. What does that actually mean? Is that what we're capped at based on what the I guess the is the bond funding it? Or mill levy, I'm sorry. >> Yeah, currently we only have one line item that was allocated back
126in 2010 and that's when concurrent enrollment looked really different. We didn't have a lot of high school select. Really the only way our kids could get that credit was through AP or going to the college campus. So in 2010 we allocated $275,000 to the campus select budget. That's fixed, that's flat, that has not changed and with Ascent going away that is our budget. We don't have any additional dollars right now in our budget to fund additional costs for students that want to go off campus for college credit. So that would mean all the all of our on campus stuff is funded differently. It doesn't >> Correct. doesn't require approval cuz it's under the 250K threshold. So hopefully you'll be coming back at some point saying it's been successful and now we're over that because we're
127going that much growth, right? Uh we we could spend Uh we have >> just I mean you're you're talking about expanding the programs and just wondering if if we I mean Yeah, so when we expand the program, we really want to expand the program on our high school campus. When we expand and invest off campus, there's transportation barriers. So getting to the class, there's also barriers for our students with a 504 and IEP um because they don't get the level of supports there that they would on their home high school campus. So we want to expand access to the most students to college credit. Um our recommendation is to invest in our high schools and our high school teachers um and to continue it to expand uh in that space and we're we're looking at
128our offerings to make sure you know, we're not paying for college credit at Front Range if we're offering it at at the Career Tech Center for example. We're not going to pay for a student to go to Aims for aviation when we have that aviation program here. So, we're we're just trying to realign and really streamline our offerings to ensure students have access and that we're not duplicating. The other piece of this new legislation is it's only counting guaranteed transfer course works, right? We want these courses and these credits to count. When wherever students go, we want it to count. So, they're counting guaranteed transfer and CTE programs. So, that's what we're focusing on with our 275. Is that our small schools like Centennial, Poudre Global Academy, PCA, they can't offer these things. This money
129is for those students to be able to access college programming cuz Fossil has all kinds of opportunities. So, this helps us equalize opportunity. Thank you. Yeah. Other questions or comments? I just want to make a comment on what you just said. I appreciate that thought of um of you know, both both bolstering our high schools and stuff in terms of that piece. I think conversation around this idea of consistency, coherence, and belonging and that idea for our students is a lot easier to do that when we are able to kind of have more of a closed system and address and they're part of their communities, right? In relation. Um which may not happen if they're leaving their campuses and stuff. So, I just want to affirm what you've said and really appreciate that idea. Yeah.
130I just I do want to celebrate Poudre High School. Their number of students who graduated last year with 12 college credits or more was 61%. It was that is incredi- Poudre High School has done some intentional work. They're they are they are leading the state in the high school as far as college credit I think they're like top five. So, shout out to Pooter. All right, thank you. I think we're ready for a vote. >> Okay. Feeling good. Uh, Jill, can you call the vote, please? Carla Bayes. Aye. Connor Duffy. Aye. Kevin Havelda. Aye. Scott Schoenbauer. Aye. Dr. Andrew Spain. Aye. Jessica Zamora. Aye. Dr. Coranda Zigler. Aye. Motion passes 7-0. Thank you. Thank you. >> [applause] >> All right, thank you so much for being here, um, and sharing what's coming. All right, next
131we have our Shepherdson roof abatement. Can I get a motion? I move that the board approve expenditures in excess of $250,000, authorizing staff to execute a contract for $882,125.25 with Element Environmental Services to provide construction services. Thank you, Andrew. Can I get a second? Thank you, Coranda. All right, presentation, please. Yeah, so You ready to go? Presenting the Shepherdson roof abatement item this evening is our Chief Finance Officer, Dave Montoya. Welcome, Dave. Thank you. We're pulling the slide up right now. Okay. Perfect. Thank you, Mark. Okay. Um, tonight we are here to, um, I'm actually really pleased. This is the last of our large construction contracts that are going to come before the board for the summer of '26. Um, it's been a long road. We've done a lot of work. We've done a lot
132of contracts. And this is kind of the last piece that we had in the queue. Um, so tonight what we're asking the board to consider is the, um, a contract to do some abatement work at Shepherdson Elementary. Shepherdson Elementary being built in 1978 has certain requirements the hazardous materials that were used in construction at that time that we need to take extra precautions to make sure that we're doing that safely. Um we have hired Element Environmental to do that work for us and the contract for the abatement work is $882,000. Um the work at Shepherdson is going to be a 2-year project cuz it's a pretty big project. Um it will happen in two phases. The half of it will be summer of '26 and then the other half will be summer of '27. Um
133and and really we need to make sure that we do repair this roof. It is there's water intrusion that is happening so it's time to replace this roof. And that's what we're here for tonight. So as always I want to pause and thank our voters for the debt free middle levy because without the debt free middle levy we wouldn't be having these conversations about any of these projects right now. So Thank you. Are there any questions or comments? About the roof. Please if you go for it. Hi Dave. I was just curious when you said that it's going to be done in two phases. Yeah. Does this $882,000 account for those two phases? >> It it sure does. That is the total cost across both years. Great. Okay. I really appreciate you sharing these though.
134I really appreciate that we're pulling them off our action items especially now. So thank you for giving us the rundown and if there's no other questions or comments I'll call the vote. Great. Thanks Joe. Carla Blaze. I. Connor Duffy. I. Kevin Havelda. I. Scott Schollenbarger. I. Dr. Andrew Spain. I. Jessica Zamora. I. Dr. Corrine de Ziegler. I. Motion passes 7-0. Great. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. All right, we're going to take a brief break just for a few minutes Uh since we've been sitting here for a while. And we'll come back. Do you think 5 minutes or 10 minutes? 5 minutes? 10? All right, we're going to go for 10. But you actually have to do it, guys. >> Real 10, not like a 10 that's squishy. 8:30 we are coming back. >>
135Mhm. >> Oh, we just traded. All right. Uh, we're going to move on to our informational reports and discussion items. First up, we have our comprehensive planning committee update and first reading of our policies FCB and FCBR. Brian, I believe you have some guests. Yes, thanks, President Zamora. I just uh frame our conversation here tonight. We're here for a first reading of policies FCB and FCB uh {dash} R. So, tonight is a conversation. There there is no vote. Um, so we're looking forward to having open dialogue with you as a board, as us as staff, and the comprehensive planning committee is truly seeking your alignment tonight through your questions, through your conversation, through your feedback on next steps moving forward. Uh, following tonight's conversation, in 2 weeks at our next board meeting, um, both our
136co-chairs in the comprehensive planning committee, who I'll introduce here in a second, will come back and highlight any potential adapt adaptations or changes that you, as a majority, uh uh refer to us as staff in the comprehensive planning committee to go back and revise uh for a second reading. Uh I also know Dr. Guile uh tonight will take us through the different phases in this process as many of you were articulating in your board committee updates earlier tonight. This particular milestone moment that we're in having this conversation and in 2 weeks having a vote is really coming to a conclusion of phase two of our six-phase process, which is really about just truly establishing criterion. Many of your questions that you posed earlier were fair and appropriate and will be more deeply addressed around what
137happens next, what happens in the summer, what can people expect. Uh they will have a deep dive in providing a detailed overview and a detailed overview at our next board meeting on that particular aspect of the process. I also want to share for those uh members of the community who are continuing to try to stay engaged, uh we will be sharing more robust communications with our community tomorrow. Uh there will be um highlights that are bulleted for people who just want digestible bites. There will be extended narrative for people who like to know more. And there'll even be some video uh some vignettes to help people be oriented to how to make sense of this data when it publishes on our website tomorrow, too. So, I want to thank all of the people that were
138involved, especially the members of the comprehensive planning committee. And I'd like to, you know, introduce our two co-chairs, Dr. Tracy Guile and Brett Hanson. Thank you very much for being here. Welcome. Thank you. Good evening, Superintendent Kingsley, President Zamora, um board directors, members of the community and cabinet. Um we're here tonight with an update for you. So, we were last here in January where we um gave you an update on the work of the comprehensive planning committee up until this point. Um you've asked us to come back now at this point as we've concluded and um nearing the end of phase two to both share some updates with you about our engagement processes and our conversations with the community, as well as to ask for a vote next in two weeks on a couple of
139policies that relate to school closures, consolidations, and relocations. So, I'm going to bring to introduce the co-chair, Brett Hanson. He's going to kick us off tonight. All right. Good [clears throat] evening. Uh first I want to acknowledge the contributions of all the members of the comprehensive planning committee. Uh for those who may be less aware, it's a committee that's been chartered by the board to look into our facilities usage, and it's made up of a variety of perspectives and uh groups across the district. We have parents, we have community members, we have uh representatives from all different levels of staff. We have teachers and principals, classified staff, integrated services, uh district-level staff with uh language, culture, and inclusion. And as well as financial guys, facilities uh management, whole host of expertise in the room to
140to support that. I also want to acknowledge the the board who's been in collaboration with us over the last few months. Uh what we're hoping to present tonight represents a collaboration between all the parties, including the board that was bringing in community feedback into our committee meetings, attending committee meetings, and helping to be part of those conversations. So, I also appreciate those contributions. Uh for tonight's objectives, as Dr. Gahl mentioned, we're going to give an update on the work we've been doing over the last few months. Uh in January, we essentially talked about how we need to start having a conversation with the community about the topic of consolidation. How would that process need to look? Uh how would that process unfold, and and what should people expect? And we wanted to really make sure
141that community input came in on the front end before any decisions were made. We were involving the community at the fun fundamental level to help guide our discussions in our committee meetings. And through that work, through our meetings and through our input from the community, we've developed a a series of policies that are up for review and for your vote over the next couple weeks dealing with how a school closure consolidation and or relocation process would unfold, as well as accompanying administrative guidelines to uh really specify how the concepts of equity would would come into play here. We We've heard from the community and from our other various members of our committee how high of a value that is. And so we have made some work to make that a a prominent feature of the
142policy. To give an overall timeline and that to show where we are at today and where we intend to be over the next year and a half. Uh we have a a series of steps that will lead us to eventually providing a a recommendation for how a consolidation process would unfold over the next a little while. Currently we are on phase one and phase two. And as I mentioned phase one is listen and design and it's getting community engagement right on the front end. Making sure that they are part of this process. It's not something that's tacked on on the end. It's it is interwoven into our discussions and what we're doing. And there's a whole series of engagements we work to do with the community utilizing every tool available to us through through district
143resources. And that led us into phase two, developing the actual criteria that would go into the policy that helps shape uh this how this will unfold. The the idea there being something that would be uh to the community making things plain, making things clear, making uh the process less mysterious. And so that that has been the crux of our decisions of everything that we've been doing over the last several months where we haven't been going talking about any specific schools or scenarios or anything of that point of this it would be it's been inappropriate to do so without the board directing us to do so in a public meeting. So we've focused on this high-level community engagement and developing of a of criteria. So for phase one uh as I mentioned we we worked to
144engage the community and get them involved uh not just shaping the criteria, but also shaping how what is successful process even look like. How do they want to be included? How do they want their voices to be heard? And how could we account to the input that we were receiving? As part of that work uh we engaged a variety of resources. We uh utilized uh surveys and we also utilized outreach to a number of groups. And if you'll excuse me, I have to pull up my notes here because I want to make sure I acknowledge as many of them as I can. I do want to add appreciation for the groups that that helped us out. We worked with the district advisory board and the school individual school accountability committees as an effort to uh
145reach every single school in the district. Uh we worked with the district accountability committee, student advisory committee, school principals and obtain consensus from them along the process, the special education advisory board. We had multiple virtual sessions for families of students with IEPs. Uh we worked with the district equity committee, the Title 1 Community Parent Advisory Council, and leadership from all our Poudre School District Employees Associations including the teachers, principals, and classified staff. Um it was a robust process. We wanted to make sure we didn't leave anybody out. Uh I know that's a a high value of the board here is to make sure we are giving every voice a chance to be part of this process and not just people that choose to engage in one this way or that way. And so we want
146to take that uh input and right on the front end the the questions were along the lines of what does this discussion need to look like and how can the community be involved? And so we looked further to some key findings, some general themes of the community input and what we found was people want to know what's going on, they want the data, they want the information, they want to have transparency with how we're making decisions and what the the rationale is for any decision that's being made or recommendation that we're going to advance. Uh they also want that to be a two-way street, not just information pushed out to them, but uh this should be a a conversation with the community. Uh this should also be a unified process across the district. Uh one
147thing we certainly want to avoid is a situation where we pit one part of the community against the other. That would be uh tragic if if if that had to happen. This is a situation that we're facing as a district together as we presented in January. And so we want to work make sure that the approach we're taking is something that tries to keep the district unified. And what we were want seeing was that the the community wanted us the whole process to be data driven but community led. Uh the community would set the values and the outcomes we want to achieve and then it was our job to find the data that would help to achieve those outcomes. So how are we using the feedback? How are we making sure we are taking that
148input, putting in a concrete action as far as the general process that we're following? Uh we have a centralized hub on the PSD website. Uh Superintendent Kingsley mentioned the data dashboard that we'll be launching uh imminently along with uh information to help people understand it. It will be the same data that the committee's looking at uh down the road. We've also wanted to make sure that we've utilized every channel of communication that is available to us through electronic means but also using engagement sessions, listening sessions, focus groups, surveys. I would add the Board of Education's listening sessions that they've been doing have all been part of the process that we've been using to form the criteria, form the policy that we are bringing forward today. There was a special effort made to ensure we were
149reaching families that may not always get the voice that we hope in the district. Multilingual families, families with Title 1, families dealing with IEP situations. And ensuring that this entire process was going to be transparent. If if you read about it in our minutes or or or in our information that gets put out, that that's what we're talking about. That's what we're doing. So, we want to make the whole process as open and transparent and predictable as as possible. And that moves us into phase two, actually drafting a a policy that outlines specific criteria, take this beyond the the 30,000-foot level but actually now start to get into how is a decision going to be made regarding any kind of boundary change or consolidation or just change that that is coming down the road. And
150as we started that work, we began with working with our legal and policy council and we began studying some of the policies that our peer school districts are using and looking for the criteria that these districts are using, their lessons that they've learned, things that we thought were appropriate for Poudre School District. And as we were engaged in that discussion, we then also started to get reach out to the community to make sure that we were getting their input along the way. Not again, not tacked on at the end after we we think we figured everything out but once we've we've made some headway, get some community input to help steer the rest of our discussion. So, first I want to talk about one of the surveys that we put out about the criteria. When
151we did our first pass of criteria, we have a high bar of consensus in our committee where we don't put things out to the public until we achieve a high bar of consensus. And so, what we did is we put out a survey asking the community to rank those criteria that we had reached a high bar of consensus on within the committee. And then hoping to get additional input from the committee from the community to help guide us in items that we were still hashing out, that we were still discussing, making sure that we were landing at a place that made this again a community-led process. We had 7,519 responses to the survey, which is a good amount for a typical PSD survey. We also had a pretty favorable distribution of respondents. It wasn't just
152concentrated in one tiny area, which again, we were we were pleased with. And the first part of the survey was asking the community to rank the criteria that we had initially reviewed and discussed in committee. The goal of this was not to you know, try to score or put weights on on on a criteria so much as it was try to get the community chance to weigh in on are we even on the right track with things? And what narrative what themes could we pull out from what the community was telling us. We have our first group of criteria there, building condition and quality, building utilization, and enrollment projections. And the top-ranked criteria that came out from the community was the condition of the building. Kids don't want their parents don't want their kids going
153to school in a condemned or poltergeist-haunted facility or anything of that nature. They They'd prefer something reasonable. Um And then when we're looking at what values we need to maintain during the consolidation is the program offerings and the support services. Those those came out as the the top criteria. Not and not that the other criteria didn't matter, but when we're trying to look for some consistent themes. One of the things we pulled out from this is the community values what goes on inside the building. That is the that is the top priority of beyond anything else is what is my child's experience attending the school. Are they receiving the help they need? Are they being challenged? Are they achieving excellence? And are they doing it in a place that allows them to do those things?
154Um We extended this survey across multiple languages and we also extended the survey to some of our title one groups. Again, I mentioned our all the outreach tools. That was not a check the box be done exercise. That was an ongoing process. And we saw similar themes emerge across the various groups that engaged in this survey. Uh one of the things also about this survey that was important was not just to constrain people to the only these criteria only these answers. We wanted to know people's uh open-ended input. Uh what were we missing? What additional things did we need to consider? Uh some of the things we were talking about that people brought up, but we needed a little community direction in terms of where we where we should land with it. And one of
155those consistent themes was on the theme of equity. It's a it's a very important value in this community that every child has access to an excellent education, that they are able to reach uh their their full potential. And so one of the ways we took that input was decide we decided we need to put some real meat on it. You know, in in the criteria that we asked people to rank, there is equity embedded in there when we're talking about the condition of a building and the program that goes on. But it this this was a value that merited extra extra substance. So, that was the genesis of the administrative guidelines document that accompanies the policy. Really trying to put some um some real strong framework around how that was going to be implemented and
156discussed and and the types of things that we would need to look at to again achieve those goals of honoring every learner in PSD. We also would edited and added and tweaked language in the criteria to reflect some of the themes that we some of the other themes that we saw from the community. We saw things for example around social cohesion, keeping neighbors together, cohort preservation. Uh that was not a criteria we initially had, but that was something that came off as a as a common theme and so we made sure to include that language as something that needed to be considered as part of implementing any consolidation plan. Uh along with some of these other topics such as alternate program models, uh manageable class size. Um again, emphasizing that this is a community led
157effort and um the committee has worked to facilitate what the community is expressing rather than uh us telling the community what we think is best. And again, we've worked through to be inclusive and accessible in our outreach involving uh again, all those tools of outreach to to the various groups in the community. And uh you know, we we had multiple engagement sessions again with our title one families and where we had nearly 70 attendance at that one along with their family liaisons. And so it's a it's a policy we've worked really hard again to reflect the values that the board expressed at the last meeting, reflect the values that the communities expressed to us. And again, to make it something that facilitates a positive outcome for the district. You know, it's a we're dealing with
158some challenges. This is meant to strengthen our schools and to strengthen that experience that the kids are are having in the in the district. And so from there, I will turn it over to Dr. Gaylord talk about some of the specifics of the policy. Thank you, Brett. So Brett and I have been working with the comprehensive planning committee for just over a year and as Brett described, we do strive for a very high threshold of consensus before we move anything forward from the group and we want to ensure that there's strong alignment from the people who are looking at the data, who are analyzing, who are discussing. Um board members are part of that process. And so the the the approach to the policy was really to study a couple of other districts' policies and
159try and glean best practices. And so over the course of 3 months, [clears throat] we studied and did some feedback loops with those different policies and really looked at what did we like, what did we not like, what did we want to revise maybe, but what did we want to ensure was in our policy. As well as did those policies reflect the values of our community? And so that's why it's been over the course of 3 months of study that we've taken the feedback from the listen and design phase, we've taken the feedback from the board engagement sessions, we've taken the feedback from the criteria survey, and really tried to listen to that and take that in as a committee, as well as wrestle with the things that we have seen in the data and
160that we want to make sure that it's also very transparent about how we arrive at whatever we arrive at. And so over the course of that 3 months, we've revised this policy a handful of times, um but it does we do feel very strongly that reflects the values of PSD in the larger community that we've heard and that we feel that it's important to codify this in a policy not just for now and today's purposes, but going into the future because we want our families to experience something that's predictable and that they could lean into in future years as well as for future boards to be able to lean into something and learn from the experiences that you all have gone through in the listening and sessions that you've done as well. And so the
161policy reflects both um parts of what we feel are are at play here in this conversation. The educational quality and the student experience, which we highly value, and we've heard examples of that tonight about um, the experiences that our students get to have in our schools. And so, the policy elevates that as being essential in whatever um, transformation that we undergo as a system, that that is primarily in our minds. And then, secondly, there's also a fiscal stewardship question, which is a large role and responsibility of the board. Now, you're charged with integrity to fiscal policies and um, our EL policies. And so, those values also being represented in this policy. Additionally, in this policy, is a recommendation for an annual review and reporting to the board and superintendent of ongoing evaluation, facility utilization, enrollment,
162and areas of further study. That as a healthy system, we should constantly and continuously see this as a our our facilities as a large and important asset of our district, and that how we monitor, how we tend them, how we communicate to our community about that facility footprint that we have, is another important part of this policy that's included as well. So, two policies that we um, have in front of you tonight and we'll continue to talk about in two weeks. So, policy FCB, so the intent of that policy is like I I explained, it's in alignment with your EL policies through your executive limitations, which charges the board to monitor instructional soundness as well as resource stewardship. And so, within that policy, you've got instructional soundness. So, the board charges the superintendent to operate
163schools in a manner that best serves the district's mission, ends, and strategic plan, ensuring all students have access to thriving school experiences. And so, that's one of the reasons why this policy is important right now, is that we feel like we're starting to compromise the student experience with the current landscape schools and declining enrollment as well as our financial conditions that we have from the state. And so this is an important driver primarily the instructional soundness of our district is being compromised and we feel the need to address that. Also within resource stewardship we feel like this policy also is in alignment with your EL policy of asset protection and making sure that we are safeguarding district property and funds that we're being financially transparent with our community and providing the board with timely accurate
164reporting through that annual report as well as now in a public dashboard that will be launched tomorrow. It's also legal compliance that we want to make sure that our expenditures adhere to state and federal laws in a line with voter approved intent. So how we manage our resources is an important commitment that we make to our community. And so adopting a policy for school closure and consolidation relocation it's a step toward maintaining a thriving school experience for every student. Additionally in this policy there's an outline for what the community can expect for community engagement as well as our timeliness and those timestamps that we've talked about as being important. The second policy is FCBR which is the regulation policy. And so the regulation policy really outlines in more depth the details the process and the
165criteria at which we would evaluate school closures and consolidations. So essentially in this policy the board is directing the superintendent and staff to apply specific processes and criteria as a regulation to the board policy of FCB. And so the regulations in FCBR and these are just some highlights of those um aspects. So, it does require data-driven assessment of the outline criteria in the policy. It directs the superintendent staff to engage a committee to apply the criteria, which is the comprehensive planning committee, and make a recommendation to the board. It requires the staff to engage with parents, caregivers, employees, and the community. There's a requirement to formally notify the public of any discussion about a particular school. And then it also um formalizes and prioritizes equitable access to programming and for support for transitions. Additionally, this
166policy um supports policy JC, which are school attendance areas, which requires us to create boundaries um for each of our schools for attendance areas. Okay. So, as Brett mentioned, one of the community values that has been very important not only to this board, but we hear it from our staff, from our families, um and from our students themselves, that they feel and experience spaces of belonging in our schools. And so, it's a really important thing that we maintain spaces of belonging and center on some definitions of as we talk about equity work, what do we mean when we're approaching school closures and consolidations? And so, there's a a few terms that we just want to pull out and talk about tonight. So, the first definition is the definition of educational equity, which is a definition
167that we've used in Poudre School District. And so, we strive to have a a a district in a community where educational equity exists when all students have access to the resources and opportunities they need to be college, career, and community ready. Equity work actively involves identifying and addressing discrimination and disparities, removing barriers, and implementing inclusive policies and practices for all students and staff. In the pursuit of educational equity and in looking at school closures and consolidations, everything centers on that student experience and that family experience and really trying to mitigate harm. And so in thinking about how we need to center on our children and families who are most vulnerable in our community and addressing what they need in that student experience and also acknowledging that we're probably not going to be able to do
168everything that we possibly can to mitigate harm, but we're going to do everything possible to consider and to engage our community and understanding what that might look like for them. And so the other part of this is the mitigation cost. And so we know that there are going to have to be resources and additional investments required to ensure that students who are displaced by a closure or consolidation receive equitable access to program, services, transportation, as well as really robust supports at their receiving school. And so in that administrative guidelines for equity, you'll see some language and some approaches that attempt to address this mitigation. We know that we're not going to be able to solve everything for every family, but we really want to strive to do that very much so at this point in
169time to be thinking about and considering and planning for whatever we can to mitigate harm. So in policy FCBR, you'll see language around an accompanying guideline. And so the superintendent identified an approach that furthers educational equity. And so educational equity indicators are considered in the criteria, but this additional guideline will ensure further depth and describe in more detail what we would be applying in tandem with a recommendation. And so we discussed this at length in the comprehensive planning committee um last week about how the group really felt like um applying these equity guidelines needed to happen at the same time that a group was grappling with a recommendation of particular schools that it wouldn't come as an evaluation after, it would come alongside and at the same time. So, very specifically in this policy, you'll
170see the language around being in tandem with the work of the committee. And so, in that administrative guidelines, you'll see um, some of indicators that we pulled out here tonight is that those administrative guidelines again emphasize people and instructional programming quality first, then efficiencies. And so, the efficiencies that we'll gain in fiscal stewardship are important, but our our equity guidelines and those administrative guidelines really talk about like let's let's center on the student experience and family experience first, and then look at those efficiencies. Additionally, there are guidelines in place that talk about assessing, documenting, and working to mitigate impacts like I mentioned on the previous slide, particularly for our students with an IEP or multilingual learners, and systemically underserved students. And so, there's processes and recommendations in that administrative guideline that talk about how to
171approach that and how to study that in tandem with um, the group who would be making a recommendation. We also would be looking at how we might evaluate and plan for additional investments to ensure equitable access for transportation programs as well as any um, undue harm that might cause um, because of a transition for students and families. Within policy FCBR, you'll also see the criterion that the committee has reached consensus on. So, our consensus threshold is 90% or greater. And so, as a committee and in alignment with the survey that you saw, our community also identified that there wasn't any of the criteria in the survey that had such a low score that it wasn't of interest or value. Like everything seemed to kind of be grouped together, and so that was an indicator that
172from our community as well that we had centered on really probably the right criteria. And the combination of all of these criteria, we feel very strongly that they make the most um sound recommendation for considering many things, not just the efficiencies, but also the experience. And so the first set of criteria, the identification criteria you saw in the survey, we believe building utilization, building condition and quality, and current and future enrollment should be the foundation for what we use as a starting point for identifying potential areas of closure and consolidation for the school district. Then after that, identifying those schools, then we're going to be looking at implementation criteria. And so as we study and make recommendations for consolidations, we want to ensure that the experience for students on the other side, that implementation of
173the approach, is better, is sounder, is closer to that thriving student experience that we aspire to have every day. And so elevating the management of traffic safety and walkability, availability of transportation and length of commute, the number one thing that our families told us was maximization of school program offerings was very important for them. Um the proximity of potentially consolidated schools, and then secondly, the continuity of services such as intensive supports for students served with an IEP. So again, all of these criteria reached that 90% consensus or greater from our comprehensive planning committee, and we felt were affirmed by our community survey. So, the next steps, we were were asking the board to adopt the policy and determine if the comprehensive planning committee will prepare a recommendation. And so tonight is the first introduction of
174policies FCB and FCBR, and the second reading will be in 2 weeks when we will ask for a vote on those two policies. If the policies are approved, the board may then direct the superintendent to follow the process outlined in FCBR and prepare a recommendation for implementation no sooner than the 27-28 school year. And so again to those um time stamps, there's nothing that's going to change for the 26-27 school year, right? So this is then the following year after that, and so we would begin begin working on a recommendation to be implemented in the 27-28 school year. At the second reading, so on May 26th, we will also be able to present to you a process for um phase three work, which is preparing a recommendation. So in that phase three work of preparing
175a recommendation, we've also heard from our community that they want the as much of the entire package for the recommendation as possible. They want to know whether transportation is going to be available. They want to know how easy it is to register, whether they have to school of choice. Is there going to be a change to school of choice? What's the community and culture system coming together? Are you creating new names? Are you creating new mascots? They want to know all of that. And so we are planning an approach where we would be able to come not only with a recommendation, but also some answers to those really important questions um that our families and our community um want to know um so that they can plan and be prepared for a transition. Okay. And
176so with that, um we're at our discussion and input and alignment. And so the first question that I would ask the board um to engage in is does the board have any questions about the proposed policy that support the committee's conclusion that we feel like we need an approach codified in policy for school closures, consolidations, and relocations. Thank you, Tracy. Would anyone like to kick us off with some comments or questions? Please, Kevin. I have a question about the policy language for um the FCB, which is the board's not the implementation of the regulation. Trying to fish for it. I'm sorry. It was [snorts] on the PowerPoint. Um Do you have it up? Yes, the years, yeah. It's still It's still loading. Um So, my question is for on page two, for this the first
177bullet initiation of process, the board will announce the start of any study and engagement process by the end of January with potential changes taking effect no earlier than the sec- the second subsequent school year. Um I understand the the meaning. I guess my question is, and it's a lang- it's a linguistic one, what are we Study is not defined in this policy. I would like to know what the intent of study is. Mhm. And is that a disjunctive list, meaning does it have to be a study and engagement process? Is it exclusive? I think our definition should be really tight because I would presume that the work that has been done by the comprehensive planning committee from at least January to now would have constituted or qualified a study, but I don't want to get
178tripped up into that by someone saying that there is no study, therefore the process cannot initiate, which means we have to wait until next year. >> Mhm. Yeah, I had that same thing right off the bat because if we adopt this policy as written right now, we adopt it and we're instantly out out compliance. Potentially. Depending on how we define study. Right. Right? Well, it it even goes deeper than study. It says that the superintendent initiates the study and then he comes back to report to the board. And then it wouldn't take effect until the following year. I understand the intent of it, but how it's written, as soon as we adopt it, we're out of compliance. Especially if we want to make a decision in October of this year. How it reads right now
179is in no later than January, the superintendent has to launch a study. Right? We are assuming that we've already launched that study. But you can't launch a study proposed by a policy if you don't even have that policy in place. Yeah. >> Right? So, I mean, I am I've I've got here I don't want to word smith. I I understand the intent, but when you take a 50,000 foot view at this and the suggestion of a policy and then say that the board that adopts the policy is instantly going to be out of compliance, I can enter a motion in right now to suspend it. Because I'm not voting for something where we're going to be out of compliance. Like what is that? So, let's suggest language. Yeah, cuz I was Okay, I was almost
180done. Um again, I think the the point's well taken. First, let me back up and say, thank you immensely for all the work that you've done. I jumped straight into the language cuz that's what I do. Um I think that to get to this point and the product that's in our packets tonight is to say it's impressive is an understatement. So, when I was going through this, I thought it was incredibly well thought out. Um I I really appreciated the the work in the um addendum, the excuse me, the administrative uh guidelines. That was I know that was sort of an inner process, too, but I I was reading through it and I was like, all the things that I've been hearing in not all, but almost everything I'd heard in these engagement sessions lives
181somewhere in these documents. And so, I think that you've done an excellent job capturing that community voice. I want to say thank you for that. Um like Connor, I think I'm skittish because it's the first time we're doing something, right? And so, uh I think that through the iterations, the policy has gotten really tight with some of the language. I would just prefer, I think, that there there the other question I had was with the January window. I'm presuming it's tied to SPB or some kind of budgetary, but it seems somewhat arbitrary to just decide January. Um I think I think uh Dr. Spain had mentioned something about having discretion or if the board saw fit or if there was a need to evaluate these things mid-year or midstream, I would like the flexibility in
182this policy for future boards to be able to have to do that. So, I think flexibility and being nimble would be preferable over tight words like a study or something that we have not defined because I get I get I do think there's there's an ambiguity there and that future boards are going to have to wrestle with that. Those are my suggestions just with the policy language. I will say I assume that the time frame is somewhat tight because we also have been very clear in wanting to ensure the community can expect and anticipate what the process would look like. So, I appreciate what both of you are saying because I had a similar wondering about the dates in there. And I don't want to get so loose that the community now doesn't know will
183it be next year? Are they going to have a year-long? Do they have a year and a half? I just caution us to get too loose versus too tight. Well, first and foremost, I'm I'm I'm glad that Director Havelda caught that same thing. Because that's fundamental to the policy, as well. Second of all, thanks to Director Havelda for saying thank you. The equity stuff that you guys have done in this for me is is better than expected. Um and not only is it formalized, but it is light years beyond what we did last time. All right, we heard that from the last consolidation process. And that that is bang on. Um we may be able to improve it a little bit more with measurable stuff, but that equity portion of it I'm fine with. When
184it gets into the details of creating a policy that not only this board is going to be beholden to, but subsequent boards being beholden to, I have major consternations. I think that yes, we need to be ambiguous, but I was thinking when I was reviewing this stuff over the weekend is wouldn't it be nice to have a subsequent policy with actual criteria that says, "And if you go below this level, it triggers this consolidation. If you have a utilization that's below this, it triggers this consolidation. If your transportation costs skyrocket because of this." Those are criteria that I was looking for, and that's what I thought the comprehensive planning committee was working on. The reason why I say that is because if we just put an ambig- ambiguous policy together, that looseness and that ability
185to waver and change for a subsequent board puts them right in the same position that we're at right now. And I think we're kind of beholden to get this right the first time than to give a document that we say, "Well, it's the best that we did and and here you go, next board, figure it out." Um I have other word smithing and I think I was talking to Corrado about this a few years ago. We actually wordsmith in one of these meetings. Um, I'm not going to do that. I can send you an email on that, but inherently I hear the words, but I don't see I don't see that meat on the bone for criteria. And going back to our January meeting, I understand at that point we thought that there was going
186to be like a 60 or 80 $18 million budget shortfall. That didn't come to fruition. And that was the impetus for speeding up the cadence of the meetings to get criteria done. However, I I failed to see the criteria. I'm going to go back to what Kevin mentioned about my my preference on the dates, and also address I think what what you're looking at uh some there, Connor. Um I found that most of my recommendations for the policy, you know, thoughts about it were related to dare I [clears throat] say a a perfect state. What we'd have liked to have had for a policy that already existed and becomes a continuous thing. We are trying to put something together in a process that has already started. And so that that creates an additional challenge for
187us because this the decision to already do the study and things like that already took place back in January whenever we voted for it. So in theory, we are in line with it. I would strongly recommend that we take out anything that mandates dates in preference for suggested timelines are list those, can be modified and or approved by the board as necessary. That's a much better policy approach. Anytime you put in mandatory dates, and I would dare say mandatory percentages, we really back ourselves into a corner. And having asked about that very specific thing about where is our automatic consolidation percentage? We haven't had that discussion. Are we going to follow Denver public school at 90%? Are we going to follow What was it? Boulder that 60 and the other one at 75% that was
188presented before? We can't do that right now. We don't know what's right for PSD. I would dare say that our best approach for this is to lay out enough of a policy to show the phases that they had up there in a in a in agreement with what needs to be happening including things such as where where does the equity commit subcommittee I I'm I can't remember their name. Where do they have a way in that's independent and evaluates make sure we're going with equity for example. Actually pulling those things puts together our step for this one and then a mandate from us to say once we're through this, we're going to go back and now look at the policy and try and give it more shape and form for things such as percentages that
189can drive when we have to be more concerned that fit PSD's percentages and things like I'm just making suggestions and and and just want to have that open for discussion. I think that's a wise way for us to approach it and we can set up things that say maybe it's 75% or 72.7 or whatever number we come up with, we really need to start paying attention. For example, I don't know what that looks like but to have enough to show the community what we're doing the steps we're taking, where we have our cross checks and pieces like that and and [clears throat] we can always have additional board votes for ooh, we had a policy it's missing a little bit of detail, let's add it in. Then once we're done and we need to for
190instance more fully address our ongoing monitoring. Were we successful? That I mean what I can't remember which of the two it had, but we need to have more specifics about that. Are we ready to actually lay those out? We can come back and revisit those based on what the committee's learned, based on what we observed, based on what the community gives us as feedback. And I think that's a really good approach for us that doesn't force us into perfect policy right now, which is really difficult to define for us. What? >> [clears throat] >> Sorry. Correct me if I'm wrong. Are those comments pertain pertaining to Let's just take the one that you said utilization. The the triggers. Is that in criteria or is that in phase three preparing a recommendation? For me, criteria Excuse
191me. Percentages are probably in terms of what we're or probably more where we have to say, "Now we've got to pay more attention." Because there's probably a range where we're just fine. We don't have to do a whole I'm going to pretend. 83% Eh, do we do we really have to do a whole lot? Probably not, right? So, that's just one of those quick check in the middle of the year when we get the October finals and it says 83% our comprehensive planning committee takes a look at it along with their other data and they come back and say, "We're good. Keep going." But once we get to start either way, because by the way, at some point it could go the other way. We we need to pay attention to that, too. I know
192we're focused on consolidation right now, but that helps us with Here's the road. And when we start hitting a shoulder, we have to start doing more. And that seems like a wise policy. Is that Am I answering your question? Not exactly. So, I see [clears throat] those triggers, what whatever they are. You're below 70%. I I consider that a trigger cuz I think we've I think that's even spelled out in Thompson's policy. You hit these certain triggers and it the triggers can be a range as well. So, 85% you go you now you now you're on yellow. You go below 60, you're on red. Correct. I see that as criteria. All right. It could be other things such as we're starting to see all our specialist teacher go from 1 FTE to 0.8. Right. >>
193We're starting to see we're losing counselors. Those are other things that we can monitor, for example, and we could place in there, but are really tough to specify right now because they're very comprehensive. >> I see that and I'm I'm moving to you and throwing it to you, Caronda. I see that as a phase two exercise, not a phase three exercise in preparing a recommendation. First of all, let's acknowledge the excitement and passion about this particular document. So, thank you. Um but I think what I want to ask us to consider, so we're talking about equity and all these things, but then we're trying to apply objective criteria to people. So, if we were talking about numbers on a spreadsheet, data, whatever the case may be, I think thresholds and things like that, fine, makes
194sense, but we're talking about people. Throughout this whole process we've been talking about equity and now in the language is shifting that in this early in the phase, we want some definitives. So, that kind of contradicts what we're saying. So, equity right, if we're thinking about the accessibility of that, we're talking about it now, we don't know what the conditions are going to be 5 years from now. We don't know what things are going to have to be considered. So, for us to say this is the absolute place where we have to be, I think is a little unfair to future board members and folks and stuff within the community. Just as we've heard from the community this time around, you all said a couple years ago that this wasn't going to happen and so
195on and so forth. Then here we are again having the same conversation, right? Things changed and shifted. What I see in terms of this FCB is what we do at least need is a process for if those conditions and context change, how are we going to initiate this conversation about the utilization of our schools and whatnot. So I think that's like, at least in my opinion, what this document is designed to do. And then giving credence to board members, I think how would we feel if previous boards had held our hands and said, "This is what you all have to do at this particular point in time, right?" There's different context. So I'm I would push back on that and say, "We don't necessarily need that, but we do need to have a process in
196place." I also think that when I look at this FCB, I hear you all's concerns. I do think there needs to be some clarification. Maybe not necessarily the language, but definitely the steps. Like there is a part where it's like the superintendent's going to do a study, but then it says we initiate the study. So maybe some sequencing could be adjusted there, right? So like um you know, does a does it come to the board first and then we kind of talk about a study and then then we move forward and say, "Okay, then the superintendent and then I like I think some of those stepwise pieces is the disconnect in terms when I look at that." Um so I think that might clean some of the things up that people have concerns with. And
197I think just the last piece, I think we can write this. Maybe there's a step we're missing from when it's initiated versus when it's explored or whatever the case may be. I think that makes sense. Maybe January, I don't know exact dates, but it sounds feels what you all are saying is, "Where's the part where we say we need to explore and actually do this and then where is the part where we're like, yeah, we're 100% going to move into a consolidation process. And I think that kind of is where that muddleness about when's the study and when do utilization come into play and then what's an absolute date and what isn't because if we don't think about that absolute date, if we kind of have that extra pieces, then what that does is what
198you all are saying, it allows that flexibility to where is like, well, you know, something came up in March. So, I just said a lot but my three pieces is make sure that we're incorporating equity all throughout our process in terms of the decisions that we're making, how we're assigning criteria, how we're dividing policies to how do we think about the sequency within this particular policy to outline what is the steps to get to something and third, what part are we talking about just exploration about a part of process and actually initiation of the process. It's kind of what I was hearing people say throughout the piece. I could have it all wrong too but just wanted to share my input. I can jump in quickly. Again, I think I kicked it off with language,
199so let me clarify my position and I think we've got at least I hear consensus between what Karanda is saying and Dr. Spain is saying as far as what I was saying and to be clear I was not saying ambiguity. I was I'm not in favor of ambiguity this policy. I'm in favor of flexibility. There's a big key distinction there um and the the point I was making Connor is that I want flexibility in the initiation of the process for the exact reasons you just outlined. I don't want to be out of out of compliance with the policy that we're as we're building the plane while we're flying it. I want to have the flexibility and I think Connor's point is great is you know, I I don't personally think there needs to be a
200triggering event with we have to do a study and then the study does this and then this. I think we don't know what we I mean, I can't forecast 10 years, 20 years in the future of what the needs are going to be per per Corrado's point. So, I think that the framework policy, the FCB for the board, I think we need to give future boards the gift of flexibility not knowing what their challenges are going to be. I actually then push back on some comments because the implementation policy, the one that's the the regulation, FCB, I actually like how that's drafted. I think that criteria without having hard numbers, and this is a point that that we were discussing in dinner session. My point there was that again, I there there may be I
201I like that there are identification of criteria. What we don't have necessarily other than the surveys that you've you've shared with us is the weight of those criteria at this moment. On the off chance that building condition could be very very high for one school and it could be completely underutilized or have a low enrollment. So, what do we do with that situation? And then we can have another situation where it's flip-flopped. Where the building condition is so poor that you can't justify keeping it open, but it's a highly enrolled school. Right? So, it what we've got some tension between some of these criteria. I think it's going to have to be a case-by-case. I think it's going to have to feel right layering in those equity considerations for what that would do. And so,
202I I again, I I would I would opt for more flexibility now instead of hard lines for a lot of reasons that Dr. Spain said. But again, I want flexibility not ambiguity. Um and I just think it was that one part of the of the policy that that read the initiation. Everything else after that sense, I think it's is is fine because I think to your point, President Zamora, I I do like the timelines that feel transparent so people know what to expect and when things will take place versus I like that. I want to anchor those timelines of expectation. I just think we need to tighten up a little bit what kicks this off. If that makes sense. I think this might be helpful. I feel like this has come up a lot throughout
203this process and I would uh appreciate Dr. Guy for helping me see it. What language are we using, right? So, when we see initiation of process, is that the you know, like and then we use initiation of process and we use implementation. Maybe we need to clarify those pieces. So, what I've appreciated throughout this process is you all which makes more sense um of this initiation of the process, right? So, this process has had five phases. It is possible, correct me if I'm wrong, it's possible that we could go through this process the initiation of the process, but that may not necessarily mean that will um result in the implementation of a consolidation or closure. And so, I just am wondering Connor and Andrew and stuff if maybe that's what the distinction in the language
204is cuz this sounds like it's like like what we've done already, like we might just come and initiate the process and do all the study and do all this work, but we might not get to the point of implementation where we have to consider reutilization and things like that. I think there's a difference in that language and I'd love to hear from others if that distinction would make sense. I think that kind of muddles the point. Um Superintendent Bright or Kingsley has offered to Yeah, I I I appreciate your comments, Dr. Ziegler, cuz I think the intent is another lesson learned from a couple of years ago when we first came into this discussion across the community is that it felt like an event rather than a way of work around how we're looking at
205our system, our resources, and our efficiencies. And so, through dialogue about that and engagement with the community, you collectively stewarded a charter to launch the comprehensive planning committee to look at this data annually, right? Um and I think, you know, piggybacking off of what Director Havelda said about the intersession conversation, I think one of the reasons, and I don't want to speak for the comprehensive planning committee, I'm not a standing or sitting member, but in understanding their work, listening to how they just explained the spirit of their work, drawing hard lines in the 1.0 version of this policy would potentially force us into a one-size-fits-all solution. And as you appropriately as a team discussed in the dinner session, when we're looking at this across regions, what might apply to Timnath is maybe very different to
206Wellington or in different aspects or neighborhoods in Fort Collins. Uh it is to no school's fault what their building condition is. Right? We didn't have the resources. And we do now, but it's going to take time to put those investments in. So, as we look at all of these together, um it is going to need to be, in my opinion, respectfully a case-by-case decision around how best to manage this in this current format. If you look at other districts such as Thompson or Boulder Valley that have those thresholds, those are just signals. They're not you reach 60% or below in Boulder Valley School District and you've closed. Cuz if that was the case, 10 schools would have closed 5 years ago. They are guidelines that kind of trigger sets of events for deeper study. And
207I do believe that's was the spirit and the intent around how these things work together in tandem through the comprehensive planning committee, and I would invite your voices back in to the conversation if you feel I'm misspeaking on behalf of the committee cuz I think it's important that we're in alignment. Uh yeah, I I I think you you nailed it pretty well. We We view this criteria as something that's meant to work together. Uh that that no one criteria is meant to be weighted above another, that they are supposed to be a package deal because it allows us to focus on the outcomes for the people, but have data that enables us to achieve those outcomes. Uh as as I mentioned, community-led, data-driven. And and and yeah, we we we discussed in the committee hard
208lines. We did. Uh and in the end it was something that the committee decided not to advance. Um one of the reasons is because the enrollment situation right now is is so far below other districts use as their standard that in a 1.0 version of the policy, it be becomes a challenge to uh realistically achieve something above a certain bar for every school unless you're planning to be really really aggressive. And maybe you do, I don't know. You'll have to tell me, but Well, I I I our intent was to put together a package of criteria that would allow us some flexibility there. I think per your comments at the last meeting, you know, if we used Boulder, out of our 27 schools, 12 wouldn't meet their criteria. Under I think it was Thompson, it
209was 14. And with the passage of time, it only gets worse. And that passage of time is only 3 years per the statements from last night, right? So it is imperative that within the time frame of phase two, we draw hard lines. Is that a hard decision to make? You bet your it is. Right? But ambiguity masqueraded as flexibility does this board and future boards disservice. Right? At some point, you got to make a decision. And it's going to be hard, and there has to be a line. And if you do it school by school by school, then we fall into the same trap that we did last time, and we pit schools against each other. And And everybody in the community comes in here when it's not 9:30 at night and they say, "Oh,
210we don't trust you because you didn't use the same criteria against my school as you did their school." Okay? So, I understand it's difficult. I don't actually want to do it myself. However, it needs to be done and it needs to be done now. If we even have a semblance of a chance to get in towards a decision in October, which I have problems with that portion of the policy as well. Connie, I just want to know. I hear what you're saying. And again, it's not just a matter of this decision. It impacts a variety of people. Absolutely, could we say, "Here's what we're going to do and we're going to do it and it's going to get done." But that's easy to do. But we have to think about the impact on other people.
211And anytime we rush into anything, we're not making good decisions. Like it's not like like like I don't I can't I don't see where anything's dire that if we don't make a decision today, the whole world's going to fall apart tomorrow, right? Like there's people involved in this process. We are making that decision, but it impacts the people. It's not just about buildings. It's not just about programs and curriculum. It's about teachers. It's about students. It's about administrators. It's about our custodial staff. It's about people. And when we just name criteria and rip the band-aid off and wrap it up in a nice neat bow, we forget about the impact of people. Change takes time. It's a change process. And I just want us to consider that. You can think about people in the process
212of change. You can think about people in the process of developing criteria. You can think about people in the process of consolidation and closure and all those different pieces. It doesn't have to happen overnight. It's not a sale, it's not a closure, it's people's lives. And so I just want us to consider that. So yes, it may take us till October to come up with the criteria to determine what buildings and what may happen. But you know in the meantime, what that does, it gives people an opportunity to prepare. It gives people an opportunity to grieve. It gives people an opportunity to maybe even imagine what the process could look like. So it involves them. That's the inclusive process, that's the equitable process, and that's why it looks different. We aren't talking about equality cuz
213equality doesn't necessarily exist when we're looking at these buildings. If we were talking about equality, then every single building right now would have everything it needs, but it does not. So by the sheer nature of the way our our district is structured, we are already at a conversation of inequity, which require us to be equitable. And saying we're going to have a certain threshold, and saying whatever else, that is not an equitable conversation. So I will respectfully disagree and ask for us to consider and just both of us just pause for a moment and consider what we're talking about. We're talking about the same thing. I'm asking for a pause. I'm going to disagree. >> let's not move on to phase three. I would like to invite Scott and Carla also into this conversation. To
214hear what they have to say, whether they have comments on the policy, concerns, wonderings, wording shifts, agreement, alignment to others. Do either of you have >> [laughter] >> Don't rush. Thank you, Dr. Scott. Um >> [laughter] >> Uh I'm I'm not sure what I'm supposed to say. I feel like we're we're sort of all talking about the same thing and I hear um I hear what Coranda is saying in terms of the people that are being affected and they're being affected now. Um we're seeing principals having to make really challenging decisions about their staff. We're seeing students not getting the level of education that everyone on this dais wants them to have. Um and I think that that's what's informing the CPC's moves and decisions in the in trying to create policy that's inclusive and
215um looking at the district as an organism and a whole and an ecosystem. That's where I feel like that equity is going to be generated. Um I I agree that it should lend itself to be flexible. I think that pigeonholing these decisions into a space that doesn't allow us to look at things in a case-by-case basis is dangerous. Um And for the reasons that uh Vice President Havelda mentioned that uh you know um we have full schools that are um probably haunted. I'm just kidding. Brett, that was really funny. Um no, I but they do need a so much work and then we have um beautiful state-of-the-art schools that are um uh have very low attendance. So um yeah, I this is challenging. By no means um can we do it alone. I just hope
216that we can find some consensus on um the next steps. Scott, would you like to share? Sure. Um this is awesome. I love having these open discussions. I think that's what I love about this board. This is fresh. A lot of us haven't heard these arguments, so uh so this is good stuff. Um I had the same concerns going into this uh reading through the policy. Carla and I got to go to the uh CPC meeting on the 4th and got a little preview of this and my expectation was along the lines of Connors that there was um we'd be seeing thresholds and scoring and that type of thing. Um and so I asked a bunch of questions. I I asked questions last week and then over the weekend and on Monday had a conversation
217with um cabinet members and got some clarification. So my understanding is phase three is where that kind of information will happen. Um I I love hearing these arguments because I think there's merit to all of them. Um I do worry about the future boards. I think that is something to um really factor in because things change. You know, we we just a few years ago, 10 years ago, built two brand new buildings. Three brand new buildings um based off of projections. We're in a completely different place now, so what's going to happen in 10 years? Um Not only would we tie their hands, I I worry we tie our own hands if we name in a policy that firm these thresholds um and we run into those situations where we have exactly what Carla was
218describing. Um closing a school, and I'll watch my language, is a big deal. I call it the nuclear option. Um And so quantitative assessments are incredibly important. That's the only way that you can ensure fairness, but qualitative factors like equity and a whole host of other things um that are named could make us say no to closing. Um it may we may determine that based off those qualitative factors it's essential to keep this building open even though it doesn't meet certain quantitative criteria. Um so I I'm leaning towards sticking with the game plan. I think it's important that we name the criteria. Not the criteria, but we name the thresholds and the scoring if there is such a thing. I think Brian made a good point. Um that any scoring is a signal. It's not
219a you have to close. And I think that's something we need to make really clear to um to everybody in the district because I think it it gets scary and that's what gets people ratcheted up. Um I have a whole bunch more to say about feedback that we got from the community and I do want to talk about that at some point, but I'll just leave it at that um in terms of uh you know, how I how I'm leaning in terms of where we're at on the phases and that type of thing. I want to mention one more thing. I do think that language is wildly important. I think that um the word study is in the language to indicate to signal that we are doing our due diligence. Um and we talked a
220lot at CPC about words like relocate and affected and making sure that um this process is one of bringing people together and making our system as a whole stronger and better. Um and and we have talked a lot about um loss and grieving and feeling displaced. Um we've also talked about the ability to bring in mental health specialists and consultants and celebrate new. Um And so my that's where my my heart leans. That's where I believe that will make the most and best impact um while respecting what everyone is going through through the process. I think that um I'm very encouraged by the really smart and intentional people that were in the room at the CPC. Um and yeah, I don't know. Um I'm going to leave it there and pass it along. So President
221Zamora, I'd like to hear what you have to say. Which I was just about to give you. >> [laughter] [gasps] >> Uh yeah. So I think to Superintendent Kingsley's point, we have a committee that is ongoing. So this need for thresholds I think is lower for us when we have people looking at our schools on an annual basis to give us that feedback. Two, I would question what criteria we would put in as far as numerical values because on the one hand I think you and I as with engineering backgrounds, numbers are comfortable and identifying things are comfortable. However, we do have a people problem. We don't have an engineering problem. So when we have if we were to put in numbers, thresholds, is it utilization thresholds? Is it percentages of special teachers' time? Is
222it enrollment? Is it facility? All of those things are things that are being looked at within our committee. So, if our job we built a committee, our job is to trust them to do what we asked them to do. And if we don't, then we have a problem with our own policy and our own expectations. We haven't set that clearly enough. That's on us. The other thing I want to say about our policy as boards, whether it's our current board or a future board, we have the ability to change them. If we come a year from now after we've done this work, after we've had thorough assessment, and our schools are in a much better place, if at that point we decide as a collective that, you know what, I think we're in a really
223healthy spot, we do want to put some thresholds in here because now we think it's the appropriate time to do it, we can do that. We have the ability. But right now, if we put some of those thresholds in there, every school could end up on the list anyway. Quite frankly, depending on what our thresholds are and what our ranges are. Is that I don't believe that's the best path right now. We have kicked this can, boards before us have kicked this can multiple times over decades to the point where we are saddled with a problem that is well beyond what we should be saddled with. I don't want to saddle the next board or a future board with these problems. So, I'd like to have a robust policy, but for right now, I think
224the policy that's in front of us is a good starting point, and I think it obligates us to look at it again 1 year from now. If we are not reviewing this exact policy next spring to assess how did it go? Did we do it well? Is there anything we would change? What did we miss? Then that's on us. That's our failure. But for right now, I think this policy is appropriate. My one caveat is I would like to have some language for I'm looking at the wrong one. At the bottom per Director Avelda, Spain, others around just making sure that we're not enacting a policy and then we're immediately out of compliance. I understand that sentiment. That's one that I shared a week ago when I first saw this. Um but I think we
225can get around it with some loosening of the timeline or adding some language to allow us to say we've already enacted it or we have the ability to move on this process at our leisure um because we're not we're not actually shocking our community. We have been through this process. We have been working through it. So my question to you and other directors on that are are we comfortable moving to phase three? Yes. Um >> [clears throat] >> few points. I argue for a living. I'm sorry. I'm going to try to give you some counterpoints. Throughout this conversation and through many others, um I want to take a step out and zoom out a bit. I I say this a lot and I I mean it genuinely tonight. We cannot let perfect be the enemy
226of good. And here's why. I want to take you back 2 years ago almost to the night, Connor. Do you remember that conversation? Yeah. Almost 2 years ago exactly right before the graduations. We had a very spirited debate and discussion amongst ourselves as board directors. And at that point, um I think this this whole process was different. But the reason I bring that up is because if we had applied a strictly objective criteria during those amalgamations of scenarios, do you know what we ended up with? I know. A scenario that was unacceptable to anyone on this board which implicated 90% I think of which were Title 1 schools. So, let's punish schools that are that that meet certain objective criteria without any consideration of equity, which leads to the second point of that. Throughout this
227engagement process, one thing crystal clear has reverberated throughout our community through the data that you showed us tonight, through the conversations in this room with the comprehensive planning committee, because I was at tables I had this conversation, conversation among us. Equity has to be a lens through which we look at everything. As difficult and as challenging as that is to define, that's why I say look again at this administrative policy guidelines. I think they've done a remarkable job trying to overlay all the ways equity could be inside that decision. But, that does not mean a decision isn't going to get made. In my view, and this is I'm going to use my own words against me, I'm at the point after hearing our principals, after hearing cabinet, after hearing experts, after hearing people from the
228state demographer's office, after listening to the sage advice from former board members as well, and considering all of these things, I'm at a point beyond reasonable doubt where we are compelled to act. And if we do not act, and if we get bogged down in the semantics versus the action of what we need to do, then I I I'm not doom and glooming it. I'm saying that we have we are commanded to act at this moment because that is also what our community has begged of us to do. So, with that, I'm that's why I'm saying the policy language, we're building the the plane as we're flying it. It ain't going to be perfect. To Justice point, we're going to have to evolve and continue to tweak and revise that so that we situate future
229boards with a a better work product. But, at the beginning of everything there was a beginning, right? And so, I don't want to get bogged down in semantics to keep going and say let's let's keep tweaking the policy language until October. We don't have that much time. We need to make a decision in October. That's my point. So, in response to that, at some point now in phase three, right? We're going to come up with criteria. And guess what? For everybody on this board and everybody listening online, there's going to be hard numbers in there. Right? There is going to be thresholds in there for the schools that are potentially going to close. So, I'm not understanding why we would move on into a phase that is preparing a recommendation when we don't have an
230exhaustive list of criteria already defined. That, by definition, is putting the cart before the horse. I will also say, going back 2 years, I think we treated this like a math exercise. And guess what? We failed the test. Right? I'm sorry, but it seems to me right now, we're probably going to fail the test again because we don't solve our problems financially unless we do this right. And it's got to I'm sorry. I don't want Like I said, I don't want it to be, but it's got to be big. If we just nibble around the outside of this cookie, guess what? We're going to be doing this every single year, just like this policy suggests. And we can't do that because it sucks up 95% of the time of not only staff, but us. Right?
231I mean we've got to make sure that the criteria is well defined before we put in preparing a recommendation for closure because that's what we're talking about. I'd like to hear from Andrew. I think you had Or you If you're not ready, that's okay. Um I'm good. I I would like to point out one rather obvious thing that we also heard from our principal who presented to us last night. This process has gone before. There is zero documentation and policy about how to do a consolidation and closure. That's something that we have to address as a board to create a road map for future boards. And I recognize any number we put on there, any equity criteria we put on there, are merely suggestions for future board, but we should be leaving them a road
232map. We would be a lot better off. You would have been a lot better off 2 years ago if a road map had been left for you previously. Because guess what the policy also does? It creates transparency for the community so they see when we to speak to your your point, "Hey, we're starting to get towards some of these problem areas, problem numbers, problem equity issues." We should be looking at not just numbers, but also again the equity issues. Having markers that we track for, "Are we keeping our counselors?" Because if you don't keep your counselors, where are we meeting our mission statement of well-being? We don't keep our specials, where are we having quality education across the board? Because that's going to limit access to those things. I don't know that we personally need
233that number right now. And and and the argument why I say that is we have a committee that has said, "These are all the items that we're going to look at, numbers and all the equity items." And they're going to be able to bring back some things and say, "This is where all the all these schools are." They will need direction from us at some point about where we're going to agree and say, "This is what we do." Which I think every one of us has said we need to do something. But to define it right now arbitrarily with just a percentage number or something like that, I I'm I know I'm not in favor of that. I am I am in favor of moving the process forward and let a committee that's done a
234tremendous job putting together a lot of good things to look at, both quantitative and qualitative. Very comprehensive in a lot of respects, not fully detailed. I I do agree with you, but even right now, I doubt that we all have consensus about how much is right. Because none of us have a crystal ball. We can look at the state demographer data. We're going to going to go down for a little bit and then we'll go up a little bit. There's so many things beyond our control that could change that. So, we're going to have to make a best decision with what we have at hand and you have a committee doing an amazing amount of work over the next few months if we say go to the next step that will bring us a lot
235of these things back and help us understand where we can pull the various levers. That's and that's why I feel having a policy with enough structure to show process to the community with some flexibility and then back to a year from now, perhaps we can go in and throw in some actual numbers that are it's information for future boards to say this is what we found at this time cuz by the way, 10 years from now, PSD we don't know what it's going to look like where all the schools will be. But at least informs them and helps them understand and of course where it went right and maybe not so right. I guess I just have a clarifying question. In FCBR and then also on the PowerPoint on slide 11, are those not the
236criterion that is being considered? They not They don't have hard numbers around them, but I thought that was the criteria, so I'm just trying to check. It is. Okay. Yes, that's the criteria that our committee has consensus on Okay. that we would propose being in the policy. And then so I'm clear, um Conrad Andrew, um I don't know where I went. I think I had another question. Are you all suggesting saying that what's missing in that criteria is that the like hard numbers or like like when they and not I don't know if I need to talk about it. I'm just trying to clarify. So, when you're talking about the numbers, so like when it says criteria building utilization, current and potential site capacity and stuff. Are you saying that in that section some hard
237numbers around that? So, the utilization rate is 60 or whatever. Is that the part that's missing? I I I think it's I look at the left side and building condition and quality is not a numeric thing. That That's a report out. Um there's there's going to be numbers associated around it, like boiler age, roof age, things like that. And it it's probably more a an aggregate dashboard status that we can see if everything's starting to go red on a building or something like that, for example. Just just for sake of I mean, we haven't created that. I understand that. The next two clearly are numbers. I would suggest if we if if if we're not paying attention, um building utilization becomes more important. That's a now thing because we're behind the curve. In the future,
238we can probably look more at enrollment projections collectively and we may not need number two very much, but that's a guess as well. The stuff on the right not numbers. But at the same time, there there are probably some numerical things about it, like FTEs and things like that. To me, all of this is together what we're going to be looking at because if if we're just looking at enrollment projections and things like that, why would we have a committee? That would be ignoring equity, all those sorts of things. It takes a lot of people to address all of those things and help bring some pointers to us because we're the ones that are going to have to decide what that looks like. Are you know which school do we decide you know, is is
239is going to be integrated with another one, consolidated with another one? I mean, all those things that comes down to us. They're doing that heavy legwork that's going to help inform future policy revisions that are more clear for future, you know, the future, whatever that looks like. And so, that's that's kind of that's my response to what you're saying. It's I don't want to pretend it's just a numbers game cuz that would be foolish. And it absolutely All those numbers things are omnipresent in the background. Dollars are omnipresent in the background. If there's some mythical future where suddenly they magically give us a boatload more money, every single one of those numbers for enrollment projections can be a lot looser in theory. I mean, I'm not sure that's fiscally sensible, but those things can change
240too over time based on our current situation, based on population changes, all these things. But the things where really matter are educational outcomes. Yeah. If we spend too much money because it's it's it's being watered down. We can't do things like CTE that we just saw So, not CTE, sorry. The dual enrollment and concurrent enrollment, things like that that we saw tonight. We don't have money left over for that. By comparison. And so, it's it's that balance. Totally. And that's why it's really difficult to put numbers to each one of them. But, you know, concerning points when when we hit worrisome points when we're really you know, how can we meet well-being if we don't have nurses in the in the building? If we don't have any No counselors. If we if we don't have
241those resources, how can we make sure they're learning if we don't have enough math support, English support, etc., etc. Awesome. Thank you for clarifying that. How I'm just curious, at some point So, we're bringing this as a broad overview. At some point, I thought you all talked about like having a dashboard and numbers or things like that. Are those more specifics or can you provide the board with something like that? It seems like you all as a group have looked at this. So, I'm assuming that that information is articulated articulated somewhere. So, um with the support of our IT department, our facilities department, we are launching a dashboard um tomorrow that will have much of the criteria that you see on the left-hand side of the screen that will be evident because it's specific to
242facilities, not as much about programming and offerings and some of the things that you see on the right. But again, you know, really taking a look at that property and facility asset and all of these factors of enrollment, utilization, capacity, as well as the finances for each of our schools in the in the system. And so, that's going to be publicly available for our community. They're going to be able to see those trends that we've been studying as a comprehensive planning committee over the last year. They're going to be able to see the same set of data that we've been looking at and that will be a part of our conversation with the board adopts this criteria that we would move forward into a recommendation. So, that's that's going to be visible to our public
243tomorrow. So, thank you for the question and Dr. Gall, thank you for your response there. I think when you have an opportunity, [snorts] when our community has an opportunity to have a thoughtful moment with the release of the dashboard, there's going to be a moment of self-discovery around how these data points play together or don't make sense. Right? Where we have a healthy enrolled school, but the the building condition has questions. Right? So, there that's going to lead to questions and curiosities that the committee will need to grapple with. But, I also think for many school communities, it will be sobering as a result of seeing a dismal projection over the next 5 years, seeing a building condition to no fault of their own be what it is, seeing their building utilization be what it
244is, and having to come to terms and grips with that reality, which will lead to a future conversation in the fall around we'll have a spectrum of data that we will need to make a decision around to what degree do we want to solve this problem. That is an it is an honest question that needs to be asked and answered. I don't think we're there yet, though, because I think as another part of the conversation that we had in dinner session that I just think is really, really important and it's been brought up loosely here tonight, uh but with intention, is that there are many parts of our community that are grieving as a result of this conversation lingering for multiple years without a decision to see what there's hope on the horizon. In applying
245an arbitrary criteria cuz if you look at one district has this number and it's arbitrary at best. There's no best practice. We're all figuring out a way to build this thoughtfully in a human-centered way, learn from our mistakes, but one of the things I heard one of our principals say here today is that we're dealing with an incredible amount of uncertainty right now. And it's putting duress on individual people. It's putting duress on individual schools. It's putting duress on this entire system in lots of different ways. It's weighing on us. 95% of I would agree with you. 1,000%. But when a school comes up with we make firm criteria right now, firm numbers to that criteria, you are going to continue potentially to feed that duress in a way that does not allow us to
246hold space to grieve, to empathize, help understand. We already have employees that are making decisions, teachers who are moving to become realtors. Heard that story today. As a result of just the uncertainty. And if we end up unintentionally putting a scarlet letter on a particular school, we're not helping them navigate how to close this school year strong, start a school year stronger, and deal with that level of uncertainty in a way that's compassionate, in a way that allows them to understand what it might mean for them. Those conversations are coming in the fall. Right? Where we will have to talk about specific schools and engage specific communities about different ideas and thoughts. But I think there are some potential unintended consequences of applying those arbitrary numbers now rather than later that I know it I
247don't believe is anybody's intent to cause harm on this board at all. But I think how that may play out would also I think limit the flexibility of the comprehensive planning committee and how they're looking at various scenarios and being creative in those solutions. And I think to me, I want to be able to try to maximize the opportunity for them to be innovative in this space um in a way that takes the values that you've all heard from the community, takes the values that they've heard from you and applies that with some level of sensitivity. The good news through our important conversation this evening is I think we agree on more things than we disagree with. Right? Which is really cool. Like when I think about the equity guidelines that were put together in
248partnership uh with our committees and local experts and scholars and staff members. I mean, there's a lot of synergy and energy that we've done something really good here. We just have to apply it. Right? Second thing is I've heard throughout the course of the evening that the regulation in its current form, FCB-R, seems to be generally positive. There's some questions around whether we should be applying specific standards to our criteria, you know, quantitative measures to each of those criteria, but for the most part, I'm not saying we've got the wrong I'm not hearing we got the wrong measures. I'm just hearing that maybe we need to be more specific in how we're applying that in phase two. When we go back to policy FCB, for the most part, I think there's agreement with the exception
249of a couple of things that I think were thoughtful. We have to come back with another iteration that further defines what we did we mean by comprehensive study. That I heard was loud and clear. The other part is an advocacy for flexibility that the initiation bullet of processing kind of hamstrings where we may consider me I don't My interpretation is we wouldn't be out of compliance, but that's because we're in the know and have been talking about this. I can understand who somebody's coming into the conversation fresh could be poking at that and I think that deserves our attention to be able to clean that up in a way that provides maximum flexibility without locking future boards in and if you choose to change that in the future, you have the ability to do that.
250I do think it would be best practice to review this at least annually, biannually at a minimum. Um but those were the only things that I heard in terms of changes that need to be made to allow that flexibility, not ambiguity. There's some specific areas in that particular policy. I think that's relatively low-hanging fruit for us to address between now and the next board meeting to come back and be able to do that. I just um but I want to check in to see if my capturing of what I've heard so far is accurate. Yes for me. Good summary. I don't think we've ever addressed the second bullet though. Do you I mean Is everyone else want to chat clarify what Brian said and to give him some direction? Did he miss anything in his
251summary? So The second question you asked of us, should they continue? I think first can we answer this question and then I agree we should move on to the second one. >> I'm just saying cuz it's 10:05 and we have another session after this and I appreciate I appreciate the dialogue but I I want to make sure we get to Absolutely. >> question two while we're still fresh. So you said yes, I would say yes. I would add in one thing on there for question one. We didn't get to it but I'd be remiss if we didn't put some kind of financial analysis metric on there. Um we are looking at potentially closing schools and if it's not going to give us some scales of economy and save us money then we might as well
252take that one off the list. Just is that a I I say that it's the it is it's the same as the measurement stuff like enrollments and those equity things. It's more an out- output of our recommendations lead to. It is that Just just it's a language thing probably. It makes you sure. >> it's not an analysis of building A cost 50% more to run than building B. I think that can be taken care of within building condition and quality. I think it's once we move the students we have um student levels above a certain threshold in a given school, there should be scales of economy there and there should be cost savings. I think I appreciate the the feedback and we can certainly do that. I would suggest that another lesson learned from our
253work collectively over the last couple of years is leading just not even just from a communication standpoint, from a value standpoint. Yes, we have financial pressures in this system. But school closure and consolidation is not going to result in major cost savings into this district. I need to be transparent about that. Because you are shepherding you're basically what you're doing is breathing health and vibrancy into fewer resources. I think that's an important part of this. When you look at other school districts across the state right now, Jeffco is an example that has 20 vacant facilities. They're having a hard time selling them. What they thought in terms of what was real property value and what they may get in terms of savings to be able to it's it's very different community by community. And so
254how we think about that, I I do think a financial analysis is important. But I think setting a tone and expectation that this is not going to be an incredible amount of savings, it's going to breathe health into fewer schools that have all of the things that they're not able to have now because we're spreading it so thin across so many different sites with almost 10,000 empty seats and I just want to be transparent about that. >> Yeah, I'm in agreement and I think a range it will suffice. But I want to reiterate this. There will be cost savings. And the reason for that is because if we don't have the students in those buildings, guess what else we don't have? We don't have the teachers in there. We don't have the paraprofessionals in there.
255Okay? You are going to get scales of economy. It's just if you there's no students to teach, you don't need the 85 cents on the dollar. I understand where you're coming from. There will be some personnel savings in this measure. But if we are shepherding 200 kids from site A into site B, those 200 kids are going to still need 200 kids worth of teachers. Right? So where the savings in the economy of scale is, you don't necessarily need two principals anymore. You may not necessarily need if we have a plan for what the building might be and if it's not the district running it, we might not need custodial care, office [snorts] staff, certain things like that. But those are very few positions within the context of a school, but teaching positions, paraprofessional positions
256in most instances will migrate with these particular moves, but we will continue to deal with further attrition over the next several years as a result of declining enrollment persisting. So I think that's important part of the story, too. Let's Let's address that offline. All right. Um other folks want to weigh in on Brian's assessment of where we're at. I'm just going to say I agree and just recognize that we are developing a process. There are no best practices. Um and we have a wonderful opportunity to develop a best practice for ourselves and where we are right now. I agree with you all and thank you for that summary. I I'm I like that. I would just say that um, the five value statements on the right might not be the values of the community in
2573 years or 10 years. So, I I agree with what Brian said for sure and um, and what Karanda just said about it being the best practice for us right now. Um, I and I I appreciate the work that you've put in. Well, for the second question, obviously no. I don't think that we should move past criteria because I think they're woefully under under baked, period. Um, I also want to draw to the attention here is this second one is not a binding vote. Just like creating the cadence last time was not a binding vote. If we want to make this a binding vote, I think it should be the approval instead of going around around the horn here saying, I think maybe this is a good idea, maybe it's not. Make it a binding
258vote on the approval of the policy next week or in 2 weeks, excuse me. He does need We do need to have clarity on if what they would need to move forward with or if we wanted to change the language if they should change the language. So, we're not You're right, it's not a binding vote, but they also have to know where to go with where we're at right now. But, is it to my understanding is the CPC meeting before our next Board of Directors meeting? No, our next meeting is May 26th, which is where we would vote on these policies. Yeah, I think that we should withhold then judgment or a quasi vote on number two about them moving forward until we approve the policy for them to move forward. >> haven't discussed point
259number two. I'm just assessing whether or not we're in alignment with Brian's summary of our discussion thus far. Okay. Scott, do you have Yeah, I'm I'm in alignment with what Brian said. I would uh I do want to bring I don't think we focused enough on some of the things that that we done differently this time. I think the dashboard is huge. I think people don't even realize just how much great information is in there. It's finally the clarity that I think a lot of people have been looking for. It really gives a school by school um assessment of of the current situation. So, I think that's dramatically better than than where we were a few years ago. Um the outreach to the community it it So, the first step that's transparency in the dashboard.
260The communication, the feedback from the community, that was another big ask the last time. I I think we really learned our lesson and are doing this proactively rather than reactively. Um the survey I think those results are amazing that that many people responded. Um the great thing I think is that we separated the responses or we had um a way to measure our English speakers versus our non-English speakers. And guess what? They both came up with the same number one. Building condition and qual quality was the number one I criteria for identifying schools. And they also came up with the same number one on the values in to maintain during consolidation, the implementation side of that. And that number one was program offerings, specials, elective, extracurriculars. And I think that's amazing and great that, you
261know, for all our differences, it turns out that we share the same values overall. And that's good information for us as board members and as staff, everything, uh everyone who's assessing this. Um From the listening sessions, those were hugely valuable. We did a lot of those. We spent a lot of time. A lot of people came out and spent their afternoons and evenings with us. Um and that information was a lot of that went into the surveys, but a lot of it um was anecdotal stuff. Everything that's in uh these values um are things we heard. Um programming came came up a lot. Um couple things that weren't at walkability, safe routes to schools, that came up. That's in the implementation side of things. Um One thing about the programming that we haven't brought up,
262and I think this is important just based off these listening sessions, is merging the uniqueness of each school is important to our community. That we have a lot of uh unique curriculums. And one of the ideas I thought was great, if if it could be done, um is to take the best of these different curriculums and merge those together in whatever the new school is. But that's not something we should put in here. That we need to leave up to the experts. Collaboration between principals and teachers about what the new school's going to look like, that's an important step during after we announce schools, that's an important step I think during that year transition. So I thought that was a good time. One thing we did not talk about with bell times and transportation, that
263came up a lot in listening sessions. I'm assuming when we get into boundaries and all that, that will be addressed. Um and then cohorts, I would like to hear that was like probably the number one thing I heard is people wanted how can we keep cohorts together, grade levels, that type of thing. Um but also staff. I think I've said this before that that principals spend a lot of time curating their teams and keeping those people together not only because of the way they work together and complement each other, but also for the kids having familiar grown-ups travel to the new school with them I think would be would is an important piece of feedback. So, I'm kind of this is the stuff I wanted to add earlier. I'm using this time to do that,
264but I would like to have Tracy and Brett actually let us know where cohorts kind of fit in to this and um you know, was that considered? So, in policy FCB-R, you'll see language around cohorts under staffing transitions and you'll see it under facility operations and community. It's on page three of that guideline at the top. And so, we did um see that in the community survey in the open-ended comments that people were very interested in talking about that and having that as a value that was expressed um in the outcome of this. And so, we talked on May 4th at length about cohort and um also recognizing that that was a value. The way that the like student cohort ended up being framed and we talked about this a little bit in dinner session
265is um the fourth bullet under facilities operations and community. Maintaining neighborhood cohorts to the greatest extent possible was a bullet that was added on May 4th in the comprehensive planning committee. Um to the point of we are not going to draw a line through a community neighborhood and say half goes here, half goes here, that we want to maintain that neighborhood cohort going wherever it is, going together. Um that's distinguishing from the another community value that we heard, not so much in the survey but anecdotally, is friendship cohorts. That's going to be a little bit harder um to analyze friendship cohorts and make sure friends go together. And so, you know, if we if we could, you know, we'd try, but that's going to be a little bit more difficult than like a neighborhood cohort.
266Like neighborhood cohort, our community felt and community felt pretty strongly that we could accommodate that. Um we also heard from the staff um engagement sessions around staffing cohorts. And so, that language is the second bullet under staffing transitions. And so, that was added as well um based on feedback from the community. Would you add anything? No, I'm good. Okay. Yeah. Mhm. All right. Are you ready for bullet point number two? Yeah. >> So, bullet point number two, we could save that until May 26th because that's when bullet point number two is really relevant. So, just so you um kind of have a cadence of how things are proceeding. They're proceeding um expeditiously and hopefully thoughtfully. Um So, at the end of this week, you know, based on how tonight went, I'm planning to meet with
267a group of people who will lead some action teams. So, that's going to be on Friday. Um we're going to start to do some additional work in preparation for a recommendation, but we're not going to get too far into it until we know where the board lands on May 26th. Okay. Are we comfortable with that collectively? Okay. Thank you so much. I really appreciate your time. It's 10:20 at night. >> [applause] >> Thank you for being here. Um All right. Well, then we will keep moving because we still have, like Kevin said, other things on our to-do list. Forecasting and Um Would we also like to ignore forecasting? Does anyone have anything urgent? Okay. >> I'm good. I feel like we could push it. All right, then let's just move on to our executive session
26813.1. Can I get a motion? I move that the board entered into executive session to develop the strategy of the school district for negotiations relating to the 2026-27 collective bargaining agreement or employment contracts as authorized by CRS 24-6-402 part 4 part E part 3. Individuals invited to join the board in executive session are Superintendent Brian Kingsley, Chief of Staff Dr. Lauren Hooton, Lead Assistant Superintendent Dr. Tracy Gyle, Chief Financial Officer Dave Montoya, and General Counsel Autumn Aspen. Thank you. Can I get a second? Thank you, Carla. All right, Jill, can you call the vote, please? Carla Baze. Aye. Conner Duffy. Aye. Aye. >> Kevin Havalda. Aye. Scott Showalter. >> Aye. Dr. Andrew Spain. Aye. Jessica Zamora. Aye. Dr. Corinne DaZiegler. Aye. Motion passes 7-0. Thank [laughter] you, Kevin. We will now convene in a closed
269session. This is the last agenda item before adjournment. At the conclusion of the executive session, we will adjourn the meeting. The adjournment will be recorded.