001So some of that stuff I go for a long time. You don't want these totally right. I hear like >> what's happening back then? So pushing small stroke It looked a lot like that. Now they just [laughter] what How do you interact socialist? I didn't like turnion. You know, they got almost all Still There were others. >> Well, I did my first. >> Yeah. Yeah, it was herself. Instead of just trying to keep did more investigation. >> Zach and Jacob are coming. They say Thank you so much. Yes, you >> [cough] >> My still Justine cut out small. This is the time you want to do that. >> We got Uh [clears throat] there's Yeah, sometime. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we got a lot of meeting order 640. Bomber. Lower >> Mson. >> Nelson >> here.
002>> Frank >> here. >> Yates >> here. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Oh yeah. I'll get it. >> [cough] >> Chelsea. >> Yeah, you're the only one on there. It looks like >> I'm not going to time your name. There's only one. You're supposed to have five minutes, you know. Good evening. My name is Chelsea and I'm here tonight as both an employee of the district and a parent. I'm speaking because I'm deeply concerned and honestly heartbroken about the employee cuts being proposed and what they will mean for staff and students. These cuts directly affect the people who support our most vulnerable students every single day. As staff,
003we are in the classrooms and hallways, helping children feel safe enough to learn, stepping in during crisis moments, and making school accessible for the students who cannot succeed without support. As a paraprofessional and as a mother of a son with special needs, I see this from both sides. Under Illinois special education law, students with disabilities are entitled to a free appropriate public education in the least least restrictive environment. And many students can only access that educ education because staff are there implementing their IEPs. And in Illinois, IEPs are legally binding. They are not suggestions. When when pair of professional support written to IEPs is cut, staffed staff are placed in an impossible position expected to meet legal requirements without the staffing needed to do so. And as a parent, I need you all of you
004to understand this. Until you are the one fighting for your child's services, many people don't realize how serious this is. Too often concerns about IEPs not being followed get minimized and swept under the rug. But that is not acceptable because for families, this is not just paperwork. It's their child's education, safety, and future. So my question is for you, with these proposed cuts, how do you expect staff to remain compliant with the law while still meeting needs safely. And this is not just affecting special education. So say if kindergarten pair professionals are cut, teachers and students lose critical daily support and students in one of the most important years of development. I work in kindergarten right now, so I can vouch for this. That stress affects the teacher, the classroom environment, and learning for every
005student. Par professionals are the glue that holds our schools together. Yet many of us remain at the bottom of pay scale and we still show up every single day. When decisions like this are made, it can be easy to look at the numbers. But I also need you to remember we are more than just a spreadsheet. And I want to say this respectfully, but honestly, as board members, you should be seen in our schools. And I've seen at least two of you at Apollo volunteering before. So, I want to ask you plainly, have you lived the job that I live and many of my co-workers live? If you haven't been the one breaking up a crisis, keeping children and trying to help learning happen every day that I don't understand how you can cut it.
006You are cutting support from children and teachers who depend on it. And I want to end with this. I would like to sincerely invite each and every board member to Apollo. And I'm sure each of the other building principles would love to have you come to their buildings. Come see it. Come see what we do. Come see what we deal with every day. Not on paper, but in real life. Come watch the moment a child melts down in a par professional keeps them safe. Come watch a child who struggles to communicate finally feels understood because someone stayed patient. That's hard to do sometimes. Come watch support. more than their job title quietly and faithfully because we love the kids. Because our children deserve more than survival at school. They deserve support. They deserve dignity. They
007deserve a district that truly means it when we say all children. And if you cut pair of professionals, then you're not just choosing savings, you're choosing which children you will. >> Thank you. students here today presentation. >> Thank you for having us. This will be short. It's going to be long, but it will be short. My name is Donna Boswell. I'm the Merc County Junior High School counselor. It was it was the end of a work day that I was at my computer reflecting on the students that come to me concerned about other students and then um students that had come to me bringing a student that they were concerned about and I thought well what are we doing for those students who are helping other students how are we equipping them how are we
008empowering them and then I began to think well what about those students in need it's a really big step asking them to come and ask for help and what are we doing for that too and so I began to think at the junior how could we be proactive and That's when I came across the program Hope Squad. And so in 2022, the Mercer County Junior High established Hope Squad. And it consists of an average of 24 students that are nominated by their peers. And the students nominate them based upon that they trust them. They talk to them. Um they um they are like confidential. They feel like they can trust them. And then that averages out to be about eight per grade level. And then um and then that way what we do share a
009little more about it. Uh the staff of Mercer County Junior High Hope Squad, he has three advisors. Um Mr. Caresco, seventh grade teacher, Mrs. Olri, sixth grade teacher, Mr. Tim Cam, the principal, we have an activity assistant, Cody Rugles, and then we have work with the community Megan for the mental health action program. And right now, I would like for Mr. Cresco, the one of the adviserss to share for a little bit. >> Thank Mrs. as possible came to me about being an adviser when she came up with the idea of starting squad program and informed me about it and it's the main focus of hope squad was suicide prevention and that's a heavy subject and I was admittedly hesitant when she came to me. Uh I didn't feel I was personally qualified to handle
010something like that. Um and so I asked for time to think about it and after a day or two of reflecting my thought I kept going back was if this is something that will help one student, it's worth it. So, I told her I would uh and that she uh myself, Mrs. went through the trainings to become qualified hope squad advisors. Um we meet every other week in my classroom and I teach the lessons. Mrs. Alred completes the activities. We meet with Mrs. Boswell every week to talk about what we're going to be doing and then the kids really take it from there. My name is Vanna Bond. I've been nominated to be in Hope Squad for the past three years and I've accepted those nominations in order to help my peers. The Hope Squad
011acts as the eyes and ears of the school providing a connection between struggling students and adults who can offer assistance. >> Hi, I'm Parker Simpson. I was nominated into Hope Squad to get people involved. Each year, Host Squad has a motto. This year's motto was we hope you find the host squad. You can help any day. Hooray. You can do anything because you are not alone. >> Hi, my name is Macy Freeman. I've been nominated for three years and I love being able to help out with this squad program. Um, like Mr. Fresco said, we meet two times a month and one of the main things that we focus on um within our lessons is the hope approach. Um, the hope approach is heads up, offer support, provide information, and empower peers. Um, modeling the
012hope approach can sometimes be difficult having some hard diff and difficult conversations but I know using these steps um it's way easier and in the next slide we have a couple pictures of the hope squad itself this is us um practicing some of these hard conversations using the hope approach my name is Miller I've been nominated for squad for three years I've accept those nominations to help us need and on this next slide called web connection. We learn that we're really strong together. Each year we do make the world a better place where we give the students cookies and in doing so we make connections and bond with them. When at the beginning of the year students were more hesitant to talk to us because they didn't know us or trust us. But once we
013had given them the cookies, they were more trustworthy for us. >> Um, next we have cups of kindness. We usually do this around Valentine's Day. We give the student body and staff cups of hot chocolate with kind of stickers on the cups. And along with this, we also do cutout cups and we allow the student body to write kind or messages on the And we hang these up on lockers. >> Each year we do hope week where we hide ducks in classrooms and if one of the students finds them, they will bring it to the office and get a bag of lightsabers like these. On day one, we do red light, green light, and trash can football. It really seems to bring students together and break up their small friend groups and make them more
014like friends with other people. Um, on day two, we do the balloon race and where students get a bag of lifesavers if they make it to us. >> On day three of the ghost musical chair and activities and games like these really help bring everyone together and that's always on day four we did Minecraft and spun. So with Minecraft I noticed that many students didn't have device with them. So when they went in, they would share with another student and they'd work together to get higher up on the leaderboard. And then with Squad, everybody shared the same common goal of trying to not get hit by. On our last day of hope week, we do hope floats. Um basically hope squad version of your floats. And along with um hope floats, that's a nice ending
015to the week. And I like that posters that we do have. Thank you to Mrs. Wingert who makes them. I I have had um my friends and other people personally come up to me and say, "Oh, I'm going to make sure I'm there on that day. I need to make sure that I get that fear flow." And I think that's something super cool to stay see. And I see a big amount of attendance that is risen during that week. Um I think it's a nice conclusion to the week. And speaking of conclusions, I'd like to thank you so much for letting us talk to you today. And I have I hope you have a great rest of your evening. >> [applause] >> fully separate consideration on the consent agenda. There was an addition um on
016the bill list. >> What's that? >> There was an additional um an additional check on the bill list that's been that was added today. >> [clears throat] >> That's it. Motion to approve the consent. >> Second voice. Are you ready? Lower. >> Yes. >> Mson, >> yes. >> Nelson. >> Yes. >> Frick. >> Yes. >> Yates. >> Yes. >> We had a finance committee last night. I don't know if one of you guys want president's day. Thanks. get lots of those requests. >> I don't we don't have any problems. >> Yeah. Um in 2022, I believe it was, we decided to move over uh from this building to the Joy A building, it's worked out very well. It's spacious, plenty of room for storage, plenty of room for the staff. Um the air conditioning and
017the heat work and so there really no complaints. Uh however, we know that the preschool program is going to vacate the Joy building uh this summer and that will leave the building just about empty. We'll have Jody Olri there and that's about it. So we started Oh, well, we want to go across the parking lot. You know, the internet connection's better over in the main building. We have it the internet signal just beamed over to the a building. And so sometimes that can be spotty. For the most part, it's pretty good. And um and so then uh we just ran with it after that. And so we you'll you have a map there at your desk that kind of shows where we envision people being. So we bas basically would take over the old office.
018you know, where the staff was for the preschool program before that, the junior high. And um, of course, Leanne's the district office secretary, so she would have that front area that people would first come in. And then the principal's office would be the superintendent's office. And then, uh, the old counselor's office where Karen Jones had her her spot for many years. Um, that would be, uh, Steph Kerry and Jennifer Mo. And, um, then next to that, uh, There's not a door to get in there from the office area. We have to go out to the hallway, go around, but the old computer lab over there and enjoy building. I don't know if you remember that, but that would be for Becky McPeat, special ed coordinator, and Jod Ori. And Jody has several hats she wears.
019She's the transportation secretary, the prek secretary, and she also does our student information system we call CIS. So, she would be in there, and then there probably be a lot of room for special ed documents to be stored and whatnot. And then because uh the preschool programs are going to New Boston in Apollo, um uh that's going to displace Jeff Long, the technology director. So I called him to see if he had any interest in going over to that Joy building and he thought that would be fine. It's whatever we need. And so uh we thought he would do well in the old band room. Uh so then um but then we had another idea. We thought, well, you know, we still have a preschool room that's not going to be used. It's air conditioned
020and it's also heated. And so we thought just as you come in the west door right off to your left is a large room. It used to be the choir room years ago. And so that could be the new board room so that we wouldn't have to tear down this room and set up this room every month. And that room could just stay up in the board condition, you know, at these tables, you know, year round. And we could also have other staff meetings there, you know, in between the board meetings during the day. And um and plus it's easy access from the parking lot. You know, you don't have to walk down hallways and you can just uh right inside the door has a a bathroom nearby. And um trying to think of anything
021else. It might save a little money because then with the old a building, you can't turn off the heat or electricity because we have uh things there that are sensitive to heat. So we don't want them freezing. But but we could take the temperature down to, you know, 50 degrees, 40 degrees, and then we wouldn't be using as much electricity. Uh but then we would be using electricity over the main building, but do there probably be a little bit of a savings there, negligible. Um and uh we could probably do all of the district storage in both buildings. We thought at first we'd just take over the stuff we we access often and then, you know, either just walk back over the act building for the stuff we hardly ever use or or bring it
022over eventually. We thought at first we wouldn't have to. Um so I thought, well, we'll bring it up at a border meeting. It's not something you necessarily have to vote on, but we would like like consensus. So if you don't feel comfortable with that, then we won't do it because it's not, you know, the end of the world we're happy where we are. Um but um but it is something I think probably be a better place for us. And I don't know, maybe just open it up for questions or maybe other comments that you have. >> Do we still retain savings from moving the the preschools back? Transportation costs. >> Yes. Yes, we're going to save quite a bit of money by um by having them back in schools. And mainly the main [cough] cost
023savings will be transportation because right now we're paying Johanna's It's about $138,000 a year to take uh Alto preschoolers over to Joy in the morning and to bring them the the afternoon set of Alto kids back over at the end of the day. And then there are two routes in the middle of the day. First, they got to take them home and then they have to turn around pick up a new batch for the afternoon. If we eliminate just that for transportation, that would save us $138,000. And I couldn't believe it because I thought it'd be far less than that. And so I actually Johanna's bill and it's actually itemized on there. So, it was it was really something and uh so yeah, I think it would save money definitely to to preschool back in
024the buildings. Are you guys okay with that idea? >> Was everybody involved in this? >> Yeah, everybody. I'd say I don't know Leand would you say everybody's actually excited about >> excited >> that's right >> okay >> in a good way >> yes in a good way >> yes that's right >> okay well that sounds good >> all right I think I have enough direction for that board agreements that are highlighted evidently the changes are highlighted Yeah, we uh talked about it last month and and uh so I guess if you're feeling okay about it, we can go ahead and adopt them as just new board agreements. Uh and to refresh everyone's mind, uh the board met with a representative from the Illinois Association of School Boards who came out and led the process to
025revisit these protocols. And so they um came up with these changes and so you know it's something to just make things a little more efficient, a little more organized. >> I guess we take action. >> We can no money involved >> a motion to adopt That's all in favor say. >> Okay. So, this was a part of what we did last month. Uh but we didn't have document yet. The auditor hadn't gotten it to us yet. And so, um, so now we have the main the this is the actual annual financial reports, the thick one, but uh, what you have is kind of like a summary or just another another iteration of it. And so, um, it basically is just all the financials uh, not only for this past year, but they also throw in
026a few from uh, previous years. So, it covers all of our grants. covers just basically everything that deals with our finances and it's an annual report that they give and we actually have to submit this to the ROE [cough] submit it to the state of Illinois and it's on file there so when they run their stats they're running their stats off of this doc >> well since it's money I don't know if it is play it safe I'll make a motion to approve second. >> I'll second call when you're ready. >> Mson, >> yes. >> Nelson, >> yes. >> Frick. >> Yes. >> Yates. >> Yes. >> Lower. >> Yes. for school calendar. >> Oh yes. I have two exciting things to talk about. The uh the calendar that we we've uh basically just has
027two main changes from what we do this year and the first one would be parent teacher conferences. Uh in the past we've done Thursday students come early dismissal staff does conferences all evening. Friday, students come, the early dismissal, staff stays late for conference day. Well, uh we'd like to change that to uh Wednesday students come early dismissal, staff stays uh late for conferences. Then on Thursday, the uh the staff just comes. The students don't come on Thursday. They stay for five hours to have parent teacher conferences. And then because they um had five hours of student attendance on Wednesday, five hours of staff conferences Wednesday night, and five uh hours of parent teacher conferences on Thursday, no one has to come to school on Friday. And yet it still counts. So I called the state
028to make sure that was kosher and asked them to tell me how to code it on the official calendar. And they gave me that information. So if you're okay with that, they'd like to give that a try. Rockidge this system currently. And then the second change would be um to have spring break uh a week later, actually two weeks later. We usually have it at the end of third quarter. So this next year that third quarter will be done on March 12th. And so usually that would start spring break. Instead, this time we decided to give it a try where spring break would start the following Friday, which is Good Friday, and then it would be all of the following week. So, instead of it being five days, it would be six consecutive days, which
029would allow families maybe to take a little longer vacation if they want. The weather would be a little bit milder at that time of year, two weeks later. So, you might be able to get more things done in the yard or whatever. And uh but other than that, well, so the start of the school year would be on the 11th with teacher institute days. Then there's something that they used to do every year, but now they haven't done it for quite a while, but they want to start the ROE has a staff institute on October 9th. It's a Friday. And so, but you're only allowed four days for teacher institute. So, we'd have two in August, one on October, and then one at the end of the year. And so, we used to have in
030back this year, we've had a teacher institute on the first day back after Christmas, but they have an allowance. Instead of calling it a teacher institute, you can call it a teacher inservice. It's kind of silly how you have to have those ticky tack names, but we can have one of those on that Friday still. So now instead of having four teacher days of professional development, we would have five in this next calendar. And um uh that teachers did vote, I should back up, the teachers did vote on that conference idea and also the delayed spring break. And that information is in the cheat sheet uh that you find in your drive. And um the last days of school would be for the students would be on the 19th of May, [cough and clears throat]
031Thursday the 20th. And the only other change that might come down is uh the state of Illinois has been in the practice the last five or six years of having a holiday on election day. They haven't voted on that yet. They're still in session. I don't know if they will, but if they do, we would just extend the school year one more day, which would still allow the teachers, as long as we didn't use emergency days, to uh be out on a Friday, so we wouldn't have to come back uh after Memorial Day. I don't know if you have any questions on that. I encourage the staff that if they should try it this next year and if they like those kind of changes then when they make the next calendar do two years worth
032of calendars so that people can make long-term plans you know so if they want to go on a missions trip or they want to go on a cruise um or if they need to schedule IEPs you know for the next year that sort of thing they'll be able to to know long in advance what the calendar so that's what I encourage them to do I said but until you live these two changes because you may not like them. >> Have any questions? >> Yeah, I think second voice. All in favor calendar say I >> 6 nothing wasn't >> okay. Uh the last one, board uh policy, second reading, >> press policies. >> The press policies. The Illinois Association of School Boards has a a bevy of lawyers that [cough] go through school laws, new ones,
033you know, court cases that have changed, and they go through our policy manual. It's about this thick. And uh they they uh they go through the whole policy manual once every five years. So, they just take a little chunk about every quarter. Well, this is the new quarter. And so, this is the second reading. And uh you don't want to read all those policies because it you know it's it's quite a lot of information. So I found the the cliffnotes on it just the summary of the big changes. Uh the first one is that now requires administrators to immediately notify law enforcement of any report regarding a threat of gun violence on school grounds. It also mandates that notifying parent of notifying the parents if the threat originates from a student. And then another one
034of the changes is uh it mandates drug and alcohol abuse prevention, abduction education, and CPR AED instruction at the high school level. So we want to, you know, train the kids and a lot of this stuff already takes place, but they're wanting to make it an actual regulation. And then regarding cyber bullying and bullying, they're going to expand the definition to include um unauthorized digital replicas uh such as AI generated deep fakes. So, um, you know, taking a picture of Don and putting big muscles on him, you know, that that AI team fake stuff, but you know, they can do >> taking my muscles off. >> Yeah, they taking your muscles off. Uh, and so, as you know, this could be done in a very hurtful and uh a very meanspirited way. And so, they
035want to include that in the uh, you know, the definition of bullying. And then uh, also regarding mental health awareness, requires district to provide student education on mental health and illness and include suicide prevention helpline information on employee ID cards because before it had to be on student ID cards but now they want them to be on the employee ID cards as well. Those were the major changes. The rest of them are changes in footnotes, changes in grammar, um changes in clarity, you know, it's just stuff that you wouldn't be too interested. That's it. Vote to adopt and it's about policy revision number 120. >> Yeah, you have no choice but we can pretend you do. >> Yeah, you can run on your own, but you just made the changes. >> Yes. >> And it's
036good to review it once in a while to hear the good information. Second [cough] ask [clears throat] us if we're in favor. All in favor say I. I see. >> Motion passes five nothing. And I lied to you the other time when I said nothing. >> Yeah, that's right. >> You know, I've been a superintendent now for something like 19 years and I've been waiting for the day that I vote. You know, when accidentally not paying attention when you say I that I'll say I I'm still on zero. >> Oh, that's good. >> So, I just jinxed myself, but Who wants to start the administrative report? >> Hi. >> Okay. >> We ended December with our holiday concert. It was cold, windy day, but parents and community members still came out. Kids sang free songs.
037They got to talk to Santa. We did some crafts and had some snacks. So, it was it was a good night. and I wasn't here last month, so I just wanted to recognize um the Sedorin and Marston families for the second year in a row have donated me bundles to preschool and we were able to give those to 19 families this past year. So, we just really appreciate the community support. >> I'll go for the junior high real quick. Um I just want to take an opportunity to kind of give a shout out and Thank you to our staff, advisors, and students. Um, they did a great job presenting Hope Squad. Um, but like the pictures and just like what it is in our building and in practice, like they're showing a lot of the
038the really good pictures and kids seeing kids doing really positive community type things in our building. Um on the back end though, I can tell you like junior high sometimes kids go through rough stages and phases where um they definitely know that they have people connected that they can reach out to and talk to and know that they're getting in touch with the right people. Um where I've sat in a lot of meetings with Mrs. Boswell with some tough situations that hope Squad has stepped in to really like bring that to the forefront and really champion and help some kids in a really positive way. So they they they create that huge positive uh community in our building that kids see and the fun activities, but they also help us get the resources in place
039to help kids um in need. So I can't thank them enough for them and Mrs. bringing that to our building three years ago because um all student organizations are good like we had student senate and different things but that's just another so huge shout out to so high school wise uh we are well [clears throat] right when he got back from from break we had our fresh off freshman and sophomores and then our juniors and seniors we had uh separate meetings of advisory to kind of go over reiterate some of our policies and rules and expectations. Um I felt like the students just needed a reminder. So that's what we did with that uh the first week. Um we finished our uh winter benchmark, [cough and laughter] our second round of stars with our student
040uh students. Our class registrations are going to be starting here at the end of January for next year. um the the five essentials, you guys haven't I'm not sure if we talked about that um in here, but it looks like that won't be coming out until uh the first or second week in February. And so they'll that'll be being pushed out to students and parents and community members to get their input. Um as you guys were probably aware of that, something in the past. I know last year was kind of pushed out this this time of year. Uh but apparently this year they're bumping that back a couple uh weeks. Um overall uh sports wise basketball's um varsity playing playing pretty well. Um trying to get through some sicknesses. Um you know it it is
041that time of the year of course. Uh girls basketball is also 18 and five. Um wrestling wise Eli Burns uh happened to become well please vote for him this week. He's be he was nominated as the uh for the athlete of the week for the KWQC. Um so that that voting goes. Um I believe this might be either today or tomorrow in regards to getting that done. Um but yeah, we've got postseason play happening of course about the same time as the next board meeting. So other than that, it's been a fun beginning of this discussion. Thank you. >> My turn. >> Uh Mr. Robertson was was gifted a tickets to his whole family tickets to the Illinois game tonight. So, they drove down to Champagne to see the Illinois game. So, I was checking
042the score. They were losing earlier. Nobody snickered. So, um that's where he is tonight. So, I'm happy to be here with you. Our kindness club has started back up. They've had their one of their first meetings last week. They're just got so many plans. Mrs. is like I don't want to spoil it, but she's got lots of things in the works for the spring for our kindness club. Um, our PTO has the daunting task of I I thought they were crazy of filling a stocking full of everything, toys, candy, uh, gloves, hats, all the things that were super cool. And we handed one out to every single student at Apollo. It [clears throat] was fantastic. Um, it was a big task, but it was really, really, really well received. Kids loved it. Uh, let's see.
043We have between December and yesterday are on our 12th new student. So, I'm not sure what's going on, but we have 12 new students at Apollo just since the middle of December. So, I Not really sure where all the housing is or what's happening, but um they've been great additions to our building so far. We're really enjoying our newies. Um otherwise, we had a few weeks in the gym when it poured rain the one day, just a couple of little spots. I think Doug was well taken care of that. That kind of shocked us a little, but otherwise everything is kicking off pretty fabulous to start our last semester. So is anyone going to share with >> you? Mrs. McCro before the meeting with her updates she want to celebrate. She said the winter benchmark
044assessment scores are in Boston's got a lot to celebrate. 53% of the students are at or benchmark for ELA in the fall 19% of the students are above the state benchmark only 18% below 59% of students are at or above benchmark in winter for ELA with 23% of students being above the state benchmark and 13% below 35% of students at or above benchmark the fall 3% above state benchmark 39% at or above winter 5%ove uh they look at the Boston Elementary School scores compared to the rest of the district called 19% of students who are at or above for ELA and MAP. um students that scores are higher because they have the same research based for students in K through five while they don't have research based compared to first grade using teacher or district
045provided resources she commented she also discuss regarding the curriculum being too advanced for students but really show that taught fidelity teachers believe in students ability to meet high standards students the occasion pass. What do we >> got to do? >> Nelson. >> Yes. >> Brick. >> Yes. >> Gates. >> Yes. >> Lower. >> Yes. >> Mson. >> Yes. like a five minute break or something. Thanks for coming everyone.