CCSD21 Board Of Education Meeting - February 19, 2026

001Good evening everyone. The CCSD21 February 19th, 2026 regular board of education meeting is called to order. Uh Carrie, would you please take attendance of the board and the student representatives? >> Yes, Jessica, >> I'm here. >> Debbie, >> here. >> I am here. Arlin >> here. >> Iana here. Bill >> here. >> Angelica here. We have a quorum and Selma, Alex, >> and Fared, >> welcome. Wonderful. Welcome. Would everyone please rise for the pledge of allegiance? >> I aliance to the flag of the United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> All right. Thank you everyone. Welcome everyone to our February meeting. Uh I'd like to specially welcome Sher Clump and Ariel Lzner from well Sherry from the Park District

002and Ariel from the 10th Congressional Dems. Is that >> I wear many hats. >> Many many hats. But thank you for coming to our meeting tonight. Um any individual physically present at our meeting tonight wishing to address the board must complete a comment card and provide it to Miss Del Rail. Written public comments may also be submitted by emailing us at district21cccsd21.org. Um, and I would just like to welcome everyone. February is our shortest month, but it's packed with celebrations, observances, and so many fun days like Groundhog Day, President Washington's and Lincoln's birthdays, beginning of Lent, beginning of Ramadan, National Tater Tot Day, National Women Physicians Day, Chinese or Lunar New Year, and it's also Black History Month. Um, and I just want to recognize the diverse community that we live in where we can

003celebrate together. We can learn from each other, each other's cultures and holidays. But we have a packed agenda tonight. So, let's get right into it. We'll start with staff communication superintendence report. >> Well, good evening everybody. Uh, thank you for joining us this evening. We have three presentations um this evening. Um, and so we're going to jump right in, uh, and start off with our comprehensive literacy plan presentation. Uh, so I'm going to turn it over to our director of literacy, Amy Brother. Good evening. All right. So, um, tonight I wanted to talk to you about our road to alignment. Um we have been um working under um the comprehensive literacy plan since it was rolled out in January of 2024. Um as our new district strategic plan um rolled out, we have worked to

004um align um literacy practices along with some of the teaching and learning goals um that are within our strategic plan. So this year um in literacy as we're working to do that underneath the strategic plan um underneath uh teaching and learning we have leaned into goal number three which is focusing on developing strong a strong professional development plan and really working to ensure that teachers have a deep knowledge base um in those evidence-based literacy practices. And we've also leaned into goal number two. We've been working as an ed services team to create a curriculum review cycle um that and uh develop a process for reviewing materials for adoption. And this year um I'll talk about it at the at the end of my presentation is about um what the process that we're doing for our

005literacy review for kindergarten through fifth grade. Um, with the comprehensive literacy plan, we've leaned into goal number one, which is that every student receives highquality evidence-based literacy instruction. And goal number two this year is that every educator is prepared and continuously supported to deliver highquality evidence-based literacy instruction. So, within that, um, we have continued to strengthen teacher knowledge, um, with evidence-based literacy instruction. And we've done that um through looking at and really building teachers knowledge base with um understanding of how students learn to read, how they connect letters and sounds and then in the end interpret meaning um from the words that they're reading. Students, people who are learning to read, right? Language is an innate process. Reading is not an innate process. So developing those deep instructional strategies that deliver that explicit instruction and

006that systematic instruction is what we are leaning into through our scope and sequence through what we're leaning into with all of the professional development that we're doing. We are also leaning into um the seven components that the state of Illinois has identified as those highlevel um components that we need to lean into. Um the seven the five pillars of literacy are typically phonological awareness, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. But Illinois has also recognized that oracy um is a huge piece especially with our multilingual learners that that starts first. If kids can't hear it and speak it, they have difficulty reading and writing it. So that's an overarching um set of skills that we are developing with our students as well as writing. Writing is the last to develop. We have been working K to8

007um increasing writing um writing response as well as genre writing and composition um within all of our language arts classrooms as well. So, as we've been looking at um each of the different um goals within the strategic plan as well as the comprehensive literacy plan in elementary um connected to goal number three of our strategic plan um is the creative professional development plan. And then the Illinois comprehensive literacy plan is every educator is prepared to continually support um will be continually supported to deliver high quality evidence-based literacy instruction. our instructional our literacy instructional specialists and our language services instructional specialists have been pairing and partnering and doing a lot of PD um at the district level both in the summer as well as virtually in the fall and then going into classrooms and supporting teachers

008um with developing those instructional practices by unpacking standards based on specific skills and knowledge and concepts um that are embedded within each standard. really diving deep into those researchbased practices. What is the research telling us? Um and then how are we teaching vocabulary, deepening comprehension and promoting discussion? Um utilizing scaffolded strategies um so that all students can access and comprehend and respond to grade level text. Um integrating EL strategies in everything that we do. We have 51% EEL in our district and those strategies are integrated in every PD that we deliver um supporting students moving from that decoding to fluent and automatic word reading. And in preK, we've been focusing this year on developing the concept of what phmic awareness is and that oral language development piece. Um we've been working on strike and meaning

009comprehension through vocabulary instruction, structured discussion techniques and knowledge building. And then last year as we Alana um and I presented on the slant implementation resource um with special education staff. So implementing that structured literacy resource with our um with our IEP students that have been identified um with a reading um goal so that we are supporting them um in developing those decoding and encoding um skills. Um underneath goal number three in the strategic plan creating a professional development and goal number two um with every educator in middle school we've been doing a very similar process. We've been unpacking standards at all of our content area meetings as well as really diving in deep to those four PLC questions um and how when we're when we're unpacking those standards, how they connect um to those four

010PLC questions when they're when they're planning for instruction. Um we've been utilizing strategic scaffolding through accessing grade level text um responding as well as um writing. We've increased written response and building writing stamina with our middle school students. Um, we've been working on strengthening comprehension through sentence level analysis. We've been bringing a lot of concept into talking about the syntax um of of language and the syntax of writing and how that connects to comprehension um as well as um good writing. We've been working intensely and I should say the teachers have been working intensely on building vocabulary through that systematic instruction with Greek and Latin roots um and developing morphology um within each of the in each of the students and really strengthening those vocabulary skills. And then the same thing with the slant um

011resource implementation um with special education staff in um in middle school as well. One of the wonderful things that's been going on for the last couple of years is we've done a lot of interdisciplinary work um in science and social studies classrooms to integrate the ELA standards um that are in the Illinois um um the Illinois state standards. So our language service teachers facilitator and our LES and our LEC's in each of the middle schools have been working with science and social studies teachers to integrate literacy best practices um within their classrooms. So turning content area into a reading and writing classroom as well. They've been working on unpacking their standards and then how and um interpreting with expressive and language demands that are within those standards as well. They've been working to align rubrics

012with the updated WEDA standards. Um they've been working intensely on those student engagement strategies. This right in middle school um middle schoolers are middle schoolers, right? So, we really need to work on how are we how are we getting kids excited about reading in middle school um and engaging them in that writing process and then integrating information and explanatory writing using the CER protocol which is a claim evidence reason and that transitions over to their high school work as well. So one of the things that I am very excited about as we have been um building deepening that knowledge base right it's not about it's not about programs that we can purchase it's about the teachers that we have in the classrooms and building their knowledge base and building the support that teachers need um

013and deepening um deepening that base and I want to thank you all for helping to support through the through a budgetary um realm of bringing letters professional learning to the district. If you're not familiar with it, um, letters is a language essentials for teachers of reading and spelling. It is a nationally recognized program um that brings in the concept of the science of literacy and it's, as I've explained to the teachers, it's kind of like taking a a graduate level master's linguistics class. So this year we have 42 staff members across the district um interventionists and specialists and special education resource and kindergarten through second grade teachers that are participating um in this um professional learning um and next year actually in May we're going to start our cohort number two. I've had so many

014emails and such inquiry um that you know the the teachers that are in it right now are are are talking to their colleagues and are very excited about getting in because how how much they're learning um and they're making such good connections and I have some great quotes that I'll share with you in a minute. Um and then we're going to start cohort three in the fall of 2729. Um it is a 2-year program. teachers committed. Um that is the level of commitment that we have with the teachers in this district, right? That they have committed two years of their time. Um eight professional development days within those two years and 80 to 100 hours of work outside of the classroom um putting in and learning and working together. the teachers in a lot of

015the schools have even have even developed letters cohort groups where they're if there's three or four of them in the building they're all working and learning together so a few quotes that I have from the teachers as as they are doing their bridge to practice pieces which is they're taking their learning and then telling us what they're doing right with some students that they've identified um as their as their um learning cohort um every time I am teaching now and this is the best one because I have to tell you. I was in the building and she walked up to me. She said, "Amy," she was like, "Every time I have teaching now, I picture the different processors in my students brains." She goes, "I can see them. It's like I can see what's happening

016as they read." Um, this has been especially important for my English language learners who benefit from repeated exposure to vocabulary before encountering words in print. Um, it has challenged me to look beyond fluency and examine comprehension and vocabulary more deeply. Learning to read is not a natural process like learning to talk. The brain must um build reading skills intentionally. An early intervention makes a lifelong difference. This was in a a chat to me. Amy, did you know the brain has evolved over a 100,000 years to support the development of spoken language, but language alone has only been in existence for 12 to 15,000 years. Those are the right when you when you get those and and she was and then she saw me in the hallway a couple couple weeks later she was like I

017just can't believe it. So the excitement for learning um is is happening in our teachers as well. Um is it an easy process? Absolutely not. I learn new things about it every day as well as the research comes out. So I'm really excited about where we're moving with um this opportunity for teachers. And with that, I want to introduce to you um this is Katie Eckleman. She is one of our elementary literacy specialists that came to us last year from Texas. And Katie has been newly elected to the Reading League of Illinois as one of their board members. Um so she is she is starting her journey on that process. Um, as most of you know, right, I am a I am a firm leader and a believer in growing leaders within um the the

018teams that I work with. And um Katie is one of those leaders that that we are growing. Um she is also um in in some intense training. Then she is going to be our district 21 letters facilitator. So, she has been going through all regoing through all of the letters training a second time and going through um the letters facilitator training so that she can then take over the cohorts um that we're having and provide that in-house PD for um for teachers. So, we are very excited to have Katie and her her newly appointed both positions. So, thank you for your work. So the last my last slide um is um about our district um strategic plan with goal number one is that curriculum review um process and and cycle that we're moving into. And

019then connected to goal number one in the comprehensive literacy plan is that every student receives highquality evidence-based literacy instruction. As I said before, it's not about the resource. It's about the teachers that we have right in the classroom. But teachers also need those high quality resources to do that high quality work. So, um we are moving it. We and I talked about this last spring. Um we have been we've started our process and we'll be working through that this spring. This fall we worked with um our ed services team to build um the review cycle. Um we've been developing the com the literacy curriculum review um process. Um we talked to um Ana Figueroa and myself and Alexander Alvarez talked to neighboring districts in district 59 63 and district 15 to just talk about their

020process where they were at what they were seeing with the data with the with the resources that they were piloting just kind of give us a bridge of where where we needed to move. In January, um we worked with the literacy and language service specialists to develop um an evaluation tool um that based on um the reading leagues tool as well as um knowledge um a knowledge building tool and a couple of other ones to build our district 21 um evaluation tool that we will be using to evaluate the resources that we will be reviewing. Um we identified key evaluation priorities um and we sent an interest survey to staff to be part of the literacy leadership committee. Um, we want to ensure that we have a diverse representation, kindergarten through fifth grade, from all

021different roles within the district. And teachers will be receiving information about that in the next this week or early next week. Um, in um at the end of February, the uh specialists and some of the directors will be listening to vendor presentations. We've narrowed it down to four of them. Um we are working um one of our priorities to ensure that we have a high quality um resource that um supports both Spanish and English so that we can really bridge in those PLC structures of those comprehensive planning and teachers can actually sit and work together um so that the resource supports both Spanish and English um Spanish bilingual and English um so we'll be working that with that and narrowing the resources down to three and then in March our literacy um leadership committee will

022come um into play and they will sit and they will listen to um three different presentations from three different vendors. Um we will work through um the evaluation tool and teach them um how to use the evaluation tool and how we will be utilizing that for our data analysis. And then they're going to have about three weeks to a month to go back to their buildings, talk to their colleagues, look at resources. There'll be samples in the buildings that and everybody will everybody in the district will have online access to all of the materials. So they'll be able to get some feedback from their colleagues and then um toward the middle of April they'll do they'll utilize the tool um and then we'll do a data analysis at the end of middle to end of

023April to make a determination of whether we will move into a pilot for next year of two different resources all based on data. If we have one, right, if we have two resources that are that are equal um in comparison that people are interested in, we'll move into a pilot phase for next year where we'll pilot two different resources and then if we have one that's an outlier, we will move into a um an early adopter where we will have a designated number of staff members that will early adopt for next year. And then in school year 27 and 28, we will do a district-wide implementation of um the chosen new resource. Questions? >> Just a curiosity question. You're collaborating with um districts 59, 63, and 15. Are they also using the letters uh tools

024and framework? >> They are not. So that excites us a little bit with with with where we're at um in in that process. Um some of their right teachers are interested in that, but no, we're we're we're ahead of the game on things. So that's great to hear. >> Thank you. >> So I've got two quick questions. One, where does at home reading fit into this program, which to me is one of the driving forces in literacy, period. >> Yes. reading at home, right, is is something that we have been really pushing every single day. Two years ago, um we started a um a push for, right, um with reading challenges at home and what we launched the bean stack program um which is in coordination with the Indian Trails Public Library and Arlington Heights

025Public Library, which is a set of challenges that kids have and they can participate in um for outside reading. So that is something that if every child is reading at home because the single most positive indicator in research is kids get better at reading when they read. >> So my second question then is the question I get from parents is often my kids are really smart. They're done in 12 minutes with their reading. Why don't they have additional they've got nothing to do at 6:00 or 7 o'clock. Why don't they have additional assignments? Do we differentiate in terms of the reading? Absolutely. So when you when you look at reading, right, we look at we look at texts that also develop students interest, right? We want to peique their interest. Um because if we're telling

026them to read all of the time of what books to read and I'm looking at you, right? Because in middle school, we've really worked a lot to give lots of choice during your book club units. Um so you're going to ga, you know, gauge that interest. So looking at different complexity levels of text, looking at different genres of text, um getting kids to do that and then thinking about right kids that are reading reading above grade level and then how in the classroom right are they are teachers supporting that as well. So looking at that whole differentiation piece. >> So are we doing more of that with this program than we did previously? Would you say >> I wouldn't the program is not going to drive that? The instructional strategies are going to drive that.

027So what we're looking at Yes. We're always looking at, right, does a program support differentiation? Yes, we will be looking at that. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Any other questions for Amy? I mean, I I have to say at the middle school level, seeing the books that my kids are reading, I read them alongside them. They see characters that look like them, that look like their friends, that go through the same challenges. It's a market difference from what I remember in in junior high. Yes, we had junior high back then. >> Right. I mean, it's it it it makes me a little sad that they don't have as much exposure to the classics, but I think what they're reading is so much more engaging for them. >> Great. >> That Did you have a question?

028>> I don't have a question. I just want to give a shout out to all the teachers that are committing to the letters training because it is quite an undertaking and to commit for two years and I know that there's a lot of work that needs to be done outside of those eight professional development days. So just a shout out to them because it's going to do great things. So it is and I'm excited what it's already doing and the email is going out tomorrow for cohort number two. So very exciting. >> Thank you so much. Thank you. >> Thanks, Amy. So, our uh second presentation of the evening um is actually kind of a uh two presentations in one. Um first, um uh Dr. Childris is going to provide the board with our winter

029student performance um data update. Uh and then our director of MTSS, uh Dr. Shapiro, is going to be uh giving the board an update on uh student attendance. Um so, Dr. Jus, >> good evening. Just really quick before we get started, um, thanks Carrie for emphasizing the amount of work because it is a lot of work, additional work for the teachers that are participating in the letters training. But I will tell you as I go through the buildings, teachers are stopping me to say, "Thank you for this opportunity." And I tell them, "Thank you for giving the extra time," right? And taking the opportunity. So that's always right very refreshing when we can offer something that people are just so excited about and asking when the next cohort is going to begin even knowing that

030it's a lot of work. So thank you for acknowledging that as well. So, I'm going to start with uh winter map um data. Well, actually our demographics, right? As as um you know, I always start the presentations with this just as a reminder just in case we have new people tuning in and listening um to the presentations, right? So, we have um about 6,200 students in the district. 51% of them are ELELS's. About 16% of our students have an IEP. Um and about 46% of our students are low income. And then we also have our racial and ethnic uh demographic breakdown there. um in the pie chart, our English learners, right? Top three languages um have stabil stabilized over the last couple of years. So we primarily Spanish speakers um and then with uh Russian

031and Ukrainian uh following up the next two top languages in our district as reflected in our programming that we have here in district 21. Just a reminder that this summer map reormed um their data. So right this is our kind of our new baseline data because this you know again in the summer basically after COVID right they wanted to reorm um and so um looking at right previous cohort data they did that and so this is our new baseline data based on those new norms. So the first slide here you see our reading growth and achievement the composite uh first through 8th grade we don't give map to our kindergarteners we start at first grade um and so keep in mind that the growth is right how many what what percentage of the students met

032their growth targets and keep in mind that it's on a bell curve right so we want to be always want to be higher than 50% um but realizing that it is a bell curve um And so that's a reasonable number. And then looking at our achievement again, first through 8th, um we've had a little bit of an increase there um from fall to winter um with 2% of the median growing 2% there for the achievement data. I wanted to also show um some of the achievement data based on grade level. Again, we know that we have high English learner population in our district and so all of our children, regardless of whether they're EL or non-ELL, um and then a number of our students with IEPs, uh take the MAP um assessment. And so this

033is important for us to keep in mind as we know that the higher the grade, the more um exposure that our EEL students have to English. And so I think that that's pretty much part of what kind of influences some of those data points of that progression going uh increasing as we look at the reading achievement data following through the grade levels. These next slides have both the um achievement data again and the growth by grade levels. So we'll see that there's a little bit of a dip there for uh first and second grade looking from fall to winter. Um and that could be any number of things. Keep in mind again that right the rigor at which which the assessment is growing. um the the the rate at which our EEL students are acquiring

034their English is probably not quite as rigorous as the assessment is growing fall to winter particularly in those first couple of grades. But then as we look at our third grade data, we see a pretty significant jump in terms of the median achievement jumping from uh the 40th to the 46th. Um, so that's a pretty nice jump and that is where um [clears throat] we do change language acquisition where most of all of our students are receiving a good chunk of their instruction in English by third grade. And so that definitely is influencing that. Again, keeping in mind that if about 3,000 students in the district, right, are EL learners, that that change of language acquisition is definitely going to swing some of the data, the data points. We continue to see that pattern when

035we look at um fourth and fifth grades. Um and so again looking from fall to winter um seeing those uh 3% gains there for those and then you know again keeping an eye on that growth number um 52 at uh fourth grade and 54th at the fifth grade of the students make meeting their growth targets is um definitely in the direction that we want to start to see that data grow as we look through uh sixth through 8th grades. again, right? Seeing some increases, not as significant of a of an increase from fall to winter for sixth grade. It's kind of common, right, when the sixth graders are adjusting to middle school. Um but then seeing some really nice uh gains in the median um there with seventh grade at fourth percent and eighth grade

036at seven uh percent um in terms of their achievement uh the percentile the median percentile on that. Any questions about the reading data before I jump into the math data? >> I just have one question. Is all of this data in English? Like they were taking the test in English? >> Yes. >> Okay. Yes, we do give our students that receive Spanish instruction at the lower grade levels. We do also give the Spanish MAP assessment if they're receiving the instruction in Spanish. I didn't put it in this presentation. It is something we analyze and take a look at, but some of the numbers are kind of on the lower end. So, just wanted to give a broader stroke and also keeping in mind that there were a number of presentations this evening. >> Yeah. [laughter]

037All right. Now, looking at our math data, as again, as a reminder, we have this year adopted Desmos as our new math uh resource for elementary. Um and so, um what we're seeing when we look first through 8th grade, right, is some flatline there between fall and winter. And there's it's not uncommon when you adopt a new resource to see either flat data or a dip even in data as teachers are learning to use the resource. Um and students are learning to use the resource. Um so that's not an uncommon thing to see. Um but we're seeing you know that flatline when we look first through ETH. And when we start looking grade over grade, we're seeing some right up and down, you know, depending on the grade level. Again, keeping in mind that it's

038a new resource and also um we are constantly looking at what is being taught by the children and then thinking about okay, what is being assessed, right? And so there's there's definitely I'm sure going to be some alignment in terms of those pieces. Um, and then also keeping in mind that um, with a new resource, teachers are trying to adjust their pacing as well, right? Trying to make sure that um, that they're making sure that our students are learning what they're trying to, you know, um, get them to learn during those time spans, but also with it being a new resource, sometimes the pacing does get slow down a little bit. [clears throat] when we get to our um sixth through 8th grade there, right, we start to see kind of those bumps um with

039the achievement kind of increasing there. Six, seven, eight. Um and so that's definitely data that we uh the direction that we want to see that data moving looking, you know, closer grade to grade and the and looking at the growth. We're pretty consistent with the growth hovering, you know, all through the grades around that 50th um right that 50th percentile group there with 50% or more of the students meeting their growth targets. Again, we definitely want to see it above that, but we're kind of right there on the bell curve and what you would expect to see. Um the achievement again, right, seeing some flat data looking from fall to winter. Um but again not not uncommon for a new adoption and same here for uh fourth and fifth. So those data points are looking

040fairly consistent in terms of the growth and then also uh what we're seeing with the achievement six through uh 7th. While we've had our middle school Desmos, um they did do a an upgrade of it and so it's now amplified Desmos and so there are some changes that were made um to the resource and so again while it's not a completely new adoption, it is some new pieces that our teachers are getting acclimated to and you know also the students getting acclimated to. So um we definitely think that there's right that that is impacting the data a little bit in terms of the achievement and growth um as they reaclimate to some of the changes that were made in the curriculum resource. Um what questions does anyone have? >> You get off scot-free tonight. [laughter]

041>> Thank you. I'm gonna turn it over to Alyssa. All right. Good evening. Thank you. I am looking forward to presenting some updates about attendance this evening with you. Um so just a refresher when we talk about attendance. Some of our main def three definitions that we talk about are the average daily attendance or the ADA um which is that average number of students who are present on any given day or reporting period. Um so that average number is you know the number of students there um divided by the number of days that we've had or on a one particular day um out of the total number of students that might be um in the total. Chronic absenteeism is a big one that we're going to focus on tonight which is students who are missing

04210% or more of the academic year for any reason. Um this includes excused absences as well as unexcused absences and suspensions. And so that's often a misconception because we will hear commonly, well, but it was an excused absence, but that still counts in our chronic absenteeism numbers. Um whereas chronic truency is missing 5% or more of the previous 180 school days without a valid excuse. So what is an excused absence or an unexcused absence? Um these are what we have defined as a district last year. you have all voted on um to approve that these were uh lined with the board of education um by ISBY and so these are the excused absences and what is considered a valid cause um so illness medical appointments dental appointments doctor recommended quarantines funerals religious holidays and legal

043appointments whereas an unexcused absence is missing the bus oversleeping work and babysitting um last year we had noted that we wanted to um continue to have conversations around vacations and trips. Um we didn't at that point have any data on how many students were taking vacations and trips during our school year, but I will be presenting that in just a moment. Um so these are some of our top reasons for students who are absent um across the district for prek through 8th grade. Um so you can see on the left hand side we have our absence reason and then in the middle we have the number of students who have used that absence code. So that has been inputed into our um student information system by our office of this is the reason that they're

044absent. And then all the way on the right hand column we have the number of days and the total number of days that um those students have taken uh for that reason. So as you can see a large percent of our students have missed a day at least for um illness. Um and vacation or out of town is our second largest reason for being absent. and we have 1,147 students who have been absent for over 4,000 school days missed for vacations. Um that ranges for anything from missing a day here or there because they were out of town to some of our families who have extended absences for various reasons. And so any day of absence goes into there. Um we did talk about making sure that our families are calling in. That is part

045of our parent and family handbook. Um, so we're really encouraging our families to call in. And so those are that unexcused absence because our office is not informed, which is that third largest reason. And then finally, we have medical and dental appointments, which is an excused reason. Um, but we want to make sure that our students are in school. So, as we're having conversations with families, we know that sometimes those appointments are unavoidable, but if you have a 9:00 dentist appointment, you can come to school after and at least get a half a day's attendance. So, um, those are lots of the conversations we've been having of trying to keep kids in school as much as possible or make those appointments outside of the school day. >> Can I ask a question really quick about

046the appointments? Yeah. >> So, that number, does that mean that that many kids missed an entire day of school but used an appointment as the reason >> or this includes people who were even gone for just a partial >> day? Great question. So, these some of it could be half days and some of it could be full days. um for students to have a full day or a a full day of attendance, students can't miss more than um an hour of instructional time. And so the way that our school day is set up, if a student misses more than 30 minutes, so let's say an elementary school student arrives at 9:45, they do have a half-day absence um because of the number of instructional minutes out as outlined by ISBY that are required in order

047to be the clock hours for a school day. Um, so that is where it gets a little tricky because we don't do by the minutes. Um, so it it could have been that they were there for a half a day. This is just that total grew up. >> And if I could add a question, the absent office not informed, does that get included into the unexcused absence because it's not listed under the in the previous slide as unexcused absences? >> Yes, it is a an unexcused absence because we want to make sure that parents are calling in. We've been pretty lenient with it. Um, you know, we've had to call families because it is still a practice that we're trying to get into. Um, but we still have families that are not calling in and

048letting us know. And it is a safety reason. Um, right. That's why our offices are calling every morning to make sure that that student is accounted for. Are they at home or are they at school? We just need to know that information. >> Um, just a quick question. What's the difference between like how are are students treated differently if it's an excused a absence versus an unexcused or what's the what's the difference there >> in reality? No. Um right at this point it's we just want kids to be in school. Um that is our ultimate goal is that we have kids that are here and in school. When a student has unexcused absences in a large number, we can refer them to um North Cook uh regional office of education has a truency department, they

049will then continue working with students. Um we are super fortunate you have approved and we have been able to fund and we have four liaison, family leaison that have been working with our families and so we're able to provide a ton of support that ultimately we're not really looking. It's helping us to better understand why kids are absent now that we have these reasons in these codes, but we're not looking, you know, the state does collect that information. So, on the back end, the state totals on the um report school report card that will appear, but here at school, we're just we just want kids in school learning. >> Do do we have any sense of how we compare with other districts by category or in general in terms of absences, how we're doing? Chronic

050absenteeism is a huge problem across the state. No, I know that. I know that. >> So, you know, we've been I've been um working a lot with just different people who oversee attendance and I know our liaison are also working they have a little network that they're working with other liaison in the area of trying to just figure out ways that we can get um families here and learning from each other of what are you doing that's working and how do we continue to build that because it's again ultimately our goal is just to get kids in school. Arllin, I can um from an anecdotal perspective, particularly as it relates to vacations, um it is a real problem across the area. Um I I've had conversations with my colleagues um at various times and and

051we have often um discussed the total number of days missed school um from that uh kind of vacation slashout of town. And so that is uh we're in kind of on track um with our surrounding districts um in some of that. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Um so this is looking overall at where how are students falling in that um overall being chronically absent. Um so we are about 17.6% of our students across the district are chronically absent. um we have about 57.58 who are in that 95% or above which is what we really want to see. We want students um to be here and missing less than 10 days. Students can miss up to that 10% which is more like 17 um but we want kids again here in our classrooms learning.

052So that 95% is really our goal. Um we have seen a great increase in our number of students who are here 95% of the time versus um last year where we were at at this point. Um so we have about a 10 almost 11% increase in that number of students who are here um 95% of the time as well as we've now decreased almost 5% the number of students who have fallen below that 90%. So we are making a lot of progress in that area districtwide. This is a look at our chronic absenteeism numbers um by grade level. And so we can see that our earliest learners are struggling the most. And so we can see that there's that that upside down bell curve of prek and K and one are having those higher numbers

053of chronic absenteeism which is a a big challenge because we want them in our classrooms. that is when we provide those foundational learning skills and you know social emotional skills and all of those really important pieces to help set them up for success later in the classroom. And so really we have been trying to push for our students in those earlier grades because we know that this is a trend we have seen. Um then it kind of gets a little bit better as we go into those intermediate years and then as we see as students kind of get towards those last years of middle school it creeps back up. Um, so making sure that we're addressing that that piece as well. So if you guys can support your friends and tell them to come to

054school every day be great. >> Alyssa, before you go to the next slide, I just want to emphasize and again in case we have any parents right that are joining us virtually dollar for dollar that our best opportunities to close achievement gaps are in the early years. So when we see that those are also the children that are the most chronically absent that makes it very challenging thinking across the board right there is definitely a correlation between students being absent and students achievement rates absolutely there's a correlation there and what we'll we also will find is some of the students who need the most intervention if they're not here then they're also not getting those additional intervention supports um that we offer a lot of intervention supports our our our board we right we invest

055a lot in people to support children who have bigger learning gaps but if they're not in school then they're not getting those the the advantages of those additional supports >> question to both of you actually with the younger grades since this is chronically absent and that includes excused absences are we seeing this might be due in in part to a greater likelihood of illness that is there's more illness illness for younger children >> in some cases. Yes. Um right we know that our kids when they coming to school for the first time it's their first exposure and there are lots of germs and so um some of it is that some of it is also just educating our families and parents of when is too sick to come to school. Right? We spent several years

056we and we were just talking about it before of saying stay home. You sniffled, you coughed once. Now you have to stay home. Now it's like send them unless they have that that fever that's an actual fever. 99 is not a fever. Send them to school. Um, you know, so it's it's re-educating our families on some of those pieces. And so by the time they've gotten older, they may have heard that a few more times. Um, but it's continuing to have that. There's lots of other reasons. um our pre-K numbers. One of the big things we hear a lot is some of the the child care components of it's a two and a half hour day and so having somebody there to get the student off the bus um and that's for kindergarten as well

057because we also need to make sure that an adult is there to pick up the student off the bus and so those just add some pieces. But illness is a big one. >> Yeah, I would just add to that that I think that um parents think, well, they're only in kindergarten or they're only in preschool. they're not missing that much. It's not a big deal. But again, that's why it's so important for us to have those conversations and emphasize we can close the gaps a lot easier when the gap is smaller. And it's smaller at those younger ages. Further along it goes, if we have a seventh grader that's two or three years behind, that's a lot harder to close than a kindergartener who doesn't know all of their benchmarks for kindergarten. And we can

058intervene right then and close those things. But if the if the children aren't in the school, then that is not going to happen. >> And people say the same for vacations, too. >> I hear parents say all the time, "They're still little. I can pull them out. We can go on vacation in the middle of the year. They can't do this when they're in high school." >> Yep. >> Well, >> yeah. Well, and being the mother of a kindergartener and he's on the borderline just because he's sick all the time with a fever of 102 or can't go to school and I'm like, "Come on, I need 24 hours to, you know, to get you in that." I know that illness is a huge at least for for us it's been in pre-k and kindergarten.

059But I'm wondering and I know um at PO I'm constantly you know I send an email to the attendants and I get an email back from the nurse and she's like okay well as soon as his fever drops below this or no diarrhea for 24 hours you can send him back. So she's always been really great in educating me. Is that kind of across the board and all the schools like I know we have like an attendance email that we can send and I always get emails back. Are we putting that information out there when the parents are are calling in for for six and and other things? We are we are trying. Um that is I would not say the consistent message, but it's really been working with our office staff. Um when was

060that like Novemberish? Our attendance um secretaries did go to more of a full-time role or at least additional hours, which has been huge. Um allowing them to be able to respond to those emails because at the beginning or last year when it was part-time, they were just trying to get through all of the calls of students who were absent and then maybe didn't have the the time to respond. But now that they have that, it's um, you know, allows them to have those more in-depth conversations or follow up with families and have some of those conversations of there's been a lot of absences. Remember, like yes, if you have 102 fever, please stay home, but if if you don't, we can you can come to school. Um, so it's educating all of our staff as

061well. And so that is something that our liaison have been great. Um, I've been meeting with our liaison and our building admin and lots of our office staff monthly, um, which has been really helpful. and we're reviewing our um the actual students and talking about what could that conversation look like for this family because we know these are the reasons they've been absent and so um trying to build the capacity so that our our staff knows as well as then our families know that. All right. So this is our chronic absenteeism numbers by subgroups. Um so you can see there is some variability in our subgroups. We can see that our black or African-American as well as our Hispanic have that higher chronic absenteeism rate with 21%. So then we're going to break it down

062by school. So these are our prek. So this is Turkington, Hawthorne, and Whitman, just the prek. So you can see that we have some high numbers of chronic absenteeism across all three buildings with our prek setting. Um so those early learners, we want to make sure we're getting them to school. um each and every day. This is our elementary schools. So this is just K through five. Um and we have seen some great growth. So on the right hand side we have highlighted the schools that have um decreased their um chronic absenteeism by over 3% from last year to this year from February of last year to this year. And so we can see that those six schools have all decreased more than 3%. Which is exciting to see that we are on the right

063track in those buildings. Um Tarkington, Longfellow, Riley, Kilmer, Twain, and Whitman are making that progress. Um we can see that some of those schools have a little bit lower to begin with. Um [clears throat] but we are making progress in lowering those chronic absenteeism numbers. And then same thing for middle school. London and Holmes both decreased. um it was about 2% at London and 4% the decrease at homes. Cooper stayed about the same at 15% with chronic absenteeism from last year. Additional questions. >> Do we know what Tarington did to get such a huge drop? [laughter] >> Great question. So, I think Tarkington was a big one that there are a lot of extended absences. And so, in 2024, ISBY passed that you can no longer drop students for um we used to drop students

064if they were absent 10 or more consecutive days. Um whereas then they said that we could no longer do that if we knew that they were planning to return or we have exhausted all measures. Um so that meant if we knew you were coming back, we wouldn't drop you. We did start having some conversations with families of how this impacts if you're going to be gone for six weeks. We've had families that are gone almost an entire trimester. Um what are some of their options? And so some of those families have chosen to unenroll and then reenroll their student. And so I think that plays a big role in that. Um because then they're not just missing grades for an entire trimester either. Um things like that. Demographically, um, Tarington is one of Tarington is

065one of our most diverse, our most diverse, um, buildings. And so, um, buildings. And so, I definitely I definitely think some of the longer think some of the longer term term vacationing pieces are because of vacationing pieces are because of some some of that diversity. of that diversity. >> Any other questions? >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Thanks very much. Demographically, um, >> Thanks very much. Um, so just as kind of a a postcript, um, particularly around the the the vacation out of town, um, absences, uh, it's a real problem. Um, and I think we need to have some really frank conversations as a community. Um, and it may not be the most popular conversation to have. Um but I think you know the data bears out um that this is something

066that is an impediment um to the progress of uh students um and you know we will absolutely continue those those education efforts and those advocacy efforts um but I think even at the policy level um you know we are going to need to have some conversations um because um you know it's it's uh I understand um the the kind of the uphill battle battle um that we are we are fighting there. Um but it's an important conversation to have. So I just wanted to make that note. >> Absolutely. >> Mike, you're absolutely right. >> Can I also ask how does the health center play into this? Like are our when our students are calling in sick, are the nurses referring them to the health center? Are we encouraging families to go there? >> Yes. So,

067that's one of the things that I think um you know, our our health offices as well as just you know, our our building staff are really trying to make sure they're engaging in those conversations. Um I think that's one of the nice things about having you know the board being supportive of expanding the attendance um secretary role to a full-time role. it it provides additional capacity to be able to engage in those conversations, excuse me, and to really kind of of um you know remind uh you know parents that that that is a resource that is available um and and ready to assist them. So um yeah, I definitely think that those advoc advocacy efforts um continue uh and will continue. Okay. So, um we have one more presentation for the evening. Um and uh

068we're really um kicking off a process here that we have been discussing um for really quite some time. Um, you know, as the board knows, um, we, uh, as a district, um, have, uh, really, um, our enrollment, uh, while it dipped a bit, um, during COVID, which was not, you know, uncommon across the area, um, as you'll see, uh, in our presentation, really has rebounded, uh, to pre-COVID levels um, which is not something that is necessarily common um, around our area. We have maintained a pretty stable enrollment um, whereas um, other enrollments have declined. We certainly have seen shifts in um patterns in terms of where the concentration of our student population resides. Um and so we have buildings that have uh you know schools that have seen a large influx of students over the

069last several years for various reasons. Uh we also um know that um over the past um you know uh 8 to 10 years um our programming has shifted um and so you know case in point we'll talk about uh Kilmer um as an example who have modular classrooms um to accommodate the population but part of the the the challenge is that in addition to kind of a regular elementary experience we also have a bilingual Spanish program in that building we have a bilingual Russian program in that building Um we have expanded uh student service programming through across the district. Uh and um the the programming needs quite frankly take up a lot more real estate than they may have 20 25 30 years 10 years ago. Uh and so when you put all of that

070together, um we really do have a situation where at this point in in the district's um life, uh we need to start having some conversations about how we are ensuring um that our um student attendance zones uh are really reflecting um the the um the capacity of each of our schools. Um, we want to make sure that we have schools that we don't have to have art on a cart. Um, that we don't have to u really limit our programming because we don't have the available classroom space where we need to have it. Um, we also know that that you know we are not a a community that is we're landlocked. um we don't necessarily have the the capacity to just go ahead and add, you know, classrooms here or there and and um so

071we really need need to take a look at the distribution of of of where our students live and and which schools they attend. Um the last time the district uh looked at its its attendance boundaries um was 22 years ago. Um we are in a very different world uh than we were 22 years ago. Uh and so while uh it is a uh um a process that is can be very um stressful, very emotional uh and not without controversy, uh in order to ensure that all of our students um have access to wellbalanced uh and used uh facilities uh and that we are meeting the needs of of of a shifting population um both geographically and from a needs perspective. Uh it really is time for us to be taking a fundamental look um at

072at how our attendance boundaries um are um drawn. Knowing however um that this really is a community-based conversation. Um if you recall in June um we had an initial uh uh conversation with our uh consultants from Walpert who by the way the district had been working with for several years as we have been looking at our demographic analysis, our enrollment studies and our building capacity studies to really try and understand um the data uh as it relates to um all of these questions. Um but um we uh the board um really I think wisely uh understands that this is a process that really needs to be um parent communitydriven. Um and so um you know what we're uh launching tonight really is I think um a process that really does as best as it can

073to capture that uh to have this be a not an administratively driven process, not a board-driven process, but a parent and community-based process. Um and so um without uh much more ado, I want to introduce Andrew Bishop uh who is our consultant from Walpert, Inc. Uh Andrew will be um our facilitator um and as we put together our MAP uh committee um which he's going to talk about u process um and and kind of the the um reasons why and and and how we're going to tackle this. Um I wanted to introduce him and turn over uh the presentation to Andrew. Andrew, thanks for being here. >> Thank you, Dr. Connley, President [clears throat] Riddick, members of the board. I'm Andrew Bishop from Walpert. Um, I'm going to be uh going over some background data

074as we kick off this uh boundary redistricting process and then go over uh just some timeline, some some basic um uh guide points that will, you know, get us to where we want to be hopefully by June. So, first we'll go over the background data. Uh as as Dr. Connley mentioned, you know, if you look at our enrollment over the last 10 years, uh we uh you know, uh District 21 saw a pretty noticeable decline in enrollment between 1516 through 18/19 and it looked like it was starting to flatten out in that 1920 school year. And then COVID happened. And so we we uh CC uh 21 lost about 600 students between 1516 and 18/19 and then another 500 after the pandemic. But what's happened since then uh beginning 21-22 is we've been seeing a

075rebound in enrollment and we're now at preandemic levels. So that's a that's a great sign. Um it's not something I'm seeing in a lot of districts around the country. Um you know the trend has been declining enrollment. So for us to even be back at that point is encouraging this. Um what's interesting though, oh there it goes. Um what's interesting is if you if we look at our enrollment on a um a grade by grade uh basis and we look at the cohorts over the last couple years, when you look at the 1516 through 1819, you see some of our largest classes uh highlighted in red there, they had transitioned through the system. And so they were uh beginning to be replaced by smaller incoming kindergarten, first grade classes. Um and and you see that

076highlighted in this chart with those blue columns right in the middle. Um as we've come out of CO, what you're starting to see is we're starting to see a return of larger cohorts, some larger class sizes that are um beginning at the elementary, you know, kindergarten, first grade level. Those students are going to be progressing through the system. And that's going to, you know, as um smaller classes in the middle school are pushed out, um that will inevitably lead to larger uh classes at the middle school level as well as as these cohorts come through. So this table, this chart here, uh this map shows the current attendance boundaries of the districts. And as Dr. Connley had mentioned, these haven't been touched in 22 years. So, um, you see all nine of our elementary schools,

077they all fit nicely into our, uh, middle school feeder patterns. Um, the chart here on this on this map though, this shows what we're calling our utilization. So, that's a measure of the enrollment over capacity and that gives us a utilization rate. And overall, the district has elementary utilization of about 86%. And you can see most of our schools um are, you know, um, fitting in right in there. 83, 84, 85, 86%. Uh we have some outliers though. Uh Kilmer is over 100% utilized. So we are having capacity issues at at that school and then when you look at um Tarkington and I I I'm sorry uh Riley or Whitman, you know, we're below 80% utilized. So we have some available capacity at those schools to maybe accommodate some of our more impacted schools. And

078so when we talk about bound boundary redistricting, um there are possibilities for us to even out enrollment, utilize some of this excess capacity that are underutilized sites and provide relief at sites like Kilmer so we can reduce um reliance on some of those relocatable classrooms. Again, this shows our middle school u boundaries and utilization. And what you see here right now, we're we're kind of packed to the gills at the middle school level. you know, we have about 36 surplus seats when we measure enrollment to capacity. And so you see two of our our middle schools are already overutilized and homes is is right there, you know, just a touch under. So really um you know, as we talk about enrollment in the future and the and growing enrollment, that impact is going to hit

079these middle schools uh where we're already, you know, already feeling it. And so um this will be things that we want to discuss. Um this next slide, this just shows student density. And again, you know, when you start looking at some of those uh those sites with the underutilization, uh some available capacity. When you look at our schools on the west end, what you see is we see some, you know, some older communities. We see some established homes and we're not seeing as many students come out of those homes. But as you move into Tarkington, you move into Kilmer, you look over at Frost on the east end, we have some very dense neighborhoods with a lot of kids coming out. And so how we can uh, you know, better balance some of these dense

080neighborhoods and and maybe um, you know, begin to fill up some of our other schools will be things that we look at with the redistricting committee. So quickly, this uh this table here is what I call a live attend matrix. This is going to just show us our students uh based off where they live and where they attend. So the way you read this is the the um the maroon uh boxes those correspond to elementary the gold middle schools and then the green would be out of district enrollment. So students who live outside of CCSD 21 and are coming into our schools going down. So the rows going down that is the boundary of attendance where they live and then the columns going across would be where they attend. So just looking at field in

081that first line we have a total of 561 students who reside in the field boundary. Of those 561 447 are actually attending field 53 are at um at Hawthorne uh ECS and then um the other 61 are attending the other eight elementary schools. And so what that means is excluding the the prek students at Hawthorne about 11% of the boundary enrollment is going to other schools and that's about normal if you look at um district average you know each boundary is sending out about 8 to 10% of their kids you know so we we have a noticeable amount of student movement. Um, conversely, when you look going down and we look at the schools that are receiving students, um, you see that a couple of our elementary schools are, you know, about four to 5%

082of their enrollment is coming from other boundaries, but it's, um, it's PO, it's Riley, Tarington, they, you know, uh, PO's enrollment, 32% of the enrollment at PO is coming from other boundaries. So, that may be because of the the programming at the school that is attracting some of those students. And so, um, again, these are things that we'll want to talk about in the redistricting process, how we accommodate some of that programming or if there are, uh, opportunities to provide that programming at other sites. When you look at the middle schools, again, you know, it's, uh, very little movement between our schools. You know, about 2 to 3% of our middle schoolers are moving from one school to the other. So, it's it's um, again, you know, it's not a um an impact on those

083schools when we're already overutilized. So, it's uh won't be something that we necessarily need to address at that level. Uh this map here, this shows some of the known residential development. And while we don't have a lot of development happening right now, there's about 327 residential units, it's about four projects right now that are in different levels of planning. So, um that that are actively moving. I know there's some plots of land that are maybe being considered as some additional housing, but um we're still waiting on information on those. But even with 327 new residential units, that's new possibilities for families to be moving into the district, families bringing students. And when you look at this on a uh boundary by boundary, you know, what you see is, you know, uh we have one project

084in, you know, different elementary school boundaries, but at the middle school level, three of our known developments are in the London boundary. And going, you know, looking back at the previous slides, London is already overimpacted. So news new housing opportunities bringing in additional families to an overimpacted school is going to you know um again you know just cause more over impact and so things you know things that we need to talk about and consider you know um in this process you know Dr. Connelly brought up some of them. The the last boundary update was 22 years ago. You know, our um how how do how do the current boundaries reflect the um the nature of the district today. So, we'll want to expand on that with the the committee. Um you know, enrollment has rebounded

085since 20 uh 2122 and we're at pre- pandemic levels. And so, you know, uh with some of the trends we're seeing, we're going to probably expect to see some more increases in the future. New residential opportunities are going to uh increase uh enrollment opportunities for new families. Growing population of English language learners in the district is uh necess necessitating how we um handle our additional classroom space and how we're utilizing those facilities to accommodate some of those students. We have expanded special education offerings at many of the the schools in the district. uh we also know that lower class sizes in CCSD21 allow uh the for the district to provide high quality education. So um you know if you know these are things that we need to consider about you know cramming kids you know

086too many kids in one site we want to make sure we have balanced schools um not over impacted so that we can continue continue to offer the same level of programming at all of our schools um in the same manner and we also you know like I I mentioned earlier we want to reduce the reliance on portable classrooms and so as we consider these things. Oh, there it is. Um, so, uh, we're going to move into talking about the redistricting process and the goals. So, um, it's important to understand the district's goals in this process. As shown on the previous slides, enrollments rebounded since 2021. The community has grown and changed. Current enrollment trends have necessitated the the need for more classroom space for special education and language programming. Uh that shift has changed how

087the schools are utilized and how we can accommodate those students in the future. Through the redistricting process, the district hopes to provide capacity uh and you know relief at Kilmer, balance the uh better balance all of the other elementary schools and um examine efficiencies for the district to prov you know continue to provide high education at the middle school level as we're becoming overimpacted. And so um this next slide, this is going to go over this redistricting process. So this will be a little bit longer um as we talk through this. So th this um chart here just shows the road map of where we want to be with this redistricting process. So we had a process kickoff in about November um between Dr. Connley, some of my Woolpart colleagues, we talked redistricting, talked about

088some of the goals, some of the needs of the district. And so that was our our our early process. Tonight we're talking about, you know, some of the data that's been collected, what is, you know, what we're examining and, you know, where we're going. Um, so we're going to probably be setting up a project website after this. Um, I need to speak with uh the district's other consultant, Giana Harrison. they're doing much more of the the public outreach, but any of the information we share with the board, any information we share with the community, that's going to be all public information for um everybody in the community to access. So, we're not going to be hiding this behind a wall. We want to make sure everyone has access and can provide their input. >> And

089Andrew, I'm sorry to interrupt. I'll just note that um we do have a web page that is operational. Um it uh has some of the early information FAQ but that so we already have a landing site so that as the document bank continues to grow we have more and more information that that can seamlessly um be uh made accessible to the community. So >> thank you Dr. Con. >> Um so after this meeting what we're going to be doing is we're going to begin a phase of project um collecting um boundary criteria. We're going to um we're going to deploy a survey. It's actually available right now. Um, and it's going to be open for about three weeks. And we're going to be asking the community, what is the most important criteria that we look

090at when we redistrict boundaries? Is it keeping neighborhoods together? Is it um is it making sure that kids aren't crossing major roadways? You know, different things that we want to consider in this process. And so these are going to be benchmarks that um I use with a committee um to start formulating some options so we can really make sure that you know um we're we're trying to meet the community's desires while also addressing the district's needs. And so like I said that um that survey will be it's available now and it's going to be open until March 13th. Um afterwards I'll be compiling that data into a report that will be made available to the board and on the project website so people can see exactly you know what criteria was most important to the

091community. So at the same time that we do the criteria survey we're also going to be um doing uh boundary committee applications. And so again everybody's going to have the opportunity to uh apply to be on the committee. Um that will also be open for the next three weeks closing on March 13th. And after that point, uh, Walpert will be working through the applications to select committee members. I think we're going to be there'll be about 30 that will end up being on the committee. Um, and we're hoping to have, you know, um, a committee mixed with, uh, parents, community members, um, school site staff if, if they have applied, and really try to get representation on that committee for all schools in the district. >> [snorts] >> So the boundary um the boundary committee

092is going to be meeting three times between April 8th and May 6th. Um so what we'll do is April 8th um the boundary committee will meet for the first time. We'll meet in person and we're going to talk about the the needs of the district uh the desires of the community that the the results of the criteria survey and then start working on developing some initial options. And um after a week we'll uh meet virtually. We'll discuss you know um again you know like what we came up with from the prior meeting how we can continue to make adjustments. Um ultimately by um by May 6th we'll have hopefully about three options that we feel comfortable with to bring to the public. And in in May, we'll have some community outreach where we can have

093open house style meetings. Um display some of the options, have some electronic versions of those options on a like a a web map locator so people can determine how they're impacted in each option. And we'll give everybody those community members a chance to come out to meet me, to meet uh district administration. Um I don't ask that the committee members uh necessarily be there or if they want to, they don't need to identify themselves. Um really, you know, I'll I'll be the face of of those meetings so that if people have questions or concerns, they can talk to me and then I can share that with the committee. Uh ultimately what will happen is we'll have a another survey after those uh community meetings. We'll collect that feedback to determine what people's preferences were on

094those options. And then after that point, we will uh the committee will meet again. We'll then you know again examine the criteria surveys the district needs the results of the community feedback so we can make any final revisions and arrive at a recommendation to the board. Um that recommendation should be uh ready by uh early June and then we would present that um at the June board meeting for the opportunity for the board to uh review it, ask questions and and hopefully vote on a boundary recommendation. And so the next slide here, this uh we won't go too much into detail. This uh it's a lot of boxes, a lot of information. You guys have it um available to you. But again, it's the same timeline. It just talks about some of those benchmarks we

095talked about um from, you know, doing the criteria survey, forming the committee, uh creating options, revising options, um community feedback, and then coming up with the final recommendation by June. And so following this meeting, we have uh the criteria here already available. It's available in our four main languages, English, Spanish, Russian, and Ukrainian. I will be collecting all that information, compiling all the results into one uh final report that we will present to the um district before April and then that will be what we work off of as a committee to start uh creating those options. And then again we also have um our boundary applications. So there are applications in each of the four major languages to give um you know u members of our community opportunity to um provide their feedback you know

096as best they feel comfortable and give them the opportunity to join this committee. And so uh with that uh just want to open it up and see if there are questions. And uh before we go to questions of the board, I also just kind of want to um highlight a little bit more about the roll out of this um information to our parent community and to the community at large. Um so tomorrow um we are queued up um to kind of really start that pretty aggressive um uh communication campaign. Um and so uh we will be sending out a messaging through Parent Square. Um the website is already active. Um we're also going to be leveraging um you know kind of our normal communication channels through press releases and and you know um but then

097also social media and but and not just social media like we put up a couple of posts. We will do a lot of posting but also um targeted posting. Um so we will actually be uh kind of doing that that paid social media so that uh and by zip code by the way um so that it will be placing you know this information actively into social media feeds. Um because we we also want to make sure that the community at large not just you know our parents um you know the majority of the community are are what we call is non-users right? They they don't have kids in the system. um but we want to make sure that they are very aware of what's going on and have the opportunity to um provide their feedback

098and you know their thoughts and also um if they so our desire applied to be part of of that committee process. So um um we had our initial um kind of roll out uh earlier this week with the staff u making sure that our staff was aware uh that this was coming. Um we kind of coincided that with with the posting of the board agenda um 48 hours before the meeting. Um but really tonight was the official kickoff of getting the information um flow out. Uh and then over the next several weeks uh while the the survey period is is uh open and the application period is open, we already have queued up and planned um kind of times where we will be putting out additional social media messaging uh kind of a you know

099facts about you know what is happening. I think we're calling it fact Friday. And uh so the team has really been uh doing a lot of of thoughtful uh work uh to really make sure that we are uh just doing everything we can to get the information out uh and and and build that awareness uh because we understand that this is something that we need high engagement um of both our parent and our and our community um populations. Um but then also that that we want to be transparent. We want to make sure that everybody understands that that we are engaging in this work um and that we don't have any preconceived um you know notions of exactly how the the new boundaries uh may may appear. Um, you know, so I I feel very

100uh uh good about the work that um that Walpert and uh Cass and her communications team and and u we have brought in some addition additional consultive support from Allerton Hill uh which is a a K12 communications um uh uh network and they've been very very helpful in terms particularly with the social media and and really kind of um you know this is what they do is making sure that we get the message out there. So um so I feel very uh very good about about um how we've ceued up this work. I also want to emphasize um that uh my me and my team we are here to support the committee. We are not part of the committee. We are not going to be I will answer questions that they may have um but

101we are not going to be participating in the work of the committee. The board is not going to be participating in the work of the committee. you um are the ultimate deciders because that's what you are elected to do. Um you know, but it will be the committee's recommendation to the board. Uh this will not be a superintendent's recommendation to the board. This is going to be the committee's super you uh recommendation to the board. I just want to emphasize that because again um you know as I know this board does I also feel very strongly that this has to be um a highly engaged process of our parents our parent community and our community at large. Um you know this is uh as we noted the last time we did this was 22 years

102ago. Um so the decisions that are going to be eventually made are going to be decisions that are going to impact the future of this district for quite some time. uh maybe not 22 years um but you know for for quite some time and these are big decisions. Um these decisions have a lot of of of history attached to them, emotion attached to them. Uh and we're talking about you know people where they live. Uh and so we want to make sure that we are getting it um as right as we can knowing that it there will be controversy. Um we won't make everybody satisfied. Um but ultimately um you know this is important uh for the the uh for the future of of the district. So um we're taking this very seriously. Uh I

103have high faith in in Walpert's ability to um uh uh facilitate this. I should also note that we have no role in deciding who committee members are. Um those applica I'm not even going to know who applied unless somebody tells me. um you know those that application process is solely being operated by Walpert. They um will be the ones who are determining um committee members. So if you're really interested, don't come to me and ask me to put a good word in for you because I can't help you and I'll we'll turn it over for questions at this point. >> Andrew, I just want to thank you for the presentation, for setting out so clearly, you know, what's going to happen, when it's going to happen, what everyone can expect, and and Dr. Dr. Connelly

104for setting out what our roles are. >> Um, obviously I'm just going to encourage everyone uh in the community, anyone who's out there listening to go ahead and do the criteria survey, go ahead and do the QR code, get your voice heard. This is your opportunity to share what you think are the most important criteria to be considered. And if if if folks are interested, submit an application to be on the committee. This process will work better when we have more engagement. Uh, and I'm really I'm really excited to see what the committee comes up with. I think this is a really neat opportunity for a group of people in our community to really help [clears throat] shape what our district is going to look like, like you said, for the next easily two decades.

105Um, but does anyone have any other questions or comments? Yeah, I >> uh so fun fact, I was actually part of the last boundary change. I was over at Twain and then changed over to Tarington. So it's going to be interesting to be on the other side instead of being the student now being the parent of the students. Um but I did have a really quick question. I know that um it was mentioned in one of the slides that there has been um you know a growing population of English learners and just out of curiosity would it be possible when when you know taking this into consideration um assigning or designating one of the facilities one of the schools for these programs so that it's more stable um kind of like you know for example

106Tarkington that they had the bilingual program and then because of numbers is decreasing, it's no longer there. Is that a possibility with this or no? >> So, what I would say is that um we want to make sure um well, let me put it this way. Um the board needs to ultimately um kind of lay out what their expectation is in terms of how we are organizing our student um population, right? We are neighborhood schools >> and so we always proceed um from the uh uh baseline of wanting to keep our students as close to their neighborhood school as we can. >> I also think you al want to make sure that that we don't have an over representation of any one particular student group in a specific building. Um you know that's the other

107piece of it when you're you're looking at it from an equity lens. um when you're looking at it from an experiential lens, you know, we are a very diverse community. Um you know, and that diversity needs to shine through uh in all of our schools. >> Um so, you know, and then when we come to the the the actual fact of the matter is is that some of our programming particularly bilingual programming are going to be numbers driven and it is going to shift. Um you know so as as you know um Andrew noted um you know one of the the um uh we just use field as an example uh you know those students at field that that that need Russian bilingual programming are largely attending PO right um it's just from a an

108economies of scale that's where we have the the numbers and the ability to maintain that program um we would not be able to you know uh uh provide that programming sight by sight. So, you know, it's not necessarily unless um this board or a future board really wanted to dig in on the overall organization of the district um and and how our schools are viewed as whether neighborhood ormies or whatever the case may be. And those are all conversations that boards can have, right? um you know that is something that that um you know I wouldn't say is is going to be uh achieved through this process. It's really that would be a more much more philosophical um kind of conversation that this board or a future board would need to engage in. I don't

109know if you wanted to add to any of that. just that there's a lot of other implications with rules and regulations also, right? In try in terms of trying to keep students in their home schools and the numbers and some of those criteria pieces which is a longer than today discussion. But that's those are also pieces that we have to be very careful about and sensitive to that there are guidelines um in terms of the population and where they're being served and also just not wanting for students to be on buses for a long time. >> Um I noticed in the the timeline for February it said that the board will be asked to provide feedback on what we're looking for in a recommendation. Are we doing that now or is that something that we're

110going to get together on and provide >> like on the the proposed timeline under February? >> Yeah, let me let me just get there real quick >> in the dark blue >> because I noted a few things but I wasn't sure. >> So, this is kind of the conversation that we're having right now, right? So, um, you know, we did, you know, the board had an initial conversation in June when we kind of initially looked at this process. Um, you know, this is kind of the board's opportunity where if there's really anything you've kind of seen or heard within the process that we're laying out that you're like, not sure if I can get behind that. Um, now's the time for us to be able to engage in that and make some quick, you know,

111decisions and change if we need to. Um but again the what what we've presented to you tonight is really based on on you know a lot of the the early conversations that we've already had. Um and um you know again the the process that we feel like is going to you know get us the best information and the best work of the community as we can. >> And I just I just had a couple things not being here when it was originally um you know introduced. One thing that I would like to see when we're going through is knowing that transportation costs are are really high cost for the district, whatever recommendations we have, how is that going to affect our transportation costs? And I know also you said, you know, we don't want students

112on the bus for an hour. Like what's what will be the average, you know, time? I know you looked at transfer in and out. PO has a huge transfer in program. I'm not sure what the average bus time was, but especially when we're looking at attendance issues, if kids have an hour ride on the bus back and forth, that's a lot to kind of um ask. And then I guess my last ask would be like how are we um putting this together for current students like what what are the recommendations for and I don't know if this is coming from them or if this is a decision that the board would later have to make but when it comes to like grandfathered in if you're entering fifth grade are you going to be able to

113finish your fifth grade at the school that you've spent the last five years in or is it going to be transferred? So those are the types of things that I don't know if you know where that's kind of coming from but those are questions that I had. >> Yeah. So let me speak to both of those. Um the first is that whatever options no matter how many options um that there may be coming from the committee um my staff and I will be producing just those kinds of impact reports right so you know what would our potential increase or decrease in transportation costs be um how many additional hazardous routes um would we be ending up needing to because now we've got kiddos that are that are needing to cross you know a major street

114or or a railroad where they hadn't had to do that before. Um so that all of those those what would the staff migration look like? Um you know how many FTEEs would be shifted from one building to another as a result of of of of those changes. Um so all of those things will be vetted out um by my staff and I to be part of um the presentation not influencing the recommendations of the committee, right? um but to just make sure that the board has all of the facts um that they need to be able to to make the decision no matter what scenario um ultimately um is uh is decided upon. Um to to your second point in terms of the implementation of that and kind of what are the abilities to grandfather

115or take a look that really also depends, right? Um and so um that is absolutely a conversation that this board is going to need to engage in. Um because um you know there are potentially options, right? Uh and and as we're looking at um you know again knowing that there are no preconceived notions here about what's going to happen um depending on the the the scenario that the board ultimately uh decides upon um kind of the secondary level of conversation is what is the pace at which the board wants these things implemented. Right? um if there is a tolerance um for a longer term implementation that would allow for some grandfathering or uh legacy kind of of accommodations being made. That might mean that you know we aren't immediately going to be able to equalize

116you know everything. It might happen over time. Um or it could be that it is just very clear um that the best way to get at this even though it may not be the most popular way is to do it right. But again ultimately that is going to be a decision of this board. We will give you the best counsel we can uh the pros and the cons. Um we will make sure that that um that is you know information is very public. Um, you know, also I I I kind of want to note that that this timeline that is as being laid out is also yours to adjust, right? Just because recommendations are scheduled to come to you in June does not mean that this board has to make a decision in June. The

117other thing that we were very very intentional about is to make sure that everybody knows and I will say it for the record here that this is nothing is being implemented for the coming school year. This is not impacting the 2026 20227 school year. At the earliest this would impact the 2027 2028 school year. And by the way, this board should feel fully empowered to in June, if you don't see it, say, "Nope, not yet, >> go back to work." Right? Um, so there is no like boxed in timeline. You are in control of when this decision is made and when it's implemented. >> Yep. Go ahead. >> Couple things. First of all, to your question about grandfathering, there's a couple of us who were here when we did it 22 years ago. Um, at

118that time, it was a board discussion. It was a board decision. It was a board decision. Thank you, Carrie. Um, that we grandfathered students going into fifth and eighth grade, but we did not grandfather siblings, which caused a certain amount of concern. Um, so that is something that we can have that impact on depending on what comes out of all of their work first. Um, and and to that work, I did have a couple of questions. Um, will the committee have a demographic projection provided to them? >> Um, yeah, we will have projections that we work with um and estimates and all the demographic data provided to them. >> Okay, good. Thank you. Um you talked about the uh the timing of the decisionm so we don't really have to go uh greatly into that

119but we can extend that out especially depending on what happens with the early childhood center because that may have an impact on when we want to make a decision anyway >> potentially. The the thing that I will also say though is keep in mind that um the way our our preschool program is currently designed uh is that we have uh preschool sections um outside of Hawthorne currently at Whitman and Tarkington, right? Um so you know the potential of a newly constructed early childhood center um you know in the immediate impact is really um would impact about eight classrooms in in over two different buildings. Um and of course then Hawthorne being the where the rest of our our our early childhood um uh reside. So from a district-wide impact, um it is absolutely certainly something

120that the board can take into account. Um it it may or may not um have a a a big influence in the overall uh kind of of um impact of of a redistricting again because it's a program that would have a new home and would free up some classrooms in two elementary schools. Well, as long as we don't have I guess the goal would be not to have to do one boundary change and then follow it up with another. So that's correct in terms but what I would say is that that >> possibility we won't have to do that >> right >> I understand. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Um you talked about bringing a recommendation to the board 20 years ago the committees and it was done with in a similar manner brought four options.

121Do you see bringing a recommendation, a couple of recommendations, four recommendations for us to consider? >> I would I would say we'd bring a recommendation as well as any of the other options that we had discussed with the public. So, um, you know, again, we're going to make a recommendation based off, you know, that community feedback. Um, and so we would I I would imagine we'd bring at least three to review with one being our recommendation, but of course the decision being the boards. >> Thank you. >> So, Bill touched on a couple of historical things that happened. I just thought it was Mike and I talked about it earlier. I thought it was worth touching on. 22 years ago when we did the last um redistricting staff came to us actually bill with the

122presentation with a recommendation out of those you were not yet on the board of our >> I was on the board >> were you on already I thought you were okay I wasn't sure >> but um and then the superintendent at that time obviously not Mike >> had to recall the recommendation 10 days later Maybe >> that was that was the first set. Then we did it correctly the second time. >> Well, right the first set, but that but it was out there. >> Mhm. >> And we So, so just stressing the importance of what Mike said of getting it right the first time. Secondly, on the demographic side, there was a point in time when we were projecting 7,000 students based on demographics in terms of when we were growing to middle schools. That

123obviously turned out never to be the case but we expanded based on that projection. So the importance of getting the demographic information right which is a tricky and difficult one I know uh is something I want to stress as well. >> Yeah. Um I just I'll just say you know and when we project enrollment projections um my motto is I try to be the least wrong. Um >> Okay. Right. I I understand that. Right. And so um we will work with the data we have and you know try and try and get it right the first time. >> And the last thing I would say just a convenience for parents I personally don't believe all parents are yet using QR codes. And so what I would my based on my observations I would encourage us

124to have applications in the buildings and if somebody wants to apply and they're not conversant on QR codes or in the computer that well give them an opportunity to pick up an application and turn it in that way. >> Well the the the applications and the surveys are all electronic. So one way or the other um it's going to need to go through that process. Um again because it is being managed by willp I understand what you're saying the the QR codes are not what is driving. So this is if somebody is is looking at this presentation or watching this presentation once it's posted um from from YouTube and they are so choosing to utilize that QR code. All of the other messaging that is going out, including the social media messaging, uh things of

125that nature, um all have links, uh that are clickable, um and is not QR. Um I understand where you're coming from. There are multiple ways. We also of course um if we have any indication um that any of our parents uh need additional assistance to reach one of those links, we will provide that assistance and any of our our our schools uh can help them with that. >> Okay. Thanks. >> Any further questions or comments? Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Thanks. >> And that concludes um our staff communications. >> Wow. Excellent. So much good information. >> Um all right, we are going to move into the public comment section of our meeting. The board will allow any individual present to share a public comment for up to three minutes. Such comments should

126not include discussion of personnel matters which should be brought directly to the attention of the appropriate school official. During public comment, the board and administration will listen to comments but may not respond to the public. Uh Laticia has just handed me one comment card. Uh Ben Coleman, do you want to come on up? Uh, good evening. My name is Ben Kman. I'm the president of the District 21 Education Association, and we represent most of the people who work for District 21. I wanted to start by saying I love this weather except for the rain. I think Chicago weather teaches us all to appreciate the beautiful days whenever they happen, even if it's in the middle of February. I had a few students dissecting sheep brains in the Cooper Courtyard yesterday because it was wonderful weather

127and a little extra ventilation was nice, so why not? The first thing I wanted to say, we are appreciative of the efforts the district continues to make to partner with the association to look for ways to keep improving teaching and learning in our schools. We hope that that partnership can continue to be strong through the process of redistricting and we hope that the needs of staff will be kept in mind when decisions are being made. The second thing and maybe the more exciting thing was the opportunity for me to attend Idea Con. My principal Dave Demouth and staff at Cooper were able to support me in attending a technology conference in Shamberg last week and it was a great opportunity to learn more about esports and how other districts in Illinois and beyond are using

128video games to bring school sports opportunities to more kids and engage more kids and all the benefits that come from that. I was able to attend the national ISTY conference in Denver a few summers ago and it was there that I saw the finals of a national esports competition with teams of high school kids playing Minecraft. It was that experience that made me want to start a Minecraft club, an opportunity that I hope to see in more District 21 schools, including potentially elementary schools in the future. I found out at the Shamberg Idea Con conference, for example, that Illinois Special Olympics is a strong supporter of esports and offers programs to help middle schools and high schools bring esports to their students. I've reached out to District 214 and have found some contracts there who

129might be willing to partner with us in getting a competitive esports program started in District 21. I hope to have a more concrete proposal soon. At this point, I'm looking for more partners who can help me get this opportunity off the ground. So if anyone out there is interested, please let me know. I would like to say that one aspect of the conference was disappointing. I showed up for a breakout session on some of the safety and security concerns about artificial intelligence and how to manage them, but I was the only person there. I think that there are many powerful AI tools available to us today, but all of us have to be careful about managing the hype and being practical about its appropriate uses. Thank you for all you do to support the district.

130Thank you for the opportunity to speak and we look forward to collaborating with you and building a better future for District 21. >> Ben, two questions. Any fainters? That's awesome because usually there's at least one. [snorts] >> Good to hear. >> What do you mean with the sheep brains? >> With the sheep bra. Yes. Yeah. >> Didn't see anybody. It was just technology. >> And those are new. The association shirts. >> The shirts. Yes. >> New look good. >> Thanks. >> Yeah. Thanks. >> Um, all right. Uh, Leticia, any other comment cards? >> No. >> Uh, Cass, any written public comment? >> No. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Very good. Let's move on into our consent agenda. We received 19 Freedom of Information Act requests this month and there are board conference and

131travel expenses for the board to approve in the amount of $928.34 the attendance of board members to the Ed legislative event, the ISB North Cook Division meeting and ISB advocacy day. Uh I had an opportunity to meet with Mike Zerger and go over the financial documents. I had a few questions that Mike was able to respond. Um, does anyone need anything pulled from consent? >> Nope. All right. May I please have a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> So move. >> Second. >> All right. Jessica, >> yes. >> Debbie, >> yes. >> I vote yes. Arlland, >> Iana, >> yes. Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. Motion carries. >> Wonderful. Thank you, Carrie. >> All right, moving along into new business. on consent agenda. >> Um, okay. We have several approvals related to

132the summer 2026 construction. Uh, the first item is the approval of bids for district summer 2026 district capital projects. Um, do we does any board member have any questions regarding the bids uh for the summer 2026 district capital projects? >> No. No. >> No. Okay. All right. >> No. No, this is this is super exciting actually. Uh, may I please have a motion to approve the proposed resolution? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Debbie. >> All right. Jessica, >> yes. >> Debbie, >> yes. >> I vote yes. Arlland >> I. >> Yes. Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. >> Motion carries. >> Great. Thank you. Good luck with that. Um, all right. The next item is the approval of bids for summer 2026 roof repair projects. Uh did anyone have any questions about these

133bids? >> I'll move the motion then. >> Okay, let's get a motion then. >> Second. >> All right, hold on. >> Give it to Leiana. >> All right, you got it. All right, Jessica, >> yes. >> Debbie, >> yes. >> I vote yes. Arlland, >> Iana, >> yes. >> Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. Motion carries. >> Raise the roof. >> I like that that's in order now. >> All right. [laughter] Um, next item is the approval of construction management fees for the summer 2026 construction projects. Did anyone have any questions regarding the construction management fees? >> Okay. A motion, please. >> So moved. >> All right. Second. All right. Jessica, >> yes. >> Debbie, >> yes. Yes. >> I vote yes. Arlland, >> yes. >> Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. >>

134Motion carries. >> Okay. Wonderful. Thank you, everyone. Our last item under new business is the adoption of a resolution calling on the Cook County Treasurer and other Cook County officials responsible for the issuance of property tax bills to resolve systemic issues. Dr. Connelly, did you want to offer any remarks? Um, this is just as a followup uh to uh the conversation we had in the during the January board meeting. Um, while uh Cook County Treasurer's Office does continue um to release funds um that were due from the second installment tax bills last fall, um they again uh I think today we got an additional $2 million. um they still owe us 10 uh million from the last uh property tax collection. Uh and as we have experienced this issue, um you know, we have uh

135deep concern. Um although we are being told by Cook County that the the tax bills for the first installment of of the current tax year are going out on time, we have uh deep concerns about their ability to meet that um promise. Uh and also as of today um because of their inability to um resolve these issues um this district has incurred um a loss of of uh $975,000 in interest income. Um you know that is um really sad uh and nothing that this board um is responsible for. So, um, so we feel like, uh, and many other districts are are are, uh, uh, approving this resolution as well. Um, we feel like this is something that that, um, the public needs to understand, um, is a serious problem that, uh, Cook County needs to

136resolve. >> And to put that number into perspective, that's more than a dozen teachers. >> That simply, it's more than a dozen teachers. >> Correct. Thank you for bringing this back to our attention tonight. Uh did anyone have any questions about the resolution? Nope. >> If not, may I have a motion, please? >> So moved. >> Second. >> I wrote Bill and I for that. Jessica, >> yes. >> Debbie, >> yes. >> I vote yes. >> Arlin, >> Yes. Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. >> Motion carries. [clears throat] >> All right. Very good. Um, okay. Let's move on into board communication. Uh, first I just wanted to note for the record that the membership of the finance and operations committee has changed. We welcome Angelica onto the committee and we offer our sincere

137thanks to Arlland for his many years of contributions to the committee. Finance committee will meet again before the March meeting and of course everyone is welcome. Um, Friday of last week, Congressman Brad Schneider visited Field Elementary to talk with our fourth graders at Field. Debbie and I were able to attend his visit. Uh, he read a story called Grace Goes to Washington um about an elementary student council using democracy and advocacy to decide how to spend bake sale funds on something for their school and then answered a number of questions prepared and asked by prepared by and asked by the students. Uh, I think everyone enjoyed the visit. I think the students did a phenomenal job, not only coming up with questions, but asking them. Um, and I'm grateful that he takes the time to

138visit our schools periodically. Um, and thank you to Principal Shaver for inviting the board. I'm glad Debbie and I were able to attend that. Um, next is the board champion updates. Uh, Debbie, could you provide your update for stakeholder engagement goal? >> Certainly. Thank you. Uh, first I'd like to thank the members of the committee for scheduling a follow-up meeting for me since I missed the first one. Um, but most and most of what we've discussed has been discussed before here and just in general. Uh, their biggest item of concern right now is the fundraiser for the health center. Um, I'm quite pleased with the preliminary information that has gone out for the golf outing, especially the option of a dinner only reservation because some of us can't golf. Um, we try, but we just

139can't do it. Um, I'm also reaching out for the people that ran the fundraisers with my connections with NSSEO to get information from them and for other fundraisers coming in the future. They've done a bingo night. Um, there's all kinds of things that are coming out that we could possibly do. Um, bingo 5050 drawing, all kinds of things. So, I'm looking for looking into that and I'll bring that back to them. Great. Thank you, Debbie. Um, Angelica, would you provide an update on the securing the future goal? >> Sure. So, um, Bill and I met with Dr. Connelly, Mr. Roberts, and Mr. Frantini on Tuesday, um, to go over everything. Um, the first due date for the KPIs is tomorrow, and then they're planning on once all that is all finalized to put together like

140a dash dash like scorecard, easy to read of all the KPIs. And we're expecting that um, around spring break. So, we're gonna have another meeting around the spring break time and then are going to meet on a on a quarterly basis. Bill helped me kick it off and now he's passed it on um to me. Um so, just as a reminder what the securing our future is, there's four key pieces to it. One is to continue the strong fiscal stewardship by allocating re resources in a purposeful equitable manner and maintaining adequate reserves. Um for this first year we're going to um concentrate on that having at least 35% operating fund balance which is about four months. So some of the things that we're going to see in the dashboard are uh days of cash on

141hand year-over-year fund balance changes and fund balance as a percentage of total expenditures. And then come year two we're going to have the capabilities more to break down the budget into categories to look at more of the allocation um piece of that. Um the second piece is to continue to recruit, select, develop and retain only the most effective and compassionate staff and administrators with particular focus on student achievement and a caring culture and climate. And uh for this year, one of the main goals is going to be to achieve a 95% placement rate filling vacancies in teaching and relating services and vacancies. Um number three is to continue to maintain the safety, security, and physical foundation of the district buildings. And we're going to provide um the board and community with a comprehensive report outlining

142the current safety and security status of each district building and also develop um like a a three-year ed foundation fundraising strategy for the health center. And the last one was to establish a committee to research overcrowding in specific schools throughout the district and offer a variety of solutions for board consideration. And we just um heard that um presentation really looking at the building compa capacity, ensuring all schools are represented in the redistricting working group and quantifying the percentage of parents that are satisfied or very satisfied with class sizes through the community survey. >> Great. Thank you. Uh Bill, anything you wanted to add? >> Uh no, I'm just very happy that Angelica is taking it over. [laughter] >> Best best of luck and if for some reason you need me, I'll be hiding. >> [laughter]

143>> Well, thank you for passing the baton and for waiting in the wings just in case. Um, I have an update for the social emotional growth goal. The district 21 um district-wide behavior committee met again on February 5th. This was a longer meeting combining our January and February meetings because our January meeting was canceled due to weather. Uh, so this is a slightly longer update. Um, our committee is covering three areas. uh behavior or PBIS, positive behavior intervention systems, discipline and SEAL. Uh first we went over the staff survey of uniform, I'm sorry, universal systems of discipline. I'm still learning all the terms. Uh main takeaways from this discussion was sort of the overall lack of consistency across the schools of practices and procedures and reporting of data. One goal of this committee is to

144agree on a system uh based on consistency while allowing each school culture to flourish. Uh it was noted that now that we are in postcoid we are spending less and less time on and more and more time on PBIS and discipline. Uh we did a quick exercise to see how quickly each of us could find the board policy manual. I won but there were no prizes. Um I might have had a slight edge on that one. Um, and we discussed the various models of responses to behavior, meaning which staff responds to which types of behavior. Um, there's sort of a model one for elementary, a model one for middle schools. Some of the elementaryaries have their own versions. um and thinking about how to revise these models to be more workable and helpful to classroom

145teachers for the behavior that they would respond to and the administrators or the deans as they respond to other types of behavior um and impose discipline so that we're being fair, we're being consistent, and we're supporting students to improve their conduct here at school. Um, at the March meeting, uh, the committee will be preparing for the April meeting, uh, where they'll have parents from the district come in to talk about a variety of the relevant topics. Um, didn't anyone else have a board champion update you guys had last month, right? So, you're good. >> Um, all right. NSSO, Debbie, would you please provide your update? >> Uh, yes. Uh well this month uh we had a shining star um who was an 11th grader who was actually from the new Trier uh school district. She's

146in the DHH program deaf and heart of hearing. Um she was chosen to highlight the self- advocacy skills that she has acquired as a junior. She is already looking to into colleges on her own and is inquiring about all the accommodations that are available and as to what she will need to ensure her future success. As the date of our meeting was also National Women in Sports Day, it is appropriate to mention that she took her rowing team to nationals recently and they won nationals. So that was that was awesome. Um here knowing that it was a DHH student that was doing that. We were also introduced to the new leader out at Sunrise Lake. Anyone who's been to Sunrise Lake and met Brian Bulier, he was leading that facility for 15 years. um he's

147only the third person who has overseen that that facility. The new leader will be um Andy Picket and he's joining on July 1st, but he's already out there and the entire Slokick staff was there to meet him and greet him and welcome him to the board. Um we also talked about multiple events that were highlighted. Uh, one of the things I have not gotten out to yet because I don't do cold weather, uh, is their winter wonderland. It was several outdoor themed items. They had ice fishing for the kids. There was cross-country skiing. There was all kinds of stuff. But the most fantastic thing was they made an ice carousel. They cut a huge circle in the lake. And the ice on the lake was between 12 and 18 in thick. So it was thick

148enough. Then they took and used a made another small hole, put a trolling boat motor in there, and they had the whole thing going in a circle. It was everybody had so much fun on it. Um I've got videos I can show people later if they'd like to see it. >> Um it was so much fun. >> Uh we discussed um ESY, extended school year, and it will be returning to the full 14 days of the past. Last year was shortened due to the extensive work that had to be done on the HVAC system out at Kirk, but we've been assured that the remaining work can be finished within the standard summer break that we have, which is important because approximately 90% of the Kirk students attend ESY, 80% of the minor students, and 60%

149of the Timber Ridge. So ESY is really big for those students. Um, we had a finance committee update. We learned more about S funds and for those that don't know it is basically a state reimburse reimbursement for special ed that was only done for private placements in the past. It was if it was a co-op we didn't get reimbursement. Don't know exact the equation that's being done that's kind of being worked out. It's still in its infancy. So but we there will now be some reimbursement for our costs for special ed. Um and finally I attended a meeting out at Kirk school with the NSSO admin team along with one of the nurses at Kirk who had invited uh representative Nabila Sed. Uh she was learn there to learn about the changes in the timeout

150rooms because we're not allowed to have a timeout room with a closed door. Um that was very eyeopening to see the how impactful that has been that they can't contain a student who is being violent to themselves in a safe in a in a safe manner. It's very hard because the students at Kirk are from age 14 to 22. And if you've got a 22 year old that insists on banging his head against the corner of a door frame, it can be very damaging. Whereas now he he in the past they had padded doors. So he wouldn't have been able to do that. Um so it's going to be interesting to see how that's that subject is going to be processed through the state government. It's hopefully roll back some of those restrictions would be

151good for some students. So that's it. >> All right, great. Thank you so much, Debbie. Um, Bill, do you have an an update from Ed? >> Yes, I do, Jessica. Thank you. Um, as I was out of town last week, I was unable to attend February's meeting. However, a recording of the meeting featuring a presentation from the Robins Schwarz Education Law Firm is available on the website if anybody would like to view it. The March member meeting will be held on March the 6th. It is a virtual only meeting, so watch your email for registration if you're interested. And finally, as a reminder, Ed will be holding its third annual mini summit on June 11th. For those who haven't attended that before, think of that as a 4hour joint annual conference, a a few uh

152seminars that you could attend and a speaker, a keynote speaker at some point. Um, registration isn't open yet, but again, watch your email and you should see that coming soon. And that's it for Ed. >> Great. Great. Would you take ISB as well, please? >> Absolutely. Um, the Spring North Cook dinner is coming up. As you all know, the featured speaker will be Dr. Chris Man, who is the executive director of the Illinois ASBO, which is the Association of School Business Officers. Uh given the governor has just released his budget, his discussion of school funding in Illinois going forward would be very timely. Um I believe most of us have already registered for that. If you haven't, contact Leticia. Um registration is still open for IASB's advocacy day in Springfield on March 24th. Um if

153you're interested in attending, contact Leticia. If you have questions about it, please give me a shout out. But I'd be happy to share that with you. I will be going down for that. Finally, the consultants working with IASB have completed the initial survey and focus groups for a potential new strategic plan. A rough draft of that plan will be shared with the board of directors later this spring or perhaps early summer. And that is that. >> Um I actually attended one of their webinar uh strategic plan development sessions. I don't know if others >> attended those as well. Um the session I attended had three breakout sessions to discuss things like uh what we see as the top three strengths of IASB. Uh the most common mentioned were a triple eye conference, regional meetings and

154networking opportunities and targeted self-evaluation meetings. uh the top three things we'd like IASB to start or increase and one thing we'd like them to stop doing. Um this is where things actually got really interesting. There were probably about 15 school boards represented on the call that I was on and the overwhelming topics for change were uh increase in accountability and communication with member districts on their advocacy efforts throughout the year, not just at the beginning and the end. uh the lack of diversity at the top leadership positions both in ethnicity and age and to increase use of technology for things like delegate assembly and other events that are underrepresented by less affluent districts that either can't afford to send someone or more than one board member like to conference or regional meetings or other networking.

155Um so be interesting to see what ISB makes of these responses. Um if anyone had an opportunity to attend one of the sessions, if you want to report on that, please let me know or if you want more information or you want to talk further about the session I attended, um you know, just let me know. >> I'll say that I did attend one of the sessions that about the only additional thing to add is people really appreciate press plus and that there's a number of districts that really that's all they do with IASB. So, >> yeah, we had one board on our call that couldn't afford Press Plus. It just so happens that one of their board members is a school attorney and so she just does that for them on their own and

156it was as a school attorney that was a little devastating to hear. Um, but maybe ISB will take that to heart. Um, Arlland, do you have an update on North Cook? >> I do. Uh, I had advised all of you that we had reviewed plans at the last board meeting last month. Um, and everything was moving forward. I just sent you advisory. I'm not sure if you saw it that there is a zoning issue which unfortunately was not anticipated. Hopefully, we'll be able to get past it. The issue is that the village of Mount Prospect uh zoning commission is seeing us as a school. By state law, we're not defined as a school. We're a program and we have many programs as you know that we're responsible for with with school districts that feed in.

157So, we're going before the zone commission. I think it's next week um shortly and hopefully we will get them to pass it. I was pretty disappointed that this had not been raised as a discussion item before and I shared that with some people on our board and the superintendent. uh this should have been anticipated just by definition and uh was not. So hopefully we get past that. I'll keep you posted on it, but in the meantime it is holding up uh any activity. >> That's an unfortunate wrinkle. I hope it can be resolved. >> Yeah. >> Um all right. If any members have updates for local government or liaison assignments, please make sure to send those in for next month for inclusion in the March agenda. Um and let's move on to the student representatives.

158>> Yes. Uh so this uh month uh we asked our student board representatives um to um reflect on the following question. Um what would you want the board to know about your school? Uh and so in addition to giving some brief updates about the happenings uh within their buildings um they're also going to share some thoughts on that question. So Alex, do you want to start off? So, first up, the updates from Cooper are that the wrestling season is coming to an end and our spring musical is finally starting. Um, for what I want the board to know about my school, I want them to know that it's middle school and that means that kids sometimes lack kindness to each other and even school spirit. And I would want kids to be kinder to each

159other. And sometimes it's hard to see if any actions are taken to keep students from making those mistakes again. >> Um so um updates from London for February are the regular wrestling season ended last week against with our meet against MacArthur. conference is this Saturday and the spring musical which will be showcasing High School Musical Junior is already in production. Uh the question, what would you want the board to know about your school is that involvement at London seems really high. Lots of students seem excited to go to tryyouts for things like the musical to athletics or even when we do fundraisers. And their request is having smaller areas for students to eat in besides the large cafeteria. Some of the other middle schools have small group lunch in other places around the building. >>

160Okay, Selma >> in homes. Our wrestling and volleyball season is coming close to an end. And our spring musical is starting, which is Spongebob Jr. where I'm very excited to be in. And our track and field season is also coming up. In February, we had our homes hangout. And I would want you guys to know that there are many different passions at homes and the clubs overall seem to be a good fit for them. Sometimes home struggles with staying as competitive with other schools in many of the other sports. >> Thank you. >> And uh tomorrow afternoon uh is our uh third meeting of the Superintendent Student Advisory Council. Um so I'm greatly looking forward to that and our representatives um will be there. Also, we've got a couple of I'm picking your brains on

161a couple of different things. Um, so, um, they'll have an opportunity to kind of, you know, report out on that, uh, in March as well. So, um, and thanks for hanging in there with us. Uh, I know it was it was a lot tonight and it's late. I hopefully you don't have a lot of homework waiting for you when you get home. >> All right. Thank you all so much. Um, all right. Our next regular meeting of the board of education is scheduled for Thursday, March 19th, 2026 at 7 p.m. We are going to recess into close session. Um, we will not take any action during close session and we will not return to open session afterward. We will adjourn directly from closed. Uh, I'll go ahead and make the motion. Be it resolved, the

162board of education approves to recess the CCSD21 February 19th, 2026 regular board of education meeting and convene in close session to discuss the appointment, employment, compensation, discipline, performance, or dismissal of specific employees, specific individuals who serve as an independent contractor in a park, recreational, or educational setting, or specific volunteers of the public body or legal counsel for the public body, including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against an employee. employee, a specific individual who serves as an independent contractor in a park, recreational, or educational setting, or a volunteer of the public body, or against legal counsel for the public body to determine its validity. to discuss the purchase or lease of real property for the use of the public body, including meetings held for the purpose of discussing whether a particular parcel should be acquired

163and for litigation purposes when an action against, affecting, or on behalf of the particular public body has been filed and is pending before a court or administrative tribunal or when the public body finds that an action is probable or imminent. Carrie, can we get a second, please? >> Second. >> All right, Jessica. >> Yes. I think I'm allergic to saying this paragraph. [laughter] >> Debbie, >> yes. >> I vote yes. Arlland, >> yes. >> Bill, >> yes. >> Angelica, >> yes. >> Motion carries. >> All right. Thank you everyone for joining us tonight, for sticking it out with us. We are now in close session.