001We're going to go ahead and get started. Sorry for the small delay. Um, can I get approval of the agenda, please? >> I move we approve the agenda for the December 8th, 2025 board meeting. >> Can I get a second? >> Second. >> Buyers. Yes, >> Gordon Ross. >> Yes, >> Franklin. >> Yes, >> Jones. >> Yes. Motion passes 40. >> Thank you very much. We'll now move on to the report of the superintendent of schools. Dr. Swift. >> Thank you, President Gordon Ross and members of the board, those who are joining in person and remote. Uh it is December 8th and we are working through these busy weeks of December. I'm especially grateful uh to our students, teachers, and support staff. Uh everyone is staying the course to finish this semester strong over these
002coming nine days of school. Very deeply grateful to our parents and Lawrence community for their partnership and continuing to support our students, staff, family, and schools. Uh members, as you know, I've I've briefed you. We recently received a request for information and before we do our uh our regular superintendent report, I'd like to take just a few minutes and members, you have a folder with a printed copy if that's easier for you, but it is also attached to the agenda and uh Miss Nommen will open that uh so that everyone can see it. Uh the inquiry we received was just really to have more information about who the administrative group is. Uh so we took some time to just set out those facts uh for everyone in the community. Um they have put up a
003graph really of the makeup of our Lawrence public schools team. Uh the blue side uh represents uh certificated staff members, teachers, 885. The green side represents educational support professionals, uh 41% of our team, 644 of those individuals. Um 33, the orange piece of the pie represents school-based administrators. Those are our principles and assistant principles, 2.1% of our overall staff. And then district administrators is that purple slice of the pie, 24 positions, 1.5% of the Lawrence Public Schools team. These approximately 1586 LPS team members work to serve our 10,148 students. I have detailed in this handout the exact members of the district administrative team. I've detailed uh their responsibilities and again Miss Nommen is opening that so that everyone in the community will be able to see it. Uh two communications members, four facilities and operations
004members, three members of our finance team. Uh they oversee approximately a $200 million overall budget that includes both general fund and annual capital outlay. uh oversee our audits and many other functions of the district. Uh one food and nutrition team member salient there is we employ about 80 uh people on that team. We serve an average of 6,000 lunches and 1,600 breakfast a day and uh that one team member manages about a $6 million budget. uh three members uh from the human resource team um one of PK K12 schools four on special education three on student supports and three on teaching and learning and data. I've also listed just a few of the positions that we've reduced over the previous 14 months. Uh members, I've kept you updated at every step of the streamlining process.
005Uh but what we've listed tonight are mostly those reductions that came from the administrator group. And I just want to emphasize that we will continue our work to streamline the organization. Our focus is really on getting our resources directly to the schools, to classrooms and schools to ensure robust programming and opportunities for our students and to align resources to achieve competitive compensation for employees. I do want to go in a little more detail that that streamlining work is not just about reduction of positions. It's about refinement of positions and that includes a focus on review of all expenditures as well as potential efficiencies across the organization. members, you've been updated, for example, in areas such as our work to streamline software expenditure, our work to recapture, align, and maximize state and federal funding sources, particularly
006funding for CTE programming uh that we have realized that we are not making the most have not been making the most of that. So we'll be making adjustments in several areas including CTE title at risk and a number of other areas of grant funding. So this is a large endeavor. Uh but the inquiry around well exactly who's in that administrative group uh drove me to just set it out clearly uh for both the board and for our staff and our community. Members, I'm happy to take any questions that you may have or I'll just move on to the remainder of the superintendent report as you prefer. Very good. It has been so delightful to be out and be engaged in our community. December is just the best time to be out in the community. I
007said to someone the other day, uh, there's no need to get lonely, uh, during December in Lawrence public schools because there is an event or an activity every night and a lot of nights we've got to juggle to get to all of the places. Uh, we enjoyed being out at the Lawrence Farmers Market for their wrapup of the season. We were able to visit with so many individuals and families who stopped by our USD 497 table. We connected with families of several rising kindergarteners. They were so excited already and seeking out information about how to enroll and get ready for school next year. And we also connected with current students and parents, family, staff, and community members. I just want to point out on the right here pictured is farmer Steve who uh had the
008booth which was his pickup truck uh next to our table and he sources his tomatoes to USD497 Kitchens and he shared with me how proud he is to work in partnership with us in the school district to ensure that our parents that our students have access to fresh locally sourced food across Ross our schools. I reassured him that we are very incredibly proud of this work. Uh also uh Senator Marcy Francisco and an array of very cute kids and puppies were among those who stopped by our table. Excuse me. Okay. I really appreciated all those who just stopped in to say hi and thank us for being there. Those kinds of connections are not like what you get in a school meeting. They're different uh on the ground in the community. I'm just so grateful
009that Lawrence is a community that cares about their schools and when they saw our people, our table, a lot of folks just veered over to say hi just because and that says a lot about our community. It was also wonderful to see uh incoming member Matt Lancaster who stopped by with his family. Many thanks to Summer Workman who did all of the work to get us there. Well, last Friday, this was the lead center right here. Um, musicians, low brass musicians from USD497, the University of Kansas, and across the the Lawrence community convened for Brasmus 2025. This year, Brasmus uh featured 150 musicians on that stage together, ranging in age from 12 to 84. The program featured a special performance by the KU Tuba Euphonium Concert as well as selection of holiday favorites to help
010kick off the festive month of December. The concert ensemble was conducted by Dr. David Earl Tuba Euphonium professor at the University of Kansas. We're so grateful to our music educators. I was texting with some of them over the weekend because they did all of this through the week and then they were at KMEA over the weekend uh learning and growing together. I just appreciate them for inspiring our students and for working to ensure such quality performance experiences. These students were performing on one of the very best stages in the Midwest. And uh this is a part of Lawrence Public Schools quality performing arts programming. It is part of the Lawrence Public Schools difference. Over at Kennedy uh Early Childhood Center, we were delighted to hear uh that the Kennedy Early Childhood Center team recently gave
011thanks to one of their school families with an active duty Army parent enjoying their last day in Lawrence prior to an overseas deployment and the family moving out of state. Kevin Orland, a major in the US Army Corps of Engineers and father of a Kennedy student, received a great sendoff celebration from the Kennedy School team. We want to thank Major Orland for his service, his family for their sacrifice, as well as Kennedy teacher, Miss Donna Lang, who organized the farewell celebration event. Teachers, staff, and students line the hallway from Miss Lang's classroom to the front entrance. They waved American flags, streamers, and signs to wish their friend and his family a warm and loving sendoff. I know we will all keep Major Orland and the family in our thoughts and are sending our warmest wishes
012for safety, success, and opportunities ahead. Deerfield Elementary's stocking cap creativity activity is so fun. I wanted you to hear about it this evening. Deerfield Elementary um shared a heartwarming example of creativity and care and action. Special education teacher Miss Cindy Carlson invited students in Miss Hamburg's kindergarten classroom to design their own ideal stocking camp. And then she surprised them by custom making hats based on each child's artwork. A photo of the students proudly wearing their hats and holding their original designs captured the joy of this special project and highlights the thoughtful ways our educators make learning meaningful. I can't imagine how many hours uh she invested to make that happen for our students. Just a delight to welcome uh Miss Summer Meccco, principal, proud principal here tonight. Thank you. Liberty Memorial Central Middle School. I
013couldn't make it over there, but I got on the line and dispatched a member of our communications team, Andrew Beavenon, ran over to KCK to see these future engineers, artists, and innovators from Liberty Memorial Central Middle who were on a field trip over at Multist Studio Steam Studio in can the Kansas City location. They are also located, as you all know, in downtown uh Lawrence as well. They put their problem solving skills to work through creative project-based steam challenges. In education, we know steam is a framework that emphasizes creativity, design thinking, and interdisciplinary problem solving. One task had teams of students racing against the clock to engineer the tallest possible spaghetti towers capable of supporting a marshmallow. The OMCMS Mustangs experimented with a number of clever architectural strategies and designs like triangle trusses, wide bases,
014and reinforced beams of extra spaghetti. The middle schoolers also gained coding and design skills to create dream neighborhoods for an assigned oozobot. These were small robots able to scan and track along colored lines to perform program tricks like the crowd favorite of a tornado spin. Each bot came with a personality such as gamebot or thinkbot and students built spaces to match game controller houses and snapshots, snack shops for gamebot, skate parks and gyms for fitbot and winding trails and parks for trailbot. It was a beautiful display of teamwork and innovation and I'm so proud when our students have the opportunity to expand their learning beyond traditional classroom settings. Many thanks to our community partners at Multist Studio for their support of our students and their highinterest steam learning. Uh, past president Jones will recall that
015one of their team members was on our De Moines trip and that was when we first discussed uh the the students getting over there. So now it has happened. Uh, great news from Free State High School's theater troop 5773. They have earned the distinguished honor of performing the Adams family school edition at the 2026 Kansas Thespian Festival. Now this achievement reflects the remarkable talent, dedication and artistry of our students and staff members. Productions selected for the festival are chosen through an extremely rigorous process, making this invitation truly a testament to the excellence of the Firebird Performing Arts program. So we're going to benefit in two ways here in Lawrence. First, to celebrate and provide our community with another opportunity to enjoy the show, Free State uh has added and will host a home performance of
016the Adams Family School edition on January 4th at 200 p.m. in their auditorium. Then the performers, and uh we've already notified Dr. Ingleick, we know it's coming. They will move the entire set uh to Witchah Century 2 Concert Hall and on January 9th at 700 p.m. they will represent us, our school and our community on one of the state's largest theater platforms. So, we're incredibly proud of our student performers, technicians, pit musicians, and the educators who guide them. This is the visual arts display from Lawrence High School. It is so impressive. I think it's going to pop out there. Yes. Um we are so proud of our Lawrence High art students who exhibited their artwork in the 29th annual high school visual arts competition along with 14 other area high schools. The event was held
017at the Tim Murphy Gallery in Miriam with hundreds of students, parents, friends, and artists gathered for the announcement of the award winners. I just want to point out that Lawrence High swept the 2D category with Kaya Bloom taking third and Ren J receiving second and first place. In the 3D category, Lawrence High students Piper Journey and Jaden Moore took home first and second, respectfully. The show will remain open for public viewing during this month through December 27th. And just take a look at these remarkable uh pieces of artwork. So very proud of our Lawrence High art students. >> [cough] >> Well, [clears throat] right here among us tonight, you may or may not be aware that we are uh spotlighting and congratulating a staff member. Congratulations are in order for Dr. JC Robersonson, director of
018elementary, who successfully defended her dissertation on Monday, November 24th. She has been finalized now for PhD completion. Her research exploring urban district structures influences on principal longevity was completed in fulfillment of a doctor of philosophy and education in the leadership and educational administration program at Capella University. We're so proud of this impressive accomplishment. Congratulations, Dr. Roverson. Yay. I don't think she's properly celebrated yet. So, we got to work on that. All right. We want to talk just a little bit about winter weather. I just want to thank everyone for your patience. Uh last Monday when we uh had weather right on the first day back from our fall break. I do want to extend my sincere apologies particularly to those rural uh bus route uh students and families who experienced some hardship on that day.
019Uh as a reminder, I just want to give a few reminders because we're now well into the zone uh of winter weather. As a reminder, we will only send messaging when there is a change to the school day schedule. So if there is no message that means we're going regular school day. Uh secondly uh just a reminder our team will use parent square when they communicate and that comes through either on your phone if you've downloaded the app or it will come as an email just like we had in the old days. So whichever way parents prefer it will come to you that way. Um those parent square communications uh will remind like we did last Monday of phone outages and then later in the day uh once the snow uh accumulated we needed to
020uh cancel after school practices, events and activities. This is just a good time to remind everyone of a couple more things. one. Um, please ensure that if your contact information has changed, you've moved or changed emails, just stop in or call in to your school secretary or school office and get your contacts updated so you get the information. We will also place that on our Facebook and share it with local media partners and they're good about running those communications. I want to give a big shout out to our facilities and operations team for their efforts not just last week but every winter weather day. They are working around the clock to ensure safe opening of schools. And members, I just want to make you aware, Dr. Ingerbrick shares with us that we observed a great
021return on that investment in snow equipment uh that you all made last year. And we noticed that our teams were able to complete their snow clearing work in far less time, making schools safer for everyone. And particularly if our team can complete their clearing before dark. Uh it doesn't always happen that way, but it's just a much safer environment for everyone. As a reminder, safety remains our top priority. And though we work hard to get the winter weather calls right, we won't always get them right for every member of the community. So, I just want to remind everyone that the ultimate decision uh is up to the family. And if circumstances in your part of town or your driveway or your situation, I want to encourage everyone to also do their own check. Uh because
022conditions do vary widely. And I want you to know that once the school district decision is made, uh, any parents who report, if we're in school, if a parent reports an absence, winter weather is one of the state approved excused absences. So, there's never a question about whether that absence is excused or not. It will be. Um, so just all of our winter weather reminders. Maybe now we won't have any weather now that I've shared all of that. So hopefully. [laughter] All right. Well, we're really excited tonight as we look ahead uh to 2026 around the corner to preview the enhancements at the January meeting. Uh members, as you know, as is our habit, we'll be bringing uh a whole menu of enhancements. We're listening to our community and aligning our system to better serve
023students. Uh but we just wanted tonight because we just couldn't wait. We wanted to go ahead and share the exciting news of preschool classrooms and we'll share two of them coming next year at Deerfield and at Prairie Park elementary schools. These two school campuses both have put their hands up and said, "Pick us. Pick us. We have a room. We're ready to go." Um and they will be beautiful locations to continue our early childhood expansion work that we began this year at Sunflower and Woodlon. Those programs are going along beautifully already and all of that work was built on prior work at New York Monasteri and Kennedy Early Childhood Center. Both of those programs are really shining lights in the district. This entire endeavor then will bring us in 26 27 to the 50% mark
024already in implementing preschool at every elementary location. This will place us to six and in offering preschool at elementary schools across the district. So, we know this is a need. We've heard it and we see it and we're delighted to share that preview this evening. Just as a note, uh, a reminder, all district buildings will be closed during that winter break, December 22nd through January 2nd. We are already looking forward to welcoming our students and teams back on Tuesday, January 6th, for the first day of a brand new spring semester. We never take for granted that quality public schools are an outcome of engaged and caring communities who value children, their quality education, and our collective future. I'm so grateful for the partnership and support of students, staff, schools, and our Lawrence community. I want
025to thank you for this opportunity to share the superintendence report and for the honor of serving the Lawrence public schools. Now, as we prepare to wrap up 2025, moving toward winter break in a few days, uh it's nine more days of school. So, just because this is the last board meeting, we got a lot of good teaching and learning left to go uh before we wrap up, but this is the final board meeting. And so, we want to wish everyone a safe, warm, and peaceful winter break. We will miss our children every day that they're gone and look forward to January 6th. Um, and just as a moment of zen, I just want to share with you uh 25 seconds of beautiful music from last Thursday's band concert at Southwest Middle School. If you have
026time a little later, uh there's a couple of minutes of Lawrence High School on the right there. Um, I was positioned in the percussion uh section, so it is an odd view. I'll just own that up front. Uh, the Southwest Band is performing here under the direction of director Debbie Woodall Rutledge. [music] >> [music] [music] >> Yay. Thank you. [music] >> Thank you, Dr. Swift. Um, we'll move on to the president of the board of education. Just a couple things. Um on the 19th of November along with Bob, I had an opportunity to participate in the Friends of Education reception here in in this room where we honored um from every building uh a representative and uh a community member who um contributed to the um our our work and educational outcomes of that building.
027It's it's probably one of my favorite events that I like to go to. So that that was um something that that I got to do. Um and then then on November 4th, this last Thursday, um participated in negotiations briefly. I'll touch on that. Um we did we focused on language changes. Um, as we start the as we work through the negotiations process, we talked a little bit about the salary subcommittee and then we talked about um um back to school nights and um open houses um were were some of the big things. And then I I ended up having to leave early to attend the Lawrence High band concert. Um that was uh also a a highlight. Um and then lastly, just a couple things I wanted to touch on on the consent agenda. Um
028so there's a a contract for um logicalis to handle uh managed services for management of our network infrastructure. Uh, Sumner One Incorporated is a a contract there to replace two high production devices in the print shop and replace 112 multi-function walk-up devices across the district. Uh, Lawrence High football is uh due for uniform replacements for home and away. Um, uh, there's an item on there for Lawrence High for remediation and repair of the girls locker room. Um, and just a little bit of additional information on on there, that item is um we're working with our insurance company. Um, but the the item on the consent agenda is the the amount of the of the total repair, but insurance will reimburse us for that minus our deductible. So, that's why the amount is what it is,
029but we will ultimately pay just the deductible. And then lastly, uh, uh, replacement of the fire alarm system at Cordley. Um, that's really all I had. And then um the last thing uh that I also wanted to say is I wanted to to specifically mention that um Shannon is not with us this evening because she is participating in the Free State High School um football um banquet uh as a parent this evening. So that is where Shannon is this this evening. Thank you for the reminder for that. Um and so with that, we'll move we'll do board committee reports and then board commentary. Um >> we do have a retirement. >> We have uh we'll do these two first and then we'll do the retirement. Thank you, Bob. So Bob, we'll start with you with
030we'll do committee reports and then board commentary coming back. >> Okay. uh in addition to the friends of education uh which I attended with GR and also negotiations which I attended G gr about negotiations. I am would say that we all look forward to the work uh in working with our educators as we move forward. Uh my other committees have met. I had the equity council uh and where we discussed u uh basically looking at family engagement uh and and looking at the difference between engagement and family empowerment as a different concept. Um again uh actually uh this iteration of the equity council we have new members. If you are available I would definitely say you ought to at least come and and listen. We have some very good discussions. Okay. >> Uh the other
031other one is uh the district site council. We uh that group as well have met. We had discussions around the around uh statistics and within the district and again uh it was a very good meeting and again I would suggest if you are a member please come if not it's an open meeting and you can come and if nothing else learn more about the district. Uh let's see and that is it. >> Okay Carol I don't have anything. Okay, >> uh the policy committee met. We meet again on December 16th. Uh we are looking at our new business will include policies pertaining to fund balances. Uh we'll be looking at sample policies from area schools. Um we'll also be looking at uh again continuing our work on KN which is our complaints policy along with
032several other um uh policies. We we are uh continuing to do our review um of the entire uh policy manual and we've had a couple uh suggestions from the LEA things that they've noticed that we needed to update and we welcome all suggestions from the community. If you notice something in the policy manual that you think might need an update that that's been particularly helpful. So, um yeah, the work continues on December 16th. [clears throat] >> All right. Do you have any board commentary, Kelly? >> Yeah. >> Okay. Yolanda. >> Okay. >> Sorry. >> Um I do have one I have one Sorry. Did you go >> Go ahead. >> Okay. I have one request uh to board leadership. Um the uh I looked up the state statute and I think I understand it correctly
033that we can swear in the new board member anytime before the first before the second Monday in January. So the city swears in their members in December. We wait until the first meeting in January, but I think I'm correct that there's nothing that dictates that we do that. Um we can pick the date essentially. We just have to do it by the second Monday. and I wondered if there might be reason for discussion about doing it along the same timeline as the city in the future. So, I'm just asking um board leadership to consider that and maybe as U president and vice president to check and make sure my understanding of the state statute is correct and if the board was interested perhaps we could look in and we don't have to have a discussion
034this evening but we might look into it in the future. So, we have two years to figure this out, but it does seem like something where we could um maybe move a board member on sooner after the election. >> Okay. You're not advocating to do it tonight. >> Well, he's here, but no. [laughter] >> All right. Anybody else? >> Okay. All right. All right. Retirement. >> Retire. We do have one retirement would like on behalf of the board to thank Patricia Iikenberry for her 25.5 years of service to the Lawrence community and its schools. Thank you, Bob. Okay, we'll move on to the consent agenda. Consent agenda items are those that are considered routine and are adopted by one motion unless any board member or the superintendent requests that an item be removed. The item
035or items removed are voted on separately. Can I get a motion for the consent agenda, please? This is Carol. I move the board of education adopt the items listed on the consent agenda. >> I second. >> Gordon Ross, >> yes. >> Franklin, >> yes. >> Buyers, >> yes. >> Jones, >> yes. >> Could you [clears throat] Blackwood? >> Yes. >> Motion passes 5-0. >> All right. Thank you. Move on to item 5.1, reports. and uh I'll turn the time over to Dr. Swift. >> Thank you, President Gordon Ross and members of the board. Uh we are uh so uh grateful to be bringing forward uh the second uh installation on the annual enrollment report. uh really appreciate in November that we did uh all the things about the basic enrollment in the district. And now
036on this follow-up report, we'll dive into uh class size analysis, elementary, middle, and high school levels. Um we'll look at enrollment entrances and exits and then land on mobility rate. One of the members said to me recently something I found insightful, which is this is just such a good time to really look at all of this because looking at our enrollment really informs as we open after the 1st of January enrollment windows for 2627. So this is coming at a really nice time. It also uh we feel strongly about bringing it following the state submission and the audit of the numbers. So I like bringing it at this time because these numbers are confirmed. As you recall, we were just over 10,000 students uh preschool 260 and 9,888 in grades K through 12. This is
037based on our audited numbers, but I will point out members, you're aware of it. This is not the FTE for funding. So, you know, when Miss Frick points to the budget, uh that's where uh student services have been computed uh special education and a number of other dynamics. Uh this one is really just about headcount and we don't count parts of students here. We count whole students who walk through our doors every day. Uh as we often do, we'd like to just share the takeaways right up front so then the members and the community can just kind of relax and uh as Mr. Pope sets out all of the details over the coming minutes. So, um, bottom line takeaways is that 94% of our elementary classrooms are enrolled at 27 or fewer students. um elementary
038classes uh average at K1 uh 20 students. Um and then that moves gradually up and at fifth grade we are averaging now uh this fall 23 students across the district at fifth grade. I want to note that these numbers represent an improvement and they are the result as you know members of an intentional focused effort to do two things. One to eliminate multi-grade classrooms except when those classrooms occur by instructional design such as Montasauri. uh to eliminate multi-grade classrooms and to prioritize and protect elementary class sizes overall. As we said back in November, and it bears repeating, I want to just point out that nothing about this report um is to indicate um anything other than just the factual numbers. We all understand elevated levels of needs across our students members. At the la at
039the first half of the report, you saw elevation in poverty impact and you also saw an elevation in students being served on an IEP with specialized learning needs. So regardless of the size of the classroom uh the needs have escalated and that is why it is even more important that we attend to classroom sizes particularly in the early grades and members I will point out from my very earliest days in the district 14 months ago we were adding in FTE in spots to reduce large classrooms and I'm proud of that work. Now at middle school, 94% of middle school core classrooms are enrolled at fewer than 30 students with a class size average at middle in cores of 25 students. These numbers have been stable over time. Uh I we've not really made changes with
040that over the past year. And then finally, high school classes remain consistent over prior years. They average between 24 and 26 students. The progress that you will see in this report tonight is a significant reduction in small high school classes. Small high school classes of 18 students or fewer. There is a dramatic reduction in those. And members, I've shared with you as we move through the year about our consistent work to ensure that we were uh being intentional to improve scheduling at high schools and to improve efficiencies. There's no more expensive investment than class size. So, if we can work smarter at the high school level, we want to be able to do so while still offering all the opportunities that we know are good for students. Now, takeaways. Um, takeaways. I'm not getting the
041right slide there. Just one second. There it is. Takeaways on uh entrance and exit. Uh we are entering more students than exiting in three areas from other Kansas school districts with international students. I think we can attribute that to our university, the University of Kansas and students coming from private schools. So those three areas we are entering more than we've exited over this past year. Uh there are two areas where we are exiting a few more students than we're entering. That is to public schools outside the state. So we've heard that we've seen it in news media that Kansas is exporting students and families. We see that in our data and very slightly by about 13 students homeschool students. Now, when we think about our mobility rate, you will see in Mr. Pope's data that
042our mobility rate is about 21%. Meaning that one in five of our students moves in or out during the school year, during last school year. And we see that by looking say at this year's graduating class. We analyze just to see what mobility looks like there. And it's about 50% of our class of 2026 who've been enrolled with us since kindergarten. So that's what mobility looks like as it graduates up the system. Now, I've just given you a lot of information. Uh, Mr. Pulk is here to unpack the details. Thank you. >> Thank you, Dr. Swift. Thank you, board, for having me tonight. Uh, James Pulk, director of data and assessment. As we go through the report, we'll be touching on the areas that Dr. Swift has shared. We're going to start by looking at
043elementary class size. We'll look at all three levels, but elementary will be first up. So, when you see the table before you, you'll see several of these tonight. So each cell that has a color in it represents an elementary classroom in our district. As you can see, each of those grade levels is separated out. And on the right hand side, you can see our overall average in those grade levels. So you can see at kinder and first grade, our average uh class size is 20. At grade two, 21. At grades three and four, 22 students are in the average classroom. And at grade five, 23 students are in the average classroom. Uh what this uh equates to is 94% of those elementary classrooms are enrolled at 27 students or fewer and this table does not
044include New York Monasteri. Um we're excluding that from this data due to their multi-grade model but that model that they are implementing is a 1:15 staffto student ratio. So what we can see when we look at kind of a summary of this data is um we can see the minimum class size at each grade level, the maximum class size at each grade level, and then you can see those averages that we saw on the last slide. Um what we want to point out is these are numbers as of October 28th this school year. And you'll see that asterisk on that number 30 there. That's a class. Those classrooms are at schools and they have additional teachers assigned to them with support for small groupoup instruction throughout the day uh to help with those larger class
045sizes. But that school did not have a location, a physical classroom to offer them. So that's where that additional support is coming from >> and that is Langston, correct? >> And then also go ahead and >> Yep. Um when we also look at elementary class size over the years, we can see um how we look over the past three years and we can see that these numbers are fairly consistent. Um something really important to note with this is the elimination of multi-grade classrooms. So while you see the numbers in the 23 24 school year of class size, another really important thing to consider with that is those averages did not include multi-grade classrooms. So we can look at this information and we can see that those numbers in 2324 also included 12 multigrade classrooms and
046we can compare that to this year's numbers where we have eliminated those multigrades unless by design like at New York Montasauri. >> I did want to mention that the other school with a large classroom or two we have our principal with us tonight is Deer Deerfield. Yes. So we just want to be very transparent on that yellow um orange and red there uh Langston which we all understand there was not another physical classroom and then also Deerfield. >> That's correct. >> And then the last thing to look at for elementary class size we also wanted to look at um how many classes had 28 or more students. So in that 2324 school year, we had 16 classrooms across the district with 28 or more students at the elementary level. That equated to 11% of our
047classrooms. That also is the year that we had 12 multi-grade rooms and that's not included in that information. And so then you can look at that progression over time to this year we only have five classrooms districtwide with 28 or more students and that's about 3% of our elementary classrooms. And as we noted, uh, three of those five classrooms are at Langston Hughes. The other two would be at Deerfield. So that's the elementary picture. As we transition to look at middle school, it's the same style of chart, but just a little bit different. So as you look at the secondary picture, we will look at the core content areas only. We know that there are more classes offered at our secondary buildings, but we're really going to zoom in on those core content areas of
048ELA, math, science, and social studies. So, at the secondary middle school level, you can see that each one of the cells in these charts represents a middle school classroom in our district. You can see on the right hand side the average for each of those courses and for that content area. You'll notice that 94% of our ELA classrooms and 93% of our math classrooms at the middle school level have fewer than 30 students. As we look at science and social studies, the other two core content areas at middle school, you'll see that science has 96% of classrooms enrolled at fewer than 30 students and social studies has 94% of their classrooms enrolled at fewer than 30 students. So, as we look at this information for middle school, we also want to provide you that summary
049so you can kind of see our minimums based on the content level, our maximums based on that content level, and then the average class size at the middle school level. So, you'll see each content area at the middle school is averaging 25 students in their classroom. So, that's the snapshot of this year. We also wanted to provide some context to that. What has that looked like over the past three years? So at the middle school level, you can see that class size has remained fairly consistent over those past three years. We haven't seen many boons or busts. We also can notice that in the 2324 school year, uh middle school did not have that second plan. It came back in the 2425 school year and is there this year as well. And even with that
050change, we're not seeing much disparity between those class sizes. Uh lastly, as we look at class size, we want to look at high school. Um, so high school is just a little bit different. So, it's still going to look at those uh uh core content areas, but what high school does is we really are only looking at required courses. So, you're only looking at the required courses that a high schooler has to take. The only exception to that is American Literature 1. So, in ELA, you'll notice uh English 9 and English 10. Well, American Literature 1 is the most commonly selected junior level ELA course, which is why we selected it here. Just to give you an idea of what the class sizes look like for our freshman, sophomores, and juniors at the high school
051level. So, you can see each one of those cells represents a section in our high schools. And you can see the overall averages on the right hand side. As we look at science and social studies, you'll notice some new fun pink numbers on there. Um those pink numbers are purposeful. They represent nested sess sections in our high schools. So ne nested sections are where they kind of combine two classes into one room. So an example that I'll give you is like AP Physics 1. You'll see AP Physics 1 has a section with 26 students. That classroom has 26 students sitting in the seats, but that might be that teacher might be offering AP physics one and physics one and they might be teaching that at the same time in that same classroom. So that's how
052high schools uh maximize the ability to provide more opportunities for students and that's how we eliminate some of those smaller classes with 18 or fewer students. So that's some of the work that our high schools have done this past year to make sure that we're offering more opportunities for our kiddos. So then we can look at a summary. You can see each content area. >> Sorry to interrupt. I'm not sure I understood the nesting. Can you go back and explain that again? My apologies. >> So nested classes are a way for our high schools to maximize their offerings. So they take two courses and offer it at the same time. So that happens typically in like our AP courses. So you'll have a AP physics one with a physics one course being taught at the
053same time by the same teacher. in the same hour. >> I would like my facial expression to communicate my thoughts on Okay, thank you. >> Yeah, and that's why if we compare this to last year, which we will, you'll see far fewer sections um of lower number students. That's how we kind of maximize those offerings. >> And I would just add that, for example, when I was a world language teacher, I would have a Spanish 3 and a Spanish 4 at the same hour. um and a group of students in each of those classes would cover the standards for both um with one group of students and in that way be able to offer Spanish for which if it were just dependent on numbers you might not be able to offer it. >> How do
054we evaluate the effectiveness of that particular um approach to instruction? >> That's a great question. I think we look at the data uh not only classroom grade data but also AP data uh you know test data assessment data and I will take that as a question and have Dr. Maya help me with a more articulate response >> and we've increased the number of nested sections that we have. I don't know for sure that we've increased the number, but I will also confirm that before I say it. >> And nested sections were included on this report last year as well. So, >> yes. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So, we do have a summary of what the high school class sizes look like. So, you can see in each of those content areas, the minimum in
055a class, the maximum in a class, and then those averages off to the right. Um, something we want to note as we look at class sizes specifically for this year at the high school level, um, we've implemented that second professional plan. So teachers have gone from teaching six of seven sections during the day to five of seven sections during the day. And we've seen fairly consistent class sizes during that change, which we note on this slide where you can see kind of over the past three years um, fairly stable class sizes at the high school level. even with that implementation of that second professional plan. And then the last thing we wanted to show for high school specifically is just the number of sections at 18 or fewer. And so these are looking over the
056uh comparison from last year to this year. You can see in ELA last year first semester they had 20 sections offered at 18 students or fewer. This year they have nine. Another example, social studies last year had 15 courses offered with fif with 18 or fewer students. Now they have zero. So we're maximizing those opportunities for students so they can choose a wider array of courses. And as we look at kind of the summary of class size, this is kind of that poster. You can see elementary, depending on your grade level, you're going to have between 20 and 23 students on average in your class. At the middle school level, regardless of content area, you're going to have on average 25 students. And at the high school level, regardless of content area, you're going to
057have between 24 and 26 uh students in that classroom. So, as we talk about class size, we also wanted to kind of add to this report. We wanted to talk about um student enrollment, specifically focusing on students outside of our boundaries. So, um currently this year, we have 513 students that are enrolled in Lawrence public schools that don't live inside of our physical boundaries. That's about 5% of our population. Of those 513, 392 come from LVS where they can attend, they can live anywhere in the state and attend Lawrence Virtual School. But we see 121 students attending our brickandmortar schools. And what's interesting about that is they're not clustered at one or two sites. You'll actually see those 121 students uh spread out between our s uh 16 of our 17 attendance centers in the
058district, which was interesting. Another thing we've uh had inquiries about is entries and exits. So, we wanted to provide a chart that kind of explains some of our more common entries and exits. So, this doesn't include all of them from last school year, but our most uh frequent entries and exits. So, as you read this table, if you look at that top line, you'll see uh students that are exiting uh going to another public Kansas school. We had 471 last school year. students that came to us from other public schools was 538. So that was a net difference of 67 students that we had that came to us as opposed to left us for other Kansas public schools. So you can see that we had a positive net difference when looking at schools from uh
059within the state uh students leaving outside of the country or uh private schools and we had a net difference uh or a negative from public schools outside of the state and as Dr. Swift alluded to a small difference from homeschooling. Another thing we looked at as we looked at entries and exits is we looked at this mobility rate. So the mobility rate measures the percentage of our students grades K through 12 who move in or out of the district during the school year. So it takes entries and exits, adds them together, and then we divide it by the total number of students. That's why we calculate our mobility rate. A mobility rate um is important for us to know because it can inform the work that we do. Um high mobility rates can negatively impact
060student achievement and our ability to serve all students um because they're often linked to factors like family income and population density. And so when we looked at our mobility rate for last school year, we had 1,119 students that came to us over the course of the year. We had a thousand student uh 79 students leave us. So we added those together. We divided it by how many students we had enrolled, 10,358, and we came up with that 21% mobility rate. That does not include those graduating seniors last year or the incoming kindergarteners. It's truly students who are coming in and out of our district kind of at those uh uh not enrollment times. Um so what we wanted to do is we wanted to see another way to kind of understand this and see what
061mobility rate actually means. So we started looking at some of our cohorts in the district. So you can see um our seniors currently the class of 2026 were kindergarteners in 2013 and 14. That makes me feel old. Uh at that time uh we had 926 kindergarteners enrolled with us. Currently 475 are still enrolled with us which gives us 51% of our students still enrolled with us as graduating seniors that have stayed with us their entire K through2 career. So as we go down in the cohorts we also looked at eighth grade. So in 8th grade we had 838 kindergarteners start with us. We now have just shy of 500 that have stayed with us. So that gives us 60% of our eighth graders that started with us and have been with us since kinder. And
062we went down then to elementary and we looked and we have 70% of our elementary fifth graders that started with us. Out of that 739 initial kindergarten group, we have 531 enrolled that started in kinder. So that's kind of how mobility rate translates and what it really means to us as we look at that. So as we look at all of this data because it is quite a bit uh we do note that there's been intentional progress made over the course of this past year um specifically to protect sizes at the elementary levels. Um we note that class sizes have remained steady at the secondary levels even considering that we've adjusted from the implementation of that second plan time and going from six of seven courses taught to five of seven courses taught. Um this
063aligns with the work that we've been doing as a district contentional uh consistent intentional work to improve scheduling and efficiencies at those high school levels so that we can be competitive in multiple ways. Okay. Uh the last two slides are just repeats of the first two. So I just want to thank you guys for your time tonight and happy to answer any questions you have. [snorts] >> All right, Kelly, go ahead. [clears throat] >> Waited. Um I I guess my first I first I want to acknowledge the um work that we've done on class sizes particularly maintaining in them at the middle and high school while we adjusted for additional plan time for educators. That is a significant undertaking by our building level level leadership and you all and I really appreciate all of that
064work. Um there are places where when you look at the data across levels the average is is strong but you still have some areas where there's work that we need to do to bring the class sizes down and not just in the hotspots but in general we might have 50% of classes over you know 20 students for example in the elementary level. So, I guess my question to you would be, what do you currently think our work is right now to um address class sizes? Over the course of the time I've served on the board, we've sometimes heard from different leaders or different um experts in the field that we want to focus on the early grades. But when I see a class size of 34 and you're an English teacher and I know that's
065one of your classes and you have five other classes when I do that math that's a lot of papers to grade. So I'm wondering as a as a leadership team what work you're doing on class sizes moving into the next year and how you partner with our union to do that work. >> Excellent [snorts] question. Thank you. We are uh first of all trying to ensure that any of those larger class sizes are occurring in high level coursework and that doesn't make it okay. Um but none of that is occurring with at risk or high impact uh student situations. So I just want to say that upfront. Uh secondly, I do believe that it is about refining this puzzle that high school principles and their teams put together. A a comprehensive schedule is an absolute
066puzzle and Dr. Amaya has been working with uh high school counselors. They know exactly what they're doing. They're experts in their field. But we are going to move to say some of those electives may not be offered every semester. Maybe they're offered in the fall and then the following year they're offered again. Um so that we are not compromising opportunities but we are streamlining in your four years. You can get this course two or three times but not every semester is it available. Uh we are also looking at aligning those CTE pathways and I look forward to sharing more of this work. Dr. and our principles and our team are on this because we we've over the years offered a mile wide um set of offerings and we have heard already strong support among high
067school administrators and counselors to really narrow and focus so that the courses are still offered but they are [snorts] vertically aligned and maybe even starting in eighth grade so that students get on that CTE pathway. And not only will that make us more efficient in a high school schedule, but it will also result in achieving funding that comes through the completion of a CTE pathway that frankly we've not been mindful or intentional about getting as a system. And I I own getting that right. Um, so there are a number of strategies that we're working through. I think the board recalls that we met with high school principles who were very patient with us and we met with them every Thursday for months last year and we're just about in January to convene those meetings again.
068So it's a week by week. I will also share that uh Zack Harwood, principal at LVS is plugging into the two high schools. So, if there is an AP class that students want or need, um, but we don't have enough students to populate it, we may end up offering a a few selections that would be offered virtually and the teacher might be at Lawrence part of the time or at Free State part of the time, but in other words, giving more opportunities while also gaining gaining efficiencies. So, And then could you um share a little bit how you collaborate with teachers on that? >> Yes. So uh and Dr. Maya can share more as well, but we are working with teacher groups. Um and those at high school are by content area and at middle
069school. Uh these uh particularly Dr. Amaya has been working with math and a number of others. do you want to step up and uh share? Um our teachers on the ground, our counselors on the ground know exactly uh what they're doing um and they inform this work. Go ahead, Dr. Amaya. >> Yeah. So, uh quite a bit of the conversation has been with uh counselors and administrators currently to get the course sequencing correct um and to kind of look overall at all our course offerings. Uh what we're offering, why we're offering, how it's programming out. Uh the next phase of that will be we're pulling in teacher groups. So we've pulled in ELA, for example, and done standards alignment, but we're going to continue that work with uh sequencing of programming moving forward. Um we'll
070continue that work with math as well. We're pulling a team together starting in January on that. Um and so um and then on the backside, we've been evaluating CTE pathways for uh quite a few months currently. So, those are three big group or networking teams that I can think of. >> When we started this last year, I think I said to the board, it's a three-year project. I it it may be even longer, but every year moving toward better alignment so that our students have many opportunities and yet we're also achieving economies of scale that are necessary in order to streamline and put resources and competitive wages. So, >> and then I just have one other question. I should probably um I'll just ask the question. The class size we are still applying a ratio
071and not a cap. Is that correct? >> It is a range. Is that what you mean? Like a range? Yes. Okay. >> Yes. >> Not a cap. >> Uh okay. >> Except in I believe in science uh is the one place >> due to safety considerations within the classroom. Exactly. >> Um I would be so to the question of the lower or the early learners, is it still the case that the return on um this would be true across I just want to name for any educator listening to this that a smaller class size is a probably a boon toward retention and workload. Um this question is about outcomes for students with the number of um individuals in the or the the number of bodies in the classroom. Is it still the case that in
072your field we have found the most return on lowering the class sizes at the earliest ages? >> Absolutely. >> So if the board was interested in a cap at, for example, the K through second or third or whatever whatever you all deemed as a recommendation, I would be interested in the um budgetary implications for that. and I certainly don't expect you to answer it this evening um or maybe to board leadership about whether or not it's something to consider within the budgetary process for upcoming years and planning um while of course balancing our wage goals. >> Very good. Thank you. [sighs] >> Anybody else have questions? >> Uh this is Carol. I um I really liked how you explained about mobility and how you came to to that ratio, but is there any way that
073you can find or I know it's kind of more work on you and thank you so much for all the work you do, but is there any way that you can take a a dive and to see which high school has the greater attrition rate of when you look at the mobility say maybe like maybe the free state students or stayed in public schools longer than Lawrence High? >> We will take that question. Thank you. I would like to see that and that might be telling of how how we can focus our efforts on retaining some of those students and see maybe look at what we're missing. >> Very good. >> And then my other question is um when we closed Broken Arrow Broken Arrow Elementary that uh school had the highest n um enrollment
074of Native Americans, American Indians, and I would like to know where they went. I don't know which school I don't know what which um school has the most. I don't know where they went. We can absolutely look at that and there is one chart in your folder. Right. >> Um that will also inform a little bit but we'll take that question. Thank you. >> I I saw it in the folder but I it didn't identify building. >> Okay. Okay. >> Thank you. >> Very good. >> And we are we are tracking those students. Um we have a way that we're monitoring those students over time. So um we can absolutely work on that. >> All right. Thank you. Anybody else have any questions? >> Okay, Dr. Swift, do you have any last minute? >> No,
075I just appreciate the work and thank you so much. Thank you. >> Okay. All right, Dr. Swift, any announcements. >> I believe we're in pretty good shape. >> I move we adjourn. >> Okay. Second. >> Second. All those in favor >> I post. >> All right, we're journed. Thanks everybody. >> Thank you. >> Well, that might be a world >> Kelly.