001Okay, welcome. The October 6, 2025 board of education meeting is called to order. The board welcomes everyone present. The Witchaw Public Schools will be the premier district of choice and inspire each student and staff member to thrive and to become future ready within the greater community. This is a business meeting of the board of education and we are pleased that you have taken the time to join us. For the roll call, all board members are present except for Melody McCrae Miller. Please join me in a moment of silence. Thank you. Our color guard tonight is from the South High School JOTC program. Please stand for the presentation of the colors followed by the pledge of >> allegiance. march guard left face present colors. Ma'am permission to post the colors. >> You may post the colors.
002>> Thank you, ma'am. Order colors. Prepare to post. Post present arms. Will you please join me in the pledge of allegiance? I pledge of allegiance 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. Order. Arms about. Face forward. March. [Applause] Thank you. And before we get started uh with our presentations, I'd like to uh give Kelly a moment to explain the space that we're in because we are in a new meeting space right now. >> So, thank you, Diane. Uh welcome to everybody, all our parishioners and our our staff or parishioners. Sorry. Geez, it's Monday, not Sunday. My bad. uh to all of our uh guests that are here, our patrons and our staff. Um uh we
003are in a new space and we're we're excited about it for for two big reasons. Uh one of which is we we needed to upgrade this space with technology and we needed to upgrade uh upgrade our space at North High with technology. It was at end of life in both rooms. Um, so to be more efficient in responding to what we hear our public tell us a lot, uh, we decided to take two spaces and put them into one, uh, our board meeting space here on Monday nights once a month will be for the board, but four to five times a week uh, for the uh, staff. We use this for training space. So, we were able to upgrade it and invest our uh, our resources uh, one time instead of doubling it up in
004two different spaces. The other big advantage um to this space is that it's ADA accessible. Um our old space at North High School um did not have any um facilities for for wheelchair bound individuals, patrons or staff. And um that became an issue two times at least since I've been superintendent. So, uh, this space being more secure, uh, more accessible and more efficient use of dollars, we thought was a was a good, um, was a good use of our our dollars, and I think it turned out nice. So, anyway, this is our new space. Welcome. >> Yeah, thank you, Kelly. Okay, Latona, first item, >> good news, Witchita Collective Impact Partnership. Welcome Gil. >> Thank you. Good evening. >> Superintendent Albert. I got some exciting news about our partnership with Witchaw impact. Got a nice
005group of leaders behind me. It's a collaboration that's making a real difference for our students in our community. >> Thank you. Now you can hear me. I'm honored to share some exciting news about our partnership with the Witchaw Collective Impact. The collaboration is making a real difference for our students in our community. Witchaw Collective Impact's mission is simple but powerful. To connect people, organizations, and resources to improve kindergarten readiness and third grade reading proficiency. change the trajectory of students and increasing economic prosperities for our families. This is a partnership that aligns directly with the USD 259's strategic goals. What makes Witchaw Collective Impact unique is the way it brings together local organizations, Cargill, the YMCA, Witchaw State's PPMC, and our own district. Each contributing their strengths. This partnership is about increasing student success. transforming education
006and workforce development and ensuring our programming meets the real needs of our community. I would like to pause and introduce the community leaders with me today that made our partnership a huge success. So, starting with the YMCA, I don't think he's here, but Ron McMahon, who is the chief executive officer here today is Mim McKenzie. If you give a wave, they know you are. There you go. Thank you. Chief Operating Officer Matt Engel was not able to be with us, but he's a branch director. We do have Tyrone Baker, branch director, and Sandy Kimell, director and community schools coordinator at Spate, who you'll hear from here in just a little bit. From our WSU Public Policy Management Center, we have Misty Buckner, director of WSU PPMC, and Brad Richards, community program coordinator with the PPMC.
007We are awesome for them uh to spend some time with us this evening. We also have a broad coalition of partners that you can see on the screen and the list will continue to grow. By working together, we amplify the impact of organizations already doing great work, aligning resources and expertise to achieve better outcomes for our students and families. Collective impact is different from isolated efforts. Instead of working in silos, we coordinate our actions, share resources, and achieve results that no single organization could accomplish alone. This approach is proven to deliver better results for our students and our community. And now I'm going to pass it over to Sherry who's going to share a little bit of the data and programming. >> Good evening. Our uh partnership with the Witchaw Collective Impact is strategic. Um
008they assist us in programming for third grade readiness or third grade reading proficiency. So you'll see in the data that we have a smart start program that um started a few years ago and every year um that enrollment has increased in that in those programs. So last year um the star program was started at Spate Elementary. It is an afterchool program um that was started by Miss Sandy Kimble who's our guest for tonight and she is going to explain a little bit about the star program. reading off your notes. Um, hi, my name is Sandy Kimble. I am talking way loud. I'm with the YMCA, Waw Collective Impact, and I'm going to tell you about STAR, which is Students Together after school reading. And so what the STAR program is, it's an afterchool literacy program,
009and it is uh it is kind of it's aligned with the strategic plan of the district where we're trying to improve um student outcomes. And so we meet three days a week for an hour after school. We they get a snack. We do reading literacy activities and then we have some fun at the end with some games which we know all the kids love. We also know that the kids in our program don't necessarily come in love reading. So we want to combine the two so they want to come back. And so what we've learned as STAR is just more than just numbers in a reading program. It's it is a program where the students came in in November last year. They didn't want to be there. Their parents signed them up because they needed
010extra help. The kids knew they were struggling. They knew they were behind. And here they were being forced three days a week to go hang out, do something they didn't like doing. And so we worked with them, our staff, which is um our team is built from spate teachers and uh paras and then we have different partners that come in and work. And so we just built those relationships over the next couple of months. And what we found after the first of the year, the kids came back and they were starting to go out of their comfort zones. They were starting to read to us willingly and they were starting to read in front of their peers. And they're like us. They don't want to do something in front of people they see every day
011that they're not good at. So them willing to be out of their comfort zone has really it showed their growth. And then I was in the hallway one day and one child came up and said, "Are we having star today?" And it wasn't like are we having STAR today, it was are we having STAR today? And I was like yes, like yes. And then it became more students coming up and wanting to be there. And so we built these relationships. And when we first started we um we had a select few third graders that were um that the teachers recommended. This year we are happy that we are able to open it up to all third graders who are able to attend and also the third graders in the newcomer class um at Spate. And
012so through this, we've developed relationships outside of just the start program. We got to do a reading day back in December that we're going to do again this December where we gave free books out to every child. We're working with their family nights. We're bringing in resources for the families and um we're also bringing more partners outside. This year we are having applied study students from WSU join our team and then we are more working more closely with them to develop the curriculum and make it um kind of bring it up to what we need it to be. We're we're right there and this is just fine-tuning it as much as we can. So it just kind of shows what happens when the district comes together and partners come together for those students and what
013we can do when we all come together. So if you have any questions, >> thank you so much for sharing about your experience and thank you so much for uh explaining some of the strategic partnerships and how you guys are coming in and actually helping align with our goals as a district. So thank you very much. [Music] >> Very good. >> Sorry, Sandy, real quick. How do you spell your last name? can't ask me hard questions. Uh K I M B A L L >> B A E A L. Okay, thank you. >> Thank you guys. >> Uh Latona, next item. >> Gates Foundation Partnership AI math tutoring with EDI. >> Okay, welcome Holly. >> Hi, good evening. Um I'll let get this pulled up. So, excuse me. This summer we uh heard about excuse
014me uh an opportunity where um we could get some AI math tutoring available through a program called EDIA. Um so this is something that we um are in partnership with the Gates Foundation. So we decided because there was a limited number of licenses to try it in our geometry and algebra 2 courses in high school. thinking about our strategic plan goals around um ACT in the high school ACT work keys as well as when do students take the high school state assessment is in the sophomore year. Um so that's how we chose those two classes. So through EDIA we have 5,000 licenses paid for by the Gates Foundation. So it is free to use. We have a little bit of setup cost and professional development cost for our teachers. So they were trained on September
0152nd and so we're just very early in the implementation. So I don't have any data to share with you but teachers have some choice in how they implement this. They can assign standards aligned assignments. They can assign an adaptive path for students. Um they can also use the data to use it for small groupoup instruction. These students need to work on these standards. These students need to work on others. So it's a product we're excited to see what might be possible. But just wanted to share this to highlight the partnership with Gates Foundation and the EDM math program. Thank you, Holly. Any questions? Okay, seeing none. Thanks, Holly. >> No, no, no. You're good. No questions. Platona. Next item. >> Appointment of director of partnerships and belonging. >> Okay, welcome back, Gil. >> Glad to
016be back. Well, I'm honored to introduce a new member of the Witchaw Public Schools family, Mr. Corinthian Kelly, who joins us as our new director of partnerships and belonging. Corinthian brings deep experience in community transformation and youth development. He most recently served as initiatives manager at the Stand Together Foundation where he led grassroots efforts to revitalize neighborhoods and empower families. Previously, Corinthian managed access and engagement programs at Witchaw State University's Public Policy and Management Center and completed a fellowship with the Cedric County Manager Office. He also served as outreach manager of WSU's TRIO Educational Opportunity Centers connecting underresourced adults with higher education and support services. His earlier work includes directing after school programs in Baltimore and Richmond and serving at our own little early childhood center. After relocating to Witchah in 2017 as director of
017partnerships and belonging, Corinthian will provide strategic leadership to foster a culture of inclusion, connection, and shared responsibility across our district. He will lead the development and implementation of restorative practices that strengthen relationships, repair harm, and build community within our schools. Corinthian will work collaboratively with district department, school leaders, and external partners to create systems that support student belonging, staff engagement, and school partnerships. Corinthians leadership will be instrumental in building safe, supportive, and inclusive environments where all students and staff can thrive. We look forward to the positive impact his experience and vision will bring to our students, families, and the greater Witchah community. Please join me in welcoming Corinthian Kelly to the premier school district, the Witchaw Public Schools. >> Don't know if you have any questions. >> Corinthian, did you want to say anything? [Music]
018>> I'll take this opportunity. Uh, thank you so much, Chair Alberts, Superintendent Bill, uh, to the board members. I am so excited, honored, and humbled for this opportunity. And I would be remissed uh, if I didn't acknowledge my predecessor and mentor, the late great Dr. William Polite, um, for the work that he did for this district and for the community. He served well. So, I hope to follow in those footsteps. The only thing I'll leave is that uh this work to set all students up for success is not something that we can do to or for the students that we work with, but it's something that we have to do with students and their families in partnership uh with this awesome community to ensure that every student is future ready. So, I look forward to
019endeavoring in this work with you all and thank you all so much for this opportunity. [Applause] Thank you, Corinthian, and welcome to the team. >> Okay, Latona. Next item. >> United Teachers of Witchita. >> Welcome, Katie. >> Hello. Um, good evening. Um, good evening, President Albert, Vice President Oh, McCree Miller. She's not here tonight. Um, Superintendent Beldeld, and distinguished board members. Um, I wanted to share just a couple of challenges we're hearing from educators right now. And can you hear me? Okay. Sorry, getting used to this new room. Um, one is the amount of preparation time it's taking for the new elementary math series. Our teachers are excited about the hands-on learning opportunities it provides, but we've had several reach out in the fa past few weeks about creating and organizing the materials and how
020much time that's taking. Uh I reached out to learning services as soon as I spoke with these uh teachers and um Amanda Sharel, she was on it. uh this week on Thursday, she's partnering with a group of elementary teachers at Gammon Elementary to explore ways to reduce that prep time while keeping those lessons engaging and just supporting them with this new mass series. And um so that kind of collaboration really helps teachers feel supported and focus more on instruction and less on time consuming prep. So that's been wonderful and we really appreciate that. We also had a concern about a very large kindergarten class at one of our title schools. Um, we know it's incredibly challenging for primary teachers to move classrooms mid- semester, but wanted to thank Susan Willis and Vicky Manning in HR
021for their quick response. Uh, they moved um a teacher that had a much smaller class size to balance those class sizes out. Um, I also wanted to request that you take a look at the elementary BOE class size review policy. I think the last time it was updated was 2006, so it's been about 20 years. So, um, there might be new data out there on class size that could be helpful. Recently, I met with uh Dr. Evans to discuss expanding mentoring and improve access to resources for special education teachers. This came after conversations with newer educators requesting more support and including one who had come from another state and just left the profession a few weeks ago. Dr. Evans and his team are developing a new mentoring program and exploring ways to streamline responsibilities so
022the teachers aren't stretched so thin. So, we feel very encouraged by that work. Our special education teachers serve some of our most vulnerable students and those strong support systems are key to retaining these educators. Um later this week I'll be visiting one of the continuum programs. As you know, we've had some concerns with from staff on the um pilot program and so I'm going with Miss Cely to hear more directly from staff this week. So look forward to that. Finally, we're excited about the community schools launch in seven of our schools this year. And I know Mr. Alvarez is going to talk about that later. Um, I know for the last few years we've talked a lot about community schools um and meetings with board members and uh the superintendent and um Mike Harris, he's
023been a huge proponent of the um our vice president of the community school model and um really really excited about this work. Uh so we appreciate the partnership that we have. Um this summer we went to a conference meeting with our steering team teachers and I know um Miss McCrae Miller was there with us and then um Knockfong went with us well with the team to Albuquerque in the spring and so um we're really really excited about this work. I brought um Becca Davidson. she um is at Hamilton Middle School, but she went on both those visits. And so, she just wanted to kind of share about um just from the teacher standpoint, what she saw and what she's excited about. So, >> good evening. My name is Becca Davidson and I'm a middle school
024social studies teacher at Hamilton. I also serve on the advisory committee for community schools here in the Witchaw Public School District. Community schools are all about using the school as a central hub, a place where students, families, and community partners can come together. This approach helps recognize that learning doesn't just happen inside the classroom. It supports that needs need to be met for all of our students and their families before true learning can be achieved. When I was in New Mexico last year, I saw firsthand how powerful this model can be. The community came together to make sure that their students all got home safely. they had their basic resources that they needed in order to succeed and that families were supported as well. Schools offered wraparound services such as mental health and wellness programs
025as well as counseling and food assistance all under one roof. When students needs are met, they come to school ready to learn and teachers can focus on teaching rather than worrying if their students are hungry, tired, or struggling because they already know that these needs are being met. We're excited to build that same kind of partnership with our families, local organizations, and all the wonderful resources that call this city home. Together, we can make our schools true centers of learning, care, and opportunity for every child and their family in the Witchaw public schools. >> Thank you, Becca. Um, we just wanted to share from the teacher perspective how powerful that can be. So, yeah. Thank you. >> Great. Thank you, Katie and Becca. appreciate you guys your comments. Uh, Latona, next item. >> Service Employees
026International Union. >> I do not see a representative from SEIU. So, next item, >> public communications. >> So, for public communications, we want to thank you for joining us tonight. And if you have signed up for public comment, you will have three minutes to speak. and we kindly ask that you acknowledge your aotted time according to the timer displayed on the screen. We encourage you to share your thoughts openly and honestly, but we ask that your remarks remain focused on school related matters and are respectful and constructive. The board will listen to your input, but will not respond during this meeting. However, we are listening and may follow up as appropriate. With that, we welcome our first speaker, >> Martin Shocket. Welcome, Martin. >> Uh, good evening. Thanks for having me. Superintendent board members, my
027name is Martin Shocket. I'm a I teach English at Chester Lewis. I'm also a UTW executive board member. I was actually at my uh English department chair meeting tonight. So, I just thought I'd come make a quick comment. Uh, so, thank you for affording me the opportunity to speak tonight. I have two topics, though they're related in nature. So, I'll make this relatively quick. Uh, my first topic is about the district financial oversight committee. Uh, the financial oversight committee is an incredible collection of stakeholders tasked with very important work and I'm proud to have been asked for my participation uh in the committee along with UTW President uh Katie and uh our colleagues at SEIU. um our labor voices were left out of the discussion last year. So I was heartened to be met with
028uh the inclusion this year. So thank you for uh for pushing for that. Um because it is imperative uh to center teacher voices in ongoing conversations about budget since we make up the largest group I'd say at at 259, right? And uh what's best for teachers I'd say is what's best for students, right? Um so our first committee meeting was a couple weeks ago and I already found it to be more than informative. I have the booklet of the budget and you all certainly have your literal hands full with that. So kudos to you all. Um I wholeheartedly appreciate the voice on the committee, but I would also suggest further democratizing uh decision-making on that board by granting votes to uh teacher and support staff voices as we move forward with the work on the
029committee. Uh my second topic again is related to that. It's also about centering teacher voices during the district leadership uh listening tour. um a sizable portion was out at Chester Lewis last uh Wednesday to have our session where superintendent was kind enough to lead us in the discussion about our building and our unique challenges that present us in our building with our program. Um so dur and during the session, Superintendent Beerfeld correctly pointed out that it's wrong for our most vulnerable students to not have the same resources and facilities as others around the district. So I'd love for you all just to keep us in your thoughts as you have been. So um and while the session was only what we could dream of within the scope of a staff meeting, I do feel better
030heard and seen as a teacher. Uh so I do appreciate the effort you all making to make the round. The others behind us here, right? Um hopefully my colleagues feel a similar sense of uh acknowledgement around the district as you continue to do your tour tour. Um because accounting for teacher voices might be the the greatest indicator for guidance decisions uh about facilities. master plans and uh future bond proposals uh in the future. So, thank you again for your time and dedication to the long-term needs of our students and staff and taxpayers. >> Thank you, Martin Lona. Next speaker, Dave Fish. Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Fish. >> Thank you. >> President, board, superintendent, leadership team. I'm Dave Fish and this is my wife Marty and we are lifelong supporters of the district uh as well
031as OK School. Uh we our children went there. were proud products and neighbors of OK Elementary and USD 259. Uh last Friday before we were getting ready to attend a North High reunion fundraiser and Hall of Fame celebration, we were contacted by the media about the district's 3% enrollment decline from last year. And uh they came to our house, spoke with us. Um later on that uh actually Saturday night district uh we we saw the the uh the video and district spokesman Bobby Armendes explained to the media that the drop wasn't a surprise uh citing lower birth rates saying the district may need to consider right sizing the number of schools it operates. He also said, "We can't operate schools that are half full. It's just not efficient." But that narrative does not tell the
032whole story. When families hear the right sizing, which is a buzzword me uh when they hear it, it means closing neighborhood schools, they start looking for somewhere else to go and that creates even more decline. There are okay neighborhood parents that have said we will have to move elsewhere. Uh as Marty told the reporters, parents moved into this neighborhood uh because they thought they thought they'd be dropping their kids off to school on their way to work. And that convenience and community connection are part of what OK Elementary matters for kids, parents, teachers, and in this supportive neighborhood. So tonight, we're asking every member and candidate of the school board, Democrat, Republican, independent, nonpartisan, to support reopening discussions on the current facility master plan and to make OK Elementary and and to take it off
033of any closure list. Uh here's a few facts that are worth noting. Okay celebrates 150 years of service this year compared to 69 and 70 years from our neighboring schools. OK's facility is actually the newest of the three with a strong brickandmortar structure mostly built in the last 11 to 20 years and twice as many classrooms added since 2000. This is from this is from USD 259 records. Uh, okay. Sits on the largest acreage of the three nearby schools per the Sedick County Appraisers Office and uh our message is simple. >> Thank you, Mr. Fish. >> Keep okay open for good. >> Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Fish. >> Thank you so much, >> Lona. Next speaker. >> Savannah, good posture. Welcome, Savannah. >> Hello, members of the board and Mr. Belfeld, and thank you
034for taking the time to listen to me this evening. Um, like Latonia said, Latonia said, my name is Savannah Goodasture. I'm a current first grade teacher at Giaman Elementary here in the district, and I am here to talk about student needs. Um, more than ever, our students are coming to us in diapers or not potty trained um with low low language skills and behaviors that exceed the support that we are able to um provide day in and day out. Because of this, teachers are typically spending more time um making sure our students are comfortable in school, teaching them how do we sit in a chair, how do we ask to go to the bathroom? um and teaching those emotional regulation skills along with executive functioning skills that we are lacking. Um all of these skills
035are definitely important for our students to be successful in our classrooms. Um not only now but down the line as they age and progress through school. Um and all of these things are things that educators are willing to do and are doing currently. And so, um, I just ask that we start seeing a little bit more grace for our educators, a little bit more support, and saying it's okay if you are not jumping right into curriculum, and that we are ensuring our kids feel safe at school, and that they are getting those needs met because um, we know that if they're coming to school hungry and tired and not um, able to communicate, it can be really frustrating for them. And so just going into classrooms and saying thank you to a teacher because they
036are all working very very hard to meet those success smiles for our kids. Thank you. >> Thank you so much Latona. Next item >> education community schools pilot progress partnerships and possibilities. >> Okay. >> All right. So, as mentioned earlier tonight, we're going to have our uh we've done a few little workshop things on community schools, but if I'd invite the the team to come on forward and we're going to learn more with an update and what's coming in the future. So, welcome. Good evening. and it's so good to be here again. I thank you, President Albert, and also Superintendent Bell and distinguished board members. As you recall, we were able to share with you the whole community school projects about a couple of m uh months ago. So, tonight we'd like to give you
037an update that will knock your socks off. I promise. Um just so that we can ground everyone where we're at. If you recall, community schools is a strategy that integrates academics, health and social services, youth development, and family community engagement with the goal of improving student learning and strengthening our families and build healthier communities. With that, I wanted to just simply share with you where we are and kind of our journey. We have a pilot program with Allen Elementary, Anderson, Culvin, Dodge, Spade, Stanley, and Washington. And that's actually Adams. And we've hired coordinators. If you recall the last time we were, we didn't have one of our coordinators. So, we have hired all of our coordinators. They're all on board. We have given the needs assessment. We've actually did that in English, Spanish, Swahili, and
038Pashto. It is amazing to get those languages in the hands of our families. The coordinators have began data analysis with that and setting outcomes and measurements based on that data analysis. And we've even began developing partnerships based on individual building needs. So the autonomy of the buildings uh and the coordinators to build what's needed there. So tonight, what we wanted to do is give you some boots on the ground testimonials. So we have Stanley Elementary principal Amy Hart and community school coordinator Eric Inkmmyer here and they're going to talk about the collaborative leadership, the school community, the community schools framework, which we shared with you previously, and the community partners that they've developed at Stanley Elementary. So, if you will give them your attention and they will knock your socks off. >> Hi, I'm Amy
039Hart, principal at Stanley Elementary. I can tell you we are very honored to be a part of this community school initiative and our journey actually began a little over a year ago when we were a welcoming building for our district. We welcomed about 80 students which came down to about 70 families. We felt our why then and we feel it even more now. We spent the last year building trust and identifying needs. This year with being part of the initiative, we have been able to have our dedicated community coordinator bring our ideas to life. Mr. Ingmire is now going to talk to you a little bit about our framework and some of our community partners we've been able to bring on. >> Great. Thank you. Good evening. Um, I want to thank you for this
040opportunity to be able to share the progress that we've made. um through the community schools model. Um especially how we've um leveraged the strategic partnerships that we've been able to to build and um to go out and discover um as we've started this this school year. Um at Stanley, we believe that schools uh thrive when they're closely connected to the communities. And so we really had that as a focus um for the start of this school year. um the school foundation that we've used kind of as a pillar. There's four pillars to kind of the the community schools model. Um the first one is the integrated student services. Um this you can look at as like uh providing health care, uh food and closed pantries, um really meeting the needs of students and families. Um
041really a lot of times even before they get uh to school. The the second pillar is the expanded learning time and opportunities. Uh this is evening activities, sponsored field trips, uh more hands-on learning experiences for our students, um and really meeting uh teacher needs that they would have in the classroom and outside the classroom. The third pillar is the active family and community engagement. Uh we're looking at developing at Stanley like a parent university, a place for parents to go and and get education and and learning and experiences um to help them um be successful and and continue um their careers or whatever else they would they would have um to do. Um also family events, right? Finding ways for businesses, churches, nonprofits uh to partner with us. Um and the fourth pillar is the
042collaborative leadership and practices, right? This is through advisory groups. Uh tomorrow night we'll meet with our PTO and um that's been a really good experience so far this year uh with our parents um and really using those times uh to talk to them and hear what um they would have for their school and what they would like to see um for us to be able to help them um in their journeys. Um, also we've done some parent and teacher surveys, right? So, we've gone there and really tried to to gather this information. Um, and so this I want to uh focus a little bit on our partnerships that we've had. Um, we've partnered with some local organizations. Um, one that um comes to mind is a nonprofit called Gathered. uh they really work on uh
043connecting making sure that families stay together uh their their students and the families and just all the things that happen. They work really close with DCF um and so they have come alongside of us and um even through that um very new partnership we've um actually been able to help a few families. We had a single mother was dealing with a dual state custody case. Um, and we were able to reach out to Gathered who was then able to reach out uh to some folks in other states um and really help our our parent um just through that time as um she continues um with that process which you know can just be there it's it's a lot it's daunting um task and so we've been able to to do that. It was really exciting
044to see. Um other partnerships um we've distributed fresh produce uh Anovo Church which is right across the street to the north of our building. Um they have been we've been working with them and providing uh fresh produce um to our families. So after school they can come over grab some um some fruit um as they they go home after picking up their child. It's really cool to see the students come over um with their parents and doing that. So that's been a great um experience. probably our biggest thing is that our our work is really rooted in relationships, right? Um, a few weeks ago I had a teacher that had reached out to me and just expressed concerns about uh the rising cost of classroom snacks and kind of providing some things in the classroom
045and and so um I talked with principal Hart and reached out to um the Witchaw Public Schools Foundation. Um, and would you believe it, by the afternoon, I had a whole cart full of snacks um that they had and they were so kind to um to give us. And so we're really trying to start almost a snack pantry for our teachers so that they can request, hey, we're low on this to be able to to come and get some things. And so that's been great um to see. Um other things that we've been involved in, we had some community events. So, In Novo Church that I mentioned earlier, um they hosted a Stanley block party the 1 of September and they had free food, uh free music, free games. Um we invited a lot of
046our families to come out. Uh there was some other local resources there for our families to see. It was a great uh just time and experience just to be able to kind of um to hang out together and enjoy some music and do that. So, that that's been good. Uh we also were a part of the Open Streets ICT down there. So, we were invited to be a part of the family hub um and had a a booth down there and and principal Har and I had an opportunity to to speak to to people there that day and um just a a great way to have our families come out and be able to see us in a different context. And then being in the family hub, they were able to get connected. We saw
047a lot of our families talking to the different groups there. Um and so that was a great experience. So looking ahead, um we're committed to deepening our existing partnerships and exploring new ones, right? So when schools serve as hubs of connection and opportunities, students thrive academically, socially, and emotionally. >> So just to close, I want to make sure that I give you a little bit more insight from my lens as a building leader. The impact has already been visible. As families feel more connected and supported, students feel more welcomed and eager to come to school. We're beginning to see those changes reflected in our chronic absenteeism in the right direction. Our overall building goal is a 93.8% average daily attendance. We are currently sitting at 93.5% and going strong. And three of our grade levels,
048kinder, second, and third, have already surpassed our end of the year goal with 94 to 95% average daily attendance. People People often tell us that Stanley feels like home. This is the biggest compliment to us and we're able to see this because families are starting to join us throughout the day including lunch recess time just coming and playing with kids. As Mr. Ingmeer said, we also want to make sure that we are supporting our staff and we've se seen this because our staff spend a lot of their own money to help support basic needs. So, we started this snack pantry and we have other things, a clothing closet and stuff in our building to make sure we're lessening that burden on our staff. We want you to know that we believe a school should feel
049like a place where every family belongs, where staff are supported, and where children know they are valued and cared for. And I can proudly say that this is happening and we'd love for you to come visit. >> Thank you very much. So, as you can see, in order for this strategy to be effective, collaborative leadership with the principal, the community school coordinator, and building leadership must be intentional, and principal Hart and Mr. Ink Meyer have demonstrated the ability to do so in a very short time. Through their collective efforts, Stanley has used the community school framework and needs assessment to develop great partnerships and to provide the needs of their families and their students. I'd also like to take this time to invite principal Wilks and community school coordinator Thomas Johnson to share how they've
050used collaborative leadership and their needs assessment to develop some outcomes and measurements from their building, Dodge Elementary. Good evening. I'm Michelle Wilks and I'm the principal at Dodge Literacy Magnet. I'm also a very proud 34year veteran of this district. Um, and it actually, if you do the math, 47 years. I'll let you try to guess how old I am. Um I am a proud product of the Witchaw public schools. And when Gil Alvarez presented the opportunity um to become a part of a community school model, it it was first time in a long time that finally there was something that aligned with the vision that we have for our children at Dodge. Um, it reflects our belief that schools can only thrive, as you've heard before, when they're the hubs of collaboration, equity, and the
051holistic support of our students and our families. And it's what my staff and I have been doing. It's what this district has done for years and years and years. But we've realized in the last 5 to seven years that we can't do it alone. And so we are looking to build the opportunity to connect with our families and our community. Um we often wonder if people really know where Dodge's Literacy Magnet is because we are tucked away in a neighborhood that is um north of Town West Square that is closed. And so it's it's it's interesting to see people respond when we give the directions to where we're located because many people don't know we are in that neighborhood serving families and children. Um, we are looking forward. We are very much boots on the
052ground is very much who we are because we are building from the ground up in terms of reestablishing our connections with our family, but more importantly with the community that we serve. So we are excited about the opportunity to bring people together, not just the principal, not just the community school coordinator, but our teachers, our families, and local community people who are can work together with us to craft a stronger vision for student success. We have a goal of being intentional about collaborative leadership and we want to make sure that our parents and our community people are involved in what's happening in our school. And that can only happen when we know about what our children and our families are experiencing. We have to base these decisions and set these these um directions that we
053want to move based on the lived experiences of our students and their families. And so for us, it is and it always has been about removing barriers to learning, removing barriers to being successful humans and removing barriers that um prevent our kids from acquiring that highquality education that we all endeavor for our kids. Um we're excited. This work is going to empower our building leadership team in the building level, but allow us to build these connections so that we can work together to strengthen what we have started at Dodge Literacy Magnet both on the academic and the non-academic side to really start eliminating some of the barriers that are preventing our kids from learning. And it starts with the needs assessment process. And so I'm going to turn it over to the fabulous Thomas Johnson,
054let him share with you his work so far. Hello. Uh kind of crazy being on this side of things. I grew up coming to these board meetings with my mother and so to to be here where I am now is a definitely full circle moment. Uh so as uh as principal Wilks said as far as our needs assessment and what it is what it does well it it's assessing our needs. So how are we doing that? Well, we've put together, and by we, I mean the fabulous Lata Kennedy has put together our needs assessment that helps gauge some of the demographic background of our families. Uh some of the challenges, some of the uh strengths and weaknesses, things of that nature. So, u with us Dodge being a literacy magnet, we draw students in from
055all parts of town, as far north as Bair, as far south as parts of Derby. Uh so we've got a very wide uh demographic landscape. So what do we do to gauge what it is our students need, especially with such a diverse background? Well, again, Lata Kennedy in this needs assessment that she's helped put together, we've been able to gauge things like again, what are the top three what are the top three strengths of Dodge Literacy Magnet? what are the top three challenges and barriers to involvement to engagement with this school? Right? And we've pushed this hard hard hard not only on guardians, families, you know, whomever it is at home, but also our staff. So, we've gotten a very wide and very large collective of feedback of what it is we can do both
056on the inschool side as well as the out of school side and what it is parents are looking for at home. And some of those things that we see align with our schools so well where we see parents wanting at-ome uh you know reading and literacy material. We see them wanting financial literacy courses. Uh we see them wanting you know behavioral u literacy if you will when it comes to some of the some of the you know socio emotional challenges that some of their some of their kids face. And so this allows us to prioritize and on a school-by-school basis, not just for us at Dodge, but for Eric and Principal Hart, um it allows all of us at our community schools to cater what it is we're doing, boots on the ground, frontline, to
057what it is our parents specifically want and specifically need at home to continue education outside of the school, which is awesome. So some of the things that we've seen at Dodge, for instance, Our top three strengths of our school community are fabulous and dedicated teachers. And now again, I mentioned previously while we've pushed this on both families and teachers, a lot of this a lot of this response, especially to the point of our dedicated teachers, is not just over inflation by those teachers being biased upon themselves. It is our families. It is it is the guardians, the parents, the grandparents, whomever it is at home, foster parents that are so in tune with their students, teachers, and what's going on in their classrooms and how it is they're performing in school that they're able to
058gauge and feel confident engaging in this statement, in this dedicated teacher statement. We've got the safety and security. We've got the academic instruction. And again, this just goes to show the performance on our teacher side and how it is we can not only piggyback on these successes, but also work on the weaknesses. So again, point of to the point of the weaknesses, what are the top three challenges or barriers that our families face? Well, transportation, child care, and healthcare. And I think that Eric and Principal Hart would probably agree given what our community schools truly represent from a demographic and a neighboring standpoint. So, this allows us to go out to build on the partnerships with Credit Union of America, to build on the partnerships with some of our local uh organizations, the VFW that
059we've got around the corner from us, the police and fire substations. Um, we've actually I I've been forming a relationship with a Hudson Valley swim club who, you know, may be kind of one of those mindbogglers. What What can we do with the swim club? Well, we're trying to open opportunities and open doors for families to get kids into extracurricular things and extracurricular activities at more affordable prices. We're trying to we're trying to figure out how both sides can benefit from these partnerships, of course. So, it's great. It's allowing us to truly build the community, build the hub. Uh I've been speaking with uh Eric and Chris of both Future Ready Center and Construction Pathway and we are working on hopefully trying to build a partnership to replace and sort of refurbish both our school
060food dropbox and school book Dropbox. So these are just some of the some of the partnerships, some of the uh outcomes that we're that we're working towards that we're hoping for. And I'll get into the measurements just briefly. So how do we gauge this? How do we measure these? Well, that's an event bye-vent thing. So if we're hosting a financial literacy class for our parents, for our students for that matter, you know, our gauge is going to be signups. Okay, how many people do we have attend based on is and how how hard are we pushing this event? How many people are we reaching for that matter? If it's something, oh, say, excuse me, if it's something like, you know, our Hudson Valley swim club, how what is the turnout for that? What is the,
061if we're teaching water safety going into spring and summer, how how does that carry over? How do students and how can we gauge those students in their safety around these opportunities? Drowning deaths are still I was told in my meeting with the Hudson Valley swim uh instructor that drowning deaths are still the number one cause uh amongst amongst kids under 18. So as far as accidental death circus are concerned. So how can we how can we combat this? How can we make things safer? How can we educate to improve the lives, improve the safety of everyone involved in the community? And so that's kind of what we're working towards. And it is so exciting. It's so much fun. I you know they say you find a job you love, you never really work a day
062in your life. And I get to go home every day to my five kids and tell them how great my day was. Tell them how much fun I had. Tell them about all the good things that we're doing. And it brings the biggest smile to my face and even with the newborn makes it no problem whatsoever. Getting up the next day motivated and amped up to go in and do it all over again. So I love this program. I'm loving what we're trying to do and to the moon. Really truly, this is awesome. So, thank you for having us here. Thank you for allowing us to come and share some of our progress in this and we can't wait to come back. >> Okay. >> Awesome. Don't leave because I'm going to have them. If
063you have questions, then by all means, we want to entertain those. But as you can see that through strategic partnerships with families, local organizations and service providers, this pilot, this strategy actually is able to help us integrate academic, social, and health supports to create that welcoming resource and that welcoming environment that will get us to our school goals of student achievement. So at this time if you have any questions we would like to entertain those if you have questions of them or myself. >> Yeah absolutely. Go ahead Kelly. >> I want to summarize by thanking all of you to be for being here tonight. Great presentation. Um I think for those of you that are going to be here all night with us. Uh the theme of tonight is community. You you'll hear it all
064throughout and that we cannot we we don't want to exist alone independent of our community but we we can't be successful without working together with the community. Um, I want to thank uh all the leadership uh the board members and UTW members and district leaders who work together. Um, I don't know that we usually scale things in six months like this, right? I mean, seriously, in K12 education, this is not what we usually do. Um, but we were committed to it. We believed in it. The board believed in it. And so, it's exciting. If we want to continue, we'll continue to need to have a resource conversation. I think the pilot uh we're showing definite proof of concept uh is is what I'm seeing tonight. Um and and one other last thing to reiterate, I
065think this is part of what um for community schools is so important that if you think of think of our mission in terms of bullseye, right? And the and the center of the bullseye is really teaching kids to to learn, right? Teaching kids to learn to read, learn to learn math. That's the core of what we do. Then there's a ring outside of that that is things that we can help our families with in order to do that core, which is a lot of the work we're doing. And then there's another ring that's really mostly about communication. Um that we're communicating with our community about things. They're they're not our core mission, but they're critically important to our families. Um I heard you talk about transportation, healthcare, and child care, and those those all exist
066in different parts of that ring. Um we can't teach an empty chair. We need kids in the seat in order to teach them to read. That's our core mission, but these other rings are vitally important. Um, and it's exciting to see the alignment with um the Witchaw Public Schools Foundation and community schools and love schools and collective impact and really all of these ideas that are wrapping around uh more than just the student, but really the community in order to complete our core mission, which is producing kids that are future ready. So, great job. Thanks for being here tonight. Thank you, Knock. >> This warms my heart. It fills my soul. It has perhaps been the best presentation I have listened to as a board member. Uh my question uh for you all, um what
067advice would you have for our school board? What advice would you have for our district leadership on how we can best support the community schools model and USD 259? >> I think for me it's being in our buildings and seeing the work that our teachers are doing and the the children that we're serving because when you are in the building and boots on the ground, you see the needs. They're right there staring you in the face. So being present um I know Miss Bond has been to my building um superintendent has been to my building. I welcome anyone to come to Dodge Literacy Magnet to see the work that's being done. Um we have mental health agency already working in within our building providing wraparound support for students. Um so this is just an opportunity
068for us to broaden that support for our families um and to make those connections that sometimes they lack the opportunity. So for me a as a as a leader in a building, it would be awesome to have you come and just visit and interact with kids. Um but then I think also being available um to come to site council meetings, PTO meetings, uh grade level team meetings, professional development so that you can hear the conversations that are happening around instruction and learning and supporting of students so that they can all be successful. I think Principal Wils is spot on with what she said. Uh we in fact all of us community school coordinators, we had a PD day um with Mrs. Kennedy and one of the things that we spent quite a bit of time
069on with the uh scholastic representatives was a model of Maslo's hierarchy of needs. And when I saw that today, it took me back to my instructing days at Witchaw State. Um, and that was something that for incoming freshmen and uh especially first generation students uh first generation college students, we really worked on uh from a confidence standpoint, from a presentation standpoint. Um I primarily did public speaking and communications uh courses when I when I was instructing there. Um, and so to see that in our PD day today, it it got my head spinning and I I I almost exploded with excitement. Um, waiting for a time to interject to just add my two cents of really understanding at at all levels of school and education from the ground up. um that hierarchy of needs and
070how from physiological needs all the way up to self-actualization. Um for one, it's a two-way street and for two, every single thing that we do and that everyone in school does plays into that hierarchy of needs. Um, and like Principal Wilks said, for students, especially at the schools that we're at, our community schools, it's huge to to see your guys' faces for them. For you guys to become familiar, safe faces and people to them. That's something that um I know Eric and I from our conversations and I'm sure the rest of our community school coordinators have have found is is is our big first task as we're really getting into this program is being that safe person to students and kids who don't have many safe people in their life and being that consistently. Um
071so like Principal Wils said, we invite you certainly into Dodge whenever, wherever. Um, I would love to see you guys in there, be able to catch up, be able to update you guys all on, you know, kind of where things are at at that time. Um, but but that's that's kind of what I I present and what I challenge you guys to do. >> I would agree with everything that you've heard so far, but Noc, you said that this filled your heart and this was just words. So come experience, come connect, come be part of what we have going on in our buildings, because that's really where the magic is. And it's not coming in to just be a board member that's in our building, to be our superintendent that's in our building. It's to
072be a new face to our kids, a new trusted adult. It's to be somebody who's going to come read a book, somebody who's going to come on the monkey bars with them. So make sure you wear your tennis shoes. Make sure you dress comfy because they want people that are real. They don't want us in suits and ties just supervising from the back. They want us to be involved. They want us. >> Yes. >> I better say something here. Um so, um a different part maybe just to challenge you on I really appreciate that question. That's a great question. Um is sometimes you got to think outside the box, right? And I think this is part of that. thinking outside of what normally might happen. And just from my few months on the job experience,
073I've um have seen um happen twice to me is talking to different organizations, nonprofits that just said, "Hey, we're just waiting for somebody to ask us to be involved and be a part of it, right?" And so that that to me is I think there's there's the community that's out there that wants to be a part of what's going on. They're just wanting somebody to >> to invite them. So >> very good. >> Kudos. >> Okay. >> Any other questions? >> Very good. Any further questions? Okay. Seeing none. Thank you guys very much. Excellent presentation and I'm sure we will all be out into your building soon >> with blue jeans on. >> So, thank you, Latana. Please keep us updated. >> Yes. [Applause] Latona. Next item, >> full screener data presentation. [Music] >> All
074right, we're going to welcome uh Justin Castwin, and Amanda to give us an update on our fall data. [Music] Are you in charge of getting us set up now or do I have to touch things? [Music] I need help. >> I don't know how we follow that. That was really uh moving testimonial. >> Thanks, guys. Success. All right. Good evening. Sorry for the pause there. Mr. Castle and I are here to provide you with what's become an annual fall report on how our students are doing with their screeners um for early literacy and mathematics. Um as you can see um our goals have not changed. We are still working in our strategic plan on decreasing the number of students who are at risk in third grade on a reading and in eighth grade on a
075math. So I'm we're going to kind of go back and forth here and paint a picture of how our students are doing. If you remember last year we pivoted when the state assessment was getting ready to change to a reading as what we were measuring for comprehension. And so you can see that there are two falls worth of data to share with you. This was not a test we were giving to every grade level prior to that. So we don't have historical data like we do on some of our others. So in this case green and negative is a good thing. Um it shows that fourth and fifth grade and third grade um have all decreased the percentage of students who in the fall were testing at risk on third grade A- reading. Just a
076reminder, this is an adaptive test and it measures a very broad range of skills from language to foundational skills to informational reading skills and narrative. This year we're looking at our A- reading data across all three grade levels. And the data you see shows a percentage of students who are either at or above benchmark. And if you look at the fall 25 on the right, you can see that all three grade levels are are a little bit higher than where they were this time last fall. Um, and we're real proud of that. Um, we use this information to evaluate the effectiveness of our core instruction and the impact of our intervention supports. Um and by analyzing these results um we can identify our strengths, our gaps and any areas where we need targeted supports uh
077to improve reading achievement. [Music] >> Thank you. So we've also um historically shown you some of the early literacy screener data that's not part of our strategic plan just as kind of a holistic view including things like letter name and letter sound for our kindergarten students. CVMR, which is oral reading fluency. Um, and you'll see there across, we really measure fall to fall to fall for a number of reasons. We want to know if our programs are working, if our training is helping, if our school improvement efforts are effective. But then, as you see on the diagonal line there, we also want to measure a cohort of students and how they're progressing through grade levels. So, if we follow the gray boxes there, you can see second grade CBMR. So the number of kids or
078percentage of kids who were fluent in CBMR back in fall of 21 all the way up to fall of 24 when they were fifth graders went from 34.1 to 52.1%. You can see the overall percentage point change there on the far right. The red in the fall 25 columns column just means a change um downwards from last year fall 24 and the green just means a trend upwards from fall of 24. So, we are transitioning to math now and this is not something we have traditionally shared with the board at our fall progress checks, but because we do measure a math and eighth grade as our strategic interim goal for goal one, we wanted to give you some context for how that's going in elementary as well. So, that is an assessment we actually have
079been giving for multiple years in the fall, winter, and spring assessment windows. Just like a reading, it's an adaptive assessment that measures a really broad range of skills. Counting and cardality, operations on algebraic thinking, you name it, it's in this assessment. So you here see here 2 through fifth grade across five falls. Um and you can see again the percentage point change from fall of 2122 to fall of 2526 and all grade levels have improved minus second grade which is down 2.3 percentage points. As you know, last year was our first year of intentionally focus focusing on middle school math. And this year, we're going to continue that, but we're going to expand our analysis to all three grades in middle school. Uh the data you you see shows that all three of our grades
080have improved a little bit from last year in math as well. Um it shows the percentage of students who are at above at or above benchmark in the fall a math screener. And while the eighth grade remains our key focus for the strategic plan, uh we are going to work on strengthening math instruction at all three grade levels and we'll continue to support that work. >> So you always like to ask us what are some things that we're doing with the data that's in front of us. So we'll start with elementary next steps and there's three bullet points up there and you also have a handout. So, um, this is the first year in the past couple of years that we can come to you and say most of our staff know and understand how
081reading develops and what they can do in their classrooms to help our students become more proficient readers due to letters. Um, we pushed for four years through volume one and volume two and the state has actually made it a requirement that by 2028 certain educators including all elementary um, as well as elementary administrators and psychologists, special education, etc. add the seal of literacy to their license indicating that they have the knowledge to apply and the appropriate necessary literacy skills and instructional practices. Um I just finished some numbers today to share with you. So we just sent 980 names to KST of teachers in our district, administrators, coaches, etc. who have earned their seal of literacy through letters. We also sent 62 early childhood teacher pre-K teacher names to the state who earned their seal through
082easy letters. This is a huge accomplishment for these staff. this was not a small lift for them and as you heard Savannah share earlier challenges of teaching are real and so to take the time to go through this type of robust professional learning um is really important and it's noteworthy for our teachers. So moving forward we intend to intentionally apply what we've learned first. Every elementary building will have a robust but focused school improvement plan which is the handout that you have in front of you. The school improvement plan is tied directly back to our strategic plan. And there are some building level practices that we just expect should be in place consistently at every single building. So that's um towards the top of your handout and includes things like teachers planning using their proficiency
083scales, teachers teaching our word recognition routines daily with fidelity, teachers progress monitoring students, building administrators conducting observations, and providing actionable feedback. And specifically that last bullet talks a little bit about accreditation. So by the end of September, all of our buildings having cycles of professional collaboration around language comprehension, which is actually the second bullet of what we're doing. So we define professional collaboration as grade level time together to plan in a standardsdriven way with best instructional practices. We've learned what letter says. Now we need to get to the application port portion or portion and that includes making sure that we are using our proficiency scales to plan. Last but not least, um it's different to measure comprehension than it is to measure word recognition. So the gains that we've seen in our early foundational skills
084um have been large across five years because they're so individualized. Reading comprehension is much more complex of a skill for students to perform on an assessment. But one thing we can do is we can start to provide teachers with common assessments that are standardsbased as check-ins or dipsticks because there's no progress monitoring measure for a reading and the state assessment data is a lag measure. By the time we get it, those kids are into the next grade level and they're getting the next test with the next grade level standards. So right now we're developing what we're calling common assessments through kite which is the system they take the actual state assessments on. We are in preliminary stages. So a small group of specialists the district assessment coordinator Scott Dillinger and six elementary buildings are working
085on developing and administering these assessments this year to see if we can scale this to size in our district to provide more common assessments. So, as early as next fall, we might be able to launch, if you will, these common assessments to all third grade teachers across our district as a way to measure how's our instruction going, how are our cycles going, and how our school improvement plans going. >> Um, in math, our goal is to strengthen both our core instruction and our intervention programs. And we do that in core with the envision math curriculum that we adopted last year in 2024. Uh for intervention we utilize the IXL math intervention and that is designed to help kids u with both ongrade level skills and and some remediation as well. And then we use progress
086monitoring with growth checks and the a math reports for reading. Um it's it's a very similar uh program. Um, we want to strengthen core reading uh through the use of the my perspectives ELA curriculum that we adopted in 2018. And uh we will uh we'll also use the language live curriculum in our tier three classes. And uh that is designed to help kids improve their accuracy, their fluency, and their comprehension skills. And recently several of you uh have visited Curtis Middle School with me and some people on our team and you got to see language live happening and and what that was doing was that was helping um our kids fill in some of their reading skills so they can access ongrade level text and their core classes and again we will progress monitor them
087with the CBMR and the A reading reports. So we know that another critical component of school improvement and better outcomes for kids is providing teachers with high quality instructional materials. So when we talk about that, we talk about adoptions. Um here's kind of where we have been. So for elementary, we adopted a new core math curriculum. This year was the first year of full implementation to all buildings. Um and like anything that we do that's new, there are some things that we're working through. um the amount of prep time and just getting to know a new curriculum. Uh Everyday Math is a game-based spiraling curriculum that we actually have used in this district before. Um but it was 9 to 10 years ago. So if you think about how many staff we hire each year,
088we've got some people who are like, "Yeah, I remember this." And some who have no idea. And we're going to help them through that. Um we are currently working with our ELA workg group and steering committee to adopt a language arts component for core ELA um K through five that would not include preK. Uh right now we've narrowed from 8 to four and we are getting ready to narrow from four to two. We've invited eight buildings to pilot. That implementation would not start until 2728. >> So from math uh we adopted the envision curriculum from SAS last year. Um, we've been using the My Perspectives curriculum by Sava since 2008 and we're looking to continue that uh with their updated version in 2627. >> So, with that, that's our update and we welcome any questions
089you might have for us. >> Amanda, I just wanted to share a couple things. Um, if are you running the slides or is Latona? >> Yes. >> Okay. If you would go back to the slide, the big one with the fall screener data for K5. Go back to that one. And I think again, like I said, you know, tonight's about community. Um, but I just wanted to to point this out, lift this up. Um, how long have those kindergarters been in school with us before they got this screening test? >> Um, about three weeks. >> Okay. So, that data, right, those kindergarten kids that are coming to us with these scores, um, have those scores despite anything we've done. I mean, maybe some of these kids were in our pre-K classes, but but not the
090majority. Um, so when we talk about strong core instruction, this is this is part of the challenge is that when kids are not kindergarten ready, it makes it even harder for that core to be built and strengthened, etc., etc. Which is why we work with Witchaw Collective Impact on kindergarten readiness, which is why we invest in community schools because we can't we can't do this alone. Um, it's Savannah who spoke, right? She was right on. It's this tension between this is what my kids need. They don't know how to use a water fountain, so I need to teach them how to use a water fountain, but our job is to teach kids to read. So, we need them learning letters and sounds and and all of all of these things. So, um, and there's just
091not enough time in the day sometimes to get it all in. Um, so this is the challenge, right? And why it can't be a solution. The solution can't live from 9 to 4. the solution has to live outside of that with families and with community and with churches and youth groups and and sports clubs and all all of those sorts of things. So, um I think I was glad we lifted that up. Um, and then the other thing I wanted to mention too, um, and you can speak way more intelligently about this than I can, but part of the challenge of comprehension, um, is students have to have prior knowledge about the world in order for them to understand the text they're reading. Even if they can sound out a word, if they know what
092the word is, but they don't know what that word means, they don't have any prior knowledge, it doesn't stick to anything. Um, so I was really excited, especially at Stanley to hear about the expanded learning opportunities. Um, kids going on field trips, going to museums, um, going camping, like going all sorts of things like that expands their prior knowledge so that when they read about something, they can connect it to something they already know. um students, especially students who grow up in poverty or who have a certain cultural experience don't have all of the prior knowledge that our curriculum always our tests especially always ask for. So um to provide those extended learning opportunities again it isn't always possible to do uh from 9 to 4 on the 180 school days. So it needs to
093happen in the summer with the YMCA or in the evenings uh with a community group or something like that. So, I don't know if you want to speak to that at all, but I just think that's that's one of our critical things, the vocabulary and the prior knowledge that our kids lack. Um, >> yeah, I would um echo that and then I would add the um challenge of language, first language into that as well. So, if I if I have the background knowledge, great. But if it's not my first language, that adds a secondary barrier to really true reading proficiency. So, it's two things that we are battling. Um, but you're spot on with if they have no experience, it's really hard to really understand the text even if they can read. [Music] >> Okay,
094I will start off asking some questions then. Uh, first off, we have a few acronyms on here. So, can you please explain what CBMR means for the audience? >> Yeah, CBMR is a curriculum based reading measure. Um, it's basically an oral reading and fluency assessment. So, how many words can kids read accurately in one minute? They read three passages and they take the median score. >> Okay. So, for staying targeted on if we're talking about reading intervention because that's kind of the basis for all of our educational outcomes, right? Um, can you explain our targeted supports especially at the elementary level for increasing reading? >> Yes. So our plan is to strengthen both core and intervention. Um in our district we work with MTSS multi-teer support and we use data to um basically place kids
095in groups where they um need to refreshen their skills or close gaps. This could look like a student who is very inaccurate being in really great reading, which is a tier three reading intervention with a highly skilled teacher in a smaller group setting every day trying to fill those gaps to a student who's accurate but just needs to be a little faster. They might be placed in a tier 2 um support group using a curriculum like quick reads. It's on our protocol all the way up to tier one students um who are accurate and fluent and just need to stay that way. Does that answer your question? Okay. And then can you explain uh we invested in letters training for professional development and can you please explain how long that process takes for our staff
096members to get that seal of literacy on their certification? >> So um the official letters is supposed to be done in two years across two volumes of work which is 80 plus hours of online asynchronous learning in addition to eight full days of training. Um, we slowed that role, if you will, down based on feedback from our teachers. So, it took us four years. We spent about two years trying to get everybody through volume one and another two years getting everybody through volume two. So, that's the length of time it's taken for us to do that. >> Okay. Very good. And then if we can go to the the screener um information that you were explaining. When are teachers providing this information? >> Can you rephrase your question? I'm concerned about I hear from teachers
097a lot that we're asking them to do a lot but we're not any taking anything off of their plates. This is very important but what when are they doing this exactly? Is there is this in place of something else that they're currently doing? >> The actual assessment like administering the assessment. >> Yeah, this screen for success measurement. It looks a little bit different than what we've been doing in the past. >> I think I >> Or is that the same one? >> Are you looking at the school improvement plan document? Okay. Where on that? I can picture it in my head, but it's not in front of me. >> Uh, it's just says goal number one for graduation. It's too small font for me to read. So, >> Gotcha. So what's on that is the
098building level expectations, things that should be in place that we've been doing for years. Okay? >> So teaching our routines, planning with our scales, getting into classrooms, providing feedback if you're an administrator, planning great professional learning if you're a coach. >> Okay? >> Each grade level is already administering the screeners that we're measuring. Okay? >> So a kindergarten teacher is already assessing kids three times a year in letter sound and word sig. And those are the two things our school improvement plan measuring versus like a fifth grade teacher is already assessing CBMR and A reading and that's what we're measuring. So we're not asking them to assess anything that we're not going to come back and check in on or that they're not um able to use our routines and materials to teach. Okay, very
099good. I thought this was something new that we were doing in addition to something else. So sorry I cannot read this font so I had to guess a little bit. Okay. Um, and if we can go back to uh the slide that Kelly addressed earlier. Um, and we had a speaker uh address this as well. So, when we have kindergarteners come in, and I have heard this from every single kindergartener and prek teacher that I have met with um, and some of these staff members have been in the district for decades. They have been these are not new staff members. they have been been through the they've been with the district for a very long time and they are telling me that some of the students they're getting in many of them many of the
100classrooms have number of students that are not potty trained. >> Um and so now we've got staff members that are are teaching very basic skills uh that have not normally been done in that kind of classroom. Um they're explaining to me that some of these students don't know how to hold a pencil. they don't know how to do very very basic things that were expectations years ago into the kindergarten classroom. And so these are real challenges that the district is facing. Um oftentimes I say we're we're not getting them at at a zero like they're they're not ready to go. They're they're at already a deficit and to try to get it takes a lot of work to get those students just where they should be. And so, um, it's disappointing to see the red
101numbers on on a chart, but I would challenge everybody to come into our buildings. Um, I think our community schools staff members address this to to get in and to see the challenges that we're facing. Um, these are not excuses, but I I'm constantly talking with staff members that are that are painting very vivid pictures and I'm seeing it myself in classrooms where these are the they're very real challenges that our staff members are dealing with day in and day out to the best of their ability. And that's oftentimes before they can get to letters, names, and sounds. And like I said that is not an excuse but at the same point in time it is reality that we are facing. Um so the more we can get um get the community in and also
102to embrace our students outside of the school hours um the better our community will will experience that. So um with that thank you guys very much. Uh are there any further questions from the board? Okay seeing none. Thank you very much. We appreciate your presentation and look forward to the winter screeners. >> Okay, Latona. Next item, >> school facilities condition report. >> All right, I will welcome Luke Newman um to come up and give us a facilities condition report. There for a while we were hanging out with Luke every board meeting. It seemed like it's been a minute. So, welcome back. Also, uh Dr. Steve Noble's here as uh sidekick. I don't know. I don't know how you describe yourself. Sidekick. Okay. >> Come hang out with me. >> Welcome guys. All right. All right,
103I think we're ready to go. Uh, well, good evening, President Albert, Superintendent Belfeld, who seems to have slipped away. Um, and members of the board. Uh, my name is Luke Newman, and I'm the director of facilities. And the purpose of tonight's presentation is to revisit some facilities related data and share how we're continuing to extend the life of our facilities. Um, and also to share some new metrics and dashboard tools that we've been developing, uh, which we'll be re reviewing with the board in greater depth next month, but at least tonight you'll get to see a little bit of a sneak peek. Okay, so facility condition index. I'd like to start by uh just revisiting the definition of facility condition index, which is FCI for short. Um as a reminder and board I'm sure is
104very familiar with this term but uh FCI is the industry standard measurement used uh to evaluate facility conditions and it represents the ratio of total largecale maintenance needs to the total replacement value of all building systems and components. So, we've had a lot of time to think about uh the best way to present what FCI is in a basic sense. Um, and came up with this analogy of the Pinto. Um, you have the old Pinto on the left and the newer restored Pinto in the middle there. And really FCI represents um the older Pinto is that large is your large scale maintenance needs and then that newer restored Pinto is the um the replacement value of your building systems. So, uh, as your Pinto gets, uh, ages more and it has more and more maintenance
105needs, um, that means your your FCI score is essentially going to to grow, um, to where the cost of the maintenance uh, about matches the cost of fully restoring that Pinto. Um, so at a certain point the cost to fully restore the Pinto will be similar to the cost of a modern vehicle with all the bells and whistles, which is what you see in the Honda Accord on the on the far right there. So that's what FCI is essentially telling us. Uh, the closer the index score gets to one, uh, the more it makes sense to potentially replace with new. Okay, so it's hard to believe, but two years have gone by since my last update on facility uh on FCI data. Um our average FCI score for all of our buildings has increased from
1060.53 in 2023 uh to 62 today, which is due to another couple years gone by at a flat rate of funding. In terms of dollars, our largecale maintenance backlog has grown from $1.2 billion two years ago to 1.4 $4 billion today. And I want to take a moment to clarify what FCI truly means. Everything we track has a fixed lifespan. So roofs might have 25 to 30 years. A rooftop unit on a for HVAC system would have 10 to 15. Um and as time goes on, additional items uh reach the end of their life, which is why our FCI score has has increased. So two years ago, we had a backlog of items that have reached the end of their anticipated life and two two more years have gone by since and we have more
107roofs that have reached the end of their expected life. HVAC units, everything from A to Z in our buildings. And so that that's that's what that means. That's why that FCI has gone up from 0.53 to 62. That doesn't mean the roof is gone or we don't have HVAC. It means that we're getting more life out of those systems than we should reasonably expect. As a result, we're dealing with more roofs that are leaking and HVAC systems that are breaking more frequently. And that's the experienced impact of higher FCI scores in our buildings. Okay, so getting into graphs a little bit. Um, starting at our current need of $1.4 4 billion. When looking out at our projected needs 5 years into the future, we anticipate our total largescale maintenance needs growing to $2.4 billion by
108the year 2030. Five year just five years out. This projection is based on an anticipated $20 million of investment per year going towards large-scale maintenance needs. In fiscal year 2026, we are fortunate to be able to put $37 million towards large scale large scale maintenance. uh due to one-time funding from cash reserves. But as you can see from this graph, the funding we are able to put in which is shown in blue pales in comparison to the volume of need in our facilities which is shown in red. So drilling down a little bit deeper when we look at our large scale maintenance needs shown in red here uh versus building system values in orange we see that there is a larger gap between them currently but as time goes on these two values get closer
109to one another and that's not a good thing. It means that as we get closer to the value of our largescale maintenance needs equaling the total value of building systems we are tracking I'm sorry it means that we are getting closer to the value of our large scale maintenance needs equaling the value of building systems we are tracking. So in essence once those two numbers become equal with one another it basically means everything in our buildings needs replaced. So relating back to the car analogy, we could continue investing in the Pinto, which in some instances makes sense. Nothing against the Pinto. Some people really want a fully restored Pinto. But as these two values get closer to one another, the more prudent approach is really to rebuild rather than to repair. And it's for the
110reasons I have listed on this slide. Um, with a newer facility, you're going to have uh spaces that better meet modern learning needs. you're going to have more flexible spaces, uh, classrooms that are that are that are better set up to accommodate modern modern learning and teaching. Um, you you reduce your long-term maintenance needs, uh, reduce your your critical fail failures by resetting the clock um, and building something new. And then this last point, I think, is a really important one, too. You have more cohesive systems. So, your whole building is constructed to accommodate all the systems that that are in it, right? rather than having an old facility that you're trying to retrofit with various odds and ends and and make it work and update it. It's just not all cohesively built together to
111function as one system of one building system. So um regarding FCI FCI facility condition index and what this means same thing just projecting out uh five years our our FCI is anticipated to reach 0.82 82 uh by 2030. Um in order to and then in order to keep just just uh just for as an FYI in order to keep our FCI at 62 we would need to invest an average of 127 million a year into largecale uh building system needs just to put things in perspective. So the longer it takes to mean to make uh meaningful investments in our facilities, the more expensive it gets due to the compounding needs and the more likely it becomes that we will have critical building system system failures that lead to negative impacts in our learning environments for
112our students and staff. So we know that this is uh that there's a significant need that exists um and we in facilities have been and will continue to work to diligently address the issues as they arise and to work proactively uh to manage our systems uh to prevent critical failures uh to every extent possible and gain efficiencies where we can. Um and I'd like to just give you a quick snap snapshot of some of those efforts. Um, so for one, the facilities division fields 40,000 work orders a year from our buildings, and that's just under 500 per attendance center. Um, our in-house in-house maintenance crews uh have also spent a total of 8,536 hours addressing emergency failures alone over that three-year period, which equates to more than four full-time crew people just supporting emergencies. And
113it goes without saying that many of these issues are due to the age of our buildings. In terms of dollars, um we spend about 15 million per year on maintenance issues and that's simply just fixing what breaks. Uh that doesn't do anything to improve our FCI scores or make any any headway on our on our backlog of large scale maintenance needs. Um but we do spend about 10 to 11 million million dollars per year on average towards addressing reactive maintenance um those fixing what breaks and then we spend four to five million per year on average towards addressing uh preventive maintenance efforts and I'll talk about that a little bit more here in a minute. Uh 20 million on average in capital outlay is available for addressing largecale maintenance um or capital improvements uh modernizations
114and adjustments that we need to make to our facilities. And then there are our recent one-time uh reactive investments that um this board again is very aware of. Um North High, these are things that that we're not anticipating. Um but North High structural re remediation, that was $24 million to date and there's more to come there. Uh and then East High structural remediation, we've spent about $8 million, $18 million to date, I'm sorry, um on that building and we have more restoration efforts that we need to make on that building as well, although not quite as substantial as North currently. In terms of our one-time proactive invest investments, um we spent put $81 million of investments uh from COVID relief funds towards addressing HVAC systems, controls, and windows. We're very fortunate to have that. Uh
11518 million went towards addressing um some school safety uh which this board again approved um adding office restricted access door locks, elevators, and things. And then we're also hoping to we were granted a $15 million grant from the um Department of Energy and uh we have a $5 million match on that. We are still hoping, we're waiting for that to come through, but we are optimistic and um that's going to give us more opportunity to do much of uh the same kind of stuff with HVAC controls, upgrades, chillers, and and such. Okay. So, I just wanted to share this graph to demonstrate the importance of preventive maintenance um and what and how we've increased our efforts there and the dividends is paid. Um the it's simple the the blue line shows our preventive maintenance efforts
116over the last three years and how we've increased um our efforts there with just it's simple things like getting into our HVAC units uh lubricating things you know changing out belts um getting out with our uh water water jet and and jetting out um sewage lines to prevent stopups and uh really all of our shops do some level of preventive maintenance. Um and it has uh it's really benefited um our buildings because in that what's shown in orange there is that as we've ramped up our preventive maintenance efforts um our reactive maintenance has has dipped. So um it hasn't it hasn't really dropped but it hasn't gone up. Um it's actually below what it was. Our our this is our volume of reactive maintenance is less than it was three years ago. So what we're
117doing is working. Um and we continue to ex extend the life of our buildings. Um and this is really our mission in facilities uh to to minimize system failures in our schools because the the more time educators have to focus on educating uh you know less time focusing on facilities issues, the more time they're able to focus on educating. And that's really what what we're all about and why we why we exist. Okay. Okay, so just touching on some more uh organizational efficiencies gained. I won't go through this whole list, but do just want to share some some key bullet points. Um, Triura, these are these are just things that we've done over the years to to really improve our offerings and and and gain efficiencies and um add value. And um so Triga system
118conversion, that was something we we embarked on uh gosh, six years ago, something like that. And um and it it's been huge for us. It's really helped us u provide a much more customer service focused approach. Um way we have way more ability to uh to track data and make sure that we're we're meeting certain performance metrics and um and so that's been a lot of the data that we that we have to share tonight and what we'll be uh sharing in the future especially next month. A lot of that data would not be available had we not made that conversion to Triurea. Um, we also purchased an edge bander for our millings department and we're saving about $75,000 per year in labor and materials uh with that purchase. And so it's basically paying for
119itself in year one. Um, we have purchased custodial autonomous floor scrubber robot robots which have helped us address staffing shortages and free up time to focus on critical aspects of cleaning and the buildings that have those. And then uh our energy savings program mentioned that a little bit, but we continue to save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in energy savings through advocacy and utility rate cases, hedging uh gas rates to lock in lower prices, HVAC, HVAC controls, data analytics, a whole bunch of wedi stuff that you probably don't want to hear about, but I love. Okay, just a couple more slides. um want to talk a little bit about our uh this this new uh measurement that we'll be rolling out with our presentation uh next month. Um and it's the learning environment
120index. And this really came about because we um really came to realize that the FCI facility condition index gives a lot of great information regarding nuts and bolts of our facilities. Um, but it doesn't really capture the experiential elements of of of our buildings and you know what people kind of see and feel and touch um when they're in there, the more the intangibles. And so um we worked with DLR group um who's done a lot of these across the across the country for other school districts. They have a whole uh scoring criteria that they've developed. And so we went through that with them. There's probably about 50 line items or or more. and I was going to print one up and give it all to you, but the font was too small, so I
121decided I'll just email it to you so you can look at it. Um, but yeah, it uh so this is um this will be something you you hear more about next month, but essentially um we're we're looking at we we spent all summer went through all of our facilities, gathered all the data, completed all the assessments, had the forms done and all that. Um and and um and it evaluated things like site size, classroom size, storage, outdoor spaces, play areas, um you know, safety, building safety, the lines of sight, signage, um air quality in your buildings. Are you getting enough daylight? Um ADA accessibility, pickup drop off areas. I mean, you can you can read it all there, but um there's there's a lot there that's captured. And so, um it's kind of that secondary
122piece to how we look at and evaluate our facilities. Okay, now here's the big big reveal. >> Um, so yeah, this is the sneak peek at what what we'll be diving in deeper uh with in next next next next month. Um, very excited about this dashboard tool we're developing. Um, I won't I won't let the cat out of the bag too much on on what we're all going to include here uh because we still have some final um polishing up to do, but essentially um the board will have the ability to look at um get get a general overview of our of our district facilities. Um we want people to be able to really see um where our maintenance is going. Um, so that's what those bubbles are all kind of showing is you'll be
123able to see um, you know, across the city where where kind of our highest volume of maintenance um, is going, where highest volume of maintenance efforts are going. Uh, and then you'll have the ability to click on the bubbles and and go into the actual school data itself. So really drill down into the specifics of each school where we're going to have the facility condition index, the learning environment index, and then a list of of large scale maintenance needs that we're projecting in addition to some previous historic larges scale projects that we've completed. So um yeah, really excited to present on that next month and uh look forward to that. So just want to finish up with some key takeaways and then we can open it up for some questions. But um the facilities team
124uh just continues to to uh work diligently to find ways to extend our our building our building life uh for all of our schools. Um and uh and yeah, just lots of proactive management on that front. Um the learning environment index is a new uh measurement for us that um that will complement the facility condition index that you'll be learning about more next month. But I'm very excited about what that brings to the table. And then lastly, just that we have this new dashboard we've been building that h you'll be seeing again next month. And um yeah, look forward to that. So with that, I will open it up for questions. Mr. Noble or Dr. Noble, do you have anything to add? >> Couldn't have said it better myself. We'll stand for questions. Thank you.
125>> I just have a couple things I want to I want to lift up. Great job. I think this is very clear. Um, Luke, since I've been superintendent, it's been been coming. This is year three. Um, are the needs going away? >> Uh, no sir. >> Okay. So, the needs are not going away. And I think that's important that we have decisions to make because the needs aren't going away. Um, the the car example is a really good one. Um, I'm going to equate it uh because the square footage I think is uh apples to apples with a homeowner. So, I'm going to equate it to that a little bit. So let's say we spend that top end every year, that 5 million on preventative maintenance, we have about 10 million square feet in the
126district. So that's about 50 cents per square foot. Addy, check my math. I think that's right. Okay. So if you own a home and you have a 2,000 foot home, um, and you spend 50 cents a square foot on maintenance every year, that's $1,000 a year. When you think of replacing your furnace filters, cleaning your gutters, uh sealing your deck, cleaning your sewer line, hopefully you don't have to do that every year, but I've lived in homes that we had to do that every year. Uh servicing the AC, trimming your trees, you can get to $1,000 pretty easily as a homeowner. So, one question I have and and kind of teeing you up here, but so why not spend more, right? Is is five million enough for preventative maintenance or if we if we had
127more would we do more with that money? >> Yeah, you teed it up well. Love we would need Yeah, if we had more we would absolutely absolutely use it. It's doing what we can with what we have, >> right? And so that chart that you showed with the two the the two lines on it could even be more stark, right? If we if we had more resources for that. Um and and the other thing I think that's important to know that and this is confusing as a constituent. So I understand why patrons are confused about this. Um the the philosophy in the past two bond issues uh for some of our buildings has been to take the existing uh aged building and then add on to it. So, uh, in the Pinto example, right, if
128you if you have a car, it's from the 1970s, and then you add on, um, you know, a new engine or something to it, the rest of the car is still from the 1970s. And so, we see as a community, oh, we've made investments over the past few years, and we have, we millions of dollars, hundreds of million dollars of investments uh, in our buildings, but that doesn't mean that large parts of our buildings aren't still 80 years old. Um, and I think the two schools that we're here tonight talking are, I think, are great examples of Dodge, which is rebuilt, um, you know, not brand new by any means anymore, probably about 15, 17 years old, um, with aging systems, but a completely different learning environment than Stanley. And Stanley has new parts to
129it, right? Stanley has a new, uh, preschool, kindergarten area. It has a new um, storm shelter, but most of Stanley um, is is from the 1960s. Um, and it is not ADA accessible and it has two floors with no elevator and and and then you go back to your learning environment critical components of uh outside space and and playgrounds and all of those sorts of things. So, I'm really excited. We're looking at this uh as holistically as we can. We obviously can't do everything all at once, but uh to to put it all out there so that we know exactly what it is we're talking about, I think is really critical. So, I'm excited. in in November is when at the next board meeting we'll have you guys come back and show a little bit
130more of the dashboard and dig into it. So that's all I had. Thank you guys. >> Okay, any questions from the board? >> I I raised my hand. >> Oh, it doesn't show up on my computer. >> Oh, okay. Well, Julie, >> okay, I'm showing myself. >> Go back one slide. >> Okay, now I got it. >> Keep refreshing throughout the night. I'm sure you're gonna get into this. So, this is maybe too much detail for this meeting, but on the first graphic >> Oh, yeah. >> On the first graphic, um, what's what are the bubbles? What are the what's the difference between a green bubble and a red bubble? >> Yeah, I'll get into that. But um we wanted to be able to represent uh the difference between so the the red bubble is
131everything is going to be uh older than 50 years old. Um and then the green is going to be anything newer than than 50 years. So that we can see the difference between what it takes to maintain the older facilities versus the newer ones. And as far as the illustration that Superintendent Beldel gave of buildings that a large portion of it is old with maybe a new addition, are you going to like average the two dates for that number or how does that work relative to your green and red? >> I'm sure I have an answer to that question next month. I I don't know that I have a great answer for that currently. I have to look at that. Yeah, >> I think it's a great point though because when when we have patrons
132come in, >> they they will say, "Well, blank is true." Well, that that's that is true, but another thing could also be true at the same time. So, >> I believe the way we set it up was the original building was this was the date. We had to come up with we had to have a cut off somewhere. So, >> Sure. Well, and um you know, we had our our um uh community schools people talk about how important it is to come out and see um the learning environments for kids and kids in their schools. Um and I totally support that and you know that is the priority in our district. But when you're when you're getting into facility needs, you don't experience the old versus the new. You don't realize that exists in our
133district unless you're actually out there physically in the building. So, I mean, it's just, you know, that is a learning experience for our community. um just as much as experiencing the needs of our experiencing the needs of our kids' kids in their educational process is experienced by going to see them, but also experiencing the needs of our facilities and our environments that we learn in we experience being there. I might add I think that's a great point that you bring up and one of the approaches um it's it's baseball playoff season so I'll use I'll try to be as anecdotal uh and and awesome as Kelly is I'll probably fail miserably but baseball playoff season is is happening right now there's two mindsets baseball's changed significantly since Moneyball uh analytics it went to analytics it
134used to be scouts watching players play getting a feel for the player and we track it now with science and data and math and formulas. Um, and there's people that will argue both are necessary. So, we have data pieces that we're diving into deeply with the dashboards, but we're also embarking on a 90 90 buildings in 90 days uh tour. Um, I'm a part of one of three groups that go around and in that environment, Julie, to your point, is we're in those spaces listening to those people tell us their stories. Some of it might fit this, some of it might be something that doesn't quite explain this, but they have their own stories to tell and that's very important to bring that piece back to the board as well along with the analytical data.
135Thank you for that. >> Okay, thank you Julie Stan. >> Um, quick question trying to put this in layman's term just in case anyone's uh interested watching this. the learning environmental index. Is it safe to say or is it fair to say that it's kind of the uh internal curb appeal and then the outside stuff is the outdoor curb appeal type of thing. Meaning, if I was a parent and was looking at these dots on your dashboard, I'm assuming that I could probably click on the area, the school that I'm thinking about sending my child to. And then it's going to give me a score of both how serious the maintenance situation is at that school >> and and then that's obviously you don't want it to get to one. Um the higher that portion
136is on the facility condition index, the worse condition that B buildings in. And then on the learning environmental index, do you want that number to be lower or do you also >> the way we set up the measurements was so that they would both you you don't want them to be high. >> Okay. >> So the idea is >> that's what they're both lower. It's it's better. Um, and what you're going to find is generally one follows suit to the other, right? If you're I mean there might be a few anomalies here and there, but for the most part when your FCI is is is higher, your your learning environment is also going to be the same way. And that's because, you know, a lot of our older buildings were not configured with with the
137modern learning spaces, you know, that we have now and classrooms were smaller and things like that. And so, um, I would say the answer to your your first question is yes and no. I think it's more of the, um, the functionality of our buildings is really kind of what the learning environment is trying to capture. Um, >> it doesn't mean the buildings don't don't work well to teach teach kids in, right? I mean, we we're doing that. We're doing a great job in at that everywhere, but it just means that it's not as ideally suited as some of our some of our more modern facilities are to, you know, take care of kids appropriately. It's kind of like Kelly was talking about earlier where you have we have these older buildings that we've added newer
138to and it's kind of it's we've done it out of necessity, but it's created some functionality issues, right? um to where you know there was space to add something here. So we added it there, but it doesn't necessar it wasn't necessarily ideal for if you look at you know modern you know safety procedures and things like that. It's it didn't give you the right lines of sight and such. But there weren't really as much considerations back then when we built as they are now. And so >> well an example of that is drop off and pickup lanes. Um uh years ago that was not that important because you had kids that walked to school and if they were over a certain mileage they were bus to school. Now I live less than five houses away
139from a a school and now you do not see anyone walking to to school and it's the changing times. So pickup lines, pickup drop off lines are extremely important to parents now. But my my point is so once we get this dashboard up and going and I want to compare especially if I'm looking at a choice is fair where I'm looking at different magnets for my child. Um I could I could compare two schools, three schools and says you know maybe the uh condition of the school is really good but maybe the learning environment uh index isn't the greatest. And so I'm going to be looking for um you know these little these areas where both the condition of the school is in good shape and the learning environment is in good shape. >> Yeah,
140you could. I think the intent of the dashboard is really to just be transparent about the data and what our needs are. It's not necessarily for parents to compare and contrast different buildings and decide where they want to send their kids, but they might. Um, but it's really just to be transparent about about, you know, to be real about what our needs are >> and I'm completely supportive of that. That is that's a wonderful idea. I just I I just want us to be prepared for these those type of comparisons that we might get from from parents. and uh really looking forward to uh this dashboard uh uh get up and going so people can actually take a look at it because we can talk about uh HVAC systems all we want and boilers and
141and but until you actually can click on a school and say oh I see they've got a lot of and then the categories of you could see where the upgrades really needed or where it's not so needed. And uh that will help parents uh make good choices. >> Okay. Thank you, Stan. Knock. >> Yeah. Not only are the facilities and infrastructure needs of our schools not going away, they are exacerbating. And based on this presentation, I think it paints a very clear picture that we need more proactive uh more targeted, more adequate investments um in our school buildings. Uh the question I had uh pertains to the the learning environment index. I was curious if you know certain factors have like more waiting than uh other factors. Um and if so I'm curious like what
142what like what those main factors are that you know determines uh you know the learning environment index of a school. >> Great question. Um it it does actually um and I will share that waiting with you when I present next month. >> All right. And then the uh uh I guess the other question um so you guys right now are doing the uh 90 schools in 90 uh days tour on uh facilities needs listening to the perspectives of you know staff. Uh will that report uh be a presentation to the to the board of education or like you know how how will the findings be uh displayed? Um >> yeah. Um and that's part of what uh one of I think we got you guys the schedule. So if you want to come visit any
143of them, um it's it's pretty much the same. A little bit different depending on the status of the school, whether it's a rebuild or um uh one of the schools are scheduled to close, etc., etc. Um but at the end of it, we we give the the staff the takeaways. Here's the next steps of what we're doing. Um, and once we get it all compiled, uh, we will put it together, then get it back to the staff and say, "Here's what we heard from you." Um, I think we should have that done either before Christmas or right after Christmas, somewhere in that in that time frame. Um, and then and then provide it to you all. Um there's a lot of it that I think um I don't know that any of it so far
144for me has been surprising and that it's things we didn't know but I do think it's at the prioritization of what the staff members feel like this is whether it's lighting or windows or air quality um kind of you know to Stan's point about picking a school for my student um you know that's one of the things we hear about poor air quality in some of our schools um that I if I have a school with good air quality or with poor air quality, where do I want to send my own kid? You know, it's one with good good better air quality. Um and that's just one factor of, you know, dozens of different things. So, um we'll we'll put all that together. I don't know that we have envisioned exactly what the report looks
145like, but we'll put all that together and provide that. Um we are also part of that process. um some of the things that we're hearing, I don't know if Steve you want to speak to this, but some of the things we're hearing um we're able to act on not immediately but but right away. So if we hear there's an issue with a blank um I don't know if you have some examples of that, but I know that's some one of the other things that's going on. If there's something that we can fix quickly, we are >> sure uh yeah quick quick quick uh quick hitters or or lowhanging fruit that we're hearing that we can get somebody in there within, you know, five to seven days to address a need that we think can really
146be addressed and Luke's very much a part of that. Um each team that goes out identifies those quick things that we can get back to and address quickly. Um and so we're tracking that and we're getting people out ASAP. Some of those might mean uh locker cubby things. There's there's more kids in a classroom than were anticipated. That's one that comes to my mind. Another one are some radios for some security folks. Um that came to mind and Terry and I have visited about that already. So yes, there are things we are addressing immediately and then we're asking staff to sort of think intermediately um you know one to three years, three to five years and then really what should this building look and feel like 10, 15, 20 years from now? what is what
147is education going to require of us in a space like that. So, we're also doing future sort of exercises with them. >> Okay, very good. Thank you. Seeing no further questions from the board, thank you guys very much for your presentation and we are I always am a fan of dashboards. So, I am very much looking forward to next month's presentation on that dashboard. So, thank you guys. Latona, next item. community engagement survey results. >> All right, we'll invite Rachel forward to go over our uh community engagement survey that was given a few months ago. I might need to phone a friend. Okay. Up and running for your patience. Good evening board members. My name is Rachel Bell. I'm the chief communication officer for the district and I am pleased to present tonight the community
148engagement survey results. Um I am going to there's a little bit of a lag. That's that's nice to know. Um tonight I'm going to be talking really about four things with the community engagement survey. Um, one is why we did it. The second is a little bit about the survey itself, what we learned, and then of course what we're going to do with the information that we learned. When we think about the people that we want to communicate with, we think about them in three main groups. We have our parents, we have our staff, and we have our community. Um, we know, of course, where our staff are. We see them every day for the most part. We know where our parents and our families are and how to get a hold of them. But
149it is the other group, it's the group that I just highlighted in yellow, the community, that we don't always know how to talk to, where we can find them, how they're going to pay attention to our messages. The other piece of the of the puzzle was not just how do we get a hold of our um our community, but also how they are different from our students. And so the uh slide that you're seeing right now shows our student demographics. And when we look at what that looks like compared to our city demographics, that is um there's a large gap there. And so making sure that we can bridge bridge that so that um everybody has understanding of what what our students look like versus what the community looks like and other supports that students
150might need. Um this is a critical piece of information. Similarly then we have um 80% of our students are experiencing some sort of poverty which is in direct almost um converse with the city of Witchah where 84% are living above the poverty line. Um, and again, this is this is just to help understand why we did the survey, why we felt like it was necessary to understand more about the community and what they're expecting of us. When we look at our students, we know that 36% of WPS students speak a language other than English in the home. And that is from last year's enrollment data when they selected uh languages spoken in the home. And that's compared to the 18% that speak a different language in Witchah. One of the um one of the important
151things to remember about this data though is that Witchah is slightly different. It's it's broader than our district boundaries. So there is a little bit of difference there and that is just something to keep in mind as you're looking at this data. So we opened the survey for the entire month of June. We had 1,800 responses. 95% took it in English, 5% took it in Spanish. Um with 1,800 responses, there is about a 2.3% margin of error. So that means anytime there are percentages in the results, it could swing 2.3% on either side of that. So that is something um also to keep in mind. So when we looked at the survey results, we took a look to see who fell into what group. Are they in the um staff bucket? are they in the
152the parents or the community or a combination of the three. And so then we also looked at um one of the kind of defining questions was how long has it been since you've been in one of our buildings? And so we looked at their responses in kind of those two main groups. We learned that uh there are similar awareness. if you are a parent, if you are a community member or a staff member of some of the activities that we have going on in the district. However, the awareness is greater for those who've been in our buildings for more than in the past two years. And so, this kind of aligns with one of our strategies, which is to try to get more people into our buildings. Um, we all know, I think, that we
153learn in different ways and if people can actually see what's what's going on in the schools, if they can experience it, um, they just have more awareness and can can learn that experience firsthand. We asked respondents um to grade us on two different in two different ways. The first was our facilities, the second was overall. It was interesting. Um, those who took the survey in English gave us a C on our facilities. Those who took the the survey in Spanish gave us an A. Now, as you saw, there was 5% who took the survey in Spanish. So, that margin of error is larger. Um, but it was it was overwhelming. Um, I think we're at 55% um, Spanish respondents said that they gave us an A in facilities. Overall, in English, um, if they had
154not been in one of our schools in the last five years, they gave us a grade of a C. But if they had been in our school within the last five years, they gave us a grade of B. So again, if we are looking at um a strategy of getting more people into our schools, which going with the community theme tonight and hearing some of the other things that um the communities and schools or community school strategy does, this this information certainly supports that as well. This was really also interesting. So now we have two grades of A's from our Spanishspeaking community. Um, which tells me that we're doing a good job communicating with that group. We have a lot of trust built up and we will continue to work in that area. When we
155asked um whether the district does a good job communicating about important education issues, you can see that um usually and sometimes were both large um large answers. Never and always are a little harder just because some people are have a harder time with definites. Um I am never going to always do something correctly. Um, but I would like to see the sometimes group shrink and the usually group grow. We also asked um parents, staff, community members. We separated those out. Parents and guardians and staff said that they get their information usually from firhand experience or those who have had firsthand experience. So our staff and our parents are relying on students, teachers, volunteers for information. Whereas as expected, our community members are most likely relying on local media. We also asked what their preference was
156and how how they want to get information from us. Um overwhelming the response was by email which was a little surprising today just to hear. Um but second was text and third was social media. Now when we looked at our trust level in English again sometimes and mostly were were very common answers sometimes weighed out on these five five topics. Um, and then mostly was the second most popular response. However, in Spanish, we had a high level of trust. Again, always was a a common response. Mostly was the second response on all five of these except for we had a a sometimes. That's a the 15% there is sometimes. From here, it looks red, but it's orange. Um, also the last line, we did have a high percentage of our Spanish uh respondents who said
157that they didn't have enough information about the finances um to answer that question. So, we have some work to do there. [Music] One of the things that I was excited to see with these results is um that it supported some of the work that we're already doing. We have heard some of the feedback that uh community does re rely on local media. Superintendent Bilifeld has started a monthly press conference to um try to get additional information out via via the media. We also have advisory groups that are um meeting pretty regularly and we will continue to do those as well. I think those have um helped in the trust category. So, we'll continue to do that. Um the four bottom bullets are things that we will be taking on here within the next year. I
158do want to highlight the streamlining of our website. Uh one of the things that I found very surprising is that we have about 25,000 web pages. Um, so that's a lot of information for someone to weed through or wade through if they are trying to find something that they need. Um, additionally, we have some federal ADA requirements that we need to meet on the website and that deadline is in April. So, it's a good opportunity to really take a look at our website and say what pages do or don't we need here. Um, but I wanted to highlight that for you in case you get questions about why things are are moving on our website. Um, additionally, we are going to be doing some civic learning opportunities so that we can make sure that we
159engage the public in just a little bit different way and educate them on some of the behind the scenes things that might not um might not come to mind necessarily when people are thinking about schools. We also want to create a community newsletter that goes out via email um since the community has told us that they would be receptive to hearing from us via email. And then we did have about 250 respondents on the survey who said yes, I would like to be part of small groupoup discussion. And so we'll be putting together some visioning sessions with those people to continue the conversation and see what we can can figure out in terms of uh further steps. >> Very good. >> That is all I had this evening. What questions can I answer? >> Okay.
160Any questions from the board? I don't see any on my screen. >> I have some. >> Okay. Knock. >> Uh, real quick, what were the uh in terms of communication preferences, what were all the options uh like listed out in the survey? >> Yeah, we we tried to keep uh reality as a focus. We did not put mail because of the expense. Um, we had a couple that I think uh community bulletin boards and there was another more what I would consider grassroots effort. Um, and neither one of those rated highly. And then uh I'm wondering how often or if this is uh like if the district plans on doing some more recurrent surveying of you know the public the community again just you know get you know get to check the polls you know
161how how does the community feel about us uh what are their thoughts about you know trust in decision-m and things like that. Yeah, thank you for asking that because I did forget to mention that I see this survey as an annual survey um because this helps us understand where we are right now, but we need to keep that touch point going so that we know where we are next year as well. >> Thank you. [Music] >> Any other questions? Hazel. >> Yes. Um on the facilities grade, can you explain what that entailed? What? Yeah, we we just um asked thinking about Witchaw Public Schools facilities as a whole, what grade would you give us? It was a pretty simple, pretty general question. There wasn't a lot of instruction with >> not directed towards any buildings
162or Okay. Any further questions? Okay. Can you explain a little bit more on the civic learning sessions? What are what are our thoughts there? >> Yeah, we don't have a name for it yet. We've kicked around a few things, but um one of the things that the city has done is some civic engagement where they will take people through some coursework to cover things like um the different departments, finances, um just in general. And so we've seen a lot of good engagement and feedback surrounding that program and we envision something similar could work for us as well. >> Okay. Very good. Very good. And I don't know if this is exactly what um the principal at Stanley was talking about, but they mentioned the parent with the needs assessment, some of the parents wanting further
163opportunities. So the I think what we're envisioning is maybe a base course of you general information about the district, but then possible engagement opportunities beyond that, too. But that's yet to come. Probably spring of 26. We're we're still building that out. >> Okay. Very good. Okay, seeing no further questions. Thank you, Rachel. We appreciate your presentation and appreciate the update. So, >> thank you. >> Lona, next item, >> consent. >> Okay. So for the public's information, the purpose of the consent agenda is to help the board handle routine matters efficiently so that the board can spend more time reviewing, monitoring, and discussing the educational issues of the Witchaw public schools. Students academic success is the top priority for the board of education. Board members review these items in detail during the agenda review workshops held
164at 10:30 a.m. on the Fridays prior to each regular board meeting here at the AAC building. These workshops are open to the public but no action is taken. The workshop is for discussion and questions only and your presence is always welcome. And so with that, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda items? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Okay. Motion made by Knock, seconded by Kathy. And before we vote, I'd like to give >> That's okay. Stan made >> or made by >> You're have to speak up, man. >> That's why we went every other so you could figure out. >> So Kelly, go for it. >> Sure. Um so Friday when we had our consent agenda review um with the board, we had two particular items that we wanted to come out
165that we wanted to bring it forward at this uh at this time. Um so for those following along at home are uh under C2 and three these are two facilities line items. Um one is called a AAC 905 office remodel and one is AAC 413 office remodel. So uh the reason we wanted to bring these up there these are not big dollar amounts when it comes to the general budget. Um but these both of these items u were completed out of order from a regular process. So, um, instead of getting board approval and then going forward with the project, the project went forward without board approval. Um, so in an effort to be completely transparent with with the public and with you all, um, we wanted to bring it forward to get your approval on
166these. Um, again, not large amounts, but uh, we've put some checks in place that we covered Friday at the meeting. Uh, so we prevent this from happening again. The other one is uh item E2 which is under education curriculum which is the graduation certification and risk assessment services. Um so this is essentially an audit of our graduation uh numbers from class of 25 and then moving forward we had determined some internal processes to uh create systems for increased data quality when it comes to uh graduation rate. We wanted we feel strong strongly that those are good processes internally but we wanted an external set of eyes to sign off on those processes um to make sure uh that all the people involved in the data uh gathering and data quality asurances uh when it comes
167to graduation uh the policies are are firm and and strong and in place. Uh and then we're also will conduct an audit of the actual numbers um to make sure that we um we we know that we need uh integrity and and graduation rate and or graduation and when students uh earn a diploma, we don't give diplomas, they earn diplomas that it means what it means. And so um that agenda item was one we also had some good discussion about on Friday. So um with that any discussion from the board you'll turn over to you guys. >> Hazel. Oh, nope. Okay. >> Yeah, >> my my screen is not working. Awesome. So, we'll have to do a >> Okay, Julie, >> you do have one. >> 5050 here. >> Yeah. And um I did just
168want to applaud um Superintendent Billfield on moving forward with this graduation certification and risk assessment service. Um just like you said um students earn their diploma diplomas and that's um an achievement that we want to applaud and it's important to this board to raise graduation rates and so you know we don't want any misinformation or any lack of trust relative to that achievement and those scores. So, um I just I I applaud um just being able to have this to communicate to the public and to have to be very transparent about uh about the success of our students. >> Thank you. >> Very good. No, just wanted to say I support the items of the consent agenda regarding uh graduation certification and risk assessment services. Uh beyond that, I would also support a board policy
169that you know codifies language around internal and external uh auditing processes of our graduation records. Okay, thank you. Seeing no further discussion, uh we do have a new voting mechanism on our computers and so we have a motion on the floor and when you guys are ready, go ahead and vote. [Music] Um, who's >> five? Kathy. Okay. >> All right, everybody in. >> Okay, >> motion passes. 6. >> Yay. >> It worked. >> Needs exclamation points. >> It worked. Very good. Okay, Lona, next item. >> Superintendent report. >> Okay, Kelly. >> All right, thank you, Diane. Um, uh, a few things. Just wanted to, uh, maybe maybe tie a lot of this stuff together tonight. um a lot of community conversation, a lot of um uh desire for us to be embedded in the community
170and our community showing up for us uh with wish collective impact with communities and schools uh or community schools and u love schools all the different things we're doing. Um I think this is a message I sent that I talked to principles about last week. Um, but I think it's it's relevant here that I hope that we can see as a as a community and a district that we we're all on the same team. Right? I say it everywhere I go. That when our kids do better, we all do better. That our 30,000 graduates need to be productive citizens for our community because if they're not, that's not good for any of us. Um, and ultimately, we need to be on the same team supporting one another when it comes to our kids. We are
171like all across the community. I talk about all the time the amount of community support we have. Um but I think uh the big takeaway I I heard tonight u beyond community was we need to be we need to be there, right? We need to be in the buildings visible um with our people um both seeing the leaky boiler and seeing the kid uh that that um is playing on the playground. Both of those things, it's vitally important to be there. So, I would challenge all of us, me included, um to invite a friend, right? Um bring somebody with you to go see the facilities, to go see the kids. Um when uh this was one of my messages that I that I've given at the foundation stuff that I've spoken at is that I
172believe anybody who gets to know our kids falls in love with our kids and they're going to be a champion for our kids. the part of the community that doesn't that gave us the sea and doesn't uh trust us as much are ones that haven't been in our buildings, right? They don't know us. And that's not their fault necessarily. It's partially our fault because we need to we need to let them get to know us, right? They need to get to know our kids. Our kids are worth it. >> Our kids are able. Um they just need the opportunities and those barriers taken away um as best we can. And that isn't just ours to do. it's ours to do as a as a larger community. So, um it's it's invigorating and exciting tonight, I
173think, to to see the amount of engagement we have with our community. Um to see alignment of systems that it's not haphazard, right? That it's not uh jumbled and it's not perfect yet by any means, but it's uh we're trying to align systems so that kids get what they need and families have what they need to help our kids achieve our goals. So, the data will move when uh we all work together for our community. So, um it's exciting that uh hopefully, um we can see that we're all on the same team. We we all should be fighting for our kids to to be better and to achieve better. Um and it's hard work. Uh I think we heard the teachers talk tonight. Um that's always profound and good, but uh it it is not
174easy. It is not easy in the field. Uh our teachers work really really hard for our kids and they need us. They need all of us. Not just not just us, the seven of you all and me. Uh but they need they need all of us to be there for them. So, um, that's it. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Very good. Thank you, Kelly. Platona. Next item. >> New business and board of education requests. >> Okay. Uh, let's see. Any requests? Okay. No requests. I'd like to say something. >> Okay. Yesterday was World Teachers Day, and since it was a weekend, I couldn't say I could say it, but I didn't. But I came across something that I want to read. This morning, a second grader looked me straight in the eye and said,
175"You don't know anything about Roblox. My dad says you're too old to teach kids now." He wasn't being cruel, just honest, the way children often are. Still, the word stung. My name is Mrs. Ellis, and after 34 years, I locked my classroom door for the very last time today. When I started in the late 80s, teaching felt like stepping into sunlight. Parents shook my hand at openhouse night. Kids left drawings on my desk with shaky letters. I love you, teacher. I spent weekends cutting shapes for bulletin boards, writing encouraging notes in the margins of spelling tests, and humming little songs for morning circle. Back then, joy was as much a part of the job as chalk dust. Somewhere along the way, the world shifted. Not loudly, not all at once, but like sand slipping under
176your feet until you realize you're standing on nothing solid. Now evenings mean typing up incident reports just in case. Parents point phones at me when a child has a tantrum. I've been shouted at in hallways, not by kids, but by the adults who raised them. And no one asks if I'm okay. The children have changed, too. Not because they're worse, but because life is heavier on their little shoulders. They walk in tired, buzzing from screens, sometimes carrying anger they can't name. And somehow I'm expected to fix it all with a box of crayons and six hours a day. And yet I stayed because for every storm there was still a spark. A timid girl whispering, "I can read this whole page by myself." A note tucked into my drawer. Thank you for being nice when
177I was sad. A child hugging me and saying, "You feel like home." Those moments were my currency. They paid for the sleepless nights. But this year, the air felt heavier. More fights, more fear. Our counselor left before winter break. Substitutes stopped showing up altogether. And me, I felt like a ghost. The patience that once defined me had been stretched to threads. Today, as I pulled the last crayon drawing off my wall, I found a card from 1997. You made me believe I was smart. I cried because that used to be the heart of this job. No test scores, no data points, just helping a child feel seen. There was no farewell assembly, no flowers, just a quick handshake from the new principal, his eyes fixed on his buzzing phone. I left behind my rocking chair,
178my sticker box, the hundreds of stories I once read aloud with silly voices. But I carried with me the trust of every child who ever leaned on me when the world felt too big. Well, what's going to come next? Maybe I'll volunteer at the library. Maybe I'll plant tomatoes. Or maybe I'll just sit on my porch drinking tea, remembering when classrooms were built on kindness instead of checklists because I miss it. I miss when parents and teachers were allies. When education was about growing hearts, not just filling bubbles on a sheet. If you know a teacher, past or present, thank them. Not with mugs or apples. With patience, with respect, with trust. Because while the world sped past, they stayed and they stood and they carried the weight of children who might otherwise have been
179forgotten. >> Thank you, Kathy. >> Yeah. >> Any other comments or requests? Okay, seeing none, uh I don't normally do this, but I think when extraordinary things happen with board members, um I think it's it's a good thing to highlight. And so for those that don't know, uh our own Hazel Stabler was in Milan this last week because she was invited to uh display her clothing line. And so for those that don't know, Hazel is an international clothing designer and was has headlined at the New York Fashion Week, uh the Paris Fashion Week, now the Milan Fashion Week, and next year probably going to Tokyo. Um and so I think it's a it's an incredible opportunity because not only was she uh representing her her work and her culture, um but also she did represent
180the Witchaw public schools. And so, uh, just on the behalf of the Witchaw Public Schools board and the all of us in the Witchaw Public School System, we just want to say thank you, Hazel, for representing us so well on the international stage. [Applause] >> Okay, Latona, next item. >> Adjournment. >> Oh, you didn't go around. Okay. >> Table. >> Uh, report. Okay. You don't have Okay. >> What you're just doing. >> I'm sorry. Just never. >> Okay. Well, >> yeah, it's all good. >> Do we need to vote for a German? Uh, we don't have a >> Can we just raise our hands? >> Yeah, we can just raise our hand. >> Okay. Uh, I move that we adjurnn. >> I second. >> Motion made by Diane, seconded by Kathy. All in favor, raise
181your hand. Motion passes. 6. We are adjourned. Thank you. [Music] It's not quite nine o'clock, is it? >> Where's the clock? on your