Special Board Meeting - May 08, 2025v

001No comments. All right, no comments. We'll head into consent agenda item 3.1, approval of early childhood fee schedule. I know uh no one's here to officially present this because we had a couple of meetings ago we had the long present not long we had a presentation from Miss uh Miss Jones explaining the fee schedule and and what she was proposing to do to charge um um qualify And that was information that she presented just never got approval. Okay. So any questions Any questions? I think we want to do these. Well, are we doing these separately or Okay. I mean, we can typically Yeah, typically the consent agenda would be that and no questions really essentially would be asked because it's on the consent agenda. So maybe take a look at it and see if we

002need to pull anything that we have questions about. I was just asking because I wasn't sure. Yes. Is that right? It's for two schools. No, it's they're actually doing it at all the early childhood sites. Oh, okay. That's even better. Sure. But if you guys want to just take a look and make sure we don't have any questions. Yes, ma'am. Okay. So, are we talk to about any of these? Well, I guess what we need to do is we need to identify if we need to pull any just to be appropriate so that we can be in line with the consent agenda. So, do we need to pull any? I just question the way you said it. Okay. Okay. So, we'll just just want to go with 3.1 is that and go ahead and pull

0033.2 two and 3.3 for now. We want to just do them one at a time or what is your pleasure? You can make a motion. I mean, I'll entertain any motion. If you have a main motion, make it. Absolutely. Okay. Is there a second? It's been moved and properly second that the LRSD board approved the consent agenda items as follows. 3.1 approval of the early childhood fee scale implementation. 3.2 round 3A employment recommendation contracts for 2526 school agenda and 3.3 personnel changes. All in any questions? Yeah. So, uh my question is on the Okay. So, with these round three hires, are they have the folks the season or have they started to be offered positions? Um, or are we still looking skipping over which I didn't answer that correctly. I mean question but my question

004is we heard from Chriser about how after round two yes because I I see a trend of hiring a lot of outside people for these positions even those um positions that may have considered internal And then we have external people being hired from them. I I just figured I'll ask the question number about that. So all all recommendations in rounds one and two were just internal people. Round three was the very first time that we first recommend people outside. Okay. Um is there is there which I know that this question will never be answered question is but is there a reason why outside candidates are being favored um so readily and heavy next school year employees that have been doing doing the work. Well, your statement that we have been hiring more out of district

005folks is not a statement that I can confirm that's factual. Number one, um so I can't So is there a reason? Okay. So if there was a my question If a position is advertised for internal candidates and external candidate is hired, how does that happen? Like so we have not posted any jobs. Well, let me let me preface what I'm I don't know that we have posted any jobs in this hiring process currently that were just internal. What was internal was round one and We actually had like 2 A and two B. So we've actually had maybe two or three rounds that was just internal. Round three, which we're on now, is the very first time that external people outside of the district could be hired. So any external people were just recommended in round

006three. I'm not involved in all of the interview processes, so I can't answer why a person was chosen over another, but my assumption is that the best candidate has been chosen for jobs. Okay. Okay. Any other questions? Other questions? Okay. All in favor say I. All [Music] opposed. Motion carried. Okay. All right. So, if there is nothing else for the special board meeting, we're not not needing an executive session. Um, any comments before we move on? Any comment? Okay. Just the teacher of the year. That was great. Shout out to all of our teachers that are making um our schools uh go and dedicated to teaching and learning and then of course to our classified uh staff and faculty who make the school district. All right. Yes. Just a brief comment that I think this

007is National Nurses Week and so we want to congratulate and recognize all the nurses who serve our students across the district. Absolutely. Thank you so much to both groups. Uh I'll entertain a motion for adjournment. Without opposition, we are adjourned. Okay. So, we're going to go ahead and move to the agenda meeting night 8 2025. Are we able to do that? do anything else in between that. Okay, very good. You're still welcome. All right, so we're going to 2.1. You're still welcome. You're still here. You on we welcome. Well, now you may be on your own. Okay. 2.1 LSD spring interim report or result as Miss Goody is coming. We are a little late with sharing this since we pushed this back a couple of meetings. Um but we still wanted you to be aware

008of um the results from the spring interums. Although we should be completed testing for the spring atlas assessment and so we were anxiously not anxiously exciting excitedly awaiting those results which we should get back this summer. So we won't have to wait until projected. So, as Dr. Wright said, this assessment was given March the week of March 12th actually and then we had our district on March 21st and so time has already been spent analyzing this data but d um why are we doing this? uh we have shared interm results multiple times and I think uh you know continually focusing on this idea that everything we do is data informed it's one thing to teach content it's a whole another thing to look for evidence of student learning in in actual student work and so

009those are the practices that we're continually building and and working to refine with staff and so when we look at these data that and the math data both were the the district interim which was created um in in our district platform and these results represent literally percentage correct okay which is a little bit of a shift when we talk about science but for both ELA and math um that's what we're looking at and so um trending up across the board in terms of you know fall to spring do just want to reiterate that you know it's not the same assessment that we both times it is directly aligned to what students have been learning. And so the purpose of this is feedback around um evidence of student learning based on what they've been taught, right?

010So we should see uh we should see those numbers improve over time. We should see um uh growth over time. And so I think what we're seeing here is just evidence of students getting better at grade level work um across the year. uh except for a couple of um of areas that stood out. Obviously, like those higher grades, eth and tth grade stand out is really, you know, getting up into the 60s, you know, we still have work to do, but but feels really good based on uh where where we have been. Uh and then and then I look at things like third grade, which definitely jumped out to me and and was something that I wanted to dig into uh more closely. And so I think anytime we do the interim data analysis, we

011look at it from all levels. So at the district level, we're looking for trends to say, you know, what is it that we're providing for teachers in terms of curriculum and resources and professional learning uh in areas where we need to see higher student performance. Teachers are obviously looking specifically at student data, right? student by student and saying, you know, who needs what, how can I go back and retach, what can I build into my next unit, etc. And so I think an example of that in third grade specifically, I think one thing that's come up in curriculum and that we work on a lot uh in literacy is teaching kids to read text and use evidence to support their thinking, right? And so if you dig into that 46% students actually performed like mid60s

012on the standards where they had to use evidence to support their thinking. And so that's a celebration. That's something teachers have been working on. That's something we look at in our curriculum. That's something that we uh want to get better at. In contrast, there was a real trend around um students being able to analyze um like graphs and charts and understand how that adds to the meaning of the text. We didn't do very good in that area. We were down in the 30s actually. And so just an example for you of, you know, that makes me go back to wit and wisdom, our adopted curriculum, and say, where are kids practicing that in the curriculum? How can we make sure that that gets highlighted and students um get practice opportunities for that? So, there's kind

013of headlines for ELA. And then for math, um, also saw some pretty nice improvement from fall to spring. Um, these data points overall aren't as high as literacy and this mirrors what we're seeing on our state test. Uh, we know that math is a focus area for us and something that we have already started doing some work with with leaders this spring. Uh, it is the focus of our leadership institute uh, over the summer. it is the focus of back to school PD for teachers in the fall. And so, you know, those are things we're already uh planning based on what we've seen in our data. But I do think it's really important to look at some of those jumps from fall to spring and and to celebrate that too. Um teachers work really hard

014to get these results and um and I think in areas where you see a you know plus 17% from one administration to the next is pretty noteworthy. Again, these are different contents, right? So like kids in the fall might have been studying in third grade multiplication and in the spring they might be studying fractions. So it's not comparing apples to apples, but it is looking at grade level content from fall to spring. And then I will jump to science. And this one's a little bit different. Uh this was actually the Atlas science interrum. And so if these numbers look lower, don't don't be I mean yes they still show that we have work to do but it's a different metric. So this is showing proficiency towards end of year performance right so again across the

015board except biology we saw you know an increase from fall to spring we should kids have been taught more things and they should be closer to proficiency across the year. Um you can see this is an area for us uh to to to look at more closely uh Science is now right up there with math and literacy, right? They all count equally in our school grades. And so that is a huge shift. The kinds of questions kids are asked on the science interim for the state very different. It used to be that science questions were kind of reading comprehension questions and now science questions are actually like can you do this simulation and answer some questions about it. Um and we'll talk about that in the next item and some ways that we're supporting that

016with some of our curriculum materials. Um, but again, I think worthy to say that we've we've made progress from fall to spring. Um, and and we definitely have a lot of of room for for growth. So, just trends and takeaways. I think just tried to summarize that here. We definitely have a heightened math focus. Um, we feel like a lot of the work we've done in literacy is set set the foundation and now it's about keeping that work going. Um, and and to be able to shift some of our professional learning focus to math. Um, since I've been here, you know, in fairness to to the content area of math, we've spent a lot of more time in literacy. And so, it is time for us to dig more deeply into math with our uh

017colleagues, teachers, and leaders um in um in preparation to support students science skills. Again, they're improving on the Atlas interim, but uh we know and and we already are looking at master scheduling, right? From the very lowest grade, students have to be thinking scientifically. And so, building more time into the schedule for science. Thinking about making sure that we frontload science instruction at the beginning, you know, first three quarters before kiddos take the assessment so they can demonstrate their understanding um before that time. Yes. Yeah. So, we didn't really change math time per se, just kind of changing the way using the time in the schedule and I think science we grabbed five minutes from yeah science science school. How it's laid out That's Kelly, director of teaching and learning. So, thanks for what other

018questions do. question about the summer loss. What type of percent? Yeah, it's a great question. Uh, Director Mason, I I feel like it depends on there's so many studies out there that talk about summer loss. I mean, I think I will just lean into some of the work that we've launched with Reading in the Rock specifically, and I know that's, you know, not math, uh, you know, that we're talking about, but but I do think there's also a lot of research that talks about kids just reading for 20 minutes a day. Um,, you know, and if they read 40, there's more growth, and if we can get them to go 60, there's even more. And so, um, that's not an answer for math, it's science, but I do think that, um, that initiative literacy is

019something that we're, you know, trying to lead into and and help kids just like rediscover the love of reading, I think. Um, so yeah, I don't know if I have an explicit answer because I feel like it's it varies, but it's real and kids who aren't exposed and don't practice um I just want to ask about the math a little bit and this is just trying to think about my own experience in math and I don't know if this fits what you would expect to see. But thinking about it, it seems to me that often the beginning part of that class such a different way of thinking and at least for some students clicks. You get to the place where it starts to click and then you expect to see that. Is that is that

020what you all expect to see? Could that be part of what we see in the improved scores and some of those upper level math? Yeah, I think to that point, Director Adams, there's um probably different than definitely different than when I was in school and how I was taught math. But but I think if you start to look at, you know, we think of algebra historically as a ninth grade course, but you know, expressions and equations is a domain of thinking in in middle school. Um and then that sort of scales back into elementary school in the the strand of operations and algebraic thinking. So I think our standards even just in the way that they're built today are very different than I think well I'll speak for me than they were when I when

021I was growing up. So I do think that algebraic thinking is starting to develop way earlier than than actually when you step into the class called algebra, right? um those strands in math and that coherence in the standards is is really really leaning down into elementary school and kids are starting to think about patterns and and things like um prerequisites for algebra way way sooner. And so if that happens, right, and we do a good job of that in the elementary schools up through middle school, algebra will take care of itself in a lot of ways. I think we can't wait till 9th grade to think about preparing kids for algebra. Um that happens way way soon. Well, it was given in March the week of March 12th is when it was given. So I

022Yeah. I mean, after February, it wasn't long after. Yeah. Yeah, they did. So, that's just something this year. I think it was the end of their I wonder I mean I know um I think a couple things. I mean, number one, you know, if you've seen in the legislation, our state pushed out this math improvement plan, which I know doesn't technically start until third grade, but I think at the state level, there is a a push for individualized support for kids through the independent reading plan on the literacy side, the math improvement plan, on the math side. Um, and I think, you know, what are we doing with that? You know, we're about to talk about supplemental supports. And I think, um, when you're one teacher in a classroom, we say this in literacy, it's

023the same math. Um, some kids need more practice. They need to see the math in a different way. They need the model to look different. They and I think um that is the role that supplemental supports can can do to support a teacher. But I also think structurally um you know our assistant superintendent specifically in those lower grades carved out wind time, right? Which stands for what I need time. And the point of that really is about differentiated intervention time for students based on what they need. Um and so you know many many of our schools you know if you know they may have used that time for differentiated literacy support and I think as we move forward there's a real push to to use that time for some individualized I just consider some of

024the focus for the year around. And so this is the first time, you know, teachers need to figure out how to implement those things. And so I'm glad we have over time of that. This is kind of the first year expectations of how long that teacher right now as far as they take the normal also engage in that assessment. So they're kind of hit hard teachers with a learning curve on just learning the system and you know trying to pieces which I think long Is it just like director Johnson? Hello ladies. How you doing? I was at a conference yesterday and I can't remember the act. I left my notes at home. But they have increased um the tutoring for kids oneonone. So when you have kids that are not foundationally ready to move forward

025in math, are we tapping into that service? And are we do we have a shortage on math teachers? So first part first, yeah, I don't know the act either. Don't quiz me. Uh, but I do know it was $500 for families and now it's 1,500 which is which is phenomenal because I don't I mean the truth is that $500 in a lot of tutoring companies doesn't go very far. Seems like it should but it really doesn't. And so 1500 is huge. And so I think two things number one either um you know we need to support families to leverage that. The other idea we had was to think about, you know, if families didn't know how to pursue that tutoring support. Um, there was some talk uh at the state level of being able to

026to for a family to say, "We actually want to, you know, sort of give that $1,500 back to the district and have you organize the tutoring for our children." And so, we're kind of in the place of figuring out if we're going to be able to do that or not because some families don't don't know, you know, who to ask and how to do that. So, there's that. And then the second part, um, remind me, Director Dunson. Thank you. Shortage. Well, let me say this about math teachers. Yes, we have some positions right now that are that are open. Um, it is always a shortage area for teachers, particularly to find um high quality math teachers. It's that's been true everywhere I've worked. I'm gonna invite Mr. Spencer up too. You want to come up,

027Joel? Um, so both Kelly Bell, our director of teaching and learning, and Joel Spencer, who is our, um, K to2 science coordinator, uh, play a key role in all of the decisions around curriculum and supports. Um, so I think what I shared um with y'all, it's not there to project, but uh in the board packet was a was just kind of a supplemental resources overview. And um if you could pull that up, that'd be great. But I think in a nutshell, just to explain the document, what what we were hoping to do here was just to provide a comprehensive picture of, you know, for math, science, and literacy. We didn't get to shout out all these schools. there were a lot of schools on here to shout out in their performance. Um but but anyway,

028uh those were the interim, you know, huge gains uh schools. So, thank you for pulling that back up. Um there but at any rate, I'll I'll um I'll start talking about it. I think on the lefth hand side, we just have all our our tier one resources. So, it's clear here's what we're using. Here's what we're using it for. And then on the right hand side are the tiered and supplemental supports for students. Um on the lefth hand side, one thing I did add was the adoption years. And so you can see we have a big year coming up for literacy adoption. Um it actually has already come and gone, but due to the changes in the state standards and the state assessment, we didn't think it made sense to adopt in the middle of

029all that change. But now that it's stable, it makes sense for us to to to revisit and engage in in the tier one adoption. But what I was really wanting to spend our time talking about today is just all of the uh supplemental supports on the right. Um as we do this, I want to be clear, we have very much trim things down. Uh I know sometimes there's a narrative that we have a lot of different programs that that we're using and I just want to be clear that this is it for math, science, and literacy. These are the supplemental programs that we have and we've thought very intentionally after piloting things in in certain schools to to gauge effectiveness um and and not just adopting anything without doing some intentional work and seeing how

030how the the supplemental tool works with our students. And so you all know we came to you last year and said build was new. it was our K1 support for students who are identified early as having potential characteristics of dyslexia. And so, um, that is specific to the law around dyslexia and having something in place for K and first grade. We talked about magpie at our last meeting and that really is the only new thing and the idea is that magpie would take the place of Lexia in kindergarten through 2 grade. So you can see sort of cost overview um you know what that would look like in in from our title funds versus our operating funds. Um and then you know going on down Lexia power up is used in middle school. It is

031our um uh support for strategic and academic reading um again for students in secondary who've been identified with characteristics of dyslexia. And then those are the literacy supplemental supports. And then you go to to math and science. Um Dreambox is used K to 8. Uh you can see that there not new. It's been used uh for the last five years I believe. I know it was adopted before before I got here. And then Alex in 9th through 12th grade. And then I would add one new thing with Gizmos. And the reason why uh gizmos is on here and there's a new sort of grade range for use of gizmos connects back to what we were talking about earlier with science. Um, and I and I should let probably Joel, who's the expert in gizmos, talk

032a little bit more about this, but I can just say, you know, generally in as an overview, um, it provides our students with opportunities to practice with science simulations. Um, something we don't have in any other, um, support tool that we use with students and and I'll let Joel elaborate on that because he's worked closely with a pilot. So, so thank you all. Uh so yeah so uh we've been using Gizmo 612 now for science and math probably for about uh seven from what I know about probably about six to eight years we we really have good usage at the 612 level with that um in fact Gizmo just came out an award at some schools some awards I think Park got an award for their usage um as well as Lacy and then we

033recognized some individual teachers at JAR um and pli heights for their usage too as well with Gizmos um uh we were approached by them last year for a grant to to try some stuff out with some of their programs at K5. Um, and just like y'all, I'm all about data, so I want to see what the data showed for it. Um, so they have a K2 program called Science for Us. Um, and we implemented that with our K2 um, teachers. Um, we didn't have as much success at K2 as we did at 35. So K2, we had 16,000 student loginins, which for a grant, that's about average. Um, and we had 300 teacher login. So 300 teachers using the platform. Uh, we did offer eight hours of professional development through the grant. So teachers were

034given two hours for that four times between October and March for professional development. And for those who couldn't attend professional development, we had several schools that I attended PLC's and got teachers caught up on how to use it. um talked to some of the teachers and asked them some of the barriers of implementation at K2 and a lot of them said that they had a lot of new initiatives that came from K2 from from the state that they were implementing this year and it just put a lot on their plate this year with you know with assessments and should we talk more about about things they had to do and tests and things like that. So I think that put a lot of stress on them and having to implement something new as well. Um

035however when you look at 35 uh we had 48,000 student login at 35 uh three uh 3,100 teachers logged in and if it does that's not total teacher that teacher logged in five did the program five times that counts as five login. Um I just had my end of the year meeting with explore learning and she says that that is one of the highest usage rates they have seen with any school across the country that that got the grant with that many login. Um those teachers also received four days, two hours a day professional development and I also attended PLC's as well. Uh some of the barriers we didn't get this grant till October. So we weren't able to really hit the ground running until October with this. That's when we first offered our professional

036development on this. So we were two or three months behind implementing this probably a whole nine weeks behind implementing this really to get this started till second nine weeks. Um, and so the recommendation moving forward is these simulations that they do with gizmos are almost identical to the simulations they do in Alice. I mean, having them move stuff around. And to piggyback on what uh Judy said about data and having the kids look at literacy and doing understanding how to collect data, understand data, all these simulations, they collect data, have to analyze it. So, if they're planting seeds, they're changing variables, um, they're collecting data, and then they're answering questions about that data. One thing we didn't get to do a deep dive into this year with which we're planning on next year is there's

037a whole literacy component to gizmos as well and teaching science through non teaching literacy through non-fiction text through science as well um at that level too um and and also implement and also uh areas for the wind time where students could do some science stuff as well some centers and things like that through gizmos as well so and so we're really excited about that for 612 um we continue to have good uh access with gizmos we have 50,000 student loginins and 2500 teacher login in year-over-year that's up 27% of last year. We're still getting a good usage rate from our teachers using gizmos at the high school level as well. Great. So, you know, totals for expenditures and things for for uh the supplemental tools are all there, but if anyone has questions about what

038you have in front of you, usage, how we're doing it, how it all fits together, um happy to answer questions. Yes. Strong. Two questions again. When are we reevaluating? I know I've heard some questions about Oh, no way. So, uh, Director Strong, that is on the document and I did kind of squeeze a lot on this page. So um but if you look at next adoption so 2526 actually we're up for literacy and um uh we will this is a big this is a big one for us right adopting literacy curriculum uh is a huge investment not only financially but you know in our students and so uh we will start this process early on in the year. you know, teacher representatives from every school will be involved and we can, you know, sort of

039present that back if anyone wants to see what that process looks like. But yeah, you had another question. The other piece of the question was um can can kids use these at home? So I know I've been so I've been told different things as a mom like I have been told yes at home and no at home but some parents know how to get on to Lexia at home. I don't know like um some people say there are maximum amounts of time you should use it. I I love things like this because our school doesn't really do homework, but it helps me like when when they can do things at home, it helps me feel like an engaged parent. And I just think sometimes an app is a way that you can engage parents in

040a way that doesn't feel overwhelming like they're having to do the teaching or having to like get the answers right on the homework. They're getting to watch the kid work through it themselves. So, um I just wondered about that and that being standard across the district and what we can do to make sure that these kinds of schools can be a way to not only engage kids in supplemental support but also maybe their parents and families. Yeah, I think that's an opportunity if if um you know if this is something that can be weaved in through our parent facilitators to help folks understand it if um you know there are recommended time frames so you you can kind of get overkill if kids are on it too but but I don't think it's not going

041to hurt them to be on it more than the recommended but you know Lexia specifically um you know if I'm a below level learner if I'm two levels below it's going to say that I need 60 to 80 minutes if someone who's on level needs 20 to 40 minutes. It it it does adjust for sort of where the student is in their in their uh proficiency. And so, um but but I do think two things. Number one, kids do like to to practice and and there's no reason why they can't be doing that and and easily could be doing that at home. So, it just sounds like we need to do a better job of of getting that information out there. that students can work on kids and you know they have to work through

042the teacher encourages teacher interaction. So that might be the cause for some of those, you know, differing perspectives on how Yeah. If a kid gets stuck and they keep practicing, it actually can be detrimental because actually that's when a teacher is supposed to intervene. So like it'll it'll on the dashboard flag them red. That's a teacher's note to like pull it pull a lesson and intervene. Other questions? Yes, ma'am. I have two questions. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So, couple things, Director Hatter, I think. Um, so here's some feedback from the field, right? people say, "Gosh, our students are on Lexia from K to five and if they're still on it in middle school, they're on it till like they're getting bored with it." So, that's one piece is like kids kind of just need to switch

043it up. But I would also say more concretely and data driven, um, you know, when I look at endofear Lexia reports, there are some things and, you know, you can look at some of the ones that we have, uh, uploaded, there are some things that look phenomenal. Like, you look at the data and it says that we have a school. I was just talking to a leader the other day and we pulled up her data and it looks like 68% of kids are proficient but they're not. I mean when you look at our state data they're in the 30s somewhere. So so I think we have a lot of questions around what's the transferability of you know looks like kids are doing amazing and we want to celebrate that but but that's not playing out

044necessarily all of the time in the same way on our state data. And so, um, it's been hard for us to verify that that data growth that we're seeing is is also what we're seeing on our state test to be to be honest. with some of the elements like you know some of those foundational skills they're very different and I think I mean just to add to that we talked about this last time but our our growth in the pilot was pretty outstanding like I don't know that I've ever seen a tool help to create that kind of of growth um particularly with phmic awareness with kindergarters. How was growth measured by by magpie or oh so if you so they have an embedded external assessment. So uh Stanford University created ROAR which is being

045used more and more um but but Magpi is partnering with Stanford and is using their external assessment as an embedded you know checks and balances really uh for their platform to look at student growth but just well yes so direct so director Rose we won't so here's what we know we do know that once we have that data we'll be able to do the same thing and cross reference that to our own state data But like we're just getting this year for the first time our K to2 foundational skills data from our state test. And so um uh but but that is something I mean they already know that's what we want to do like we we're going to put those together and we're going to look across assessments and do some some checking. Thank

046you. Other questions? Other questions? Yes. Comment. I just want to thank um our teaching and learning team um all of the folks who do this work our LTS our principles our teachers um this is like the real work and this is why we all are here and we have been hard at work I know uh especially over these last three years really trying to put some systems and things in place and so I just want to say thank you to the team uh for all of your hard work and also I just want to reiterate again so when we hear comments like we have all these programs and we spend money on all these programs like what you see here are the only supplemental programs that we use in the district. So I kind of

047want to dispel that myth like every supplemental program that we use K to 12 all content areas is listed here. I think some of the struggles we still have is that you know some folks who are using things still may be using some things but those aren't things that the district is requiring. Um um so we're still working to try to make sure that we have some cohesion and alignment in terms of uh programs and things that that folks are using. But this is it. This is these are all the supplemental programs that we're using for K12. What is there? Um I do have a question about um not and then although it's it's funion that if any of these programs are able to do um and then like we could use that $6 million

048um somewhere else particularly because it's only serving a few hundred students anyway and it cost $2,200 per student. Mac is $17 per student is 53. Well, it's under 75,000 for everyone. So, um so tell me a little bit about Ignite and how does and where does that play in here and particularly if we could free up$6 million that's serving only a few hundred students. Um I think that that will be a benefit for in our district. So, I'm gonna let Miss Goody answer the question about where does Ignite what are we doing with Ignite now? But I want to clarify a couple things. Number one, the $6 million was a one time expenditure for the ESA money that we had left over. And that $6 million supported um I think was almost 2,000 kids across

049several schools. And so that was a one-time thing that we did in the 23 24 school year. Yeah. And then this year and moving forward, I'll let her using some of the grant money that we get from the state to fund a smaller portion. Um, but that $6 million was the onetime thing. Um, in the beginning that served about 2,000 kids and that was just a one time expense. So, we don't have that money anymore to to free up to use somewhere else. And then, right, write the cost of that what we're paying. Yeah, I can tell you. We have 300 students this year. Um, and so it's 750 total. 750,000. Correct. for 300 students. Correct. That's still a lot of money for 300 students. Yep. And I'll tell you sort of in the tiered

050support structure um where that sits and why. Um, so the good news about magpie to your point is all of our students will have access to magpie and if they're getting additional practice and additional support like we when Kelly was talking earlier, if you look at some of the videos of of the magpie um platform when students are learning how to say cat, right? and they're learning how to segment the word cat and they're going like they see the the the person make the mouth right for for and then they have to match the sound to the way the mouth looks. It's so intentional and focused around that early um phmic awareness. And so we haven't had anything like that where all of our students could practice with something like that outside of their teacher

051doing it, which our teachers are doing that, right? But they're doing it whole group and they're trying to do it in small groups, but like kids are getting one-on-one practice well with with it with with Magpie um if we get to use it. And so it is I think in that way like it it is a tiered supplemental support. It's giving all kids practice and it's giving kids who need it more practice, which we would call like a tier 2 support. And where Ignite fits in, director Hehatter, is it really Ignite is a tier three, right? After kids after all the other things that kids have had practice with ar haven't worked, then they need this one-on-one tutoring with with somebody. But we have too many people. We have too many kids in that need

052that one-on-one tutoring than we should have, right? So, we shouldn't have as many students as we are. And the plan would be that if students are getting more intentional practice with something like mag we shouldn't have as many students who need that individualized onetoone tier three support. And my last question to round this up if we're paying $750,000 for 300 students know being able to see how the mouth and the tongue move the breaths in between is very important because and and all that and learn how to pronunciate words correctly. So if we are finding programs like a magpie that is only costing $17 per student under $75,000 to cover our K12 are um a far greater number of um students. I think it's like almost 4,000 or more students. Um it I'm sure there

053just based off of that if I'm just going off Macpie to Ignite I'm sure there's probably another program or supplement for tier three that we can get that have a less cost per student instead of $2,200 per student times 300 student giving us that 70 you know that $700,000 price tag is there anything out there or can or can we even open up a bid for something else? Well, let me tell you this. If you find something, please let me know. I can I can tell you this. I um I definitely um scour uh platforms, people, professional relationships I have here and elsewhere um to figure out, you know, what's been vetted and what works with kids. I actually don't know of one that does that sort of onetoone tier three support like Ignite does.

054I understand your concern and and it makes perfect sense. Um I don't know what would replace that though to be honest. I would also say for it to be an effective it is required I mean in the NTSS structure and response to intervention is really required for it to be focused and um targeted and so of course when you do that that's manower you know to kids and so um that's going to be more costly than something that works for everybody and what is the time frame for student per week. I believe I read. What is forg Ignite? How many minutes? 15 minutes a day. So 15. So we're talking 75 a week. 75. So 15 minutes more a week. That's still a a big price tag for I was getting No, I I I

055get I I get that, but I'm just thinking about You guys don't know. I'm thinking about this as well, but I'm just thinking about our budget cuts, future budget cuts. and the cost of it is $2,200 per student. We only get $1,900 base um state funding. So, I'm just And I think all of that is Yeah. All all of that is is fair. I think um like we're not purchasing that with our with our district funds. I mean, I've been waiting for the state to post the high impact tutoring grant, which is specific to high impact tutoring. That's the only way you can use it. Um, apparently it's out there. So, uh, I've got a grant to get busy with, but um, uh, that is the only we wouldn't use just I don't we don't

056have the funds right now in in our district budget to to support that, but that high impact tutoring grant, that's what that's geared for. Thank you so much. Any other questions? Okay, we're going to go ahead and go to 3.0 financing operations. Miss Mchuan, she does. Absolutely. So 3.1, two, three, and four. Future Smiles Dental Clinic, River Mountain Eye Care, Arkansas Children's Hospital, and Medical Billing Specialist. I'm excited to see you all. It has been a little while since I've been here to the board meeting. So, thank you for inviting me to come here to speak with you all tonight. Um, we have a couple ofUS um that we need to renew. Um, can I share some good news with y'all really quick? So, we got good news today. Um, we applied for a grant

057um for a three-year grant. Uh, the first year 150,000 and then it goes down to I think the third year is $75,000. And Linda Young wrote a wonderful grant for us. Dr. Wright helped us as well come to our site visit. I think you won him over. Um, and then, um, Mary and I worked pretty hard on getting that, but we got, uh, the news today that we are going to be getting that grant. So, that'll be helping our Wakefield dental clinic. So, I'm really excited. Um, and then do we have the PowerPoint or we like to get some grant money, so it helps out. And she Pam's pulling up my PowerPoint. Have you guys been doing well? Yes, ma'am. So luckily for the dental program, we are um they are increasing the Medicaid reimbursement.

058So um that is good news for the dental clinic. And then um we work with Arkansas Children's Hospital for our other clinics. Um and then River Mountain Eye Care is its own separate um organization as well. So, um, they're still able to bill for Medicaid services. Mhm. Yes. Yes. Yes. So, this this first one is just a title of what we're going to be talking about this evening. So, Future Smiles Dental Clinic, this is the one I was just sharing with you all about. Um, we got awarded that grant. Um, we have threeUS with this grant. It's going to be a little bit different than last year. Um, so this is not necessarily a um signing a contract that we already had in place just because Children's International did pull out of funding. Um, and

059so we are going to be taking on um the dental clinic here in our district ourselves and it's going to be great. Um, so the first one is the AC dentalou. And with that, um, we do have a contract with AC, um, that you should see in your packets, I'm assuming. Um, we, um, Children's is going to be providing a contract as dentist three days a week at $500 a day. The $500 a day will be supported by Medicaid billing from the Wakefield Dental Clinic. We've been able to support that cost. our Children's International has and now we'll be um still be able to be billing and we'll still be able to cover those costs. Uh we do City of Little Rock has been so gracious to help us out um with providing a dental

060assistant for our um Wakefield dental clinic. Um it is going to be $45,000 a year. They are actually going to be an LRSD employee. um they are going to continue to they'll re-evaluate at the end of each year um to see if they can still provide this assistance um but this year we are being covered and we have posted for that position and we've had an applicant so far um that we're going to interview here is it Mon Monday um so we're looking forward to that uh dental hygiene we have partnered with Dental Hygiene um for quite a few years now um they have a a program for their students that is the only pediatric rotation that they have. And so they're able to come to our um school and help out um two to

061three days a week. And this helps our educational process um as well as helping out our dentists there. And then so this was some um our numbers from last year, the 2324 school year. The dental clinic provided um 1,31 visits um to 1,248. So, we did have some students that needed to come back for some additional care. Um, and we're going to continue doing that this next year. River Mountain Eye Careou. Um, I don't know if you guys need to come and visit our our Chico Clinic and our dentist clinic. Um, River Mountain Eye Care. Um, that is also that's going to be a renewal of the contract that we had. There's no cost associated at all for us in this district. Um, which is also really good. Um they provide services, the dentist or

062the vision doctor provides services one day a week. Um but we had 253 visits and prescribed 218 pairs of glasses. That really helps with the educational process if we can get our kids to be able to see and and learn. So um a primary careou um that is going to be a renewal as well with our Stevens and Chico clinic. Um they provide primary care services for all LRSD students. um no cost to LRSD services provided routine physicals, sport physicals, wellchild sick visits and immunizations. At Stevens, they we had about 680 visits last year at Stevens and then 950 visits at Chico. Um I think numbers are going to be definitely going up this next year at Stevens to to be able to see kids there. So, I'm excited about that. Can I ask a

063clarifying question? Yes, they can see any LRC students. So, it's not just the students at Chico and Stevens. Yes. all of our clinics. Um, we see all our all LRSD students. How hard do people do the parents around the district know about it? So, we do quite a Mary is our schoolbased health school clinic coordinator and she does a lot of advertising with that. Um, we've gotten grants to be able to help with that advertising. Um, we try to go to our um the events throughout the year um to give out free swag to try to get some notice and education with that. I've tried to we've handed out toothbrushes to promote the dental clinic. Um we've tried to to do quite a bit, but there I think there's still some people that don't know.

064Um and if you guys have any ideas on how to reach we have a Facebook page. We have I mean we're trying to we even try to educate the teachers about it at the beginning of the school year so that they can inform the parents as well as they see needs. So is that sports physicals? Is that the entire is that all athletes? Anybody that wants to call and make an appointment to do that, they can go on over and schedule that. So, what are the hours? The hours are different at both of our clinics. I feel like this is attacking my face. There's some caveats. Sorry. There's some caveats with insurance and PCP and everything, but that's something that the clinic they can call and figure out what they need to do to figure

065out. So there's two days at one of our clinics which is at um Stevens and then we have two and a half days at Chico. Um the hours are school hours um until about 4 till about 4 and they can call either clinic to schedule at either clinic. It's the same staff that goes between them. I didn't want to cut anybody up. Um so when um the seasons change and start you know for playing ball, football, basketball, all of these seasons um is there any coordination with you know um coaching staff and different individuals to you know ensure that they're aware? Yeah, so we try to put out information around those seasons to um to get those students signed up for appointments at the at the clinics. Um, we're actually just started a new conversation

066with Children's Hospital to try to bring sports physicals back to the schools a little bit. So hopefully that's in the works this coming year mid July. Yeah, if we reopen mid July for the children's hospital and go through the end of the school year. So yeah, we try to get ahead of those back to school physicals and immunizations before It's crunch time. Other questions? Yes, ma'am. Hannah, I'm disappointed information. Children's Hospital, they already do the physicals, right? For our athletes as well as um CPR for the coaches certification. So, that happens. Been happening for a while. I guess 10 plus years. Yeah. They transport students to Children's Hospital for like a mass sports physical. they come too on on campus as well. So, our department actually uh provides CPR to all staff members who want

067to take it as well. Um we have a link on our page for any staff members that want to come sign up as well. Okay. Strong. Maybe I'm missing a Thank you. I've worked for years. Love Schoolbased Health. Um on the Arkansas Children's Hospital primary care one on the funding, it just say didn't anything in the document that said that we we are responsible financially for that. Is that correct? That's correct. So we don't have to still kind of funding. Okay. I just wanted to make sure. Thank you so much. Any other questions? Questions. Questions. Thank you. I think we had one more. You have one more for the one more. I'm sorry. Medicaid billing. Yeah, Medicaid billing with Sandra Lynn. Um she does our uh dental Medicaid billing. Um, we are going to continue

068that this year. Um, Mary and I are gonna possibly look into seeing if we can do something with that. Any questions about that? No. Yes. Go. If I might jump in. So, we bill extensively for other services through the district. Correct. Like we vision our department, all those things. Okay. Um, and so this is just an outside person. Do we contract with this person for all of that billing too that brings? So my department does the vision and hearing and personal care billing. Okay. Gotcha. Yeah. All right. And um, do you know off the top of your head, this is a pop quiz question, um, how much the district brings in in Medicaid revenue every year. So this year with vision and hearing, we made over $100,000. Um, we are continually trying to increase that

069number. um we have to get like a signature from the parent to be able to bill for that, but we've been able to come up with Summer Young a way to not have to ask for those signatures every single year. Um so then we can start targeting our new students that come to our district and get those signatures. And then our personal care, um we're continually working on that too. There's a lot with personal care on getting the families to uh sign permission to be able to bill for services as well. And then we have to have those staff members that can be able to um keep logs and are certified, right? I know. Yeah, I know that that's a there's a lot of kind of administrative overhead and that but I just know it's

070a huge source of income for a lot of our our health related services in general. Thank you for all. Thank you. Thank you so much. Absolutely. 4.0 strategy communication and community engagement. 4.1 city year. Miss Festol is that you have someone Miss Fest while we're going to the next one if I could just make a comment to the board since we've been talking more this past year about thinking more about conflict of interest things and I'm hoping to be able to bring something to you with Mr. Kazay in the in the next few months to think about that for us. But I think I was thinking that probably to take the highest road possible for this one for the for those where there's an Arkansas Children's Hospital connection that I should not be a part

071of that decision. Um although I'm very in favor of that which would mean after speaking with Mr. Kazay that next week when we vote on this that I would just leave the room so that I would not be counted as a extension and a no vote and then just come back. Uhhuh. Exactly. That's right. So when it would come up when and and so when it would come up, you know, for discussion or whatever that that I would I would exit and but I have I'm supposed to say that publicly and then leave and come and come back. Well, won't it be on the consent agenda or would you want to pull it off the We want to pull it. I would want to pull it off so that I could still vote on the

072other things on the consent agenda. Well, and I was just thinking about this too. I may I may have some for my day job may have some members who work in some of these spaces. I'm not totally sure off the top of my head, but we do have I'm looking at you guys. I don't even know who the current who the current providers are on the position or I would love to just be able to double check that. Yeah, thank you. Thank you guys so much for that. Thanks so much for that. Okay. Hi everybody. I know. I know. Um Okay. Do you have my Oh, okay. Great. It's a fun time to be in an Americanore organization. It's a fun time. It's a fun time to care about kids. All right. Well, um, for

073those of you I think I've been in front of this whole board before, but as a refresher and as a proud City Year, I will stand and declare, but I will sit. My name is Jennifer Cobb. I have the honor of being the executive director of Cityear Little Rock, and I also serve as a senior vice president for Cityear, Inc., which is our parent organization. And so all day long I'm going back and forth between wearing my ED hat which is focusing on schools and core members and students and fundraising and staff and all that wonderful things and then also my SVP hat which is looking at the strategies of the entire organization and how we can sustain the climate that we find ourselves in. Um, but I uh first of we've been in we're

074celebrating 20 years which has been really great. This has been our 20th year of service. We're about to Oh my gosh, that's so fantastic. Um, these are our core members. That's the 20th class right there. Um, this was taken a couple weeks ago at our Rock Your Red event. Um, and just to give you an overview of our footprint in central Arkansas over the last 20 years, we've served in 21 schools. We have served 63,000 students. We have served we I did not core members, student success coaches served in classrooms with students 918,000 plus hours. And then we have roughly 850 alumni and um more than half I would say about 60% of our alumni stay in Arkansas and um you know are all over uh in concentrated in central Arkansas and the Delta doing

075great work today. So um what do our educators say? If you talk with our partner teachers and our partner principles, we do a start of year, midyear, and endofear survey every year to collect the data on whether or not we're living up. We're fulfilling our promise to them. One of my favorite things that Don Porter said this year is that city year changes the world through relationships, heads, hearts, and hands. I could not have said it better. Um, we served at Cloverdale forever and then followed Mr. reporter over to Lacy and it's been such a wonderful year in that new space. Um, and we're looking forward to being back next year. Um, why it matters. This is Ren Riiles who is a second year at fair this year and she is a rock star in

076that first grade classroom. She was part of our pilot for the littlest learners and has really perfected the whole school whole child model for first and second grade classrooms. and the work that that team did at fair is allowing us to say with confidence that we can heavy up in that second and third grade for next year to support the district's strategic priorities. So, um obviously we have a high need here. 94% of the students in the schools where we serve are lowincome and 46% are early uh sorry, English language learners. um our our core members serve as tutors, as mentors, and then as role models. It's so fun to walk the halls with them and see the high fives and the fist bumps and the hugs because even if the students are not on

077focus lists or they're not in classrooms with our Cityear core members, they still know every core member's name and every City in a red jacket is their personal city year. even if they've never worked with them one-on-one. And so it's really fun um to watch the first couple of weeks these young adults get adjusted to their new rockstar status and um you know then they come down off their high horse and are very humbled by the relationships that they have with their students. It's why they get out of bed every day. It's really neat to hear. All right, next one. academic gains um over the last this this is um aggregate data over the last two years in the little art school district 91% of our focusless students who started the year with a DNF

078in math improved to a C or better and then 85% of students with a DRF and ELA improved to a C or better. So um we're proud of that. We know that C is average, but we know that that's better than a D or an F. And so, we're proud to be contributing to getting folks back on grade level. Yeah, I know. I think they are, too. It's just sometimes naysayers want to say, "What about the A's and the B's?" And I'm like, "Well, we have some of those, too." But um so just to give you an overview of our service this year um we have served in Chico uh all four schools where we all all five schools where we served are amazing. Chico I'm sure all of you have seen it before but

079man that's such a gem. It's so much fun to go to that school. So we're at Chico Stevens Lacy Fair and Mabelville Middle. Um and the top skills that we have covered this year. There you go. Um comprehensions, fractions and decimals, writing and vocabulary. So those are the ones that bubbled up. Um as we looked at our CY Schoolhouse, which talks sort of to School Zilla through our data sharing agreement, we were able to track that those were the things that our core members worked most on across all schools. We have 279 focusless students across those schools. Um, as of last week or two weeks ago, um, because that's when this data was pulled, we had done 66,640 minutes of intervention and that represents almost 2,000 sessions with students. Um, and I just love this

080quote. Angelica Davey is the team leader and she's coming back for a third year. We love our third years. Um, and I just think this is beautiful. She talks about one of her focusful students. She began to see herself differently. The quiet girl now speaks up, participates, and asserts herself in class. This is the power of showing up. Having just one person believe in you can make all the difference. And sometimes that's all a child needs to realize they're capable of more than they ever imagined. That's the magic. That's the magic of what we do. And it's cool to see the students realize that. But also when these young core members who are between the ages of 18 and 23, we don't have a whole lot of older core members, but when they see themselves

081in the smiles and the success of the students, it's a win-win for both sides. Um, what sets us apart? We are not like any other mentor tutoring program because we are daily uh we serve all day every day embedded in the classrooms working with partner teachers. Um we do the whole classroom support during group instruction and then we're able to do the pull outs and the pushins whichever the teacher or principal prefers. the principles set the tone for the grades where we serve and the and the partner teachers and then we work with the partner teachers to make sure that we meet their needs whether or not they want us to pull their students out or just push in pull the group in the back. Um we still do all of the academic interventions ELA

082and math and we still do we're we're shifting our language in the world where words suddenly you know will get you in trouble. We're calling it not social emotional learning. it's just going to be behavior. Um, even though that's not exactly what it is. Um, but we'll be talking about behavior groups where we pull them and work on things like communication and cooperation, um, confidence, just those resilient soft skills that are so important. And then of course, mentorship and belonging for all students and then also for the core members. Looking ahead, we're ready to partner with y'all. Um, we have, y'all have stood by us in lean years and so we will always stand with you. Um, and while we didn't love the call that we got, we understand and we're just thrilled to still

083be standing shoulder-to-shoulder and have a partnership. So, um, we will continue to serve as long as you'll have us. Um, we have proposed a three-year contract. Um, and we will be aligning our service to cover all second and third grade classrooms in the four schools where we will serve. Um, I'll tell you that as as of sitting right here now, we believe that those will be Chico, Stevens, Lacy, and Fair because we will be focusing on second and third grade. So that means it was an easy decision to leave. I mean, not an easy decision to leave Mabel. We've been there forever, probably for 20 years. But it makes sense because we're going to focus on second and third grade. Um, we're way ahead on recruitment, which is shocking to me because in a year

084when all these headlines about Americanore, people are still applying and I love it. So, we have 17 core members coming back to serve next year and then 16 for your first year core members right now. We also have one undergraduate teaching fellow. She is going to be a junior at UA Little Rock. She will be concurrently enrolled as a student success coach with us. So, she will be in the classroom three days. She'll be at ULR two days a week, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. And then she'll be a student success coach Monday, Wednesdays, and Fridays. She'll be getting credit for service. And so, she'll do that junior and senior year. she will be able to shift her in her senior year, her second semester will count as her internship or not a teacher prep expert. I'm

085just a leader of a nonprofit that I'm passionate about. But um but yeah, so we're thrilled. So that's a wonderful thing that we're kicking off this year. All right, we're coming back. We're serving in four schools and we're thrilled about that. But I would be remiss if I didn't tell you a little bit about what our experience has been. I will not belabor the point. I just wanted y'all to know this. Doge did terminate cityear grants completely in Columbus, Cleveland, Detroit, LA, New York, Philly, and Sacramento. Um, not necessarily. Sacramento is a really small site. There's no rhyme or reason. It's not like we've looked for it. It's like, were they all red states? Were they all blue states? where they all like there's no rhyme or reason which makes me even more grateful that

086it wasn't Little Rock. Um so that leaves 500 core members stranded with no stipen ED award but because we are um a 501 501c3 we are shifting those core members over to open slots in our national direct hopefully and they'll be able to continue to serve. our core members have not missed a beat and when I try to talk to them and see how they're feeling about it, they're all like, "I'm great. Can I go back to class?" And I'm like, "Okay." So, they are they're in classrooms and they are rising above all the politics. Um, grant funding for Little Rock and FY26 remains secure. As I sit here right now, there are efforts to put forth a recision package to rescend the appropriations that were extended in March. Um, we'll just have to see

087what happens there, but that's where we are right now. We feel good that our Americanore funding is intact for FY26. So, we are moving forward as planned. Thoughts, comments, questions, concerns, questions? Yes. Comment. Yeah. Are you Yeah. Yeah. It's It's been a whirlwind. every every day something new changes as you all for what you do. Well, thank you. I remember 20 years ago and I was I was tickled to do this then and I'm I'm so glad I did not know that. I'm sorry that I didn't put that together. I remember the kids in the orange jacket is why why stuck in my Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. All right. Thank you guys. Thank you so much. Absolutely. We'll move to 4.2 two 2025 25 to 26 to dig. For those of you who don't know,

088this is Miss Sheila Hayes and her team uh who she will introduce. I would like to Well, I'm not going to I'm going to be nice to Jasmine today, so I will let uh please. It's a wonderful afternoon. Good afternoon everyone. Good afternoon. Um we're going to I'm going to introduce Jasmine Wakefield. She's our senior behavior specialist as well as Jared Green. He's our um other senior behavior specialist. And we're going to um first um provide you all with a um presentation from the time that we've been with Little Rock School District, which is since inception in 2017. And roll it. [Music] Every student deserves a second chance. At Tandajagi CDC, we believe in reclaiming scholars, helping students develop the skills they need to succeed in school and in life. The Tandaji Reclaiming Scholars Program

089addresses behavioral, academic, social, emotional challenges, ensuring that students understand the impact of their choices and how to create better futures for themselves. Since 2017, Tandaji Reclaiming Scholars has partnered with the Little Rock District to provide crucial services from out of school suspension programming to mediation, social emotional learning, and individualized interventions. What started in just two schools has grown to serve seven middle schools and one high school. The impact life-changing. Sometimes students don't want to hear you got it or you can do it cuz they mentally, physically really doesn't like they really lost in their mind. they go along basically like and I just feel like students will be engaging more in school if they if the school like have more strategies or make or help the teachers make the classroom better. Like I feel like

090students would actually come to school. Uh first uh probably start listening to what we have to say like helping us more with our work, you know, like cuz you know some kids, you know, they be having like stuff that they go through at home. So it be hard for them like do their work and stuff. Like if a teacher like help you with it, like you know, you'll probably start like in school cuz you actually getting your grades up and like people working together, you know, teacher helping us actually like showing us how to do it and stuff like that. like talk to your students like like talk to them like actually see what's going on in their day-to-day life and things like that like just check up on them. Over 5,000 students have been

091served since the program began. 1,061 students received direct intervention services this year alone. 250 parents and guardians have been engaged through exit sessions and workshops. And through our district-wide RAP sessions, we've empowered over 3,000 sixth graders to develop self-awareness and decision-making skills. Educators see the difference. 100% of staff surveyed believe TRS sessions are necessary for student success. They witness firsthand the growth, accountability, and emotional development taking place. I'm Ivan Christopher Kelly. I am the ninth grade assistant principal here at Little Rock Southwest. And I say Tenagaji is the best partner I think I've ever worked with. They have helped us out tremendously. Taji has a good relationship. Mr. Green and all those who come over have great relationships with our our students over here to where there are times when they'll feel more comfortable talking

092to them than they will to us. And they help us on the social emotional aspect of our students. AI's helping them problem solve and conflict uh management. all those things that these students actually need over here to kind of navigate kind of the complexities of life. And so I love Tandaji. I think they need to be in every school in Lorra School District. 85% of students strongly agree that the strategies they've learned in Tandaji Reclaiming Scholars will keep them from being suspended again. 92% want to continue participating at Hamilton Learning Academyy's alternative learning education. to dodgy specialists lead weekly sessions to create a positive culture shift. Pre and post assessments show clear improvement and students consistently express how vulnerable these sessions are in their daily lives. I am Jonathan Webb. I'm the social worker at

093Pinnacle View Middle School. I learned about Tendaggi through uh our staff. As a therapist, I can only provide so much for the kids. And the more positive role models that they can have, the better. I'm just going to be honest, as a white therapist, I not all of my kids can identify with me. And I want them to have the tools that they need to, you know, grow as a person. I do feel that Tendaggi is an asset to the district. Um, and I feel like it's necessary to have these community partnerships that can serve the needs of the greater area of Little Rock and provide services outside of school hours. Feel that the program is great. I wish it could expand and I wish we could have mentors here every day. I wish we

094could have mentors and tutors here in the afternoons to help with tutoring for some of the kids that need it. Tanagi Reclaiming Scholars is more than just an intervention program. It's a movement toward a stronger, more supportive school culture. But we can't do it alone. Little Rock School District, your continued partnership ensures that we can reach even more students, strengthen our impact, and build a brighter future together. Let's continue reclaiming scholars because every student deserves the chance to succeed. Um well pretty much the um video we wanted to um give the narrative of making showing a holistic approach of what we do. Most of you all know me so you know I can get long- winded so I'm going to try real hard not to but um I am very passionate about what we're doing.

095I'm a 30 year plus educator and went into um the sector of doing um working with um our nonprofit to work with these students because we have to change the narrative. We have to change the culture. Um but we can't have those expectations of these children without giving them the tools. Um, Tendagi is very effective because we have taken the time to build that trust um, not only with the students but as well as with the teachers, the staff um, and the community. And so they've we are approaching year 10. So we're very um, excited about it. Um, and our followup has been great. Um of course um as the lady um with city year stated before the call um made us a little unhappy. However, we are happy to because we started this initiative

096with Little Rock School District and uh we started as a pallet and we have grown and we see students and each year we modify based on the students needs and what's needed in our community. is all about changing that generational gap, trying to change the narrative of our students, our community, and getting those students graduated. If we can get behavior under control, then academically they are going to thrive. Um they work and I'm I'm just the executive director giving out orders. Um the person that does the direct um intervention and lead this reclaiming cycle is Jared and Jasmine. So if you have any questions, they work a lot intensely with the schools um especially AL. Um so if you have any question, any questions? Thank you. uh the uh LRSD foundation is it do we

097have any money in that foundation? We do, but not enough to uh make up for what we're cutting here. And right now our all of our efforts um have really been geared to making sure that we're able to continue our reading in the rock initiative. And so that's the only thing that we've kind of focused on right now. Okay. So, at some point, can we start trying to focus on these once we start getting the millions of dollars into our foundation? Yes, that's what that's what I'm going after. And it it it I will say that this is one tenti and city year honestly are and really every decision that we've had to make tough decision around reductions. This one is particularly painful um only because I know the work that these folks do um

098and I know kind of firsthand because when I pop up in schools I oftentimes run into them and some aspects of their work is not even listed in theou. I mean they go way way beyond um the the the services that they actually contract with us with. And when I tell you that their presence is known and felt um in some of our schools, um they work directly with some of our kids who have the most um issues, behavioral issues. And so um you know, and so the compromise, well, I won't say necessarily compromise, but the way in which we approached um this particular is to decide to focus all of their work that they have been doing on our priority middle schools. um which means which means that Plaska Heights Middle and Pinnacle View

099are the two schools that they used to serve that they will no longer serve. That's how we were able um to to get the the cost down a little. Yes, Mr. Mr. Kaz attorney Kazaji is housed on St. Mark's campus and I am a St. Mark's member. Do I need to excuse myself or am I safe to vote? Okay. I think you're probably all right because you don't have a direct financial interest in the outcome. Arkansas not connected to somebody elsewhere to do it very long. Okay. Thank you. May I also add to to your question? Tendi and St. Mark are two separate entities. We're we stand alone. Their in kind services is allowing us to use the building. So, it's two totally separate entities. I'm sorry, director B. No, you can call me Bali.

100Um, I appreciate y'all for being here today. I admire the work that you all do since I've been introduced to y'all um and and got to witness um the excitement that y'all bring to the children's lives and building those relationships. So, my question is to you two. I don't think I've ever met you all before, but uh I wanted just y'all to speak on uh the importance of uh the work that you're doing, how it helps to improve uh the mental health uh for the kids and also uh building positive relationship, how that impacts their education as well as uh developing their life skills. Okay. Um well, I'm gonna a little bit of a perfect question within some timing. Um, is it to turn up my teacher voice? It's on. Okay. Like I was yelling

101at you guys this evening. Um, sorry about that. But, um, good question and and good timing just because I just showed um, my colleague an email I received. We were at Pinnacle earlier uh today and um Mr. web their social worker had contacted us about adding some more kids and like I know it's we only have two weeks left but if you all could work with them and gave us some background um but as well as him following up with one of the students we're working with just to speak to relationships and the holistic approach we try to take with working with students the school and the parent um and being in process with attempting to get him some glasses because we eventually connected him with his behavior that was going on in the classroom

102was directly related to him not understanding the work. He didn't understand the work because he couldn't see. Um, and so it was easier for him to just cut up in class instead of focusing um or feeling embarrassed that he was not um you know as knowledgeable about the subject as some of his peers. Um just a long story short with working with him he founds like you know I can't really see and we notice he squints a lot. So um in working with him and then Mr. Web um and now connecting to uh his father so that we can try to work with who's dealing with some transportation issues trying to work something out so that we can get him prepared for next year. Um and they spoke about the clinic earlier which is like

103huge help but again um where we come in and bridge that gap sometime with our our kids and not receiving services. you know, his father wasn't aware. And then when he became aware, um, unfortunately was was slow to move. Um, and when it comes to our kids, they're they do become our kids. And so, you know, we're trying to find a way to how can we expedite this before the school year ends and make sure he gets the glasses he needs. Um, but just bridging that gap with our students, finding out what is the cause. It's not surface level. Most of the time, a lot of people think that it is once we get to work with them and speak with them, whether they're we're meeting with them once a week or twice a week,

104um we get to know them, see what their background is, see what some of the issues are, getting to the root causes, and seeing how we can offer our services, our expertise, but also being able to connect the dots, help them, you know, connect. Yes. And that's the thing you see when you see the light bulb goes go off. Like that's the moment when it's like, "Okay, well, how about we try this and this and oh, I've never thought about that before or nobody's ever asked me that." Or even something as small as like, "How was your day?" or "How are you feeling today?" and to see them light up and really just take charge of their day and actually try um I forgot her name that quick, but the um the woman that spoke

105about City and those grades and we you definitely champion them for grades. A lot of uh teachers sometimes end up thinking we're their parents cuz we will pop up on you in school. you got a skipping problem, be where you're supposed to be cuz if we pop up, we want to make sure and see that you're in class. And um we champion for them. And if they're if it is a small bump from a D to a C, we're happy about it because that means that you did actually apply yourself, apply what we showed you, what we taught you. We know it's more in there and we try to get them to strive for more, but we also don't condemn them for not being at that A level. you like to add? I will to

106answer your question. I think I work not exaggerating at all just basically saving lives. Just today at Pinnacle View had a young man just tell me he didn't see himself being successful. Uh not to share too much of his story, but he lost his mother. He just lost his sister a couple months ago. So when you asked how to create an environment for learning versus just making it safe and comfortable uh them being honest enough to tell you what's wrong with them and even after expressing to me what he's going through I also I comfort him but then I can finish with some solution how we got to move forward. So, uh, we give him that hope, that strength to p push through that life will be tough. Uh, that you will be uncomfortable doing

107certain things. That doesn't mean stop. And, uh, so just being myself, I'm from Little Rock, I'm educated. I also play sports. So, a lot of students, they like to play sports. So, they say they going professional, you know, and so we try to make it real, too. So, I joke with them sometime, do you even play on your team? You know, but but also, you know, talk about the probability of if you are great, like it's a 1.3 chance of you going, but even if you go, once you finish, you 33, 34, 35. So, you still have a whole life to live. So, talking to them toward figuring out what next they want to do. They hate to hear that plan B. So, you know, just kind of in conversation, meeting them where they are.

108And that just come from repres representation, just showing them seeing themsel in me. I see myself in them. helping them understand if you do make a mistake that's not who you are. You can't change it but you do have to be conscious that whatever decision you make you have to face that as well. And so um when you say creating that environment as teachers definitely holding them accountable but also understanding maybe ask why you don't have a backpack or why she don't have a pencil before you just have an attitude because they might not have it. Some of our students are homeless some of them just literally don't have the resources. So and some of them just flat lazy. They'll tell you that. But more importantly, I offer structure, uh, accountability, and then I give

109them love. So, and that's what they want. I don't I'm not their friend. I miss the Jared, but they know I love them. They know I got their back. So, when you say why we're important because when they walk in schools, they don't really see themselves much or they don't feel like they have a voice just as the students she referring to is fourth nine weeks and we just found out about those glasses last week. And so, we just heard them. We're going to get that situated. So it's just leading by actions, not words. So when they see us get glasses or something small that's bringing a lunch, then they know our word hold weight and we just not there to take up space or get a check. If that answer your question, we just

110really applaud the Go ahead. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I just really applaud your I'm so sorry, honey. I just, you know, it's just filling me up. I just applaud their relationship building. I think it's just remarkable because the things that you're discovering there has everything to do with them connecting with you. I mean, you don't recognize these things without that connection. So, I applaud you guys so much for that. Yes, ma'am. as far as It's not. Okay. What can What can the community do to keep these programs funded at at the level that it is so it can continue or is that against the law? I mean, for the public schools, other schools, it's not. I I don't think fundraising is against the law. Number one, um, and I'm g try to I'm going answer

111this maybe a different way. So, one of the things that we want to first of all, we don't want to have to cut services that $10 provides. And so, it's just and the money comes directly from um our general fund. So, But one of the things that I think is important is that we try to model and embed as many of the practices um that they do. Uh even if we didn't have to cut, let me just say this, even if we didn't have to cut the level of services they provide, one thing that I wish we could do is to model a lot of the MTSS work that we're just now starting to do um as a district with the culture, climate um and well-being team that we discussed the last time. Part of

112what we We want those individuals, those MTSS coordinators to do is to really model the prevention work that they do in schools. And so we want to make sure that the type of work that Taji does is felt and seen throughout throughout our district and not just in the individual schools that they that they serve. Thirdly, I think um no because there's enough if you remember one of the things that we discussed when we were talking about these budget cuts like we have more need than resources, right? The need for these type of services, we will never run out of um need. The problem is we just don't have enough. Even if we didn't cut them, they're probably touching 15% of the students in our district who need their services. And so we've got to

113figure out how to reach more. Um, and one of the things that um I think is in theou like we really want to you I know we kind of started doing this at uh AL this year really trying to get them to do some training and work directly with staff because the same way in which they approach kids in terms of really getting to know them to build those relationships sometimes and this this is not the case for all of our staff I won't even say the majority of them but sometimes our staff set our kids off um and so one of the ways in which we are going to utilize them is to help them help our staff um um in addition to the direct services they provide to kids. Now thirdly, I will

114say now we we will continue to look for grants and opportunities and ways in which we can fund more of this work. Um, but remember when we talk about all of our needs as a district versus resources, we we have to prioritize what we what we are we got our our major what we call them our major goals or our major whatever we called them the last time and this is actually one piece of uh that major work around culture climate uh in MTSS all that stuff we need to do. Uh, for instance, at one point in time, there was a organization I mean, not organization, but a program in the Little Rock school district called Tessa. I'm real old. Okay. You remember Tessa? Okay. So, I work with Tessa. Uh but uh Tesla train

115teachers and uh that's I was like thinking the Tesla model and uh by training teachers but would that require that that required training and then you had like groups in schools of people who actually needed it. Now this was this is a while ago. tell you how long. But uh can we look at something like that? Because this young this is this is real sad about the glass situation. I know I can't see without and uh and and and and the other young man. And we we we used to have pods in each department that would deal with that. And then we had there was money to do that. And that's the reason why I kind of asked about the fundraising piece to have a fund that if I need glasses, they can get glasses.

116But you have to get that information, but you didn't get that information to win a couple weeks ago. But if you have somebody who's trained, they could have got a little bit quicker than just having the one staff member. I'll just also add there's so many we have so many partners. Yeah. But again, a lot of things are not as aligned as they need to be, which is another reason why we're trying to create this department to give attention to these things because we have like bright futures and other partnerships that could that that are designed just to to do some of the things that we're talking about. But as I was explaining before, we are operating all of these little pieces are like operating individually. Um, and so we've got to bring everybody together

117up under one roof and and better capitalize on all of the partners that we have because there's no reason why this child, we should just be finding out that this child needs glasses at the end of school year. But that's just an example of how some kids just go under the under the radar for so long. And okay, Director Strong, I'm sorry. Was there a comment here? She can come. Okay, Director Strong, thank you guys for all you do. Um, one of the qu I think you Dr. You kind of started to to talk about this. I think one thing I would maybe love to see at some point and maybe it's a little further down the road as the climate culture and belonging team gets together, but one of my questions originally was going

118to be are you guys therapists at all? Are y'all are y'all like licensed social workers or are you mentors? I guess that's the first question and then and then how depending on the answer to that. My question was, how are you coordinating with the people who are coming on campus doing therapy for kids who are are they coming to to your site when kids are with you guys or how how are you working with that the social workers on campus and how does it all how does it all fit together because then maybe that's still evolving. So, so yeah. Yeah. So, I'll work work backwards and then we can give our credentials. Of course, our team um each person has their own items, but as far as how we're working with um like perhaps other

119social workers on the sites, we'll use Southwest as an example. They have a social worker that immediately we connected with when the school year started so that they could um uh work in tandem with our behavioral specialist that goes to the school. And so they're talking about the students. Um she's there on a daily basis. And so she's able to give some feedback um because of course we can get it from our kids and some of the teachers we connect with the principles of APS but you know they're able to move around a little bit more and then if there's already a previous history there they can share that. So sharing notes sharing information um and as I spoke about earlier with Mr. Web um at Pinnacle we made a connection with him so that

120we can exchange information and he can refer some kids to us. That's how we um got our groups um for Pinnacle was him referring some of the students that he saw had different issues or that he knew had um some background issues or familial issues and he wasn't really making that connection. So, he bought us in to be able to work with the students and families. Um and we try to make a point to do that with all of our schools. We know that there's not a dedicated social worker in every building, unfortunately. But with our APS, we try to build that connection and relationship um to the extent that they're, you know, texting or call in the middle of night like, hey, I got to tell I didn't have time, but this is what

121happened today with this student, this student. Can you come up here to talk with them? Um and even though we have a built schedule, that's another good part about our team. we're able to be flexible and we can I need you to handle this group even though it's at 12:00 cuz this AP text me saying that this student is having some problems. So, we're able to move around um and connect in that way. Um I I'll speak for myself as far as my credentials. Um I do have a master's in counseling with a concentration in community agency and um a trainer of trainers both trained and then a trainer of trainers for restorative justice restorative justice practices um from the international institute for restorative practices. Um we're of course always trying to push um the

122restorative justice. So being able to train and to speak on Oh, I'm sorry. I don't because I was going to go back into the training piece, but I have my bachelor in sociology and then my master's manager in leadership. I'm also a trainer trainer and I'm also trained in trauma informed. So, I was going to ask about it seems like y'all are doing, you didn't use those words until just now, but very trauma informed care for both like the students and the schools. That's really helpful. But y'all are not billing for your services like health insurance or Medicaid or anything like that. Okay. That's that was kind of one of the big questions of like of like where does the overlap happen with like I'm trying to think of like what are the outside groups

123that come in like Pinnacle Point or whoever comes in but we have a direct totally different from all that but some collaboration coordination. We do collaborate with them. So based on and we have three other specialists um that are all um double degrees as well in psychology, sociology, education and those levels. So they're all equipped and they're trained. Um now um based on our model, we um as Jasmine mentioned at the beginning of the year because each year the administration changes in the building. So we always start the school year off with having a meeting, starting that relationship with the team in the in the building. Um from that that gives us that association of filling in that gap. So when something happens um they will contact and what we do um Jasmine assigns the

124specialist to certain schools. So then they know who their specialist is. If they can't get them, they can always get me. So, and our program manager as well. So, we kind of work consistently um collaborating. If a cert if a student is referred to our program that need um certain services are already receiving therapy, then that student if he's at on our campus during suspension, then he will continue to get those services on campus. Um if there if we have a student that um they might have a um modification something if that's a student that we're working with they will inform us and a representative from Tendagi will be there. So whatever so we're trying to be we're trying to make it seamless. So whatever the school is doing and whatever we're doing we're trying

125to collaborate so that that child is taken care of and don't fall through any gaps. Our model is essentially built on, if you all are familiar with Maslo's hierarchy of needs, is getting to the core of that student, finding out what those needs are. A lot of behavior issues. I remember um even with elementary students that we work with, um students will um act accordingly based on what their needs are. If a child doesn't have the one child had a serious behavior issue and I contact the parent found out that he need a book a Chromebook and I think it was $25 but the grandmother the mother the dad was in jail the mother was deceased or out the picture and the grandmother was trying to raise those two grandchildren and she just did not

126have it in her. So we use that's where our partners come in handy. We contact anybody that we know. I'm I'm real good at begging for the children and we find services. We find, you know, find someone that can help them if we can't do it. So, we try to make it wrap around. As a former educator in the district, um I I have several hats within Little Rock School District. And so, Tendi is a collaboration of everything that I've seen in my past 25 30 years of student needs. Um and it's across the board. We have priority schools, but at Tendagaji, all students are a priority because just because they're in a certain school or in a certain neighborhood doesn't mean that they don't need help in some way. So that's the that's the

127narrative that my team that this is how we are trained. Um that's the message that we carry. Um and that's how we make a difference in the children that we serve. Director Hatter. Thank you. Director Mhm. Where are they now? Thank you. Sorry. Um and and and then I know there was an education component to it. So are you able to talk a little bit about the academic um piece of it because most of the conversation centered around behavior and we know we can't get to academics until you deal with behavior and all that. And so it was two questions at some point. Some some to email us uh some reports um um about the students of where you they started and where are they now and then to for now to speak about um

128the academic piece um to to helping uh student achievement uh within the district. So go ahead me. Um so um of we provide um uh end of the year reports every year. We have since the uh company or excuse me organization's inception and we're actually now trying to um on the rise of our tenure uh conduct this longitudinal study that we're going back and trying to find all of our students. of course they move around a lot even just within the same school year let alone over the past um 8 to 10 years um whether it's moving to different schools within the district or outside of the district or outside of the state. And so we're in the process of collecting that now so that we can do a you know from when we met

129them the grade or age and where they are now um both from a qualitative and quantitative perspective where we are talking about grades and behavior but as well as just how um going through the process with Taji may have impacted their lives andor their famil family's lives because of course we bring the parents in when we're referencing the uh out of school suspension But yes, that is something in process and something we are excited about and excited to be able to uh put out to you all in the community. And one reason of course we we try to collect data as we go along but um another reason is um when we have weekly meetings and that's when I get feedback from my team about what's happening in the school and during the conversation I

130started hearing um Jared referencing a child and I was and I mentioned I said wasn't he on there two years ago and he said well he never stopped calling me. So, this is a different type of program because a lot of the students um we did a workshop for superintendent, right? Um last year at um we Southwest at Southwest and inviting all the young people in. And so we used our male um counselors to do the presentation, not knowing who was going to be, you know, coming into the workshop. And as they were um speaking um during the workshop, a young man raised his hand and said that he had a comment. And when he stood up, Jared recognized him. And he was a student in middle school. We had him in middle school and

131um now and he talked about the program and he talked about the things that he learned doing the program and he at that time was a 10th grader. He was on the football team and he's doing really well at Southwest. So when we make that connection then we have a person at Southwest. So then we take that and say check on him because now we know where he is. So, um that you know it's that word of mouth. It's the kids are getting giving us that data. Um I my staff impressed me um every meeting because I hear a little bit of what you all have heard um of the students and the lives that are being changed and the time that they put in that's not on my time. um students calling in reference

132on a Saturday um saying, "Mr. Green, can I can you pick me up? I don't want to get in trouble." You know, that type of thing. And he take them to the gym or something like that. So, we end up although they say that I'm the one that has the biggest heart, um my team is they're vested. Um they're vested because we have to be these children. the narratives that we're trying to change. Um, they're our future and I'm a firm believer if we don't give them those tools, change will never happen. So, and to answer your question in terms of fundraising. Yes, ma'am. We are fundraising. We are fundraising. We are fundraising. You can save the date for June 12th. Invitations will go out to everybody in America. Uh but we're um hosting a

133meet and greet on June 12th to talk about Tandaji and all the programs that we're doing um in hopes that we educate the community more. Um we'll be doing a lot of marketing this summer trying to get more out initially um because of the work that we do particularly with reclaiming scholars. You can't build trust and people hear their story. So, a lot of the information we had to keep it. We didn't want to publicize or use a child as an example. But now we actually have parents that say, "Do you want me to talk to somebody? What what can I do?" Because you've made a difference in our life. So now I would rather for them to volunteer that then us break that trust because we have a confidentiality clause as well. So we

134have to be careful. But we still want people to know that it's not a punitive that we're trying to change lives and as we educate our parents um the better it'll be. And just I wanted to make sure I did address the academic piece. So, we don't directly work uh well, when we go to the schools and work with the students, we are working with them um either one-on-one or groups, but we're focusing more so on the session topics that we do with them and the lessons that we're doing with them. Um and so for us, when we go into the schools, we are more so connecting them with educational services or tutoring services they can utilize, whether it's um community based or directly with the school or something. they themselves can look up on

135their phone and navigate through. Um, and of course anything free that we can try to connect them with. Um, as far as our OSS program, when the students are able to come for the duration of their suspension, we do have a set schedule for them where at the top of the day, they do use that first core hour um and a half to actually work on their work. that way they can stay um on top of it and they're not getting back to school and being behind um since they were out on suspension. And they do receive um assistance with that. We're um lucky enough to have previous teachers on our staff um that can assist them with different components of their work. And again, they're also getting some of those additional tools as far

136as um just encouraging them and reminding that's important um because that's a big piece that that goes along with it as well. Not just knowing it, but understanding why it's important to provide that motivation for them to even seek it out. So, we have one more question. My last question, thank you for that. My last question, my last comment really is uh about our grants that like we go after four different things um and how they touch on some of the things that they've talked about and how we may use it for different initiatives or pilots or whatever we may use it for. Um perhaps um we can um right when we're looking at grants and and applying for grants to right to start looking and thinking about um Tendaji as as they're providing services

137to Pinnacle View and um the other middle school that was cut because those are typically viewed as schools that don't have any issues and they have resources but But then like they have um the same issues and res um the the same issues um and that actually require uh the resources. And so if we can you know as a unit or whatever be intentional about right when we're going after all these grants because we're very successful at getting grants. Um right to think about them to where we could have our grants cover their their their services to our students and so we can free up our um operating um budget. So, director Johnson, this is for Dr. Wright. Um you know, I was that student. I didn't first pair of glasses until the fourth grade.

138So, I was paying attention. I was doing goofy stuff. I was getting spanked all the time. I was not a bad kid. I just couldn't see. So, what I'm trying to figure out. Can we when parents register, can you have a statement maybe asking when was or has your child had a visionering test? And if the answer is no, maybe a link will pop up and I think at Chico they have the vision clinic there, right? Yes, I do believe that those questions are part of the registration process. And I don't know about middle schools. That's something I was I know um nurse Mchuan already left, but I know vision screening, hearing screening, those are things that occur regularly at our elementary schools. I know I don't know that that there's a requirement to do

139that in in middle school, but that's something that we we can we can find out. So, if it occurs they miss that student, and that's what I'm trying to figure out. Do they pull out who has not? Because I think you should have that test what every one or two years. So we missed a student and I'm just trying to figure out how did we miss that student and we have a vision. So are they pulling out the nose or I will have to research and get back to you because that dental clinic only ser I mean although it can serve all students put the dental clinic aside we still have regular screenings that all kids go through every single year. My question that I'm not sure on is does that extend to middle and

140high school? I know that those are standard practices at the elementary school level. Um but I'm not sure about at the middle and high school level. Yeah. And I was going to say I know that it's a statewide requirement because there's a statewide report to the legislature on this that I know happens. So I mean if the kids are coming from somewhere else in Arkansas then they should have gotten those screenings and I think they are universal for every kid unless the in like all of elementary school. But in the in the same vein that has been cut from uh uh the health services because at one point they not only gave flu shots but uh they on the high school level and there was vision and whatever and whatever and since I left all

141of that's been because I worked in the on prep periods in with the health with the nurse and most schools don't even have a full-time nurse and sometimes they would get together and have like clinics. You remember when they had the hepatitis B thing that went out and everybody got those painful shots. But you haven't heard very much about hepatitis B because that was done probably just like measles. I mean, I don't I'm not trying to be funny, but but I mean, but it's true. And and and with the current administration and government, whatever, you know, that's not a priority, but I I would like I would love to see that be a priority here. And like, what can we do when they cut our money and giving it away? and we can't do those

142things anymore. So, I think what we really need to do is think about and come up with some ideas that can fund these types of projects that we need for our public school students. Well, thank you guys so much for the information. It's been wonderful. We appreciate what you do. That's why we kept you here about 30 40 Okay. All right. So, we're going to move on now. All right. Thank you guys. so much. We do appreciate you. Thank you. Okay. So, 5.1 discussion act 503. Uh Mr. Chris Hammer. It's easy. All right. Good evening everyone. Wish I had better news. Well, so Act 503 of 2024 sort of upended the way school elections, when and how they will be conducted and for what candidates will have the opportunity to run and probably no district

143will feel the impact of that more than our district. So the bottom line for us is we're going to have to reduce the size of the board to seven or five members which requ will require us to establish new election zones and then we'll have to decide and all positions will be up for election and then we're going to have to decide whether we'll have two or four year terms I'm sorry four or six year terms um so and it seems clear I've talked to people I have a letter from the secretary of state and then I talked to people and the election commission and the county clerk's office. And it seems like the secretary of state, the state board of elections, the school boards association are coming to a consensus that there's not going

144to be an election this year. So those of you I think there are three three of you, right? No election in 2025. So the next election will be March 3rd, 2026. And we've got three members, I think, Mr. Bali, Mr. Mason, and Miss Johnson, who will be holdovers until that March election. So, um, there are I I can I did a timeline. I didn't have time to make a slide out of it, but we can Let me make sure I have one so I can talk about it. But there's some things we're going to have to do right away. It would be a disaster if there were to be a November election. But even with March, there are things we're going to have to do right away. So I've got in my category to be

145done soon, as soon as possible. Um the board's going to have to come to a resolution about whether we're going to reduce from nine members to seven members or five members. And then uh the next thing will be to decide on the terms, four years or six years. And then once we have decided those things, we're going to have to find somebody to create those zones and bring back to the board some proposals for some options for the new zones. And it looks like the uh the candidate filing period will start November 30. So if you kind of back up from that, you know, everybody's got 90 days in advance of that time to begin collecting signatures to be placed on the ballot. So that takes you back to what June or July we want

146to be able to submit a plan to the county clerk. So there is a provision in law for submitting a petition to the board of education if you're going to ask to have a smaller board. I put a question mark on that one because uh I'm not sure it applies to a situation where you're required by law to reduce the size of the board. State board of education really won't have any discretion in deciding whether or not we can reduce the size of the board because the legislature has already said that we will. So it looks like We're headed for a candidate filing period November 3rd to November 12th I think because it's Veterans Day on the 11th. So it's extended beyond the usual eight days. Um early voting February 17th and a March 3rd

147election first we've got decisions. So, I um was at the same conference several of us went to for the ASBA and the AAA leaders joint leadership conference earlier this week and one of the one of the questions. So I I went up and talked to Lucas Harter after this and from ASBA and one of the things he said I told him my understanding is that when we came out of state control five years ago almost six years ago I guess now we were told to have nine members by the state. Is that correct? I'm not sure about that. I talked to Shelby today from Geographic Information Services who did those last two right zones and you know he said he was hired initially by Johnny Key to do the coming out of state control zones

148and they were so he was told by the state I think to do nine and then you know there was the law that also allowed us to have n and that's what and average daily membership, which is because with with our early childhood programs, we're way over 20,000, but we're only allowed to count our K12 students for this. Is that correct? And we're like 220 students under I think 20,000. We're like 19. I'm sure Dr. told me we were under and I didn't I didn't know it exactly. It was like Well, Mr. Bailey shared at our last meeting. I think he sent me to ask him for that PowerPoint and I think we were like 197 something. Um, and so, so one of the questions I had was, I mean, since we were like, what

149is the expiration date of the state ordering us to have nine, you know, is it when state law changes that or would that supersede state law in any way if if we were told that we were by the state state or by the legislature passes Act 503 and the governor signs it, that supersedes, but that already existed. That already existed. statute that piece I don't think that piece was changed about the you were only allowed to have more than have nine board members if you were over 20,000 if you were over 20,000 and I'm pretty sure that was not changed by act 503 if I'm not wrong right but the law says that any district which quote has fallen below the average daily membership requirement 634 has to Oh, that's the new Okay. So, okay.

150So, this is it's just telling us we have to reelect like immediately, whereas before it was already law, but it didn't tell us exactly the timeline. This is giving us the time. Okay. Okay. So, there's no he he anyway. This the conclusion to all that was I just wanted to say like he said he would seek out maybe an attorney general's position on that just since we were told to have nine. Um or just some feedback from Desi legal team. That was all I just wanted to say that Mr. I'm sorry. Let me say one more thing. I spent a lot of time over the last few days since Dr. Wright asked me to come here talk about this trying to figure out who might know something whether it's the secretary of state, the attorney

151general, the state board of education, state board of election. So I've talked to people from a lot of those places and I am happy to say the consensus is becoming clear on at least that there won't be a November election. Nobody's saying for sure, but the secretary of state says that's his opinion and everybody else seems to be coming along. Yeah, I think that's right. Director Callaway had a question. I'm sorry. I thought I loud. Okay. Northwest Arkansas, they have just recently become the number one and number two where we have consistently been number one and we have the largest number of charter schools. Da da da. And it appears to be targeting now targeted. Now, as some I want to know, is there some relief to uh that that could be considered for our

152district? And there seems to be a lot of things that are out of order to to be simple. Uh, so if we do this, we run, we spend a whole bunch of money running against each other and whatever. I think there needs to be order to be paused. And I'm not I'm not arguing for myself. I am talking about confusion within my district because, you know, I've I've been on here for a while. I see massive confusion. Now, we're trying to go forward here and we have a a whole bunch of bricks in our way and they set them there. The the state legislature and what's the name who who signed it? Um who decided that this is what we needed to do because whatever Little Rock School District is doing and looks like they're

153getting ready to do some good positive things perhaps. So, we're going to do this and we're going to cut them from people to five, right? And we're gonna run the five folks. Now, we don't always agree on this board really and and and and that's a good thing. However, I feel we need to consider uh the all the legal ramifications before we go to this To tell you the truth, Miss Galloway, I spent all my time trying to figure out what happened so far so I could explain it as best I could to you all tonight and haven't yet tried to figure out what can be done about it. Is there something that we can do? Like for instance, you gave us this piece of paper that says that we have to decide we're gonna

154have four year terms or six year terms or five people or six people. This looks like we got this tonight. I'm not for that. I don't think that's true. That's not true. Right, Chris? That's not true. Right. What's this right here? Yeah. I mean, just he's just giving us some guidance on what uh I know you're giving guidance, but I'm ask what I'm asking for is guidance for a position that we need to perhaps seek legal and I can I can legal remedy to this because it's obvious We've only got one meeting. It doesn't say for tonight. I mean, you you're exactly where I was going with this and I needed a break. You know, and I'm sorry. I'm not I know. And I'm not attacking you. I'm not trying to say Yeah. But I'm

155just working backwards from a calendar to say if we're going to comply with this law. No, we're not. If we're going to comply with the law, there's a schedule we're going to have to follow. Sorry, Mr. What? We don't have any laws anyway. Dr. Bali, don't comply with the law. What comes down on our heads then? Yes, we had a we had a question on my question is does this law apply to the enrollment numbers right now or does it apply to the enrollment numbers in August? Cuz what if it goes up? I think she just mentioned about 214 students missing from 20,000. So what if 215 more students enrolled this summer and it takes over 20,000? Does any of this even apply as far as like the board members? Is it an emergency clause

156where it is it goes into effect right now? Now it goes into effect um 91 days from Monday. is that well that's the law that if you pass a statute without an emergency clause it goes into effect 90 days after sign which was Monday okay so 90 days after this past month that be like maybe September October whatever July whatever that's okay but in the meime some relief can be I mean they they stop because there are that can be done to get some legal remed that's all I'm saying step one for me was to understand it and look through all the statutes that were changed and there was some uncertainty uh Mr. Rose, for example, about even the first thing whether there would be a November election because besides the fact that this law

157repealed the law that allows November elections and then you deal with the fact that this law didn't take effect and then it says in part of the law it explains what's going to happen to people who are elected in 2025. So that created a little confusion because under the part that was repealed. Nobody's director Adams. Okay. So, I I just wanted to get some clarity on that on the enrollment numbers and I did have a second question, not a followup to that question, but just a new question. Um just in your opinion would is it better to hire a demographer for a new zone plan over a cgrapher? I I just use that term for the kind of people who can take census tracked information and have experience in creating election zones taking into account

158all the legal and practical aspects of that job. So anybody and Uh in my experience with the district, that's either been geographic information services from the state or metro plan. Um and I've talked to both of the people who have done talked today to both of the people who have done zones for us before, but it doesn't have to be them. And I'm not even sure if one or both of them would be willing to do it. Different people had some reservations for different reasons. Part of it is how much you want to get involved in politics because there's always a political aspect to it, especially when you're reducing zones and potentially putting incumbents together. Yeah, that's Thank you. Thank you. I wish we were not having to do this because I think it's going

159to provides, you know, an extra challenge and disruption for us. But if we are having to do this and it sure looks sounds to me like it is like the the law whether you you know we agree with it or or whatever the purpose of it was if it is I would be in favor of taking these first two steps as soon as possible because I don't think those are hard questions for us. I think that we'll probably can decide if if we're going to have to do this. I think at the same time we could explore we could be exploring if there's any other options but but with the timeline that you presented if if you're going to file in November and people can start doing petitions in August then I think the clock

160really is ticking and for the sake of our community and clarity for our community I think we'd want to try to get I think that we would want to try to get clarity so we could tell them are we going for five or seven and what the terms are going to be and where the zones are going to be to give people an opportunity to decide if they want to run for the school board and and it also gives us an opportunity around this table to decide if if we wanted to run for the school board and I think that as much time as possible for a community and for those of us around this table to decide that would be helpful and I think that it's going to be a potentially complicated and challenging

161thing to decide about zones because because of going from 9 to seven or five. My guess is we would probably go to seven, but but if we go from nine to seven and and then that means there's not an assumption that every all nine of us would want to run again or wanted to we're going to seek another term. But assuming that if that were true, that means that that puts us in an awkward position where there's no way that there will not be some zones with at least two people who are serving on this board right now. in time. And I I just think I I would I would propose that that we put those first two things on our agenda as soon as possible so we can at least get that settled and

162then we could go ahead and start seeking, you know, an outside group to help us to make the zones. Let me let me just say something to Mr. Adams point. When I talked to Shelby Johnson from Geographic Information Services, he said it could take a month or two depending on how many options we would like to see. So the point I want to make is the sooner we decide what the more time we have for whoever does the work to provide us more options for you to consider. That that's that's very much part of my thinking, Mr. Heler, is I I would like us this is already going to be rushed for us in the best case scenario and I would like to have as much time possible, you know, to try to work it

163out so that we could decide and still be responsible to our community so that we provide them an opportunity to consider what they want to do. And also to to Miss Callaway's point, going ahead and planning for this to me any commitment that we're accepting this and we're deciding not to not challenge anything consider are you familiar oh I'm sorry let me let this we had a question sorry we had a question on this side and then was there somebody else on this side was I will go ahead and yield and go behind. Thank you. Are you all familiar with the term red lining? Because I am and this is all this is. Okay. And in this day and time, and we have taken so many steps backwards in this country, Little Rock, Arkansas is

164a place and space for uh uh history, let's say, and what we go through with this right here without having some type of legal regress. If it's from somebody from out of state who was willing to to file a motion, we are going to okay and tell everybody, okay, we're getting ready to redline Rock School District. We're getting ready to do this, do this, do this. my opinion because I lived in a rich I'm not from here originally might as well be but uh where you couldn't live beyond a certain boundary of from 55th Street south if you look like me and maybe it's personal it is personal I mean really and this right here that's all this every single step. I would like I don't want to set up nothing anything at this current

165time without having uh somebody else oh look up a a demographic who's going to really redo our whole stations and whatever. And I probably wouldn't. I don't know what I might do, but I think it just gets me to just think that, okay, we got to like what they're doing in particular. So, what we're going to do is we're going to reszone everything because you've done it before. And I've been in this town for over 50 years. And in this town, I have seen it happen. And so, we're going back to that. We were had five people when I was here since I've been here since I went to go and then you had X number and now we have nine. Well, we've always been the biggest and the baddest. You know, they taking everything.

166But this is I felt when they took they took they took the state took us they took PL first that and they came after us and that was like a really big thing. Okay, I can't agree to anything that's on this paper without having uh somebody to look in to the legality of any of this. Well, and that's that is something I can do and I can do it right away. But well, all I'm saying is when I was asked to come about what the impact of this law is. This is what it is. If we follow this law, this is what we'd be required to do and this is how quickly we'd be required to do it. I'm not saying that I see any educational value reli to the community value in reducing the

167size of the board that old girl Thank you. Okay. So question on going back to what you said about zones one, two, and seven. They will run again, but that that those elections when it happened this November, it will go to March of 2026, right? So Okay. So you said right on that. Okay. So this is even this is something that's included in Secretary of State's that school board members whose terms are up for election in November will hold over until March of says that we'll hold over uses that term. Yeah. I will send this out to everyone. It went to county clerks and county election commissioners and that does. And so would that mean that the remainder of the uh members on the board, everyone would be on the ballot in March of 26

168or does that mean the remainder of the members would go to March 27 if school board elections for November have been done away with? I'm just trying to figure out entire board will be up for election. That's what I was thinking. with the Okay. So, and then I also heard you say uh we could go ahead and do the ground work, figure out then if we because I heard you say that you're going to go back and look into some questions that have been asked. Um we're 214 students away from the 20,000. Thank you, Anna, for that. But if we go ahead and decide whether it's five or seven and um go ahead and start doing some mockup zone four or six years and do and doing some mockup zones and then we find that

169there's another way around it or whatever and then like we are we are not married to that. Correct. Right. I think to me there are a couple things that could happen. We could have evidence sometime between now and August when the law takes effect or even later that we will have 20,000 lawy um and then my last question on this thing here is no I think it was answered and I'll pull back And if it's not, I'll get back in. Thank you. Um, no, she kind of said what I was going to say. I do want to get some No, that's fine. We need to be bringing up the same points occasionally. You know, I was just just wanted to make sure that before we start cuz I don't have a problem with planning just

170in case. Uh but I just wanted to get some clarity on if we do hit that threshold, reach the threshold of 20,000, this doesn't apply. And if it and if it happens in the future, do we have to reszone again and go back to nine? Because it it could it could happen. You know, I'll tell you I'll tell you what's going to happen in the future. I think the way I read this is that um after the census so we will have done it you know return from state control 2020 census mid decade and then again Gary which is why I was asking about the ctographers and all that I mean you know it's hard to run for this board and expect to be able to serve your full term the way things are. You're

171too strong. Well, I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm sorry. And I was just going to say uh Miss Callaway is gone, but she's but she's back. But she's back. She's she's back like she never left. Um I do think that legally there could be some challenges. I'm not a lawyer, but this just this is preeemption. And so I mean I do think that there's a way that maybe this could be challenged and maybe that's a good idea to explore that. So thank you strong. Um I just wanted to point out one take away from so I mean yes this is super challenging. I think the fact that we're going to do this and then four years later have to do it four or five years later whenever that happen you know do it again is really

172going to be a challenge for us. One of one of the positive takeaways I think for schoolboard election continuity that I think does come out of this is that you will only be elected in even years only. So we will not have turnover every year. And I think I mean except for the fact that of of having to do this now and then again in in four five years or whatever. Um but that I think is a really positive takeaway from this. So like as we kind of think about the implications of it is that we will continuity um of for four years or six year terms um however we end up doing that because they have moved the elections to March and they are with the preferential primaries and they're now on not on

173if I'm not misunderstanding they're on the same day as along with the preferential primary so it's not a standalone school board election which it has been for so very long um so that means we're going to have everybody voting in in those And but I will say also I think there was an attempt to make the school board elections partisan that did not move forward I believe. Yeah. So that is um judicial elections are nonpartisan too people comment not a question is political comment not a question. Think about what the rules judges, district attorneys, uh, two or three other kinds of judges, another attorney, and a school board. That made so much sense to me. Director Adams, if there is a runoff, I'm sorry, you have something else. The last thing was if there is

174a runoff, you have to wait from March until November, which is a very long time to not have that be settled, right? Thank you, Miss Wesley. along with my request to have this on the agenda as soon as next week. I for those first two pieces I have a question uh Mr. Heler. So the second point about the four and sixyear terms whether or not we find a way to u to avoid having to go from nine to seven or fiveyear terms because our enrollment goes up or or there's a legal challenge. Would it be correct to say that we still have to make that decision? Every district that's a requirement for every So we So regardless about whether we can challenge or not, that's not a really an issue for us to be able

175to challenge. Is that correct? Right. The law that allows terms of between three and five years. So that that decision is the decision that stick and then we could make the other one we could make it contingent upon whether or not we find another way to approach the situation. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. So this question uh kind of it it builds on to what Director Adams was saying. Um with the four to six year terms and the four or six years um terms would the board need to still have staggered um and and so that would look like pulling straws. So would we have to and so um that means if um someone runs and they pull a twoyear that means they'll have to run a twoyear and if someone pulls a threeyear that means

176three years from that date be a three year or a four year. So, what would it be? So, what would the pool look like? The the straw pool. Well, all it says in the statute is draw a lot. And I I was trying to think about when that would happen, you know, and you guys might have thoughts on this. I don't really know what makes sense. I thought maybe after the election, the new board seated lots and you know, you have to have an odd number of members and terms have to roughly the same number of members have to come up every six year terms. Prior to what were Okay. prior to what were your uh what were the terms? How did they look? Um I my term is through 2029. Okay. That's not what

177I mean. I mean was it four years or was it six years ago? 20 years ago. Oh, it was three. Okay. It was three and there were seven of us. And there was seven and everybody had a three-year term. Yes, ma'am. And did you all run at the same time? I don't even two two one year two two years. Yeah, it's goofy now. Think about it. It's two two and three. Yeah. Uh this u since we got the district back allegedly. Uh I'm with her. It's allegedly. I mean uh they laughed at my perfectly straight remark earlier, too. I don't care. But uh since we allegedly got the school district back uh we drew lots online. So we really don't know. That was during co though, wasn't it? Oh yeah. Because you know what? Nobody

178getting out. But yeah, it was but we didn't see the ball. You see what I'm saying? We just got we just got what we were told we got. And I was I wasn't trying to get out, so I was good with that. But I I just I just really wanted to know. And uh see this to me this is such an unnecessary problem. And again I'd like to ask you is there any other school district in this state in this state with this problem? I would bet not. there there are other categories that it could apply to. So that's the reason I'm not 100% sure because if somebody uh was you know changing from at large to zones or somebody was coming back to local control or there was a boundary change then this would

179apply to those districts but I don't know if there are any districts in those categories. Okay. And let I don't know what they doing but Springdale got 21,000 folks. How many How many people do they have? Right. Right. Right. Right. At 20 and we right at 19. So Northwest Arkansas, they're good. Well, you know, at some point, and I'm not sure, I can't remember exactly when or why, but at some point the state law thinks 24,000 students to go to members and then it was reduced to okay but don't you see I'm not sure who was accommodated by that or what the reasoning was behind that I mean I mean that's that's crystal right there because 21 20 we got 19 we can go home Thank you. Uh March the 3 is the election on

180your on your form. When is when does it say uh when are the board members seated? Is that sometime in March? Anytime or two days, 10 days? That's a good question and I haven't seen anything on that. I'll have to look. County clerk had a whole new way of certifying elections. Whenever they get first meeting that be awful. Okay. Can I just say this one thing? It's more of a a a comment for Little Rock and Beyond, but it's all political. It is so crazy. Oh my god. So, we need to hurry up so we don't get wet. Um, it is it amazes me how how how the legislators spend so much time on trying to regulate school boards who um the members are n paid member. We are nonpartisan. Uh we do not draw,

181you know, any type of um income off off of this. And yet they don't do any type of safeguards or rails around them being in office and what they can do and how they could walk in the legislature armed and how they can kind of have businesses and contracts with the government. And I'm not talking about national, talking about local legislators. And so like state legislators. Um and so right when we're thinking about, you know, project um 2025, you know, that isn't happening now. That started happening a few years ago locally like at the state level being pushed down and lobbyists coming in and changing these laws and and this is just another form of that. And so, um, I just wanted to say that because it just been it been a conversation among, um,

182other board members and myself where we're like, God, they they are spending so much time trying to regulate board members and school boards and there's a lot of activism at the state level, not so much at the local level where a lot of this impact happens. And so I just want people to be mindful of that and right when they're looking at laws and acts to come down to the school board and and advocate more directly at at at the at the point of impact which is us. You know I'm not 100% sure that they have the right to do as much as they do. We're allowed to establish curriculum, but strangely enough, we get told what the curriculum is going to be despite the constitution say the state constitution says we're responsible for curriculum.

183Nowhere, unless you can point it out to me, and it wasn't in the Lake View decisions. I know that somewhere a judge got the idea that the state was responsible for education and that changed the interpretation of everything when I think what he said was they were responsible for paying for it. Well, it's a two-step process, Mr. Rose. Really, the Constitution places the responsibility for public education with the legislature. The legislature has the authority to delegate that to schools, school districts. So, once they make that delegation, you know, what does that mean? How much can they then Yeah. I mean, you know, tell the school boards, tell the people that they've delegated the responsibility to exactly how But they don't they don't get to delegate the responsibility for curriculum. That's in that's straight out in

184the state constitution that we provide a correct and proper curriculum. And that the state says here's your curriculum. This is what you're going to do. In fact, why don't you teach Jesus loves Thomas Jefferson despite whatever you might think? And why don't you make sure that everybody understands that the founding fathers were all good Jesus lovers? That's the one that just drives me crazy. I'm sorry. Thank you so much. Now we're we're moving on. We appreciate your information, your insight. One, one more thing, Mr. Heler. Our our takeaways from this because we talked about a lot that was needed. Yeah, I agree. Um, our takeaways from this is that we are waiting on you to come back um to the board. To me, there's three things. I would I agree with Mr. Adams that you

185need to schedule a time to discuss how many zones we want to have in the district if we have to make a change and how many how long the terms will be for board members and to talk about how we would go ahead and get those done. So, I have a question. Go ahead. If there's anything that can be done either because of the prospect of having membership 20,000 students legally because there's basis for challenging. Okay. So it's just the zone choice and the length of time. So seven or not I mean five or seven and then four or six. Yeah, that's first step and it's easy. I don't know if it's easy but it can be done and it doesn't you Anything else? Is that something that we should uh have a committee kind

186of work on um before our board meeting so that we have something to Yeah, that's you know it it struck me that you know that's something you all probably have opinions about. It's a simple question. I don't need anybody to make a recommendation when you get to hiring somebody and planning the zones, you know, maybe that's something that just the first two make a recommendation. You think we can Okay. Is there any are there advantages, disadvantages, anything like that that we should be thinking about to be informed about? I don't know. I mean, when I when I think about six year terms, my first thought is that people who run would probably want to stay in office as long possible. My second thought is maybe the idea of six years would would scare some people

187away. So, you all have made the decision to run, so you probably know the thought process better than I would. Okay. Right. Thank you so much. Okay. So, c can I add one thing to just our next meeting agenda? So, I think I would love if the district or whoever would do this would go ahead and maybe draft up an RFP for the zones and we can fill in some information if we could go ahead and get that RFP drawn up so that we can move as quickly as possible. Um, you know, if you already have that ready sample contract, it was online somewhere. I haven't really looked at it that closely, but it sets out the specifications for demographer to create zones and it sets out a lot of the rules you need to

188go by to do that correctly. Thank you so much for that, Attorney. So, did we do an RFP last time when we did when we used um GIS? It just seemed like it just I'm not sure about that. I think what happened was they agreed to do it for free. Yes. Yeah. I didn't think we paid for it. Yeah. especially if GIS or metro we had we had the computers necessary over in the student assignment place to do school attendance zones in board election I remember working on this I don't know what became that but we did have the capability okay sounds Okay. I'm sorry. Okay. Sounds great. So, in keeping with this whole committee piece, as we look at the next one though, 5.2 discussion, teacher and or student exeicio advisory rep, is that

189one that we think that perhaps Thank you so much, Chris. I appreciate you. We appreciate you. Absolutely. Thank you so much for your time. Is that a committee piece that you we think that um Okay. Well, let's talk about it. That's the first question. I think so much is going on. I agree. I think waiting is fine. Students to learn the process to learn what's going on. Yeah, I'm gonna go there. Well, I mean, it's something it's something that they may learn and I mean in the future they may be sitting in these spots. That's against Okay. All right. So, if if we kind of go ahead. Yes. No, you're fine. So, the question is whether or not we want to pull this and wait until 26 2026 to do this, right? So, it is

190part of the process. I mean, I think it's probably be a good civic um lesson. Um but it's really whatever the the will of the the board is on what they want to do. But I do think that this would be good good for them as long as we have an outline on what they're going to do. Um I I feel like we can do either or I'm not going to vote on it right now, but I was just going to ask were you going to show us I'm talking to Miss Vestal. I'm sorry. Were you going to show us cuz that popped up. Were you gonna show us something that we might need to consider just in case we want to do? No, I think that was an example that that I that have

191been shared with everyone and then I had sent you some supplemental information just because I taught in Fairfax County for 10 years and I had students that I worked with that were on the that were that served in that position. So, I have some context for it. So, okay. I was just making sure that you weren't going to show something that that we needed to see. But, I'm fine with putting it off if that's what the majority wants to do. But I'm fine with moving forward with ch it feels like a lot. But I also love student and family engagement in our schools and our work. So I mean if we're going to do it, I'd love to be involved. But there's a lot going on. recommen it it I'm wondering if if we are

192not urgent where like we have to have this done in a month or two. I wonder if it would would be good to go to give some parameters and ask for um some help and a proposal from our like our student advisory council to say we would like to have a student who would serve for a whole year or if we say at least half a year, you know, one of the two. I would be opposed to doing less than that because I think that it doesn't empower somebody to get used to it and and be able to be a real voice. But but if if we said a year or a half a year and we want it to be chosen by all the you know high school students and bring us bring us

193a proposal for for how it could work and and let them you know own you know start the process and and owning you know how how this is done. and we give them some guard rails and and then they can come up with an idea because it's it's going to be they're going to be the ones that who's going to be uh we want to get their sensibility even in the beginning maybe to start it and if and if we were going to do that we might be able to give similar guard rails you know for the teacher representative we could say we want it to be for a whole year or half a year and we want it to be something that all the teachers vote on and um you know so people could

194put their name and name out there and and do that and ask the perhaps ask a PPC to bring back a proposal for how that could be done to see and but but I but you know but I don't I don't want it I don't think I I would ag I don't I don't think I want the PPC or the student advisory council to choose the people. I think it needs to be sort of like we are. We're elected. We're elected by the PE, you know, for by a broader group. And uh but if we're going to take some more time with it, why don't we use some of our groups or put together a task force or something like, you know, put together a group to be able to think it through and and

195bring us back something. Sure. Yeah. And but if if if we're not feeling like it has to be done and if they worked on it in the fall and then then maybe and brought it back to us sometime in the fall, we might be able to put it in place for the start of calendar year 2026. Or even if we did it the way that we did it before where we have we had a group of students and they chose among themselves who who all would represent the group at each meeting to where um they are not tied to it. I think that there's value in having um different people uh coming to the board meetings where one mindset isn't um seen as representative of an entire body but yet they we're able to see

196different variations which is which is exactly the way we had it when we had a student advisory council not last year but the year before last year. So um that worked and maybe even a board member could um even be a part of that working with uh you because we have a board member who does this pretty often and my daughter's calling so she must be off work. Yeah, I I would just I would just you know I I appreciate having the the diversity for me. I think the I would lean on the continuity piece because, you know, even as adults, you know, we we come here and it takes us a while to get our feet under us and understand what's going on and be able to feel comfortable and know that ask the

197questions and all. And I think that that's if we really want to get quality input from people to understand what's going on. I think we we need to give them opportunity to get some continuity in their experience. like it's something we should attack right now or Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Director Johnson. I strongly feel that we should wait because I think we're making It's a little too complicated. I think that any kid or teacher that came, whatever they talked about as quality material, but yet we want to put all these extras on them. And sometimes that can discourage people. I have nothing wrong with people who want to volunteer, put their name in the hat and pull it if they stay here six months or a year. But once you start making it complicated,

198people lose their interest. And so I think we should wait and just really try to figure out how we want to do it. All right. Okay. We've done well tonight. Were you? Okay. Okay. So, why you why are you looking at me like that? Some of you guys say I rush you. I don't mean to rush you. I don't mean to do that. I just want to be precise and concise. Right. So, um, we want to just make sure we pause for comments if we have some comments. Anybody? Superintendent, any comments? All right. All right. So, thank you guys so much for everything that we've done tonight and we will depart and see you on next week. Next week. Let's see. You should my name on my car.