001Got a little sunburn on your nose. All over. I made Grace bring three Kansas sunscreen. Good evening everyone and welcome to the June 4, 2025 Lichfield School Board meeting. Uh the time is now 5:30. Call the meeting to order and we'll begin with the pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Uh we are down a board member tonight. Mr. Plansky is on business and will not be joining us this evening. So we have a four member board tonight. Uh any changes to tonight's agenda? Nope. All right. Uh moving into our consent agenda. Any board members like to move anything off of consent into our standing agenda this evening? No,
002thanks. Okay, we'll move forward into summary of non-public actions from May 21st, 2025. Miss Ames motion to approve the May 7th, 2025 non-public meeting minutes. Mr. Dit seconded that motion. That motion passed 302. Miss Ames motion to approve the leave of absence as presented for Renee Fushi Fouchi, special education teacher at LMS. Mr. Shoemaker seconded that motion. That motion passed 50-0. Miss Ames motioned to approve the nomination as presented for Jennifer Mitchensson, principal at uh Campbell High School. Mr. Shoemaker seconded that motion and that motion passed 50-0. Miss Ames motion to approve the resignations as presented. Mitchell Roy, CHS case manager, Patrick Keefe, CHS English teacher, and Dana Gian Paulo, CHS assistant principal. Mr. Shoemaker seconded that motion and that motion passed 5-0. Miss Ames moved to adjourn the non-public session at 7:43. Mr. Pinsky
003seconded that motion and that passed 50-0. And with that, we'll move into the presentations and recognitions tonight. And I'll turn it over to the superintendent. Thank you. Um so I want to welcome up to the small table here uh Miss Jennifer Mitchensson who uh we recently hired as the next principal at Campbell High School. Um, Jen's just going to give a little overview of herself and, uh, welcoming her to the Lichfield School District. So, hi. Thank you for having me. Um, well, I already shared that sometimes I like to eat ice cream for dinner, so that's a fun fact. So, um, if you're ever wondering if I want something, it's probably ice cream. Uh, I am really happy to be here. I'm really excited to start, uh, in a couple weeks uh, and join the,
004uh, Campbell community and the Lichfield community. I grew up in New Hampshire, so um I'm very familiar with like the small town New Hampshire. I love it. Um I grew up in Plastau, so um I'm really happy to be back in a nice small community and that's always been um my preference and I just I get it. I love it. Um I'm hoping to move up closer to this area. I don't live too far now. Um, but I am excited to, you know, get to know everyone in the community and, um, from the businesses to the best ice cream spots to, uh, um, you know, what what the kids like to do around here other than, you know, typical high school kids that we we were talking about. Um, I have a really strong curriculum
005background. Um, strong with grading and reporting. um really kind of pushing rigor in the classroom and um helping support instruction, specifically literacy instruction. Um but math, I think, you know, I understand a structure that you need to help um work in the math world as well. So um and you know, while I was at Samborn, I really helped to boost um their SAT scores up in the past few years really by focusing on literacy when I started. I think that first year um students that cohort was at like 45% at benchmark. Um and this year we got our test scores and they were at 65. So I was really happy to see um all the kids growth and looking at their PSAT scores and just seeing the growth of each cohort. Um but then making
006some changes in the classrooms to then really push the kids um and getting them to feel confident. um you know looking at if there were places we knew kids were really struggling and floundering um they certainly weren't going to be doing well on any kind of assessment um whether it be the state test or just in the classroom. Uh so do we need to adjust our course offerings to help um support our kids just as much as what are we doing instructionally? So um it's really been the focus of my work the past two years. That was a lot of it. um vocabulary initiative again to really support the literacy stuff. Um so that's about it. I taught uh English for nine years. I taught remedial reading for a year. I was a paraprofessional. I
007was a curriculum coordinator for five, assistant principal, principal for three. So have a I'm like, wow, where' the time go? But uh so this will be my 10th year in administration. Um I've kind of seen it all. So, I'm just excited to get to know get to know the people of Lichfield. So, thank you very much. Welcome to the district. Thank you. Yeah, we're excited to have you. All right. Awesome. I don't know if the board has any questions for Jim. We don't have to drill her, but if you do have a She is I just had ice cream. I'm just going to tell you, I think you just jinxed yourself with I've seen it all. Always arise. Challenge accepted. Okay. Okay. All right. I'll let you know and if something new comes up I'll
008make sure to let you know that okay haven't seen this and hopefully two principles behind you that are smiling. [Laughter] We are behind her. We're here to support you. I think the only other thing I would say is like we we have a pretty new administration across the board. We're excited uh uh you know they're all pretty cohesive so we're excited to have you on the team and kind of assimilate in with them and go running. Yeah, I'm excited. I'm really happy to join the team. Everybody, I've met the crew and it's a good good group. Yeah, lucky. Yeah, we're excited to have J. Obviously, we're we're sad to see Jake go. Um Jake's done some great work at the high school, but we're excited to to welcome Jenna aboard. I've known Jen in a
009couple different capacities over the years. It's a small state in education. You get to know people. Um we were obviously high school principles at the same time as she's been in that role for the past few years. Uh she's wonderful, really bright. I think she's going to do amazing things at Campbell and I'm so excited to to see the work that she does. So, yeah. Likewise. Welcome again. Thanks for coming tonight. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me. Yeah. Thank you. And with that, we'll turn it over to uh the nominated Dr. Per. Just so you know, Ryan just gave it to me. That was so nice of him. It's by Rain Alison, right? Exactly. Oh my good. Can you pull that up? Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Give me a sec. All right. Hi
010everyone. How are you? Um so I just wanted to share um every year the state receives or the state gives out um LEA determinations to every district um within the state. Um so we received ours at the end of April. Um, and I wanted some time to kind of digest it and kind of go through it before I presented it um, to all of you. Just going to try to make it bigger. Okay. Yeah, you're going to need to help us understand. That's to and that's totally fine. Um, I figured I would. I'm going to pull it up on my end. So, this is essentially um I don't like that one. It's not colored. Sorry. It's okay. I just like I like stick to this. I like the pretty colors on mine. Um, you can
011zoom in. How do I zoom in here? Click from the little map. Yeah, got it. Thank you. There we go. All right. Is that better? Um, so this is essentially um a report card for the district. Um, looking at a lot of different areas in the world of special ed. Um, kind of rating us. Um, so when you look at at the scores, the lower is better. So it's kind of counterintuitive to what you would think. Um, so the higher the number, that's actually not a good thing to have. So zero, we want to see zeros, you want to see ones. Um, to kind of summarize because it is, as you said, it's a lot of information. And um there's different indicators that um the state looks at. So like indicator one is your graduation
012rate, indicator two is your dropout rate. Um I'm not going to go through obviously each one of them um but it looks it pulls that data um and kind of gives us a rating um based on that. There were some areas that Can I just pause you for one second just for clarity? This is the special education population. Yes. Sorry, I didn't clarify that. It's just looking at students that have IEPs. So when I see twos on the right hand side, that's not good. Yes. The lower the number the better. It's like golf. Okay. Um I've never played golf, but that's what I've heard. Um there were some things that um you'll see some NAS. Um those were taken away statewide. Um so for the like letter F under area, um parent survey indicator eight
013response rate. Um there was a low response rate across the entire state of New Hampshire. Um so nobody they gave us our number but didn't count it as a score. Um going forward they want to include it, but I think it it takes time. Um, I did hear from the state this year, um, for any parents out there that fill out the survey, thank you, that our response rate is already way above what we had last year. So, that's that's a good sign. Um, the same thing with post school outcomes. Um, a survey is sent out to students that have graduated the year after they graduated from Campbell that had IEPs to kind of see like what they're doing, um, whether it's college, career, etc. That also had a pretty low response rate. Um, so
014they didn't count it. Um but that again was not just for the town of Lichro that was also across the state because it was just a low response rate in general. Um so you'll see that there's four one four different sections and then each section has kind of a result right so areas um that are results based the section results says meet requirements so we have met what we're supposed to meet in those areas. Um I'll get back to assessment um compliance um again is just our indicators. to making sure that we are um our discipline rates are not higher for students with um with IEPs. Um that our discipline is even across um different races, ethnicities. Um the disproportionate rate and making sure that um again making sure that students um with IEPs are
015not disproportionate in as far as identification rates. um making sure our child find um is done correctly, make sure making sure that our preschool outcomes are good and then our transition into high school. Um that we actually did really well and that also meets requirements. Um section four is just other things. So a lot of it has to do with our grants and making sure that we are using our grant properly, that we've submitted on time, we've used what we said we were going to use and that we put out monthly and that was an area that was um good as well. Um so three of the areas we fell in the meets requirements section which meant that we're doing everything that we're supposed to be doing and that's a wonderful thing. The area that
016um we fell into the needs intervention category um is assessment. Um as you can see it looks at a bunch of different things um looking at grades 4, 8, and 11. Um participation rate being one. Um proficiency um making sure that the students with IEPs don't fall below the state. Um and then the all proficiency is for those students that are um significantly cognitively impaired and take um the DLM instead of the New Hampshire state assessment. So it's their alternate assessment. Um and then the gap proficiency looks at the gap between students with IEPs versus regular ed students um and how big the gap is between their scores on the SAS versus regular ed. Um that's the area that we kind of um fell short on. Um, so then if you scroll Oh, oops. I
017just got rid of it on my computer. Okay. So then if you go down, oh, you don't have to go all the way down, but sorry. Nope. What page you want me to go? Uh, two. That's it. Yeah. So overall, um, we fall in the needs assistance category. So it's like a four it's a four level, um, overall assessment. So you either meet requirements, you need assistance, you need intervention, or you need substantial intervention. So we're in that second category right there of needs assistance because of that one area that fell under needs intervention. Um when we got this letter, the state kind of advised us of what because we fell in this category, what are our next steps and what we were supposed to do. The first was to attend an LEA determination training,
018which I already went to. Um that just kind of explains this in further detail. um and explains how the state kind of comes up with these numbers and where it's pulled from. The next thing that they will do is in September I'm should be receiving a survey from them to ask what kind of what our next steps are and how we're going to address um this particular area that we need um need the help with. Um, I do know that, um, at the elementary school that, uh, with the restructuring of the of the schedule that that that they're going to be doing that there's going to be some more time for special ed teachers to be able to work with students, um, and kind of align things a little bit better than um, than it
019has been in the past. Um, and really, I know with with Dr. Taylor's help in in kind of helping the teachers with alignment and with um kind of creating more of an assessment culture within the district. Um maybe placing a little bit more of importance on these tests. Um obviously not to the point where it's stressing people out, but just you know this is these the SAS is important. It's what we're we're looking at. It's what we're graded on. Um so kind of hoping to increase the participation rates um because that's really the biggest thing if you're kind of looking through like the participation rate is really kind of not the best. Um, so are can I ask just a question? Yeah, go right ahead. Are all four areas equally weighted? Um, yes. Even though
020there's more parts in each one, but yes, like all four are equally weighted. Okay, I guess is what I'm trying to say. So that being said, I mean, assessment testing based, right? Yep. compliance looks like it's discipline or how do I interpret compliance? Um, so it's compliance. It's more of um it's less outcome based and it's more of how we report things. So like for example, if there's a student with an IEP and they receive some sort of um suspension, whether it's in school, out of school, um we have to report that. Um, and so it's just making sure and then they take that and they look at that towards the regular discipline rates for schools or for the district and making sure that we're not unfairly um disciplining students more with IEPs that don't
021exactly. So say we we I'm going to use madeup numbers, but just for simplicity sake, say we our suspension rate for nonidentified students was at um 10%. Right? Like 10% of the students that didn't have IEPs got suspended over the course of a year. Our number for identified students should be approximately the same. You're given a little bit of wiggle room depending on your total numbers, but say that number was 11% for our identified kids, we would be in compliance because the two numbers are relatively the same. If we had a 10% suspension rate for kids who who were not identified and then a 50% suspension rate for kids who who are identified, that's way out of whack. So why is that? We would need to drill down on what the reason is for that.
022uh is there some sort of systematic problem? Right? Are we not meeting the needs of an IEP? In a bigger school district where you may have um more identified kids and especially especially more kids who have an emotionalbased disability, they could be getting suspended at a higher rate and there might be a valid answer for that. That's what this work is is to drill down to explain like why that is. Right. One of the things and I know Sarah's going to talk a little bit more about this that's a little tricky for us is we're a small district. So it can really if you think of the junior class in the high school right we have roughly 90 kids give or take a couple kids right um our our um I identified rate is 20
02320 of them 20% there's 20 of them um that swings if five of them opt out of the SAT now we have a negative number in terms of participation compared to the identified kids right and that's any like any of the identifi and they don't have to take the SAT they can opt out via a parental opt out and stuff like that. So, but if that number, there's two things. One, if that number is just a flatout percentage of how many are opting out, we have to meet a certain threshold and then a comparison to our regular rate kids, that kind of threshold as well. Um, that whether they're similar, those are some of the things you can kind of get dinged on and stuff like that. Um and one of the things specifically is
024our participation of identified students in in our state testing that was lower than um than what the state wants in those type of numbers. So that's something we they opted out. They opted out. Yeah. They didn't take the test. Sometimes they just didn't the most common reason they didn't take it as an opt out, right, from a parental opt out. But it could be a kid was just continuously absent, for example, which may have nothing to do with their their identification. May not. It may may not. Um but we never had the opportunity to sit that that that kid down for testing because the window ended, right? Like um you all have kids in school, you know, there's a testing window, but that window then does close and if we haven't we haven't given that
025kid a test for one reason or another, then they count as a non-est taker in that situation. Can I can I ask a question on the assessment piece? What data what is the time period of the data that they are using? So, is this based off of 2024 test results, meaning the SAS testing that was done last year? Yes. Not this year. Correct. Okay. And Okay. Am I interpreting the results correctly? So, I'm going to pick on compliance again because if I look at compliance, I see a score of 28.5 and I see that as borderline to needs assistance. And if I think about this correctly, if that flips to needs assistance and we're right on the edge, then that flips our overall score from needs assistance to needs intervention. So really, we're we're like
026a point away in compliance from our overall score of needs intervention. Correct. So we're we're really close. Yeah. And again, I mean, looking at the same section, Andrew, the indicator 12, early childhood transition, that's an they got like an 80% score. I can tell you exactly what it is. It's one case. So again, kind of speaking to what Brian's saying because we have such small numbers. One case can put us in this position. So we're not talking, you know, we're not talking hundreds of cases or things like that. But it's that that literally is one case. So you then have to give explanations on some of these things, right? That's what you're explaining about um one of these things in compliance. So if if your explanation is satisfactory is that the state basically says, "Okay,
027we understand." and then we're going to ask you again next year. Yeah. So that looking at that same one, so letter E under compliance um with that one particular case, I investigated it. I figured out what happened. I explained it to the state and they said, "Okay, I mean they don't change your score obviously, but they have like okay, we get it. Like that person doesn't work here anymore. There was an error in this. There was the few things involved with that particular case. Um but I just have to write a letter to explain what happened and then steps I'm taking going forward to ensure that it doesn't happen again." Gotcha. So I think like a I just know this one off the top of my head. So even though it's in a different category,
028the parental survey rate, right? It's in the first category here. It's the it's letter F here. This is the rate from last spring when we did the special ed survey. So that was percentage of response from our um families that have identified students. It's obviously very low there41%. Uh but it's low across the state. That's not a unique Lichfield thing. But next year, we know this because we can see who's respond. Well, Sarah, I can't. I I can't. But that number is going to be significantly higher because we did some different things to try and get some different responses. Sarah had some suggestions. She sent out direct emails. I put it in my newsletter and different things like that. And we shut now, we weren't struggling necessarily in this, but it's an example of taking
029the information and then applying it to the next year. So our hope is a year from now when we're here a number of these things have been addressed and they're they're not an issue because Sarah's done work connected to it. But we want to inform you of it because it is an important component of her work and we are close on some of these things. So when we are doing standardized testing that families understand like because we again I'm put my high school hat on for a second. We sometimes see students and and therefore their families who ultimately are the ones who opt them out of oh my students not going to college. They don't need the SAT, right? So, I'm going to opt my kid out so they don't have to sit and take
030the exam. And that is a great pathway for kids who don't pursue college. I pro that. But we still need you to take the SAT because of these type of reasons, right? Like we there's an expectation that kids are taking these standardized testing and participating in them because we can get dinged for things if kids are not opting out of it. And it's kind of a tricky situation like get caught a little bit like you don't want to force kids to sit and just do poorly. But like we also need to hit certain benchmarks of participation in these type of type of things. It also goes to like what I talked about when I was presenting the data and we were talking about the PSAT and the SAT and again going back to changing that
031assessment culture and the meaning and purpose behind the test. Is the meaning and purpose behind the test just sitting to take the test to go to college or is it to see how did I do as a learner through my high school career? Like if I can track myself from my PSAT scores to my SAT scores and compare like my growth, then I'm meeting I have more purpose for taking that assessment as opposed to just taking it because I want to go to college or not taking it because I don't. Yeah, we just need to fix that mindset. So, how I guess my question is, you know, because we're talking about like if if you're you know for a fact that your child doesn't want to go to college like we're now I mean we're
032you let's say you're at the end of your high school career. How are you going to convince a parent that they should even care at that point? Like it's a great question. It is like we we don't have a magic answer, right? It's again just trying to change the mindset around assessments. If you can change it from the beginning, then it might be that the student wants to take it because they want to see how they did. You know what I mean? Like it just there's a lot of we need to change the mindset. Yeah. So, if you don't mind me jumping, I scroll down to page nine here because it drills more detail into the particular sections of it that might uh help with um just as we we go through this and stuff
033and just look at um these three right here on page nine which gives you a good summary. So there's a state target which people are trying to hit. Um the state data of where the collective schools are uh and school districts are in the state and we'll just take this first one with reading participation in grade four because this is just straight participation. The state has a target at 95% and this would be identified students taking this in grade four. Show the data that the VA that we're not meeting that as a state right of grade four kids they're at about 89% there. We did a nice job of that last year where it looks like all I'm assuming all because it's at 100. All of our grade four students who were identified took the
034assessment. So, we got a zero for that which is good. If you look at the second one down um reading participation for grade 8, they again have that 95 um% threshold that they are shooting for districts to have. The state data there was at about 83%. We at a district were higher than the state added by 11% right. We were at 94.12 and then but we fell short of that state target. So we got a point for that, right? So that's how that kind of math kind of goes there. And yeah, that's lit. That's one student, right? That's the difference there. Like it's one student opted in opted out take it or didn't take it for some reason and grad like SATs make sense to me, but like you could opt out of the fourth
035grade. You can opt out of SAS. Yes. Yep. They just recently changed the letter which I shared with all the principles so that it doesn't it's not a glaring like opt out. It's very like small and not so prominent and we do not have to advertise it. Um Oh yeah, I saw that. Yeah, you did. Right. I opted out actually. I was the one that You're the one. Yeah, you're the one right there. It's you. Screws this up now. I did not. Just And then the third one on this page is an area where I would say we need to put the most focus, right? Like so the state target is 95. This is the SAT grade 11. And we can see as a state we're nowhere near that right across the board. Like I
036I can tell you my previous district, same thing. We got dinged on this this particular thing. My district before that got dinged on this type of like it's everyone gets dinged on. I would be shocked any district that hits that threshold. Uh and we were at 56. So I would like us to at a minimum above the state average, you know, that would be helpful in that. Uh but that is a more significant number. That's not a difference of one kid, you know, that that is um more than one kid. But again, we're talking like we have a total sub population of maybe 20 kids that is making that percentage up of of there and stuff. So I should trick I should know this because we've talked about this before. Do you have to pay
037for the SAT? Not the one that's part of the state assessment. So you get you essentially get one try for free when you do it as part of the state assessment and then you're welcome to take it as many times as as you want after that. So that has a cost associated to it. It just seems those don't count for us for any state testing reporting. state target seems a little bit unrealistic in some of these categories. Well, it it just it to me it seems like this is like Sorry, but I'm just look I mean I don't know much about this but I'm looking at it saying okay I mean if that whole state is 65% they want 95% like maybe you should adjust your your standard on that one and because that doesn't
038seem like that's an achievable number for anyone in the district at least. I have a hard time wrapping my head around the SAT one. I I mean the younger kids obviously we need to like they're still early on in their education. So, we need to I I think it's easy there's it should be easier to impress upon parents like, hey, we get it that this is not easy for your kid to do, but it's really important and we want to set them up for success. But by the time they're in 12th grade, the parents are like, you either s you succeeded or you didn't, right? You all of you, not not the kid, right? Like the kid, these are actually because we can remember back before the SAT was the standardized test in high school.
039what used to be kneecap kneecap and other things way back in the day. These are better participation rates like the SAT has helped with that and getting people to participate at the high school level in their state assessment. So while like you know we had a 56 percentile in this particular subgroup here. I would go out on a limb and say that's much better than it was pre have we seen uh have we seen data that we could compare how many of these kids actually went on to college like percent percentage-wise? I think we would have to construct it. Is it possible to do yet? But I don't think it's just something we can pull. I mean, I think it's it would be interesting to know because we obviously know that the SAT the the
040primary reason that people take the SAT is because it's required by most colleges or what is it some laxed on it a little bit and now they're like, "Oh, maybe we shouldn't have done that." I think it'd be important for for that particular metric though. I think it would probably be important to understand like for our own purposes how many of these people are taking like are we are we pandering to uh you know a large portion of people who are not going to college or are there a large number of people who are not going to college still taking the SAT like I think it might be helpful. Yeah that's a good question. I know you love going finding data. I really do you know that already Matt come on. So we can drill
041down specifically in the green section or this section too and you can see the certain subcategories and the area and we do need to improve on this. I don't want to pretend otherwise Sarah's been working on this all year, but it is important for you to understand the context of these because you can see like, hey, you're in that need uh whatever the need invention need intervention stage category and you're like, oh goodness. But like, yep, that's true. But this is what where it's coming from. You know, I think the other not to like bill this for too long, but the other thing that I think would be somewhat interesting is too late. And I dance it. What' you say? Too late. Too late. It's been This is what we're here for, right? Been belored.
042We haven't just wait. I I'll go I'll go easy on the uh G GMS stuff. Um can't distract me. I have AD. Uh, I think it would be interesting to also be able to help figure out how do we tie into like the parents understanding like we need to and we're we're kind of working on this with assessment stuff right now. Like we we're trying to figure out, okay, well, what's the best way of showing like h why this is valuable or how it's valuable. But it's almost like a marketing campaign. Like you have to you have to find a way to to make it make sense to them cuz like I'm sitting here I'm like that thing doesn't make sense. And it's little things too. I mean Jen's doing I don't know if you
043have email scores but Jen uh and Dan's done other things too but this is the one in my mind like the water balloon thing for participation. 652 water balloon tomorrow. Yeah. Exactly. So you know the kids particip I think it was just participation. No growth. Oh growth. If they show growth in one of the um the testing areas, then they got a water balloon to throw at, you know, Miss Grantham and Mr. Peterson. Um and that's a really large number of growth there. 652 water balloons coming your way. So those math, language, arts, and science. So if they went up in all three, they get three to help help us with. Yeah. So those type of incentives for kids. I don't know what the maybe water balloons would work at the high school, too. Sorry.
044But like those type of just little things to help, right? That I think that was a huge positive thing at the middle school to help the kids just I sure hope so. So I those of you that have kids who are in the middle school, they're talking about their scores. They're they're car I went up 12 points from last year to this year. I went up like they know if you ask them how'd you do on your stats, they're going to tell me I got three balloons, you're in trouble or I'm working on it next year. I'll get better next year. So it's good. Yeah, we're excited about it. It's shifting the script. Yep. So, I totally derailed your presentation. That's totally fine. I'm sorry. I don't know what else you want to touch with.
045Yeah, I didn't know what else. I mean, I I have to do also a followup. I think it's by the next time like before this comes out again next April. Um, just to talk about what we've done during the year and how we felt that it went and um so it's it's an area I mean it's it's a it's not perfect, but it's it's not terrible. Um, and there's definitely areas that we can improve upon and we'll definitely um target that next year. So, if I'm thinking about this right, the next year's report for for area H where it says administration turnover, we should see a one there, right? Because of the turnover in the administration. I don't even know how. Hold on. Let me look at this one. I thought you were going to
046say one because you're getting rid of me. Hold on. Nice way to tell me. Thank you so much. Last year or this year, right? That's a change in administration on their right. That would be how Andrew would we should get a zero in. Thank you. Now they may not count that as one of our categories because they may not have enough data at the state. I'm sure the data if you look at that particular one you see NA now because I am speculating there's been so much turnover special administration. There still is. It's not fair to to hurt schools about that. But if this comes back next year, if they feel it's a it's a um an indicator, we would get a zero on that because well, we think Well, yeah. I thought so until
047this isn't reflecting this administration at all. This is like correct, right? That's what Yeah. Yeah. So, so I just want to say I this is my fourth year on the board. I don't know that I've ever seen this before. Do you remember ever seeing this? So, I actually find this to be really helpful information and I appreciate you sharing it with us, even if it isn't all 100% great news. I mean, I think that's part of how we learn and how we grow and Yeah. Um, so I, you know, I this is really helpful for me. So, I appreciate it. So, thank you. Yeah, it's it's a good snapshot of kind of where we're at and things that we can celebrate and things that we can improve upon going into next year. So, sounds good.
048Appreciate it. Thank you for the No problem. Thank you. All right. Next up is uh director of the year Crowley. I got my $50 check for winning Northeast Regional. I didn't know that was part of it. So, I'm doing it for the money now. Just so you know. Um So, you're going to just compete in every region now? Yeah, I'm just going to travel around. Um, so I'm here to present a couple things to you all and have a couple discussions. Um, as we all are so surprised. Um, we will not be we will be ending with a negative balance this year. By my calculations, I'm I'm thinking we're ballparked right around where we were last year, which was about 85,000 um, in the negative. I'm not thrilled about it. I I take it very
049personally. I know it's nothing we've done, but still. Um, so I have a few ideas and creative solutions to present to you to close that gap a little bit and do everything in our efforts. I've met with Brian and Julie about it. So, um, there's a few points. So, first is meal prices. The next is um discussing uh the mail charging policy and implementation discussing implementation of a credit card machine at the high school. So, um, my proposal for the meal charging, Paul, no, the bail prices, I'm tired. I've been at work since 6. It's fine. Over the next two years, I'm proposing that we increase the lunch prices at Griffin and Middle School by 25 cents each until each school reaches $4.25 for lunch. The reason I'm proposing this is because with the National
050School Lunch Program guidelines and portion sizes, graduated pricing does not line up. Um, barring a couple of items like fruits and vegetables and pasta, it is the same meal across the board. Portion sizes in everything. Um, so for example, the chicken waffles basket, 4 ounces of chicken, 4 ounces of fries, one grain with a waffle, which counts as 2 ounces of grain. Same at every school. So high school kids are getting the same portion sizes as elementary. Correct. So therefore, you I know I don't agree with it either. I just do what they tell me to do. So, um, in my opinion, there's there why are we, you know, 375 versus 425? It doesn't make any sense to me. Well, that was the way because we it was explained that the portion sizes were not
051the same, right? In certain aspects. I I don't want to throw anyone under the bus. I tried arguing this point with other people in the past and it didn't it was dismissed a lot. So, I'm here to explain. We do have different items that we use up at the high school, but really at the at the core of the meal, it is the same meal barring fruits and vegetables and pasta. The high school can take up to a cup of fruit and vegetable and the pasta graduates. So, it goes 4 ounces, 6 ounces, 8 ounces from elementary to high school. Um, I just did some quick math out based on our paid lunches this year at Griffin and at middle school. um from this is from all the way through May 31st and basically did
052the math out with these lunches to come up with our prices at what we currently charge if we had charged $4 for the meal at Griffin and 425 and same with the what we charge at middle school now and what it would be for$ 425 and the combined differences for each category. So, the difference for middle school was just one, you know, one price thing. Uh, was about 5,100 bucks. If we had done the 25cent increase going into this year using these numbers, we're looking at $5,600 or 11,000 if we had done across the board. And there's the combined increase totals uh at the bottom right. So, if we had done these, you know, hypothetical, if these were to be in place, this is the extra money we could have had coming in this year.
053Um, I did get asked on the next slide, I did do our peer cohort as I have presented it many, many times over the years. Um, and I did add in district enrollment because I feel like that's very important to um to what we do. In my honest opinion, I don't feel our peer cohort that has been provided to us this whole time for food services is necessarily a great comparison because you have Bedford that has 4,000 students versus us who has,00. So conveniently actually last week the guy who runs the buying group sent out a survey to all New Hampshire districts and said what are you charging for lunches? I took that information and came up with my little I call it the little guy cohort and these are districts with enrollment very similar
054to us. Um, barring Eping, but the reason I put Eping in there is cuz them and Bow, they are the only ones that do the same price across the board, even though Eping only has like 870 kids. But Guilford, Lichfield, Milford, Pelum, Portsouth, Portsouth is on there. Even though they're high, they charge 425. So, we're not just the only ones in the state that charge 425 for a meal, which is um that I was very surprised to hear. Raymond and Winnisquam. And I did reach out to all of the directors. Uh Milford, Pelum, Raymond, all got back to me. They do not end positively. They end with a negative fund balance. Hudson also ends with a negative fund balance. Um B does end with a positive. And I didn't hear back from Guilford, Portsmith, or
055Winnwam. So just based on I feel like that's more this is more of a cohesive more pertinent information for what we charge versus what other districts of our size charge. They may not be like surrounding towns but in terms of um enrollment. How is B ending up? So yeah, let's take both for a moment. Let's take both. Yep. So Bo does Bo does a t they actually have very little um reimbursement money. All of their money especially at the high school and I I've have actually got to visit Bo with uh my up and cominging high school lead. We went and saw a lunch service. They came to us. We we've been working with them a little bit. They make all of their stuff in alle cart. All of their sales are alle cart sales.
056And that plays into and also the meal charging policy and everything is kind of going to all play into one big thing. But theirs is alle cart sales. They have a cafe. They have that they offer all different kinds of graband goes and um alle cart their high school and like I said I'll get into it a little bit more. They are not allowed to charge anything. You owe money. You don't get anything until there's money in your account. So that's plays into a big part of it. And um they are just they make a lot in their allocart versus like they're getting off the school breakfast program for example because it doesn't do them any service. They can sell more allocart than they can breakfast meals. There there is a school cultural comp that
057I happen to know how B operates shockingly and there's a school culture component that feeds into why because the high school is the big driver of why they're turning into the black. Not the sole reason, it's run really well. But at the high school with the open campus model there, the cafe is open from 7:00 until the kids leave at 2:30, right? And there are kids buying food all day long. So, for example, kids, if you're not a freshman, you don't have study hall. You have just a free period and you can just be in the building wherever, right? The library, the common spaces, whatever. And what do kids do when they're bored? They eat food. So they go down to the calf and they buy an alle cart item and eat, right? They might
058buy if it's breakfast, they might buy a breakfast sandwich for $2, right? If it's they sell coffee in the morning, they sell that for $150, right? There's all this like revenue generated because it's essentially open all day. From a kitchen standpoint, they're probably doing the equivalent lunch sales that we do, right? I'd argue they're doing less. We might do less but it's all the allocart that's going constantly all day but that's a whole cultural shift for a school. It's it's I have said it in the past, Boh High School is a vibe, right? Like you go there and it's a mindset of like how much freedom and flexibility the kids have in their day. It works for that school, right? Um but and this is one of the like positive components of it is that
059they can generate revenue and these other things from this. The allocart stuff is crazy. your kids go to high school is crazy there. Like they are buying food all day long. Um and it just is cranking through sales like it's and they get their vending machines are open during the day and they're cranking through sales and that because that's all going back to food service too. But you have to commit to being comfortable with that as a school, right? Um and maybe we can get there at at the high school, maybe we can't. That's a whole community decision. It's full-on open campus there. You know, kids come and go as it is. That might not be something that's right for this community. It might be. Who knows? Maybe different aspects of it. It's very different.
060So, is there alle cart pricing? Because I mean, we're talking about school lunch, correct? This is school lunch pricing. This is school lunch. Is alleart more is is the pricing more akin to retail pricing? We can work with it a little bit more because it doesn't have to be board approved or it doesn't it's not subject to reimbursement from the federal government. Some of the alle cart stuff at bow is more expensive than the lunch. Correct. Right. Well, that's why I'm wondering, right? Like where do you how do you because I mean part of the problem is that if you're collecting $3 for a lunch, right, it's not we obviously know now your $3 is really six or more because you're buying things individually. Right. Right. And the way they've I like I said, we
061went up and we saw a lunch happen and you know, like I said, I brought up the the the woman who's going to be running our Campbell kitchen and she got some really great ideas from the kitchen staff there. And the way they physically run their lunches, I'm going to mimic next year because it allows for more of like a a picking type situation like, you know, it's self-service on some of the options that they're like, "Okay, well, they offer pizza every single day." say, "Well, they're more likely to take two if they're serving it themselves versus whatever." And it's all revenue driven that way. It just gave me a new perspective because I've been so gung-ho focused in on our school meals over the last few years that I was like I not that
062I was neglecting the other side, but I just didn't know what I didn't know and I didn't realize the possibilities of what could actually occur. And now that I've seen some of it and I plan to travel to other schools as well and taking staff members with me to get better ideas as to how to continue to grow what we're doing and close that gap as best we possibly can. Yeah. And because it's that grab and go and you hit it on the head like we'll use meatball subs. My favorite of course. Right. So the at bow the meatball sub is sitting there as an individual item. Right. So the kid can just grab the sub or with some of the bigger high school kids they will grab two of them. Right. and they just
063are buying that. They're not buying a school lunch, right? So, they're bypassing the fruit and the vegetable that would have to come along. Well, I think the veggies in that, but the fruit and the other things that come along with it. I've been in that lunchroom the number of times I've said like, "Hey, just grab that. It's actually cheaper if you grab the OJ." And they're just like, "Nah, don't worry about it." You know, I just want the sub. I'm not going to eat the And if we were to implement that at Campbell, you'd be if they were just buying the meatball sub, you'd be $4.75, not 4.25 because it's not a complete meal or, you know, we do charge a higher price. And then if it's two, you're looking at what 9ish925. I mean,
064I've seen kids spend $20 at lunch on a regular basis. I think what's interesting to me about this and that's a really positive thing for us is that our biggest struggle with the pricing has has been the fear that there's going to be some people that don't qualify for free and reduced lunch that are on the cusp that are really going to be impacted by the change in this. And it to me it sounds like this is a way around that because you can absolutely generate more revenue without needing to impact them. And you guys, I mean, obviously you are the board. You set the meal prices, so I'm fine with whatever you choose, but that would be my suggestion. I, like I said, I did bring it to other people, but it's not all
065roses. Like, I just painted a lovely picture of how Bo cheats the system here, but they're not getting as much revenue back because the meals aren't being bought. If you remember, we did a presentation a few months ago now at this point where we get a certain amount of revenue back for every meal bought. And that would sometimes be a frustration there, like just take the orange juice to make it a meal, right? So we can get the the kickback from from selling a But they're in the black though. They are. Right. So that's kind of the like the the the ying and the yang of it, the give or take, right? Um where we're going to see a decline in the amount of if we go to more of that graband-go style, we're going
066to see a decline in the amount of revenue that comes back from making full lunch sales. And we're hoping and there is evidence obviously that shows offset by just you're going to generate more money period in this type of style which will make up the difference in the type of um revenue you're losing in terms of of the of the federal funding piece. Correct. I mean the the way I see this like I remember in high school all through track I was getting double triple lunches. I just needed the calories. Yeah. And so, and I remember I had to buy complete meals. Whereas, if I could buy a meal and then say, "Yeah, I want to add another meatball sub and I want to add another side of fries to that, you know, and not
067get two and a half meals and throw away half of it." That's the extra revenue. You're still getting the meal reimbursement, but and you can add in the grab and go to that. So, you're the one that's not taking the fruit and vegetable and costing us. No, the fries counter is a vegetable. No, I fries counter is a vegetable. I I did three times over. Julie's got Julie's got I'm putting her on the spot. Julie's got a high school boy at BO, right? I am sure you are spending of money into that account. Yes, he's an lunch every day and then and then snacks all day. Like it's just like constant all the time. It's going out. Is this I You're going to get to your next slide, but is is this happening at the
068bow middle school as well? It's not as um a free-for-all because it's just not. It's middle school. You can't do that, right? [Laughter] There are there are other things. It's where they have a version of a cafe and different things they can purchase like during the day and stuff like that does do that and kids can buy multiple like lunches and things, but it's not like the high school where it literally is kids walk in. I mean, it's supervised, don't get me wrong. We're not and like yes, there's a little theft like be honest like cuz if you're in this kind of trust and this is where like that give and take of trust comes from. If it's going to be grab and go and a lot of action coming in and out, there is
069product that walks out the door that just is going missing in the sense of the kids are just taking and not paying for it, right? It's minuscule in the big scheme of things, but again, I I don't want to be all rosy here, like that does happen. I feel like with food services, especially, sorry, I don't mean to interrupt you, but in the national school lunch program and really like in a lot of I call it, like I said, in our little guy cohort here, we are really stuck between a rock and a hard place because a lot of these districts do not make money and it's it's balancing like you said with the with the meal prices. We can only raise meal prices so much before people stop buying and then we don't make
070money. So, I I am just so beside myself that I I'm trying literally everything I can to, like I said, close that gap and provide better options and and do as much as we can with as little as we are getting. But I I feel like we're all we're constantly stuck in a rock and a hard place. And I just I'm I'm just as frustrated as anyone else is because Yep. Now, there's other we're going to get to other slides of Lauren's presentation of other things that BO and other districts do to help offset and help with this kind of problem if we're good to kind of go. Um, and that's how they handle meal charging. So, yeah. So, because I got my SNS this year, um, through that process of getting my school nutrition
071specialist credentials, I did learn a lot more about the how the program works, the ins and outs of things that necessarily is not what I was taught. So, a lot of the things that I've been taught was like displayed as it's the rule, it's what it is, you have to do it. And then it turns out, no, it's actually not. The board and the district can set their own policies and their own procedures. So, something I'm floating to the board as an idea and we don't have to do anything with this in the mean in like immediately. We can take a, you know, a year, a couple months, whatever we want to do to talk about it. I'm interested in updating our mail charging policy to get to a point that again does mimic B
072where we do set a no charge policy whatsoever at the high school. Um the meaning behind that and it's not because I mean and I want to take food away from people but it's also real world experience. You can't walk into McDonald's with no money and get a meal. You can't walk into somewhere else again McDonald's and say I know I owe money but I'm just going to take this anyway. Um, I was very much kind of like felt gross about it until I saw it in action actually at BO where the kitchen I was standing there talking to the kitchen manager and she went watch and the kid had his lunch and the cashier said I'm really sorry you don't have any money. He reached in his wallet, took out five bucks, gave it
073to her and she said that money was there the whole time but it wasn't necessarily going to make it to the register. Um, again this is this is a very touchy subject and I understand that. I think their their collective owe list at that high school is like $14 and obviously it's a case by case basis. A free and reduced student comes up with, you know, an owed money. We're not going to take meals from them. They they have that. But we have we have out of our entire two $2,300 meal debt, half of it belongs to the high school. And of that half, it's the juniors and seniors. And it's increasingly frustrating to me to have to chase these families down who are, I'm going to be very frank, are paid families that just
074ignore me. And if this is a way we can kind of help take some of the pressure off of my staff, take some of the pressure off of what we do on a day-to-day, and we're willing to explore this option, I'm happy to mock things up and do what we want to do. If this is something we are not interested in pursuing, it's fine. I'm not going to be offended, but I just figured I would float the idea out with that. Handinhand with that, I want to explore because this would be a budgeting situation. Um, the implementation of credit card machines at the high school. Again, saw it. Bo does it. I'm not just mimicking it after Bo. This is just the only place that I went to that in the black. I don't care
075if you Okay, great. Stellar. Love that for us. Um, I mean, and it's innovative. It's it's ways we're trying to we're trying to get this close. So, what they do is the credit card machines are a single one-time installment fee through link does it. I already asked all those questions and it's about 700 bucks and she said on the phone we the district would have to eat the fee which is about 4% per charge. The way B gets around that is they have a minimum set up. Um you have to pay $10. Now whether you buy 10 bucks worth of stuff or you just say you buy a lunch for $3, the other seven goes on your account and that's how the the 4% fee is 40 cents ago. But it also again hands in
076hands with the up with the meal charging policy which then keeps them their accounts positive and then you don't have that kind of extra. Again, floating the idea out there for discussion and or you know, contemplation over the next few months, whatever you want to think about. I'm not looking for answers today. Just discussing some options. I'm doing my part. My kid just paid $8.60 at the middle school today. Holy moly. Do your part, Andrew. Thank you. Thank you. I'm doing it on how much he's eating, right? It's It is. Yeah. Um, so a couple of things. the meal. I was there as they unrolled the the meal charging thing. There is like when you first roll it out, look, there's some awkward conversations, right? But when you establish it as the culture, it get
077over the awkward conversations. And no, I never saw a kid go hungry, right? Like if there's a situation, we always took care of the student, right? They always got a lunch. Maybe they didn't get three meatball subs, but they got lunch, right? And they were fed for whatever the situation is. And there was definitely situations there is that's just the way it is. Y but when you do establish it as the culture once you get over the initial um kind of I won't even say confrontation but some challenging situations it just becomes the norm and people do it. The credit card thing while great for food services is something in general I think we should start thinking about for multiple things we do at the school. for example, like when we do a play, you
078know, when we're selling tickets at the door and stuff like that. If we have ways to generate additional revenue, I don't know about you guys, but I pay almost everything with a card of some sort, right? Like I rarely have cash that I'm using to to pay for stuff for and we don't necessarily We're getting better at it. We played around with the Square thing to to help with some of that stuff. Um, but there's ways to use link, no pun intended, but to link link to multiple things, not just food service to allow credit card purchases for for people in our community. And there is that service fee, but if you do put some minimums in, I believe BO is actually raising their minimum. They are they're going to raise it to 20 next
079year. Um, because it's been a success. They started with that lower minimum to encourage people to use credit cards for food service. They said about 5 to 10% of their overall sales are through the credit card. So, um, and again, they kids with that minimum, they're going to put that on. They're going to pay for the thing they're purchasing, and there's always extra money that they're going to spend eventually, but it's there, but that's the point. They're going to spend it eventually, right? So, if they spent $5 on their lunch that day, and it's a $20 minimum, that you can count on that 15 eventually going back into the school's revenue. Now, from a parent standpoint, again, transparency, it's not all rosy. you better be paying attention to what your kids's buying because we've seen
080phone calls. Hey, you you got a $1,000 that your kids spent this week. No joke. And they're like, "Excuse me, what?" Yeah, it looks like they bought like a ton of food this week and maybe bought some food for their friends. So, like, uh, be paying attention to what your account is and stuff like that. Thousand might be a little exaggeration, but like a lot of friends, a lot of friends. a lot of but you know and that's like you have to train like people to do this like with that cafe the the bow system is a key keypad right so each kid gets a five-digit keypad like here at at at um in Lichfield and kids learn their friends keypads right or the kids give out their keypad to their friends and so so
081and so is just quickly using the keypad at the cafe because it's a different computer system or the friend goes up and types their their name in and then turns around and hands the food off to their buddy, right? and all of a sudden they spent $25 at one shot. You got parents have to talk to their kids about being responsible. I mean that's part of the education of all this. But that will be some of the like cons that happen right away if you were to entertain some of these things is like some awkward conversations like hey your kid spent $200 this week like you know and we're not giving that money back to you. You have to talk to your kid about what they did you know and how they approached this stuff.
082I have a quick question. So, um, are the high school students notified like of their like I know the parents are. I know everybody is. Yeah. It's, you know, are kids seeing it though? Like or is there a way to like make sure that because I think the way you avoid the awkwardness is like the kids having the kid be aware? I would think that some kids might just walk up there be like, I have no idea what's on my Yeah, a lot of them do clue what if my parents put money on my lunch account, right? Yeah. And there's ways, you know, we'll have it's we hit you hit every scenario basically is that like we'll have kids go, "Can I check my balance?" And then you check the balance or hey, you have
083two bucks left or hey, you just went negative. Like there's always a communication piece. Sometimes it's a issue because you just hit the thing and then they just go and you're like, "You have negative. Okay." And then you just, you know, they're like halfway across the calf, which you're not going to scream, you know, you're negative. Gone into the negative here. Like cuz I put in like $100 at a time, right, to the the food. Yeah, I know. unacceptable. And I went to buy lunch and I went to the negative and they were like, "Hey, you're in the negative." I was like, "Oh, sorry." And like I'll come back with like I didn't have money on me at the time, but I think they can find me. But um you know, but like they just,
084you know, pivoted the screen and showed me like, "Hey, you're down $2." Yeah, it's on it's on the register like it would be for anything else. But maybe maybe if we had something where they could like look it up like somewhere in the calf or something just so that that way like like Yeah. down. Mhm. Then it's at least like, hey, I should probably check my balance before I get Yeah. Yeah, that's not a bad idea. And then the other thing I just wanted to mention is um there's a lot of you got to really look at credit card vendors cuz some of them charge a heck of a lot more than Oh, yeah. No, I know. I just link was the one I happened to be on the phone with and they provide our
085overall POS system. So, I was like, what do you do about credit cards? And the credit cards are al the system also does Apple Pay and Google Pay as well, which is a big thing. Our vending machine does Apple and I don't know if it does Google Pay, but it definitely does Apple Pay. Um it's just the way a lot of people are buying lunch now. And um another thing I heard from the BO director is that she'll have parents from the other schools because they have a credit card machine in the office as well and they'll call up because it's actually cheaper to put money on the kids account through the credit card machine right then and there on the phone than it is to like go online and load your because the fee
086is less with that minimum. Just saying. So, those are some ideas that I've now put the bug in your ear for and it's something to think about. We can revisit at another time. We're not asking for any approvals or changes. We just want you to start thinking about this as we wrap up the year. Lauren's wrapping up our stuff, checking out how how food service went this year. Um, I think we will, you know, with a policy obviously that would go through policy committee first before coming here. But these are just kind of things that we've been discussing about in food service realm like the credit card machine. you're going to see something in the budget proposal next fall related to this. So, um it's just putting it on your radar as we kind of
087wrap up this school year, but not and no proposed changes at this point. Yeah. And then the last slide I have is more ideas to bring in more revenue. Um as we discussed increasing allocart options at middle school and Campbell, um we have new federal guidelines that we just had a wonderfully fun um webinar about today. So that's actually we have to we have to overhaul breakfast which I wanted to anyway. Um that needs it's a reduc sorry it's reducing the added sugar items. So we're going to be overhauling the breakfast next year. Um something that I found over the winter and I was like I don't know why I didn't never think of this but it's a hot chocolate program and basically you just heat the chocolate milk up and I was like oh
088that's stupidly easy. We can totally do that. So, we're going to promote that during the winter and it would just be the same price as a milk, but it would boost our milk participation and may even get more milk, you know, being sold. Um, at BO, we did witness they had they had the deli bar like we normally do at the high school, but they also came they had smoothie bowl day that day and that was really cool. They had um it's really hard being the only chef food person in for three schools where they have a lot of like Tiffany and Nikki are very food people and they had like poke bowls and all the stuff and I'm just like I can't I can't think of that for all the schools. But they they
089gave us some really great ideas. Um a wider variety of new recipes at middle school in Griffin utilizing what we already have in house and our commodity items. We're continuing to tweak that. I'm going to be investing in my staff a lot more um because I go to our national conferences for free. So, I'm investing in our staff to go to the local conferences um for to learn these kinds of new tricks and things like that. Um Jen, sorry, I'm just telling you this now. Gradual implementation of offering second helpings for middle schools grades six through eight over the next year. Sorry, surprise. Surprise. Um, we can offer seconds to everybody at middle school. Um, the reason fifth's not on here, and it's not because I don't like fifth graders, it's because per the USDA
090regulations, there are still elementary students and they that's out of their calorie and nutritional guidelines. Um, so we're going to do a slow implementation of that because that was brought up during the career day. Why can't we get those seconds? Um, and then really, I know it's been addressed a couple times, really hitting home with the wellness policy and committee. Um, we are going to be really hitting that hard and we've been talking about a bunch of things and that will be, um, hopefully resulting in some more catering opportunities for us instead of, you know, we're planning this whatever for this group of people. Um, but hopefully utilizing the food services more for catering, um, which will bring in some more revenue as well. I use you all the time. You use me all the
091time. Yep. Yeah. I cater for Sarah all the time. You did? Yeah. Jen used me a lot, too. So, um, I know it's not a fun like super fun conversation to have. I'm very upset about it. Like I, like I said, I take it important conversation. It's a very important conversation and it's not I know it's not for lack of what we're doing. I know we do a good job. My department does a great job. My staff are fantastic. We do good work. our our um meal participation is is steady at 50% across the district for lunch, which for a district of our size is huge. Um our breakfast has been steady. I think it was at 15% last I saw, which isn't stellar, but breakfast is always tough. Um we've done really good work
092and we continue to do good work. Our reimbursement this year is already surpassed what we got last year. it. I think there's just a lot of other factors in play. So, we're I'm I'm constantly trying to do more and better. Awesome. Any questions for Warren Crowley today? You only look at me. I know. So, specifically, Matt, do you have any Just a comment. I think I think you wanted, you know, you it sounded like you would like feedback. I think you're going in all the right directions. I'd love to I think keep keep going with this and I think we should be definitely looking at implementing these things and I think you're going to be the national director of the year next year. I'm definitely the school nutrition New Hampshire president the next two years.
093So there you go. We have that doing all the things. So but I do appreciate it like I know I know I appreciate you looking into all this. I will say the only one that really gives me hesitance is the raising of the prices. Um the alak cart sounds amazing. I think the credit card sounds great. Those are all all of those ideas are awesome. I get it. I just I get it. I I bristle at 425 across the board when only one other school over on the sea coast that high. And so I understand. That's the only one that gives me pause. Not a no, but just No, that's cool. And that the meal charge thing, I mean, not charge. Goodness gracious. the meal prices. I do need to know that sooner than later,
094like not immediately, but it does affect our state application, which I'm really hope they really like shortened our application this year. So, I'm really hoping to get that in before. So, here's what I'd like to do. We have Mr. Plansky hopefully joining us at our next board meeting. This is certainly food for thought. See, see what happened there. That was good. That was good. That was nice. We'll fill Mr. Plansky in and I'd like to add this to the agenda next at our next meeting just for continued conversation. Perfect. Sounds good. Can I say with the credit cards tie in with curriculum and uh proper financial balancing because I know when I left high school I had no clue about a credit card and I goes here's a plastic thing and yeah I I ran
095myself into a lot of trouble personal finance. Yes, it's a required class. See now they don't even get the plastic thing. Now it just goes it's just on the phone. Yeah. Here's access to the plastic thing. Danger. Danger. I still struggle with that as an adult. episodes. Oh, I still Thank you again. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Um I appreciate all your support. You guys are great. Thank you. Thanks. We'll turn it over to Danny and Nick for an update. Here we go. End of year. You know, our last one. So, baseball have have their first round of playoffs tomorrow at home against Guilford and are currently 11 and five. Softball have their first round of playoffs away against Sambourne and are currently eight and eight. Boys, boys lacrosse have their first round
096of playoffs tomorrow and are currently 10 and five. Girls lacrosse ended their season being 4 and 10 and track and field had their state meet this weekend. Awesome. Um, some of the past activities we've had going on was on the 20th we had eighth grade stepup day and then we also had the spring pops concert that night. And then on the 20th, we had the academic excellence banquet for the seniors. And then on the 30th, we had one of our best spring fests yet. We got so much positive feedback from it. It was just like a full day of celebrating the students with our awards ceremony in the morning and then we had our fun scavenger hunt outside. We really just got the whole school involved. It was really good. And in the last few
097few weeks of school, we have senior week and on the 11th we have class night and on the 12th we have the last day of school and graduation. Excuse me. Um for future activities you just have summer. I'm sure everyone's excited. Yeah, I just looked it up. They won six to five. Yeah. All right. Congratulations. Um, so LMS is completed with NHSAS. Um, they're pleased with the student growth from last year. We have a celebration for tomorrow. All students who made growth in ELA, math, and or science will get a water balloon to toss at Miss Granthm and Mr. Peterson. We have over 600 balloons coming our way. LMS 6th grade just completed their entrepreneur day projects. 89 students created a small business with a product to sell. The civ the creativity was awesome. Congratulations
098to our LMS musicians for wrapping up the year strong with concerts, Memorial Day assembly performances for our raising fifth graders tomorrow. What time is the balloon toss? It's going to be after lunches. So each grade level So we're going to get with 157 this at this time. Oh, it's broken up. It's broken up the full day. If you want to see Jeff or I be professional, don't come between 10:35 and 230. That's exactly what I want to do. Are you going to take the water balloon, Andrew? We have extra. Okay. So, so I I was going to say the question is who's filling all of the water balloons? I got the uh the one that you attach to the hose. Oh, you're cheating on that. Oh. efficiency. Otherwise, we tie a lot of knots. Um,
099but for the rest of LMS, the students are finishing up the year strong with amazing academics. In order to have the most accurate data for honors and high honors, students will be receiving their certificates at school and a grade level assembly on June 12th. Students will be able to celebrate the news with families when they get home. Promotion is scheduled for 6:11 at 5:00 p.m. and they appreciate the support from the CHS Cleub to help facilitate facilitate organized parking. Friday is the fundraiser field day. Students will spend time completing outdoor games. Please focus on working together, communication, and they are looking forward to spending time together. For Griffin, it's field trip season today. Third is at Strawberry Bank. Last week, kindergarten went to the Butterfly Place and second went to Charming Fair Farm. Next week,
100first will be going to C Science Center. Jaden uh Jaden Vickers was the champion of the first annual GMS rock paper scissors contest. Congrats. I love that it was fourth graders. I know, right? Really? Well, yeah. That's crazy. It's awesome. That's it. Um We just wanted to we just wanted to add one more slide just because it's our last meeting and we just wanted to ask like if you guys had any ideas about what you guys wanted us to do next year. I sadly won't be schoolboard rep next year. I plan on being co-president next year. All right, that's a good reason. And then Nick's obviously going to college, but we just wanted to ask for your guys' opinion like what you want to see this grow into. Obviously this year we added all the
101other schools and everything. So we were just wondering Yeah. I mean I think having the representation of all the schools, right, is is a nice welcomed addition this year, right? I think you guys have done an amazing job representing the district. Uh you're definitely viewed as a member of this board and have a seat at the table. I definitely put you on point probably unexpectedly sometimes, right? But that's all good. Keeping everybody on their toes. I almost did it during the food presentation and I was like, "No, no, no. But no, I mean your your your thoughts and your your your input um and your viewpoints on the district are appreciated and so you know heartfelt thank you and best wishes for an amazing summer and next chapter. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank
102you. Any thoughts or feedback for the student office? I mean I agree with everything you just said. You surprise me sometimes that you're at like I I'm like they can't be paying attention to this and then you chime in with something. I'm like There you go. All right. Thank you. Thank you guys. All right. Moving on to uh community comment on our agenda items. This is our first of two community comment sessions. Any community comment this evening. All right. I will close community comment and move into correspondence and turn it over to Vice Chair Ames for a summary. Thank you. On May 21st, the superintendent uh emailed the board during the meeting circulating the RS RFP for GMS. On May 22nd, Ron Oennis emailed the board requesting contact information for the school's legal council. On
103May 22nd, Holly Felzone emailed the board circulating an administrator's contract um for review. On May 22nd, Ronald Bennis emailed the board and facilities committee circulating the text message sent to the school board chair. On May 22nd, Valerie Nelson um CHS director of school counseling circulated an invitation for the board to attend May 30th underassment awards. And then the June 11th senior night on May 23rd, Dan Dit um sent an email to Mr. Obleness and copied the board advising of his removal from FIC based on the appointment by the school board. On May 23rd, Brianna Blinger emailed the board um reaching out about availability at her private practice for mental health care for students under age 18. On May 27th, Jan Sullivan emailed the board circulating draft public and non-public minutes for May 21st, 2025 meeting.
104On May 28th, Annamari emailed the board circulating the June 4th, 2025 manifests. On May 30th, Renee Burgess emailed the board circulating the draft June 4th, 2025 agenda. And on June 4th, the superintendent sent a text message to the board with an update on a confidential personnel letter. And that brings us up to date as as of like noon. Thank you very much. We'll turn it over to the superintendent for an update. Yeah, thank you. Um, so first just enrollment. Um, we do this once a month. It's actually not the enrollment uh meeting this, but I did want to just mention kindergarten enrollment. Uh, we did we're still at 61, which is uh low. Um, so I think when we're at the next meeting, we're going to allow some um hiring stuff to still play out.
105We have open positions in the district still. um we have um some uh ideas to make sure that if we need to move someone to cover an open position that we can cover that, right? So, we're not um having excess teachers or anything unnecessarily in that way. Um we're still in that hiring season though, you know, and allowing things to play out. Um but, you know, right now, for example, we have five kindergartens and obviously if that's the number, we're not going to have five kindergartens next year, right? So, then we would um move a teacher to to cover a different need for us as needed. But we are going to let the hiring season play out to see exactly what that need could be um and then kind of go from there. So, we'll
106continue to update the board in um along those lines. And again, I'll make my pitch that I have for the last couple uh board meetings. I've been including my message. Um if you have kindergarteners, please register them um with our building class list, their building assignments, and those type of things. Uh we based again over this last time, but based upon projections feels like we should have more kindergarters. If you look at the birth rates from the corresponding years, it's not the same kind of percentage that we've seen historically. So, there are families out there that haven't registered their kindergarter yet, please reach out to GMS. They will be happy to help you. So, there we go. Thank you for that update. Um, next, critical response mapping. So, that's link's going to take you to
107a website. So, on May 1st, um, I went to a presentation at the Hudson uh, Police Department. uh Chief Jones um from the Lichfield PD was going to join me, but unfortunately he had a police matter here in Lichfield to deal with that morning, so he didn't join me. But it was a meeting of um a number of different um emergency um personnel from around the district. So obviously Hudson PD was there, uh Salem PD, uh we were representing Lichfield, Dair, Londere, different communities. And we saw a presentation about um critical response mapping which is this is and this is the group that made the presentation critical response group. And essentially it's um it allow would they come in and they map um a facility maybe it would be for us here in the school
108district it would be our three schools um and it's in a grid type of style very straightforward um grid style where you know horizontally it might be numerically and then vertically it might be alphabetically and that allows for safety personnel who are all coming with different ways of talking to be on a common language when they're coming in to resolve an issue. For example, we might say an issue is in the fax room, right? And that might be shorthanded for us as school personnel where we know exactly where the fax room is. But if we had a situation there and I'm on the radio with police and say, "Hey, there's a situation in the fax room, they may not specifically know what that is. They might not know what room 146 is, right? They they
109might they might not. They might be looking at a map that's not necessarily oriented the true north. They're going to be looking at it in their their different ways. Police has their own way of doing things. Fire has their own way of doing things. Schools have their own ways of doing thing. Everyone has their own kind of language. And this is kind of a common ground um for for safety personnel. So this was I thought a great presentation. What this group would come in is they come in and they create um this critical map for whatever your your group and your facility is. Again, for us it would be the the school buildings and the accompanying land with it. They produce the mapping for you. They orient to true north. They give you the maps,
110you know, to they're yours, right? They do it digitally and hard copies for it and they provide it for all um the safety personnel that you need to provide it to. So, they'll provide it to the police department, the fire department, your local 911 call center and yourself and anyone else that you want. Um and they come in and do this work. Um I think it's something, you know, Chief Jones was very uh intrigued by it as well. We followed up afterwards. He had been familiar with it beforehand as well. Um and it seems like a lot of the other uh local um police departments and and there are schools and fire departments there as well all seem to be very intrigued by this. They've this group has done significant projects of this kind. They
111just did the Super Bowl this past year. You know, as they do those level kind of um projects and also down to the school and local levels, you know, when we were there, Salem was the Salem police were like, "Do you do more than just, you know, hospitals and schools?" They were like, "Would you do Tescan Village?" And they're like, "Yeah, we would do that for you know, like different zones would have different things. Um, here in Lichfield, we could expand this beyond the schools, you know, partner with the town. They could do the their safety facility here, you know, other places in town, um, some of the field spaces. So, again, everyone that common language. So, I wanted to introduce to you, this is going to come up later in end of the year,
112encumbrances, because we received a quote on what this um, would cost us in terms of that, and I'll talk about it when we get to encumbrances down there. Um, but this is something that the safety personnel in town are on board with and there would be a onetime cost to do it initially and then there would be a reoccurring cost potentially. So, you do it's roughly um about $4,000 per school. So, the quote that we have is about $12,000 to do this mapping uh original set of maps. And then what they will do is charge you about $500 per school to come and do updates every single year. You don't have to do that every single year, but for us, for example, if you know, we were I'm just saying hypothetically, we were to do
113this this year, we were going to get an elementary school renovation potentially approved, right? And we're in this agreement with them, they would update our maps to do that for minimal cost because we're in this kind of yearly agreement with them and stuff like that. Um, this is all military personnel who who um originated this. I obviously did not serve, but my understanding is that this is where it comes from. Um the Yeah, it's very it's very very common in the commercial world. We we build our buildings to a standard like this. Yeah, it's room numbers are numbered front to back and I don't know if it's oriented true north or not, but I know uh column lines are alphabetical and room designations are front to back. Yeah. Yeah. And then it's all common language
114that they used to and it's simple and straightforward so you can walk into the situation and be alert to it. So, I think I just want to present it here, allow you to go through the website. Um, we have a rep that we've been in contact with who did the presentation who is happy to um, you know, do a mini presentation or talk to the board if it's something they want more information on. Um, and I just want to put this on your radar and it's something, you know, we'll talk about a little bit end of the year in conferences if it's something more immediate. I'm not expecting that per se, but it is something that I think could be a benefit to us um, as a community. So, there you go. Any questions? Not
115yet. All right. Um, next thing, ropes course update. We Ryan, right? Yes. Yes. Me and Julie met with Ryan from W I keep want to call him Jason. Um, uh, Ryan from Wing Speed uh, yesterday at the ropes course. Um, and uh, to go over um, how to dismantle it. I don't I'll just be straight forward with it. Like if we, you know, would like to not move forward with it, what would we need to take down? what would be the costs associated with this, who would do the work, um what would happen with the stuff, like all of those type of details on it. So, we walked through the ropes course. Um he went through um what would need to happen um what would need to be removed, what could stay. for example, on
116all the lower kind of um part of the course. Um from an insurance standpoint, what you need to do is unscrew everything and take away the the like the big screws and the big bolts and stuff like that, but you would leave some of the stuff in the tree so the tree can continue to kind of grow around it and you would be covered from an insurance standpoint um in that kind of kind of terms. And then the logs that were part of the the different pieces, you could lay them on the ground or you could just dispose of them or do whatever you want. Uh for some of the more up in the air pieces, there's a threshold of about 12 feet, I think you said, where you would want to remove stuff up
117to that threshold, but some of those kind of um higher perches up there. You can put a no trespass sign up there and remove access to it and then you're covered yourself from an insurance, they can take it down as well. They talked about that. They can climb up there and take um the entire thing down. And they would they would all also take down anything that connected various pieces. So there's bridges and different um steel and everything that could do that and they they would take that down um and remove that as well um if we luck to go with that. Um in terms of what we can do with it, they will pretty much take most of it off of our hands. A lot of it's not resellable, but some of it is,
118you know, um for example, with the the ropes themselves, he was saying, um if it's been in use, then they can't really resell it, right? That's because it's it's been in use, right? They can't guarantee its safety. They donate that to uh ironically someone who makes dog leashes out of the ropes and stuff like that. So you could get dog leashes for your community as like a trade-off. Sounds great. Um and uh could use that. But we also have rope, you know, in storage that has never been used and that's something that could be, you know, they could sell to someone else who who's doing those type of things. Same thing with some of the other equipment like for helmets. Um there are a number of helmets that are in good condition that are not
119near the their end of life expectancy. Those could be uh resold and and we would receive some funds back for that. Or there are other helmets that have that have or are about to exceed their life expectancy. So you we wouldn't get any value back for that. But he said he would take everything and dispose of it for us um if if need be and stuff like that. So really the only cost for it is labor. That's what we would have to pay for. He's preparing a quote for us. um that he'll get to us as soon as he can and um that that is where we are at the rope course. We are ready to close it down. Um so that's where we're at from it. Is the quote going to be for is
120it going to give you an idea of what it would cost to take everything down including above 12 feet? Yeah. Yep. Yep. Great. Yeah. Yeah. So that's where seeing the number and Yep. and we'll have it. He He's like, "I just have a bunch of trainings this week, so the end of the weekend." Yeah. So, I assume once it's down and we update our insurance to let them know. Yep. Exactly. Hopefully save some money. Yeah. I don't think it's going to be a huge money maker for us in any shape or form, but maybe less sleep. Money saver. Yeah. Money saver. But, you know, if we're not using it, we shouldn't have the risk. So, you know, so um and then just kind of a general year update. I mean, uh, the students talked about
121some of the stuff already, so I won't try too much on it. Uh, we have a couple big events, uh, coming up, um, with, uh, fourth grade. When's the fourth grade promotion, Dan? Monday. Uh, 9:00 a.m., right? Uh, don't show up before 9. Yeah, show up at 9. Ceremony will start between 9:15 and Okay. Uh, fourth grade promotion on Monday. Eighth grade promotion is Wednesday evening at 5:00, right, at LMS. And then senior night follows that at 6:30 at the high school. And then we have graduation on Thursday at 6 o' I should look to Nick for this one. 6 o'clock, right? Uh yeah, 6 uh six o'clock. Uh so those are big events. Obviously the board is invited to to any of our end of the year events. Um we've obviously been going through
122a bunch of them. I went to the honors dinner uh for the high school the the other night, Thursday night. It was wonderful hearing um you know just hearing the teachers talk about the kids obviously the relationships that have been formed there uh the success the kids have I mean our kids are going to some great schools uh it's not just all about college but you know college is part of it where kids do you know we have students going to Duke to Yale to UVM some really uh WPI high achieving schools UNH I will it's a high achieving school that's where I graduated it's best school out there um and uh lots of other schools so um it was wonderful to kind of see the the seniors celebrated in that way. Um, and you
123know, schools are having different events, entrepreneurship day for LMS and all the field trips at GMS and just the chaos of their field days coming up. That's going to that's going to be scary. Um, and uh, seniors have their class trip um, Monday night, you know, into Tuesday. Say hi to all the Bo kids for me because that's who you're sharing the boat with on Monday night. So um, and uh, yeah, wrapping up the school year. So, too fast. Can you believe it? No. Whole year under your belt. This Yeah, it's been a really really good year. I guess this is the last I mean we'll have another board meeting in June, but the school year will be over. It's been um an incredible school year. Um for I'll just speak for myself, but um
124this the schools are wonderful. The people who work at the schools, the students at the schools, the community in general um so supportive of everything that we do. There's just great things happening every day. Um uh It's wonderful. It's exhausting. Um, school years are exhausting. Your parents and you know, like we get to this point of the year and it's just please end that. I'm sure you guys are that same way. Nick, you're a senior. I'm sure you are counting down the minutes to graduate here. Yeah. Minutes, seconds, whatever. Yeah. And that's such a natural thing. Like it means we did our jobs. If the if the seniors are at a point where they're like, I I'm ready, then it's like good. You should be cuz you're graduating. Um and uh so it means we've
125done a good job with the kids and stuff like that. So it's been a wonderful year. Um uh lots of lots of good things. We're happy to build on it in the in the years ahead and stuff. So yeah. Awesome. Thank you for that update. Yeah. All right. For a business administration update and we have solar. We do have solar. So we have um the sparks fly. We have power going to the building now. Um, everyone hear that? Our switch has been flipped on solar. We should have really taken a video of the switch getting flipped and posted it on sent it over to confetti. Uh, so yeah. So that's very exciting. Um, we they're still doing a little bit of testing, but it's still live and um ready to go. Um, so that is
126very exciting. Um, I did follow up with Kay about the battery and where we stand with that. um she's going to be um reaching out to us to do some of the work over the summer. Um but she did um talk a bit about the factory because I I asked specifically I wanted to make sure that there was factory actuallyist is now under renovation. No, no, no. That was the last factory. I know they switched technology. They switched technology and now this factory is under renovation. This is Yeah. Um feel like we should sit on this. Yeah. Yeah. All right. for the gonna let these the student repres. Yeah. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We give Nick his little like sign or I guess both of them coming back. You want your
127sign? Yeah. Oh my god. No, wait. Really? You can have the Yeah, we need the holder, but you can take the little sign. No, I'm trying to slide. It's your last task as a senior. Can you slide out the You're stuck here forever. There we go. Thank you guys. I'll buy a little mini router so I can router out the etching plastic so we can slide those in a little bit easier than paper. So with this renovation, do you have any idea of how extensive that renovation is? I mean, do they currently have occupancy permits? Are they inspected to deal with energized power systems? What's up, Dan? Dan, those are cute questions. Exactly. Exactly. I think uh you know Andrew could use a break. I think we give Dan Kan andrew on it. Let him
128loose. I mean the the factory will be magically built in a week. The the other concerns I have is drawing designs of the battery are not complete yet. She said they're be they're being worked on. Yes. And it's not UL certified. Correct. that does it's pending UL certification. Do we know what's the delay? Like why hasn't the this I mean there I know there's so many questions here and I'm I know. Yeah. All right. Yeah. I mean we knew we knew that it was going to be a while before they could build them but like you could have been designing them. I was going to say the design should have been done and it needs to be all the paperwork could have been happening. U is underwriters laboratories. it goes into an NRTL certification process.
129That can take a very long time for an unproven design with an unproven technology. So that could be potentially years. I was under the impression that we were switching to an established we were going from an un established technology that they didn't even have a site readily available to a readily available. So that's what I understood as well. So that's why I'm really confused by that. Yeah. So I it sounds to me like they went back to the original. What are we building? Because yeah, my understanding is we're supposed to Jen apparently knows what they're what they're building. I do. You want me to? Sure. History is on this because I might be the only one that hasn't really be great. That'd be great. Very helpful. Come on up. So the technology originally designed was
130to be this high tech unproven, untested, untried super capacitors. super capacitors with inverters and all kinds of fun things attached to them. Um our fire chief and um fire department came and we did a walkthrough of the site and they were like at a school with children, no thank you. Not going to fly. Not going to happen. So it was especially with how close it was supposed to be. Correct. Because it's only across the driveway. Um, so if you think of where our loading dock is, the pad the pad is supposed to be poured adjacent to where our parking spots are in the back there. Not not good. So last, I think last August it it's been a while. It was completely shifted to a standard battery, standard operating procedure just because it was covered
131and was tested. And but that doesn't sound like what we're getting now. I haven't heard the newest one. Is it back to the the capacitor? Well, so she said she did say they're using a Japanese design, not the Chinese design. So, I don't know exactly what was explained to us in in a meeting was that the design was switching to a Toshiba based product that was readily available, industry standard. That to me reflecting on this conversation is not a drawing of design of a battery that requires certifications. True. That is true. It sounds like she's gone back just changed it again without telling you. I mean I I don't want to guess that and if that's and if that's the case like we need we need another meeting with K, right? We need to understand
132what this is and um that's not going to be okay. Right. Right. And if and if this is a cost issue because now dynamic grid doesn't want to pay cost because of geopolitical environment and increasing costs globally or whatever it is or the fact that they've been carrying electric and they're changing the design for their own economic benefit. I don't care. So did we end up getting something in writing that indicated that we were switch that they were switching us to the Toshiba design? Is it in the amendment? Good. I'd have to go check, but I don't know. I believe there's an email chain, too, that talks about that change with you. We need to get the answer to this in because if there but this might be we've been now that we're talking this
133through. In all seriousness, now that we're talking it through, this might be the thing we need from a legal standpoint because if this has been changed without our knowledge, I feel like there there's something there. What? I'm not sure but something I mean especially if we have an email saying that they're changing to an established design right so Uwell goes to the source of the component not the system overall. So if they are still doing designs of the battery and need to get the battery certified, it's like you you certify a power cord, you certify a power supply. You don't certify a computer to be UL, right? Is so that's certified to a whole bunch of other standards that says all of my other good stuff has UL certifications. So my con if we have
134an email that says that they're going to an established design and they're saying that they still have to go certify that design. I'm I would say it's not certified and it's not an established design. Is there I'm trying to find the contract as we sit here. I have it. I was going to say is there a place where I can find the I I'll say uh boatload of information on this. I can send you the contract and this one I found it. I don't know if the amendment is attached to this one or not. That amendment might be in an email. I have to go back and find. Energy storage systems shall be installed after solar during the summer break last year. Last summer. I just don't know that we ever saw something that indicated
135that they were switching that. I know they told us that. Well, if it's being if our fire chief is not going to approve the design any like why are we going down this path again, right? You know, if that that's answer has already been provided, it doesn't make a lot of sense. We need we need a lot more details of this and we need to make sure that the design is aligned to what our expectations are. Absolutely. and that the fire chief is again on board with what this design is because I don't want any more delays or unanticipated delays. Okay. Interesting. Thank you, Jim. It's interesting she said that it's being renovated because it wasn't built. The the other one wasn't even built. Yeah. I mean I So are they considering being built renovated?
136I mean, so like with that though comes to are they replacing the ceiling tiles or are they moving walls and they're installing clean rooms and new equipment so they have to go get occupancy permits and this isn't our problem. Yeah. No, it's not. It they've had years to figure it out. Mhm. Mhm. All right. Thank you for the update. Sure. I will follow up with those. Um and certainly if you at any point if we want to have another meeting I'm happy to schedule that. Um the other thing I wanted to um go back to was under VR encumbrances. Um we've um received a lot more quotes. Um still working on some but we've updated the list and prioritized um what we have on there so far. Um one thing I did want to talk
137about is the um parking lot study that we had previously discussed for LMS. Um I was I spoke to Kevin Brown as you had um recommended which was a fantastic contact. Um and so um he indicated as far as like a study goes because he is going through something different over at the transfer station and all the work that they're doing over there. Um he said that really it's not a worthwhile thing to do a um to do a study or to or to even put this out to bid because there's basically one option. Right. So, um he has um actually he had offered to reach out to them for us. Um and he said he'd be happy to like when they come over to see the place for him to be there as well
138to kind of assist with anything that we need. Um but essentially he said that he he thinks what's probably going to be the outcome of this is it's going to be a similar job to what they have at the transfer station. So we're looking at probably somewhere in the ballpark of between$2 and $300,000 to redo this. He doesn't think that there's actually a lot of um drainage issues underneath as we had thought. Um he he does not think that that's the issue at all. He said that that we had replaced some of our um catch basins and that that's great. Um everything seems to be going well with that. Um but he did say that, you know, there are some um if if we wanted to think about doing this job maybe at the end
139of next year, but perhaps we could work together because he has some other jobs that he needs to do. house. We could line that up so that we could um make that more efficient and maybe cut down on some of the cost. Yeah. Um so I didn't want to take this off of here without explaining that first, but we are going to take down the $25,000 that we had in here for the study. That's great. Thank you. Sure. Um is there um so I I know we don't have to do a study. Is there any preliminary work that would need to be or that could need to be done on that that we should be I don't think so, but I will double check with that. He's going to get back to me next week
140when he speaks to Continental for sure. When we had talked with David Elely for the um construction and the setup information, there was question of whether we touch the parking lot, do we have to bring it up to compliance for um Americans with Disabilities Act because parking lot does not meet that with the that was something that came up also actually I think with the 18 insight onsite insight report. So that is I'm sure the the company has lots of experience with this. I would bet from the estimate on the on-site insight that's the difference because they do everything to current standards and that was like a hundred something,000 and I bet you Kevin's thinking that we do have to bring it up to those codes which is going to add the work to why
141it's going to be a two to $300 estimate on that or two to $300,000 estimate on that. So yeah, um the rest of here is uh so if you want to click on the link to the incumbrances, as Julie mentioned, uh we've been updating this as we finalize quotes and we prioritized and um these are just by by price by priority um is the sort on it currently. Um this is up for discussion. This was our um feelings on prioritizing some of this stuff and um but obviously it's it's the will of the board ultimately. Um we don't have to finalize this today. We do probably next meeting next meeting is definite right and how are we intending to cover the food service deficit that transfer. Yeah. So we have to do that when we
142do the budgeting. Um you are assuming less revenue. Now that the what you do is you eventually transfer to cover that loss revenue that you don't have in the food service account from your fund 10 account. But it's part of the budgeting process. How we do in this district is it's part of the budgeting process when you're budgeting expected revenue to the district. So Doug did last year's with this. he had put in about $100,000 as um not as revenue we would not receive from food services to to um represent the loss of of being in the red essentially for food services. So we're we've had that in the back of our head as we've been going through everything this year that that would need to be generated somehow. As um Lauren mentioned, she's expecting
143about $85,000 of that. Still have a couple weeks left finalizing some things and bills and collecting money and things. Um, so we have the money to do that. So that would be one. It's not on this list, but that essentially needs to be covered from our end of the year um, fund balance that we have in fund 10 is to make transfers to the reserve accounts. Correct. Yep. So I think that, if I'm remembering right, it was the benefits one was a little over $2,000 as part of that. And then and we'll this is just our list, but Doug left a really nice one that you guys used last year that will transfer this over that includes those things. And I believe the other one was two $200,000 for special education. Um that will go
144into that account as well from from the boards. Yeah. Um, just to go over this list, our our kind of number one priorities are safety age things that kind of come up at um, both GMS and LMS in terms of bathroom repairs and physical structure um, repairs. The one variable here that is a level one that we're still waiting for the quote for and the mason was in this week is the exterior cracks um, up at CHS. That's going to be a pretty penny um, there, you know. Um, so we're thinking 20 to $30,000 in there as well. So those would all be kind of those priority ones. We I think you just deleted the study after you talked about it. Um, but those would be kind of our priority one things that that we
145would want to get that we personally feel um we should prioritize. Um, those HVAC units is is the most expensive. Um, again, this is just done by cost. Those need to be done in the portables over at GMS and some other things. If I can draw your attention to line 14 here. Um, the panic doors is what they're called, but they're those things we've talked about in facilities that that kind of this is the the quote is for and you can click on it is for all the doors that go to the exterior. Um we don't need to do necessarily um I think the ones that you were talking about. So one by the first grade wing um as the most priorities and then um maybe calf maybe like we don't have to do every
146set of doors, you know, like the back doors that are running out to the field. Yeah. We don't want kids running out to them, but they're not running out into a highway. So, that may not need this level door. But, um, couple doors that just don't have regular eyes on them. Yeah. Like in the connector hallway, there's one that kind of goes out into the maintenance that doesn't prior cafeteria door. I mean, it's it's always got eyes on it. Now, there are some things that different priorities here, but the same company does it. So, um like I would say the PA horns at GMS and LMS would be kind of a we would want to get that done for safety reasons. Like that's very important. Not quite as important would be the panic doors and
147some of the camera upgrades just because we've lived without them, you know, and like it's okay. I don't want to minimize their importance, but if we are prioritizing, but that's all one source who's going to do the work. So, we may want to think of um grouping that together, you know, by that kind of vendor because they're all going to do the work for us. And can you uh remind me with the panic doors? Um is there any ability to like reuse or salvage is it components or is it like could it be reused if we if we renovate the school or is it some cost? No, there's parts of it specifically. Yeah. And there you might be able to So, it's an alarm system that comes up into the door. You might be able
148to take components of it and reuse in a renovation. The actual like bars that go across, they will be customized to the doors there. So, may or may not, but the alarm system itself is potentially, especially if we continue to use, you know, one source and the camera systems there that we we could potentially use that over. Yeah. the contact switches, the switch box, everything that goes with the alarm system. So, I guess we'll open this up to discussion for all of you if there's anything that we don't have on this list that you're looking for um or if you have different feelings on priorities or or anything um along that. Where's the LMS? Uh yes, we got clarity on that. That is um I I changed the wording on it because Yeah, it's a
149refinish. It's not a te it up and redo type of thing. We were Yeah, we were incorrect in how we were describing that last meeting. That's not That was not refinishing for $2,200. Yep. So, you mentioned that there's some stuff that's all by the same vendor with these quotes. Separate. I was going to say they're quoted separately, not combined. Correct. Okay. So, we get it by one one job at a time. Yeah. Um I mean, their labor is part of it, right? So you're going to see a potentially a little bit additional cost because if they're doing this thing and then doing that at the same time, you know, they're not gonna they're going to do it at the same time. Like if they're up in this panel rewiring, right? Um so it could be
150a little bit cheaper packaged together than separate. But the quotes are by individuals think typically I see that where like their trucks are already there, their tools are already there, right? They it's already planned. You'll see something like a 10 to 12% efficiency just because they don't have to move people around. Um, one thing, sorry I meant to mention this before we go too far on this. One of the things we added, and Jen is the one who suggested this. Um, I kind of like the idea the more that I've sat on it. So, it's it's line number 20 here. So, there's a law going through, a bill going through right now that could um end up banning cell phones in schools, right? And then it will be up to school districts on how you
151go about ensuring that law is followed. So, um, that's going to be tricky, right? like to to to make and we don't know what the final bill is going to look like and there's a lot of variables there. Um so but if if it does become a law or even if it doesn't become a law, it's not the worst idea to entertain banning cell phones in our schools u particularly at the middle school level where they they can create some some issues uh from time to time. So Jen, uh yonder pouches are kind of the most common things that people you may have heard about them, but they're very very expensive. um these yonder pouches. So, Jen found um these cell phone cabinets. If you click on the quote, it will take you um to
152the website that kind of shows you it should take you there. It goes to a picture of them um and what they they kind of look like. And uh I kind of like this idea. So, the model would be, you know, they're in their first period class, their home room, right? They put it in there. Next, you want me to Yeah, come on up. Next one. Um so, cell phones have been a huge problem at the middle school. Um the entire time, the entire time I've been there, um we started with off and away. Uh then we went to off and on your person. But what we see happening still at this point is cell phones are a huge distraction. If we want our test scores to improve, our kids have to be in classes.
153and the number of minutes and times and kids that are going on a steady parade to the bathrooms all day every day and going every period. And it's not to use the bathroom. It's to go make Tik Toks. It's to go play a game on their phone. It's to go sit in the toilet and see the glow coming from behind the screen because they're playing a game in the bathroom. They're making Snapchats. They're texting to get picked up because they don't want to be in school at that moment in time. What we want to do is kind of help to mitigate that and to help give them a reason to be in classes. I've talked to Pella Middle School who instituted the yonder pouches this past school year. They said the kids are happier. There's
154less bullying. There's less teasing. There's less issues. There's it's just kids are in school and they're there to learn. We all survived school without a cell phone on our person. Every classroom has a phone in it. If there was if there was an emergency, there is that phone for that use and that purpose. The teachers would have access to the cell phone cabinet should there need to be an emergency to access that. The kids could get it during the day if there was an emergency, but I would really love to see us try something else because often away isn't working. Um, we can say it, we can do it, but every time I see a kid and their pocket is glowing or they're walking to the bathroom, some of the teachers have them put them
155on the desk. That's not secure. It's not safe. I've seen in other districts where they take the cheapo pocket charts and hang it on the board, but that first pocket chart that falls off the wall, there's thousands of dollars in cell phones that are smashed on the ground. And we just don't want that to happen. We want the kids devices to be secure and safe. When they come in next year, all four grades are going to have their Chromebooks on the cart so that they're charged and ready for working and learning. um and they'll put their phone in their phone in the um cabinet, take their Chromebook, and at the end of the day, they'll put the Chromebook back in and they'll take their phone and they'll be all set. Yeah. So, we're trying to
156think if this becomes a law, how do we do it? And this was an interesting idea. I would not advise doing this at the high school level um because there's a different uh really just purpose for cell phones with the older students. Some of them legitimately need their phones on them because they're getting updates from work, like if their hours change for work or they're supposed to in theory be more mature and handle the responsibility of a cell phone a little bit differently. Um where I would not advocate taking this type of step um for high school age students because of just the um different different maturity level for that group. But I think this could be a creative solution for that that middle school age tier. Um so the proposal there the quote is
157for 30 of these. So, one for each classroom um at at LMS um that they're bigger. You can fit 36 phones in them. There won't be 36 on any given time, but um it's it's secure and it sounds like there could be a nice system in place. So, this is something just think about as that law kind of progresses. I as a school administrator have been really like how are we going to how are we going to follow this law? How do how we how can we show we're taking it seriously in doing this? So this could be a very tangible way to show that we take that bill seriously, that law seriously, and these are kind of the action steps we put in place to try to kind of enforce it. The yonder you
158get the burner phones that go in there in a bag and Yeah. So at B, they did the thing. This is a high school, different age, right? They did the shoe rack on on part of the door and that's exactly what happened is a kid would put like an old iPod that looks like a phone in the shoe horn and keep their actual cell phone like on on them themselves and stuff like that. So you got to be conscious of those type of things but um you can only do so much. I mean well that's the thing I mean you can only enforce so much but um so that's an idea uh to kind of kind of help with that. to give you the price differential for the Yonder pouch is it's about 30 bucks
159a phone versus this isund 132 $152 for the full case. Yeah, it's a little about 5,500 when you factor in shipping and stuff like that. So, just an idea. So, amazing given that the pouches are literally just sewn pouches, but I'm looking at Well, there are the RFID pouches blockers. The the Yonder pouches have the RFID blocker so it blocks the signal. They also have a whole list of phone-f free spaces including workplace hospital. Can you imagine going to a hotel? They're like, "Put your phone in this." I'm gonna tell you, I've I've been to Broadway shows where you have to put your phones in those couches because they don't want you to record. Um, do you think that uh I mean, not that it's a it's a socialization thing, but do you think that
160parents are going to be upset by that? I think they are. Um, but I think it's a battle worth fighting. Again, thinking about the amount of time kids are out of classes right now, I can tell you we have had an off and away policy that is in our handbook for three years at least. Do we enforce it? We when we get it, they have to turn it in the office. They have to have parents come to pick it up if it's more than two times. Yes, we enforce it. But at the same token, kids are always going to find a workaround. kids are not I'm going to say we've had a huge uptick and have been working with Mrs. Chambers um on the number of kids that text to route around going to the
161school nurse to get dismissed. Come get me. I don't want to be here. I got a math test next period. Come pick me up. Well, that's not a good healthy strategy for kids to learn how to deal with anxiety and coping with life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. we have to help support them through that versus just I'm coming to get you. Your question is spot on. It's a controversial topic, right? Some parents for safety reasons, right? If there's an emergency at school, they want their kids to have a phone for not that they work in the buildings because of the blocks anyways, but whatever. But I look, I I think it's just one of those things we have to think through and be mindful of as we make decisions here. I do think
162the trend has shifted where I would say even I would say precoid um and immediately after COVID on the return if you said you were going to take the phones away from the kids you were going to get a significant push back from from families and I say that I feel like that has changed like there's a reason it's a bipartisan bill right like there there is a lot of studies now showing how phones are hurting kids in schools right and hurting their learning hurting their ability to handle challenging situations um being just a distraction, how it schools that implement something significant such as a yonder patch or something see major declines in in bullying and harassment and and uh increases in academic success. So I do think there's enough data out there where I'm
163not saying every parent's going to be thrilled about it, but I think more and more people are understanding um that they are causing issues in school and we need to take more proactive steps to prevent them. And and there would always be workarounds for a case by case basis. For example, if there was a student who needed their cell phone for a diabetic monitor, insulin monitor. Yep. And you you know, part of it is the education. We talk about the high school age, you know, and you look at the progression over the four years. Like um I've definitely observed where the phone is a legitimate tool in the classroom, right? Like, you know, they're in an AP physics class and they're doing an experiment and they're measuring um time or something like that and they're
164using their phone, right, as part of that component because that's what they're going to do in the world, you know, in the real world and stuff like that. But that's an education piece that should come along with cell phones as well that we're showing students the the appropriate times, modeling the appropriate times of doing that and and the the pieces for it. So, but middle school, I mean, so so in terms of incumbrances, is there anything on the from the board that uh is clearly just a non-starter or anything from the board perspective that you expect to see that you don't see? Uh, I mean, I think the I know that you you rank these in terms of severity, but I know the removal of the ropes course is pretty much a like we I
165mean, obviously, we got to see what the quote is, but I think we're pretty determined to get that done, right? Yeah. And we budgeted money in our budget for next year. Yeah. So I think my only question is that and again we won't know for certain what our fund balance is until we get a little bit closer and we have an idea but you don't know for sure. Um I see you know amongst the level one and the level two and then it seems to go in the highest dollar amount to the lowest dollar amount. I think maybe that's fine for category one because those are all safety needs. But if we start to get down to it in category two, if it's is this order the order you're thinking or would you move like
166something that's $2,700 up y even though it's Yeah. I don't know. So that's my only question is like if we start to get down to it and we're trying to figure out what's higher priority um you know again like I said level ones are all fine or grouping things. Yeah. I just want to understand them a little bit. Yeah, we can we can uh provide that because that is definitely true. Like I with some of these uh relatively cheaper things um I would value more than maybe something else even though they're in the same kind of subcategory and stuff like that. I trust your guys's judgment when it comes to this stuff. So, if you're telling me that you think it's more important to have the $600 LMS refinish the stage floor compared to the
167carpet replacement or, you know, whatever, and not that you want to compare, but if what's what what do you guys think are more important, you know, between you and the admin team, I would I would trust your judgment on. Yeah. Like, for example, in that priority twos, again, I these are all priorities. I don't want to minimize it, but like agree. Honestly, I think probably of that sublist, the most important thing, and Dan, jump in, would be the room divider, even though it's not the most expensive thing. Like, if you look at something you need in your building next year, having that that room room divider. The room divider the classroom. Yeah. Right. So, those things are just kind of understanding. Yeah, that's Yeah. Yeah. That should be built into the budget rotation anyway. But
168yes. Yeah. Um, but otherwise, no, there's nothing on here that jumps out at me as being a hard no. And there's, you know, again, just to paste on the amount of money that's going to be left over to make the decisions on the rest. Okay. All right. Well, more to come uh at our next meeting where we'll certainly go through these. I would anticipate going through them one by one and taking board action. Just quickly on the cell phone thing, does this just encourage watch use at that point? Like is this just going to move it from every kid has a cell phone to every kid now has a watch? Many of the policies address that as well with the watch as we go in the cabinet. Okay. All right. I just I'm again thinking
169as a parent in terms of if I'm want my kid to be able to contact me even though you're saying they shouldn't and I'm the parent, I'm going to give them a watch then and then are we going to move into, you know, where does it there's a ring now, isn't there? I don't even know like where does it all stop? This is a brain implant, right? I don't know about you guys with younger kids, but my second grade daughter legitimately asked me the other day when she's getting her phone and I I laughed at her. But like I think she asked because she has friends who are getting phones like and I to each their own. But just I my daughter will never have a cell phon my second grade my second grade daughter
170has asked for a cell phone and now an iPad. Well, let's uh let's keep it moving here. So uh Dr. Taylor, you're up for curriculum. All right. So, um grants update. Um there's been a lot of um things happening obviously with um the state of where everything is up at the federal level in terms of changes with the federal department of ed. So, um our grant allocations have been really tied up. We keep getting that we'll get them, we'll get them, we'll get them. We signed the general asurances finally, but we still have yet to get our ESSA allocate preliminary allocations. Um the IDA allocations did come out um last week there. A couple weeks ago. No, it was last like last Friday. It was last Friday. Oh, yeah. Like late in the afternoon. They're
171like, "Oh, here you go." Um so, um we need to do the consolidated app. We got everybody has an extension to July 1st, but um we can't do it without the ESSA um consol the ESSA preliminary allocations. We're just waiting in limbo, but we should be getting in the next couple weeks. So they said so hopefully we'll get that so we can get that consolidated app done by July 1st. Um and things have been going actually really well in terms of grant spending. Um the 2324 title 2 grant still had quite a bit of money left and we had to get that spent down by September 30th. I have it spent down to 170 bucks by now. Um which is really good. So um it was funny. I was talking to the title 2 person
172at the state and she's like this is awesome. Like you know you're really spending. I'm like yeah we're really we don't leave money on the table ever. So um it's going good. Um but we're just waiting for those allocations. Um and once we get them, we'll update you um when we have them. Um so just a quick CIA update. There's been a lot as you guys have known throughout the year happening in the CIA world. Um the learning outcomes task force actually just we pushed out our first deliverable and it was a brand new committee. I commend all of the people on it and all the work that they did really digging into figuring out where we needed to focus our concentrations and the committee focused on assessment. Um, and we really dug into the
173depth of knowledge portions because that's really where it starts. Um, and so the first deliverable that went out the beginning of this week was a kind of a do refresher infographic which came out really cool. We want to patent it. Sarah is on that committee, too. Um, because it looks really cool. Um, and we're hoping that it will help people just kind of think more about their questioning. Um, and not just their assignments, but what kinds of questions they're asking and what kinds of tasks they're asking students to do. Um, we're going to be doing more on that next year. So we already have a plan starting at the very beginning of the year to continue in that work which is really great. So again, thank you to the um members of that task force.
174Um, last Thursday at 3:00 I think I like fell on the floor because we finished I finished the ninth vertical alignment meeting of the year um for the content for every single content area. It was amazing. Great work. And I was like, "All right, I am wellversed in all content area standards now." Um, which is fantastic. But I had amazing meetings with all of the content areas. We dug into a lot. Everybody is level set in understanding of what is happening and where we're going and all of that kind of stuff. So, um, we can really capitalize and keep moving forward as we move into the f into next year. Um, this summer or at the end of this month actually, I'm doing a full day training of UFly with K to2 teachers, special ed,
175whoever signed up to come because it's obviously after school lets out. Um, and then I have two days with math and ELA, two days with social studies and science, and there's several teachers that have signed up to do that, um, vertical alignment work. We didn't get enough UA subject subsections to sign up to hold a full day for UA. So, um, we're going to continue that in a different light, but just kind of a an overhaul of what has been going on in the CIA world. It's been really good. Um, I did just quickly put together some preliminary data. I'm not going to go into all of it with the SAS because the windows still open until the 6th, so the end of the week. Most of our students have done have finished um and
176don't need the makeup. But I was happy to see that overall we are up a little bit in math, we're up a little bit in ELA, and we are even in science overall. So, when I put all the overall district data together, nothing went down. We went up. So, that's yay to everyone. Good job. I'm excited. Um, and I'll dig into more of that because again, it's just preliminary to look at that. Um, so that's the CIA update. Um, the DLS update. The DLS job description is linked. Um, and when I came here and I started meeting with Karen and her and I had started working on things together and we've done so throughout the year and we really started to think more about this position and what this position is and what this position
177should be and could be. And through lots of conversations, I talked with Brian, we talked with Holly, we talked with Chris, I talked with Karen. There's been a lot of conversations on how do we leverage this position more than it's not just tech integration. It's really curriculum because right now, as we all know, a lot of our curriculum comes through a device, right? And if it doesn't like how could like the work that she did with kindergarten with Cubetto you guys saw the video and what amazing things these kindergarteners are doing. So there's just been a lot that we have seen that and it got me thinking like I really want to capitalize on this and keep moving forward. So had conversations and we would like to move the DLS position to report to me
178and be in the curriculum department as opposed to be in the technology department. Um and just kind of shift a little bit of the purview and so that we can really continue the momentum in the vertical alignment work in instructional shifts in pedigogy and all of that kind of stuff and not just thinking of the DLS as a part of the techn technology department. Can you set up my projector for me type of thing. So, I made some changes to the um job description. I just did it in suggesting mode. I don't know if you guys can see the suggestions. Can you see them? Oh. Oh, sorry. All right. Let me tell you, let me tell you what they are. Um, so they're minimal in the reports to it just says instead of um the
179school principal under director of technology it she would report to me the director of curriculum instruction and assessment and then under visionary leader um performing other tasks or and assumed everything is basically instead of reports to the um Oh, did you just the first Yeah, I'm doing it right now. I'm doing it right now. Don't worry. Give me a second. went away. Give me a second. It's just give me a second. Okay, it's coming. You're going to know where all the changes are cuz he's because they're that they're that um so I'll just keep going. So, it just says so collaborates with administrators and teachers to use technology within the curriculum. We added within the curriculum because we're really going to keep going through that this is curriculum that and it's instruction and it's assessment.
180How do students take their assessments on the computer? And when um I was talking more with Karen, I'm implementing a brand new literacy foundation program in K to2 uh which is UFly which I've talked about and what is where do the teachers get all their stuff on the computer all the slide decks everything. and I'm creating a digital binder. And I was like, "Oh my gosh, I could have Karen create the digital binder and she could go in and teach the teachers how to use the digital binder so that I can teach the teachers about the actual program and can and focus on that part of it. So, um, that's what we would like to propose to change kind of her change the DLS from being part of the tech department to being part of
181the curriculum department and reporting to me. So, if you go click on it, I just bolded the changes and they're very minimal in the big things. And it is just as Sarah said, um, it is really chance changing who this position reports to from an evaluation standpoint. So, uh, Dr. Taylor or the director of curriculum instruction assessment would be, um, the primary evaluator rather than director of technology. There would still be a lot of involvement with the technology department. It's not like this person's not going to work in the technology department. Yeah, we I talked to Chris and we have already planned that we're going to meet the three of us three times a month so that we can make sure everybody's on the same page because Chris and I have talked a lot about
182needing to align things too because people will come to him to for some software and then he'll be like um should we be using this software for curriculum you know so there's it's all integrated together. Yeah. So just update real quick so you can see the suggestions. Um the bolded italics italics is the change um or the slight addition to what it is. There's about four lines here that four areas here that change and three of the four are just changing from director of technology, director of curriculum instruction. Um so much of the position would stay the same. It is just coming down to who is it reporting to and doing the evaluation plan for. So this is a proposed change. We don't have to finalize it tonight. you can obviously think about it. Um,
183but we wanted to put uh make that suggestion tonight. Any thoughts, questions, comments? It's good. No, I'm I'm good with it. I I worry a little about the manpower with technology, but it doesn't sound like this position was I'm just picturing the chart that Chris had for us back at budget time where he's like, "This is how many people I have and this is how many an average Right. So is this Well, I talked to him before obviously before we did you know we had a conversation and he agreed that this was a better direction cuz she does not support like it stuff that's not the scope of what she does. So it she does more like pushing into classrooms and really supporting in the like if we have software like for example the middle
184school we um purchased Nuzella for them and that's a digital social studies ELA science platform and she was integral in helping teachers understand how to use it how to act how to navigate it how to incorporate it into their instruction as a supplement to what they're doing, etc. So, it wasn't tech focused, it was curriculum focused and instruction. I get it and I and I get the the role. I think the scope difference for me is, you know, the way this role was positioned was Chris needing support, Mr. Jamrog needing support for him to do his day job. And I think the scope, even though the angle is changing, I think the scope of this and what maybe the role's evolved into is different than I think what I expect the role to be. And
185that's what that's what I'm struggling here with. I think that's a valid question and feeling not being here when the position was originally proposed, right? Like I look at the title um digital learning specialist slashtechnology integrator, right? And I think it's the same position. It's just like what part of that slash are you emphasizing? Well, this was the person that was supposed to help with the Chromebooks and and help with, you know, Chris's daytoday job. Is that what this one was? That was my understanding. this position. I thought that the position that he was seeking I thought it was one for each school initially one for each school and then it was two went on the ballot and we only got one. So, but yeah, it's designed her position originally was designed to be someone
186who supports the teachers in how to implement the technology. That's what I fix and bite stuff and and she's not about like, oh, my projector isn't working. How do I fix it? She can, but that's not her role. role is about how do you use that technology tied to the curriculum, right? If if you I actually I sent it in to the board earlier, but it didn't make correspondence tonight. We did a and this was unrelated because I didn't even know it was on the agenda tonight, but we did a survey for Karen as part of our lit team in our building. So, she works with Amy Provenel and Kate Kramer and our lit team travels around and there was a survey that went out to all of our teachers about how they use Kieran.
187And you'll see some of the quotes that are in there are about having her support the curriculum or ideas using technology within the curriculum to increase the rigor and increase that value. So, it's what she does now. Now, now to put it in perspective how this helps Chris because I think that's a valid like way to go about this. The director of technology role in different school districts is is very different, right? There are some director of technologies that are very involved in the educational component of integrating the technology into what's going on in the classrooms, right? Like that's where their specialty and background might be. That is not Chris's background of like he was not a teacher at any point, you know? He's a tech guy. He knows how to do the wiring. He
188knows how to make the system more efficient. he does those type of things. So I do think Karen helps with that aspect of that larger role of technology that she's an expert in terms of how does the technology benefit the curriculum where in some school districts the director of technology is responsible for that type of work as well. So she is taking that off of Chris's plate from that technology director seat. I do think in general Chris continues to need more support. Wasn't another position though? Like I thought he was asking for a different position. He I would assume cuz he has brought Well, we put on the ballot. Well, we I don't Did we take it off when it was all said and done? But we had the network administrator that we talked about
189at length about putting on as a warrant article um earlier this year that would provide different support than even this role. Security that security type. He talked about a I thought that he was looking for No, not that. No, he's looking for another looking for someone like like another like true just IT person. I thought he asked for that my first year, my first budget year. He did. I'm assuming he asked for a tech assistant to get a group. Well, not being here at those conversations, maybe this was this person can do some of that work. um wouldn't be shocked if that was part of the conversation that happened at the time, you know, and reading this job description when I read it cuz you know, Holly and Brian, they were like, "Do we need
190to change anything in the job description?" All I added was again was the within the curriculum. Like this was the a job description that was I'm not opposed, don't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to aligning the the job description to the role that the individual, right, is playing. I'm not I'm not opposed to that. My my again my hesitation and my concern is hey does Chris still have the support that he needs? I don't think regardless of this change Chris is going to have the same support that he's had this year. Yeah. I don't think Chris is going to I don't think his support changes. Is this role in repurposing even on paper repurposing the the the spirit of this role is it is it taking away now a position that was intended to
191be for his support? I this is what the position was described as. This is the original job description. Now whether the whatever the intent was I cannot speak of and whatever was told to you guys to sell this position I cannot and I know that sounds super no that it was always put that as it's connected to tech but this is the leverage person. This is the person that goes into schools and leverages the technology to to get used not on necessarily the tech side but on the learning side. Um so if you remember we talked about how um all the programs now have a tech component. This person goes out and leverages that to get it into the classroom. Whereas you have your tech team that deals with the bits and the bites in
192the in the boxes. You know, they purchase the best ones. They deploy them and then we needed the person to leverage it for learning. And that's was the gap that we filled with the digital learning specialist. We called it a tech integrator back then with the intention of that leverage point and then the state came in and actually changed the title for certification to the digital learning specialist position. That's the change. Yeah. Can we just think about it until Of course. Of course. That's why we just wanted to to Sorry you guys couldn't see the No, no, no. And again, it doesn't sound like there was that many changes. I just want to wrap my head around the purpose. We'll put it back on the agenda for next. Yeah. Yeah. Please. Yeah. Y and if
193it's a no, that's okay. Like it's it's it it's not that big of a deal. Again, if it's what you guys are recommending, just me understanding. Yeah. Yeah. Um All right. Public minutes. Anything else from Corpion? No, I'm good. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, public minutes for May 21st. Has everyone had an opportunity to review the minutes? I'll make a motion to approve them. Motion by Mr. Shoemaker. Second. Second by Mr. Dit. Good night, everyone. Good night. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed. Obstained. That carries 40. All right. Now we have new business and we have some policy discussion but not first read. No. So this isn't policy. This is uh I want to wet your appetites a little bit because we have um uh some things have come
194up over the spring. Nothing bad. Nothing bad. This is not bad. But we're going to have new procedures. I'm going all I know. But there's not any proposals. So, like I don't want you to think that we're coming in to radically change the high school overnight or in June, late June, trying to propose all these changes, but I think we need to start having some discussions related to policies and procedures related to some different grading assessment things at the high school. This is not being critical of certain practices. Some of these things are just because things have changed. For example, the link right there is policy IKF, which is our current high school graduation requirements. We need to update that because the ED 306s have changed. So that needs to change if we're going to
195go through the process of updating that policy so it's in alignment with the 306s and some of these are seat some literally surmatic stuff because for example the requirement now is specifically digital lit um um personal finance that's the one I'm I'm in my head. So we need to state that in the policy that personal finance is a requirement because of the updated AD306s. But if we're going to go and have some changes to this, it's worthwhile to have a discussion if there is other changes we want to look at these type of policies for. So, for example, high school graduation requirements. And I'm not proposing I want to make this crystal clear. None of what I'm about to say is an official proposal. We would need to put teams together, involve different different stakeholders
196and everything like that. But if we wanted to tweak our high school graduation requirements to more closely align with something such as a New Hampshire scholars program, which is a state accepted um set of courses that prepares kids for um both professional and college um post-secary plans and stuff like that, maybe we want to tweak this so it more aligns with that state scholar program. That could be something we have discussions about. that could potentially add, you know, um, for example, the state scholars requirement is, uh, four credits of mathematics or math experiences, right? So, something in here that highlights that type of maybe suggestion. We want to discuss that. I'm not saying we're going to do that, but those are the type of discussions we're going to start having. So, I want to put
197this on the board's radar that as we bring a new administration in, as specifically me, I'm a high school guy. as I get more comfortable in year two, this might be stuff that we start really diving into to go from a different thing with um than the the graduation requirements. I linked the student handbook in there. And there's lots of stuff here. I'm not going to go through every single line of every part of the student handbook, but this will obviously be part of um Jen's work is reviewing this and updating for for the fall and stuff like that. And in terms of the academics, we have our grade scale in here, for example, right? And they're they're weighted grades where the college prep is you know, starts at a 4.0 for the A and
198I'll use A as the standard here, right? That honors is a 4.5 and then the AP weight is a 5.0. If I was to ask you as a board and I'm not putting you on the spot, why is it a 0.5 increase? Why is that the metric we use to increase that weight by? Why is a half letter grade used? But it's not a half letter grade. Okay? Right? Because think about that grade scale there.33s that shift everything, right? Like an A is a 4.0, an A minus is a 3.67, a B+ is a 3.33, but a B is a is a 3.0, right? So what is the logic? They're not equally split. Now, if the logic is we're basing it on the AP weight is going to be a 1.0 from that. Great. But
199we don't articulate that and no one could explain that to me. So, we need to discuss these type of things and make sure that we're comfortable with with these type of changes and these weights and everything like that. This is not a proposal to change that right away. This not a proposal to do away with rated grades or anything along that, but we need to articulate the reasoning on why we're making some of the decisions that we're making here. I think um because questions come up from families about why we make certain decisions on why an AP course is weighted. Why does my student have to take an AP exam to receive that that AP weight? Those type of questions and we need to articulate that either by policy officially because there's not policies connected
200to there or a little bit more clearly in how we do our student handbooks and of that type of nature. So that's work we have to dive in with with our high school teams. Again, I'm not here to tell you that we're proposing radical changes to any of this stuff. Some of this might be read just affirming the work that we do um and making sure we're comfortable about it. But just to give you that grade weight thing as an example at Timberland where I was, this is committed to policy. You can go look it up. They were.33 increases, right? The college prep was a 4.0. The weight for the honors class was a the A was a 4.33 and the AP weight was a 4.67. So there was consistency across the grid in both
201directions. A.33 jump up and down like when you looked at that and that was the logic they used for that set of weighted grades. We do not have to follow that logic. That's not what I'm saying. Um but those are conversations we're going to have as we bring in uh new leadership um with with a focus on on kind of assessment practices at the high school and stuff like that. Obviously like our new high school principal to weigh in on all this 100%. So that's, you know, we've talked about this already a little bit as she's been kind of coming on board. That's why there's nothing in here in terms of proposals, but this is going to be discussions happening. I don't want to catch anyone offg guard. If down the road we do have
202policies that we suggest, if there are procedures, you know, when we get to the fall, well, late summer, early fall, when we're looking at um our handbooks and reviewing them with the board and stuff like that, this is the work that's going to be happening over the summer and stuff. And if there are actual changes, there will be lots of discussions, right? Like as an example, I am not advocating for or against this, just like as an example, Bo High School has rolling grades. We have quarter grades here. If we were to propose some sort of change like that, there would be committees. There would be multiple people that would weigh stakeholders that would weigh in on those type of decisions and data representing that if that was something that we're proposing. I'm not proposing
203that at all, but just as a tangible example. So, I wanted to start these discussions with you. One, if there's anything, particularly those who have high school students and are experiencing it, if you have ideas and thoughts about this, we are open, I'm sure you do. We are open to those discussions and uh how we approach these different different practices. Another is our assessment practices with how they break down the summitives and the formatives and the percentage breakdowns. I believe it's the 85 and the We have strong opinions on that as well. So I know I'm sure you do. I also have thoughts on this as year one as we do too. There's been a lot that we just Yeah. As year one ends and the the era of observing kind of concludes and now
204action is going to start unfolding like we have to be transparent and open in these conversations and and talk about some things. There will be things that we reaffirm because we do a great job of and there will be things that we need to evolve on and and and change at all the schools, but we're talking high school at this exact moment. So, I want to kind of throw that out there. We're open to the feedback and suggestions on how this is when Jen officially comes on board here when she wraps up all our responsibilities at Sandborn and we transition here fully. I would not be shocked if she seeks out input from specifically high school families. Grading and assessment is a a strength of hers and a passion of hers. So, I have a
205feeling she's jumping right into this with two feet and looking at some some different things. So, yeah. And I think working with Val Nelson, our director of counseling, will be huge in terms of understanding historical perspective as well. You, you know, the why we do what we do and what that reason is. And yeah, and I think a question came up, I don't want to talk too ter out of turn, but I believe it came to the board itself. So, I feel like it's it's okay to bring this question up. um is that uh you can only receive the AP weight is if you take the AP exams. So So why is that? That's not something I've experienced in other schools. Someone explained the logic to me and I could see that perspective. Um but
206we don't have that in in in a policy. It's in the handbook, but it's not in the policy, right? Like and that's something as a board I feel like you I don't know if you wait in at a time. Maybe you did, maybe you didn't. Um but like let's reaffirm that if that's forward as part of the handbook changes and it was one of the ones you know when we asked them to this a couple years ago they highlight every area that they're changing and outline why and there was a lot of students who were not taking the AP exam and were only taking the class to get the bump. Yep. Um and then not taking the AP exam and the purpose of it is generally to take the exam. Yeah. And so talking through
207those type of things, right? Because those questions come up. It came from a good place. the issue was resolved easily, right? We evolved. Not going to get into all the details of specific situation, but we took care of it. It was fine. Um, and uh, but that's something that that even if we refresh ourselves every once in a while and why we make these decisions, it's it's good for us because I do understand that logic. There was a uh, at the as you just explained, right, we wanted to get more buy in on the students to take the exam. The curriculum of the course is preparing you to take that exam. That is the point of an AP course. um and therefore we want investment and buyin from the students to take it. That is
208not a universal rule at every school. Every school's approached that differently, right? Um particularly if an AP course is a dual enrollment course, there's a different set of parameters that come into that, right? But starting to have those conversations and being all on the same page with it all. So, so this is more just like uh a preview of things to come and we are open to all feedback and suggestions from all that have opinions and something we're going to be diving. Just as a reminder to the administration, we only have one meeting in July. Yeah. Yeah. No, I don't think we're because you know I mean you know that's a good question and uh No, it's not the answer. No, because the answer is you don't because anything that would be a significant proposed
209change is going to take time to really like digest into it. If we are more articulate in our explanations in the student of handbook on why we do some things, that's not something that necessarily needs a standalone meeting. If we all of a sudden are going to propose unweing all the courses, that's going to be six months of dialogue and multiple meetings committee. Again, I'm not proposing that. That's not what I'm proposing. But if it's something, yeah, if it's something significant of that, um, you know, there's going to be extensive work towards it. But I do in the effort of transparency want to identify that we want to examine some of these practices and we are going to be doing the work and and you might hear it constantly over the next school year like
210with little tiny updates as we progress through some of these things right like we focus on this part of assessment maybe it's the summit of informative thing I think that's the thing most universally people want us to look at both inside the building and outside the building right back midterms and finals that's another thing we talked talked about just me and Jen did, you know, b no that was me and you talked about briefly today is um what that would look like if we were reintroducing uh midterm and final format at the high school. I have not had that conversation with Jen yet. So um but those type of things is we're focusing kind of going to be focusing that on more. So just to kind of wet your appetite a little bit on it.
211Sounds good. Thanks for the sneak preview. Yeah. And I I and in complete transparency, I sit on the the board for New Hampshire scholars. So when I promote it, I do have some bias to it. I think it's a wonderful program um and uh a really powerful program that helps prepares kids. I just want to say that out loud so people know that I am biased towards that. So when I say aligning with it, that comes from bias. So uh next up, old business and we have GMS RFP update. Yeah. So um you know, we had the the pre-bid meeting Dan um attended yesterday as well. So weigh in at any point. Uh I think we you know we worry is anyone gonna show up? Uh so you know you just have that concern. Uh
212but it was great. We had 11 people um at the meeting last night um beyond us um representing nine different firms um as part of the the pre-bid meeting. Uh we went over kind of an overview of the project with everybody um and what are uh what we're looking for through this bid process. We did a tour of the elementary school with all the different parties and then came back at the library to do um some questions, but people were asking questions as we were walking around the tour and stuff like that. I feel like everyone who was there was invested because everyone was asking questions, you know, whether they end up bidding on the project. That's ultimately um their decisions, right? Um but you definitely felt people were invested in being part of that
213meeting and not just going through the motions because their firm sent them or something like that, you know. Um so I thought it was a good process. People asked some good questions. um about what we're looking for in our in our bids and uh we felt really good at the end of that meeting that um you know we'll have we'll have some bids to to entertain you know when when the window closes. I don't know if you what you want to add Dan. No I honestly I was surprised that nine firms showed up you know just from my Google search I thought there was like six um that might so uh I'm glad that nine firms showed up. One of the things that I kind of highlighted was three of them mentioned a pre-construction manager
214from their firm. So, not just working with, you know, our person talks to every position start on their side. It's a point-to-point contact of you have a lead on our side, they have a lead on their side. They run down all of the subs, they run down all of the bidding, they run down all of the contracts and the design and and that way. And that's what I'm used to seeing. So that that I was glad people mentioned it. I was glad that you know it was actually three of them. Three question asked questions about it. Two basically said I I would recommend that this would be a part of our of our offering. So I was encouraged to see that as well. I thought we were going to hire Kay for that. I haven't
215met her yet. I just seen if you were paying attention. Um, I heard uh because I I was really hoping to get there, but I could not get out of work. Um, but I did talk to Dan Mitchell. He indicated that three of those firms were firms that bid on the last project. Yep. Um, and a fourth that was going to but didn't because they had um honestly as some sort of death in the firm that prevented them from bidding in it. So, um, and uh, so yeah, exactly. So there's some repeat people who were here before and stuff. I also heard that you had a lot of good input with them because like there was a lot of dialogue that your expertise very appreciate that that was there. Yeah. Thank you for that. I
216don't know what the content was, but I'm glad that Yeah. And I I didn't think it was anything out of the ordinary. I mean, they were just impressed that someone from the community like before I was elected the school board, someone from the community who's been involved for going on a year to talk about the project from a community perspective. Um there was I mean honest why am I involved? Why am I invested and what was my background as to make me relevant to the conversations. Um but then a lot of it was just heading off um other questions so that way Dan just wasn't bombarded by 11 people asking him questions. So, and it was great because you have some of the technical knowledge that um we just don't have the same depth of,
217right? Like um like that pre-construction manager question, you know, we both turn to you because we were just like, "Yeah, we think that's good." And then when you're like, "Yes, that's good." It's like, "Yes, okay, good. We were right." Yeah. Because it essentially it's that or they come out with an estimator, right? So then you get a guy that's at somewhere at the firm that's going to go, "Well, that's going to be roughly this. That's going to be roughly this." which essentially we've got that with on-site insight. Yeah. Um and Kyle Barker did it at some level for us as a faith of goodwill as well. So it's just we we want someone that can help manage the firm and the responses from the firm. We don't want to try to take that on. We
218don't have the time or the ability to. I understand the question is timeline. Was there any talk uh amongst the We outlined the timeline that we were hoping to get this in and we acknowledge it's a tight timeline, but that didn't no one seemed to give it any pause per se. We didn't get any questions along it like we What is the timeline that was communicated? Um the one that we went over at the board meeting with the March 2026 is kind of the the goal of putting this on the ballot. Um and then going backwards from there when we need to put a bond kind of proposal in all the way back to like this bid needs to be in the July 3rd. we get into that agreement work over the summer um about
219fine-tuning going back and forth on different plans and different ideas for this for in the fall bringing a proposal to the board um in terms of what the project would look like and stuff like that. No one gave us any questions around the timeline um or there weren't any initial facial reactions that we were crazy with that sort of timeline. Um, we'll see how they're I think we have a two-eek window where they can ask questions of us before that closes, right? Um, so we'll see if we get any follow-up questions, but we haven't gotten anything originally. So, we'll it is a tight window. We acknowledge that with them. Um, but it seemed like something that could be not just could, but you know, people seem comfortable with delivering on that timeline. So, yeah, it's
220good to The only questions that I got is what do we mean by 50% state drawings? Yeah. Um I it's different in different industries, right? So a lot of it is, you know, the way that I phrased it was we need a good enough design set to say your number will not exceed this without like applicable inflation rates and stuff like that. Um and it seemed like people understood what that meant. Yeah. Yeah. because that, you know, just from the most recent project watching the bow one, they had that number and then when they were actually, you know, ahead, right? They weren't spending as much as they thought they could go back to their list and add some of the things because they were not approaching their do not exceed number. They were actually less
221than what they were projecting. I mean, that was a great scenario for them. I'm not saying that's where we're going to be, but that would be wonderful if we're we're continuing to be under that number. So, and and we definitely mentioned like we want an open conversation. This isn't we send you a series of files. Go give me a design and a plan, right? We want the conversation back and forth. We want I mean late night phone calls. I mean, I know it's all going to be an hourly charge relatively, but it's we would rather have that and get it done right and get it done the first time than have to go back again and again and again. And we stress that that we we want transparency with our public and we want to
222make the best use of our facilities coupled with the financial needs coupled with the engine uh educational needs. Right? So for simplicity sake for this discussion right now a renovation project exclusive to GMS versus a renovation project that results in reconfiguration of the schools. We want to have dialogue around those kind of options that we're making sure that for the community we're making the right decision when putting all those variables and factors together and people seem to understand that that's what we were looking for. There was a follow-up question, you know, a couple follow-up questions about that. Good questions about using LMS. You know, we were like, "Nope, you're not touching LMS. That's the high school that that would be the one that is in question here." and and um and they good a good
223question was asked if you're going down that road should we factor in um other upgrades or fixes that you would need at the high school and we used the roof as an example right because it's meeting the end of life expectancy and we explained you know we have our capital reserve funds that we're starting to put money away from to address those things so this project's not necessarily addressing those this is to solve GMS issues and if we utilize Campbell as part of that solution we do but it's not to address Campbell structure AL issues and stuff. So, good good questions, good um dialogue. So, right. So, this will be on the agenda for July 3rd for our meetings July 9th in July. Um the bids are due on July 3rd. So, um that's the
224Thursday before the 4th obviously and then we'll have the bids for the board to review as part of that July 9th meeting and obviously part of the agenda we send out um for that meeting. So, do we have another meeting in June for the board? For school board. Yes, on the 18th. 18th. Um, time flies. Uh, I probably should have called schoolboard comments before the GMS update, but the time is now 8:12, so I'll open it up for our second round of school of uh I'm sorry, uh, community input. I'm saying school comment, but community input. So, I'll open around uh second round of community input this evening. Running to the microphone right now. Hey, I just want to acknowledge it's 8 p.m. All right, I'll close our second round of community input and uh
225now I'll move into schoolboard comments. The only thing that um that I'll make a comment on and Matt and I for the history of the FIC that we've been involved have been kind of pretty aligned on this. I really do think we need to start investigating into a PR firm to help get what we're doing with GMS and the work that we've done out there. We tried to do it through previous means and it hasn't worked. I think we really need and and I would also say that should probably start now soon like now. um to help us get the message out there, get highlight all the work that we're doing, show the transparency, help take on some of the stuff and yada yada yada, all that stuff. But that that's something that I think
226we we should be trying to approach. Yeah, that's what we ran we really kind of ran short on that at the last one. And actually being involved previously, there was someone that was hired to do that on the last project. And my because I was dealing with that person directly a lot. My impression was that that person was essentially just looking for a community member to go out there and do it. Like we definitely need a like an actual firm that will actually develop a strategy, develop the content. uh we can't do another Lichfield special where we're trying to like find community members who can volunteer their time for that. I mean and this could be something of they see something posted on, you know, the WhatsApp page. They link appropriate real information, right? So
227we they can help quell the rumors. This could be getting the mailers out. This could be doing community outreach and surveys and, you know, group surveys. So where it's not a school board member going out, it's not a committee member that's associated with the school board and that type of stuff. They can reach the community in ways that the schools potentially don't have. I get the I get the importance of having the marketing and the PR behind it. I kind of feel like it's a waste of money. My my initial reaction, people already know about this project. It's not but it's it's not about knowing. It's it's about it just it's the the rumors and everything. It just all turns up like the second you get a new thing on the table. It's like, well,
228they didn't look at this or well, they did, you know, and it's it became because I was trying to do a lot of it and it just was not it's I can't do it, right? Like as a I think I feel like the community is already very passionate about this topic, right? We've sent out communitywide surveys. We've done that, right? The town was very vocal when it was on the ballot. Um, like people know that this is out there. We've been very transparent that our plan is to go back in March of 2026 with another option to the voters. Right? So, I think there's already an understanding that we're doing our due diligence. We've put together an FIC of cross representation of of a collective of town. Like I I feel like we've done that.
229So I I can tell you before I even got involved with the FIC when all those nine different options, I had no clue that nine different options were looked at before the GMS new GMS building was sent out. Well, I can't help you with that. I mean I mean but even if I go to your stool even if I went to the GMS website, I couldn't find it. Yeah. So can we get a quote? I mean is that I mean we did Well, I think we could ask around and see what different districts have done for different projects, right? Yeah. just the one I live in, the one I work worked in, right? In bow, we never did any PR for the projects, but they also kind of knew the projects were going to pass,
230right? And so all anything that was done was in house. Some flyers were done, some basic stuff, some videos were made, but it was all in-house employees kind of doing it where I'm assuming from the how polished it was when Windom went through their major renovations to to their school facilities. I don't know this factually, but that was not just some school personnel putting some stuff together out that they must have. I mean, I will confirm that, but there had to have been a PR firm involved in that that thing. It's different district, different project. There was multiple schools, you know. So, um we can definitely look around and ask around other districts that have done um these type of level projects and the level of PR that they PR firms or PR people that
231they brought on board to do it and what the cost estimates were that to get an idea. Uh because I I hear both both sides of this kind of argument. We've been talking about this exhaustively even in my year of being here and I feel like people are very aware of what is going on and we've been very transparent. I feel like we have an update about it almost every board meeting of some capacity, right? What percentage of people watch the board meetings? Yeah. Yeah. Or read the minutes and all of that. But at the same time, like um there is value in PR sometimes, you know, and putting out a structured plan even if it's a consultant who helps us create the structured plan of do this at this time because this I'm going
232to be honest with you though, it's the it's also the doing it. It's too much. like it's too much for us. Too much for you, right? But like is there a way that we can not you I don't mean that. No, no, you mean us, right? Like having other jobs but also can we utilize the people in our like Rene is great at stuff like one of just as an example, right? Very organized, does a nice job at putting things together, has a passion for for making things look nice and presentable. I mean that as a real positive, you know, um can we utilize her in that capacity in a way and and give her some focus on on specifically this project, right? Um is there other people in our district who have um some
233some ability to help us with these type of things? I don't know. But like maybe that's what we want to ask. So I guess maybe PR firm is the wrong way to frame this, right? I think we are going to need help to help stop the rumor mill because it just takes off especially on the we're going to have that but I mean just someone that can that their job part-time right is to go through the different avenues of social media and say hey you know what that's not right here's the link to what they're doing and here's the link in the information as of last month what the plan is and how they're doing it. Yeah. And that's what I mean maybe we can utilize some of our people. So with Renee who runs
234the social media account for the district, like the Facebook page, I don't think I don't have Facebook, so I've literally never even seen it to be honest except when she spins her computer around to show me something, right? Um and uh she will from time to time, I'm not saying it's a regular thing all day long, but if someone does make a comment on a post and it's not accurate, she will respond. Right. and with corrected information and usually in a very pleasant sunny demeanor if you've ever met Renee. But um and that can be where we utilize her who has a a strength because of what she's done previously professionally, you know, to to leverage her in a way to do some of those things is to be more on the prowl for um
235negative information. and then not even negative but incorrect information and providing school district approved information that responds to those type of type of um comments or or misinformation that's out there and stuff like that but I think it's worth you know point taken yeah 100% more to come that's your patented saying more to come more to come um all right just comments from my side I'd like just to congratulate all the graduates right and all close with a plan moving on to the next chapter uh whatever that chapter is. Uh congratulations on behalf of the board and uh yeah and thank you to all the district administration as you uh as you work uh together to close out the remainder of this school year. So well done. Yeah. And great job with your first year
236here. You guys It's not over yet. Don't a lot can go wrong in the next three weeks. So knock on All right. I'm going. All right. With that, we'll move into manifests. Uh, so this is the manifest from May 21st, 2025. We have a payroll manifest for $422,924.71. We have the voluntary 403b deductions that was uh that was signed for $244,77171.14. Uh we held the LSSA dues for $496.58. Uh, and then we have four accounts payable manifests. One for $28,899.33, another for $21,710.99, a third for $75,99146, and the final accounts payable for $40,840.33. And that wraps up the manifest that was signed on May 21st. Uh and with that, that closes our public session this evening. Uh we do have some business in non-public this evening uh as a board under RSA 913 matters uh
237or specifically A and C. Uh and with that, I will do a roll call vote to move into non. I'll make a motion for it first. Motion first. Second. Motion by Mr. Shoemaker, second by Miss Ames. Roll call vote. Mr. Shoemaker. I am an I. I. And Mr. I. That carries four zero. We are now in nonpublic. Thank you very much.