You
Good evening, it is six o'clock, I am calling to order the regular board meeting.
Of Tuesday, August 18th, Mrs. Schope, may we have a roll call, please.
Yes.
Carol Fox.
Here.
Tom Hankins.
Here.
Bill Johnson.
Here.
Meghan Miller.
Present.
Joanne Ruhl.
Here.
Ann Schuch.
Here.
And Tia Johnson.
Here.
All members are present.
Thank you.
Can I get an approval of the agenda and I am requesting with this that we move item six K as in kayak to six A and move everything else just down. And the reason for that is this is we have a guest that is in person tonight and rather than keeping people waiting.
People waiting, then we can have that person beat early on.
Second.
Is that emotional?
I'll move that.
Sure.
I'll move.
I'll second.
Motion by Megan Miller, seconded by Tom Hankins.
Mrs. Schope, did you get that?
I just need to know where you were moving it to.
We're moving it to the top of the board action discussion items.
Okay.
Should letter A.
Okay.
Thank you.
Any other questions or comments?
All in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Motion carries unanimously.
Would anyone like to lead us tonight in the Pledge of Allegiance?
Oh, Dan, please.
Board Member Schoof.
I pledge allegiance 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.
Thank you, Mr. Schoof.
Good evening and thank you for joining us tonight and for your continued interest in
and support of the school district of Bloy.
Since our last regular board meeting on July 21st, the board and administration have been
busy preparing for the rapidly approaching start of the school year.
Board members continue to participate in district and community activities and remain
engaged in planning for the future of our district.
The board was invited to attend the graduation ceremony for the Bloy Memorial Summer School.
This year, five students completed their requirements and graduated.
It was wonderful to see their families and district staff come together to celebrate this
important achievement.
We congratulate these students and wish them every success as they take their next steps.
Board members were also invited to attend the second Harvest Food Bank Roundtable held
last Thursday at the Bloy Public Library.
Vice President Fox and I attended the meeting where several local and regional food service
organizations discussed ways to improve the process and efficiency of getting food from
organizations to the people who need it.
It is heartening to see so many individuals and organizations working together to support
the health and well-being of our neighbors and especially our students.
The school district of Bloy provides breakfast and lunch to all students.
However, we recognize that some of our students and families may need additional support with
food during weekends, holidays and other times when meals are not available.
The Board of Education is grateful to the many community partners who are working to help
meet this need and strengthen the support network available to our families.
The Board also has been meeting every Monday primarily to discuss a potential referendum
and long-range planning for the district.
These conversations are important as we consider both our immediate financial challenges
and the long-term sustainability of the school district of Bloy.
Yesterday the governance committee met and discussed several items including the current
Board meeting cadence, superintendent evaluation tools and the timeline for establishing district
goals.
The committee also discussed a proposal to add two positions to policy 143, official board
representatives.
The positions being a City of Bloy governmental representative and a Rock County government
representative.
The intent of these positions would be to help the Board stay informed about current issues
and proposed actions that could affect the school district while also creating opportunities
for collaboration and partnerships.
These representatives would not serve on the City Council or the Rock County Board of Supervisors.
Rather, they would serve as liaisons between the Board of Education and those governmental
communities helping strengthen communication and coordination between our organizations.
Finally, Board members are invited to attend the Wisconsin Association of School Boards
Fall Regional Meeting.
Our region, region 13, will meet on Tuesday, October 27th.
There is also an optional pre-meeting workshop, Wisconsin's Open Meeting Laws, Understanding
and Navigating Closed Session.
This should be a valuable opportunity for Board members to strengthen our understanding
and our responsibilities under Wisconsin's Open Meetings Laws.
As we approach the start of another school year, I appreciate the continued work of our
Board, our administrators, staff, families and community partners.
Together, we are making steady progress and continuing to build momentum for our students
and our community.
That concludes my report.
Thank you.
Next, we have upcoming events and announcements, Board Clerk Miller.
Thank you so much.
Good evening.
So these are the announcements for Tuesday, August 18th on August 21st.
Jacobson Field will be officially renamed Jacobson Field at Heineke Stadium.
This dedication is in honor of Bloitte Memorial High School's legendary head football coach,
John Heineke, and will take place at halftime of Bloitte's non-conference season opener
this Friday.
There is also a back-to-school tailgate from 4 to 6 p.m., and kickoff is at 7 p.m.
The 2026-2027 school year will begin on September 1st, 4 grades 4k, kindergarten, 6 and 9,
and on September 2nd for all other grades.
The reason for this is so the kids have a day to get acclimated, just FYI.
All students must be registered before they start.
Registration is now available through Skyward Family Access.
Any parent needing assistance may contact the attending school or call the Central Enrollment Office
at 608-361-4171.
It says we are excited to announce that Bloitte Memorial High School
and the Southern Lakes Conference will have partnered with Bound,
a comprehensive athletic activities and facilities management platform
that will serve as your one-stop resource for everything athletics.
There is a hyperlinked thingy attached, which I believe is uploaded to board docs,
so you can click on it, but I can't click on it while I'm talking.
The district website serves as a resource for all other areas, so you can visit us at our website.
The meetings that are coming up and being held here at the Colac Education Center include
Monday, August 31st.
There's a policy meeting at 3 p.m. Tuesday, September 1st.
There is a Business Operations Finance and HR meeting at 5 p.m.
And the Teaching Learning Equity and People Services Committee meeting is scheduled to start at 5.30
or immediately following the 5 p.m. meeting, whichever is later.
Lastly, Tuesday, September 15th will be our next regular board meeting, which will begin at 6 p.m.,
and this concludes the announcements for tonight.
Thank you, Board Clerk Miller.
Next, we have recognitions.
Tonight, we are honored to have Community Action Incorporated here to receive a recognition.
The purpose of recognitions are to recognize and honor staff, students, community members,
and partners for their outstanding achievement goals or service.
Tonight, we would like to thank Community Action for being a great partner in the annual Community Health Fair at Bloyant Memorial High School.
This year, unfortunately, I was out of town, so I was not able to attend, so I'm going to turn this over to Superintendent Dr. Gordon
to share with us her experience and the recognition.
All right, tonight, we are proud to recognize Lexi Tintleman and the Community Action Group as a whole.
They put on an amazing health fair for us this year in partnership with the School District of Bloyant.
I think this was our fourth year, right?
And I think it was the best year yet.
It was so organized, well attended, even though it was pouring rain for the majority of the morning, people stood out in line.
It was huge.
So many fun activities for our families.
Just, it was a great morning for everybody.
We had, like, backpacks were amazing.
Kids were waiting for the bounce house.
Free haircuts.
It was just, it was a truly amazing event, so I appreciate all of the work that you put into that.
Our school board appreciates that.
Our school district appreciates that, and it's just such a great partnership that we have with you, and we truly appreciate the collaborative effort in working with you and your organization.
And we look forward to continuing that partnership with you, so thank you so much.
Thank you very much.
This gentleman, there's a microphone there if you would like to say anything.
We'd love to hear from you as well.
Thank you for attending.
Good evening, everybody.
Thank you so much for this recognition.
I would like to highlight that I also have Andrew Gohner with me.
He has been a rock star, ensuring that everything runs smoothly, so I deeply appreciate him and all of our committee members.
On behalf of the entire Back to School Community Health Fair Committee, I just wanted to say my sincere thank you for this recognition tonight.
It is truly an honor, and I'm grateful to accept on behalf of the organizations, volunteers, businesses, foundations, community members,
and the partners who helped to make the event possible.
This Back to School Community Health Fair was created with a simple goal.
It's to ensure that families can begin the school year with their resources, support, and the confidence that they need to succeed.
Thanks to the incredible community-wide effort, we were able to provide the event for completely free to the families in need.
This year's event exceeded expectations, so we did distribute just under a thousand backpacks filled with school supplies to students preparing for the new school year.
Nearly 30 vendors also joined us to share valuable education, health, and community resources to families.
Local officials, including the Deloitte City Manager, State Senator Mark Spritzer, and State Representative Clinton Anderson,
attended to show their support.
In addition to the school supplies, we were proud to provide direct services to improve those barriers to children.
We received more, we gave out more than 70 haircuts to children and families that day.
We also provided important health services, including dental, vision, and mental health screenings.
The day also featured food, games, and friendly activities with live performances.
One of the most encouraging outcomes was seeing that families across all regions participated.
So I did want to highlight while many attendees were from the school district of Beloitte.
We also welcomed participants from Janesville, Whitewater, Clinton, South Beloitte, or Fredville, Rockford, Rockton, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Lincoln Academy,
Rising Phoenix, and several other communities.
So it's not just Beloitte-wide, we are helping several other communities within our region every year.
And we've succeeded and grown so over the year we track this data, and we are excited to always share that we have more every year.
This level of participation demonstrates both the need of these services and the power of the community collaboration that is shown each year.
Events like these are important, and they all happen because of organizations willing to work together for a common goal.
I guess at about 30 organizations we're in attendance this year, and I would just like to extend a special thank you to the school district
for their continued partnership and support for every year.
The commitment goes for way far beyond just the classroom and your willingness to collaborate with us,
so making sure that we can strengthen the community efforts.
With that being said, thank you again for this recognition partnership, and thank you for the wonderful time of being here tonight.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
We so appreciate working with the community action and all of the good things that they are doing.
Apparently not just for us, but for people in Green Bay.
That's awesome.
Thank you.
Next up we have public comment.
Are there any public comments tonight?
Okay, and do you know if we have any online public comments?
There were no e-mails.
Okay.
Short, sweet.
Good evening.
Oh.
Are you the public comment?
I am.
Oh, okay.
I need to read this before you.
Oh, okay.
Just jump.
Members of the public are welcome to attend all open meetings of the Board of Education.
Individuals attending board meetings are expected to conduct themselves in a respectful and courteous manner that models appropriate behavior for our students.
Individuals wishing to comment are expected to comply with the norms found on the back of your comment cards and in board policy 187 public participation at board meetings.
We ask that each of you contribute to maintaining a respectful and orderly meeting and prevent discussing confidential matters in a public forum by following these norms for public comments during board meetings.
Thank you for your participation and courtesy.
Lisa?
No.
Sorry.
Good evening.
It's been a bit nice to see you all.
One of the commitments that we made when we embarked on this journey to do this pilot project with you was that our team would try to assist in helping the community understand the work that was being done.
So I'm here to share with you all and community members that might be watching my appreciation to the teams at Gaston and Converse for the work that they've been doing.
To the principals at both schools, Benji Klet and Fonda Lewis.
Thank you.
Both leaders as well as their leadership teams have been working closely with Michael Sonbert throughout the summer to position themselves to implement the skyrocket model at the start of the school year.
The work is behind the scenes and could go largely unnoticed.
My goal tonight is to make sure that it doesn't.
To the staff at both schools who spent last week, all of last week, working very hard a week of their summer immersed in skyrocket training.
Thank you.
Thank you for showing up for being open, vulnerable and courageous.
Your willingness to lean in was nothing short of inspirational.
My goal.
I know there's a long road in front of us, but I ended last week very hopeful.
To Dr. Gordon and Ryan Stengel, thank you for your leadership and your openness.
We're building a strong partnership as the backbone of this work.
We know how much you have on your plate, so truly appreciate you making room for this work as well.
To the BEA, thank you for your willingness to meet with us both prior to and after the training last week in order to structure a proactive partnership.
It matters.
I clearly recognize this is a marathon, not a sprint, and we are just getting started, but to the community.
I want you to know that there are teams in these schools working very hard to improve outcomes for kids.
Please give them your support.
Thank you.
Next up is the superintendent report.
All right.
Good evening, board president and members of the board.
As we prepare to begin another school year, I want to take a few moments tonight to share an update on the work taking place across the district and more importantly, the work that lies ahead.
There is a great deal happening at once, but much of it is connected by one central focus preparing the school district of a light for a strong start to the school year.
While also thoughtfully planning for a sustainable and successful future.
One of the most important areas of focus continues to be on our long range planning.
As we have discussed, the district is facing significant financial challenges, declining enrollment, and the need to right size our operations and facilities to better reflect the number of students we serve.
At the same time, we have an opportunity to think intentionally about what we want the future of the school district to look like.
Over the past several weeks, I have appreciated the opportunity to meet individually with board members to hear your perspectives and ideas.
These conversations have been extremely valuable.
Each board member brings a unique perspective, but there are also common themes emerging around the importance of creating a district that is financially sustainable, provides high quality learning environments and gives our students and families reasons to choose the school district of a light.
The conversations have included thoughts about our facilities, programming, enrollment, and the possibilities surrounding a future referendum.
We are beginning to take those individual ideas and identify areas of alignment that can help guide our long range planning.
This work will not be easy, and there will be difficult decisions ahead.
However, I believe it is important that we approach this work thoughtfully, transparently, and with a clear focus on what is best for students and the long term health of our district.
Facilities and financial planning continue to be an important part of this work.
We are awaiting the closing on the sale of right, and we will continue to monitor the financial impact and opportunities associated with the transition.
In addition, Stephanie and I will be meeting with Mike Marquette to begin looking more closely at the financial numbers associated with Colac.
And as we consider the future footprint of the district, we need to have a clear understanding of our assets, our costs, and the financial implications of maintaining, consolidating, selling, or repurposing facilities.
These conversations are part of a much larger picture.
We cannot separate our facilities decisions from our financial realities, our enrollment trends, or our educational vision.
All of these pieces must come together as we develop our responsible long range plan.
Our goal should be to create a district that is appropriately sized, financially sustainable, and capable of providing our students with the programs, opportunities, and learning environments they deserve.
Last week, we also continued important work directly in our schools.
Michael from Skyrockett spent time working with the staffs at Gaston and Converse.
The focus of this work was on strengthening the foundational routines, procedures, systems, and expectations that are necessary to create consistent and sustainable learning environments.
A major component of that work centered around identifying what must be non-negotiable.
Strong schools are built on consistent expectations, not only for students, but also for the adults who serve them.
The feedback from staff was very positive.
Many shared that they were excited about the work and described it as an opportunity to go back to basics, while also raising expectations for both staff and students.
I believe this work is important because before we can build upon excellence, we must first ensure that our foundation is strong.
Clear routines, consistent systems, and high expectations create the conditions that allow teaching and learning to thrive.
I am appreciative of the staffs at Gaston and Converse for their engagement and willingness to embrace this work.
This week, we are welcoming our new members of the School District of Delight family through our new staff orientation.
This is always an exciting time because we have the opportunity to welcome new teachers and staff members who have chosen Delight as a place where they want to begin or to continue their professional journey.
During orientation, our new staff will have the opportunity to meet key district leaders and staff, learn about district expectations, and begin building the relationships that will support them throughout the year.
As we welcome new employees, it is also important that we remember the orientation is about more than providing information.
It is our opportunity to communicate who we are, what we value, and what it means to serve the students and families of the School District of Delight.
We want every new staff member to understand that they are joining a district that is committed to our students, committed to continuous improvement, and committed to working together to create the best possible outcomes for every child.
This Friday will also be a special moment for our district and our community as we come together for the dedication honoring Coach Heineke.
The dedication is an opportunity to recognize an individual whose contributions have made a lasting impact and celebrate an important part of the history and tradition of our School District.
The evening will also mark the beginning of the 2026 Beloit Memorial High School season.
Events like these remind us of the importance of schools beyond the classroom.
Our schools bring together students, families, alumni, staff, and community members.
They create traditions, memories, pride, and a sense of belonging.
I look forward to seeing our Purple Night community come together on Friday evening to celebrate this dedication and to support our students as they begin our season.
Finally, across the district, there is tremendous amount of work taking place to prepare for the opening of school.
Our administrators, teachers, custodians, secretaries, support staff, and district departments are all working to ensure that our buildings are ready for classrooms, and our classrooms are prepared, and our staff members have what they need for a successful start.
There are countless details involved in opening a school year, and much of that work happens behind the scenes.
Buildings are being cleaned and prepared, classrooms are being organized, schedules are being finalized, staff members are participating in training and professional learning,
systems and procedures are being reviewed.
This work is a reminder that opening a school year is truly a district-wide effort.
As we move closer to welcoming our students back, I want to thank everyone who has worked throughout the summer to prepare for their arrival.
The start of a new school year brings energy, excitement, and a renewed sense of purpose.
While we have significant work ahead of us related to our long-range future, our financial sustainability and the configuration of our district,
we must also remain focused on the students who will walk through the doors in the coming days.
They deserve our very best, not only as we plan for tomorrow, but every single day in the classrooms, schools, and programs we operate today.
I'm looking forward to the year ahead and continuing the important work of building a stronger, more sustainable, and student-centered school district of LA. Thank you.
Thank you, Dr. Gordon. Next, we have the Policy Committee report, Policy Chair Foxx.
Thank you. The Policy Committee has been busy, and we're getting busier.
We met on Monday, August 3rd, and we reviewed several policies.
We spent the majority of our time discussing and revising the policy regarding student use of personal electronic devices.
i.e. cell phones and other devices.
That policy was approved to move to the full board for the first reading, and that is on the agenda for this evening, and will be discussed later.
Two policies, one regarding the requests of funds directly from the board, and one about student-adult boundaries were discussed,
but the committee requested that Ms. Elwood and Ms. Almonderes do some further work on these.
Those came back to our next meeting, which was yesterday, Monday, August 17th at 3 o'clock.
Ms. Almonderes presented her work on Policy 528, the Adult Student Boundaries, and she has worked on 528 and added a 528.1 rules to coordinate with that.
That was passed from committee to a first reading of the full board, which will come up sometime in the future.
Ms. Elwoode presented policies 623 as the best place to put the additional statement about requesting funds from the board,
and she made a couple of other minor adjustments to that policy.
We also approved that policy to come to a first reading to the board.
Our next meeting will be on Monday, August 31st.
It's a little adjustment of the calendar so that the policy meeting and the other board meetings are on the same week.
So, thank you.
Thank you, Policy Chair Foxx.
Next, we have Business Operations, Finance, and Human Resources Committee Report.
Chair Hinkins.
Thank you so much.
At that last meeting, I was on vacation and we had a little technological issue getting my Wi-Fi to coincide up here.
So, I asked my Vice Chair, Dan Shuf, to handle the meeting, so I'll ask him to do the report tonight.
Thank you.
Yep.
So, I chaired the Business Operations Finance HR meeting on August 4th.
Stephanie's End of Year Finance Report was we will take that up next time.
The end of the year closing in a normal way takes a couple more weeks, so at our next meeting we'll take up the monthly finances and the end of the year close out.
Dr. Gordon, let us on a discussion of we're going to schedule some building walkthroughs.
And once the semester gets underway, I get a chance to welcome and community members to our buildings, some sort of open house.
Please stay tuned, we're working on that.
We also got our first briefing on a phone system issue that's coming up, the VoIP phone system.
We're going to hear more in upcoming meetings and Stephanie and her team are working hard to try to minimize that expensive possible, but at some point we need an operating phone system that's supported by the vendors for safety and normal use.
So, we'll hear more of that in the future.
We also move forward a purchase for our Blackboard communications platform that'll come up today.
And we also, of course, reviewed the personnel recommendations exhibit A, which is on the calendar today for everyone to see.
And that's my report. So, thank you.
Thank you, Vice Chair Shuf.
Next, we have Teaching Learning Equity and Pupil Services.
Chair Roo.
Yes, thank you.
So, the Teaching Learning and Equity Committee met last Tuesday.
We discussed several important areas related to student support and instructional practices.
We discussed using grant funding to add positions that will directly support students and staff.
Proposed positions include two positions to support staff in addressing appropriate school behaviors and student needs.
Pair of professionals to provide additional support for early literacy and reestablishing the district's Teaching Intern Program, which was in place for many years.
And the Teaching Intern Program is especially meaningful to me because I participated in it many years ago.
I saw firsthand how it provided valuable classroom experience while helping Beloit develop, recruit, and retain talented instructors.
Reestablishing this program would be a positive investment in both our future teachers and our district.
As we continue to learn more about technology and how it affects our children, the district is taking a thoughtful, age-appropriate approach and setting clear limits on technology use in our classrooms.
Students will continue to engage in hands-on developmentally appropriate learning, including reading physical books, practicing writing, using paper and pencils,
and building mathematical understanding through the use of manipulatives and other hands-on activities.
Technology will be used as a tool to enhance learning rather than replace these important foundational experiences.
This looks like 4K having no devices at all.
5K through second grade technology will be limited to foundational skills, including IXL, tutoring through open literacy and keyboarding practice beginning in second grade.
Use will be limited to 30 minutes or less per day.
Third through fifth grade students will continue these activities and begin using library databases for research,
as well as technology for some formative and summative assessments.
Use will be limited to 60 minutes per day or less.
At the elementary level, there are no digital worksheets.
For middle school students begin transitioning toward greater responsibility for their tech use.
Devices may be used for up to 100 minutes across all curricular areas.
In high school students will have greater access and responsibility with taking at their devices home.
Devices will be sent home only in high school.
Middle school and high school students will not have any access to non-educational platforms.
So this approach allows us to use technology when it genuinely supports learning while preserving the importance of books,
handwriting, hands-on mathematics, face-to-face instruction, and other developmentally appropriate learning experiences.
The committee also received an update on the CLC grant.
Unfortunately, we learned there will be budget reductions this year.
We will need to continue monitoring the impact of these reductions and consider how they may affect programming and services moving forward.
Overall, the committee continues to focus on thoughtful student-centered decisions that support learning, strengthen our staff,
and use available resources responsibly.
Our next meeting will be Tuesday, September 1st.
Thank you, Chair Roo.
Next, we've got the legislative update, legislative liaison, Shuf.
Yeah, thank you. I have a quick update.
So as you know, the August primaries are behind us, and both parties have picked their candidates for governor.
Milwaukee County Executive David Crawley will face off against United States Congressman Tom Tiffany,
and the general election, if you're counting, is 77 days away.
We just urge all residents of the school district as you decide and get ready to vote in November 3rd,
that we encourage everyone to listen and learn the different candidates' stance on public education.
That funding formula that you'll hear a lot about is drives to great degree what we can do here in Deloitte.
So pay attention to that.
We'll also be watching what proposals come out of those candidates, legislative leaders, advocacy groups, the state superintendent's office.
And then I just want to, back to my previous days, working for the state.
This calendar is really fast. The elections in November, the governor transition literally begins the next day,
and that governor, whichever governor is selected, has to present a budget the last Tuesday in January.
So this happens really fast. It's likely to include education policy in there and funding formula reform.
So it's a tight window, and we, as this district, others interested parties will stay engaged in this process
as we work to have a more equitable system that can fund the school district of Deloitte.
So thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Shuf.
Our first board action discussion item tonight is open literacy.
The purpose of this is to approve the use of Title I funds for the purpose of purchasing 60 open literacy tutoring seats at the second elementary school.
Dr. Gordon.
Yeah, thank you.
So we know that we have accepted the Hendricks Family Foundation grant for one elementary school,
and we had two elementary schools that were kind of competing for that grant.
Both of them were so interested. It was very hard for the foundation to decide which one.
So they have gifted us the opportunity to have both schools participate in that opportunity.
So that was a little redundant there. But anyway, we are being gifted skyrocket to the second school.
That is a huge offering. And the caveat to that is that we would agree to pay for open literacy for the three years that skyrocket would be in the school.
With that comes some incentives for teachers, a lot of training, which Lisa talked about when she was at the podium.
Our staff was engaged in a whole week last week of skyrocket training, which was fantastic.
But open literacy and skyrocket are two separate things.
But they connect to each other because you have to have solid systems and structures to make solid learning happen.
So open literacy is virtual literacy tutoring for students in grades one through three.
Students are tutored 25 minutes, four times a week.
And the literacy skills are very targeted for each child, differentiated for each child.
The focus is on word reading, comprehension, fluency, and vocabulary.
The tutors are certified teachers or retired teachers, so they are very well versed in working with the children.
This opportunity is something that I was able to watch when I took a tour in Milwaukee.
And it was just amazing watching kids interact with their tutor one-on-one through the Chromebook.
The kids wear the headphones, they have a microphone on their computer, and they just work one-on-one with the tutor.
They are building a relationship with their tutor, they have the same tutor every day for the whole year, so it's remarkable.
And the tutoring sessions are fluid, meaning that once a student does not need the tutoring anymore, or if the student moves away, somebody else can take that tutoring spot.
Again, it's 60 tutoring slots in the building.
And the tutoring sessions do not have to be designated 21st grade, 21st second grade, 24th grade.
The building is able to set up those tutoring sessions for where the greatest needs are, so they've been able to work on that designation over the summer to decide where the greatest benefit is going to be.
A kid who kind of ended the year in that struggling area of reading, so it's being very well vetted out through the intervention staff, the literacy coach, as well as the classroom teachers and the building principals.
So they have really put in a lot of time and effort in that.
While Dr. Anderson was still here, we started working on this project with Lisa, and Michael and Sarah, Michael's from Skyracket, Sarah's from Open Literacy.
And Dr. Anderson was very much for us going ahead with this and using some of our title funds to fund the Open Literacy portion of what we would need
to make this work for the second school.
So with that being said, we are looking to approve the cost of the Open Literacy tutoring for the second school in the district here.
Thank you.
Did Ms. Forceth or Dr. Stingle want to add anything to what's already been shared?
Okay.
Do board members have any questions or comments?
Megan Miller.
Thank you so much.
I wanted to just in the spirit of transparency, I asked Dr. Gordon earlier because I heard some feedback from community members when this was last brought up with the two schools.
So I just wanted to address her answer, and the question was just, you know, is there an opportunity cost essentially to like, how would we have used these title funds?
And I'm definitely assured of this based on the amazing work that Dr. Gordon and her team have been doing all summer with us.
It's very much meets the prioritized use of what those title funds would be used for anyway, and which, again, not surprised to hear, but very happy to hear.
And so certainly like, you know, a wise use of resources from the district and I'll just iterate again.
I'm just so thrilled at everybody's flexibility and just like sustained focus from all parties and like best meeting the needs of our kids because that's really what this is for.
And I know that's a ton of work and a ton of data analysis and expertise that goes into making sure that that's happening at our buildings and also in partnership with, you know, these organizations.
So I just wanted to like kind of highlight that and just express my gratitude.
So thank you.
Vice President Fox.
I certainly have no objections. I'm just kind of wondering why we're limiting it to Title 1, perhaps, because I would think maybe AGR allows for tutoring that AGR might be another opportunity or, you know, some other things.
So I don't know that we need to actually limit it to whatever source the district feels is appropriate.
It was simply because of the tutoring piece.
Tutoring is allowed under AGR. That's correct.
I mean, we can look at the other fun too, but this was the designation under Dr. Anderson's guidance.
Yeah.
And like I said, I have no absolutely no objection to it.
I just don't want to tie your hands to one grant money.
It might be more appropriate to use the other one.
Any other board member questions or comments?
Hearing none, I am seeking a motion to approve using Title 1 funds to support the Open Literacy Program at the second participating school.
This will allow for the 60 tutoring seats.
What did I say?
Oh, Grant.
I'm sorry.
We're going to change that to grant.
So move approval using grant funds to support the Open Literacy Program at the second participating school.
This will allow for 60 tutoring seats in grades one through three.
So moved.
Second.
Motion by, I'm sorry, I missed who made that motion.
Dan Shuf.
And who was the second?
Meghan Miller.
Any other questions or comments on the motion?
Hearing none, all in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Motion carries unanimously.
Again, thank you to the Hendricks Family Foundation for everything that they are doing.
And thank you to our wonderful administrators and superintendent for making this happen.
It is an opportunity that our students will have this year, but we will reap rewards for generations to come.
Our next agenda item is the contract revision for the board consultant's contract.
The purpose of this is to review revisions to the board consultant contract and take action on that.
We met last night in a special board meeting to receive the final changes that were requested.
The revisions of adding the different articles that had been accidentally missed during the copy and pasting of this.
And I will take ownership of that oversight.
Are there any board member comments or questions?
Bill?
Is your hand up?
Oh, anyone else?
I am seeking a motion then to approve the board consultant contract as presented.
I move approval of the board consultant contract.
I'll second.
Motion by Carol Fox, seconded by Tom Hankins.
Any discussion?
Hearing none.
All in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Nay.
Motion carries with one nay.
I don't know if you heard that.
Ms. Schop.
Meghan Miller.
I did.
Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you.
Our next agenda item is the budget update.
We have a budget update from executive director Stephanie Elwood.
Thank you.
I did just want to give a brief update.
I do have some slides here which I'm just going to quickly go through.
But for the budget for 2627, the board did work on approving some reductions.
And those reductions were approved on June 23rd.
And so our team and HR has been working through those reductions to get them to be to match in our system for Skyward.
So there's a lot of behind the scenes work that has to happen to get the final numbers done for October.
So we've been working through these reductions that were approved.
We have not updated the numbers from the last update that we had given.
I think it was in July.
So we are still at the $408,000 deficit.
Knowing that we have cut quite a few positions in the district.
And we have gone through almost all the budgets.
Teaching and learning, people services, all the schools budgets got cut again by 10%.
We're holding the athletics department to what their previous budgets had been.
And we are looking still at other properties to sell and those types of things.
There is not a whole lot of wiggle room anymore in this budget to be honest with you.
We have cut quite a bit in the last three years that I have been here.
And without having additional funding for students and with the decreasing enrollment,
there's not a whole lot more that we can do for 2627.
I would ask that the board allow us a little wiggle room with other post-employment benefits at this point.
We do have still have, I just checked today and the balance right now is sitting at almost $4.7 million.
I'm pretty confident that we're not going to have to use any of that for the 2526 school year.
I still have some finishing entries to make for the previous school year.
But we're getting pretty close now that we need to also start thinking of our timeline for getting the budget approved.
Because we have to have the budget formally approved at the end of October.
And moving back through the timeline, we have to do a preliminary hearing,
some time, I'm sorry, annual budget hearing, some time towards the end of September beginning of October.
And there has to be some public notice that happens and you have to formally approve a preliminary budget.
So we have to do some things here.
Just going back, attached in here also is the memo from July 18th with the details of the budget that we had put together.
Do you have any questions at this point?
I think.
Thank you Director.
Executive Director Elwood.
Do any board members have any questions?
Megan Miller.
Thank you.
And I'm not sure if it's like a board ducts glitch, but I'm so sorry Miss Elwood.
I don't have that attachment on there.
So I apologize for asking you to repeat what you very clearly explained and I just didn't write down.
But could you remind me in case we need to make a motion, which is my second question?
What is the, I guess, like the range of reasonable kind of like wiggle room that you're looking for?
So right now we have with the budget, we're short about $408,000.
Was that 408?
408.
108,000.
However, there are some other things that have come up since the last budget.
We talked about the phone systems, which may be anywhere from.
So can three to $500,000 additional.
Sure.
So what would make you feel comfortable so that like as I know that there's nothing that's going to not make like this stressful.
But if you knew you had like this, like XML that is going to make this workable where you feel like you could in good faith bring us like a budget that is reasonably going to meet the needs of the district while being, obviously, physically responsible in the spirit of what the board has directed us to do.
What would that number or range be?
So realistically, I would like to put another million dollars from open into the budget.
As a caveat, if we do have to do an upgrade to the phone system, or if there are other unintended or unforeseen infrastructure things that need to happen this year.
Because at this point, we're not going to refer on them for 2627, but we're still around and need some wiggle room for some of the things in the budget.
And so my last question and then I'll yield the floor would be just, I'm wondering, would it feel, in your opinion, would it be wisest for us to make a motion to formally say like, you know, the board authorizes the administration to bring forward a preliminary budget with up to this amount from OPEB?
Right.
Or is this just something where you're just coming for an update?
Ms. Miller, if you don't mind, I have requested that we have regular updates included in our agendas.
And that's a wonderful question.
I like the motion, but I would personally would prefer for it to be reserved until we have a board meeting specifically about budgets so we can see all of the details in front of us.
Right now, this is just a snapshot of what's happened in the past month.
No, I really appreciate that clarification. Fully agree. Sounds great. Thank you so much.
And knowing that we have to sit down and make some finalization on the dates to set up for the next month or two.
Bill Johnson.
Yeah, if we do take a million out of the old bed.
Any idea how much interest we lose at that point?
I can get that number for you off the top of my head. I'm not sure.
Yeah.
But realizing to that putting the OPEB dollars into the budget doesn't automatically reduce the funds in the account.
It is contingent about us of us.
Uncing those funds as well.
So if we don't spend the money, we wouldn't remove the money from the OPEB account.
Thank you.
Thank you, Director.
Oh, Board Member Hinkins, Treasurer Hinkins.
Thank you.
And go back to what Tia said, so I won't belabor the subject because this is a preliminary look.
I have many questions, but I know we're in this process and we have a timeline that we have to hone in on.
So these numbers, I appreciate coming forward with these numbers.
Knowing that I go back to my meeting with Leah and we had several options put up there for budget reductions.
So we haven't exhausted some of those yet, so we're still in a preliminary mode, so I won't question.
No, you and those until we go through this process. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Director Elwood.
And thank you, Board Members, for your understanding.
Again, these updates are just a snapshot of what's happened over the past month for us to be well-informed,
but also for our public to be well-informed as well to know what's happening.
Our next update comes from the special education update.
And this is Melissa Beaver.
Melissa Beaver is Executive Director of Pupil Services and Eric Weir, Director of Special Ed and Pupil Services.
Good evening.
Since you received the written update in advance, I'm not going to walk through the entire document tonight,
but rather I will briefly highlight what we have done since the July 15th meeting.
And more importantly, what the implementation of this work looks like moving forward as requested.
As you all know, staff have not yet returned, so the work we have completed has focused on getting the people,
expectations, structures, and professional learning in place so that we can begin implementation with the staff when they return.
There are several things that have already occurred.
First, we reviewed the findings from the evaluation alongside our continuous improvement plan and incorporated this work into that existing plan.
Second, we have restructured the program manager role and are making changes to help Pupil Services Administration supports building administrators.
We are shifting program managers from a primarily administrative support role to a capacity building role focused on implementation,
coaching, collaboration, and consistency across schools.
We rolled those changes out to all administrators during Admin Academy last week, and we have additional professional learning and technical assistance plan for program managers in the fall.
Third, we are onboarding all new special education staff before they begin their work in our buildings.
That onboarding will provide a common foundation around legal requirements, district policies and processes, behavior,
discipline and safety, paperwork and compliance, the IEP process, rules and collaboration, and who to go to when they need support.
This starts tomorrow with day two of new hire orientation and will continue as we hire new staff throughout the year.
For all Pupil Services staff, special ed student services, health staff, our August professional learning is also planned.
We will be level setting expectations around special education compliance and spending time on specially designed instruction.
Least restrictive environment accommodations and modifications, LEA responsibilities, and the restructured program manager role.
We have already begun meeting with our elementary principals to develop a scope and sequence for professional learning for elementary staff, regular ed and special ed.
That work will focus on areas such as culture and climate, behavior, classroom management, student regulation, and creating stronger building level systems for supporting students with complex needs.
We are also developing regular collaboration among our coaches, school psychologists, and program managers to strengthen our multi level system of supports and create greater consistency.
And how we approach intervention, problem solving, and student support across our schools.
And finally, staffing remains a significant part of this work.
We are continuing to work closely with principals and the human resources department on recruitment and staffing alignment.
At this point, we have approximately 17 vacant special education teaching positions and about 25 paraprofessional vacancies.
We are working hard to fill these positions because we know staffing capacity directly affects our ability to consistently implement services and supports for our students.
Some pieces of our plan are already complete and some begin with staff professional learning in a couple of weeks.
Other pieces will continue throughout the year because they involve changes in practice and
building capacity over time.
We will be looking at staff feedback, implementation, consistency across schools and student outcomes to determine what is working and where we need to continue to make adjustments.
So that is where the work stands today.
Thank you, Executive Director Beavers.
Are there any board member questions or comments?
Vice President Pox?
Just wondering the role of the program manager, did you change the job description or did you just, how did you do that?
All job descriptions were updated as a result of positions being cut due to budget.
Okay.
So yes.
Anyone else?
In terms of the vacant special ed positions, and thank you for working with the HR department and
the building principals to work to get those filled, is there anything that else that can be done to help expedite getting those positions filled?
We would need applicants to apply.
Okay.
So I will say this to all listening bodies out there in the virtual world.
If you are interested in a position in special ed and qualified at the school district,
a boy, come on down board member room.
Yeah, my question was similar.
What are we doing to try to recruit more special ed teachers in Paris?
I mean, from our departments, we have relationships with colleges and universities.
So we're trying to create pipelines like that.
A lot of you may remember the UW set program that I was heavily involved with with the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
There are jobs out there on we can.
I would maybe defer to DD to add additional information on what human resources does.
We also send blasts.
We go into we can and search whoever has the appropriate licensure for
the jobs that we are seeking and we send blast emails to anybody who has touched their application within the last six months.
A lot of times we have our own staff coming in and saying, thanks for asking me to apply for a job in the district.
Because so we know they're receiving them, but we're job fairs.
Yep, we have gone to specific job fairs for speech,
like, you know, to get those hard to fill positions.
It's just really the special education teaching positions that we're really struggling to fill.
Board Member Miller.
Thank you.
I think we're all on the same page tonight because I too wrote down a very similar question to what Board President Johnson and Mr.
just asked, but I also as a follow up, I was going to ask this in the next update.
So maybe this is a more appropriate place for that.
Let me know.
Is it within I guess like the scope and capacity of your department to do any like information collecting about like,
you know, what, whether like in like both in a positive way, like, hey, like what caused you to choose us as your district?
Just like to help inform us and whatever policies, processes that we need to look at.
As well as like, maybe as people are leaving or I don't know if there's any other data like people talk about that might inform like any long term or strategic planning that we do.
So we can help systemically remove some barriers or make adjustments or is that more kind of an HR.
I think that's an HR question.
We we don't see that that information.
Got it.
Well, I will hold my question.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, Ms. Beavers and Mr. Weir.
And that's a good place to transition to our HR update.
Good evening.
So today, excuse me, today we had a great honor of literally filling this room with new hires, professional educators, very,
very positive environment, just they're ready to come in and effect some serious changes.
So I'm very excited for those who participated today.
And of course, new high orientation continues for the next couple of days as well.
Our focus during the presentation that HR facilitated is on retention.
It is great to have a room full of new fresh faces.
I would love next year to have maybe the 10 positions that someone retired from be all that we have in that room.
So a very lofty goal.
But again, it's very refreshing to see the new faces and the new energy that is coming in.
And again, just trying to work with them at the first sign of anything that we could be doing different or better for them to reach out to go through the chain of command to allow us the opportunity to make this transition into their new roles here at the district as successful as possible.
Other than that, I did provide you with the latest and greatest ever changing vacancy list.
And I say that because as I was sitting here, we got some new recommendations for hire, which brings down the count.
So again, it's a very fluid count.
The total that we have outstanding currently are 61.
And the primary areas, of course, are the very difficult to fill.
Not just for the school district of Beloit, but throughout the state of special education.
So again, not a reflection in our district, certainly not a reflection in our hiring practices or people services department as much as it is.
We simply do not have as many students going into the profession and then of those that are going into the teaching profession.
Even fewer are going into special education.
So aside from that, we're also shifting our special ed paraprofessionals between buildings and we do this every year.
And the goal is to capture where the students are going, what school and grade level they're going to.
And what the IP minutes are that they require to determine where our paraprofessionals need to be placed to follow the needs of each student.
So we're almost complete with the process of moving the staff to the appropriate location.
Again, to meet the needs of our students.
Other than that, I don't have any other update.
Thank you, Executive Director Almondoress.
Are there any board member questions?
Tom Hankins.
Thank you so much.
To clarify to me, perhaps.
Did I hear you say that we still have 61 vacancies?
Yes.
Okay.
Throughout the district.
Throughout the district, yes, sir.
And the ones that knew hires, so that's not including, that's okay, they're in.
Okay, so my question is going back to last year, all the years we've carried over these positions we've never hired for.
Those are not on this list, right?
No.
If we did that with our budget trim, we're not going to advertise for those.
We just said, okay, we can't hire for those.
So let's, okay.
So the 61 is a true, true number for this year.
Yes, sir.
We still need to be filled.
Absolutely.
We're going to try it.
No, I'm not.
I'm just clarifying it for me.
Right.
That's 61.
And hopefully not carry over into the spring that we still have 50 openings like we've done that for.
Okay, because we've trimmed that on.
Okay, sorry, sir.
Stay here a little bit.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hankins, Vice President Fox.
I have a couple of questions.
Are we using the agency yet or?
Yes.
So those are already, and we've been using that and we still don't have these positions.
I'm wondering, especially with special ed, it's, I know it's a statewide thing.
Are there other districts doing creative things to solve their problem?
Or are there things that we aren't doing that we should be doing that would help that situation at all?
That is an excellent question.
I think other districts are also experiencing the same shortage.
I don't know of any creative approach that they may have, but I can certainly cast a wider net and try to get some insight.
Well, I just wondered to, you know, one of the things that people talk about is salary and whether we need to be, you know, beefing up the special ed teacher's salaries or not.
I don't know if other districts are doing that to be competitive.
So that might be something we certainly needs to be looked into, but we need to discuss.
I do get concerned about the number of special ed pairs that we have, and especially since it seems like most of them are one-on-one pairs.
And I'm wondering if that dynamic could be looked at and changed as well in some ways, or if it's just absolutely necessary to have that many one-on-one aids for our students.
So that's just not a, that I'm not saying anybody's doing anything wrong, or it's a bad thing.
I just worry about it because we have so many, and now we have so many vacancies because then we have these kids that are just not covered.
So, and I think I had something else, but I don't remember what it was.
Well, if you remember, I'll come back to you.
Board Clerk Miller.
Thank you.
Here, I'm going to lower my hand before I forget.
All right.
Thank you so much for the update and the presentation.
I know it's a lot, right?
I mean, it's very complicated.
Employment field like to navigate, and there's all kinds of stuff.
And so in the spirit of helping to inform the board so we can kind of partner in improving systems, just a couple of questions.
One thing would be from your recent and I guess historic experience here, are there any policies or procedures that would have to be amended at the board level that are perhaps creating additional hoops or barriers, whether it's through communication for staff?
And I'll just name one that I've heard people share with me in the past, which is like our drug testing policy because I know the school district of Janesville does not require employees to get drug tests.
I think at some point there's some kind of like, it's also like a huge expense thing, things like that.
You know, yeah, it's extremely expensive practice.
In no way am I advocating that we just like, hey, come on, come on, whatever.
I'm just, I just, if districts, neighboring districts seem to be doing well without some of those pieces.
Is that something that maybe the board should be prioritizing and are there others?
So I would say what takes the longest is in some instances background checks.
So if you have individuals that have lived in multiple municipalities, states, then you have to wait for the information to come back from each of those reporting agencies.
And some are a lot quicker than others with how they present their information.
Like we literally have some municipalities that still have paper files.
So with that being said, the biggest delay oftentimes is the background check.
And are you aware is that something that like we should like, is that something that in the circle of HR school district professionals that I'm sure you're in communication with?
Like, are there other like, you know, vendors or processors or even like timelines that like, again, like, I know the board sets some of these timelines based on like, when are we bringing things to agendas and things like that?
Like, are there any adjustments we can make on our end that you would recommend that would help move that along more quickly for you?
I think the board has been very generous in the past in allowing us to, for example, for new hire orientation since there are no students present to be able to include everyone that is being brought forth to the board so that they can participate and receive the same information.
When school is in session, the board has also allowed us in the past and it's a practice that we've continued as long as they pass the background check, drug screening, all of the pre-employment required features were able to bring them into the school.
For example, teacher as a sub in case the board does not approve their hire, that they get compensated at a sub rate.
But that way it allows them to get into the classroom a lot sooner and allows the two weeks, sometimes three week gap, to not limit them from being in that classroom.
So the board has already been amazing in allowing us to do that.
We actually coincidentally looked at a vendor to do background checks.
Currently, we put forth to Infomart to the DOJ and to another entity that is slipping my mind right now, but we have three different entities that we utilize to vet background checks and that's the same for our staff as it is for our volunteers.
And we're doing it ourselves, which means we are following up and waiting for the results.
So we looked into a vendor, it's a little pricier, so we will look at some other options outside of that and that will help us streamline the process.
But until we take it for a test drive, I don't know if they're going to be quicker than what we've experienced doing it ourselves directly.
So I appreciate that.
And then my last kind of question here and then I'll yield the floor is just kind of along the same lines.
Are there things that you would like in your perfect world, you would like to see that would help maybe streamline communication and other processes?
Because I know there's always a buzz around, oh, well, so and so do you know, I didn't get a thing back until this day.
And that's I'm sure very much the culture, right?
So like ideally to make these processes as smooth as you would like them to be.
I guess there are other things that we need to have on our radar as is, you know, we were looking at looking at a preliminary budget soon and things like that, right?
So staffing is a big deal.
In my perfect world, I would love to be able to have an HRIS that is more intuitive than the HR side of Skyward.
So there's different modules to Skyward.
And so I would love that because we it can service an ATS where you can send out interview invites.
And there's no data entry when you press to hire someone, all of their information that's already entered slides into creating a record for them as an employee.
So they're very intuitive programs out there that I've been able to utilize in the past.
There is a cost associated with everything.
So I would love to be able to calculate what the cost in manpower is because sometimes when we look at vendor pricing,
we tend to forget that if we're spending one employee, you know, 50% of their day manually entering in different systems,
the information, you may have very well paid the per employee per month fee.
So I would love to be able to focus on that and bring that to the board if the board will be able to consider it.
And I also want to bring in different stakeholders to make sure that our desire to do that does not impact their ability to do what they need to do on Skyward.
So that's been a dream of mine since I started here and it may be a little cost prohibitive, but again,
it may pay for itself just as with the background check going to a third party.
Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Chair Roo?
Yes. Thank you.
Okay. So first question.
So these positions are these positions being filled by the temp agency at this time at all?
Or are there additional positions that are being filled by temp employees?
So these are true vacancies that are not being filled by direct hire or third party employees.
And so do you know the number of third party employees that we've hired for this?
I can get that for you. I don't know off the top of my head, but it is a substantial number.
If I had to guess, I would say it's probably close to similar to the number of vacancies if I had to guess.
And of those is the ratio of special ed employees the same with this being over 40 of about 60.
Do you think the special ed numbers look the same for that then?
I would say yes, because we for allied health positions, we do rely heavily on the agency to provide us with the SLPs and Sykes, etc.
And also for the special ed paras, there is a more immediate compensation benefit to them when they go through the agency than when they are hired directly.
And so it's a matter of you want the money now, you want it later.
So some of the perks that we have that we benefit from, they don't have, but then that helps to push their rate a little more than what we offer.
So this is a crisis, right?
That's over 100 people that, I mean, if we're looking at the temp ones as well, we're down over 100 employees.
I think it makes sense to look at that skyward thing if that would help us to move the process along faster since that is one of our hurdles.
So I would love to hear more about that and how much that would cost.
I think this directly impacts our retention of staff too, especially when we don't have our special ed staffing the way it is here.
I know my last year, part of the reason why I'm no longer a district employee that way is because my students, I didn't have the support I needed in my classroom.
I don't think one-on-ones are used as much as one might think.
A lot of times we have paras that are in charge of three or four students.
We move them around the buildings now, we don't keep them with just one student, so I don't think one-on-ones is what people may think it is.
I do know other districts in the area do pay their special ed paras more than their regular ed paras.
Maybe that might be one way to look at it or offering paras options.
I don't know if this is possible, but if they wanted to work less hours, like if they worked 8.30 to 2.30, then they wouldn't be a full-time employee and we wouldn't have to offer them benefits if they would prefer that and we could pay them a little bit more that way too.
This makes me lose breath when I look at it and I think we need to, as much as our budget is a crisis, this is a crisis too, because this affects so many other things to our retention, our students, what they need, behaviors, academics, all of it is related to this as well.
So I think we as a team really need to dig into this.
Thank you.
Any other board member questions or comments?
Well, board member Miller, you and I must be thinking alike tonight because the two questions I had one was on the drug testing.
We do live in a state that is bordering other states where recreational THC usage and medical THC use is legal and I think that's something that we do have to accept that reality.
And so, but the other question I had was retirees.
Do we reach out to retirees to see if any of them may be interested in coming back and helping part-time or whatever they can?
So we do.
We actually want to see about bringing them back as substitutes primarily.
And we did that with a position last year, even part-time to help cover with a retiree.
It's the WRS cap that impacts us because it can only work so many hours or risk not getting their retirement.
But we do reach out to them to at least sub for us and those are opportunities to gauge their desire to continue working at all.
We are successful in some cases, not all.
Sometimes when people are done, they're just done.
But we do keep a list of retirees so that after that honeymoon phase of being retired phases that we can reach out to them and see where they're at then.
Thank you.
So from the sounds of it, I will ask Chair Fox and Chair Hankins to work with you and putting on their future committee meetings issues of looking into drug testing, the third-party background check, the HRES, and salary rates and options to attract para educators.
And the skyward thing.
Yep.
Okay.
Thank you.
Executive Director Almond-Darras.
Thank you.
Next agenda item.
We have review of board meeting cadence.
The purpose of this is board members will discuss how the trial period for the board meeting cadence has been working and whether board members want to keep it this way or go back to the board meeting.
This way or go back to the old way or try something new.
Background information.
We changed this this summer.
Our meeting cadence at the beginning of the summer, we had a different expectation of what the summer would look like.
And as it morphed, we changed our meetings and ended up having at least the last month.
Special board meeting every Monday and one board meeting on the third Tuesday of the month.
And we were at our three month point of what we originally agreed to try.
Yesterday the governance committee discussed this item and the benefits and disadvantages of the current meeting schedules and the previous ones.
The concern was shared that this current cadence has not been used during the school year calendar.
It was the committee's recommendation to continue this cadence on a trial period through the end of the calendar year, December 31st.
Which then would give us a sense of how it works for the school year.
The chair is being able to make minor adjustments as needed and a recommendation to administration to have administrators do a prerecorded video of their presentations and be uploaded prior to the board meetings to give
board members time to view their presentations and hear what they're saying as opposed to just a PowerPoint presentation.
Are there any questions or comments at this time?
Board member Shuf?
Yeah, just briefly.
I wasn't at the governance committee yesterday, so I appreciate the update.
I particularly just want to comment as a new member have really liked the committee meeting day where we can and are encouraged to sit in.
And all the chairs have been great about obviously you're calling on your committee members first, but seeing if other members want to comment, I've learned a lot from the other committees as well.
So I've really thought that'd been helpful and I look forward to participating in the trial cadence through the semester. Thank you.
Joanne Ru.
One of the things I have appreciated about it is that it does make for our regular board meeting to be usually much shorter.
I think tonight the three things that weren't part of a budget or a committee meeting are the three things that have taken up the chunk of the time.
So I think that it just proves our case that doing the work at the committee level helps make this meeting more palatable.
Megan Miller.
Thank you so much.
So I would agree with all the comments that have been shared and in terms of, so one question or I guess suggestion I would have.
I like the recommendations, but it doesn't matter if I like them because I'm not the one that would have to do the work.
So I just as long as I'm fully in support of all of that as long as our administration is like, yeah, that's palatable or we can do.
So as long as we're being flexible and responsive to like whatever works for them, that works for me.
Another thing I'd like to highlight as a positive is I really appreciate it like just the room configuration.
Like as like, I'm spending the night kind of doing one of these and a movement material, you know, because it's, you know, I want to talk to you.
And so, I mean, I don't know if there's like a way like technology wise to make that work here where there's, it would still preserve space for people or not.
But I've loved that and I would encourage us to consider, you know, replicating.
I guess that that configuration for our regular board business meetings, but yeah, I just want to echo everything that was said.
And just to confirm like all of those meetings for the committees, they're like, they're not, I know they're not like live televised, but they're recorded.
So there's not any accessibility concerns or anything or transparency issues or anything, right?
The one of the ideas behind going to this would be have the Tuesday committee meetings recorded.
There's been some hiccups and getting that done every time.
So we are working on getting the Tuesday meetings recorded and all chairs have the ability to record through Google Meats.
It may take some training and it's a little bit clunkier through Google Meats because of the audio.
No, and that was, and I didn't even know that and certainly no criticism at all.
I just know that that's anytime we've made any kind of alteration in any kind of meeting anything.
There's usually some kind of public concern about like, is there transparency?
Is it accessible, which are excellent and important questions?
So I just wanted to raise those and yeah, I think that's fantastic.
So thank you.
Thank you for that comment, board member Miller.
We are all about transparency.
We are never trying to, you know, be less transparent.
We are trying to be more transparent.
There are costs though that are involved in having somebody here to record meetings.
And so we have to balance the, are we being transparent versus the cost of what we can do?
And all of our meetings are public meetings.
So everybody is welcome to come on down, sit in and join us for a meeting.
We would love to have you here.
And, you know, those are just things that as we move forward,
we're going to have to decide what are our priorities.
No, I fully agree and thank you for saying, and that's just something that's one of those things
I think we should just like keep saying because it takes a lot of communication to break through,
you know, previous experiences and thinking and I would agree.
I think we've done a great job with that and this is great.
Thank you.
Board Member Hinkins.
Yes, thank you.
And in saying that and you're absolutely correct.
One of the goals I know is to try to get all the board members to,
if they're in a committee or not to be present.
And the clunkiness, it speaks to the, you know, if things being recorded.
And I know we've had some clunkiness to that.
Because if we all want to be, you know, the idea is to when we come to board meetings,
we're all prepared to know what already was said in the, you know, not just rely on the board report
by the committee chairs, but also have been present.
That's the goal.
But if they can't, to listen to it.
So, yes, it is transparency, but it's also a good tool for board members who can't be present
at a committee that they're not a part of but still want to be involved as we all do.
So, yeah, I'm just saying we do need to iron that out so I can access if I can't make a policy committee.
You know, so I know that you're saying that I'm just reiterating.
It's not only for transparency, but it's for us.
Thank you.
Is there a motion to continue with this current cadence through the end of the calendar year?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Carol Fox, seconded by Megan Miller.
Any discussion?
Hearing none, all in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Motion carries unanimously.
Our next agenda item is resolution for September submission to WASB.
The purpose of this is board members will discuss submitting any resolutions to WASB by September 15th for the January Convention Delegate Assembly.
Board Clerk Miller, I'm going to turn this over to you if you don't mind.
No, thank you so much.
Well, first I just want to thank everybody.
I sent a really late night email like on Friday just to try to get prepared for this evening.
And we've had some just kid related illnesses and things like that at home that prevented me from being able to have something to upload.
So might want to first apologize for that, but I did would have just included the information more or less that I had sent anyway.
So let me just kind of pull that email up quick.
All right.
So a couple of things in the past.
We have submitted resolutions and I'm going to read through a little bit of that for both board for us for our benefit about how to move forward and also just to sort of, you know, highlight, we did submit a successfully adopted resolution within the last few years, which was, you know, it's something to be very proud of.
So I wanted to congratulate our board for doing that.
The issues that have been prevalent in our discussions have to do, of course, with funding and also, you know, there's been some environmental stewardship discussions as well.
So I did take some time last week to read through the updated resolutions committee booklet, which is available to all of us and I included the link in the email as well.
It was also in the email that President Johnson forwarded to us.
In that spirit here, there already are current resolutions and the resolutions committee for WASB.
They won't adopt a new resolution if there's already one that kind of covers that.
So that's why I wanted to include that for context.
And I'm not going to name all the numbers for everybody, but we already have in the WASB advocacy book, an item that advocates for some sufficient, not some certain because some certain is like certain to not be enough, but some sufficient funding for public education.
Ensuring every child can access sound basic education, which is the language in the state constitution under Article 10, Section 3, which is conveniently on my little sticker here, which we should all get.
Anyway, so pervents and verse void ruling from back in, I think it was like 2000.
There's also already a resolution that we submitted that was adopted that the state adopt all of the recommendations from the bipartisan blue ribbon commission.
There is one that advocates for, again, some sufficient special education funding at a minimum of 90% reimbursement rate, which is what private schools get already.
There is a resolution that advocates for class size reduction funding to return, which many of us who are teachers or have been teachers remember.
There's one already that advocates for a high poverty categorical aid category, essentially, which we don't have.
For one of like two or three states, don't quote me on that, I don't remember, but there's just very, very few states that don't have that built into their funding formula already.
So there's also one that already advocates for public dollars to solely fund public schools, as well as supports a requirement for tax bills to show how many local dollars fund voucher and charter schools, which is a really popular kind of trend right now.
Green Bay just recently did this, and it's something we should incidentally probably look to work out with the city of Deloitte, but not necessarily something we would have to put in a WASB piece here.
So lastly, there's one already that advocates for districts to be able to use all legally available funding sources for renewable energy and energy conservation projects.
And there's also an entire section devoted to a very long list of things to reform the equalization aid formula to decrease the burden on property taxpayers, which thereby would also like reduce the need for districts to even go to referendum for operational purposes.
So that's the background. And again, the purpose of these WASB resolutions are so that WASB can advocate on the behalf of not just us, but all public school districts to improve, you know, the state funding and we have a budget coming up, right?
2729 budget is upon us very soon, as Mr. Shoeve mentioned. So possible next steps.
I do think that it would be good to have some kind of meeting, maybe at our next committee meeting, that is a meeting of like a convened, like a legislative focus.
Mr. Shoeve certainly, you know, can facilitate that if he is willing to, or however you guys want to do that, not only to kind of finalize a potential resolution or resolutions, but also to kind of delineate what should our budget priorities be for our own school district advocacy
for the upcoming 2729 state budget. So I did want to throw that out there for discussion or consideration.
The two resolutions having read through these a few times and thought about it that I think we should consider drafting, and if there's consensus, I'd be happy to put these drafts together.
One would be writing resolution advocating that in addition to prioritizing all these existing resolutions, we would like a hold harmless for districts that lose 10% or more of their students to open enrollment.
And including to a charter school or private school to have some sort of like hold harmless in the funding formula.
So that would not only help, of course, the school district, but you know, I was just talking to somebody today, like school district of white water already loses a ton of their students to open enrollment in general.
And it would be really helpful, I think as well, to like our rural school districts and things like that are already like struggling with a variety of lack of access to resources, preserve funding.
It would also help the state streamline its funding and balance things into like funding a school system versus funding to parallel ones, which is exhausting our state resources,
which is why there is a lawsuit against the state right now for doing so. So that would be one thing to consider.
Another thing to consider might be for charter schools that are within traditional district boundaries not to be able to receive a per pupil rate that is higher than the public school district. So, for example,
you know, we get X amount per pupil for students in school to exploit, but you know, other like charter and voucher schools around here, some of them get a higher per pupil.
So when we lose students to those schools, we're not just losing our per pupil. We're actually paying additional funds because the state sets those rates, right?
Like we don't have any agency over that at all. So that would be another thing to consider. And then lastly, I mean, there's already some energy around this from DPI.
I shared a link with Board President Johnson earlier to create asking the state to create either grant funding or some kind of funding opportunities for districts to upgrade energy efficient and renewable energy infrastructure.
Not only so that we can be long term good stewards of our tax dollars and exhibit good environmental stewardship, but also as like, you know, there's like climate change related like weather stuff.
It could potentially be like an insurance savings if we're able to put in facilities that help anticipate and be proactive right against like major weather events and things like that.
So those are some things. And I guess I know I've talked a lot. So thank you all so much for listening. I guess I would look, I'm looking for some direction from the board or some feedback about the extent to which we would like to draft all or any of these or any additional resolutions to submit for consideration.
Thank you, Board Clerk Miller. Are there any board members that have any questions, comments or suggestions for potential resolutions for this year's WSB?
Well, Ms. Miller, I can get behind all of these as we have discussed offline that, you know, I always have an interest in the energy efficiency and the long term effects that that can have on a community and looking at other school districts.
What they've done and where they're actually receiving funds from their solar fields that they have.
And I think that would be something that we should probably look into.
Would you like assistance in writing any of these?
What I would say is, of course, and it might be something, if we want to post something we could, I'm willing to set aside a data time that works for other people to just come here with my computer and knock these out.
I'm free Friday afternoon or I guess the timeline, I'll defer to you in terms of when you would want us to meet to actually formally approve it and then maybe we could backwards plan a date or some dates from there.
But otherwise, I'm more than happy to just do it to and just send a draft out for people to kind of give feedback on whatever.
Okay, because of the timeline, this will have to be on one of our special Monday meetings.
But I'm okay with that as long as you are, I mean, right now it doesn't look like we're scheduled to have another regular board meeting for the 15th.
So either way, it would be a special meeting.
Well, I'll tell you what, I'll just throw out an open invitation. Anybody who wants to hang with me here, or this call I opened here on Friday.
Cool, I'm going to hang in the library. I'm going to hang in the lobby here at like, I don't know, 1.32 o'clock on Friday and draft some of these.
And if nobody shows up, that's totally cool. And I'll just send out a draft.
We just can't make edits because otherwise it counts as a meeting.
So I'm not going to send out like an editable document.
But if then if you have feedback, if you just give it directly to me, then I can make those changes and send revised drafts out to the board.
Wonderful, thank you. We greatly appreciate your work on that and taking the lead with that. I really appreciate that.
Thank you.
Our next agenda item is policy 443.5 student use of mobile phone.
The purpose of this is to review the proposal from the high school team that presented in May and was asked to bring back a proposal for the committee.
Committee Chair Fox.
So the committee did take some of the recommendations from the high school and we actually have a policy here that we are looking for the board to look at and approve for the first reading.
It's not that difficult.
We changed mobile phones to personal electronic devices because there's many iterations of what an electronic device would be.
We added a definition actually of what electronic devices include and also includes headsets and earbuds and some of those kinds of things.
We also put in a definition of instructional time so that the entirety of the class period is an instructional time, which the devices are prohibited during any instructional time.
There are other designated time student meetings, student assemblies, field trips, those kinds of things were added to that definition.
I think some of these limited exceptions were included somewhere, but they've been sort of rearranged and rewritten.
So there are, of course, needs for some people to have certain devices, students with disability, if they're using it for a specific class, a health need, and those kinds of things.
We are allowing a limited mobile phone usage.
Students can use mobile phones before and after school.
And pretty much for most of the kids, that's it.
And then at the high school that they can use their mobile phones during the lunch period and during passing periods.
That also says that the schools may issue specific directives about enforcement and storage and possession and usage.
That meets the high school's need for, they have a system they're using for, kids are supposed to bring their phones in and they store them in a certain spot in everybody's classroom.
So there are still some prohibitions.
Those were in the original.
They're just narrowed down to two.
And those numbers would be gone if you're looking at that.
So it's the prohibition, the green, the use of personal electronic advice, and it goes over to where it would be number three, but that's going to come out to take photographs or to receive on and up.
So anything that's illegal, of course.
This, the one that was on the board ducts, is not correct in that second paragraph there under the bullet point, the race color, national origin, sexual orientation, that phrase that you can't use any device for the purpose of harassing based on those things.
And that phrase got taken out and it was supposed to be put back in.
So we will make sure that that gets put back in.
And then we do want to have a parent notification, a parent student notification so they understand completely the policy and particularly the cell phone piece that basically only cell phones are allowed only at certain times and they can't use headphones or earbuds or any of those kinds of things when they're using them.
And then, of course, the consequences would be subject to disciplinary action.
So that's the new cell phone pals.
Thank you, Chair Foxx.
Are there any board member questions or comments?
I will entertain a motion to move to recommend to the full board of education the revisions of policy 443.5.
Well, I'm sorry, this must be.
It said.
Yeah, but it says move to to the full board, the revisions for first reading.
It should just be move approval.
Okay.
Take out the recommended to should just be move approval to of the revisions of the policy for first reading.
I tried to update it, but it probably didn't carry over during the meeting.
Okay, this is first reading approval.
Okay, so recommendation to move approval.
The revisions of policy for for 3.5 student use of mobile phone with the new name student use of personal electronics devices for first reading.
So moved.
Second.
And I'll add that phrase back in by second reading.
Okay, thank you.
So the motion was by Joanne Ru seconded by Carol Fox.
If there are no quick.
Tom Hankins.
Just discussion.
It's first reading school starting when we're going to do the second reading.
And if we can wave it and do the second reading.
So the students all have this policy in hand by the time they get to school.
Just a question.
We.
Yes.
Yeah, that's correct.
And various.
We do have a motion and a second.
So we would have to vote on it and vote it down.
And.
But.
Oh, yeah, we could we can't amend it.
Let me before we do though, I'd like to ask Dr. Gordon.
Would you prefer to have this done now?
I think that would be a good idea since the restarting school.
It's hard to take things away once we give them.
Yeah.
Okay.
Is there an amendment?
So can I amend it since it was my motion?
So we're going to have this be the final reading rather than first reading.
With the suggested changes.
Yes.
That was that was part of the original motion, though.
I will second it.
Okay.
So we again have for the amendment.
Changing it from first reading to final reading.
Motion by Joanne Ru and a second by Carol Fox.
We are voting on the amendment to change first reading to final reading.
Any questions?
All in favor.
Aye.
Any opposed?
The amendment carries unanimously.
Now we are voting on the motion to move approval.
Any questions or comments?
All in favor.
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Thank you.
Chair Fox.
Our next item tonight is grant funded positions.
The purpose of this is to present recommend recommended positions for approval.
Dr. Gordon.
Yeah.
Thank you.
We had brought to committees two different categories of positions.
One with one would be for behaviors and one would be for foundational literacy support.
So we are looking to of course support our early learners in their literacy.
The paraprofessional would be to provide targeted targeted instruction to elementary students to strengthen literacy skills.
So that the parapro would work with the literacy coach and the interventionist to help work with the students.
And our behavior interventionist would work under the direction of the special education and student services team.
So I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Stengel to talk about the paraprofessional position first and then I will turn it over to student services.
Yeah, good evening everybody.
So you have the attachment for the early reading paraprofessional position.
So this would be funded through Title 1.
The position would provide a short targeted individual small group reading interventions for our young students identified through ACT 20 and other literacy data that is listed here.
Also classroom performance foundational skills assessments and progress monitoring results.
Support would focus on foundational reading skills including phonemic awareness, phonics, decoding, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.
So a licensed reading specialist would identify students, plan or approve the lessons, select materials, monitor implementation and review student progress.
Then the paraprofessional would deliver and document the assigned interventions.
The services would supplement, not replace classroom instruction, reading specialist or special education services.
Effectiveness would be measured through student growth, intervention attendance and frequency, instructional fidelity, accurate documentation and regular progress monitoring.
Student groups and interventions would be adjusted based on data with the overall goal of providing early support.
Before reading difficulties become more persistent.
Additionally, this would be four positions for FTEs looking at Merrill, Hackett, Robinson and Todd.
They would be funded through Title 1 and will ensure consistent, dedicated support for our youngest learners at the point where early intervention has the greatest long term impact.
This position will have a significant amount of professional learning on reading foundational skills and meetings regarding student data.
Included in your documents is a corresponding job description.
The position will be on a 192 day calendar, seven and a half hours per day with compensation based on the classified staff compensation matrix.
Column C02 with a start starting our early range of $16.78.
Thank you so much. This is a lovely presentation.
I am just calling attention to like the weather situation and so I have no disrespect intended.
You're doing a wonderful job.
I am just wondering because I don't know what people's commute situations are.
Would it be wise for us to maybe like go virtual so people have a chance to.
I don't carry their way. I just wanted to.
It's a little scary out there right now.
If board members need to leave board member because I know different we all have different family situations at home board members are free to leave.
I would prefer that we have four here so that we at least have a quorum to keep the meeting going.
I will be staying.
Bill Johnson.
Okay.
I apologize for the interruption. Thank you so much.
If board members need to go you're free to go.
But like I said I know some of us have different family situations and if you can join virtually I would encourage that.
Okay.
So board members are going to.
It looks like board member Hankins will be leaving and if you can join us virtually that would be wonderful.
Mrs. Shope if you could send Mr. Hankins the phone number so he can call in.
Yes I can do that.
Thank you.
I'm sorry about the interruption Dr. Stingle.
That's that's unusual but appropriate right now.
Not a problem.
So Gaston and Converse are not included in this because they are getting the open literacy.
Sky rocket program correct.
That that's a part of the reasoning behind it. Yes.
Are there any other board member questions or comments for Dr. Stingle.
Dr. Gordon.
Did you did you want to add anything or continue.
I'm sorry.
No.
I would like to move approval of the paraprofessional literacy positions as described second.
Okay.
So we have a motion by Carol Fox and a second by Dan Shoeff to approve the paraprofessional foundational literacy support positions as presented.
All in favor.
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Can I clarify with that Carol and Dan.
Correct.
Okay.
Thank you.
Is there a motion for approval of restarting the WIP teacher intern program.
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Megan Miller.
Seconded by Carol Fox.
Any discussion.
Hearing none.
All in favor.
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Is there a motion to approve.
No.
I want to hear the presentation for that one.
Thank you.
Director Weir.
All right.
The other proposal that we have is to again use some of our title funding to try something different and unique in our district to support some of the behavioral needs.
The request is to bring on board to the district one BCBA.
So.
And then one behavior intervention.
So BCBSR board certified behavior analysis.
And then one behavior interventionist to support in our elementary buildings when reviewing the data last year, this last school year, we had 18.
743 incidents involving 2,202 unique students.
It's a 17.1% increase in behavior incidences compared to the same period in 2425.
And only 876 of those in each of the buildings resulted in some form of intervention being provided.
The majority of those resulted in just exclusionary discipline being provided.
So out of school suspensions in school suspensions, et cetera.
When we review our current supports and think about aligning to a similar structure like we have for academics in the district.
We have a very strong foundation for tier one universal.
We have good high quality social emotional learning resources that our buildings use.
Character strong personal people at the elementary levels seven mindsets at the middle school and high school levels.
But where we've noticed a critical gap in terms of some behavior supports is in that tier two area, which is the targeted intervention.
So right now currently the majority of that workload falls on student services staff.
And while they are most certainly in the buildings to support, that is not their primary role and responsibility.
And so if we're able to pilot this approach, we're having a board certified behavior and that analysis providing some like assessment
and collaboration with teachers and building a plan and a behavior interventionist then doing the actual individual skill based intervention with students that could alleviate.
Some of the student services time to focus more on tier three, which is that intensive support, which is really where our school counselor, social workers and sites are supposed to be spending the majority of their time.
And right now our primary source is to outsource to community supports if those are available and families are able to gain access to those.
The other thing, so when we think about how we use title, so one of the areas in the plan that we submit to the state specifically asks how we will use title funds to support the efforts to reduce the overuse of discipline practices that remove students from the classroom.
So again, those exclusionary discipline practices. And so we did right into that narrative looking at this approach.
It is not the BCBA portion of it is not something that a lot of districts in Wisconsin have, but it is something that we're starting to see other districts explore as behavior is a hot topic across the state in our schools.
And in one of the most recent work groups that DPI had put out in regards to looking at a state licensure BCBA adding that as a Wisconsin DPI license is something that they're currently going to be looking into right now that department is or that license comes out of the department of health.
So tell me again, you're looking for one BCPA and one behavior interventionist. Yes.
And where, how is that going to work and where is this pilot going to be?
So my recommendation is that they work with Hackett and Todd, and that's just based off of looking at the data of behavior referrals that were logged.
Those two buildings have the most consistent data and they have the highest number of incidences that have been recorded.
Has this been discussed with the staff and the principals of these two buildings?
And there's something that they are looking have or are looking for having.
It's been discussed with building administration.
Yes, it was presented to them.
Do you remember Dr. Gordon?
It was like maybe a May principal meeting.
Dr. Anderson was still here at the time.
Yeah, I think it was May.
Yeah.
Mid May.
Those are two brand new principals and I'm a little concerned about some of that, putting brand new things and pilots in that kind of a situation.
I also wonder, especially in some of these buildings that I've been looking at is where these people would hang out.
Because there's just not a lot of space in some of these buildings for people.
So has that been addressed or discussed?
I haven't done a lot of work in terms of details around office spaces, locations, anything like that.
Obviously, the BCBA is a much more fluid position.
They would be in and out of classrooms doing observations, supporting staff, collecting data on the students that they're looking at.
We would have to do some work around identifying locations for the behavior interventionists to provide the actual interventions.
But I would be shocked if student services staff or other staff that have space wouldn't be willing to give up for a period of time throughout the day to allow some of those interventions to occur.
I'm going to interrupt. We are at eight o'clock.
Can I get a motion to extend the meeting and in the interest of time?
Rather than half an hour extension, can we extend it for an hour and try to get through the rest of this agenda quickly?
So moved.
Moved by Carol Fox, seconded by Bill Johnson. Any discussion? All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Go ahead.
Are you done?
Okay.
Megan Miller.
Thank you. And thank you, Ms. Fox. Those are really good questions. I appreciate that you raised those.
I just wanted to comment on, this is a very innovative thing that you're proposing that we do.
And I just think that's something important to highlight.
And I really appreciate that.
We have to be proactive and forward thinking about rapidly changing needs and the landscape of education right now.
So that's awesome. Thank you for doing that.
I also wanted to highlight that since we've had to make some budget reductions, you know, and things like health services and things like, you know, of that nature.
I wanted to put forward, I think, did Rock County, I feel like Rock County declared that like suicide prevention was like a very, it was, it was like a high priority health initiative.
I don't remember what the language was, but I know we all had to get trained the last couple of years.
So I feel like it's also to me a matter of safety.
And so I really am very much in favor of this.
I have kids who have worked with the student services specialist at Todd and it's important, powerful work that they do.
And I absolutely want to see their time and resources used for the kids who demonstrate those needs.
So for those reasons, I'm very much in favor of this.
I think it increases our capacity and not only just to support the academic, you know, we're about to get a presentation about like how important behaviors are.
So, you know, to the academic performance piece, I feel like it's also like a student health and safety piece as well.
So I am in favor of that.
I don't know if I asked a question or not.
Those were just things that popped into my head.
But if you have anything else to share on either of those, that would be great.
Otherwise I'm good.
Thanks.
Yeah, I just for my own personal experience.
My I've experienced two times now in districts where the classroom needed more support with behavioral needs.
And I'll say again, Carrie Oscar, she came in.
She helped me so much.
I was so thankful for her her expertise.
I also have been part of a district where a student needed a behavior intervention plan.
And it never happened because, and that wasn't in Beloit.
And it never happened because there was nobody to collect the data.
And so these positions are so important for those reasons.
And I think having two new principles along with all of these open positions, especially in special ed.
I think having additional support is a fantastic idea.
Any other questions or comments?
Is there a motion to move approval of the board certified behavior,
behavior analyst and the behavior interventionist positions?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Joanne Roo.
Second by Megan Miller.
Any discussion hearing none?
All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
And before we move on to the next one, I just want to make certain.
Did we get the early reading paraprofessional positions in there too?
Okay.
Thank you.
Okay.
Wonderful.
It's team effort.
That is what this is.
Our next item is the.
Yes, as long as you're fine. Can I clarify what that motion would have been?
I had that the motion for the paraprofessionals was.
I have to get back to it quick here.
I had that it was to move approval of four paraprofessional foundational literacy support positions.
But were there also early reading paraprofessional positions?
Yes.
There's how many positions?
Four.
Four of each?
Four of literacy.
Yeah, I was just four paraprofessional literacy support.
And then we.
Two for behavior.
And then we restarted the WIP intern program.
That I got.
So it's just for paraprofessional foundational literacy support positions.
Correct.
Early reading paraprofessional positions because I thought I read that in the proposal.
But I could very well be wrong.
No, I'm sorry, Michelle.
There were two early reading paraprofessional positions.
Four.
Okay.
In addition to the board.
Looking at the board agenda item, it says move approval of the blank paraprofessional foundational literacy support positions.
And then and blank early reading paraprofessional positions.
Right.
Are they the same?
I didn't know how many there were of each.
Are these all the same?
Four paraprofessionals.
So this is confusing.
Okay.
Yep.
Move approval of four paraprofessional foundational literacy positions.
So it's one.
This is just one.
Okay.
So this is.
Okay.
Thank you.
Okay.
So it's.
You are correct.
Yep.
Just four foundational literacy support para educators.
Thank you.
The next item is the sale of the right building.
And the purpose of this is to move forward with the sale of the right school.
Dr. Gordon, would you like to say anything?
Sure.
We would like to move ahead with the sale of right school.
We have a purchase price offer.
Full price offer for $325,000.
The earnest money has already been deposited.
And we are looking to close on that building in September, September 18th.
Is there a motion?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Megan Miller, seconded by Dan Shuf.
Any questions or comments?
I am excited about this sale.
And I think it will bring good things to the community in many ways.
All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Our next agenda item is school resource officer program.
The purpose of this is for the Board of Education to move approval of the school district resource officer SRO program agreement for the 26-27 school year.
Providing dedicated coverage for the two middle schools and Bloitte Memorial High School.
Dr. Gordon.
Yeah.
So we are looking to move approval of the contract for two SROs.
One would be split between the two middle schools and one would be for the high school.
In the past, we have asked for three SROs.
We do not have three SROs on.
Sorry.
We do not have three SROs on for this year.
If you've heard anything about our police force, we are definitely in a shortage there as well as, you know, it's like teachers here.
So when we had our meeting with the city and the police department, we kind of talked through these things.
They're they're discussing or that we were discussing the flexibility of two to three.
It was that was during a multi year contract when they prepared the final draft.
They made it a one year agreement and this was for a couple of reasons.
One was because staffing last year was very difficult.
We really didn't have three to fill the positions last year.
So we were kind of left hanging.
There were some staffing issues there.
So they're they're taking measures to improve their staff recruitment and retention as well, just like we are.
And they're hoping to have a staffing rebound as well.
So and they know that we're facing a fiscal problem as well here.
So given these concerns, they thought it would be better to offer a one year agreement and revisit it next year.
And hopefully things will have improved on both ends.
Thank you, Dan.
So we had a chance to discuss our cadence for the board meetings.
I was caught off guard by this.
So just I don't need to know everything going on in the district as one board member.
But I was surprised because it feels when I read the materials, which I didn't get to until today.
It feels like we made this decision at the district based on budget.
You know, it feels like this was a we were trying to meet a very tight budget.
So we're we did that.
Dr. Gordon, it sounds like it's more of a.
Was a collaborative discussion and even if we were contracted for three last year, we didn't really have three because obviously sworn officers get pulled away from the building.
If they're needed for high priority issues in the city, I would be much more comfortable.
Setting, you know, happy to prove things that are in front of us.
I get it and we don't need to micromanage.
But I would would like to give the district more of a board direction that we would prefer to have a school resource officer at the junior high or middle school and high school level as soon as possible and give you that flexibility rather than, you know, it feels like this
came from looks like this letter came from a deputy city manager Kruger kind of all baked up in based on what you guys had discussed.
So I really would prefer to have the goal of being having a school resource officer at every middle school or high school.
And so I guess I don't know how to approach that, Dr. Gordon, where we're at and look for you and your team suggestion.
If that's something that's possible, something to strive for as a board policy goal here.
Well, it's definitely something to to work for.
But I do have communications between our district and the city about, you know, discussing between two and three.
And, you know, it is in here that they're having trouble with staffing and recruitment as well.
So, but there are, you know, other avenues that we could pursue, you know, very informally, we have talked about those avenues for which we could possibly pursue getting another person.
You know, but what guaranteeing that is going to be tricky as well because of that staffing issue.
And, you know, hopefully things will turn around in the boy police department because we would certainly like to employ our own.
And, you know, it is such a nice thing to have here in our school district, those officers because we really rely on them.
And just we're hoping that they will be able to get more staff, just like we are.
Megan Miller.
Thank you so much. I actually thank you so much for putting this together.
I really just want to commend like that sounds like some really excellent partnership that's happening between the district and the city.
And I'm really grateful to you and staff for doing so.
I know this issue has been, you know, this contract has gone through many iterations and I think that each time we've done it, the process has gotten better and better.
And it's, at least since I've been on the board, it's been very much driven through like, you know, administration, which I think is important and not driven by the board because we're not the staff and we don't know.
So, thank you for bringing this.
From the board level, however, in this isn't directly related, I'm just going to float this as a larger topic as we're engaging in long-range planning.
It might be a good idea for us at some point to have like a board, city council, touch base, like large view meeting, just to kind of like look at, sorry, look at all of these issues under larger like strategic planning, long-range planning umbrella.
But I think this is like actually a really good example of how, of the things that we have that are working well, like that they are working quite well in terms of that collaboration.
So, thank you. And I just wanted to float that kind of city council board kind of idea as well.
Absolutely. I think that's a great goal. I cannot take credit for the work that was done here. This would be Ryan Turner and Missy's department. So, they've been doing all the work on that.
So, I just inherited this. So, kudos to them.
But again, if you have questions and maybe Ryan would be better person to answer some of those, but we would like to have the three officers just saying, but this is where we are right now.
Okay. So, what does this look like for? I've got a few questions. So, what is, what will this look like for sporting events then?
It's not related.
So, this Friday is the first home football game.
We, I work with the high school team athletics and so on and ask comedy for each sport that they want us to request for the police department to post for overtime.
So, the SROs, we like them to work, but it's not part of the SRO program. So, hopefully we, like for this Friday, we asked for four. Hopefully we get four. We shall see.
Be a completely separate.
Okay. Thank you. If, if it is related to the police force and they're, they're staffing shortage too. Is it possible for us to look at security and like hiring a security person that's not a police officer?
We already do. The high school, we have six FTE.
Oh, yeah, we do. Yeah. Okay. So, do we have any at the middle school level security officers to, or I don't know what you call them.
Yeah, one each. Okay. Well, then if we don't have three police officers or SROs.
I don't know. Does it make sense to increase the number of security that we have instead?
Dr. Gordon.
I'm thinking we have how many security there?
So, one at Aldrich, one at Frozen, six for the high school plus the BLA FTE transferred over. So, seven in that building for 26, 27.
Do we need, do we need to hire another security guard, an additional security guard since we will be short one SRO?
So, a couple of things. One first for bringing this up.
If our goal, we, we want the three SROs. In fact, when we brought this four years ago, we were looking to add a fourth and so on and so forth.
I'm always for more security. Don't get around here. You're never going to hear me say no.
But if we get to a point in the 27, 28 school year, or we can get three or more SROs, then what will the discussion be about this potentially excess want FTE of security.
So, we can always use security in the district. We can float them around elementary. There's a lot of things we can do, but that's just a consideration that if things improve on the police department side.
Now we created a position to supplement that is it still needed.
The other thing is with primarily one SRO will be at the high school. That's a given.
The other SRO will float between the two buildings, two middle schools.
It would be interesting to see how we take that extra FTE to support both of those buildings because it's really easy to say Monday, Wednesday, Friday of one week.
The SRO is at one middle school, Tuesday, Thursday at the other, and then it flips the next week, but their calls require them to go back and forth.
So, there's no clean way to do that. And if we, again, it would be interesting to see how we make that equal between the buildings.
Because if we send the SRO from Frues into Aldrich, I can't just tell the security officer to go there.
And so, again, I'm all for extra security. We can absolutely get our money's worth with those positions.
Thank you, Mr. Turner. I don't think any of us disagree with wanting more security, especially in today's world, even just recently hearing about the fights at the state fair, which, you know, things just seem to get crazier and crazier every day.
So, a couple of things that I'd like to say is to remind everybody who's listening.
Student behavior, yeah, from the first bell to the closing bell is our responsibility.
All of those other hours, it's the communities and the family's responsibilities.
Please work with us and teach your students right from wrong and appropriate behavior.
We continue to encourage all staff members and board members and anyone associated with the school district to model good behavior and respect.
The other thing that I'd like to say in response to that, I hear you.
I understand it makes, yeah, what you're saying makes sense.
However, as we move forward, if this is what the board approves, I want for Dr. Gordon and you to realize if there are concerns and you need another position, please let us know sooner rather than later so we can be working with you to support you in what your needs are.
And then the last thing I want to remind people is even if buildings don't have SROs, if there is an incident, the police department is called.
They are called and will respond as soon as they possibly can.
Any other, Mr. Shuf?
Mr. Turner, I don't think we've had a chance to meet.
Nice to see you.
Question for you and for Dr. Gordon and for TIA, it's kind of collectively.
What about an idea of having kind of a modified approval where we say that because it hasn't been signed yet, right?
This is a draft.
Correct. They have us sign up first and then they take it to City Council.
So this would be a change that I'm assuming you could get through something along the lines of the school board approves it.
And we ask that the goal be to have three SROs and then collectively we're given budget authority for three SROs, but we know that, or that we ask that to be made true as soon as possible.
And we know that they have staffing issues and so on, but just be clear that the board gives budget approval for three.
We give flexibility for you and we ask you and Deputy Manager Kruger, whoever is negotiating this to make clear that we understand the situation we're in now, but our collective goal is to get back to one in building.
We all know that the building number of buildings might change in the future, but that's for a different discussion.
If I may, Missy's trying to find the language, but I have mentioned when you're here four years ago that the intent was to grow the program.
Three was the baseline hoping to add more. So there was language built into it that allowed us to add that forth without going through multiple levels of approvals and stuff like that. So.
I think that's what I'm hearing you hoping to incorporate, but like I said, Missy's trying to find the language. So there is precedent that we've done that before.
Thank you. So while she's looking for that.
Bill Johnson.
I believe that there are different jurisdictions along that same lines.
I believe I read it correctly. The Floyd City Council approved a contract with the sheriff's department to provide extra patrols for the city.
If that's something we want to look at, we can. I'm just pigging backing off of looking at other jurisdictions, but the any law enforcement agency that we have.
I think that there are a lot of other things that we want to look at.
I think that there are a lot of other things that we want to look at within the jurisdiction and it would be the city of Beloit police department, the sheriff's department of the state patrol. Obviously, one makes more sense than the other, but that's just where we are.
And Dr. Gordon want three or more, but that's just not feasible right now.
I have a comment here for me.
That is a case by case thing. I can't speak for them. They, I will say about halfway through the school year.
Last year, they had some like military relief stuff like that, and they did what they could to pull patrol officers to come and cover the buildings when they could, but their priorities are going to be to the streets.
So they do what they can do. I wholeheartedly believe that's, but you had just two is what they advise that they could could provide us.
Tom.
Thank you. I just want to go back to what Mr. Schup is bringing up. And I think it's, to me, it's like we leave a slide open to pay for this person as we have done for many positions in the district that somehow don't get filled.
I think what I'm hearing from Dan is, yeah, we want to keep that option open and maybe that's the way it's written. I don't have it in front of me, but just so we keep that slide open in our budget.
So if we can't add the third person or for it, at least we have budget of the money to do that. Thank you.
Thank you. Can I make a motion?
Are you not ready for that? Megan, did you have your hand up?
I just want to let you know that Bill had his hand up, but yes, please make a motion.
We did find that language in the old MOU if anybody's interested in hearing that.
There is a resolution, so we either need to waive moving the resolution or it will need to be read.
I'd move that we waive reading the resolution.
Okay.
There is a motion to waive the reading of the resolution by Megan Miller, seconded by Bill Johnson, all in favor of waiving reading the resolution.
Aye. Aye. Aye.
You can give us this language if this doesn't work.
Aye. Move approval of the updated program agreement and the MOU for the school resource officer program at the two middle schools in high school,
with approval to move to three SROs if positions become available.
I'll, okay. I'll second.
We have a motion by Carol Fox and a second by Megan Miller.
Oh, yeah, I have a discussion point once you.
Yep.
Okay. Missy, Mr. Turner, what are your thoughts? Do we have it right or do we need any modifications to make it better?
So I'm going to read the language that we found from the last MOU from four years ago.
The city shall employ three SROs during the initial term in any renewal terms of this agreement.
If the parties agree that an additional SRO was needed, a written amendment to this agreement shall be made.
And this reminder, this is it for a one year. It's one year. It's not like it was before.
I think you have the motion, right? I do for what experience I have in these types of things.
Just remember this also then needs to go to city council and so there's that dynamic as well.
So just on the discussion point, I think we have it right. We're we're not approving a very specific one.
We're approving all the rest of the specifics with with administrations goal to go convince our friends at the city that this is what we all want.
And I, you know, I think we'll be successful at that. So I think Dr. Gordon, does that seem to be okay where we're at on this?
In your opinion? Yeah, it should be okay. All right. Thank you.
Any other board member? Mr. Johnson.
Part time or police. They, the city of boy police department does not currently have part time police officers.
Like security wise.
Those those those might get a lot.
Your mic's not on apparently. Okay.
So we're talking part time security.
It's my thought would be we would have to have FTE approved for me to be able to have sub coverage to go into that.
Otherwise, it's a fiasco trying to figure out account numbers and then it becomes.
There's no on it. There's no. Yeah.
Coming down. Yeah. All right. Thanks.
Yeah, I have one more question for Ryan. Please go ahead.
Ryan, what, what does that look like? You talked about the one sharing between frozen and Aldrich.
And I know you're trying to work this out, but what does that actually look like? You talked about, you know, Monday, Wednesday, Tuesday, Thursday.
Hours, just curious, how does it, or have you not decided that whole thing yet? Thank you.
So in the past, the way they, they try to do a schedule and it's just like I, I described now that's the previous administration.
What that looks like for this. I'm sure I would imagine it would be something similar. There's only so many days in the week.
But they can never stick to that schedule. If, if on the day that they're assigned to frozen, something comes up at Aldrich, they, they have to go.
A supervisor could pull the an SRO from the high school to go there, but that's, they have that control, not us.
When we had four intermediate schools, the SROs were split between those buildings. They had two buildings each and it was the same thing.
They were put on a schedule and they tried to stick to it as best they could. Sometimes they figured out they would do half days and half days. It just kind of depended on what was going on on those particular days.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. Any other questions or comments?
Well, I just have one and I will put a plug in for the Beloit Police Department, just as we are looking for people for our special ed staff.
Hey, folks, Beloit is a beautiful city. We're on the banks of the beautiful Rock River. We've got lots of wonderful things going on here.
So if you are interested in serving on the Beloit Police Department, come on down.
There is a motion and a second by Carol Fox and Megan, seconded by Megan Miller. All in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed? Motion carries unanimously.
Just a quick question. Since we waive the reading of the resolution, we don't need a roll call vote, right?
That is my understanding.
Okay. Thanks.
And if I'm wrong, I apologize in advance.
Our next item is the final report from the Adhoc Student Success Support Committee.
Dr. Kim Erhart, Chair of Adhoc Student Success Support and Support Committee.
The purpose is to share the results of the spring site-based visits to each of the school buildings relative to the implementation of the six steps
of the Adhoc Plan. Dr. Erhart?
Good evening, everyone. It's good to be here. I'm going to be clairvoyant because I can already hear this in your heads.
Can you streamline this presentation? So I'll do that. I'm going to be assisted by Vanna Almonderes.
She's bringing up the presentation here. So that'll be forthcoming.
I'll just start to kind of introduce and talk again.
Again, the Adhoc Committee for Student Success and Support really had come out of.
Juan Romero was a board member who had written this very extensive document and was really trying to focus attention on the board
for concerns and challenges with student behavior and student achievement.
So that's kind of the genesis of our work. I was pleasant to have.
Joanne Rue was the board member that worked with me and we started going through all the data and we really landed on as we looked at it
with the whole notion that you will not improve student achievement until you move forward with behavior and the whole student conduct can
behavior. So that became the focus of all our work and all our plans and all of those sorts of things.
And we worked on that all year. I've already reported in the fall those particular findings.
There's a lot of information in the board packet that has the whole presentation and the memo and hopefully that has given you a lot of information.
So if it's okay, I will move to the conclusions, recommendations, bottom line, the end of the report.
Is that all right?
Works for us.
Okay. Very good.
Just to let you know that I was able to meet with Dr. Gordon, Dr. Stangel.
We reviewed all of these because we want to make sure that we're all in alignment with where the district is moving because the Adhoc Committee had
representatives from the community, the district and the staff.
So if, all right, well, the first conclusion was we made progress.
We made progress in our particular effort to improve a universal approach to student conduct and behavior.
What we discovered early on is that we have certain schools had bits and pieces of things and one of our first decision points was to create a universal plan
for conduct and behavior.
And that was the work of our committee in the summer.
And then that became the work of, throughout the school year, working on that.
And so in particular, we found, yeah, let's move.
Keep going.
There's really good stuff and it will maybe come back on it.
There we go.
So again, what we found, all our data, we did pulse checks.
We did three of those to kind of validate all of our work.
And we found we had really positive growth with communication of our message and our plan.
Consistency showed growth over the year.
School climate also showed some positive results.
And yeah, those are the areas that really showed the most amount of growth.
The middle schools did the best.
When you looked at all the survey data, they had the highest rankings and all of which in particular.
So Mr. Joe, Principal Joe, we'll get a big award from us for all of that sort of things.
But in the recommendations, and we also looked at that we would use the work from the middle schools to help instruct others.
The area in the surveys that we discovered perhaps needs more growth and more development is the perception of the staff relative to the board's support for this initiative and the central office.
So those are areas that we need to figure out ways so that the staff understands that the central office staff and the board is very interested.
And as forthright in advancing the goals of this, the data came out the lowest and you can see that in there.
So that's an area that we'll have to have some continued attention on.
There are certain schools that didn't do as well as others according to the survey.
So we talked with district administration about doing some work with them to have some intervention plans and improvement plans so that the perception of the staff
and the data is positive that way.
Of course, in our whole study, we saw the whole issue with the human resources part with vacancies and substitutes and all of those kinds of things that we discussed earlier in the meeting.
Our challenges that are also connected to creating some issues in consistency with our efforts.
Recommendations, committee is recommending that we continue to study this.
We continue to do the surveys throughout the school year and continue to keep this as a priority item and even recommending that this is some way, shape, or form a district goal.
So we continue to look at student conduct and behavior in its supportive student achievement as a particular goal for the upcoming school year.
Again, we recognized the good work of Aldridge Middle School and they had been working on this before we got going.
So the principal there has had a strong focus on that for several years.
So they were able to bring what we worked on the ad hoc and what they were doing ahead of time to move forward with that too.
The concern that we talked about staff had been requesting a district professional development opportunity or a class for a particular new teachers coming into the system for classroom management.
Always the biggest struggle of new teachers and so having some sort of option available for them to help deal with that and learn more skills and build their success in that area, strategies and practices.
So talked with both of the district administrators about doing that.
Our highest priority is the elementary school.
The data shows all our school visits.
Board Member Fox was able to visit all the schools with me in the spring and the elementary as the area of biggest need.
And most of that kind of shows up with kids with some really unique and challenging behavior and they're outside the regular kind of realm of what I would consider school.
So some of very unique sort of situations.
So some of the information I heard tonight about behavioral specialists and the efforts to focus that way should be supportive of that.
And then I know the district Dr. Anderson was looking at some sort of alternative educational program at the elementary level.
And that proposal was approved by the board.
And the planning information now will be coming back to a TL meeting soon as I understand it.
So we'll be able to hear more of that so that can be part of the plan.
So we had our committee really supported that whole move and wanting to move that forward.
Bottom line, get to that.
So what we discovered in this whole effort looking at student conduct and behavior to raise and enhance student achievement is the effort,
to develop this universal plan and stay focused on it and attend to it throughout the school year showed credible improvement.
So we had growth again in communication of the plan, consistent the plan and then raising classroom climate.
However, there is certainly work to do.
And if you look inside the report, you can see that there needs to be more attention.
And one of the things that we found from the ad hoc committee, people are saying,
and especially from our school principals as we visited those sites, you have to stay on it.
You have to stay on it.
It's not something you do in September and forget about BIACS.
And particularly the middle schools that are most effective, you know, they don't give any direction.
They don't hardly say anything out without some sort of connection to how you're going to conduct and behave yourself.
So it's very embedded in all their messaging.
So a piece of success is to embed and continue to support that particular message.
The pulse trucks are valuable again for helping us keep track and stay focused on our energy.
And...
Appreciations, again, Joanne Ruhl helped and assist with this.
We appreciate that.
Tia Johnson helped first semester do all the school visits.
Carol Fox assisted second semester in doing all those things.
I don't know if you have anything you'd like to add to.
Please do this very quickly, but I think the written documentation in there is more eloquent perhaps.
Thank you, Dr. Earhart.
Are there any board member questions at this time?
Megan Miller.
Thank you.
Yeah, thanks to everybody who participated in the ad hoc for sure.
I want to go back to just a couple of things from your conclusions and recommendations.
First, I love that we were able to identify kind of that communication gap.
I mean, I think that's something that we've seen it kind of text back to Ms. Almonderes's board report from earlier, right,
about just kind of continuing to like identify and close gaps to help with retention and recruitment.
And so I think that was really valuable.
Back in the fall, when you did kind of that breakdown for us, I had asked if there was anything that was recommended
or weren't kind of like currently doing in terms of programming.
And it sounded to me and I'd certainly happy to go back and revisit notes in the meeting itself.
We already have a lot of the programming in place.
And so I was a little surprised to see the comment about programming for elementary schools.
So I guess one thing I'd like to clarify since we do have pretty outstanding systems and programming in place already is
do you feel like there's more of a focus that we need to put on staffing versus programming would be one part of that question?
For example, just like getting the additional pair of support of the elementary schools.
I did hear quite a bit from folks about elementary.
I understand where you're at with that.
So that's one piece.
And then another piece that I'd like to put forward for consideration, I love the focus on new staff support for classroom
management and PD.
But I know that, and we're not alone in this, a lot of districts struggle with like mentor programs being effective.
And I, you know, it's like constant topic, like CSAs always do the stuff.
Do we need to consider maybe mentor stipends or reshaping that mentor program?
Anything at the board level that we might want to consider to like have somebody to like more actively support new staff is my second thing.
And my third piece would be I know Ms. Beavers has some really fantastic needs based data about, you know, like student needs.
And like to what extent are we engaging, I guess, in root cause analysis as part of your report and your takeaways just to make sure that we're really precise and how we use the scarce resources that we have.
Lots of good questions there.
Yeah, I think everyone would support as resources and personnel would be available to focus attention in this area as much as we can possibly do.
But the resources are scarce, I think.
And sometimes again, finding the people in those areas.
But yes, the more support you can to deal with.
And what really seems to be happening at the elementary schools is schools are dealing with, you know, student profile very aberrant kind of behavior plans that are behavior situations that are just beyond typically what schools are dealing with.
And, you know, what we've heard is, you know, students coming in with pretty significant mental health issues, which is our come to play.
And so again, that's what that alternative focus at the elementary level was trying to do a therapeutic classroom, that sort of approach so that we can have responsibility to educate all students.
But when you have those really pretty significant needs, you do need someone with the specialization in the programming to get to that.
So staffing and then with your the PDPs, I guess I'm just curious, like, was there a discussion or do you see, like, as part of that recommendation?
Is that is that a takeaway?
Am I correct in understanding what you're saying to say that I would want my colleagues to consider looking maybe at the mentor program?
And if there is any kind of like financial support that we should consider, maybe not this year, but in future years in terms of making that mentor program or robust.
Because we all know, like, once the school year starts, like, PD isn't made.
And I know this is like, I'm going to be the unpopular kid.
I enjoy professional development.
I find.
I do too.
All that just being said, once the kids come in the door, a lot of it, you're like kind of in crisis mode all year.
Like, I love my job, but you're also like, you're, it's hard to be like, let me have like a mindful reflection about my day every single day.
So it's really important to have that collegial, you know, like, support and things like that.
Is that, am I correct in maybe adding that on as a takeaway?
Oh, yes.
Yes.
But what we do is when we get to the recommendation part, that I think is something that could be included in the recommendation.
As we look to continue focus and attention in this area, how can we best use the resources that we can find and the budget that we have to best serve, you know, staff and students in the district.
So all of those, yes, as they're all available and possible.
Yes.
As long as the board would approve, you know, continue to focus and attention on this.
And I think the next slide has.
Thank you.
This is, I'm sorry.
I know we passed the addendum matrix recently.
Mentors still get paid for their time.
They get an addendum pay.
So I like where Megan's going with this, but I think the direction should actually not be towards giving mentors more stipends, but giving the teacher that needs the support, giving them time, giving them paid hours to sit in trainings and get the trainings they need.
And I'm telling you this from personal experience, because when I, yeah, I'll come into a mentoring and meet with a mentor.
But if I'm told, okay, on your free time this weekend, here's eight hours of video to watch.
There is no way that's going to happen.
And I think I've heard from the BEA, like they were looking for more time.
So for both like the new teachers and for the mentors to sit and actually do some of that coaching.
So fully support that.
And I think the best form of professional development is job embedded.
So it's right inside the actual situation that you're dealing with.
It makes more sense rather than on Saturday morning or something.
But again, any kind of continuum of help and support for teachers, that would be very important.
Because this, all the national literature, again, this shows up as a big deterrent and why people leave the profession as they get overwhelmed with that.
So anything that we can do to help support that and stabilize that and minimize the disruption.
Joanne Ru.
Yes, okay, just a couple of points.
One, this spring I was very concerned seeing the teachers lack of confidence in our board.
And I think we need to do some self reflection and really think about what we can do to build that confidence back up.
It goes back to staff retention again.
Also, Missy Beavers taught me, Brene Brown says, clear is kind.
And Eric brought this beautiful Google Drive full of very clear resources that we could use.
And since our district is so transient, I think it would really be a good idea for our leadership to take a look at some of those documents
and find ones that we feel would be good common documents to have visuals in all of our buildings that look the same.
We did that for a long time as a district and it really helped us feel like we were all in this together.
We used to have, well, lots of different things, but that's, I just think we need to go back, look at Eric's documents
and figure out which ones are going to be posted in every building.
Thank you, Carol Prox.
Yeah, I think the work that's been done is excellent.
And we just need to continue to focus on that and continue to down that road.
I guess one of my, because I guess my biggest comment is sustaining it and sustaining the effort
and sustaining the procedures and things that people do throughout the year, I think that was when we visited in the spring.
I mean, you could see that the procedures have been in place, but somehow, you know, and people get tired and things kind of, you kind of, up in there, done that, it gets a little lax.
And so the hard part is, you know, you start out with this great intent with the initiative, but to keep the focus on the initiative and keep it going.
And I think as we work with Skyrocket and some of those, maybe they'll have some ideas about how we might continue to do that, because I think that's one of the things that they've been working on really hard is the sustaining thing over us.
The saying that how, over time, so that, you know, when you've got a behavior expectation in September, you have that same behavior expectation in February, and that really makes it work for kids.
So I think that's one of the things that, for any initiative that we do in a school district is the hardest thing, is to keep it sustained.
And I think the more the board keeps wanting to revisit some of these, maybe that'll help with their perception that we're interested in what's going on.
Yeah, sometimes we just lose that love and feeling, don't we?
And then it kind of goes, yeah.
One of the things that we also discussed, too, you know, coming up this year is the principal meetings.
And again, having the, if the board approves moving forward with this, this would be a standing item on principles meetings.
So again, it starts from your building leadership continuing to revisit and revise and focus attention on it.
And again, that will help to keep that energy flowing in this direction for the whole system.
Thank you.
Dr. Gordon, I have one last question.
So in terms of the professional development, I know we've got staff coming back next week, is it next week already?
What is on the roster for professional development to get them all aligned with consistency, classroom climate, perceived academic impact, so on and so on, to do all of this good stuff?
Well, next week is a lot of kind of onboarding with the curriculum, like curriculum boosters.
So, reamping the math and literacy curriculum and all the things that go with it and Missy kind of talked about what they're going to be doing in the special ed world next week.
So this, the PD around classroom management and behavior and such is going to have to be embedded.
And I will work with Rochelle and Dr. Stengel on getting some new teacher behavior strategy management stuff going for the new teachers during the mentor sessions.
Thank you.
Any other word questions or comments?
Thank you so much, Dr. Earhart.
We really appreciate your time and commitment to leading the ad hoc student success and support committee and giving us this report and feedback.
And there's action to with the next slide, I think.
There's the next slide, there's one more, one more, there.
Is there a motion to accept this ad hoc student success and support committee report and approve the recommendations presented to be acted upon in the upcoming 2627 school year through the leadership of Dr. Earhart?
So moved.
Motion by Bill Johnson, is there a second?
I'll second that.
Carol Fox as a second.
Any discussion?
Can you can you pull up the slide that had all of the recommendations then please.
I think we still need to add in.
I mean, this doesn't say anything about how the board, the before it was, they were linked together when it was the district and the board.
And then it was separated out and the board score was the lowest score.
I think we need to do some more digging into that as well.
I think that should be a recommendation.
And then I, I'm hearing from staff that, I mean, this is a lot of high level stuff, but we need some of the nuts and bolts stuff like the Eric's, Eric's clear visuals supports. We need that as part of this as well.
That's in the conclusion part of it. So if you, again, if you accept the report, then it does say the board needs to work on that. So I included it in different areas. But.
Dan Shuf.
Yeah, I read these materials in advance. I didn't realize this was an action item.
So I guess I don't know, maybe a question for Dr. Gordon and, or, or Tia, how this stuff all interacts.
It does a bunch of things and I don't really understand where it sits. I totally get accepting a report. I totally get, you know, thanking people for service.
I don't understand saying that we're, you know, this is a bunch of things we're going to do that are in various places.
I don't understand how that interacts with the work of Dr. Gordon and Dr. Stingle. So maybe someone can help me out.
Dr. Gordon, but before I turn it over.
So the ad hoc typically for school boards when ad hoc committees wrap up their charge, they come with a report findings and recommendations.
The reason we have ad hoc committees is to help, you know, many hands. It makes, makes a lighter load for, for all of us because we can't all be everywhere, all the time.
Unfortunately, sometimes we have ad hoc committees and we don't do anything with their recommendations.
And that then in turn has the unfortunate result of leading to the poor feedback on boards because we're not listening to the ad hoc committees who are our staff, our community, our administrators.
So that's the idea why there's a motion with this report.
Dr. Gordon.
Sure. I would like to say this is mirroring what Tia said, but adding in that you're hiring a board consultant.
So when you're taking a look at the work of the ad hoc committee, using what Tia said, the board scored very low in the ratings.
And so using the information gathered there to help improve the board score and help, you know, you're wanting to improve the overall culture and climate of the district, not just the individual buildings.
And getting the community of the school district to feel like the board is supporting them more, having a more mutual trust and respect between the two.
So that there's that feeling of more support. So how can, how can you leverage the two together?
Joanne, so am I able to propose an amendment to the motion? Okay. So, all right.
I really like the paragraph and conclusions about district and board support is the dominant unresolved concern.
We should put that up into the recommendations area.
And then because we have staffing vacancies, substitute, fill rates, class and all of that stuff, because we have all of those things along with our transient population.
I think we also need a recommendation to have clear and consistent visual supports, district wide, and they're already created.
They were shared with the ad hoc last fall, I believe, right? Are they shared last fall?
Do you remember?
I remember Eric just bringing it and it was like, it's beautiful. But I think we need to add those two in.
I think that's important. Can you repeat the second one?
The second one was that because we have so many staffing vacancies, have a hard time with filling our substitutes, we have a high transient population, a lot of new teachers.
We need clear and consistent visual supports that are universal in our district.
So that it doesn't matter what school, a student, a substitute, or a new staff member is in, everybody's messaging is the same.
And it makes it easier for us to be unified as a district when it comes to discipline.
So you're just adding to the recommendations, you're not changing the motion?
No.
Got it.
So you want to underscore the recommendation to address and improve the board rating and to address in light of the staffing vacancies,
beef up the clear and consistent visual universal supports to strive for consistent messaging and unity throughout the district?
Yes, but the district and board one wasn't in recommendations, it was in conclusion.
So I'd like it to be part of the recommendations, which Dr. Erhart is nodding his head. He's good with that.
Okay.
So your amendment to the motion is what?
To revise the recommendations to have those two things in them.
Like just clearly in there.
We also have to move to extend the meeting.
But I'm happy to second the amendment.
Okay.
So can I get a motion to extend the meeting by 30 minutes?
So moved.
To second.
Motion by Joanne Ru seconded by Carol Fox. All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Okay, so we have a motion, an amendment motion by Joanne Ru with a second by Megan Miller.
Any further discussion?
We're voting on the amendment.
All in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Aye.
The amendment passes unanimously. Now we are voting on the original motion
by Bill Johnson, seconded by Carol Fox. Oh, I'm sorry, that was the other way around.
Carol Fox and seconded by Bill Johnson. All in favor?
Aye.
Any opposed?
Motion carries unanimously. Thank you, Dr. Earhart.
We are now at the consent agenda.
Typically there is no separate discussion of the items unless a board member so requests in which event the item or items will be removed from the general order of business and considered in their normal sequence on the agenda.
Are there any consent agenda items a board member would like removed?
Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda as is?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Joanne Ru, seconded by Carol Fox. Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
We are at human resources, employee recommendations. Are there any open session questions for the exhibit A?
Are there any closed session questions for exhibit A?
I have just a comment, an open session comment. I was slowing.
Just Dr. Gordon and your team, lots of great people on this list.
So I know it's late and we don't have time for extra words, but just want to celebrate that there's some great staff and leaders being hired on this list tonight.
And thanks for all the work that you guys all do to get them in there to do the good work of the year.
So thank you.
Thank you.
Mr. Schuf, we appreciate your comment and helping us remember to celebrate the good things and blessings that we have.
Is there a motion to approve exhibit A?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Carol Fox, seconded by Megan Miller. All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously.
Is there a motion to adjourn?
So moved.
Second.
Motion by Carol Fox, seconded by Megan Miller. All in favor?
Aye.
Motion carries unanimously at 906. We are adjourned. Everyone have a good night and thank you for a good meeting.