So we'll get started. Um I want to thank everybody for coming uh here today. Um just so everybody knows this is kind of we'll go over kind of the district task force. But when
the task force said yes, we wanted to start information where it's kind of a central location. Um so we kind of looked my thought was from downtown that was the idea in the future. So we'll have another meeting here but in
the future I suspect will directly once they start to try to make some decisions have some recommendations for the parents will meet with some results back to the board. We will end up coming more
evenings at that time with schools, but we will also do some different places in the community to try to make accessible members. I found my career that either people that never had kids in the school system
or a while been in the school system ends up always notable going to schools. Um, so it's kind of a mix in the situation. So, um, that's why we're here today and I appreciate you coming today.
Um, kind of our agenda for today, everybody should have one out front. We'll kind of go over the overview, purpose, and outcome. We go over our task force timeline. Um, we'll go over capacity study. Um what I'm going to try to do in the next 20 25 minutes so that
we have a good half hour for discussion and talk um is going over information that the task force has said two and a half months and has spent considerable amount of time and hours on. So if I go a little too fast, if you have questions
during the presentation, stop and say, "What did you mean by that?" or "How does that look?" or move that slide fast, just let me know. But I think the important part is once I get through the information that you have time to talk about yourselves
back and we will have some sheets of paper that you can provide some we have some questions at the end of the task force agree like some questions. So if you have that information, we do have that so you can write it down and read that information.
Um we'll go over what's the capacity study and I'll explain why there enrollment current projected how capacity and enrollment work together that discussion. So, the task force um and I'll be real
upfront honest when I did the research and this position this year. Um I could tell I knew I came in the interview I knew that um the district was financially I could kind of see why
it so um even during my interview and after my interview I talked about we're going to have to have district there some decisions as a community we're going to have to to decide how we want to move forward with the educational system. Um so really that's the how the
district's fac and operational costs line with current and future education needs. Um so they're analyzing key data and I'll share a lot of that data with you today to provide recommendations both to the district administration and
the school board uh regarding the effective and efficiency buildings. So the outcome is that we have a set of community informed recommendations to guide facility planning for the next decade ensuring that district buildings effectively support teacher learning
while maintaining long-term financial support. So back early June or I already started I called meeting with Paul we sat and talk all architects um and we hired them to do a facility study to analyze the
buildings of our schools capacity and um we were projecting we're projecting for at least the next seven years once you get eight years it's hard to that part um
and that's going to cause us to face those budget pressures annually. So we're always reexaminating our cost. We're always looking at how we currently spend money, how we project to spend
money, we share that with the board. We have a finance meeting that periodic legisl if you have already but you'll have an inside knowledge. So financial
uh the district like some people like are we in financial we're declining which is causing us to cut we're financially stable so we're we're in a good spot um
we made 2 million in reductions for this school already. Okay just so you know the last school year they made 1 3 million going into this school year. Paul and I
at least that's just because there's less students this year less students next year that um so and then people say we have that 12%
fun. So that's like our sustainable. So, I told the staff on Monday, if the state of Minnesota quit paying the district and went to just that savings account, we probably had 2 and 1/2 months.
In this case, take that 12%. If the states just paid us with that enrollment, we didn't change anything we were doing, we hit that bankruptcy. So either way we're what we're trying to do is protect that 12% by statute we
have to have. So trying to protect that savings once you start getting that savings account down to that's when you start to save everything. We also have to look at educational impact right we know financial impacts can have an impact on the quality of
students. So whatever decisions whatever we're doing we need to minimize the impact to the classroom right people think about class size we think about experience of teachers and some other areas we also need to minimize the impact of educational program so
literacy is a big component all other curricula and services so that will be all your special services special edll specialist services that those need to be prioritized so we're
not impacting them or we need to increase our staff effectiveness here we do a high reliability schools or HRS but we also talk about our professional development learning how our staff work
together so are we are we increasing how our staff we have to find creative solutions to work together for long-term success all students. We can't just do a couple things and hey, we're going to do this and we're going to do this. We need to
have a plan. What we're looking for as a district is can we plan on this and how many steps this plan because we know things can change things. So, uh, it just all depends on how
things are moving. And then we need to build that continuum for the district to serve. People forget we have our prek. PK only goes to school a couple days. We have a daycare that works alongside.
We have our normal K12. We also do adult program, not just adults for us, but 21. So, there's the district serves a huge across both preschool and 12 but also
our adult programming, our community. So we have to look at how the educational impact is going with this financial. So um the study timeline back in September we brought information to the finance committee the full school board
regarding the results of a facility study and that's a piece that we'll go over next. Uh and then we presented the facility study to the entire board in October. Um we did the district facilities walk through. So we started that. So came in
and started to look at how we are how how are the buildings of the building the infrastructure there. We began the task force application in November. Um we kept the evaluation of the district's
fac and uh started our task force meetings. At those meetings, they designed that little survey that was offered at the end of this. Um in December, they had the third meeting. Uh we looked at the initial survey results. We didn't have
pushing a survey out there. Again, it's still open to this day. Um in January, we're looking over the surveys. We're looking at the community sessions. They met last night. uh till about 9:00 after um and then
they'll have another meeting and at that at that fifth meeting is where they'll determine like they take some time off for the school board to come back to meet again. myself as a superintendent stuff. So we'll get to that fifth
meeting February. Uh we'll evaluate the concepts that they give us the information that the task force gives us before it February and March and out. Um we're going to have the task force present to the school board some of the recommendations.
um school board some decision and again we'll see community input session on board's thoughts and then hopefully made this summer because this whatever whatever happens is going to take some time to get done.
So we're hoping that um the recommendations for as we start to formulate plan that we have a number of months that so that we're not making mistakes that we look validate. So our capacity analysis so they went
through we'll go through and architects look at how are we currently using the buildings. So it's an attempt to quantify the building capacity. So how it is going to be in there and it's a lot of people think about it as head count or some
people say belly button count or seats. So however you want to refer to it there. It's a standard for functioning school anticipation. Now um if we change the way we use a space in school that alter
capacity I'll explain that a little bit um why that is because special education and other student services sometimes have requirements of saying 25 kids in class.
So that's how and then assignments change. So that changes how capacity we did in the capacity. These are just a generic Minnesota capacity numbers. That doesn't mean that class size 25
or 24. So the target is kind of the average of where you would say okay that's that's probably the average class size the cap is where you want to say once you look above you need when you look at the pictures you'll see
some that like in an elementary school if the dots pull that teacher in that room all day. The reason why music and art I haven't got there is those classrooms when these students go to
art, there's not another group of students that place in that class. Make sense? So then when you get to like a high school, there'll be a group of students in the classrooms, but there's also a music class.
So high school's capacity looks a little different because you generally have the students moving around. Granted, we have teachers that have a prep hour. There's a time those students are in our room. That's just a short period. So you should have this in your packet,
too. We went school by school with the principles um and district admin. We talked about how each one of the rooms was used. Uh and I'm not going to go room by room, but you can see like the STEM room has
an open circle. So again like in our room they would go in to use it but it's maybe not used every day and we know certain groups of students use it. So yes it's used but not consistent. And then you can see kind of where they
have all the dots. When we get to the sped setting the reason there's not a color dot in there yes students are in there but it depends on the set. Does it have a a cap of 12 students? of six students. So because of that um
we just kind of leave the room as it is um because setting three move to another school. So it's a little bit this is how they're being used. So you can kind of anticipate that the number of say 73 special ed sites those aren't
going to fluctuate very much. You pretty much need that cover in the district just will depend on the student. So here's then you have the main level lower level
the upper level uh lake view and again you should have all this in your packet. So you have lake view lower level upper level sibly lower main
southwest lower level and here's where you can start to see like there's usually always an art class going on with technology see filled in. So southwest lower level
main level the high school lower level main level. Again some of these you'll see centers and stuff not tricky. So you won't see the dots on the
road side because some of the rooms are preschool rooms. So they're used almost every day. Sometimes morning, sometimes afternoon, sometimes both. You've got daycare rooms which have different state requirements on how many kids can be in
there based on the age level. You have a district office there. You have adult education. We do some evening classes, some during the day classes, um, and community. And then of course there's a lot of So, so be color coded based on all the
different services that are there and which pieces they use both at the main level and so with that calculation the target capacities those are the 22s and 24s and 26s and then the max
capacity to say capacity we need to look at another section This would be the target really. We look at the target capacities for the max that we can have all. >> Can I ask a question?
>> So these numbers then are based on right. So if you change that >> yeah, >> right? So like Yeah. So if you got rid of music, art, and e there, and you can put a dot there, then you'd have 22
times three more classes. 66 more. >> What we're doing right now. >> Yep. >> That's a great fun question. >> Or like you said, Dr. the special education program move from one building to another, you know, building that was formally housing, and maybe they can add three or four home rooms, but then
another building's going to go down three or four, right? So that would be the benefit. still kind of this >> I would say it's pretty close. Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. Sorry. Probably should have solved from old. >> Oh, no problem. >> Yeah. No, no, but that's good. So, old
architect is here today. Sorry, I should have said that. So, we've got the people that have helped us do all this in this meeting. So, this is kind of your target max capacity of this stuff.
So, enrollment Um, I took the numbers. So, this is how I kind of look at it as a superintendent. So, I It's kind of nice because I can kind of how we look at things from a district office standpoint. So, every week I get an enrollment of what currently happen in
enrollment at what school. So, um, you can see here we look at what's the student counts, how many sections are at that school, and then what's the average. Uh you can see like I do highlight so we start to get those upper levels where are we going to start
thinking about a third section of what we need to do um I highlight those so those are things that I'm watching on a weekly basis my whole executive director. So there sorry there you have and here
you have Lake and Sibling and you can see there's quite a variation across schools took like second grade there. There's quite a variation in second grade across schools. Um overall
that would be your average class size just overall. So again, look back to see there's a variation in there. Um for Southwest um middle school we have here for the
high school we have by grade. You also have to consider that there's an ALC that's at Brookside, but sometimes these students switch places. Sometimes there's less than 100, but that gives you at least an idea of the current.
So, this is from uh NV. It's some of our projection charts. And I know this gets a little bit washed out, but you have it there. We put circles on it. So here is this year's graduating class anticipated next year. So this would be
junior, sophomore, freshman, eighth grade, seventh. You can kind of see how that's so it shows you kind of if you look across um like you took your juniors and you look across and said, "Okay, sixth grade
class." So those would be hypothetical graduating class. So as you can see, we're We're declining at about 2% roughly. I've been here and that's about what we're looking at pursuing.
So I say low for about the next seven years. These charts are how we're able to kind of determine that they really do. Now the things that can happen something houses unit somewhere is that going to
affect this? Yes. That's what takes a couple years for that to be done. But right now, this is kind of this next one I took, the blue and the red next to the current enrollment. And
again, in these numbers, just a reminder, the ALC and the early childhood were not in there. K12 numbers at everything but Brookside and then the percent of target capacity and we use that target number. So like we can say
homeless right now seeing about 68% target capacity. Here's how it looks in another way. So for K1 fall your max capacity your target capacity there's current enrollment
these numbers on the bottom again we're taking from MT at different times during the school year so those numbers are always fluctuating based on who's in the district we do have we're not a high transient district
so we do have kids And um so that's kind of then are at the bottom 25 26 all the way to 331. So we know that's what it's looking at. That's 25. Here's for 67. So that would have to be
southwest should there. And then we go for the high school being 812 max target overall in the district that's
um MD also has a square footage. So per student square footage they'll build and they they factor in gym space like high school they factor pool space all that kind of stuff together. So
we took our current enrollment that's there numbers that you should see in here and then we factored in the square footage of the school by the amount of students and we have 209 square feet per
student. The MD recommendation is 125 square feet to 155 square feet for homes. So how do you read it? If your square footage number is greater or more that
mean you have four square footage per student in the recommendation in this recommendation. If the square footage number is under lower then that means you don't have enough. So you right. So in reality these square
footage numbers hypothetically should be somewhere in between these numbers. Does guidelines like that? >> They do. Yeah. That would be an entire new school. So like if you were planning a new school, they would ask you to be
within that range. If you ever were outside of that for some reason, you would have to kind of justify it. Yeah. But that should be a fully functioning school. It's, you know, main office space, hallways, bathrooms, media center. >> Yeah. So sometimes what we see what I've
seen when they're outside of the number >> if some of your larger districts will build school then they attach like >> a field house with thousand seat auditorium well then you're going to be way up here on this number and then they
say this is why our buildings were designed the same And this is again just a kind of a metric to measure. I guess it doesn't tell you what to do about it, right? But it shows you have your square footage intensive for your
slides. is there any slides anybody? >> Oh, do you mind Dr. When we wrapped up with the task force last evening, a couple of them wanted us to mention that in their work, um we had had the task force look at a lot of peer school districts. Um so they looked at um we looked at a big list of districts and
then picked out four that um felt like peers in regards to um either being in your conference or being of similar enrollment or having faced similar challenges recently. Um they studied their building configurations and things like that. So that's kind of been a part of their work. It's not looking just out
but data of people. >> Okay. So we'll get this. Um so just a couple discussion feedback we'll get the sheets out. So the first one is and just sit and think about it but then if you're like me and like person you can write down
your thoughts do that if you had to choose one or two which of the following should carry the most weight educational quality program inside uh fiscal responsibility to the
community safety and facility condition school location for and the flexibility for future. Take some time to think about that. >> This is not that other sur Just number one right now.
Yeah. Okay. Wow. Watch. Yes, I have. I think last year I understand Well, they're getting more
Just see what happens. He's almost We don't Okay. So, I'm going to answer some of your thoughts. Does anybody want to share question one? Is there um
maybe one or two areas that you feel are a little bit heavier for yourself after kind of seeing all the data? Which one? >> So top priority should be education, quality and programming. >> Anybody choose anything else that you'd
like to say? You know, you're really really probably because all this input will get back to the task force lot of agreement on. Okay. So, um based off the data presented or based on the data presented, what data point
orformational point stood out to you the most? >> So, we'll give you a few minutes to kind of think about that. And again, you have Is there anything that really stood out to you? I don't know.
Oh yeah. Oh my god. It's not repeat. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I can't Okay. Is there is there any data points that
really stand out to you or information points that really stand out to you most? I think this show that >> any other any other data points or any other information that stands out
So the one the one point that somebody suggested was that across all the buildings it seems that the capacity that we're under capacity relatively the same right it seems that it's just that's the
general Anybody else? >> Okay. So, given declining enrollment, rising facility cost, which statement best aligns with your thinking? Maintain current district cost increase. Uh
current facility costs cost increase. Reduce or consolidate facilities to remain financially stable. A combination approach depending on facility. Unsure you need more information or do you have another thought of those?
Awesome. Because for you know Okay. Do we have any thoughts here? Yeah, >> one of these four. But how do these four Anybody
want to share representing right now? Yeah. Okay, now you're all right. Try again. Anybody got a statement that they think kind of right now?
Does anybody want to say do we maintain current facility costs and costs increase? Do we reduce or consolidate facilities? Do we make financially stable? Is there a combination approach? uh is there information that
>> I might share that you know this is what the task force is like weighing heavily right now um you know 45 minutes are being kind of we've been admiring the problem as I say for the past few meetings now we're kind of what we're going to do about it and today and Monday
very much so we would love to know maybe people aren't comfortable saying it out loud maybe behind your um filled out statements, but there's different ways to attack it, right? Or revenue or not spending as much combination of both, right? Or go ahead.
>> The survey is still open. Yeah. I think the code is on the back. Yeah. So, you could fill out the the broad district survey. Y >> So, this would be a good one to think about. Um it's called keep change all. So, what about our current facilities or approach should we preserve?
It's in your mind right now. What clearly means uh to be different moving forward and what may no longer be realistic given a moment. This can just be your your gut feeling
right there. So what just a couple of things we don't have to share out loud if we don't want to. Um but again if you can leave those for us on this again we share them with the district task force. So, from what you've seen right now, you might have some personal thoughts on that. You
might have some ideas from being in this community for a while, too. Um, what about our current facilities or approach to be preserved? What clearly needs to be different moving forward? What may no longer be realistic given a moment.
If we can discuss that with each other and put some thoughts down, that would be great. You don't necessarily share to us. >> Is it about the age of the building? >> I know it's so old and but I like it.
>> Yeah. No, I like that. We talked about that last evening. So, um, we've done a study like all the upcoming maintenance costs kind of normalized over what the kind of value building um, and actually, uh, Hawthorne was hanging in there and kind of the in a good category, but
they're all pretty they're they're pretty similar. Um, they kind of range from, um, it was a 6% score, which is good. A zero was like a perfect building, and then, you know, 60% would be like, oh, you can put 60% of that in the building. Um, so there was no building that was over I think about
14%. So the district's been doing a very good job maintaining buildings. So nobody was really like an outlier of like a state building. Um, thank you. >> Oh, y >> 14%. So, if you were to take all the needs of
the district right now, this is just estimated that the construction cost today was $52 million. >> The average for the elementary is probably five and a half million. >> Yeah, they're all they're all quite
similar on square footage. But >> what does the fix up mean? I mean, what does that mean? So we go through and we evaluate condition of parking lots, conditioner roofs, conditional windows, is carpet failing or cabinets falling off the walls, the bathrooms being co,
you know, are the air handlers coming up, water heaters, electrical service. You kind of go category by category. And if anything was seeming like it was going to come in the next 10 years, it went on list, right? Maybe it's not actively broken, but it's on the watch list of, you know, we know we're on time
on that water heater, right? So, um, so that was just turned over to the district. Patrick should know. Do you have a facility that's kind of weighing us down or not? Right. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. No, it's a great question. >> Yep.
>> Yeah. Compiance. >> So, every building, but there wasn't one. >> So, I have a question. I kind of So like it seems like it just it just seems when school districts building and
and want to get rid of it. It typically like I've heard they sell for a dollar or something. We actually sell a property and make money from the school district to be used for the school district's general fund. I can take that
several school district. So um as you can imagine there has to be a market for somebody who wants it right. So, I've gone through our fees or, you know, request for proposals or requests for visit districts. Um, I've had districts get $100,000 for a building before, which, you know, won't trip my nose up
at. Um, but the the idea that you're going to get millions from the school building, um, I would say never really because anyone who's going to come in, that building needs to work for their function and they have to convert it, right? So, they have to think through like all the maintenance that needs to
be done, any renovations, right? So I I've been part of like elementary school that senior housing but the developers can kind of think about their own costs versus um like in Greenfield like would it literally be cheaper to go build that development from scratch somewhere you know if there's no developable land in
the community then adaptive reuse becomes kind of a bigger market if there's tons of options tons of vacant buildings you're not you're not in high demand so what I would say is it's hard to rely on it you know get some huge confusion but the district or the board
could choose to try, right? And then I'm thinking we could do that, the district could do that. Then maybe that should be a factoring, right? Like there's one that like I'm not saying they want to close Lake. So they have Lake View is actually
right on that one or I mean there's another one that I'm just not aware of like whatever like but like should that If everything else were equal, then should that be a factor
then distributed last night which would be more or less But the hard part that's the hard couple years ago a lot of that. So there's it gets really
important. >> My my thoughts on you high in the sky. >> Yeah. Well, but >> we'll try. It really matters market, right? We can't make people pay more than there is. >> But when you talk about I'm not saying this,
but if you do, but that's >> hard. politics and geography and right >> and anytime you talk about >> because I've met a lot of people in town
they just always >> so then you got to grapple with that >> emotional history >> emotional so that emotional piece of that would be any building you have >> I got one of the old high school
building in town. I got this. >> So, so that's just the nature of a school. >> All right. Anything keep change? Let go. Anybody want to give us any examples? Oh, well that could be people might say
that could be a change that could be a key. >> It's hard to say. So So >> yeah. could be a change or a let go. So what Neil what Neil asked was um there's been some people that say put all put the
same grade level right well that could either be a change so change away from neighborhood school management schools or let neighborhood schools right um it could be change to great schools so we'll see I don't know if anybody has an
appointment you're going to consider the bill It would be pretty imperative that at the same time probably the most efficient piece of cutting our costs
a lot of efficiencies that I know for a fact that you're also going to introduce a lot of controversy that we had. So we need to balance controversy as opposed to benefit
that will be a factor. We have to do an awful lot of earth coming out of the benefit that you know off the top of my people. It seems like there are an awful lot of
possible ways of gaining all the first and second class size how many teachers you need. is probably the biggest cost we have. So if you want some significant
financial advantages and realigning those buildings awful lot of sense but so to speak to this point so the group to see here one thing hard on is what's happening when building gets on the two
sections teachers in each area. There's substitute when you're gone. It's hard to absorb 1920 kids in another classroom. But if you have a three section building and a teacher's gone, you just split that
class up and handle that. That's a lot easier. So there's little things like that, but also when you get down to two sections and we need to keep reducing staff, if you try to reduce a few down to one, you're going to have to reduce class sizes and create more. So our
boundaries and our four different schools as we see our decline, we're seeing discrepancy between say so let's use the other um where you have the.3
you have 18 or you have I think there was one that was almost like significant like 26 to 18 and so you're seeing these big discrepancies from building to building and so one family across town has totally different experience than another family and so if you were to
grade levels concern and there's also some conversation about um you know benefits for education class those teachers can collaborate and meet grade level um grade level PLC's and collaborate um specifically for eighth
grade that so there's benefits to band grade levels. Um I think we heard from a group last night one of 500 in kindergarten and third grade and now they're two different sites where I have three students and now they're going to be at
three different sites and so there's pros and cons but I think to me point there's a lot of efficiencies we can really maximize the most But that would be the case anyway. If you have a fourth grader, a sixth grader, and a nth grader, you're in
three different schools anyway. I mean, unless your kids are like mine, right after each other, they're going to be, you know, >> so it's a listening session. We're I think really just seeking ideas,
test these items out. They're terrible ideas. They're good ideas. I guess. >> Okay, so real quickly, we're coming up to 1:00. We have a great conversation. I'll be here to listen for anybody who wants to stay. If there is one piece of
advice you can give to a board member as it considers future facility decisions, if you have anything you'd like to just say to those board members, please leave a comment on that. Um, the last page of your package is
also that survey with the QR code and and feel free to go around for the next couple of days and tell everybody, you know, take that survey if you haven't already. Um, even though you kind of now are a little more educated and have that information, we're trying to get this
ready. I'd love to have 25,000 respondents to the survey. It was a doctoral survey. I know that's not what you get. So, Thanks. >> Okay.