To order. I'd like to remind everyone that this is a hybrid meeting and that some of our presenters and audience may join by zone. Miss Ozyinski, may we have a roll call, please? Trustee Schmidt? Present. Trustee Mohammed? Here. Trustee Wilkins? Here. Trustee Wilkes? Present. Trustee Basquiat? Trustee Wilkerson? Present. President of the Easter? Here. Thank you, miss Odescalzke. Trustees, you have received the agenda. Are there any changes? May I have a motion to approve the agenda? Oh, you have a change? Yeah. I think we would like to add a closed session later in the agenda. Thank you, Trustee Wilkinson.
Second. Alright. Closed session. The the reason for the closed session, please? For Oh. For For new Negotiations and superintendent evaluation. Okay. Alright. Any discussion? Under board action, I'm assuming. Yeah. Under board action. And is it? Yeah. That works. You're not adjourning this meeting to it. You're recessing. Correct. Thank you. Any discussion? Let's do a roll call to Adam. Yes. We have a first and a second. Yes. First by Trustee Wilkinson, supported by Trustee Schmidt. Yes. Whenever you're ready. We'll go ahead. Vote. Alright. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Wilkins?
Yes. Trustee Wilkes? Yes. Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. President Feaster? Yes. And Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Motion carried. Any other changes changes to the agenda, trustees? Is there a motion to approve the agenda then? So moved. Second. Moved by Trustee Wilkes, supported by Trustee Schmidt. Any discussion? Seeing none, miss Osinski, please. Okay. Trustee Wilkins? Yes. Trustee Wilkes? Yes. Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. President Feaster? Yes. Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yeah. Motion carries. Thank you. I would now like to introduce the nonvoting member at the table, miss Jazz Parks,
superintendent of schools. Good evening. Thank you, president Feaster. And that brings us to our land acknowledgement statement. And I'll turn it over to trustee Wilkerson and ask him to please read land acknowledgement statement. Certainly. We acknowledge that the Ann Arbor Public School or Ann Arbor Public Schools District occupies the ancestral, traditional and contemporary lands of the Anishinaabek, Three Fires Confederacy, the Odawa, Ojibwe and Potawatomi. The taking of this land was formalized in a process alien to native cultures by the Treaty of Detroit in eighteen o seven. The Ann Arbor Public Schools recognizes that many other native peoples lived on this land
at different times, including the Fox, Sauk, Shawnee, Kickapoo, Miami, Muscatine, and Cherokee, many of whom were forcefully removed from their homelands. Acknowledgment by itself is a small gesture and does not exist in the past or solely in a historical context. Colonialism is a current ongoing process, and we understand our responsibility in educating students about our participation. We further recognize the outgoing relationship and dependence upon and respect for all living beings of earth, sky and water.
It is our responsibility to care for this land, and we honor with our deepest gratitude the native people who have and will continue to steward it for generations. Thank you, Trustee Wilkerson. I believe that brings us down to public commentary. The board would like to remind everyone that individuals who have signed up for public commentary will have their name called and are given an opportunity to speak or have comments read by members of our staff. Commenters will receive up to four minutes with a total of no more than forty five minutes allowed for the public commentary period. When your name is called, please come forward and speak at the microphone.
To help manage your time, a clock will be placed on the screen in front of you. We would like to remind everyone that public comments are generally pertained to to Anheuser Public School District matters. Comments about any individual or individuals are expressly prohibited. Also, please understand that board members do not respond to public comments, but we will listen carefully and will follow-up as appropriate. Miss Solzinski, how many sign ups do we have for this evening? We have, 10 this evening. We had a late sign up, which, I did allow. I hope that's okay. We did have one person who is not going to come.
So Thank you, miss Williams. Alright. And when you hear your name, you'll just come on up to the podium. Monica Martin Holman. Hello? Hello? My name is Monica Martin Holman, and I became a guardian of my cousin, last August who, at the time, was 14. She's now 15, but she was a ninth grader at Pathways, high school. And I have a great concern because looking through her education, it show that although she was, 14 out of fifteen and ninth grade now of tenth,
She is only at a second to a fourth grade level, education. And that's very concerning because she spent her entire years going to Ann Arbor Public Schools ever since preschool. But throughout her years through elementary and junior high, she was allowed to miss fifty to sixty or more days a semester. And for whatever reason, it wasn't addressed. And so now she's paying the penalty by having such a, low quality of education, which we're really trying to work hard, but it's just kinda very, concerning that this is happening in the 2,000
era where we had this, like, no child left behind, and she definitely was left behind. The other situation I have is that, she's at, pathways, and there has been a particular student has been bullying, some of the children there. And I feel like it's not being addressed properly because this has been going on since last year. There's a couple incidents that, Zaniah was involved in with this person, and, I know they have been doing somewhat of a job to try to curtail it, but I don't think they're doing as much as they could to stop this, student who's really becoming a menace.
She has not just harassed my cousin, but she's harassed other children. There were there was a lot of fighting going on in the bathroom. And I with the school being such a small school, I just didn't see why the bathrooms were unlocked at a earlier time. Just stop the when you move this to the place where kids would go fight, why don't we just stop the children from being able to go to the bathroom freely? And so, basically, that's kinda what I wanted to, have put on record that I'm not too sure if anybody here is concerned about it. But if you happen to, reach out, you can definitely look back at her school record and see that we have this
unfortunate situation of a Ann Arbor Public School student who's been going to school all of her life, and she's, struggling, and she's very behind from what, you know, she should be if people would've took more care and concern with her education. So I'm not for sure exactly why the ball was dropped, but it was dropped, and it's a sad situation. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Shelley I'm sorry. Kelly Shelton followed by Sonia Chawla. Good evening. My name is Kelly Shelton, and I'm here tonight to speak on behalf of my family and more importantly,
my host daughter Magdalena Hall. She's a foreign exchange student from Germany who has spent the past school year with us. Magdalena came to The United States full of excitement, eager to immerse herself in the all American high school experience, a phrase often used to describe the memories and milestones that define these formative years. She has worked hard in her classes, attended school events, cheered at football games, danced at homecoming, showcased her talents at art night, volunteered in the community, participated in after school clubs, and proudly plays for the girls JV soccer team. Along the way, she has built meaningful relationships with students and staff alike.
When I reached out to mister Carter to ask about if Magdalena could participate in graduation, he initially responded that she could not as she would not meet the Michigan requirements for diploma. I understand this and respected that rationale. However, after speaking with a friend who has hosted 14 exchange students, each of them who have been allowed to participate in graduation at varying schools throughout the Anarbor District, I wrote to mister Carter again, clarifying that I wasn't asking for a diploma or transcript, but for a chance in a or once in a lifetime quintessential American experience for Magdalena. Once again,
the answer was no. Magdalena then decided to advocate for herself and met with mister Carter directly. She was given several reasons why her participation would not be appropriate. One, it would be unfair to students who haven't earned enough credits to graduate. To this I say, how is that relevant to Magdalena's situation? Those students have known the requirements for graduation, and Magdalena's participation would not diminish their lesson accomplishments. Two, it wouldn't be fair to a student who tragically lost a parent. To this I say, my best friend from high school lost her mother during our senior year, and our school rallied together to ensure that she was able to participate in graduation.
Again, I fail to see how this relates to Magdalena's situation. Three, says the kicker. It goes against his morals. To say this, I say, while I respect mister Carter's personal beliefs, I'm not sure how his morals should dictate what is fundamentally a community celebration. Look I looked up Ann Arbor Public Schools' core values, which include creating a a learning environment that honors the dignity of each student providing inclusive and engaging experience. How does this decision align with those values? Four, it would turn graduation into a performance, making it less meaningful for those who have earned their diploma.
With all due respect, I disagree. Magdalena is not asking for honor she hasn't earned. She's simply asking to stand with her peers to be part of a moment and that reflects her effort, participation, and her commitment to the school community. This moment matters deeply to her. It's part of why she chose to come here in the first place. We truly we fully appreciate the importance of preserving the integrity of graduation, but this isn't about compromising that. It's about recognizing someone who has fully immersed herself in the school's culture, contributed to its community, and built relationships that will last a lifetime. We are doing our best to provide Magdalena with our meaningful experiences during her time
here, but there's no substitute for standing beside the friend she has made, hearing her name called and feeling like she truly belonged. I respectfully ask the board to reflect on whether this this this decision aligns with the values of inclusion, empathy, and global citizenship that I hope our school likes to uphold. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next is Sonia Chawla followed by Owen Murdock. Good evening, trustees and superintendent Parks. I'm here tonight as a representative from the PTOC Equity Committee. As you know, for the past few years, we have held a twenty for thirty fundraiser to help support our title one schools
with the hope of decreasing the PTO fundraising gap between our more and our less resourced schools. This is the final week of the fundraiser. And if you've already donated, thank you so much on behalf of the committee and, and the students that are title one schools. If not, I invite you and the rest of the Ann Arbor community to donate to this worthy cause. 100% of the money goes to our title one schools to spend at their discretion. The funds we've raised over the past few years have gone to student field trips, teacher grants, and other programs to meet students' needs.
So far this year, we've raised $25,000, and the PTO Thrift Shop has generously agreed to match up to $30,000. The link to donate is on the PTOC website. We would like to thank superintendent Parks for her support and for helping us publicize this fundraiser in the AAPS emails. We also would like to thank the AFC Ann Arbor for supporting us in the fundraiser at their home openers this weekend. The women's home opener is this Friday, May 9 at Pioneer, and the men's is this Saturday, May 10 at Saline High School.
Both games start at 7PM and are free for kids 13 and under. Adult tickets are discounted for APS teachers and staff. The, AFC Ann Arbor has been generous enough to give the PTOC a table at the game on Saturday night. So we, we thank you for your support. We hope to see you at the game and, supporting our title one schools. Thank you very much. Thank you. Owen Murdoch, then Isaiah Clifton. I say I thought you won't be. I am here to talk about the suspension of one Alexander Constantellos,
after the We The People DC trip. I'm not going to go into specifics. However, he was suspended, and I believe that was, without cause to the best of my knowledge. He is an amazingly effective educator, efficient as well. He was able to make some 60 students over the two years that the We The People program has been running, and I can confidently say the vast majority of this year and last year got fives on the AP test, and they were more than prepared. And on top of that, both times we've gone to national competitions. This year, we placed, fifteenth of 48 teams at a national level against some very stiff competition.
But that is that's all been said and done. Anyone could tell you that mister Constantellus is a very effective educator. What I'm asking for is just a little bit more information and perhaps the ability to make our perspectives heard, because we've been told repeatedly that we don't have the full story and yet with the very limited pool of witnesses, for the event, I'm the the class I asked, I didn't do exhaustive research, but it doesn't seem like anyone in the class was asked about it. So I'm I don't doubt the competency of the investigation.
I would just like more opportunity to make our voices heard, and I would like more opportunity to know even what the problem was. Because from my perspective, there really wasn't much happening. And I just I I have all I would like to have faith in the investigative process. I just I need a little bit more to have faith in. Thank you. Okay. Virturo Bartolome, sorry. Couldn't make it. Okay. And Alexander Gladiden? Hello. My name is Alexander Gladunin. I am, other student in, with the people class in, Pioneer High School.
I am a foreigner. I'm from Ukraine. English for me is my third language, and, sometimes it is, like, really hard to go through, like, to go through school is hard to sometimes understand stuff when, you hear words that you never ever heard in your life. The, with the people program, was for me very helpful to, study gover American government in-depth. When I, started, on the beginning of the school year, I had no prior knowledge of American government.
Like, only what I know is that there is some senate and there is some president and a supreme court. And what do they do? What do they compose? What are their tasks? What is what does constitution says? What are first amendment protections? Never heard of that. And my teacher, Alexander Constantellas, he helped me and other 24 students to study such huge, array of information very quickly and with deep understanding of of material. Then we,
proceeded to, preparation for competitions, regional states and nationals, on each, for each competition, students were given very specific parts, very specific questions such as, what what are effects of polarization on American government and and how we can deal with this, which is not getting taught in as far as I know, it's not really getting taught in regular government curriculum and even AP government curriculum.
And, working with mister Telus, through the whole year gave enormous under like, gave enormous understanding. It was, like, deeper than any other govern like, government class teacher can give me in this city or maybe in the state even. So, I agree with the point that my, friend made a minute ago. So you think that, Alexander has to be returned to, pioneer high school teaching? And I think that it's very important for him to return
back next year and teach this class because, you will never ever find anywhere else a teacher who is willing to sacrifice nights on tie on on research and on typing a lot of, basically, s essays, timing them, speaking with students on deep questions about their topics. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Claire Arthurs followed by Linden Dibble. Claire Arthurs?
Thank you for your time. Dear board and superintendent parks, this is cobbled together of a letter from today and a letter that I sent some of you in last spring. Yesterday's PD emphasized the importance of numbers, and so I hope to bring a couple to your attention. Learning that math is not just logic, just data. A substitute earns $150 a day to sub in as a teacher. Any retired teacher or admin subbing in a school, I believe, earns approximately $215 a day. Because our buildings are working tirelessly to try and support our students, many are hiring substitute teachers at a teacher rate, even if they're doing the work of a teacher or teachers at a teacher rate,
even if they're doing the work of a teacher assistant. Base level TA salary is $17.08 an hour. If you work a six point seven hour day, such as I do, I earn $114 a day, plus of course benefits. The district is woefully understaffed with TAs. This was shown last year by active unfulfilled job postings at 93% of Ann Arbor public schools, 30 out of 32 schools, as well as two posted last spring as location to be determined. This is no longer the case. It's now just posted as we're hiring TAs. There are also repeated pleas to apply,
as a paraeducator from every district, almost all district updates. Sorry. Some of this is old. These are harder positions to fill and even harder to retain. I asked how many TAs worked in our district, and I was told I could not have that information. I scoured a bunch of school websites, and it appears that our our TA numbers are approximately 261. At only 261, TA positions are down across the district. Pre layoffs, we were told there were approximately 411 positions, which included other members of our bargaining unit, which includes community assistance and quite a lot of other positions,
but few people in those positions. Both the office of special education and building admin are working actively to recruit and and retain more TAs. Unfortunately, as they do so, TA pay remains low by comparison both to other districts and to the pay of substitute teachers. I speak with many TAs across the district. At at least 15 schools, they're reporting that they are both down in TA numbers. It is hard work there. There are long term subs that are put in the place of TAs in order to be in legal compliance with the IEPs. This is rather than paying TAs a higher wage.
I repeat, long term subs are being used across the district in buildings to cover the loss of TA positions. Rather than paying our TAs more, we are subcontracting this work to subs who make more than TAs. I mean no disrespect to any long term subs or building substitutes. I've done it. It's very hard work. We have amazing subs at TAP and we are grateful for them. I will say I believe this is a Band Aid, a very expensive Band Aid, on a much less expensive problem. While earning more, these subs are also not trained in crisis prevention. They are not overseen or evaluated in any formal capacity,
and many do not have access to students' IEPs per FERPA, so I'm unsure how exactly they're able to meet the needs of the students. Many TAs have left to work as substitute teachers because they'll have fewer responsibilities. I'm running out of time. So I will say that, I understand salary step steps are negotiated with union bargaining teams. This is a hopefully very friendly reminder that AAPS HR itself could choose to create more fiscal incentives for TAs. With the new data shown in suspensions as well as to comments expressed here in the past several months, It feels we are again sorely lacking to fill critical and hard to reach positions
to support our students with IEPs. I urge you as a board to please plan for ways to strengthen AAPS' supports for special education. As you do so, I encourage you to please create reasons for teaching assistants to stay. You have the power to help thousands of students. Please save your district money by paying TAs more and reducing spending on outside contractors. Thank you. Lyndon Dibble. Good evening. Hey. Okay. I'm also here to speak about, We the People. I'm a student who competed on We the People last year, going to states, placing second, going to nationals, and placing nationally as well.
Mister Telos, I independently, reached out to mister Smith to ask for further information on mister Telos' removal as he's been gone for close to a month now. And as you know, AP season is this week. Just yesterday was the AP gov test. His students missed him, in this window of opportunity where he needed to prep them for this exam where he should have been at the school teaching his math students. He's he's not even a civics teacher. He's a math teacher. He teaches four math classes and one civics class and happens to be we the people. So his his ninth graders, his tenth graders,
his eleventh graders, they're all missing both now his math education and also his team was missing their prep for their AP exam. I'm a student coach for We The People. Mister Tellus, after long school days, you know, 06:30AM to to 4PM, he goes home for just an hour every Thursday and comes back to the school at six to coach We The People again from six to nine every, every Thursday for practice for for practice. But he doesn't stay there just till nine. He stays stays there till 09:30, nine forty,
ten PM discussing with us, the student coaches, problems that are rising in the team, people who aren't, you know, carrying their weight, other issues on the coaching end. He dedicates so much of his time and passion to We The People and whatever happened to DC, which we have very I have very little info information on because I was not there personally, from my perspective is not his fault and he should not be punishing being being punished for actions that were not his. It it's it's just sad because We The People is,
as Sasha mentioned, a very, very education education focused program. And you learn a lot. You learn so much more about government and America and We The People than any other government class, in in APS and in the state. We placed first in in the service competition. So, yeah, we we learn more. It's we had an exchange student last year, and I'm sure she would say the exact same things Sausage said. She knew nothing about American government until she came here. She's from India and she's now back in India doing whatever she's doing. And and from my perspective as a as a prior alumni,
I want future a, b, students at Pioneer to be able to take We The People, be able to have mister Telos, coach them through it. He's a good coach. I've tried recruiting juniors and sophomores to get ready in their minds to take We The People next year, and it's frightening that the teacher who teaches it may not may not be may not be there next year because of discipline disciplinary issues. Yeah, that's my that's my message. Thank you. Thank you. Then finally, Shlomit Cohen. Hi. So I'm also with, We The People, but I'm from a little different perspective.
I wanted to put a spotlight first. Maybe I need to introduce myself first. My name is. English is also my second, third language. My daughter, Gabriela Revson, went with these fine students for the same program. I wanted to put I didn't know what to write because I wasn't sure what the student would say, and I wanted to give the stage first for the the floor for them. But I want I do wanna fill in the gap or put some spotlight first for these young kids. I know my heart is pounding standing here. I'm sure it's not easy for such young hearts and such young age to to
stand here and advocate for the teacher, for the program. And, that's my first point, and I think it's important to take this into account and think not just of the kids, you as the board, not only of the kids that are not supposed to be left behind, but also those that we wanna push forward. And that's the importance of this program, to make sure there's answer for all the students, those that want to exceed and to excel and they forgot to mention or maybe I didn't hear. They represent Michigan in
Washington DC. They brought a lot of crowd, not only to the parents or the school, but I think to Ann Arbor and Michigan. So this is one thing that is very important. Second, yes, the teacher is missing. There's a lot of question in the air, and, maybe it's not for the students to know or to judge. But with no input information, people do need do have the need or the tendency to fill in the gap. And there's a lot of, how would I say this? When you learn about justice,
sometimes you put things on a scale, Who's right? Who's wrong? And then when a teacher is missing and a student is is missing, you're thinking, okay. Who's right? Who's wrong? Maybe we'll advocate for her or for him or you know? As if you need to choose a side. And, I wanna say, please make sure that there's no side to choose. This is not the case. This was not explained to the kids. I know there's some cyberbullying already started against that student that is missing. So I state as your responsibility.
Sorry. But I know that your tool is to give suspension if it's for a kid who's misbehaving or if it's for a teacher that you're not sure if he's misbehaving. I'm sure the teacher was not misbehaving in the safety of the kids. I was talking with the principal. The principal also told me there's no safety for the kids, and that's why I don't understand why he was not coming back to school to teach them. It's not a safety issue. Other things that you need to discuss or check, you can do not on the expense of our students' education.
They did not they were not ready for their AP test that was this Tuesday, last Tuesday. They were for almost a month without the teacher in class. So suspension is not ideal, tool. That's what you have, and I understand it. But I guess when there's a rule, there's need to be an exception to the rule. And in this case, needs to be dealt in more delicate hands and understand the situation. So please make sure that the student is safe. Putting this in this equation, it's not helpful, and that the program is safe and the teacher is back to class.
Thank you. Thank you. And that concludes public commentary. We appreciate hearing from our community. The board would like to thank everyone who spoke and shared their comments tonight. Miss Parks, are there any points of clarification? The, the staff will follow-up on the individual student concerns, and we you know, as is our practice, we don't comment on on personnel. So while we do that. Thank you. Next is the community feedback. Obviously, that is available on board docs. And I think that brings us down to reports of association. And I think I see mister Klein in the back from the Ann Arbor Education
Association. Good evening, trustees, Superintendent Parks, Anabra Public Schools community and the talented and fierce educators that make up the AAEA. My name is Fred Klein, I'm thirty five year veteran in the Anabra Public Schools and I'm now proudly serving as the president of the Anabra Education Association, the union that represents the teaching and professional staff of the Anabra Public Schools. I appreciate the opportunity to provide these updates on behalf of the AAAEA. As we continue to work collaboratively in support of students, educators, and public education, I want to highlight several important events and developments from the past few weeks.
First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to Trustee Don Wilkerson for attending the AAAEA member organized People for Public Education rally at the Capitol in Lansing on Saturday, April 26. Your presence demonstrated strong support for public education and meant a great deal to our members. I also want to sincerely thank Trustee Leslie Wilkins for joining us, educators and allies at the Michigan Educational Justice Coalition's Lobby Day at the Capitol on
Tuesday the twenty ninth. Your advocacy is vital as we continue our efforts to protect and strengthen our schools. It is critical that we work together to advocate for our public school system, especially our beloved Ann Arbor public schools in this crazy time when public education is under attack. I look forward to many more opportunities to partner with all of you in championing the needs of our students and educators. Thank you both. I am incredibly proud to celebrate the national recognition of student journalist Annabella Mee of
Clague Middle School who was named young aspiring journalist by the Journalism Education Association, honoring her as the top middle school journalist in the country. Her advisor, AAEA's member, Sarah Beth Badalamente, I seem to mention her name a lot here, and she deserves every, accolade. She shared that Annabella showcases it all, noting her leadership, reporting on breaking news, engagement with the school community and thoughtful implementation of an AI policy for their publication. In addition, Clegg Middle School's Cougar Star website has again achieved top honors,
ranking first place in Best in Show. This marks the third consecutive year that that site has been named the best middle school journalism website in the nation. Congratulations to the students and their advisor, AAAEA member, Sarah Beth Badlamente for this impressive achievement. On a more personal note, I want to pay tribute to AAAEA member and fourth grade teacher at Baugh Elementary School, also our AAAEA Elementary Caucus Chair, Anita Ringo, who will be retiring at the end of the school year after thirty seven years
of dedicated service to the Ann Arbor Public Schools. I have had the honor of working closely with Anita for over two decades, both as co chairs of our elementary caucus and on the bargaining team. She is a model educator, mentor and advocate and her impact on our district is immeasurable. We will miss her deeply and remain grateful for her legacy. Turning to collective bargaining, we are currently engaged in interest based bargaining or IBB, and we have training with our two facilitators. Our second training session with the district is scheduled for tomorrow from 01:00 to 04:00.
This training is essential to ensuring a collaborative and productive bargaining process, which we have successfully utilized in the past. I remain optimistic about the potential for meaningful progress this year. Formal bargaining sessions will begin next week on May 21 from one to five o'clock and additionally our teams are working on bargaining the school year calendars and then we will meet next Thursday from eight to 10AM. As I have said consistently, this upcoming negotiation is the most critical we have faced. Our experienced teachers continue to earn significantly less than their peers in comparable districts,
while also subsidizing lower health care premiums for other district employees, including the highest paid central administrators. If we are to truly live up to our model exceptional, this bargain must be the first step in reestablishing the Anab Republic Schools as a model district for excellence in education and one that can retain and attract the very best educators. Thank you for your partnership and support for educators, students and schools. I believe that brings us down to community group reports. There's the link there under aid, indicate how you request time.
And I believe we have a report from the Asian Pacific Islander, South Asian American group APISA. Sorry, I'm going to hand out little flyers first. Good evening, president Feaster, esteemed board of education trustees, and superintendent parks. My name is Jocelyn Hunter Young, and I'm here tonight speaking on behalf of the Asian Pacific Islander South Asian American parent group or APISA. I'm also a teacher in AAPS and a parent of kids who attend Ann Arbor Open at Mac school. APISA is excited to join AAPS in celebrating Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander Heritage Month.
This month was first officially recognized at the national level in 1992, building off efforts in the 1970s to recognize Asian Pacific American Heritage Week. Although simply recognizing a heritage month does not address the need for action and change to combat systemic racism and other challenges, we do know that it is an important part of visibility and representation. Singer Olivia Rodrigo, a Filipina American, has shared her experience of getting messages from young girls who say things like, I've never seen someone who looked like me in your position. Miss Rodrigo said that this is a pow is powerful for her because even at
the age of 22, she recognizes that she did not have representation of people who looked like her growing up. This helps to highlight why celebrating the diversity of the Asian American Pacific Islander, Native Hawaiian, and South Asian community is so important. As such, we would like to draw your attention to a number of local events happening throughout the month, including many upcoming at the Ann Arbor YMCA and the Ann Arbor District Library. The University of Michigan Museum of Art also has a photography exhibit of work by Jared Lew called Strange You Never Knew, which is on display until June 15. As part of the this effort to raise awareness of the Asian American and Pacific
Islander community, our parent group is proud to continue our tradition of organizing and hosting virtual author talks for AAPS students, staff, and families to attend. We started these in 2022, but only started truly tracking attendance in 2023. In just the last two years, we've had over 200 classrooms or families register for these talks, reaching over 5,000 members of the AAPS community. At a March board meeting, an Ann Arbor Open Teacher Luke Jackson shared, the virtual author talks have given my first and second grade students the opportunity to see themselves reflected in literature and learn about cultures and experiences beyond their own,
fostering a more inclusive and engaging learning environment. That same night, Rachel Eiler, a parent of two kids at Hazely, talked about our twenty twenty three author talks. She said, my children and myself, we're thrilled to attend a talk with Gracelyn, an author whose books we had discovered and loved at the library. To be able for my daughters to meet a beloved author and participate in a draw along made me feel so proud to be a parent in a school system that can bring in such a talented author. What a great opportunity for children to be able to see themselves represented in lovely storybooks. For my kids, it's amazing to see protagonists from other cultures who have the same problems,
fun, and imagination that they do. I can't express how taking the time to celebrate our similarities and differences means the world to my two girls, myself, and our APS community. Through collaboration with and support from superintendent Parks, assist assistant superintendent Don Liddon, social studies district chair Jared Almond, and the coordination of Anne Judge, we will host two events later this month. On Wednesday, May 21, from ten to eleven AM, there will be a virtual author talk on the topic of global citizenship by Sadia Farooqi. Miss Farooqi is a Pakistani American author and interfaith activist.
She writes popular children's early reader series, like Yasmin, and other books for children, including chapter books for ages eight and up, graphic novels, and picture books. Her author talk is best for students in ages or in grades three to eight. Her talk is on global citizenship and should be of great interest to our community. This theme is in all of her books, but especially in Thousand Questions, The The Partition Project, and The Wonders We Seek. Also on Wednesday, May 21 from 01:30 to two, Richard Ho will join us for another author talk geared towards elementary students, particularly those in grades the young fives through second grade.
Among many others, mister Ho's books include children's picture books like Red Rover, Curiosity on Mars, and Two New Years. Mister Ho, who is Jewish and Chinese American, will read from his book Two New Years, which explores both Chinese and Jewish cultures. Illustrator of that book, Lynn Scurfield, who is of Asian ancestry with a Jewish stepfamily, contributed to this award winning book, which has received both the Sydney Taylor Book Award and a National Jewish Book Award. We are particularly excited to have this event because May is also Jewish American Heritage Month, and we hope that mister Ho's talk will help to highlight the diversity of our community and the complexity of the identities we all hold.
Pregistration is required for these events at timeURL.com/apisa, with two a's on the end, twenty twenty five author talks. And AAPS teachers who register before May 20 have the opportunity to be entered into a raffle to receive a copy of a book by these authors. We encourage the trustees and members of the AAPS community to pre register and participate if they are able. It is truly a pleasure to see classrooms actively engaging with these authors. These are or there are opportunities for participants to submit questions in advance or during the livestream of these talks.
And trustees, please also check your emails, for the digital version of that small advertisement that I just gave you, and feel free to share broadly with others in the community. Finally, John Chu, who's an Asian American director, producers, and screenwriter best known for his work on Crazy Rich Asians and Wicked, said representation is showing the world who you are at its most intimate levels. We appreciate how AAPS continues to support our students, staff, and families to show the world who we are and celebrate this community diversity. Thank you. Thank you. And I believe that brings us down to number six,
board committee reports. And I believe we'll start with the bond committee. And I'll turn it over to Trustee Wilkes. Okay. Thank you, President Feaster. So there were items that we reviewed, during our bond committee meeting today and those items will be coming before the Board for first briefing this evening. And that concludes my report. Thank you, Trustee Wu. I believe that brings us down to the Equity and Inclusion Committee and I'll turn it over to Trustee Mohammed. So, yeah, we met and we talked about Title one schools and the different resources that Title one schools have. I know we're gonna hopefully follow-up with more detailed presentation,
but, it was a great presentation, very informative, and that's what we talked about. Thank you, Trustee Mohammed. I believe that brings us down to the Finance Committee. Trustee Wilkinson? Yes. Thank you. We actually haven't had another Finance Committee meeting yet, but our next one is tentatively planned for 05/19. We will be getting that on the calendar, once we have a time set. Like like it's there? And I can also cover planning. Please. That works? Okay. The planning committee met on Friday, the twenty fifth at 10:30AM.
We went over an overview of the committee roles and thoughts for the year. Couple of topics that we covered were strategic planning and then also received an update on personal finance graduation requirements, which will go through other committees as well and move forward. Alright. Thank you, professor Wilkerson. I'll turn over to myself, the executive committee. We met, and we plan the agenda for tonight's meeting. And we discussed the agenda for next week's meeting tentatively, trying to get ahead of it a bit so that it won't be, last minute and trust it to have a little bit more information,
a little bit further in advance. And we did there if there's no question. Alright. So that brings us down to number seven under information, and that brings us to the superintendent update. Miss Parks. Thank you, president Feaster, and trustees and community. I appreciate the opportunity to provide an update this evening to our, Ann Arbor Public Schools community. We'll start with National School Lunch Hero Day, Friday, May second, the Ann Arbor Public Schools celebrated National School Lunch Hero Day. Our AAPS food and nutrition team truly serves as superheroes every day throughout the school
year. The team works diligently to prepare and provide children with nutritious meals each day across our 32 school locations. By the end of this school year, they will have served more than a million meals, all while keeping students healthy and, the safety of our students and staff as their top priority. So we salute our school lunch heroes. This week is National Teacher Appreciation Week, which is a time to recognize the commitment and dedication of our exceptional AAPS teachers. A quality teacher makes all the difference in student growth and learning both today and
throughout a child's development. Our Ann Arbor Public Schools students benefit tremendously from their learning experience in our classrooms under the guidance of extraordinary AAPS teachers. So we celebrate our teachers during this week and every week in the Ann Arbor Public Schools. We're grateful for their role in achieving our critical mission of caring for and serving our students. On behalf of the Ann Arbor Public Schools and the Board of Ed, we recognize and thank our teachers for all they do every day for our students, families, and community. Shira Tucker, a fourth grade teacher at Angel Elementary,
is featured in the Michigan Department of Education's two thousand twenty five teacher appreciation videos. Miss Tucker received a special recognition by one of her students in the form of a video that was sent to Michigan Department of Education by the student's family and was chosen to be highlighted as a part of their teacher appreciation, this month. So please take a look at that video, which is linked on our website, and see miss, Tucker's recognition. National School Nurse Day is today. So we are celebrating and recognizing our school nurses who serve as value members of
our school teams and supporting the whole child. National School Nurse Day was established more than fifty years ago to foster an improved understanding of the role of the of the school nurse in our schools and to recognize the essential contributions of school nurses and the contributions they make to our students' school and community success. During recent years, the responsibilities of school nurses have become increasingly more significant and vital for our students, school teams, and families, most especially those for whom access to quality health care beyond the school setting continues
to be a challenge. Students with chronic conditions may miss school more often than others affecting their academic performance. For these students, school nurses offer critical daily help in managing their condition so that they can learn and grow at school. So we thank our school nurses for their dedication to what they do every day for our students and families. This coming Friday is National School Provider Appreciation Day. And now more than ever, we appreciate and honor the people who work every day to provide healthy, safe, and nurturing environments for our children while their parents are at work or school.
Our APS before and after care staff are the first degree over 200 elementary students every day and the last to say goodbye. They are trusted adults who keep our children safe and support working families. On behalf of the Ann Arbor Public Schools, we recognize and thank our AAPS before and after care staff for their dedication, commitment, and compassion. May is also National Mental Health Awareness Month, but we know that mental health matters, each and every month. The reality is that many people are struggling, and they deserve the care and understanding and support and empathy,
that we can provide. Mental health challenges don't define a person. They are simply a part of the human experience. By having open, compassionate conversations, we can break the stigma and create a culture of support. Let's stand together to ensure no one has to struggle alone. If you or someone you know needs help, we have resources including Care Solace, which are here, to help support our students and their families as well as well as our staff. This is a complimentary and confidential mental health care coordination service provided by the Ann
Arbor School Public School District to connect you with a provider quickly and easily. And information, can be found on our website. You're not alone. Help is always available. May is also Jewish heritage, Jewish American Heritage Month, a time to recognize and honor the history of Jewish Americans' rich contributions to our nation's development. We pay tribute to the generation of Jewish Americans whose lives, resilience, and hope contributed to a better future for our country. This month in the Ann Arbor Public Schools, we take the honor the opportunity to honor timeless traditions and heritage.
Jewish Americans are highlighted in lessons and reading selections with our students across our classrooms and libraries. In the arts, students explore, study and perform the works of great Jewish American artists, lyricists, dancers, composers and many other extraordinary individuals who have positively impacted our society. We are a stronger community when we honor, embrace and celebrate our diversity and continually create a culture of belonging for all and the value and connections that unite us in an inclusive Ann Arbor community.
May is also National Asian Pacific Islander South Asian American Heritage Month as we heard from Ms. Hunter Young. Asian Pacific Islander South Asian American Heritage Month is observed each May to honor and celebrate the contributions and generations of Asian Pacific Islander South Asian and Native Hawaiian Americans that have made American history, society and culture. This time of recognition provides an opportunity to listen and learn more about the rich diversity within APISA communities throughout our country and our Ann Arbor community.
Our students will be able to explore the contributions of APISA, Americans in Literature, History, the Arts and Science during May. We are pleased to share that our students will have the opportunity to celebrate by welcoming aspiring Asian Pacific Islander authors. On Wednesday, May 21, from ten to eleven, there will be a virtual author talk as shared by miss Hunter Young for students in grades three through eight on the topic of global citizenship by Sadia Farooqi. Later, 01:30 to 02:00,
Richard Ho will join us for another virtual author talk geared towards elementary students, particularly those in grades young five through second grade. May, this is a busy month, clearly. It's also National Speech Pathologist Recognition Month. And we wanna take the opportunity to express our appreciation for our outstanding APS speech pathologists. Our speech pathologists work to increase understanding and ensure ensure treatment of speech and language, matters with our students, which can improve the quality of the daily interaction in life for students experiencing communication
challenges. Communication is critical to connecting with others and is the channel through which all other learning happens. So we, today and this month celebrate our speech and language pathologists and the contributions that they make to, our school district and in the lives of our students. Three years ago, a group of Jones School alumni, local residents and our Republic School teachers and historians collaborated to create a permanent historical marker. Recognizing the long standing and often hidden histories of Jones School and Ann Arbor's Black
community on the West Side Of Ann Arbor. The marker will be officially dedicated in a public ceremony on May 15 from 01:30 to 02:30 at Community High School, which was the home of Jones School, and that's located at 401 North Division, in Ann Arbor. Members of the community who attended Jones School or lived in the neighborhood's thriving black community will be provided priority seating at the event. Jones School served the black community of Ann Arbor for more than forty years, and the work to publicly and prominently honor this history was a key goal of
the organizing committee. The marker dedication ceremony provides an opportunity to celebrate and honor the rich history of the school the school and community while acknowledging that we must continue to learn. The work to design, create and install the marker was made possible through donations from the Mosaic Foundation, University Bank, as well as fundraising efforts from community high school students and local residents. Local businesses also donated to the efforts. They are Format Framing and Gallery,
Kerrytown Shops, The Lunchroom, Zingerman's, Bank of America, and The Little Seedling. The Jones Committee worked closely also with Ann Arbor Historical Foundation. So we thank all of our, donors who helped to contribute to, this marker and we look forward to seeing everyone who can make it at the installation on May 15. Annabella Mee, an eighth grader at Clay Mc Middle School who mister Klein, recognized also. She was recognized on April 26 in Seattle, Washington as the Journalism Education Association's twenty twenty five aspiring young journalist award winner.
This award acknowledges the work of junior high and middle school students, one overall winner, and up to five finalists based on the total number of entries are selected each year. So we, congratulate Annabella for this amazing accomplishment. Another accomplishment, for one of our students, Satvika Ramanathan, a previous finalist from Clegg for the aspiring young journalist of the year award, who's now a student at Huron High School, was recognized at the Journalism Education Association's twenty twenty five event, receiving the Student Journalist Impact Award for high school journalism.
The award recognizes secondary school students who, through the practice of journalism, have made a significant difference in the lives of others. Annabella and Saifika are fortunate to work on the direction of Sara Beth Belamente, who's the adviser for both the Clague and Huron journalism programs. Another honor, the Science Olympiad State Tournament was held at Michigan State University on April 26. AAPS Schools won three of the state's four bids to the twenty twenty five national tournament. The tournament will be held at University of Nebraska Lincoln on May 24.
Slauson Middle School took first place in the middle school division and this marks their fifth state championship. Clague Middle School finished in a close second place, giving Clague its second national tournament bid in the past three years. In the high school division, Pioneer High School finished in second place. This is Pioneer's third consecutive national tournament appearance and the fifth out of the last six tournaments. Our Science Olympiad teams are self funded and organized through the work of dedicated parents and community volunteers.
With the national tournament less than four weeks away, teams are working to raise money to bring over 50 students to the tournament. They would welcome any contributions from businesses and individuals in the community to support these critical STEM education activities, and they can be located at apssci0ly@gmail.com, and we also have that posted on our website. Pioneer High School, acapella choir has been designated through blind auditions as the Michigan School Vocal Music Association
twenty twenty five outstanding choir. Only two choirs from across the state are given this distinction, which which represents the highest level of recognition by our state organization and is equivalent to a state championship. They will perform in the MSVMA All State Festival Gala Concert in East Lansing Tomorrow, May Eighth. This is the sixth time the acapella choir has received this distinction. A blind listening panel has selected the choralers, which is a chamber choir from within the Pioneer acapella choir,
to perform at the MSVA Allstate outstanding solo and ensemble recital. Only 13 large ensembles statewide are selected to perform. The MSVA Allstate outstanding solo and ensemble recital takes place at Michigan State, Friday, May 9. And that information is linked on the school's website. And that concludes the superintendent's lengthy report this evening. Thank you very much, superintendent Parks. Well, can we give a round of applause for all of that great news? I believe that brings us down to our CTE,
an education update. Thank you, president Feaster. We have, Tom Pachero, back again this this week, who Tom Pachero, who is our PLTW and CTE director. Trustees, you remember a few weeks ago, we had doctor Ryan Rowe here talking about our CT efforts across the county and potential county wide millage. That resolution will be coming forward to the board at the next meeting. So, mister Pachero is here this evening. Just to highlight for trustees in our community, our career and tech education programs again in preparation for that resolution coming forward,
in a couple of weeks for trustees consideration. So at this point, I'll turn it over to Mr. Pachero. Thank you. Good evening, President Feaster, Board of Trustees and Superintendent Parks. Thank you. As Superintendent Parks said, I'm Tom Pachero. I'm your current Tech Ed Director. Before serving as current Tech Ed Director, I taught at Skyline High School and before that Foresight High School, Foresight Middle School, excuse me. So I've been around a minute, and I'm really excited to share with you some great news for each of our programs. So what is CTE? I think we went over this a little bit,
but I wanted to just touch on a few things, that doctor Rowe didn't touch on it. It is all hands on project based learning. We think the best learning is by doing. We do offer some graduation credit options and as always, real world experiences. Many of our teachers were were not originally educators. They came to us through business and industry. Those of us that were educators first, also have second or third jobs. We have to have four thousand hours of industry experience, within the last ten years to be a CTE teacher.
We start early in Ann Arbor, much earlier than our folks around the state and around the country with Project Lead the Way. As you know, we offer Project Lead the Way in all 21 of our elementary schools, young fives through fifth grade. Every student has at least one, if not two, Project Lead the Way experiences in computer science and STEM or hands on science. We move on from there, sixth through eighth grade electives, at all seven of our, middle schools, sixth grade, exploratory wheel for every student.
From there, we move to our CTE courses again in all five of our high schools, ninth through twelfth grade. We total now 39 CTE programs, or twice the size of the rest of the county combined. So CTU is split up into career pathways and then into programs and courses. So our pathways cover automotive, business, computer science, construction trades, cosmetology, culinary, cybersecurity, digital multimedia, engineering, finance, health sciences and marketing. Here is our extended list of CTE courses at each of our high schools.
Please keep in mind, our courses are open to all of our AAPS students regardless regardless of what high school they attend so they can move from school to school or site to site as the case may be with cosmetology and home building, both off-site courses. In many cases, we're able to offer transportation at least to the off-site school and definitely to both of our off-site programs. So some of our, CTE programs all of our CTE programs have a leadership portion.
Most of them utilize a student organization. These are called CTSOs, career and technical student organizations like Business Professionals of America, DECA, health sciences, which is HOSA, and SkillsUSA encompasses culinary, home building, cosmetology, and several others. So as I go through our programs, you'll see those names or those CTSOs pop up. The first one I wanna highlight are automotive courses. We have auto labs at Pioneer and Huron. Again, all students are welcome to attend. We're moving to all two hour block classes next year.
So our know your auto classes, even though students signed up from, we probably won't be able to offer them next year. This is one of the expansions that we're hoping will happen through the county wide millage. Our teachers are basically too busy, and we don't have enough space to teach those first level courses. We'll be teaching auto one, auto two, and our advanced technology or advanced auto courses. In this picture here, I wanna highlight, the teacher, Alex Spencer, who is an alumni of Skyline High School, one of my students. And then the student next to him is Tyler.
Tyler is our first student, to win a silver medal at the state level in automotive electronics. Keeping in mind automotive electronics is a brand new competition at the state level. Next, we have our business courses. We literally have almost a thousand students that participate in either BPA or DECA, our our two student organizations. We offer business fundamentals, business management, business principles, computer applications, and entrepreneurship, and several others. We had 300 students participate in the DECA state championship in Detroit this year with
30 of those students advancing to nationals in Florida last week. We had over 400 students participate in BPA this year. 68 of those students moved on to the state finals, and 21 of them are moving on to the international competition, which starts today in Orlando, Florida. One of our amazing Huron students, Emily, will be the next, BPA president, for the state of Michigan twenty five point six school year. Our computer science is, as I talked about, when doctor Rowe and I talked about at our last meeting is one of our
newest CTE pathways. In computer science, we have advanced topics in programming, computer science a applications, which is offered co seeded AP or non AP. So students can sit for the AP exam if they'd like to, and most of our students do. Computer science principles, which is offered also offered AP or not. Computer science one and two, which is our which are our IB programs at Huron High School, cybersecurity, introduction to programming and web design. I don't have them listed here, but many of our, students participated in a cybersecurity,
hackathon, if you will, up at, Saginaw State, University this year and did very well. Our cosmetology courses, are held at Huron Valley Beauty Academy, which is in Saline on Michigan Avenue. We had we have 20 students from Ann Arbor that participate, ten eleventh graders and ten twelfth graders in that program. Four of our seniors, participated in the regional competition and went and went on to states this year, and, participated very well in nails, hair, and mannequin categories at the state level. These are all really new for me.
Mhmm. Our culinary program is thriving. Many of you attended, our pop up at miss Kim's in, Cary Town a few weeks back. One of our chefs, won a gold medal this year, and she'll be representing in our public schools, and the state of Michigan for that matter in nationals, the June this year in Atlanta, Georgia. And her, her dessert is now featured on miss Kim's menu in Cary Town. This is one of our first students ever to make it to nationals in culinary, from Huron High School, so we're very excited.
Her and her sister, will be participating in the entrepreneurship, program, dual enrolled at Huron and Washtenaw Community College next year, and they plan to open their own bakery. Our engineering program is thriving. We had 20 students from APS advanced to the Michigan Invention Convention. One Forsyth student, two Skyline students, and 17 from Huron. Of those, two of our students, two of our student teams will be advancing to, the International Invention Convention, June four through six at the Henry Ford in Dearborn. Along with our engineering courses,
we offer a great number of middle school and high school robotics competitive teams. I don't have a slide for this, but I I totally forgot about it until I was sitting here tonight. Three of our teams, which are generally high school teams. One is now a middle school team participating at the high school level foresight. Three of our teams made it to the international event two weeks ago in Houston, Texas. No grand finishes there, but just to be involved in that. There are more high school robotics teams in the state of Michigan than any other
state in the union, including California. There are more high school robotics teams in the state of Michigan than football teams, varsity football teams in the state of Michigan now To to make it to internationals with that number of teams in your state is a huge, huge success for us. So we're really proud of all three of those teams. Our finance courses, including counting one and accounting two. Students that participate in accounting two, can sit for the Microsoft Excel, manager certification. Personal finance one and two is offered for fourth year math credit.
Our health science courses, again, are thriving. We have a new course for eleventh graders this year that is overbooked at both schools here on and Pioneer. Again, with students participating from all five high schools, their competition is called HOSA. Over 200 students competed at the regional competition in Adrian. Ninety of them made it to the state finals in Traverse City, and I'm really happy to announce that 31 of those students from APS will be competing on the national stage the week of June 18 in Nashville, Tennessee. Homebuilding. CTE CTE Homebuilding,
in Ann Arbor. This is our fifty fifth year, our fifty fourth house. This year's house is 3,600 square feet, five bedrooms, four and a half bath, full list for over $700,000 Lots are becoming more and more expensive when we can find them in Ann Arbor. So we're very happy, to see a profit this year so we can pay for lots in the next couple of years. We had seven seven of our seven students that participated in the regional competition made it to state competition this year. And I'm very happy to say one of our students,
Jupiter, is the first female carpenter to win a gold medal for the state of Michigan. She'll be advancing to the national stage. They don't take any tools with them. They arrive there and their platform has every tool they need that they get to take home. Probably about $10,000 worth of tools, Jupiter will bring home, no matter how she places at the national level. But we're very excited to send the first female carpenter, to the nationals, from the state of Michigan. Jupiter is a community high school student. DECA, I mentioned earlier, is part of the marketing courses.
We have advanced marketing, marketing education, school store operations, and of course, sports and entertainment. So we've had some recent CTE additions, as I mentioned earlier, computer programming, cybersecurity assurance, engineering technology, a pioneer and hospitality and tourism will be brand new next year. We'll also be offering a brand new home building course called fundamentals of construction. There'll be a one hour course for students to, participate in, housed at Skyline High School, but all five schools will participate. We also, are hoping oops.
I need one more slide. Sorry. Thanks, Andrew. Yeah. Coming soon to peel to coming soon to Ann Arbor is our fundamentals of construction class, our PLTW flight and space drone technology class. We're gonna offer that at in our open a two steam force, Nathan Slauson. We've also been awarded, from NASA, Michigan Space Camp Grant Consortium, and KLA laboratories right here in Ann Arbor, $30,000 grant, $15,000 a piece to run, a summer camp for students, all around space and drone technology, and we'll use some of that money to fund,
the start up of those new PLTW courses. You may remember PLTW offered us vouchers for our teachers last year. We used five of those vouchers of the 30 that we got to train our teachers for flight and space for next year. So that all came, free to our public schools thanks to our great relationship partnership with Project Lead the Way. We're hoping to spread in 2627, to CLAG and Scarlet, that same program. We're hoping to start a natural resources conservation CTE course. The state still calls it agricultural.
We're hoping it will be much more of an environmental sustainability, agricultural program. Early childhood development may be on our horizon. We're hoping to add a robotics CTE course to our high schools, again, to, fill a need for students that want even more robotics than just after school. And then last but not least, our aviation drone technology course. This is taking off, excuse the pun. Hopefully, that course will run out of Willow Run Airport and we'll be able to send students again relying on that CTE millage that will be hopefully coming to us in
the fall. I'm very happy to say that, we have once again become a distinguished school district for project lead the way. This is the third year in a row APS has received this honor. Only two districts in the state of Michigan, and 28 districts across the nation have won this award this year. And our public schools has 31 schools that received PLTW distinguished sorry, I understand banner, distinguished schools this year. Congratulations to all 21 of our elementary schools, six of our seven middle schools and four of our five high schools for being
Project Lead the Way distinguished schools making also distinguished school district. I want to reiterate again, CTE has been on the rise for the last four years, even though some of our, schools are seeing a decline in students, we're seeing an increase in students almost double, or more than double than we were four years ago. I want to give you an invite before I show this short video. We'd love to see you at our annual AAPS District PLTW CT Expo, next Tuesday, May 13 from six to 07:30 in the Skyline Commons.
Great opportunity to see all of our programs, some of many of our business partners. And one of our new business partners as we, gear up for the agriculture, sustainability is Guardian Tree Company, and they'll actually be in the woods behind Skyline with a safety tree climb for students. What was the date? That's next Tuesday, May 13, '6 to '7 '30 at Skyline. It's in your it's in the board update also, all the information. Alright. Thank you very much, mister Pachira. Sure. Do you wanna show that video? Oh, sorry. Okay. So I'll take some questions there. Some questions while they,
gear up the video? Yeah. First of all, mister Pachira, I just wanna say, this program is so impressive and it's just amazing what what our students are doing in this CTE program. Just it's mind blowing. And, I was just wondering, so the house that was built this year, I guess, it was built in a year. It sold for $700,000. I'm just curious, does that money go back into the program as seed money for other home building projects or or what actually happens with it?
Yeah. It does. We've been fortunate to fortunate to, be a part of a nonprofit in our public schools, in cooperation with the I always get the name jostled a little bit, but it's, Ann Arbor Student building industry program. I get those two mixed up. They're a nonprofit that have been around since the inception of the home building program fifty five years. So they raise funds through golf outings, generous donations from, alumni, and they're made up of just like our other CTE advisory committees except they are
their own nonprofit. Okay. So in our public schools, part of the deal is the instructor, the teaching assistant, and the trailer, and all the tools that go in the trailer. The trailer is the classroom much like construct trailers around sites, but it's a classroom. There's an area for students to change in it. They leave their work boots, their clothes, their hard hats in their cubby in the trailer, for each day. And there's, of course, an office for the teacher and TA. The nonprofit, this the home building board provides the property, all the materials to build the house and links the program with all of our,
local unions as well as private contractors that come in and do the work with the students. So we have, a union roofing company that roofs the home with the students. So they're not on their own doing the roofing and and the instructor, The two instructors aren't trying to watch 17 kids roof a two story house. Got it. So that partnership has allowed us to, buy property every year. We have three lots, so that covers us for the next three years. And those profits from one house move to the next house. Okay. Yeah.
And you also said that the enrollment has doubled. And what do you attribute that to? Is it just word is getting out, kids are saying what other students are doing? I I think it's threefold. I think one, it's been four years since COVID COVID taught us a lot of lessons. Like, we don't have enough skilled tradespeople. Mhmm. Skilled tradespeople are retiring at what I would say is an alarming rate. And it I think it helped families understand that, you know, as educated as Ann Arbor is, not all of our students belong or should go to a four year university.
Many of them will do just as well, if not better, becoming a skilled trades person or going to school or going into an apprenticeship versus going to a four year or longer university. And then lastly, yes, word-of-mouth. Our program numbers have gone from 20 to 30 22 to 39 in the last four years as well. Bringing in some higher tech programs like engineering, computer science, cybersecurity has really helped. Combining CTE with AP has helped. So I I think those are all the factors that have contributed to those numbers.
K. Thank you. I'd like to take all the credit myself. Missus Schmidt. I think the point you made that students see other options. That is not the because I think at a high performing district, and I don't think it's unique for Ann Arbor, that for many years, you're looked down on if you don't go to a four year college. And people need to see that there are a lot of other options. And at least as a teacher, I know there were people in the skilled trades making more money than I was. I mean, really, there's a lot of opportunities. So I just think it's great that kids see there's just
such a choice of all kinds of things. I'm just thrilled that that's not like that. I can remember when I was in school, they still had shop and a lot of classes that, when the when Governor Granholm pushed for a lot of changes in the state, those all went away. Mhmm. And so you had a group of kids that they wanted to work with their hands. They, you know, they wanted to get involved, and and there wasn't any place for them. So this is really great that this is coming back. And and we are very fortunate. We didn't, we didn't, take our shops away. We changed them to TechEd Labs and then Project Lead the Way Labs.
So we still have most of our space that we had before. The machinery has changed. It's become a lot safer. We have three d printers now and, table saws that can't hurt you. Mhmm. So it's it's yeah. Things have changed quite a bit, but we're very fortunate in Ann Arbor that we didn't get rid of our shops when a lot of districts did. I mean, that wasn't Mhmm. That's fine. Yeah. So I was just gonna ask to follow-up with a comment that you made about, you know, the students and then, you know, obviously preparing them for hopefully the the,
you know, future apprentice or whatever. What are ways that you are helping with that? I know there's the training, but are there, like do you have already partnerships with, you know, these certain like, how how is because what matters is what also happen after school as well. Yeah. So all of our current tech ed programs have a work based learning component, that can be very simple as a someone in a career in finance and banking coming into the finance or accounting class,
to talk to the students. Just this week, our finance students at Huron are visiting a fifth grade class to talk about money, with fifth graders. And then we use a a it's called Pathfinder. So it's a an online version of a job shadow. So students can pick whatever career they want. The company has done a great job to show people from all over the world, all nationalities, all races, so students can find themselves in those videos, as a plumber, as an electrician, as a banker,
etcetera. If I could highlight our home building program again, a few years ago and still in most places, students to become an electrician to go in the electrical union have to go to work first with a union shop. After two or three years, they can enter an electrical apprenticeship, then become an apprentice and eventually a journeyman and a master electrician. Our students are direct admit to the local electrical union apprenticeship. They go to work, but they're automatic. They don't have to deal with a year, two years, or three years.
They start their apprenticeship right away. So they're they're making a living wage working for the electrical contractor and going to school to get their, advanced electrical degrees. That's wonderful to hear. Because I think that's sometimes there's these programs, but it's just the connection of, like, how do we get them ready or direct admit like you what what you shared with the electrician program. That's that's amazing to hear. And we are making great strides with, Washtenaw Community College, and other universities. The the state CTU website now has most of the state funded universities on it,
and it shows our articulation agreements. So our engineering students, if they have three engineering classes, they might walk into, an engineering program with three, six, or even nine credits. Okay. Thank you so very much. Alright. Are we gonna show the video, Andrew? Okay. CTE is career technical education. We try to get students ready for their next step in life, whether it's college, trade school, or going right to work. These students behind me are working in the school store here at Huron Greenhouse, and it's just one of our many exciting programs you're gonna hear about in this
story. Gosh. It was super fun. These kids all wanna be health care providers, so it gives them a good wake up. Why I wanted to come to Interpreter Book Schools, reputation. You guys are amazing, and boy, has that been proven with the kids. They are curious learners. They're intense about getting the information and getting started on their career, and it's really fun to teach. Reach around. Valley button is this little white hat. This goes right above it. Hand goes over. Okay. It's I think, CTE is so important. I think every kid should know how to cook basic things when they leave high
school. It's just like one of those skills in life. You should know how to, you know, finance. You should know how to, work with money when you leave school. You should know how to cook. You should know how to do laundry. There's these basic skills, that are super important. And you'll never leave a CTA class, a CTE class, and say, it didn't help me learn something for when I leave school. So learning how to cook my for myself properly is just kind of, like, why I took this class in general. When I I'm gonna be moving out soon. I'm a senior, and, I wanted to be independent and have to cook for myself.
We rely on repair professionals to keep us on the road so we can keep moving into other things that we need to do. And, unfortunately, as things have gone, on, we've sent more students in into, you know, fields like engineering and, workforces to try to get more money and more success. And we've lost some of our trades. There's not enough people out there working to do these jobs. So having a class like this to, get kids that are interested in that field experience and, career path to go to outside of high school.
A lot of these kids can go right out of high school and make more money in, industry than some students do with a four year college degree. And I take this automotive class because I feel like it's one of the more necessary skills to be able to know how to work on my car so I'm not taking it to dealerships every time something goes wrong with it. They are really passionate about being here and learning and gaining new skills. Yeah. I wanna learn more about cars and learn how the engine works and how to fix things on them. And I'm hoping that this will help me in the future because I do plan
on becoming a mechanic. And then we have, some other live work going on here. So nice open space. Students are excited to take the classes. I'm excited for that. This store just opened up. This was the first semester it ran last year, this last semester, and we'll continue to provide students with the opportunities to gain some real experience, working with customers, ordering product, ordering merchandise, dates, and all of the workings of running the store. I attended this program, thirty eight years ago. I love the program.
I've been a licensed cosmetologist, like I said, for the last thirty eight years. Now I'm an educator full circle. The environment is very welcoming, and I'm getting my skills. And hopefully by the time they're ready to graduate, they're also gonna be ready to enter the workforce as a licensed cosmetologist. Thank you, Mr. Procurea. Any other questions, Trustees? Alright. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. So we need a break. Is everybody okay? Okay. And that will move us down to first briefing, and I believe that brings us to the Washington Intermediate School District proposed general fund
budget for 2526. Thank you, president Feaster. This is our annual item, of the WISD's proposed general fund budget. By by law, the ISD board, has to have their local school districts review their budget, and they are, here today for any questions trustees have. Trustees, you have the materials in your, in your packets and board docs. And the the goal here is for the local board, again, to review the the proposed budget and then,
adopt a resolution expressing support or disapproval for the proposed, WISD budget, with any specific budget objections, or changes for the ISD board's consideration. So, again, you have all your materials, linked there in board docs, and we have the, associate superintendent Brian Marcel of the WISD and the superintendent Naomi Norman here for any questions trustees may have about, any questions that came up as you review the budget. Any questions? Mr. Schmidt, I'm sorry. And no surprise I'm going to ask this question.
Can you tell me I see a few things in the description, not when we get into the slides as much, but in the first half of the presentation. There's mention of an early literacy foundations and then the Washtenaw County Collaborative embedded with assessment literacy. Could you expound on what those programs are? So we have a countywide network that focuses so assessment literacy is focusing on the formative use of assessment, helping students understand themselves where their learning is, and helping teachers be very deliberate in teaching,
exactly where the student needs the support most. So they learn how to assess where students are, provide the instruction, and then make sure the students are growing. They have linked that assessment literacy effort with some of the, our work around supporting, equitable classroom environments and also bringing in our literacy efforts. So that's the assessment literacy, really focusing on that assessment side and being literate in the use of assessments. Does that make sense? And then the other one you asked about was?
Early literacy foundations. So with the early literacy, we started a network, probably about twelve years ago focusing on early literacy, and we worked with Nell Duke and Tanya Wright, two professors. And they helped us identify the things that we should be working on for early literacy that grew and emerged and, shifted over time. It really is focused on the science of reading essentially, supporting our teachers locally and how to embed those practices more deeply. I actually think you'd really like it. Pardon me?
I think you'd really like the initiative. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? Mister Woodruff. Yeah. I have a couple of questions. Regarding the outgoing transfer of monies for special education, there was a dip in 2025. Can you speak to that a little bit? Yeah. I'm going to have Brian. Thank you for having us here, first of all. So the first thing, to note, I think on the bottom of that slide, I'm not sure which one you're specifically looking at, but it does indicate that it's a budget period. And as your board,
our our board, our district does the same thing, we tend to have a conservative budget. So we project our revenues to come in here, expenditures come here, and hopefully, we get a little more revenue and hopefully, we spend less money. So that's the reason that that actually shows a dip. If I was to show you the, like, three past ones, you would have seen the same dip that would have happened in the previous years. And once it turns into an actual, you can see what happened in the past three years. It's been increased over that period of time. So Okay. And then similar question around the fund balance for special education.
Mhmm. In '24, it was at 10.34 Yep. Which is, you know, quite a bit higher than it has been historically. Yes. And so can you just talk a little bit about that and, if there were any activities to kinda spend that down to get back to your 5% projection? So we've had a target fund balance that was established by our board at the recommendation of the Washington Superintendents Association of being about $3,000,000 And you can see we're kind of teetering around that number and then it went
to 5. And the reason that is is because of that outgoing transfer you were just speaking of. So what happens is, the amount that we're able to reimburse a school district, is limited based on how much they spend. So if we have a we have a calculation and it might say that Anar Republic Schools, is gonna get $40,000,000 out of that outgoing transfer. I'm just using a round number. Let's say they're getting $40,000,000. If Ann Arbor doesn't spend enough to earn that $40,000,000, then I can't pay them the $40,000,000.
Let's say I can only pay them 39,000,000. If that happens, it doesn't get then sent to other school districts. It gets put into fund balance to be used in future years. So that's what's happening in those years is there we have our nine local school districts, and then we have all the public school academies. Several of those entities were not able to spend enough money to earn the full calculated amount that they were that they could have earned had they spent more money on special education. So when they don't do that, that drops to our balance because we don't then have it as an expenditure.
Okay. Great. Thank you. And I I know, DNR Republic Schools and many of our districts are very pleased that we have, you know, the ability to almost reimburse up to close to a % of our budget. It's very close. So yeah. It's, very much appreciated. One other question just about the '25, the budgets, for next year. Just is there any plans to reduce or concerns around federal funding at this point? I know, obviously, Naomi, you are at the the, Given her experience last week. Yeah. Exactly.
So if you could just touch on that very briefly. So we get about $29,000,000 a year in federal funding. Most of that funding does flow through to the local district, about 12,000,000 in special education dollars, for example, through IDEA. For each one of the 19 programs that we have received federal dollars for, In the budget, we assume that the money is gonna be there. So that's the way we budgeted. We built this budget in January and February before we even realized we were gonna have this kind of potential impact,
through federal, maybe having federal reductions. But for each one of the, areas where we get funded, we have scenario plans. So the scenario for what if it gets reduced by 10%, what's that gonna look like? What if it gets reduced by 50%? What if it's cut? So we do have plans for how we would handle that, and, we do know that we do have a little bit, not a huge, but we do have a little bit of a fund balance so that we can carry a program for a very short amount of time if there's uncertainty around it.
So we could potentially, carry head start for two weeks. If there was some uncertainty around what was gonna happen, we could do that. So we it's a wait and see at this point, but I want you to know that we have developed plans for how we would be managing on the ISD side. It would have an impact on the local district, though. If you think around 29,000,000, if you do, Ann Arbor's typically 40% of any number, if we lost everything, it would have an impact on the local districts, at the proportional rate that you would receive the flow through dollars.
Thank you. Does that make sense? Yeah. Just to follow-up with that, is there an ability to share or, like, for us to be informed about the different scenarios and what the plan is as far as, like I mean, I don't I know you don't have that in this presentation. But just to kinda get an idea of, like, worst case scenario, what is that gonna look like? I mean, obviously, from the WISD and how that does impact it will I mean, it'll impact the district, you know, the district as a whole. Right. Right. So, for the things that are direct flow throughs,
it would be on the district side just thinking about what would it look like to have this much less special ed dollars through IDEA. We have had the preliminary conversation around head start, so we do have a bit of an understanding of what that might look like at a very high level right now. But, yeah, we definitely are staying in very close contact with the superintendents on the ones that are most likely. In the current budget, though, it looks like special ed's gonna be okay. At start, it was not named in the,
proposed presidential or the suggested presidential budget. So we didn't see anything in that budget at this point in time. That's a direct impact on our budget. So we're gonna wait and see. So what areas are because you're saying there's plan just in case. What areas will be impacted? I guess that's what I'm trying to get get at where you're you may have to be shifting. Mhmm. You know, shifting from one area to another. I don't know again. I don't know what So so you want me to give a couple examples just to give you? Just to Yeah.
Okay. So we get about $450,000 in Perkins dollars. That's money that we use for career and technical education. We received a $5,000,000 grant from the state to do this consolidation study. So we have mapped out if we were to lose Perkins dollars that we would backfill that with our money from that consolidation grant for this year. If it happened next year, then we would be looking at whether or not we have other funding for, career and technical education,
and then we'd be looking at how we would manage backfilling that. That would be one example. Head start's a tricky one. Head start, we have four districts that receive funding. It pays for classroom teachers. If we were to lose, let's say, some percentage of that money, the first thing we would do is we would say, how many of our head start students could we slide into GSRP so they could stay in school? And then could we move those teachers then to be teachers of GSRP classrooms? So we'd lean on the state dollars instead of the federal dollars to educate those
children. It wouldn't be every student though because head start is three and four year olds. So then what we did was for three year olds, we, applied for a grant to try and open one state funded three year old classroom. And so we're gonna try that out. We'll hopefully get that funding. So at least we'd have one classroom for three year olds. And if that worked, we maybe could expand that in a future year. So we're trying to figure out how we could you know, if it was a small, you know, amount of money, like a 10 or 20%,
we might be able to manage it that way completely. There's other funds, like I talked about last week, our health resource advocates. Those are nurses that we hired during the pandemic to help us manage contagious disease, and, we lost all of that money. Now thankfully, Ann Arbor had already pulled their portion of it down to put behind a staff member within the district, so he didn't lose any money for this year. But we don't have it for next year. So that's just a you know, in most cases, six of those people ended up getting laid off,
and four, the districts have absorbed the costs. So each thing has a different plan depending on the really specific needs of that program and the requirements under the law for what we can or can't do. So the takeaway for me is that you guys are being very creative because we can talk over and over about all these scenarios and get everybody's minds worried. But I think we have to go with the flow and know that you are working with our district and surrounding districts in the county to be creative, to do right by the kids as best you can in the situation we face.
Right? And live into our values. Right. Right. Right? Making sure that we're serving the kids who need us most. So, Naomi, thank you for coming. Do you anticipate any impact on GSRP dollars? I know you were talking about that possible scenario. So I'm just wondering. I you know, we have to wait and see what the Michigan budget process, does. And, we have our legislative breakfast coming up on May 19, so we'll be able to ask, our legislators what they think is gonna happen right now. I think, the senate and the governor have pretty solid budgets for GSRP that I think could
manage and support, at least in Washington County, if we lost a little bit of the head start dollars, if those go through at the rates that they were proposed. Okay. Good to know. They also have a rainy day fund. So if something drastic were to happen, they could maybe do a supplemental budget at the state level, if that was important to them at that time. Okay. All right. Thank you so much, so much. I greatly appreciate it. I had one more question. This is related to the timeline. This is nothing this is I know you gave us a timeline of deadlines and whatnot.
So the ISD board election is on June 2 at 6PM. Yep. We also have a Skyline High School graduation on that day at 6PM. So I just wanted to put that out there. I don't know if there's any flexibility with that date. I wish there was it's actually in state statute. It says on the June, on the odd years, you will have the ISD election. So Can we vote in proxy? I don't know. It's Oh, Okay. Unfortunately, no. Okay. I But it will I what I can say is it'll take about fifteen minutes.
Oh. It does it's not a very long event. Okay. Okay. Good to know. Trustees, I just wanted to put that out there. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Thank you so very much. Good to see you. Thank thank you both. Thank you. And I believe that brings us down to letter b, a n two two zero eight Slauson Middle School major renovation trade contract recommendations part one. Thank you, president Feaster. We have miss Corona coming forward, to present this particular item. Again, as you stated, the Slauson Middle School renovation trade contracts recommendations for those contracts.
Good evening, trustees. Good evening. We're looking to bring forward, trade contracts for Slauson Middle School major renovation. Just as a reminder, we had come about a month ago for the demolition and the mass timber. This one is for the structural steel, electric and geothermal. We'll be bringing the remaining trade contracts at the next board meeting, but we knew we're short for time during the bond committee meeting. So we brought the most important ones forward.
We did review it earlier today and we're looking to bring forward trade contract approval for commercial contracting for structural steel, Huron Valley Electric of Ann Arbor for electrical and Midwest Geothermal for the geothermal system. The geothermal work would start as soon as this summer along with we would be starting to order the structural steel and our main distribution panel for the electric and that's the importance of bringing it early since it has about a
one year lead time for that equipment. Any questions? Ms. Corona, can you just address the gap? There's a huge gap in terms of the bid the bids that actually came in. There's a $4,000,000 bid versus a $7,000,000 bid. Is this unusual or is this sort of typical for some of these companies? It's not unusual. When we're talking larger projects, everybody has the same information. Everybody's given the same instructions, the same documents. Not everybody looks at everything. The low bidder
informed us that they had for Had missed some items in their bid. I think they saw the spread and and panicked and went back and saw where the error was and asked to have their bid withdrawn. The second bidder we did go as we do with all, bids. Actually, we don't have the construction manager, in this case, that's McCarthy and Smith, do a thorough post bid review with all the trade contracts and did do one with commercial contracting and the high bidder also and determined that commercial contracting had everything.
Sometimes, you know, people maybe misread, put too much into it, put too much escalation. I'm not sure. But sometimes they just do it as a as a courteous and throw it out there and say, if I get it, great. I'm gonna make a lot of money, but my plate's already full. Mhmm. So that's that's also another thing that we see. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Any other question? Okay. They asked about bond dollars. We did cover that earlier. Alright. It is it is though, it is bond dollars and does not come out of, general funds. Alright. Thank you.
Okay. So that I think that brings us down to c, Annex AN 02/1100, Abbot and King Elementary playground equipment replacement. Thank you. We're looking to bring forward two awards, one for a king and one for Abbott for new playground equipment. Mr. Rice indicated earlier today that the district does do inspections, I believe four times a year, Mhmm. Four times a year, by an outside, inspection, company, and they did indicate that there were two pieces of, playground equipment that need attention.
This equipment is, old to the point there isn't isn't any replacement parts for it. So at this point in time, we'll need to order, new equipment quickly so we can get it in before, fall of next year. It is looking to be purchased through the, cooperative purchasing cooperative. And the purchase purchasing cooperative does not include freight or shipping at that time, so I did put in for a contingency allowance line item for, for freight when we get that that final quote. Questions for this? K. Find Alice?
This is sinking fund dollars. Okay. Missus. Okay. But not general fund. But not general fund. I love it. Okay. Anything else? Thank you very much for that one. I think that brings us down to second briefing. NXAN2204 skyline claim, Freeman Transportation South Bus, lot solar array installation trade excuse me, installation contract recommendations. Are there any changes? No changes. Are there any questions? Alright. And that brings us down to letter B, N S A N 2 2 0 5 A 2 Steam Baugh Community,
4 sides, Freeman's skyline, roofing repair and replacement, project recommendations. Are there any changes? No changes. Any question? Uh-huh. Let me see. I put down the letter c, annex a n two two zero six, New Thurston Elementary trade contracts part two recommendations. Are there any changes? No changes. Are there any questions? Okay. And I think that brings it down to the consent agenda, missiles and skiplugs. Approve annex and dash two two zero four Skyline, Clegg Freeman Transportation South Bus Lot solar array installation contract recommendations approve Annex AN-two 205,
A2 Steyn Baugh Community, Forsyth Freeman and Skyline Roofing Repair and Replacement Project recommendations approve Annex AN-two 206, New Thurston Elementary, Trade Contracts, Part II recommendation approve minutes of the 04/02/2025, closed session approved minutes of the 04/23/2025 closed session, approved minutes of the 04/23/2025 regular meeting, approved minutes of the 04/27/2025 board retreat, and approved donations from Laura k Ciela Armstrong,
we received a 02/2002 Saturn l 200 donated to the Pioneer CTE auto program. Okay. Would anyone like anything removed? Okay. And is there a motion? So moved. Second. Moved by trustee Wilkerson, supported by trustee Schmidt, to approve the consent agenda. Any discussion? Seeing none, this is just a quick Trustee Wilkes? Yes. Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. President Feaster? Yes. Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Wilkins? Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. And I believe that brings down to number 11,
board action. Approve resolution, to consider designation of Washington Intermediate School District electoral representative. It's to, consider who you would designate I'm sorry. As the, electoral representative. We have to have a separate motion to consider. Thank you, ma'am. So now we so I'm looking at for a trustee to make a motion there. And and select a trustee to to consider. Okay. And an alternate. Yes, please. So I think, trustee Wilks, you brought up a good point related to this.
The date? Yeah. So the date of whoever is selected to attend the vote, it's June 2 at 6PM, the ISD board election. And there's a conflict with Skyline High School's graduation, which is on the exact same day at the exact same time. However, Naomi just said that it would only take fifteen minutes. Not every trustee is attending Skyline. Right. Oh, okay. So for the so perhaps if somebody would tell us they're not gonna do Skyline, maybe they could do this.
I'm happy to Would you do it? Yeah. Cool. I've been to several graduates and Yeah. I have And we need an alternate. I'm I'm happy to do that. Alternate. Right. So trustee Mohammed has volunteered to to serve and trustee, Wilkins volunteered to be the alternate. We need to have a motion to approve that. The motion to approve, trustee Mohammed. So moved. Thank you. Second. Moved by trustee Wilkerson, supported by trustee Wilks. Is there any discussion? So I'm just trying to remember this last year, is the intention that you carry our wishes to no vote?
So then we'll discuss that. On the twenty first, you, the board will We'll make our decision now. Designate the electoral candidate Okay. And select the candidates to vote for. Got it. Okay. So you guys will carry our wishes. Alright. You're just representing us. Alright. Thank you. Any additional discussion? Is there a form that we have to fill out? I I there was a a lot of, I saw some sort of form indicating that we had to give, like, a resolve who we were gonna vote for. That that will that will come on the twenty first, Trustee Wilkes.
Yes. Absolutely. I'll make sure I'll make sure you're all legal. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So probably, I think I've already seen one, maybe more come you'll be looking for emails from the people that are running to sort of see what their qualifications are. We're ready for the twenty first and I've got that information as well. Yes. I've got some I don't know if I got all of them. It's a blur. All right. There's no other discussion then. This was discussed. Okay. Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. President Feaster? Yes. Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Wilkins? Yes. And Trustee Wilks? Yes. Motion carries.
Thank you very much. So this is I believe that brings us down to letter b. Approval closed session at is that correct? At 6PM on oh, that's for next. That's for next. Approval closed session at 6PM on 05/21/2025 for the purpose of return claim privilege. There So move? Second. Moved by trustee Wilk, supported by trustee Wilkerson. And the discussion as interested. Yeah. So I'm not sure how to handle this. Can I make a friendly amendment that we also add to this motion adding a
a bond committee? A bond committee at 06:00 for the whole Well, that's going to be a process. This is at six, and they said they needed an hour. Oh, you don't need to add that to this motion. We don't need to? Bond committee consent that separately from that. Wanna miss an opportunity. Okay. Thank you. Alright. Any additional questions or discussion? So we're not doing bond committee at 06:00 on the twenty ninth? The bond committee will well, the second We'll have to talk about how that's gonna go. Yeah. Yeah. I can Because, obviously, this is at six. It won't be at six. Right. Correct. It'll be another day,
another time, another We'll have to figure something out. Well, yeah. Except that's what happened last time and then we thought we had it scheduled and then we didn't actually have it scheduled. So I just don't want to run into the same thing again. But that closed session came up unexpected. Can we consider changing the time of the closed session to accommodate, I mean, just like what we did today, it worked really well. Okay. But they need an hour. That's the difference. They need an hour and So can we start at 05:30? So let's talk about that, shall we? Let's talk about that 05:30 time.
Who can make it at 05:30? If we want to do 05:30 to 06:30, do this closed sessions, the bond at 05:30, closed session at 06:30, and then we delay our meeting to 07:30 like we did tonight Uh-huh. To get a count on this because I won't I won't be here. You won't be here 05:30? I can't. Okay. Doesn't mean you won't can't meet. Yeah. Exactly. I don't But Yeah. I can do 05:30, so don't coordinate around. I can do 05:30. Yeah. But we need four, so we got to get what everybody has to say. Right? Well, if we don't have quorum smoke to it and hot tea.
So Oh, that's true. Every For for Vermont. For Vermont. For Vermont. For Vermont. For 05:30. You can. Yeah. Defonds. Yeah. That's true. Okay. Why don't we do that? Because the group will hear it again at the regular meeting. Right? That's true. Yeah. Okay. So you're proposing the bond committee meets at 05:30, And the the closed session that starts at 06:30. And it goes to 07:30. And then the regular meeting starts at 07:30. Like it did? Just like similar to Yeah. That's the Yeah. That's the friendly amendment. Sure. That's my friendly amendment.
Are you willing to accept that? Yes. Okay. Are you still second? Yes. Thank you. Any additional discussion, Trustee? Okay. Seeing none, miss Hilsen's complaints. President Feaster? Yes. Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Wilkins? Yes. Trustee Wilkes? Yes. And Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. Motion carries. Okay. And I believe that brings us down to There's a recess to close session. Right. If you refresh your screen, you can see it. I'm not trusting Lucas in. It is a recess to closed session, permissible under 15.268,
section eight a, superintendent evaluation, and c negotiation. Okay. Still refreshing. But given that fact, I think we're at Trustee Wilkinson, addition to our agenda. Is there a motion? So moved. And second? Moved by trustee Wilkes, supported by trustee Schmidt. Is there any discussion? Saying none. Okay. This is all this Mhmm. Trustee Schmidt? Yes. Trustee Mohammed? Yes. Trustee Wilkins? Yes. Trustee Wilkerson? Yes. President Feaster? Yes. Motion carries. Okay. Recessing at 09:44PM. Where I now recall this meeting of the entire board of,
public of and I'm Board of Education back to order. It is 11:58, and I am sleepy. I think we are number 12. Item for agenda planning. Trustees, are there any item for agenda plan? Oh, just to know how So I just have two and I think one is gonna probably come up. One is, is there even if we have time, could we do a study session on the budget? If if there's time to help, like, before we have to to prove the budget just so we have all the information, answer any questions. I have no problem with having a study session on the budget.
Okay. Because I Yes. That's that's one. That's one. And then the other one is going maybe having some time at a future meeting soon sooner future meeting is to revisit our board goals so we can finalize that. Because we kinda find we have, like, some Yeah. At the retreat, but just so that we can sit down and actually fully finalize them with metrics and Is that something for a public meeting or for a trip? Or Well, so here's the here's the interesting thing. It's almost as if we're doing it in the wrong order that when the strategic
planning process is concluded, we want to tie into that. So we could spin wheels now and try to get something all sewed up. But I I think I mean, we should have that conversation about we what we did at the retreat and just see how much more time we wanna put into this. You know, just because it seems like strategic plan and then we make our goals and then we the two should Yeah. Yeah. No. That's fair. I just figured to wrap up I mean, we still have some goals about our own governance. Yeah. And things like that that are irrespective of Yeah.
What the strategic plans does. It's not my list, but we'll figure out how to do it. Whenever. I mean, whenever. I think we have to come back to it. But if it makes sense for the strategic plan, and then, I think yeah. That's right. No. I just I I support coming back to the board board goals as well. I just think the strategic plan should drive our next iteration of board goals, but we do need some to be taken care of in time. The board goals in connection with our one? Yes. Thank you, President Feaster.
While I was attending the NSBA, convention in Atlanta, I had a chance to attend a workshop about elevating student voices. And, I was thinking maybe we could try to revisit that. There are actually some student reps on some school boards. I would just maybe like to explore the possibility. I'm not saying that we should definitely do it, but, something to consider. I was in that session. Oh, you were? Yes. Okay. There are a lot of people in that session. So when we have agenda planning and this comes up at every meeting, I think it's important that what comes up and before we start to aim our
ship in that direction, we need to get a feel for if the majority of the board wants to do it because I have a lot of things I'd like this board to do, but I'm not sure everybody else would that that's the way we're gonna spend our time. So I think whenever we all think of something, we need to get a you can do a poll Yeah. Of us to get a sense. Because if I get an idea and then I want you to go and get her, Jazz to get stuff together, I mean, that's why this is such a Yeah. Dysfunctional situation sometimes. Trust me, honey. I think just to add,
I think that's why we bring it up. And then the the executive board looks at what is coming up. And then based on what the calendar is, so for example, the study session on the budget, I thought it would help before the budget. So we're all informed. But like like this idea, you know, could be something that could be maybe a not immediate, but it's up to you all to kind of make things work. Okay. So you missed my point. Let me go back there. So your budget idea is a great idea and all of us nodded. There's a consensus of this board that, yes,
we should do that. What I'm saying is, we might each think of something that we want to do as a board agenda item that really isn't what the whole pleasure of the board is. It's my idea. And so I think it's our job. I don't think it's the executive committee's job. I think it's the president's job sitting at this table with all of us sitting here. When those ideas come up, what do you all think about that? Would you like to do that? Because we just can't go down every lane of everybody's wishes. It's that we've governed as a board.
That's my sense of this, and I'd love to hear your response. I'm not suggesting that we adopt this. It was just an idea that I brought out. And I do I would like to know the pleasure of the Board, but it's not something that we have to discuss tonight, but it's just something that I just wanted to mention. No, no. I don't think it's a bad thing to mention. I think that the what we could do rather than when we have individual ideas, and I got lots of them too. I really do. I'd love to do some stuff. Is it it might make sense to take an idea and talk to your fellow
board members and just say, Hey, I saw this thing at this conference, and sort of get some interest going and see if it's something that then would actually come to the top of now we bring it as an agenda item and actually spend our time in a meeting doing it. That would be because there's a difference between I've got an idea and what do you think and putting it on the agenda because then the executive committee is gonna try to get it on the agenda. But I don't need it may not be anything that everybody wants to do,
whatever it is. And Not judging. Not judging on the idea. That's not the point. It's the process is what I'm I hear you. I hear you. To her credit, she did that. I mean, she and I had a conversation about the So she's already started. And I Yeah. I could really Yeah. So yes. I I agree. And I actually have some handouts. I'll just give them to you. So after the after the meeting. Okay? I grabbed these from the con from the conference. So Okay. Any other items for agenda planning, trust? Alright. But that brings us down to items from the board. Trustees, do trustees have anything they would like to share?
Mister Wilkins? I'll share quickly. I attended the MASB spring training this prior past weekend, up in Mackinac. Good sessions. I think there was four classes that I took, and, you know, I hope to share some of that content with my fellow trustees. I will say student voice was also another thing that was talked about and sounds like a student voice. For sharing that. I appreciate that. You may not need to talk to him. That's all. Thank you, Trustee Wilkerson. What were the other classes on?
Advanced finance, effective board meetings, governing through policy, and there's one more. We'll think of it later. Yeah. So I cover up there. Oh, Tracey Wilson has something. Yeah. I just wanted to say thank you, President Feaster. It was a great weekend for theater in the Ann Arbor Public Schools this past weekend. I didn't make it to everything, but Skyline High School theaters production of Hadestown teen edition was amazing. And, the Pioneer Theater Guild's production of Footloose was amazing as well. They were both, outstanding, really. It just felt like Broadway in in Ann Arbor for a weekend,
and so we were just kinda making our way to everything. On a more somber note, I wanted to pay tribute to Shirley Beckley who recently passed away on April 15. Miss Beckley was a civil rights advocate who fought for the black community and anyone who needed her help. I'm told she was instrumental in creating the Jones School historical marker, that will be dedicated on May 15 at 01:30 at what is now Community High School. So, again, she was instrumental. She attended Jones High School back in the day. Her legacy will live on in our community.
So I just wanted to make note of that. I'll just say a couple of things. I know we had a couple awesome, events at our, schools for groundbreaking this week. And so, I know superintendent parks, was present. And I trusted Schmidt Wood was present. I trusted Woods was also present at Dick. Yeah. At Dick. And so it was a a couple great experiences seeing the kids, see how tight they were, the community, teachers, principals. Everybody seemed very excited for for the new schools. And so it was a pretty pretty awesome and awesome experience. So both of them were awesome experiences.
So You know, from what you just said, that's what I was gonna mention. Because it was so it was so fun watching the kids. They're just so geeked. Yes. It it was great. They were. So, alright. If there is nothing else, I will entertain it. Oh, no. I'll do it by voice phone, don't you? Yes. I may have May I have to return? I moved to return. I support. Second. Before by Trustee Wilkerson. All in favor say yay. Yay. Any opposed say? Hold on. Wilkerson. Same time. Could it be? Any opposed, say nay. Motion passes. Meeting of January is 12:09AM.
Thank you. Record