##VIDEO ID:WPooc9y9HLw## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e [Music] good evening i' would like to call to order this an okah henan school board meeting for today October 28th 2024 please join the board in pledging our Allegiance flag United States all right our first order of business is to approve the board agenda is there a motion to approve the board agenda as presented so moved thank you director Simon um is there a second uh thank you co-chair Des Shane any discussion hearing none all in favor of approving the board agenda say I I any oppos say Nay with six in favor and zero opposed the agenda is approved all right members the next item on our agenda is item four the consent agenda as normal members can remove items for separate consideration and discussion if that's their desire is there a motion to accept the consent agenda as presented is there a second so is there any discussion I um maybe I should have said this first actually maybe it's out of order there's one item I wanted to pull off for separate consideration um it is there's a lot of appendices I believe it's appendix H the new Middle School courses just for separate consideration so with that item removed for separate consideration um is there a motion to accept the rest of the consent agenda as is soov thank you director Simon is there a second to approve the rest of the consent agenda with that one item that we'll visit second thank you all right hearing a second will all in favor say I I any opposed say nay all right with six in favor and zero opposed the consent agena minus that one item is approved um and we I had requested that we remove um item H I believe it was the new Middle School courses sorry I was getting a little confused so I thought I think it might been listed differently in here um so the I had pulled it so I'll just State what I was going to State about it um so init so what item H is it's the new Middle School courses um we had discussed this at a previous work session where it was the idea of having um an alternative music class offered for a number of students and parents who had you know requested you know essentially not to participate in the ones that were offered which is totally fine the presentation given was great um I was in favor of it good questions asked but ultimately it did seem like a good idea um so the reason I mention it is because to at least for me um given that support that I just stated for me to vote Yes currently on these courses puts me in somewhat of an awkward position because it was recently brought up by a number of community members students parents teachers that there's concern some concern over math curriculum the details of which are not going to be gone into right now but suffice it to say I had requested a solution at least be come up with and at least for now that hasn't happened and what I realized when I was looking at this band curriculum or not band music curriculum idea is it kind of is at least a work it would have been to me a workable solution or something comparable to it for the math curriculum as well kind of offer an alternative option that still meets state standards for the math students who are struggling in the in the existing course um but that's not what we're voting on but the reason I mentioned that is because if I were to vote Yes on this it would kind of put me in the position where I feel like I'd be supporting at least what I interpret to be a double standard which is we'll say yes we'll allow an opot option for one one course but we're not going to allow the same opot option or like an alternative instruction for a different course so I I'm actually like the idea for this um it kind of it's frustrating to me that I don't feel like I'm in a position where I can vote Yes I be but I I do think to be cons consistent and to be fair we have to provide the same opportunities for everybody whether that's we find an alternative solution for the math kids and the music students or neither for both um but consistency is important just so I don't feel like I'm supporting a double standard um but I would just in light of that like to reiterate my request since this was done um it this idea was brought forward you know with the good intention of trying to find a workable solution for a number of students and parents that had requested it it's a good idea um I would just request that we do a similar thing for the math curriculum so that I can get on the same page and so that I can support this in the future if it passes or doesn't pass um but that's really all I wanted to say that's where I'm at with it um beyond that does anybody else have anything they'd like to add director Des Shan thank you co-chair Arco um you said a couple things that I just want to address really quickly so you said it's like an opt out or alternate that's not the case so for music curriculum um options we have band choir orchestra and this new one is a non-performance based music curriculum so it's not the same as an opt out or an alternate it's just an additional curricular offering the way I would think about that in comparison to math as you brought up we have algebra algebra 2 geometry trigonometry Pre-K Kelk statistics Etc there's a lot of options for students who want to have Choice some are prescribed but some are also choice and I think that's what's happening here with this music one it's not really the same thing as an opt out or an alternate so I just wanted to to share that perspective out as as you're making your considerations thank you any other discussion uh director hulman thank you co-chair Arco um according to the testimony that we heard at the work session there was a small number of parents um was the testimony that we heard who were opting their students out of the course due to the performance requirement and so this is a course that's being created to satisfy um that need um and I strongly support parents rights to opt out of courses and um in every way influence the education of their children so I think that's a strong a good thing for parents to do it's also a per state statute that if parents choose to opt out of a course then um the school board is not required to pay for the cost of that alternate instruction um so this happens with many other courses and we aren't um as the testimony said a handful to perhaps 20 students um we're generally not making new courses to satisfy that demand and at this time when we're at such a financial impact or Crossroads in our district um that's really the fourth thought of my consideration for this is the cost associated with developing a new course and we have many unanswered questions related to how will this affect the music program what number of students will be taking it when added um are we adding courses equit equitably considering all parents needs in this District um to satisfy the education of their students and um just what will be the content of that class none of those questions have yet been answered so for those reasons right now I have concerns is there any other discussion from the board director langfeld it sits on the side thank you I appreciate that as we think forward then here we here's a course that has been brought forward to us and I just need a point of clarification um I I'm feeling it's conflated with something else so I I would I'm hearing um director hulman speak to a course at a time adding a course when we are all in a place right now with budget reductions and then I'm hearing director Aro talk about the fact that it's an opt out situation and something to do with math so just for clarification purposes as we look at this course and um think about it in terms of meeting the needs of kids and as we move forward my question to us is then if we take it off this agenda and we don't support it I I'm I apologize but I don't know what happens next with this course and where it goes so if someone could help me out with that i' greatly appreciate it assistant superintendent broer is here to answer any questions you have we did not receive any questions ahead of the meeting since the last work session so we can answer those now if you'd like if you have them um because there is a distinction between a course that has start started during a term and someone wants out of that course after this term has started versus a new course that you register for as a new option in a course offering um of course catalog offering so I think there's some distinctions there to be made so if it's the will of the board you we can try to answer some of those questions with M boier certainly would be helpful for me I'd appreciate it if we could I don't know if I disagree thank you um I'll I'll throw something out there real quick uh just to clarify my apologies if I misspoke so I I Ed the word opt out um in a sense that is true but I don't think it was the right word choice here because they are opting out of like band and like choir for example um it's more that they're finding a a different modality to meet the same standards and a new Option a new class is being offered to allow them to still meet the standards but in a really a fundamentally different way which is totally fine like I support that I think that's great um so the the going back to my initial reason is is this has nothing to do generally speaking with students opting out of one particular class mid mid semester trimester that's not the concern it's it has everything to do with the idea that um an alternative option is at least considered for f a future remedy to the problem and so so and the reason I bring it up is because I had requested at least some solution be considered not adopted of course I'm only one board member I can't unilaterally decide anything nor should I be able to but the a request was put forward by me um to at least come up with some solution and the only answer I received was that we can't redo the whole math curriculum not nothing I did not recommend that nor did I suggest that nor did I think it would even happen but just to give an example of kind of what I was thinking of in in the case this the band or this music class is the perfect example of this we're we're coming up with a creative option to offer a different class and satisfy the standards we could do the exact same thing with the math curriculum we could have an alternative math class like another geometry class that just emphasizes for example direct instruction more over the Collaborative Learning instruction not that the goal is to pick and choose one or the other it's simply there's enough there's a at least in my per interpretation there's been a critical mass of teachers parents students and even myself that have raised concerns over this that we should at least be considering a possible solution to it and unfortunately I just don't think that's happened or is even likely to happen which is why I like I said I'm at a point where if if I as an individual board member said yes to the music students we're going to give you the alternative option but all of the math people who are asking for the exact same thing we're not going to consider your concern I feel like I'd be in a position where I'd be supporting a double standard so that's perhaps a better clarification my apologies for any confusion uh go ahead with that you uh director langen feld's question just so I'm sorry can you repeat your question I I guess I was trying to understand if this is tabled at this time is it something that can be brought back and also uh there there are questions regarding cost now that may not have been addressed in the past that people are requesting and then it sounds like there's another curriculum concern in math which is not part of this so I I I'm asking for clarity somewhere I'm not sure what I'm asking in that regard because it seems uh kind of going in a variety of spaces that's all but in terms of the cost and bringing forward uh this particular course was in fact as as director hulman spoke to the fact that people were seeking an alternative and and certainly and I can certainly affirm that having been in the district serving as a middle school principal for many years that in fact that was the case back in the day already and now that there's some additional requirements around music This lends itself to consideration I would assume that's why it was brought forward yes thank you director lingenfeld uh the course was brought forward in order to better meet the needs of all of our students unlike math music requirement in sixth grade is unique to a no canopen most districts don't have a music requirement a no canopen does so we have three options that are performance-based and music studies was brought forward in an effort to maintain a music requirement for all sixth graders but give another option I wasn't prepared for this conversation tonight so I apologize I don't have the exact costs in front of me but because the equipment is very uh there really isn't equipment as a non-performance based course uh the costs would be relatively low um I'm sorry I don't have an exact number we can get that back to you um I do think that this uh is again a unique requirement for an nanopin we have a long Rich history with m music education and requiring that for all sixth graders so this course was brought forward in an effort to better meet the needs of our families director hookman you mentioned the handful to 20 students I just want to clarify that's per School depending on the community so throughout system you know we're we're talking about probably a 100 families that have formally requested um while even though if they're not requesting I would anticipate there might be um other students that would prefer uh this method of music instruction we don't have those those exact numbers enrollment fluctuates from year to year um but giving families that option was the goal of the of bringing forward the the request thank you uh director adad I think just a comment as I'm getting up to speed here seems like the the issues with the what you call the double standard of we are we are creating an additional class at the behest of some group of people um which again doesn't altogether sound like a a bad idea though there have been other requests from groups of people to make alternative classes or different offerings that we haven't always done so I mean to me the point that I hear you making is if we're going to do that we should do that or we should not do that but we should not have a double standard where we make a a course in order to satisfy some group of people and then we we won't make a course in order to satisfy a group of people in all cases which of course is is going to be tricky um it's I'll acknowledge but it's at least I get the point you're making it's worth a discussion and does whether it's here or at another time but I guess we're having it now direct IET not I don't I don't want to speak to the math question because I'm not familiar with with that um we have over 400 courses in our secondary level so we do do just what you're saying um the process for for new courses comes through department leaders um so this wasn't particularly just because families are requesting it but the system was requesting it so again I I don't want to I can't speak to exactly what you're talking about with the math situation but I agree that we want to make sure that we have a clear process for for that recommendation and I do believe this music class followed that process yeah I'm not speaking to the to the math at all I'm I'm just I'm simply saying and I and I don't know the group I I I asked actually is there a specific group of people I didn't really get an answer to that it doesn't much matter to me my point is let's suppose somebody came forward with a religious exemption or otherwise if they asked for additional coursework and we I don't know if that's what we're doing here but if it is okay it's it's a reasonable thing if members of our community need it but that type of accommodation that type of alternative course could be proposed in other scenarios too and I don't at least I've raised a number of issues that I might suggest we could do it for up until now we haven't done it [Music] so no I don't have anything to add the math issues a completely different topic so that would take further discussion I think at a more appropriate time it's not on the agenda tonight um what's on the agenda is this course so if the board doesn't feel comfortable passing it tonight I think one of the questions was what happens next what's the timeline um you know I know the window closes for any new courses so maybe that timeline comes goes without approval so be it um the math issue is a different set of facts and really unrelated to this thank you the timeline for this particular course would probably be by the end of November in order for us to implement for the fall of 25 to include it into the registration guide so what I would recommend board members is it can be tabled until uh um the next meeting in between now and then we can provide any additional information that the board may want and get some feeling whe whether there's board support moving forward with it at that point knowing that we can still have the potential to get that added to the the list of courses available is that possible yes so uh it really isn't about math in particular the what I'm trying to drive at yes math is the particular example here but is the idea that we have a block of students I'd say it's some number of students and parents who have asked for this and rightfully we responded to them and that's great we should do that which is why I'm generally actually in favor of this um but when the same request I guess is made I had made a request for at least to have a solution considered not even acted upon not even a timeline given but just a solution considered essentially throughout the course of the conversation the request was dismissed so if it's just a numbers game just boil it down to numbers you have a lot of parents we absolutely should not deny them we should take their consideration seriously but each individual board member represents something to the tune of like 40,000 residents in their area so I think a request by any board member really should be taken seriously and even if the consideration is eventually rejected by the board as a whole which is totally fine that's what the board is for I I just that's I think at the heart of the issue for me is if there's no mechanism through which at least me or the board as a whole can at least not even a in a public facing board meeting just request a solution to be had or considered but this will just kind of happen on its own like I don't think there's any one board member who asked that band be or the music classes have a new class added to it which again is fine I have no problem with that but it wasn't requested it was done that's great now it's being considered but when a board member I guess requests it and then at least how I interpret what happened is my request was kind of dismissed I I don't feel like I can act in good faith to the people I was trying to represent when I say yes to one change and then we're just going to disregard the request coming from a different block of people altogether if that makes sense so either way is there any other discussion um hearing none we will take a vote on whether or not to approve it was appendix item H will all in favor I or was it I think we need to move and second it probably sorry about that um is there a motion to approve so moved thank you director Simon is there a second second thank you co-chair Des Shane all in favor say I I all opposed say Nay Nay with believe it was four in favor and two opposed I get did I hear that correctly um it does pass so thank you um our next AG our next agenda item is item five the communication delegations and petitions section of our meeting this is time for community members to provide input directly to the school board about issues that fall within the school board's Authority we plan this agenda item for 15 minutes our policy allows for community members to speak up for up to five minutes but if there are several persons that want to speak the chair has the discretion to reduce the time to comment to hear from all and also to keep the meeting on schedule during times of large committee input we have been Flex when allowing the meeting to run late tonight we have two cards to keep the meeting on time um individuals can have up to five minutes or more if they need it um and if you would like to comment um please complete a yellow card or and provide it to miss kovsky so that we can provide a written follow-up a couple of procedural reminders our meeting participation procedures are in place to ensure open and orderly public comments as well as to protect the due process and privacy rights of individuals under the law if speakers use specific names of students staff or board members I will need to interrupt and or stop speaker please remember to direct your comments to the school board chair myself members of the audience please listen respectfully if the board cannot hear speakers I may reset the timer to allow the speakers to be heard audience members that disrupt this portion may be asked to leave for the remainder of the meeting and with all of those disclaimers being said the first yellow card is from James and Amanda my apologies for the mispronunciation of the last name Jaden perhaps I got it look at that all right sorry we are new to this can you hear me all right uh my name is Amanda my husband James and my son am I allowed to name his name he's just here for Mason um our family moved from Texas a couple years ago and we chose and over because we were wanting to be part of a community that was a big motivator for us to change our family tree and make a big move um when we first moved here we were in a rental location that we were supposed to go to Andover Elementary School we opened and rolled because where we were originally or where we were going to eventually live was in The Rum River Elementary School borders we had a builder that was not very upfront with us about the zoning and which wind we would go to they just said yep you're part of Andover you know you guys are going to be going to Rum River that's a great school and we kind of were misled through that process it wasn't until later after our house had been already started and we had already started to build our new life in Minnesota that we found out we would actually be going to Anoka Middle School we would also be going to Anoka High School and then later found out our kid can no longer play hockey with his friends that he had made and I know that it's sometimes hard when you're looking at numbers to sit there and say well we can't make this work this is just a boundary issue my son has told me there's one bus that goes from Rum River that won't be going to the element or the same middle school that the rest of the kids will be going to it is a very small population but it is really affecting him I remember one of the first days that he came home after going to school and said Mom I have kids in my class that are also on my hockey team and that is so awesome he was grinning from ear to ear and he was so excited to be able to share that and that same kid that was growing from ear to ear when we had to tell him that the district told us we can no longer play for Andover Youth Hockey because we don't fall in the Andover High School borders was crying was tearing up and said I can't believe I can't play with my friends I can't can't believe that these people I have built this relationship with during this process of building the house I can't continue that with and as we're looking into the statistics more it is a very small portion that is getting affected by this and we've been told well you guys can just move we just built our house it's not even completely finished at this point and we've been told to move we've been told that really I don't think they're going to matter it's such a small percentage if you want you can just open and roll but I'm also hearing people that have opened asked for open en roll and and wanting to be in District that haven't been able to because there are people from outside of Andover that are getting those spots I as a mom want to protect my kid he's not here as a prop but he's here to know that each of those decisions you're making is a person and he has cried pretty much every night for the last 10 days and as a parent that is heartbreaking to know that your kid isn't part of a community and within the boundaries and how they're set up it is setting up kids to not be able to find a community because he's told for six years of your life you get to be at a school that is 98% huskys and we're going to have spirit days we're going to have husky days we're all going to wear black and gold and we're going to cheer on our team and you have 24 of those kids looking around going I don't belong I don't fit in here and this is not right for those kids to have to go through that and Mason is a fifth grader so next year he will be going to a middle school the way those numbers break out it sounds like it's about four or five kids that are going to be going from Rum River to Anoka middle school I know kind of if you're thinking about Middle School we all went through that awkward phase where we didn't know who we were we didn't know what we belong we didn't know how awkward it was I've even seen Facebook posts of people who have just recently gone through that transition and they said you know oh my gosh my daughter was so nervous when she went to her locker but the second she turned around and she saw her friends they hugged and they were all excited and they skip down the hallway my kid doesn't have that there's other a few other families that are in the same situation that are not going to be able to he's going to a brand new school and he knows nobody and I was looking up just the effects of how they're starting a program on middle school and how difficult it is to start middle school and how we need to have programs to help that adjustment and now we're putting these kids in a place where they're not going to be in the same experience as everyone else in there class most of theirs are going to the same class and they get to go play with each other they get to see each other my kid gets to if he gets a chance to open an roll he can do that but he's still not allowed to play hockey with them or he can do he goes to Anoka and he is an outcast he is at the Billy where he might be get bullied because of these decisions that have been made and I get on a map it doesn't make sense and it the numbers just don't work and I'm so sorry we can't really do anything about that this is a family these are my kids these are my life and this is making a big impact on them and I'm sorry I don't know what the rules are we were originally told that you guys will be looking at boundary changes in the fall of 2024 we've been crazy we have a lot going on in our family life but we didn't find out until yesterday that that was pushed to last year and that that's not even a consideration so I guess my plea as a mom that cares so much about my kids I want it to be something that we're addressing I don't want want it to be something that we can't talk about for another 3 or 4 years because it's not on the agenda I want to make it on the agenda because these kids deserve more these kids deserve a chance and they deserve to have the same experience that their classmates are having and right now it really doesn't feel like that's the case for these kids and again it is such a small number I can't see 24 kids in the span of 5 years really affecting the school boards where we don't have enough spots at Oak viw and we don't have enough spots at Andover High School and we are members of Andover and we are so proud of it it's very hard when we're told and our kids are told that their identity is so separated based on what grade they're in and that half of their life they're going to be an and over husky in half of their life they're going to be more so focused on inoka and they just don't belong in either group from what it feels like right now yeah I can also speak to my personal experience uh I moved around a lot growing up um I was never in the same school until I was in high school um that was 12 different schools growing up and it is very difficult in that situation to know where you fit in and I know as a sixth grader and that adolescent life you're trying to feel out where you where do I fit in this world where what am I part of where where do I belong and a situation is being created because of the boundaries that he he'll never figure that out he can't figure that out and he he doesn't have a support system to help with that he does he's not even the cool new kid that has a cool story cuz he came from somewhere else he's just a kid from another school um I can touch on the bullying piece right now because he's actually scared he's scared of it he has said that if I can't and we don't get the decision to be able to play four and over I'll play for in NOA but I'm not going to tell my friends I I only have a small group of friends that I trust that won't make fun of me and won't say anything to put me in a position where I'll be made fun of that's concerning moving forward yeah and it's because of boundaries thank you for the comments um any final thoughts wrapping up otherwise see thank you for your input you thank you our next speaker is Natalie Hansen hello thank you very much for your time this evening my name is Natalie and I am actually Amanda James and Mason's neighbor my son Harry is in the back over there um and we all live in the Peterson's Farm neighborhood in Andover Minnesota currently District Lines delegate that our children will attend Anoka middle school and Anoka High School I am here today to ask the school board to consider redrawing the district boundaries to include our neighborhood into Oakview middle school and Andover High School areas I was recently told by a teacher at Rum River that very few kids at Rum River will end up attending Anoka schools she thought only 10 or so per year that will not end up going to Oakview that was really disappointing for me to hear as my son will spend 6 years making friendships and relationships with district teachers that he will not be able to make with will not be able to take with him to Middle School in a transition for children that is already really hard making the leap from elementary school to Middle School it is not fair to make a few number of children have it be even harder to to have to make all new friends in the classroom and through Sports we have also heard countless stories from friends who work at schools in middle school and high school that recount the many outof district kids that are brought in and open enrolled kids whose families do not contribute contribute to our tax base in the area kids that do not live in our city and really don't share any sense of community meanwhile kids in my neighborhood in Andover trying to open and roll into these schools and we are told that they are being denied in the city that they pay taxes in they're being denied school enr open enrollment most recently while while trying to sign up for youth hockey our family was told that my son was not eligible to play hockey in the city that we live in because he is in the boundary for Anoka High School every other sport he has played he has played for Andover he is an Andover Husky and now he is being forced to play hockey for a different city and he is not allowed to play hockey and use a very expensive ice ranking Community Center that our tax dollars pay for our neighborhood and close surrounding neighborhoods have started to gather and discuss this boundary myself personally my family my close neighborhood community and my friends ask that you please redraw the boundary in order to include our area into Oak viiew Middle School and Andover High School so that our kids are not separated in an unfair way and that we can attend schools within the community and city that we choose to live and pay taxes in that's my Spiel I do also have a question about how do we interact with you in like a back and forth type of way is there any sort of forum for that or is it always just like this um you are always free to send any board member or the entire board an email or give us a phone call okay so thank you thank you thank you all right our next agenda item is item six Board calendar and District update uh superintendent McIntyre thank you co-chair tonight I'll be presenting some items of interest for the board and their Community regarding activities and events that we are proud of in our district we do this to celebrate students staff and community members who are contributing to the accomplishment of our mission which is to effectively educate each of our students for Success so to start us off tonight I think Jim and Heather are helping me here with some of the slides for you to see the district was in attendance in support of the city of an noa's anti-crime Commission at their annual meeting on Tuesday October 22nd this is a community- based partnership organization that makes a positive impact for safety the school district benefits from a strong partnership with our area law enforcement and the district has a history of some of our leaders being on and serving on the board of directors for the Anoka anti- crime commission marching bands from Anoka hanapin five Traditional High Schools collected High honors at the youth and music Minnesota state championships and class championships at US Bank Stadium on Saturday October 12th Anoka High School took the first place title in the class a division three other Anoka henpen marching bands secured top 10 finishes in class A Andover High School played second and earned the percussion Championship the percussion Champion award Rapids High School played seventh while also earning the colorgard champion award Blaine High School placed eighth in class doublea Champlain Park High School took second place so congratulations to all of our marching bands on a strong showing at this year's uh state championships in addition I also wanted to mention that Rapids High School Activities director Jeff Thompson was honored as administrator of the year for his support of the band programs at Rapids High School congratulations to Mr Thompson and finally the district has a strong tradition and we know this over the years of having EX in music which includes being named one of the best communities for music education now for 10 consecutive years all right the most historic School site in in Anoka hanapin is our newest site as we formally dedicated Two Rivers transition program at Franklin here in October co-chair Des Shan had the honors of cutting the ribbon and opening a new chapter for a a location that has served as a School site since 1871 this is just 13 years after Minnesota became a state and seven years prior to the formation of the City of Anoka Two Rivers transition program at Franklin is a program that brings together two programs in one facility the former Bridges program which relocated from a shopping center in Andover and Pathways program which migrated to enoka from the  Rapids Family Center Mall the program serves over 225 students with disabilities ages 18 to 25 to learn Workforce skills and life skills to manage Independent Living this move provides a much improved education setting for our students and also saves taxpayers over $593,000 annually from the cancelling of the leases for that space Anoka hopin remains committed to maintaining facilities in the City of Anoka and the district across the board and has invested over $50 million recently at schools located in Anoka including the two rivers location State and section tournament competition continues to over the next several weeks as students conclude The Fall season and over High School boys soccer Advanced to the semi-final round of the state tournament with a win over number three seed minaka they play in the semi-finals on Wednesday October 30th against Maple Grove this makes the third straight and sixth overall appearance at State for the huskys Champlin Park volleyball faces Maple Grove with a trip to State on the line the section Championship is set for Wednesday October 30th at oio High School in section 7 four 4A Anoka and Blaine are in the semi-final round with games played Tuesday and the championship match for Thursday in football the road to state for Champlin Park and enoka both go through Lakeville the rebels are on the road at Lakeville North and the tornadoes host Lakeville South Friday night in the semifinals in the other 6A bracket Blaine travels to Forest Lake and in 5A Andover advance to the section final where they play at top seated Oak River on Friday night cross country girl swim and dive and adaptive soccer tournaments are set for November so best of luck to all of our student athletes in these competitions also kind of a historic ending um and a gracious donation for one of our schools Advent Lutheran church located across the street from Lincoln Elementary School for the Arts in Anoka recently closed its doors but its Legacy of community support will live on through a generous donation of $124,000 $4,195 to Lincoln Elementary School for the Arts so just an amazing donation members of Advent Advent Lutheran Church have been involved with Lincoln for well over 50 years donating countless hours of volunteer service food drives school supplies clothing and other items for students in need school schools benefit from Partnerships like this and strong community support and this donation will be facilitated through the Anoka henpen Education Foundation so thank you so very much to that generous donation and lastly election day is set for Tuesday November 5th and students will not be in school in in Noah hanapin as 15 elementary schools three middle schools and two Early Childhood facilities will be serving as polling locations there are no school district elections on the ballot and I just want to say thank you to all who take the time to get involved in informed in vote uh chair arle that concludes my superintendent's report for this evening thank you thank you very much superintendent McIntyre um our next agenda item is elementary and secondary education item 7A we're going to discuss the Morris Leatherman Community survey welcome Peter Leatherman from the Morris Leatherman company is this on y we're good yes all right it's a pleasure to be here with you this evening to go over the results um it's the same presentation that I shared in the work session so just sharing it publicly kind of go over some of the slides a little faster uh than we did in the the work session if we go to the first slide and methodology we spoke with 500 randomly selected residents across the community the 500 samples projectable to plus or minus 4.5% in 95 out of 100 cases we then did a parent balloon so we could look at a subsample of parents because there were some specific policies uh the district wanted to look at such as school start times and the middle school schedule um and so that 400 sample is projectable to plus or minus 5% non-responsive rate was 6% average interview time was 14 minutes and it is important to note the timing on this this was in August um so on the questions about budget cut specifically and awareness there's really limited awareness going on on everything people are tuned out during the summer um so that's going to impact some of those questions obviously those numbers would be very different right now as you're in the midst of discussion of budget cuts putting up some demographic iics uh first off how long has the person lived in the inoca hopin School District the typical resident's been in the district for about 16 years 10% have a preschooler or an infant 28% have a child attending the Anoka henpen school district and then 70% are empty nesters and once again that does not imply an age it's just lack of presence of a child 177% are renters uh pretty even divide between owners of homes under 300 100,000 and over 300,000 ethnicity 58% white 19% African-American 10% Hispanic Latino 6% multi-racial and then asian-pacific Islander and Native American the typical age of the respondant KE and WR at about 47 years men and women were equally represented in the sample and then you can see the geographic distribution and those are based on registered voter counts in communities if we go into some of the general big picture view on how folks feel about the inoah henpen school district we've asked this question for probably the last 20 years in doing this survey and that is how would you rate the quality of Education provided by the district um we saw the decline just like every other District did in 19 from from 19 to 21 with the pandemic uh we went from 33% excellent down to 21% that 20 21% was stable over the past 3 years we do have an uptick now it did go 5% uh to the in the excellent category for a total of 84% rating the district favorably the state average and what differentiate school district is the excellent rating um and that is at 11% so it is moving in the right direction and I think the district's at a point now of going back to where it was before the pandemic that the shift is now to get people more enthusiastic about what's happening in the school district um and move them from the good position to the excellent rating now what do folks value what do they like most about the district uh 18% point to the teachers but if we combine the good education and excellent education uh we actually have almost 30% indicating it is the academic quality that they're resonating to and then if we combine the good the good programs the good college prep and the broad curriculum curricul curriculum you have 25% that are reacting to what's being taught in the classroom so the hierarchy here is the academic quality and the programs and offerings in the district and then the teachers what do they think is the most serious issue facing the district well high taxes high taxes has uh been the growing issue uh over 23 and remains in 24 uh the norm on this right now is about 15 to 20% um so a little bit on the Lower Side large class sizes at 133% uh you can put together the budget cuts and funding that forms a coalition of about 23% that have concerns on a financial level in the district and then if we look at the bullying and lack of discipline that's a 16% one and six reacting to that sort of uh aspect um you don't have anything hitting 25 30 35% um but you do have a series of issues in the high single digits and low teens uh to be aware of now what is the overall reputation uh in one or two words how would they describe the district it's good uh 24% say it's excellent 18% average and 7% large that's been very stable over the course of the pandemic the excellent rating had started to increase pre pandemic um and now it kind of just reflects that overall rating on the quality of Education parent perspectives I'll keep this one simple it's a sea of blue instead of a red rip tide on all of these things we've tested um and so you know overall satisfaction in looking at parent responses on this uh the thing to look at is the strong agreement versus the soft agreement and you have more folks more parents St softly agreeing than strongly agreeing so once again that's an intensity an enthusiasm to move parents into that stronger position one of the policies I mentioned the district wanted to explore was start times um so first off we told parents exactly what the school start times were for each level and we asked if the elementary school start times were too early about right or too late a third said too late uh 60% said about right so we follow up and we ask folks would you parents would you support an earlier start time only 39% would support an earlier start time 11% would oo would favor a later start time so there's not any sort of majority in shifting of Elementary School start time simply because the vast majority of people think that they're about the right time similarly on middle schools it's even more unanimous with 78% indicating that Middle School start times is about right and we have basically an equal distribution on too early versus too late so then in asking the followup with this would you support an earlier start time or a later start time we had 78 and 89% opposition because there's satisfaction with the school start time now in doing these school start time surveys for many districts over the past 30 years it's always comes to high school start times is kind of the impetus for this discussion um you actually do have a majority of parents though indicating that the high school start time is about right uh 42% too early 3% too late so it's not surprising then when we ask an earlier start time absolutely not uh but even the later start time it's a 45 55% opposition to it um there's just not clear consensus there's not the concern on the starttime issue and basically if you choose to change High School start times then you have to Impact Middle School and Elementary School down the line um and so there's just not appetite or desire or even the concern on the start times at this point in time what about changing the Middle School scheduled to six periods uh we just gave them a brief uh uh intro paragraph stating the current class schedule at seven and the district exploring uh the potential to go to six um there was support albeit lukewarm at 3% strongly supported uh 57% support 25% oppose and 15% % were unsure if we go back to the whole sample we had 28% indicate that they are a member of their household had participated in a Community Education Program over the past two years uh overwhelmingly High satisfaction including you can see the enthusiasm on this with 70% rating saying that they were very satisfied what would folks advise the district to improve the quality of Education 24% indicate small class sizes 19% say go back to the basics 177% talk about better discipline and 12% better spending less technology focus better teachers more Choice um but just a second direct director Lang I'm sorry question given choice or or is it all just open-ended this this one is an open-ended question okay so some are and some aren't yes okay yeah the majority are close-ended okay I I'll make note as I go through the rest on what's openend and what's not this is open-ended so they can tell us anything we collapse them down into categories so you have three items that are about one and five are talking about class sizes the basics and discipline what's the most important indicator of a high quality District now this is close-ended they read this list and they're we asked them what is the most important indicator you have four that basically tie reasonable class sizes broad curriculum the number of graduates going on to further education and Safety and Security then down the list it's up-to-date buildings and Facilities standardized test scores increasing property values Awards of Excellence reducing the achievement Gap and state-of-the-art Technology um so those four items approach almost 2third of the sample in indicating it's Safety and Security grads going on Broad curriculum and class sizes now how does the district do un meeting the learning needs of all students most only some or very few um I noted in 23 you were one of the few districts that actually got over the 50% threshold of of saying you're meeting the learning needs of all students um it's stay at 56% that's very strong in comparison uh since the pandemic started you can see in 21 the all was down to 38% um and following up with the most only some and very few is there a type of learning a student whose learning needs are not being met it's the same everywhere it's The Underachievers and it's the struggling students um it doesn't matter if I'm in babic or in Noah henpen that is the concern across the state of who's getting left behind currently coming out of the pandemic how does the district do in offering a wide range of uh educational opportunities well this is important thinking back to what they like most about the district um it was 91% a bit of a drop to 84% uh still on this one you know it is a soft yes and it's it's difficult to have this conversation as you approach budget cuts um but it really is an important value in the district um it's what they look at it's what they have an expectation for how does the district doe in promoting high achievement for all um for all students there was a 10-point drop and it went into most students uh no change in the only sum or very few um so just a a a bit of a drop this is you know two data points that Trend does not make uh you need a third data point to see where folks are where the differentiation is between all and most overall quality comparison then and we set the uh uh comparison into 3 years um it's not fair to go back before the pandemic and ask folks if they think it's better about the same or Worse um last year 50% felt it was moving in the right direction this time 59% feel it's moving in the right direction so even if there are concerns there is a feeling that things are moving in the right direction it's actually a 59 to8 ratio it's better than 7:1 currently the norm right now in the metro area is about 3:1 positive in getting better as opposed to worse some perceptions of the district um and some of these are obviously going to be impacted by discussions with budget um and funding in the district so spending tax paars money effectively and efficiently uh 75% this year uh the norm right now in the S County Metro is 58% do they trust you to do what's right for the children unchanged 87% does the district provide a safe and secure environment unchanged 91% does the district do a good job of involving the community and on this one the district has always done an excellent job um this the pandemic uh cut this rating because it became hard to involve the community for two years and certain sections of the community didn't re-engage uh the 88% is outstanding the norm right now is was 72% and that really does bode well and it leads into the bottom one in the satisfaction with decision making that at least they feel they can have a say accountability hasn't been an issue in the district for a long time going back to Jesse Ventura like I noted the satisfaction with decisionmaking 83 to1 on that one it's a better than 7:1 ratio Norm on that right now is about 4 to one um and that really is directly connected to do they feel that they can be involved in what's happening in the district a key question facing the district obviously in the coming years is a potential property tax increase and this question asks folks would they support a property tax increase to protect their investment in the inoka hopen schools we do have a statistically significant change and part of it is driven by the discussions happening on budget cuts and and what could happen um we had 72% indicate that they would support 23% oppose and 5% are unsure so that disagreement is core opposition because we're not talking about an operating Levy or a bond referendum we're talk talking about a dollar amount they're just against anything um so it means there's more of a willingness to have a conversation of all my clients that are on the ballot this fall uh unfortunately during a presidential election um the the norm disagreement is at 30% at the outset so you're about seven you're seven points lower now that's in concept and we're going to go in just a little bit on the tax tolerance question um the school bird performance obviously with everything that's gone on a 10-point drop in favorable a 10 a ninepoint increase in unfavorable uncertainty at 5% um there is a drop obviously associated with what's gone on um but still the norm right now is 55% favorable to 40% negative if we look at the superintendent and administration uh a similar drop Five Points um this is a better than 3:1 ratio the Norman superintendence and administration right now is 2: one and then if we look at teachers it's a 90-10 um they're actually uh more favorable than they were pre pandemic um and this is actually uh strong compar uh comp uh looking at comparisons uh ratings of teachers have dropped a bit over the past four years A lot of it with discussions with unions uh and people things that have played out in the media um so that the norm favorable rating on teachers and instructors is between 80 and 85% so a very strong rating uh in a Noah henpen are minus schools adequately funded 43% said yes 40 2% said no do people believe in NOA henpen has sufficient funds to provide a high quality education 48% said yes 45% said no this is the current state of where we are in the state on the question of adequacy of Education funding we don't know um after 21 with education funding increase in discussions from the legislature in St Paul uh we had 75% of people indicating that districts were adequately funded now coming out of the 23 bium what happened there there was discussion of money uh but now folks are hearing about budget cuts in school districts operating levies during presidential elections people don't know what to currently think about the adequacy of funding overall assessment of financial management then obviously impacted with the current discussion uh but still 10 points higher than the norm of 52% on the favorable rating the value provided by the Anoka henpen School District this is driven you know the the key input here is the value is what you pay in property taxes and we know that property tax uh concern has gone up since 2022 um and so it's 65% favorable to 32% favorable that 2:1 ratio is right at the norm now everybody's District has been impacted by perceptions of high property taxes coming out of the reassessment across the state in 22 if they heard the district was going to ask for a funding increase are they for all against all or persuadable you start out 1% uh in in the lead uh 28% are against all 27% are for all but then the persuadables the largest section at 45% the key obviously is going to to be what would the amount they would support um first off the nothing uh we always want that to be under 35% um so if we look at where folks are at that are willing to accept a property tax increase it's between $8 to $10 a month um and I always School boards always ask is that number set in stone it's absolutely not set in stone it's meant to give you an indication of where the community is at knowing that the further you go from that it matters greatly what the funding request is for there's a big difference between say mental health support and uh outdoor athletic space for sports teams I I mean in the minds of the public folks are prioritizing and we're in the current state right now that the districts that have the best chance of success this fall have prioritized the needs versus the wants um and and assessing that and obviously maintaining program avoiding budget cuts um all of those sorts of things are highly prioritized there's not as much excitement for an enhancement or um expansion of programming and services by schools currently I noted this the timing um awareness was limited this number would be different now absolutely uh but 41% in August were aware the district was facing $21 million in cuts a new section that we added was a discussion of topics um and an emphasis on topics in the schools and this is set up like a stop light too little uh there should be more emphasis uh red too much stop yellow about the right amount and on this one just kind of go through it quickly if we net out the too much versus too little on the too little Nets out the basics um then mental health support Career Tech education um and then music and Fine Arts if we look at where it Nets out too much it revolves around Dei slavery and racism gender identity and lgbtqia plus issues this is the overall so how do parents feel um on these same topics and they pretty much mirror the community as a whole in fact parents are more intense on more emphasis on the basics uh more emphasis on Mental Health uh Career Tech uh education really are prioritized by parents uh similarly parents are a little bit more divided on the community with Dei and slavery and racism still tips to too much uh but they reflect the community with gender identity and lgbtqia plus issues and then finally the rating of school district Communications um this is always in the summertime um there's always a tick down to traditional your surveys were done in late spring coming out of the school year um so the 78% uh positive rating uh is a summer rating uh typically we see that go to about 70% um but still relatively strong and amongst parents it was over 85% rating the school district Communications is positively um so I think with that I'd be happy to answer any questions you have thank you very much for the presentation are there any questions or comments from the board uh co-chair to Shane uh just a quick thank you for your time uh and effort on presenting this to us in a way that we could understand and uh have at the work session and then now so that the public can see the results of this I think you had mentioned that Anoka hennipin has done a survey of this nature for an extended amount of time could you give us the exact like amount of history that we have behind um survey results like this I believe we started doing this in the failed operating after the failed operating Levy in 1996 or seven probably seven uh with a regular check-in every year um and obviously it's changed over the years you know some years it's much more I mean for a while you know in from 15 to 18 it was all focused around the bond referendum you know we would have these core sections in it was kind of like we had the doughnut what's the donnut hole this year we looked at the school start times we looked at the middle school change we looked at the emphasis on curriculum um so it is evolved over time but those core questions it's quite an extensive database going on with the inoka anapen district thank you well I I think it's it's really important for us as board members to have statistically valid survey information reflection of our community voice uh and just stakeholder feedback in this way so thank you any other thoughts or comments uh director langenfeld just a uh comment and first of all thank you uh as you think about the school districts that are currently going out for referendum you mentioned the need versus want are there just like one or two top things that that you believe will be um received well by the community in terms of support like is it class size does it parallel what we saw in terms of the priority typically is there any kind of alignment there it it class size is tough because class size is in the eye of the beholder sure um with with specifics um for operating levies I think the districts that have the best chance of success is a clear message on what The Logical consequences are going to be if it doesn't pass we are back to 2008 2009 with the recession in looking at maintenance of what we have as opposed to enhancements if there are enhancements that are supported it definitely revolves around mental health supports it definitely revolves around improving reading uh programs those sorts of things to help lift the you know that goes back to the foundation it doesn't matter what's being taught if the kids can't read um on on the bond side it's Safety and Security and deferred maintenance okay the the half to Hales thank you I appreciate that any other thoughts or comments or questions from the board well thank you very much for the presentation thank the next item on our agenda is item 7B the mshsl foundation resolution solution welcome Josh Dr Josh delich the associate superintendent for high schools oh good evening everyone uh good evening co co-chair uh D co-chair Arco members of the board superintendent McIntyre uh tonight in front of you uh is our grant a from the Minnesota State High School league through Minnesota State uh High School league Foundation the form a grant helps uh fund extracurricular participation for our high school students in athletics and Fine Arts programs it's really awesome opportunity for this grant uh to support uh schools and how it works as the unduplicated number of participants who qualify for the educational benefits including free and reduced meals uh so in this context just uh to clarify kind of what does UND duplicated mean it means that each student uh only counts once um regardless of how many sports or activities that they participate in but it's a great opportunity and Grant to help support uh our activities uh in our high school so as a member school we have submitted that resolution to our governing board co-chairs and now I'd like to just turn the mic back over to you uh co-chair Arco and I'm asking uh for a vote in favor of a resolution and the for thank you very much are there any questions from board members hearing no request for discussion board members we have the Minnesota State High School league Foundation resolution form a for approval as presented in appendix K with no further questions the clerk will call the role please Simon votes I hman I AET i langenfeld i desane i and Arco I with six in favor and zero opposed the that resolution is approved thank you very much for the presentation thank you all next on the agenda we have item 7c October 1 enrollment report welcome Dr Joel verduin Chief technology in and information officer thank you co-chair Arco um members of the school board co-chair Des Shan and superintendent McIntyre um tonight I am presenting the October one enrollment report uh just some basic information about it um one thing is I will refer to a couple of the um graphs that are on the the hand out in the packet otherwise the um slides are pretty just straightforward words um and I'll um point out where those um particular um places are that I'd like to um point out um schools in Minnesota um are um submitting their enrollment counts on it's an October 1 process and so that's the official date for Minnesota when schools do this we we perform two major things when it comes to enrollment one is this enrollment report um and um my departments do all of the student data accounting um but then secondly we do a projections um and we do that sometime in the January time frame just just ahead of Staffing because it is what drives the Staffing um process by taking a look at our um students and predicting where our enrollments might change this enrollment report you'll you'll see and and we'll point out a few things on here um there are um the differences from projections because it matters um for a number of things um but also I'll give you some um change from the last school year so I'll talk about some of the statistics in terms of what was it like last year what are what are we looking at this year um so my goal is to provide some um information on some on key demographics um to let you know of any Trends and changes uh in the data and describe any of the potential impacts um try to make a few connections to things that go on um districtwide one um additional item I'll add is we had a um we had a commission Study last year it was just before new board board members came on I think we presented in December of last year um that is a much more detailed um enrollment projection but what I would say at the outset and I'll summarize at the end is most of what we are seeing is um found within that 10-year study that was done some of the implications such as smaller class sizes at the at the earliest levels um being one example of what that 10-year report says um so uh moving on to the next slide I will talk just a little bit about um the idea that the enrollment report there's um there's several things that are related to it the impact on facilities and programming um our projections are our staffing um our implications to it and then uh there are items that we keep close eyes on most recently we read uh we met to talk about Open Enrollment um and uh uh boundaries uh as we're watching some of the schools um getting filled up and um we will make a decision usually in this November time frame as to whether or not we need to close schools to open enrollment so that's something that we brought back to you around that time um each year so there are um some different um broader implications and just the numbers and how they change um so the summary of the main points in the different parts of this is that our enrollment declined slightly from last year um our K12 projection was off by uh negative .8% so we projected a decline but we didn't project as much of a decline as we actually saw um and I'll go through more details in this changes in enrollment um does vary by level so this isn't unusual sometimes our elementaries go down our middle schools go up our our high schools are um are sometimes off and and it seems like there isn't necessarily a pattern to that but um it is essentially the fact that um our students don't stay the same from year to year and sometimes where students come and where students don't come is it can be a little bit unpredictable but not by a great amount as you'll see in the the total um percentage that that we uh we off um ethnicity does continue to change in a very steady pattern so that one has been fairly um predictable our multilingual learner numbers um are are decently near steady just a little bit of an up uptick this year and our free and reduced populations um actually had a slight decrease this year so those are the major um takeaways for that we'll go more into detail um into the K12 enrollment so our enrollment is down by 358 students from last year um we projected a 66 student decrease um which also means that our staffing was built on that so we staffed for more students then actually showed up and essentially um just for for information I think for for board members um that Staffing process kind of corrects itself the next time around so when we look at Staffing if we've overstaffed one year we bring it back down to the level that it should have been at and then build on that Staffing so that we try to rightsize the Staffing numbers for the students it isn't really possible to I think on our best um year we actually were like one student off or two students off but across the schools um it it varies so we do our best to to determine Staffing for the schools um our associate superintendents keep a close eye on those numbers and we do make adjustments where where we need to um the next slide our um our K5 numbers have decreased by 224 students from from the last year so that is essentially where most of this um decline actually occurred and it's mostly at kindergarten um the kindergarten class is at 2402 and um kindergarten uh our kindergarten classes have been have been in the past fairly stable around the 2500 to 2600 number um but this one most recently fell down to 20 um 24 or I'm sorry 2402 as a kindergarten them so that's low that's um in our um 20year history and our um kindergarten classes were much larger in the 90s um in our in our history of keeping these numbers for um the years that are in this uh packet that 2402 is the second lowest number next to um co uh the the pandemic year and so this is a low number for us that number the kindergarten number is a really difficult one to predict we use um we use all of our birth rates from the two counties um and then we keep track of every kid that's born we we track them um in terms of uh having lived here but we obviously don't know what happens to them between K and and four or five and then we take all of our preschool enrollments and we roll those forward to try to figure out what our kindergarten numbers are like and so we do um vary in percentage wise from the birth rates but the birth rates are in a downward Trend and that is part of the report that we heard uh last December and it's been true um if you looked at our enrollment um history and I will point that out on on page four that kindergarten history um you can see that um on that graph there's kind of a line you could draw that would just sort of be a slightly declining line on page four of the enrollment packet as they're numbered at the top um that one shows the kindergarten going across we graph the um we graph them for 20 years but there's enrollments that go even further back and you can see they were up in the 3000s um back in 1994 so the declining birth rate is is probably the biggest driving factor in our enrollment and then moves ins outs open enrollments those types of things kind of modify uh that number to a degree um the K5 uh so I'm sorry I did actually state that last Bullet thank you you move to the Middle School um uh for the Middle School enrollments they were actually up 78 students Middle School school um has had a bit of a a trajectory that is that has um been down the last couple of years um they've went back up by 78 students um what happens at middle middle school and high school is we get an influx of students at Sixth and nth grade um this is something that's very predictable that number for sixth graders tends to be maybe 3 to 4% and for ninth graders it tends to be five or six% new students um and those are likely students coming to us from other programs that have made a decision maybe that's the right time to move um maybe there's other driving I imagine there's a multitude of driving factors but that number is consistent and that's pretty common for schools um across the state for them to have a bump in enrollment in those years um so our Middle School enrollments were up by 78 students High School enrollments were down by um 22 students another very predictable pattern our high schools tend to lose students as the year goes on um it is um something that's not seen at the other levels but it's just a very predictable program some kids exit um in their after their first um first or second try if they're returning for for work um school work and so that is a a piece of sometimes what we see there so not a lot of change for those for those um secondary schools um our ethnicities uh there is something that I would draw some attention to in the um ethnicity part of the report um while our ethnicities are actually um continuing to follow the same trend lines that they have been a have been following we tend to tick up um in the number of students in in um almost all of our minority care uh categories and um that's true in this report as well um we do have um two we added a new page to this report so for the very first time we were reporting um the state um level E ethnicities um they are beginning to be reported on when it comes to the Minnesota accountability system which is State reporting um for for testing and um we wanted to make sure that we included those here and to let you know what the difference is between them and so in 2017 the legislature approved a statute that um asked for the Department of Ed to um be more granular about um different ethnicities and finding out which ones as as an example with Native Americans how many of our students belong to the most populous Native American tribes in the state of Minnesota and so that's one example where they've decided the federal just says yes or no in Minnesota we ask sub questions that will go further into those ethnicities Minnesota also um considers North American um Native populations as being Native American while the federal government recognizes North America Central and South America and so um those numbers end up um being calculated a little bit different way and so they we've have forms that we've been given from the state um parents have been uh filling those forms out that way Federal one is also defined for us and we just use the federal and the state forms for when people um fill out their ethnicities so the net result of the difference and um it I'll just simply um try to make this hopefully as easy as I can what happens is we end up losing um students on the state that categorize themselves as two or more um ethnicities and we end up picking up students that are Native American and this the specific reason why is the state of Minnesota says if somebody chooses Native American plus another category they're considered Native American for the purposes of of Minnesota if um they do that federally they're considered two or more and so um that difference plays out um in the in the numbers that we have here it also is and will continue to have different numbers being categorized that way when it comes to State Testing and Janna will talk about that anytime that we have reports on um State Testing most of um everything else that that we end up working with are the federal ethnicities and those are on that next page and um we actually uh we actually um changed a little bit uh in our um minority enrollment went up a little bit and our majority Ro enrollment went down um by about 2% a little bit less than 2% that's a trend that we have continued to see across the school district um it's also a trend that's seen Statewide um and um interestingly at Noah henpen actually um has a lot of um similarities to the overall state population um not maybe surprising given the fact that we cover a large geographic area um our in our um excuse me moving on to the El students our El students actually had a just a little bit of a an uptick in in numbers um we went from 8.67% um El students to 10% in the past we've seen a little bit smaller um inclines in that most of them were across the Emer um the emerging to expanding categories and those Cate tend to be students um that are a little bit further in their journey in terms of um being completely uh proficient in the English language um next slide are free and reduced uh lunch numbers actually decreased um just a little bit uh if you recall this is I think now this is the second year of um meals that are um not paid um that we have free meals for for all students and so this is one of the ones why um I want to continue to give um uh credit to our uh Child Nutrition program because they um find new and creative ways to remind families that there are other benefits to en um signing up for free and reduced lunch be um because if we um if we don't know that then sometimes things like field trips and other um other things that can be discounted for students by our schools um they benefit from that and so it's important for those um families to enroll in it um in addition to that we have the ability to um uh Direct certify families and that has tended to expand over the last couple years and when they start when they um when they uh qualify for one program for the state then we can direct certify and say that they qualify for this program so that number went down just a little bit um it had gone up if you remember um after the pandemic we had one year where there was a 10% increase um that kind of leveled off a little bit and then this year just went down slightly so we lost about one .2 uh% uh free and redu students in that area next slide um so some uh some just review it's it's really likely that our enrollment will continue to be limited by those smaller birth rates um what our District's population tends to do is it gets a little bit bigger so if we have a thousand kids come in kindergarten it it ends up being like 1,300 by the time they're seniors so um that's a that's a function of moving in and moving out we tend to pick up a little bit older kids um so that's that's a good thing it's not a great thing when the elementary or that kindergarten number starts that low because that number is going to move through and that cohort's probably going to change a little bit um that it is um it's not we have seen a little bit of up and down with that number so there's a chance that we re rebound and have a bigger kindergarten class next year um but it will likely um have an impact of kind of keeping our enrollment pretty steady um within a very small variation I think um I mentioned the birth rates being the most influential item and um that last concluding point is just saying the same thing that I think this will continue be our enrollment expected in the near future pretty level if there's going to be changed it's going to be minimal unless something else happens and I think that's the concluding slide it is I'll take any questions or comments that you might have are there any questions or comments from the board uh superintendent McIntyre just just a context piece for the board as I talk with other districts on the Metro and Statewide the trend is what Joel described the kindergarten numbers are down metrowide and Statewide and I think we've heard from our at least henan County um people that it's a 50-year low in 2025 for birth rates so it's not out of the real of possibilities that we'll see some low you know families are just smaller uh in the in the coming num so I think Joel's right we we tend to have a pretty flat um enrollment but I think we it wouldn't be I wouldn't be surprised we see continued low numbers at kindergarten just because of those things with the low birth rates and the fact that we're that's a trend around the state not not just here locally in our district do some context rette a question and I don't know who the right person would go to but I I'm curious um you know sort of to substantiate that is do we have do we have numbers of how many kindergarten age children are reside in the district you know so that we could get an idea of you know how many are out there how many of them are enrolled here so we could and if we had that you know history also that might be useful so we could kind of get a good feel for where that trend is at and is it is that what's in in our specific case impacting us or are there other factors um we we do um know of all the students that would have enrollments and other schools and programs and homeschool um and uh so that number would be one that would be um would be pretty uh realistic for for a number what we wouldn't have is um parents don't have to send their kids to kindergarten um they have to at a certain age but that's usually first grade um and so there could be some students that are just aren't enrolled and we wouldn't necessarily know that but we do track all of the charter school private schools um home school enrollments and um we would have a little bit more solid numbers on those other programs uh in the next month or so um and we can certainly do a reporting on that um yeah that's helpful I guess history yeah I'd follow it then then say well let's not fix it just on the kindergarten number then let's let's get to where they're mandated so we can get a feel for some of those other classes too okay just what's the trend and what's going on any other questions or comments from board members well thank you very much Dr V doing all right I'll turn this next item over to superintendent McIntyre it is item 7D Phase 2 budget reductions yeah thank you co-chair Arco so consistent with our budget reduction and realignment process and timeline tonight's an update on the phase two process taking place this fall and thank you so to so many of you that board members that came to the community meetings here recently so um there'll be some um information you've heard before I I always um think about the people that and as many times as we review this there's always someone that's hearing it or seeing it for the first time so we're trying to make sure we're consistent in our presentation so if we move on to our what I'll briefly cover tonight in consistent with previous uh board meetings is just a brief review of the process for decision- making for phase two and and uh doing that after our completion of phase one last spring um I'll also talk about um the quick review of our phase two recommendation and a summary of the community feedback received here recently and wrap up with a timeline review in our work leading up to this uh I've shared at every presentation the convergence of factors coming together at the same time really explaining how we got here and it's really a number of things the fact that we have stable enrollment growth means we haven't had increasing enrollment and we know that our funding is tied to enrollment so we can expect not a large increase in funding the pandemic relief funds have ended we have employee contract settlements with you're actually the last two of the 18 employment groups are on on the agenda for tonight inflation and higher cost for transportation and this General District Operations have has kind of been in that 5 to 10% range knowing that we have uh when it comes to expenditures as compared to the revenue of about 3% or less projected forward the anticipation really uh looking forward is there's no new or additional Revenue that we can count on at this point either state or federal um we'll watch what the next legislative session brings forward there's also several un new either unfunded or underfunded mandates that have limited um funding for when it comes to our general fund expenditures so um those have had an impact and we'll continue to have an impact KN that some of the legislative action around those have brought forward one-time funds and not ongoing funds so as a result we are we moved into a two-phase budget reduction process we started last spring with phase one knowing that we have to plan for for um being uh hitting our budget targets for next year in the 25 26 school year so just by quick review if I move on here phase one you've you've uh seen this information multiple times but that um our district is one of many in Minnesota and in the Metro uh experiencing some of the same impacts the 41 Metro school districts are estimating about 300 million in shortfalls our phase one reduction plan started right away um in February and went through April with the goal of Trying to minimize the impact for this school year and and moving forward so we made the move to reduce 5.1 million there with about 50 positions uh centrally being infected either through reduction or reallocation um there was also some non-personnel reductions in the areas of transportation and District technology so the goal was to try to minimize that impact on the school operations at our sites phase two reductions um again we dove into this right away in July as after we got the uh budget approved for this school year moved right into planning for next school year and um those reductions for phase two so after the phase one uh reductions were made we had a new Target kind of reset for $21 million for this year so that we had about a 26 million dollar Target between phase one and phase two so this slide here just reflects the key dates and decision-making that we've reviewed a number of times with preliminary recommendations that were provided to the board September 23rd at our board meeting these recommendations were provided uh to the community and for staff review and feedback through a series of committee open house meetings kind of open house style meetings and on the online survey process that was available for those who participated that was late September and early October throughout the phase two process uh we've talked about um the planning parameters at play so we've taken into consideration the district strategic priorities our enrollment which you heard a lot about here tonight reviewing existing programs and services applying this approach through a phased model looking even further at central office and Central administrative uh reductions looking back in time on the impact of past reductions and then also considering restricted versus unrestricted funding areas fund balance class size making sure we're optimizing operations and also looking at instructional uh instructional time and supervision through the uh school schedules which you all um spent lots of time with uh considering when it came to middle school and high school schedules I'll follow up with that in a minute and then finally uh legal and financial compliance that comes along with our budget when it comes to um collecting input and and really getting information to you we started that process this summer with District level leadership in July through the summer and then developed a number of options for the board to consider and have discussion about so at the September 9th work session you considered five options and really had long discussion about the pros and cons of each of those options and after taking that cons discussion into consideration we came back with um which I'll get to in a moment a kind of a hybrid recommendation taking elements of those five recommendations especially the first four the fifth one was a referendum option for you to consider for the November 2025 uh time frame so that would be a a way to bridge the reduction with some reductions at central office and strategic Investments which would just be two years ahead of those Sun those funds being sunsetted already and that would be a way to keep the fund balance at about 6% so we covered all those um pieces and at the September work session began to talk about two recommendations for the board to consider um one being uh kind of a cut now option for this coming school year and one being an extended option to take advantage of um the opportunity for the voters to uh weigh in in November of 2025 so through a lot of changes this is the recommendation number one that we landed on as far as the um how to hit that Target of uh 21 million in in addition to the 5 million previously cut this chart reflects the current recommendation number one for $12.25 million at the elementary middle and high school level it also includes a 13.75 million total cut at the central office again to minimize the impact at the school level with the district office taking on the majority of the overall reductions from both phase one and phase two in addition after com comp prehensive review of the the schedules the middle school and high school schedules those changes are not recommended at this time and the board had lots of conversation and discussion about um those scheduled changes and and in the end the direction was to not pursue them so on the next slide this is again the the recommendation for referendum should the board consider to go that direction it's taking into those into account those three key pillars in this option so to maintain a six % fund balance you would um Sunset early the one-time funds used for strategic Investments those are five million a year so that'd be a $10 million um way to adjust the fund balance and then couple that with an additional 5 million at the central office and then you would have to decide as a board whether to you're still 13 million dollar short potentially or somewhere in that neighborhood so you still need to think about how do we bridge that Gap whether or not that's through a referendum um or additional Cuts so all overall the um if you did go to a referendum option we could bridge that with strategic Investments and central office reductions and you could pause or delay any cuts at the school level at the elementary middle school and high school level for another year so just some detail coming up on the next slides we've went through this as well this is a a breakdown of the um level at each level elementary middle and high school Cuts so this reflects um an effort to try to minimize impact primarily at the elementary level with over 70% of those Elementary Cuts away from the traditional classroom as of today the you know of the our total amount needed 26 million about 5% of that only is at the traditional Elementary classroom that was one of the interests of the board so the remaining 95% of the entire 26 million is is in other areas the total number of positions U recommended for reduction at the elementary level is um approximately 1% of the traditional classroom piece and again this is again to minimize the impact at the elementary level at the middle school level a little different story this uh would result in class sizes increasing uh average class sizes across the middle school level to increase by approximately four with um this reduction the total number of positions is a just shy of 6% of our total Middle School staff and without a high school schedule change the high school class sizes are estimated to increase by about five or approximately five across when you think average class size and that's approximately 5.3% of our total High School staff this is a new slide some additional information that's provided for you on the on the uh next slide this is a breakdown for you by department at the central office so when you look at districtwide staff and non-staff reductions gives you some additional detail of the dollar amounts per department and it um really in the end will reflect another 90 to 100 positions being reduced in addition to the close to between 40 and 50 positions already reduced in phase one so you're getting in the neighborhood of 150 positions centrally and you'll have additional details uh at the work session next Monday as we continue to make sure we're um honoring our employee contracts our collective bargaining agreements private Personnel data and so forth so with some additional work this week we'll have more detail for you uh next Monday night at the work session but again the at this point the central office is the majority of the total reductions uh it's about onethird of the central office positions being reduced as compared to roughly 2 to 6% of positions at the sites in addition to their reductions if you go on to that yeah thank you onto this slide these are some realignments that we can make to help um minimize the number of personnel reductions so we can um make some realignments within Child Nutrition technology Community Education and again with a new legislative change with student support Aid we can now fund existing positions with that new student support Aid um that will that's additional dos we wouldn't have to cut deeper into more Personnel cuts on the next slide is where I'm going to get into some of the feedback uh the summary from our community meetings and those who participated in the online uh survey so I kind of want to make a distinction between engagement and participation so we know that when we track the hits on our website or the uh how many people open the emails we push out uh we know there's thousands of people we can confirm that through our data that received the information which is a you know different uh piece than those who actively choose to participate through either coming to a meeting and or filling out the survey knowing that we made that survey available online so for those who were not able to attend our community meetings we did record that first first meeting in in live you know that live streamed um option or recorded option is on the district website on the YouTube channel we did for anyone to re uh view that and and that can still be done over 300 U residents have viewed that presentation online and through our Communications we've raised I think that awareness piece just through our um email pushouts in in the newsletters so we also had about 274 residents that completed the staff or that completed the feedback form uh that was online so here's a breakdown of that sample so 65% of those who filled out the survey or the feedback form were either parents or Guardians and within that uh 72% identified they had students with in elementary 33% had students in middle school and 35 in% indicated they had students at high school of those taken the survey as well 52% were staff members so roughly half and again um others that completed their survey about a third that completed it do not have students in their household and then just a fraction of our students uh took that online survey here's a different way to visualize that and Mikey takeaway for the board on this is we have sampling from all five major High School sectors or clusters in our district you can kind of see the breakdown there um but it represents that all again um each geographic region of our district was is represented in that survey so some themes that we can uh take away from the those that did participate in the feedback Forum um the survey ask for a direct response regarding option one or option two uh when it comes to either the reductions now or the referendum and 89% of those who participated supported option two or the referendum option in the survey so some additional breakdown here there some data I thought you might be interested in 35 responded uh added of the respondents added comments about a need for the ref a referendum additional themes so we had about 110 respondents who mentioned class size concerns uh 79 residents offered ideas for efficiencies or their own ideas on reduction strategies or areas for reduction to be considered we had about 47 who shared concerns about losing additional elective options or Advanced programming for students 35 were concerned about Staffing changes uh 19 actually weighed in on the proposed schedule change although the board is not currently considering that as part of the proposals at this point and another um 19 we're just purely asking for more details on on the two proposals so um that is a summary and I know you have a document in your packet that goes into more detail there and I think we also provided you with a copy of the comments uh last week in my superintendent update so looking ahead here's another look at the kind of the visual timeline that blue section across the top is the board related areas and the section below are the actions taken by the administration throughout the timeline so um I'll just note that as we continue through this um the richness of the board and each individual having their own ideas and perspectives on what should be considered in the reductions and realignments and um there at this point I've just maintained the two options for the board to consider the kind of here's your option to reduce now and what that looks like and then the other option for um referendum and then you know as we move into the final month here should the board provide different direction then we'll follow that direction right so right now we have the two recommendations on the table we will have like I mentioned earlier additional detail on the specifics for those uh reduction areas and that'll be reviewed and discussed at the November 4th work session with final recommendations and board approval still expected at the November 25th board meeting so that the process is timed in support of our district Staffing process in planning for next school year which starts in Earnest really in January but we get a preliminary jump start on that in December so to wrap up the information on the process continues to be available on our website at ahschools.us budget as well as um continues to be shared with our community members via our monthly District e newsletter the focus and um people can Subs subscribe to that online we always like to make a plug for that uh that kind of wraps up my comments for this evening chair Arco so um thank you very much and we'll take any comments or questions from the board at this time there any comments or questions from board members uh director adette uh yeah thanks so first I have a question I think it's it's probably a board question um but I I do keep seeing under recommendation number two we talk about a referendum option uh and we keep saying we're going to maintain a minimum 6% un assigned fund balance but and my question is really a policy question we have a we have a board policy that mandates a 10% um un assigned fund balance so I don't really know at this point and I haven't heard us talk about how we would propose we're going to work through that but to me it's an important policy question um I don't know if have anybody has any thoughts on that yeah and I know um Miss Fergus is in the crowd that is our the board's Target for fund balance and you know I've filed questions from all the board members from what if we don't cut anything what does that do to the fund balance which brings it even lower right so there's a range of options depending on what you want to do um my recommendation is you just you end this strategic Investments early you make the central office reductions it still maintains at least a 6% fund balance but those numbers can can move should the board want to move those variables along with it okay but I mean it does still leave us sort of in breach of that policy so I I feel you know since it's our own policy that's something we need to put on a discussion Point someplace and I would say if the board wants to Main Ain that 10% then the reductions that yeah have been proposed you're going to need to go deeper right yeah that's right um and then I I think just otherwise I mean I as I've sat tonight I've uh well I think I submitted over 20 questions earlier this week over the weekend um I had no expectation they would be answered incidentally and you remind me of that superintendent so that's fine but um but my point really with it is the deeper you dig the more questions you have um I I as I sat here today and I think I wrote by the way 15 more so in the and the questions really stem from deeper analysis of uh of you know what we're proposing to cut and and um and you know what we're not and I'm not going to read through all my list of of questions now but I do think that there you know the goal is the goal has stated is to uh try to minimize the Cuts in the classroom and you know I I think that my overall summary review of where we are to date there's still Cuts we could make uh that we have not elected to make that would or you know proposed to make that would minimize what was happening in classrooms so the questions I submitted really got to that um probably one important one that I have that I am going to highlight is um just that we analyze the management I called it the management impact of the funding of a lot of restricted funding programs so we have a ton we have a ton of our budget that comes in through restricted funds these are funds that get ear marked through federal state legislation and otherwise I mean I I don't know all of the places I I did actually summarize it at one point I had a whole lot of information and it was it was dozens literally of of different what we call restricted funded programs and so in essence as I understand it uh we take we take in the district takes in a lot of money that's restricted it's for it comes for various purposes and it it can it can have an effect where it sort of feels like I'm going to call it free money that's my word but it feels like it's free money because it doesn't come through the normal funding process but the reality of free money is you all of the programs come with a requirement to manage to manage them there there will be people that that will be funded there will be programs that will be funded there will be many of the some of them have plans you have to write every year so there's there's just this overall management impact and I mean you you can see it just in the sheer number of people employed in our school district that you know and and especially the are employed as a result of what I'm calling these restricted funded programs it's a ton so the more that I look into it the more I realize that that management impact is is is very significant um I think I think it has the potential to take away from our core Focus uh you know big important Focus areas and so we ought to do an analysis to say what would be the effect if we reduced our acceptance of some of those funds um what would what would it do to the ability to manage the schools on a lower administrative impact what would it do to sharpen our Focus what would it do to any ass Associated spending that may or may not be connected because you know these types of programs are always really great but they never give you quite enough so then you wind up having to uh you know find other ways to fully fund them so I I'm just presenting that as one big but I think important example and and I'm going to add that because I've spent three years nearly on the board now um arguing against a number of the programs that we've initiative a big chunk of the programs I'm talking about come through these restricted funds so when I talk about it taking away from our Focus taking away from feelings of unity taking away from you know overall alignment uh it it has a big impact so for people don't know it where is that where is that funding coming from where is that spending where do those programs come through a lot of it comes through these types of things separate issue that I just want to provide my own color to how we got here and it's really important because it's our state government that sets laws and um and funding formulas and all of that from school districts and we all witnessed the the government telling us in the past year or two years about the unprecedented funding that they that they uh put into schools um we heard it on the news some people actually I couldn't believe it but some people actually said we'd finally fully funded schools and then of course everybody was confused why after doing that we got to this point where you know we find ourselves 26 million in the whole but you know the a lot of that uh fund fing also was tied to different things so free lunches for every child even though every child did not need free lunches there I don't believe there was a in any recent time there's been a child who who didn't have lunch at school whether it was paid uh through the government or through home um paid paid family leave uh was a requirement that hit us uh unemployment for part-time workers a massive uh mandate that the state government put on us uh read act uh We've talk it's been talked about a lot tampons uh in all the schools the list just goes on and on and on so tons of these mandates that hit school districts went unfunded we've talked about it a lot so when the state came out and they said well we've had unprecedented funding um much of it was earmarked for specific purposes that cannot pay for teacher salaries and things like that despite that fact uh when we settled our contracts people came in for huge increases uh that was due to a lot of factors inflation's real also caused by in part by the government and so we really were forced to make the inflationary increases and here we are but prior to two years ago the school when this historic funding was passed the school district was not in financial trouble we were solid and so this is where State politics and education get into it it was an election year our government worked super hard to hand out tons of money to a bunch of people they didn't raise ta they didn't want to raise taxes they did not want to raise taxes during that year so they spent a bunch and now here they are they've left it here they've left it here at the local level for school districts to try to wrestle with it you know either either operate in deficit or pass a levy referendum which you know as Mr Leatherman points out oh you might have a chance of passing it in a scenario where the the want the the want versus the needs and if we're in a really need-based situation but these Levy referendums never go away they'll be here forever and So eventually state government will get around to doing their job they'll refund the schools and the levy will still be here and at that point that money will be directed into something that may or may not be a want or a need so I don't feel I do a good job as a board member if I don't raise those issues dig deep into the proposed Cuts dig deep into the proposed budgets ask 15 questions over the weekend come up with 15 more now um and I'm going to continue to do it um but I I think that there's still plenty of work to be done that could result in in less cuts to our classroom uh than than we are than we currently have on the table and I want to encourage us to continue to pursue it thank you thank you just a couple thoughts and then I'll let other board members jump in um on the second part we agree yeah and we're working to do our part to as we enter into this next uh funding session right uh can't guarantee you know all we have right now is what they've committed to from a small increase through a consumer price and index so beyond that you know we'll see what kind of impact we can make um so just a couple high level thoughts um because you covered a lot of ground there um early September the board asked me for my recommendation so through the work of the expertise of our Administration through the summer that's what I provided to you right if you as a board and the majority of you say go another Direction we'll do that but I gave you my best and our team's best uh path forward and yes I agree on some of the areas around restricted funding you if you look at what's on the table there are reductions in special education multilingual Learners achievement and integration all in areas that um that restricted funding that we get provides the the critical staff and services often required by either state or federal law for those students who have uh learning needs so um for one example there's $2 million of special education Cuts in there that because of the funding formula we only realize $500,000 of actual general fund savings but those are 50 jobs that we would cut to realize realize that so that's one example there that are in your materials and then lastly um I think the district's prided itself on minimizing the administrative impact or or you know when we're at less than 3% of our budget uh centrally you've heard me say it before that's near the bottom of the largest districts in the state 30th out of 34 so we are we are doing a lot with very little to begin with I gave the board um as requested what does $15 million look like what does $18 million look like so you have that if you want to go deeper and that's the direction of the board I've given you three additional steps along the way and like I said earlier you all have your own Vision or own ideas on what you think should be looked at and and in what to what degree so we'll have to eventually get to board direction from the majority of you on how to how to move forward whether it's reductions now or whether it's delaying those and doing that later or looking at other uh Revenue um possibilities depending on what coming forward statewise state from the state and so forth so um that's I I think I'll just end it there thank you any other thoughts or comments from board members director Simon I believe was first oh sorry jumping on thank you Zach um I have one question first and then I'll make a comment about the discussion that's been occurring um superintendent and I know Michelle's there too she may need to um speak on recommendation number one where we've already done 5 million of course that's done so there's 21 more million in cuts and you have it broken out on this slide where Elementary Middle High School Phase 2 Central Services um so in that option if that option were to go forward we would am I right to say that we'd continue our $10 million of strategic Investments for the next two years yes we would okay so those would those would continue and we would do permanent Cuts obviously strategic Investments are a one-time cut and not ongoing so it'd be all the ongoing cuts and strategic Investments would continue correct I don't think I thanks I I should have that looks pretty clear on the slides and everything for some reason it just didn't register in my brain uh so thank you um so I the discussion that just happened I mean maybe just a few quick comments about it um first of all I I have always been an advocate of any board member that has a question should get their questions answered right I mean we make uh important votes here so um I think it's I think it's needed and how much time is needed it it just has to be done so I'm supportive of that um and um member AET made comments about the um state government and I agree there are and we've we've said it so many times about the unfunded mandates right they're not just new to this leg last legislative session they've happened throughout our history one thing to I think I always try to look at both sides of it one one thing that this board and it it's this board not pass boards that we had control over and the the main reason that we need to cut is how we settled our contracts right so we gave and I agree with it I think I think our staff deserves even more than we were able to do but we're able to do it and we agreed up on it but that's a decision this board made and we made that decision knowing that if we did this we were going to have to cut so I think that's an important distinction too regardless of what um the state government does that we don't necessarily have control over we do we have control over what we have control of and we did make those decisions so it's all I've got thanks just one I did forgot to acknowledge thank you for the questions we will get answers to you and I I think to all the good ones that all the board should have and definitely by the end of this week if not sooner there was quite a few there but we're going to get those um answered for all of you U as soon as possible director langenfeld first of all I appreciate questions and I noted that earlier I think if we um the more we can unearth what's going on and and really uh do an a deep analysis the better we will decisions we'll make uh just a speaking of of an analysis as I think about um and conversations are being held as to which positions and so forth um the Administration has provided us with um the recommendations and for me personally the questions that I I really um want to have a deeper understanding of is the unintended consequences sometimes we we can understand the position but the impact it's like an uh a value on the impact of what that really means to a student um because there's trickle down kinds of an unintended consequence so for example if we cut something out of central office how does that impact the principle that impacts this you know the classroom teacher and and as I've been out and about just having conversations with Educators who have you know friends have reached out um the considerations of different opportunities you know what that looks like um people have different ideas as to what that is so questions are being asked about you know are we giving consideration to the impact of the cutson central office and what they will do uh to the student um in the classroom eventually it it it it works both ways so that would be one area I'd really like to have just a little deeper understanding I can understand the positions but the question is um and I know that our Administration is working very hard to minimize that impact but to just have a some clarity around that the other thing I would offer is and and this is a question and maybe I'm I'm thinking or reflecting of it this a little bit different but a lot of the restricted funds in my past experience had to do with uh legislative federal or state requirements and perhaps um just a little more about that as you look at the the the the the different areas and categories that are restricted how many are those aligned with a state or federal statute that's required that we need to provide that kind of programming support or services and then what does that really look like is it even possible to reduce those areas and if so for example I think of special ed for example I think of Maintenance of effort and and what that looks like um it it's um you question how much is when you say restricted it's restricted for a reason typically because someone has determined that a certain student group should have those resources really is what that means in in my experience anyway so I would like to have if to answer um as we look at uh director adet questions uh within that framework I would like to have that information as as well in terms of um what really can we look at um in that in those spaces as well but the other part as I was sitting here listening and and um just one more comment um to the superintendent's report is that for some people this may be new information and they might have missed the window to provide us with input and I would assume that anyone that is still interested and out in our public that has some thoughts reflection on what they just heard it might be for the first time um that they would be able to send an email to the superintendent in the board and get their questions answered as well or at least provide U their comments or concerns um I'd appreciate that as well um we had a good turnout for for the timing that we had but I'm sure there are other people that are talking about this as well so thank you [Music] any other thoughts or comments from uh director hulman thank you um that statement was really insightful to unearth what's going on because it's a big district with a lot of money um the size of this budget is huge and with 5,000 employees there's a lot of things going on and um just want to make certain of course we're always thinking you know how are these things going to impact the kids um of course we need um the staff in place to support the kids um but really digging down to that most basic part is how do we best serve the students in the district so as I um just look and consider that a question I have is when did we how long have we had the Staffing ratios that we're at right now for our schools approximately well they're reviewed every year um so there's an annual VI and I'm kind of looking to my team here I know I I'm not sure for certain how many years when's the last time they've been adjusted um that's really kind of been driven by the budget they're all intertwined right so I can follow up with more specifics on maybe some history on that is there any like five years one year any like 20 th okay okay so 2009 so that's been pretty long time um during that time we've had a large increase in staff the ratio has remained the same and our student enrollment has been pretty constant so I guess the question that I have as related to the question that other board members have brought up is what are the additional positions funding and again it's back to this unearth what's going on because if we're growing the number of positions but we're not adding or changing that Staffing ratio to our classrooms are we getting the return on investment with these new positions that we want are they giving us Higher Achievement in our classrooms is it providing the services that our kids need I feel like in this whole thing I don't know that we've really assessed that because I think that's really an important piece when we're looking at um how we're cutting positions and back to that other idea of are they tied to mandated things and even if we're getting that as um director Adat said kind of called free money almost um is it worth it how are we looking at that so just this is so big um and I just will continue to ask questions and I um thank you for the presentation and we really have a lot still to unearth yeah and I'll resend for the board we did a um a chart that went back in time and especially pre- pandemic coming have staff we had and then by year and in what areas it was so I'll resend that just I think it might get some of your questions honestly one of the biggest growth areas has for all districts has been the area in special education and that isn't free money they're only funding a portion of that so every school district's budget takes on the cross subsidy and so that's been a challenge across not even Minnesota across the country so um the majority of those additions has been for the kind of programming that we've needed to provide for for special education and other supports so I'll make sure to send that in I would ask board members follow up with additional questions in relation to that trend line by year on what the FD total FTE the district has had over time because you're right enrollment has been kind of flat and and um our ratios have stayed the same but it's been the changes in some of the some of those areas that are mandated by by state and federal law too so so I'll try to keep chipping away at that with you see if we can get add some clarity for the entire board and that in that regard right yeah thank you for that and of course it's not just the board we need to be informed and wise but I mean it's important for our public to know and have as much clarity as possible as well so thank you um co-chair to Shane thank you um I just I just quickly wanted to call attention and focus on kind of the governance of this process really quickly um you know that's the duty of this board right to govern these sorts of things you know the majority of the board gave direction to our administrative team and those professionals running their departments and their schools to provide recommendations based on the reality of providing services to our students our families and our community uh we asked them for options we agreed all on narrowing those options to focus on you know making all the cuts or bridging cuts to a referendum for further discussion and to gain Community input the people who provided those perspectives and information to us are those that have worked in education with specialized skills long-standing experience focusing on student needs focusing on achievement goals um I just think that's important that we remember that that these recommendations are coming from highly skilled professionals with direct experience um in the areas that these cuts are going to be coming from um as a board we also asked for transparency and open communication with our stakeholders I think that the the district communication team the teams that pulled together all of the in-person meetings at each High School cluster the virtual option and several board meetings where we have had presentations where the public could attend or they could watch the recordings afterward is a a really important element to this as well um email blasts to families the text message Focus letters you know I think that we're doing a good job getting the information out there so that these questions can continue to come and so that board members can continue to have opportunities to engage with the communities that we represent answering questions learning from from each other and from our our stakeholders in this process so I think the details are very important but also the governance and just the process that we are following to try to gather this information um is important to not lose sight of as well director Simon thanks Zach um you know as I hear this conversation I just I'm going to ask the superintendent this and I'm not going to ask for an answer but just maybe a thought process um and get back to us in the future it seems like there's there's still a lot of um people AR it doesn't sound like the board is close to maybe having a majority of the decision behind this so we have less than a month and there's a lot of stuff you were just asked for um I have no doubt that you will do everything you can to get that and get board members there but I'm just curious like if we get to the point of November 25th and you don't have a majority of the board decide on you know agreeing on what to do I think it's just prudent for you and your Administration to find out and let the board know what does that mean so don't do it tonight I don't want to put you on the spot but I I don't know what that means so I'd like to know thank you director adette yeah I just want to make another comment and add some perspective so first of all I'm I'm op I mean you can't you can't cut a budget anywhere without feelings of you know despair but I I am act I mean I we we do we have gotten good information the ability to analyze it it's takes time you're working with formats that are unique to to this role I'm personally optimistic we can make the reductions that we need to make and um and come out in a in a place that is uh is effective um and for the perspective I I will tell you why I feel that way if you just now I'm going to do math in public and I said before I don't like to this but if you just take a $700 million budget and you take 10% you get $70 million uh 5% 35 2 and 1/2% 172 so if we're talking about 25 million I I it's it's in the neighborhood of three to three and a half% of a reduction off of the total and I get it I I already just talked for half an hour about the different sources of funding but at the top level what I'm saying is we're looking at a three and a half% reduction off the total which for anybody whether I'm talking business business house household School District or otherwise that is a number that is manageable it's manageable by many all the time and you may not like to do it I I could actually from my time make a case we we almost ought to have a policy that says we look to do it every couple of years anyways to be quite Frank so and the reason is because when you go back and just like you do it in your household when you rep prioritize when you when you revisit decisions you made previously is it still working for us is should we keep putting our money here should we keep putting our money there that's a healthy thing and so it's hard most of us would probably rather not look at this but if we do it right we could actually come out in a in a what I don't know what the right word is but in a position where where we're doing as well or better as we were before and we can we can say for certain that we have we're making a good use of the funds were provided by our community and the reason I believe that is because again off 700 million we're looking at 3 and a half% which is a number that can be achieved um I'll throw out a comment um so I I love the conversation I really appreciate it um and so I just want to acknowledge the high tension in the room and you know it like director out was saying it's a difficult place to be none of us want to cut anything really like in a perfect world we just wouldn't cut anything but I hopefully I can maybe get everyone a little bit back on the same page I I don't actually I've been encouraged with the process thus far so this is just my gut take I feel like and we're all rightfully doing this there's nothing wrong with this we're kind of jumping ahead to the conclusion and we're making assumptions about how I think it's going to play out we totally normal we all do it um but I think where we're at is actually just a natural piece in the progression of this entire process and I don't think anything out of the ordinary has happened thus far and I I I at least I don't feel like I'm in or we as a b are in any danger of hitting some like impassible barrier the reason is so I agree with everything you said um co-chair to Shane about you know them giving us the recommendation we that's what we asked for they gave it to us um and so far as I'm aware it has kind of followed you know all the board input um so I actually love the a lot of the questions that director adet asked and it they come at a time when those questions could only be asked as the specifics are starting to unfold a lot of them you know some of them are internal to the board still eventually they'll be external so there there's not really a way that director I at or myself or anybody could have even asked the questions really until some of the more specifics had started to be generated so I think it very much fits in in the time timeline of almost where you would expect these things to happen and again fully acknowledging we no one wants to be in this position no one wants to cut anything the reality is there you know whether it's the state's fault certainly they're to blame for certain things or you know we made we made choices we're going to have to own the choices we made um no one's denying that but the reality is when we make budget cuts there's pain involved there there absolutely will be pain and it sounds weird but maybe a different way to frame this is we get to determine where to deal that pain to it's a uncomfortable decision and it's it's an important decision CU we have no choice but to do it so I think that's why the tension is high and really to kind of echo what director adette was saying but in a slightly different way it's like especially for me as or all of us really it's incumbent upon us as board members to ask the really hard questions to really really get to the the nitty-gritty of what we're doing and why justify the decisions so that when we get to that Finish Line we can have that high level of confidence and um yeah I I like I said I think this is just the natural progression of how everything has played out um I had specifically requested you know just to understand broadly like all of the positions in the district because and I stand by this I really mean it it's it's hard for me to say yes to something when I I don't know what I'm saying no to so if I don't know what positions remain it I'm kind of missing half the context there so now that we've had more insight into that um it's I'm kind of forming my thoughts on it I'm trying to digest it trying to understand it I think a lot of board members are doing the same so I think everything that's happening is a very natural progression of kind of just the timeline of things so I would encourage us as board members um just ask the questions you got to ask get the answers I I I still think there is some room to depending on the the answers that we get and who even knows who thinks what about them there there is still some pivot room right if we feel we need to Pivot if we don't that's okay too so don't I I guess what I'm saying is I'm just encouraging everyone don't uh don't rush to conclusions yet I'm actually eager to hear the answers to a lot of the questions that director asked so that's where I'm at with it um I appreciate all the work you've done superintendent McIntyre and just and Michelle Vargas compiling that big list for us to review it has been extremely helpful for me as a board member just to understand if if nothing else just to have an understanding of what's happening so really appreciate it but that's that's all I had to say so any other thoughts or comments from the board all right um with that that brings us to a close um the next item on the agenda is item 7e the comprehensive achievement and Civic Readiness or the world's best Workforce achievement and integration overview welcome Dr Jonna rerer executive director of research evaluation and testing and Friends good evening chair Co Arco and chair Co or co-chair not chair Co co-chair co-chair Arco and co-chair Shane board member superintendent McIntyre um I'm going to apologize up front because something in this room is um I'm reacting to it you know from an allergy standpoint so I'm gonna my voice is maybe gon to be a little lower in tone than um typical but bear with me um I'm here with with my colleagues this report is one that is put together collaboratively with a lot of folks and so um my colleagues are here to speak on behalf of like their levels and the things that are happening in in their areas of oversight as well so we're we're working on this collab atively this evening I'm going to be a speed talker as much as possible so try to bear with me um in in this presentation we will um the purpose of it is to present and provide information to about the district's 2324 academic performance um to our community as required by world's bre Workforce which is now in this year um renamed through legislation as comprehensive achievement and Civic Readiness so you'll hear that moving forward but tonight we'll still rest on world's best Workforce as well as to provide information around around our achievement and integration um plan um just that the progress of of the things that we're doing toward that it's also to share information and progress with the board members in order to inform decisions about our continuous improvement process or in alignment with our continuous improvement process in in Noah hanapin we Embrace that continuous Improvement mindset and we value and use data to form our decisions and Improvement planning each year data are compiled and analyzed from a variety of measurement methods and multiple resources um to monitor our district performance in relation to a broad range of desired outcomes in October you know this time every year we present an overview of of the previous year's data and then in November we consider all other input um in conjunction with our year- end data to inform our first draft of our 2425 strategic priorities ahead of our annual Staffing and budgetary processes one of the tools that we use to Monitor and Report District Effectiveness is our district scorecard the district scorecard is another tool that is used to inform our continuous Improvement planning and goal setting throughout the year um it has a wide range of of key performance indicators as well as a wide range of um intended outcome levels that District scorecard we'll move on to the next our district scorecard informs our strategic priority it also informs which in you know Cascades through our superintendent goals and then through the the organization to cabinet and administrative goals as well as school Improvement and departmental goals and ultimately you know like to um our compensation quality compensation teacher goals and classroom student goals starting tonight kind of an overview of world's best Workforce again you know renamed comp comprehensive achievement and Civic Readiness there are six defined areas component areas um as you can see on the screen and then the next slide tells you a little bit about an Noah hopen strategies aligned to each of those I just talked about goals that Cascade through our system in terms of um a process for for assessing student progress we use a comprehensive assessment system throughout our levels and departments um we analyze and disaggregate that data in multiple ways um we have a system to review staff uh Effectiveness through our quality compensation and our performance appraisal system of teachers as well as principes and other um staff throughout the district uh we um go through a rigorous um instructional curriculum process to uh review and adopt curriculum and we use things like um professional Learning Community structures multitier systems of support and you standards aligned practices um in terms of our our educational effective educational practices we also have over 75% of our budget directly aligned to classrooms I know kipin schools is required by legislation to have an achievement and integration plan because according to Minnesota rule and no hennipen is identified as a racially isolated School District districts who qualify for achievement in integration dollars must use the revenue to pursue academic achievement and racial and economic integration achievement and integration goals are established to reduce disparities in academic achievement reduce disparities in equit Equitable access to effective and more diverse teachers and increase racial and economic diversity and integration we are in year two of our three-year plan that was submitted to and approved by mde in March of 20123 in terms of plan strategies I'll highlight a few advancement via individual determination or Avid is a student centered approach that prepares each student for college career and life as of this fall Avid is in all 11 traditional secondary schools in in Noah hanapin academic interventions include including math and reading intervention teachers at the secondary level and finally a no canopen has 13 magnet and specialty school programs that provide Innovative programming and school choice across the district as we move into looking at our district data Joel reported on the 2425 um October 1 data these data go through 23 24 so you can see the trends some of which Joel spoke to um in in terms of like that large increase in um students qualifying for economic Services you know between 23 2223 and 23 24 um you can also see that our students of color as Joel mentioned is you on a steady increase increasing almost 20% over the last 10 years um in terms of our students qualifying for language acquisition services and um special education services we've seen a slight increase in those uh percentages over the last few years as well we'll move into student perception data first and focus on three key areas the first of is which of which is um students who report feeling safe at school so feelings of safety have declined slightly at the elementary middle school um since last year as reported by our student engagement survey um but we have seen a slight increase at our high school level in terms of students who reporting never having been bullied students um they have remained relatively steady over the last three years um with you know more students at the elementary level repeat or reporting you aspects of bullying than at our high school levels in terms of students who have reported having a good relationship with students or students who have reported having a good relationship with teachers overall students report having you know strong um relationships with teachers at high levels across our system all right uh safety and connectedness uh uh one of our top priorities in an Noah hen is the safety of our students our staff and our communities uh we've done a remarkable job in terms of taking a quick start and um start safety guide for all of our our schools uh We've enhanced our crisis response procedures we as you know we've invested and continue to invest in just safety measures uh if you think about um just Champlin Park and their new uh front office areas many of our schools are also experiencing those safety uh measures that we're wanting to put into place uh in addition with that we have these schoolwide behavioral plans that we are really intentional about of how do we help support and keep our schools safe in addition to um the big that that connectedness um that that really looking at a strong culture and clim in our schools not just that you belong that you are welcome but that you belong in our schools so all of our levels are really focused in on whether it's the morning meetings that are happening in the in the elementary all the way up to the secondary where we're connecting in classrooms for for Community with our kids and wanting to make sure that people feel that they're welcomed and they belong in our classrooms uh in addition to providing that well-rounded experience with our academic programming and support for our mental health and behavioral Sports and our schools we know that by data we have continued work to do in these two areas uh but we also have made some really good traction and advancements in our safety and our connects for our students in in our schools thanks Josh we'll move into student um achievement data and aligned to world's best Workforce there are um four goal areas we can move forward to the next slide um there used to be five um but the third grade literacy is now incorporated into the reading or Minnesota reading to ensure academic development or the read act that you've heard a lot about so the the four areas are School Readiness career and college readiness closing achievement gaps and all students graduating it's um interesting to note that next year actually there will be a fifth area um added that is around um students being lifelong Learners measuring how students are are you know demonstrating lifelong learning so in terms of School Readiness um in the 23 24 school year um we saw lower levels of students meeting benchmarks in the spring than previous years even though the rates were similar in the fall in terms of your um students entering kindergarten with you know we're we're entering kindergarten with similar rates of letter name recognition and similar rates of letter sound knowledge um however by Spring we're seeing increased trends of students meeting benchmarks as they're leaving kindergarten then Michelle will talk about so I think um just to remember that School Readiness um for an NOA hanen we're really working on we're having all of our teachers trained in the letters Early Childhood letters we had to complete the training the first round and we have 29 going through it at this time um so we're doing that to be in um better alignment with our kindergarten and literacy um the continuation of our heges um curriculum which um focuses on um rhyming and alliteration for our for our um preschoolers I think is will also be a good um it's really helping us try to get caught back up to where they enter kindergarten ready to um take on the literacy there and the pyramid model mtss our Behavior our social emotional learning um I think that in especially in School Readiness that's so very important that we have our kids ready to learn how to learn for preschool or for kindergarten and so I think that that's where we're putting a lot of our Focus for our kids and that's having a positive impact as we move into Elementary achievement you'll hear me um compare our performance to the state as Joel mentioned in his presentation Anoka henip and mirrors the demographics of the state in many many ways so we uh are somewhat of a microcosm so we compare our performance to Statewide performance um when it comes to things like you know the Minnesota comprehensive assessments and and those types of measures that we have statewide data so in terms of um this presentation you'll notice that the math are in green tones the reading are in purple tones and the science are in um orange tones just to give you kind of a perview as you're you're looking at you so you'll know which subject you're you're looking at um the blue horizontal lines represent the state proficiency so as you can see across these Graphics um grades three four and five we are performing above the state in mathematics um we had a slight lower um performance in third grade increased performance in fourth grade slight lower in performance in fifth grade in mathematics in the area of reading our performance in third grade was relatively flat again we are performing above the state in all of these grade levels we had again an uptick in fourth grade um in Reading performance and a slight decline in fifth grade relative to science you'll see the district and state side by side now because it's just one grade level it's only in fifth grade where Sciences is assessed um and the district is performing above the state but we both in both um district and state had a decline in science proficiency over in this last year we also look at how you know kind of our relative performance to other districts across the state so this tells you the percentile that the district is performing at so I'll focus on the district elementary math um the fourth set of of bars over that tells us that we're at the this past year we lost a little bit of ground um compared to all other districts in the state but we're performing at the 69th percentile in the state meaning that we're performing better and in elementary mathematics overall than 69% of the districts across the state um Elementary reading we're performing better than 64% of the districts and in science we're performing you know in the top half better than 54% of districts and providing more detail in relation to Elementary um achievement um in our response and what we're looking at in response to our student achievement data at the elementary level we are focusing on a number of different strategies in relation to our student achievement the first one that is noted here is the read act which is new legislation implemented the spring of the start of the school year of 2023 so at the elementary level we are in the fourth year of letters training in May of 20124 we had our first cohort of teachers complete letters training which was 58 staff um currently at the elementary level we have 368 staff in letters training and 218 staff at the elementary level in Olaf and then we're in year four of focusing on um schoolwide English Learners in relation to um math we are in our sixth year of implementation of our math program Bridges and also in our sixth year of talent development and school within a school nebula programming and our talent development programming is offered to students in grades three four and five for those in relation to meeting the criteria for reading and math and in that we provide programming for students in grades three four and five reading and math for tier 2 tier three and then our nebula program which is tier four and then we continue to focus on our um excuse me on our academic and behavioral interventions in relation to meeting the the needs for all of our Learners through mtss um additionally with our um it's not on this slide here but also focusing on our science standards and our science student achievement and so we are in year two of implementing our new science curriculum twig science which is aligned to our new science standards supporting our students this spring with MCA 4S with the new science MCA 4 um testing and then continuing sorry the last bullet is we continue to implement our schoolwide Behavior plans across all elementary schools those are reviewed every year with the principal and the staff and they are reviewed in the beginning part of the school year and then reviewed at the end of each trimester to look at any potential adjustments to meet the needs of our Learners um at each site as we move into middle school again um we are outperforming the state across grade levels and each grade level in mathematics at the middle school level um increase slightly or maintained the same performance as the previous year in Reading again each grade level is performing above the state at the middle level and each grade level has either either increased their performance slightly over last year or maintained performance of last year in science at the middle level again you'll see a side by side because science is only assessed in the e8th grade at the middle school um our performance actually you know outperformed the state in terms of the the trends that we saw we saw a much greater increase in science in 8th grade in inoka henpen than did the state as we look at that same comparison um of against or compared to all other districts across the state at the middle school we are at or near the 70th percentile in all three subject areas at the middle level we are committed to an effective multi-tiered systems of support to meet the academic social and behavioral needs of each student our school board's strategic priority and the read act focuses our work on improving student literacy strategies that you'll find at the middle school include online language and literacy Academy professional development or Olaf for teachers we are in the first year of that our focused literacy coaching uh across content areas so we do literacy coaching not only in ela but also science and social studies and other content areas and we focus student intervention in the areas of literacy to improve literacy skills the alignment of state standards and science is complete and those new standards went into effect this fall the district is prepared to take the science MCA 4S this spring when it is offered for the first time when we move to high school um at the high school level um again you'll see these graphs are side by side because um each subject is only assessed in one grade level so at the high school level the district and state both saw a slight decrease but we are still slightly above the state I mean it looks like when rounding they're both at 3 5% relative to um math performance at the high school level in terms of reading we saw a slight increase in performance um where the you again performing above the state and in science we um maintained our performance where the state had a slight increase but we are still performing at the same level as the state in terms of the comparison to other districts we're performing in the top half of districts St Statewide at the high school level with the 60th percentile in mathematics the 54th percentile in reading and the 57th percentile for science in science we're also going or in high school rather not in science in high school rather we're going to also look at um students you that you know their um career in college course taking when we look at this indicator we look at seniors who have taken these kinds of courses across the their High School career almost 80% of our 24 seniors took at least one potential college credit earning course while they were in high school and almost 90% took at least two of these courses all right specifically in uh High School how we are approaching this is uh through the continued work just like you've heard from elementary and middle school high schools we really focused in on that multi-tiered systems of support specifically really looking at the early warning uh mtss indicators which would be like credits failing courses attendance and behavioral incidents which allow us as a system to provide this worly early warning indicator to our uh to our staff about how can we help wraparound support for our students um so that's really exciting um the added uh feature that we're going to have this year uh as a system we continue to leverage the math and literacy coach model um thanks to those that have visited some of our schools you've actually been able to uh visit the Innovation Center Director Simon and Dr langenfeld as well uh you were able to see the work that was going on as well as co-chairs uh visiting our schools to see the the professional development how those uh teachers are getting pedagogy while while at the same time um getting help and support whether it's through data analysis uh instructional design or lesson planning uh which has been very helpful in addition to that um we've also uh thanks to you all have visited our academic interview intervention teacher models and our behavioral models at a couple schools um and have been able to engage and see the work that's going on uh just yesterday I received or actually today I received uh just a quick uh tidbit Lind hulman you'd be appreciative to know 77% of our students in over at Andover big shout out they are working through this AIT on the math intervention 77% of those students have improved uh with the work that that math team is doing so kudos to you all if you're listening um and then in addition to um uh what's going on in high schools I know that a couple of you have joined some leadership development that we have going on in our schools and you have seen uh our actual principles engaging in leadership development we appreciate that the time that you've got out there in addition to um the Ola support that uh we have been providing the professional development with our teachers to really focus in on literacy as we know can be a huge Gateway for many of our students and their experiences in school so it really is exciting to to know that kids from elementary all the way up to high school are receiving this focused attention on literacy uh through our our adult and our staff um just getting stronger in the area of literacy and cross crossing it through uh contents so that's what's going on right now in the high schools excellent our next area of focus is graduation indicators when we talk about graduation indicators just a quick reminder there are four indicators actually that are counted in in toward graduation we have the fouryear graduation rate we have a a dropout rate we have a continuation rate those students that maybe well they didn't graduate in four years but they continue on they they keep enrolled in our system toward diploma and then there's a what's called an unknown rate for students that just um leave our system we're not sure where they they went so we'll highlight three of those areas um the state sets kind of a a a goal or a a target for us of 90 % for your graduation rate and in this past year we had a slight increase in our graduation rate to 86.7% um whereas our our dropout rate still was was very low below 3% at 2.6% below the state dropout rate in terms of continuation rate if we need a a 90% graduation rate or if that's what we're striving toward then those other three indicators have to be below 10% so we have um it's the fact that this our our continuation rate is declining a little bit is is a good thing because it says that more of our students are actually graduating in four years um so we had a 7.7% continuation rate students that didn't graduate stayed in our system which matches the state rate um in this past year and graduation rates are um are a year behind we you know 23 2023 is our um latest graduation data that we have from the state next indicator you know not only you know if we um students don't graduate with us you or and and don't continue our system certainly we work to serve students and in adults in our community through our adult basic Ed Pro program as well um so we measure those kinds of indicators also and um student persistence are the students that that stay in the program similar to that kind of continuation they H um we also measure students that took a pre and a post test giving us the information about making an educational gain and then we look at those students that set a diploma or a GED as their goal and how many of those actually achieve their goal in that given year and that's the data you see in front of you all right back to me it looks like all right with that graduation uh just to give you a quick rundown if you recall uh earlier last spring we had our counselor group come come out and talk with you all just about the work that's going on uh specifically those one minute meetings uh which don't sound like like wow we could do that in a minute but they met with every single student in our high schools um and then that's a huge task uh for them with the busyness of schools to really start identifying through the personalized learning plans plps that really talk about who am I where am I going and how do I get there so through that work we have uh our our counselor team and staff that are really wrapping around students to really help them determine their College and Career um trajectory and what they want to do and and their experience in in high schools which is really exciting uh in addition we've kind of touched on that just developing uh support systems so pairing that with our mtss uh early warning indicators and our teams to really try to help and keep students on track uh within our buildings we have uh student data reports that obviously indicate where students are to try to maintain and make sure that our students are on track and if they're not what can we do to wrap around to make sure that they they are to help support our graduation uh earlier um I think it was in spring or maybe even fall they all run together uh but we you had a presentation for with regional um just on the the intense work and the robust um work that they do with with tech and Regional regarding credit recovery and the systemic efforts that we do to support our students in their progress um so again um just that work that they do and we continue to refine that and say how do we help improve our systems and our processes for our high school students and then of course uh that this Collective impact uh it's a team how do we get everybody involved um really maximizing and leveraging all of our support that we have ranging from our counselors our social workers Indian advisors assistant principls principles um and really try to keep our students on track so that they can be successful in their College and Career um Endeavors next we're moving into the area of achievement Gap closure and as as we move to this um um area I I wanted just to you know show you this graphic this scattergram tells a story why demographics are important um there's a strong correlation or relationship between the percentage of students in a district who qualify for free introduced price services and the rate at which students reach proficiency as you can see by kind of the tightness and the the um linear fashion of those those dots how they're grouped together um the orange dot represents an Noah hanapin School District while the Blue Dot represent other districts located in the Metro areas across the state you can easily see that school districts with the lowest percentage of students qualifying for free and reduce price Services have the highest math and reading proficiency rates this becomes increasingly important as you know our free and reduced rates increase you know year to year this graphic shows you the percent of U students in each student group um reaching proficiency rates you know with the Noah henpen in the dark green shade on the left side of the groupings and the state in the lighter green shade on the right side of the groupings um in all student groups in in NOA hennipen we outperformed the state in 2024 in mathematics you can see this it depicts the the um Gap if you will by the height of the dark bars compared to each other and the height of the light bars compared to each other but we'll dig into that a little deeper as we go a couple more slides down the road um in the area of reading all student groups outperformed their state counterparts in inoka hennipin with the exception of Asian students and students qualifying for special education services who performed about the same as their state counterparts in the area of math or in science rather all student groups performed above the state with the exception of multi-racial students who performed slightly lower than the state in this past year as we look specifically at the areas um aligned to achievement and integration you know comparing free and reduced to non-free and reduced and students of color to white students um you can see the changes in what's depicted are are the proficiency rates of each group so even though the proficiency rates might change year toe you know the Gap in you know in this case um stayed similar to last year in the area of reading the gaps again um stayed similar with a slight closure of gaps between students of color and white students in this past year with students of color gaining proficiency rate or where white students maintained their proficiency rate in science free and reduced compared to non-free and reduced students the Gap is slightly narrow narrowed in this past year while students um of color and white student Gap stayed slight above about the same relative to silence when we look at the Gap in terms of your career and college course taking again our gaps have narrowed in both um free and reduced non-f free and reduced and students of color white now I want to point out to you that the Gap did narrow with free in roduced non-f fre introduced but ideally it doesn't narrow because one group you know the the in this case the non-fr reduced group decreased slightly that's not the way we intend to close the gap it did you know that's why we look at the rates as well um it did close but it's closed because one group increased the other group decreased slightly when we look at our graduation rates um the um gaps stayed similar for four-year graduation rates in both free and reduced compared to non-f free and reduced students as well as students of color white students over the the latest year of graduation data so as we um look at the the data that JN just reviewed we know that in our district excuse me we are committed to creating Equitable learning environments for all of our students and providing access and representation for all of them in meaningful and highly positive ways um that is uh a goal for us strategically so um with that we're really focused on done looking at student data to drive our improvement process and a success for all of our students through multi-tier systems of support in a number of our slides you've heard us reference mtss and what is mtss mtss it really aligns to multi-tiered Systems Support where tier one instruction is provided for all students tier two is provided for um strategic interventions for some students and in mtss 3 tier 3 it's an providing an intensive intervention for a few students so we look at mtss through that lens for both instruction and assessment student engagement School climate and student Behavior mental health an example um that I can think of which we ref I referenced earlier and my colleagues well with the read act we're looking at that through the process of professional development for our staff and another example at the elementary level is looking at our curriculum in alignment to standards to improve our Student Success additionally with this we look at an equal education for all students and in looking at um some of the processes with that another one is strengthening our Recruitment and Retention efforts with a diverse pool of candidates and also looking at securing grants to support Recruitment and Retention of Staff as we you finish up our our presentation here we have just a few more slides to go you can you like breathe a little easier um similar to The District picture there's a strong relationship between the percentage students in a school who qualify for free roduced Price services and the rate at which these students reach proficient proficiency as well um ideally we want to see the dots the orange dots again represent an Noah henpen schools the um blue dots represent schools across Metro areas across the state we're looking at math right now ideally we want to see as we as you think about that um kind of line you grouping of of dots there we want to see the orange dots on the top right of those um groupings which say I mean certainly we we heard a lot that um free and reduced is a a strong predictor of proficiency and that is absolutely true however there are many of our schools that are beating the ads if you will compared to their economic peers and that's what you can you that's when schools are at the top right of those groupings those are the schools that are beating the odds and we'll we'll look more specifically about um at those schools in just a moment or the numbers of those schools when we look at Reading um you can see that we don't have as many schools you on the top right of these plots as we did in math um which you know maybe apply you know so we're focusing on literacy across our schools so when we look at the number of Noah hampen schools that are outperforming their peers you know beating the odds if you will um comparing overall performance of similar schools based on percentage of students qualifying for reduced price services and looking at the schools that are performing in the top quarter of their economic peer groups you know so the top quartile the top fourth of their group if you will um at the elementary level we have 13 schools in the top of their peer groups Middle School 4 high school one in the area of math and actually there were four schools at the elementary one school in at the middle school level that was actually in the very top spot of their economic peer group for mathematics you can see how those numbers relate and again you can see not only pictorially in the the um Scatter Plots but also we have fewer schools in that top core tile um in Reading um across the elementary middle and high school but we have six schools that were in the top for both um at the elementary level and two schools at the middle school that were in the top for both subject areas so as we consider these things in Noah hanapin School outperforms an Noah henip and schools outperform their peer groups across the economic spectrum it's not just schools that have low free and reduced price services or schools that have high you free and reduced price Services we see our schools outperforming their peers across the economic spectrum nearly 2third of our schools are beating the ads in when we look at similar schools across the state in at least one of the subject areas and almost 90% of those schools were also in that top cortile in the previous year nearly every one of our schools have outperformed their comparable economic peers in at least one subject across the time that we've been looking at these data and you an contend schools outperformed their their peer groups as you saw um not only in this past year at higher rates in math but that is true across time than in reading for the two years now thank you director Simon you um prompted us to look more deeply at the student groups we've we used to only look at these data in terms of all students um based on on you s questions from director Simon we looked at this from the last time or last year for the first time across student groups and when we looked at um our schools compared to their peer schools economic peer schools relative to student groups um that are again similar comparisons in that top quarter top quti of their schools um nman schools outperform the economic peers at even higher rates than looking looking at just all students um this table demonstrates the number of schools with at least one student group in the top quarter of their peers you can see those rates are higher across our elementary middle and high schools for math and reading um considering student group performance with many many of them 14 at the elementary five at the middle school and two at the high school that were in the top quarter quartile for at least um one student group in both subjects so considering these data over 90% of our schools beat the ads outperforming their economic peers in at least one of the examin student group areas nearly 80% of them um performed in the top quarter of their economic peer group across multiple student groups in any of the subjects nearly 80% performed in the top quarter of their economic um peer groups in multiple subjects in any of the student groups over 40% of them LED their economic peer group in at least one of the student groups and a fourth of an Noah henpen schools LED their economic peer groups in more than one subject area um more than one student group or subject area so with that we will um sit for questions or comments um co-chair Des Shan thank you just a really quick comment thank you so much for all the work that went into this I know as you said it was a collaborative effort um a lot of different data points and perspectives across kind of the spectrum of our Learners from prek all the way back to adult basic uh education Learners and everything in between so really appreciate all that work and I think you know there's a lot to feel positively about we've seen some increased proficiency levels large increases in our kindergarten skills um from Fall to Spring and some outperformance of State averages and of course obviously there's still room to grow and increase achievement across these measurements uh you know I think we have had a continued focus at on this board of reducing the achievement gaps and we're continuing to prioritize student achievement so I just wanted to acknowledge that like with all this success I think it's so important to see the different data sets you know we know the MCA test is a point in time therefore seeing these different data points across time and across different measurement tools really tells kind of a full story of what's happening in in each of our buildings so thank you for sharing that with us and um I look forward to all of our work together to continue watching those scores climb higher any other thoughts or comments from board [Music] members director langerfeld I too want to Echo my appreciation for for the presentation but equally if not more important is all the hard work behind the scenes when you have had the privilege to be in a number of schools and see these programs in action and to see how these interventions are being implemented and the extraordinary staff and the amount of professional development that's gone on I mean Mary you provided some incredibly large numbers of Staff being trained in letters and the district is leading the state in that area as well and I know we'll see some even greater dividends in student achievement and um we should really uh be be paying attention to that since that's one of our top priorities as a board too around literacy I think the other piece that is quiet but a really vitally important part of the presentation that um really contributes to the success of students is really that whole model and implementation of the multi-tier systems of support it's not something that people see or hear a lot about but there were many many years where we did not have this approach and to really identify it in the way that it's scaled out and affords each child what they need in a timely fashion that's a that is a really really important part of the success of what we're seeing when you talk about schools beating the odds because as it was explained to us to step today by a principle the the significance of sometimes how far apart children are in terms of their skill sets when they come in the doors and how uh to bridge that to get that student up where they need and we need them to be in terms of that proficiency takes resource support and time and skill you know it's will and skill as well so um a shout out to all of the all the staff who have been working so hard uh both in in our classroom settings and interventions and the thoughtfulness that's gone in um as our as our population changes in our children's needs shift as well um which we've seen in in uh to really recognize that um you're doing extraordinary work to to ensure that every child has what they need for success and you can see that when you start looking at graduation so it's it's all the way through into adult basic hit as well so thanks any other thoughts or comments from board members um all right if nobody else has anything I would like to throw something out there uh first of all thank you guys very much uh thank you for the presentation and for put putting all this together it's very helpful to just have a better understanding of just what's going on in the district and how we're measuring up so to speak um one of the things one of the great difficulties with um the MCA test is it is a very polarizing just test it's a very polarizing metric there's very strong opinions on it and rightly so it is certainly not a perfect test but it is a test and we use it and we just spent a lot of time talking about it using it as a metric of comparison and understanding so um I have done as a board member my due diligence I've made my very best effort to understand that test as much as possible so I can just give my feedback to the public and I even actually went so far as to just take the equivalent of the MCA test the 11th grade math test myself because you can load questions online from previous years they won't give it to you from this year but from previous years so because the the best way to learn about something is to just get your hands dirty so to speak so that's what I did and just to give a really quick recap I went and I took the 11th grade math MCA test I believe it was from two years ago um there were a total 48 questions I could download and take um I wrote all my answers down to make sure I wasn't deceiving myself into thinking I got one right or wrong when I I may not have so I would write my answer down and then check the answer um it took me approximately around 66 minutes to complete the test I got a score of 44 out of 48 which uh is around 91% um that's passing by any metric um and just quick because it's worth mentioning the the reason I got four questions wrong fall into three categories number one is I misunderstood a question second one was as anyone who's done math will know there's if you do a long calculation sometimes you just do bad math even if you know what you're doing that happened to me and then there are two questions I simp simply forgot a detail of the subject matter so I got it wrong which that's kind of what it's testing right do you know how to do this so the reason I mentioned that is because those are those are all going to be common reasons students or really anybody misses questions on the MCA test so what happened to me I think would be very common for any student taking the test um and I really did this the reason I went out of my way to do this is to just speak to it in a very specific sense because at a previous work session we discussed the MCA test and it was made apparent to us that the presentation of the results of the MCA test are confusing it best it is not for the sake of the public it is not the way You' think of a normal test you don't just get a simple percentage based on how many you got correct and Incorrect and then it's it's not like a very easy to understand scale like that I mean there is a scale they use it's just not that straightforward so that that adds a level of confusion to it that I would say is the first and one of the biggest flaws to the test the second and biggest flaw to the test in my opinion is the fact that it is not tied to anything that incentivizes students to care as painful as as it is to admit that out loud if if anyone an adultery student goes into a test knowing that no matter how they do it has no impact on them you know we're all going to do what people do and generally on average we're probably going to take the path of least resistance so I think that really works against The credibility of the test unfortunately but despite acknowledging both of those two things as in my opinion the biggest concerns having taken the test um and as someone who knows math very well my degree my profession use math heavily um I would still say it's a good test it that when I took the test simply stated if you know how to do what the questions are asking you should well if you know the math that we're teaching you and the standards that you are supposed to have learned at that time you should be able to answer those questions that's what I'm trying to say um so as much as frustrating as the confusion around the test might be I still do think it's a it is a good metric and all of that leads into kind of you know I'm kind of speaking specifically because this is the one I understand to 11th grade math well I I mean I understand all of them to a certain point but that's just the one I chose to do a deep dive into um and W it is great to see Improvement certain areas and it is good to have a comparison with the rest of the state because it's good to kind of know where we are on like in comparison to everybody else um it is good to have essentially a bottom line so to speak just a single metric we can point to and say yes or no this is how we know what we're doing and um let's let's just say for the high school 11th grade math um unfortunately we've seen a decline over the last many years in our district and really Statewide and I'm just hoping that we can turn the ship around I'm hoping that we can find a way to improve the MCA score not because the MCA score matters in and of itself but because it is an indicator of if students are in fact learning the benchmarks and the standards that we are teaching them so um that's my take on the MCA I'm trying to make it as clear as possible for the public because admittedly there's confusion and strong opinions around it so that's my quick take um and yeah those are all my comments are there any other thoughts or comments from board members all right well thank you everybody for the presentations um next on our list we are moving to item 8A Labor Relations uh for 2024 to 25 par Educators Master agreement welcome Dr Jennifer Cherry the Executive Director of Human Resources good evening uh co-chairs uh Aro and Des Shan members of the board superintendent McIntyre I'm here this evening and I'm pleased to announce that our par Educators who are represented by Noah hanapin par Educators Association have ratified a new two-year agreement with the dates of July 1 2024 through June 30th of 2026 thank you to the members of the employee groups and the district bargaining teams for their work in negotiating an updated Employment contract contract the tenative agreement reached includes a salary increase that includes a market adjustment to tr to raise the starting wages with every employee receiving at least a 5% increase during the 2-year agreement starting wages now include for our bus peras $18 per hour our elementary and secondary Paras will now start at 1875 our special education pairs will now start at 1960 and those special education peras that are working in setting three uh an additional 50 cents and our special education pair professionals working and setting for an additional dollar per hour in addition to that our LPNs our healthare professionals will start at $25.20 per hour all of these increases um are important for us to remain competitive and so this is a a great um um a great agreement uh for both parties the uh agreement also includes step movement both years of the contract and an increase to the district contribution toward benefits of 5% for singles and 10% for family benefit holders in year one and a 5% increase for all benefit holders in the second year of the contract the total compensation package includes an 11% increase or $4.5 million in new money the total contract equals $88.2 million over the course of the two years this proposed agreement is within the authority provided by the Schoolboard and as a result I'm seeking approval of the contract as presented thank you very much uh board members are there any questions for Dr Cherry all right if not before us is approval for the 20242 par Educators master as presented in appendix P hearing no request for discussions I would entertain a motion to approve the 2425 par educator Master agreement as presented so moved thank you director Simon is there a second thank you director langenfeld um will all those in favor oh my apologies is there any discussion oh will all those in favor say I I all opposed say nay with six in favor and zero opposed the motion is approved and that brings us to our next item which is item 8B the 2425 Education Office professionals Master agreement welcome again Dr Cherry thank you cherle uh again I'm pleased to announce that we have another uh tentative agreement uh this evening this is listed in appendix Q in your packet and I'm pleased to announce that our education office professionals who are represented by the enoa hanapin education office professionals Association have ratified a new 2-year agreement with the effect of dates July 1 2024 through June 30th of 2026 thank you to the members of the employee and the district bargaining teams for their work in negotiating an updated Employment contract the tentative agreement reached includes reducing the number of steps on the schedule from 10 steps to six steps and changing the longevity stiens starting in 11 years now instead of 15 avoiding the overlap between the steps on the schedule and the longevity pay supports pay transparency and fairness amongst our employees the targeted increases to the salary schedule were made where needed to meet Market median rates and all employees received between a 5% and a 20% increase to their salaries over the two years of the contract the starting pay for entry level secretaries increases from 1710 to 1905 per hour the agreement includes step movement each year of the contract and employees who were not scheduled for step movement or Improvement to their longevity pay either year of the contract received a one-time payment of $500 upon ratification or I'm sorry upon authorization uh the agreement also includes a district Insurance contribution increase of 5% for singles and 10% for families in year one of the contract and 5% for all uh insurance benefit holders in year two and finally it removes the weit time in the lifetime cap for district contributions to the 403b this allows employees to start receiving this benefit upon hire which is a a great uh resource and tool for our entry level employees and a great recruitment tool for us the total cost of the agreement is $26.5 million this is a $1.6 million change and it is equivalent to a 13.6% package over the course of the two years the proposed agreement is within the authority provided by the school board and as a result I am seeking approval of the contract as presented thank you very much are there any questions or comments from board members all right hearing no request for discussion I would entertain a motion to approve the 2 25 Education Office professionals Master agreement as presented thank you co-chair to Shane is there a second second thank you director Simon um is there any discussion hearing none will all in favor please say I I all opposed say Nay with six in favor and zero opposed the motion is approved thank you very much thank you board I just have one other comment that that was the last uh open contract uh at this time so at this time all of your contracts are settled thank you thank you very much all right we are nearing our last board agenda item um we are at item nine board correspondents and communication members this is your opportunity to share happenings in your community report on committee assignments or other items of interest does anyone have anything to share co-chair to Shane I'll go quick because I know we're getting late um I was able to uh visit Champlin Brooklyn Park Academy joined by director langenfeld and we were able to view the partnership that they have with the Three Rivers Park program which provides opportunities for students to have Hands-On science learning activities among other really cool exciting things happening at the school it was a very productive and uh Happy visit uh Dayton Elementary had their Fall Festival this weekend I was able to swing by and I saw so many happy students and families enjoying their time together it's an example of of work that our parent teacher organizations put on for our school community so just a huge shout out and thank you to all of those involved in our parent teacher organizations for the opportunities that you provide for our students and um at Jackson they had their Fall Dance and I've enjoyed chaperoning the Fall Dance the last several years this year was another delightful experience spent with our middle school students and the amazing staff volunteers that make uh a fun and engaging exper opportunity for students to just have fun with each other so thank you to all that make those those uh exciting opportunities possible uh director langenfeld thank you I was able to attend the anti-crime breakfast which is just an incredible collaboration and I know some of you probably have attended in the past a lot of the team went um from the cabinet and that was a really really important uh group of people coming together for the safety and well-being of our community and the data was there to support the work that's underway so uh a really nice way to start the day too with all good some very important good news the other thing that um I know uh co-chair Arco and I did attend on behalf of the board is the community curriculum advisory committee looking at the social emotional learning curriculum and um it was very well attended by representation from all of our schools there family parents who sit on that Committee just to talk about uh the questions and surveys that are going to go out um we spent some time just understanding the work that was going on in our schools heard a very positive feedback about the various programs so underway now we gave feedback um on the survey format for both teachers and for families and they anticipate those go out probably if you recall it was a second week in November I think so those surveys should be coming back to us to give us feedback and I don't know if you have anything to that you want to add to that as well yeah I I attended and um we're kind of just kicking off the process to reevaluate the curriculum so it was good to get community feedback and yeah I look forward to just seeing how the process unfolds then as as another opportunity I did attend the uh curriculum night um again the US History 10 was there well represented by the vendors but also had an opportunity and I know some have been sitting on the ELA uh committee to look at the curriculum again in terms of ckla and Bridge to read and Whitten wisdom and and they're all being piloted now so a lot of good feedback in terms of the results that people are seeing and today um uh co-chair duchane and I along with the superintendent visited Oxo and there was reference to uh the implementation of those particular programs as well um had a chance to uh check out the safety secure office now in the front area of Champa Park High School which was pretty Grand and uh co-chair desan and I attended that and and and got a real good look at they were just bringing all the furniture in last week so it was very exciting as as well lots of great work going on in our schools and um I I encourage everyone to to really recognize the extraordinary hard work going on to be able to ensure that every child has what they need for success thank you thank you very much any other comments from board members all right hearing none we will move to our last item item 10 it will be conducted in closed executive session the first closed session will be a closed session pursuant to Minnesota statute 13 d03 to discuss negotiation strategies for the following bargaining groups building supervisors building service employees Child Nutrition site supervisors Community School coordinators Education Office professionals education education support professionals parent Educators principals School officers supervisors speci special education program supervisors and Technical Specialists the second close session will be closed pursuant to Minnesota statute 13 d05 subdivision 2 B for preliminary consideration of allegations or charges against an individual subject to its Authority the Clos session will be held in the Michael Sullivan room I would entertain a motion to move to close session for the reasons just stated thank you director Simon is there a second thank you director adet is there any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I all opposed say say Nay with six in favor and zero o opposed we will move to Executive session in the Michael suven room uh do we want to take a 5 minute break okay we'll do a f minute break the meeting is recessed at 9:55 [Music] for