here number three heat heat i don't even know how to use a gas all right good evening everybody it's so wonderful to see a crowd here we're happy that you're here um we're going to go ahead and call tonight's uh regular school board meeting to order and we're
going to start with roll call dubet here hardman here croc here leathers here mallister here young here silky here please stand for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic
for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right we have an agenda in front of us can I get a motion to approve tonight's agenda i'll make that motion motion by second by Peggy
all those in favor i motion passes our first agenda item is our winter sports recap with our activities director Katie Carter and I think she's got a bunch of students that are going to be speaking with us good evening board chair debate Dr paige members of the school board um
Katie Carter activities director thank you for having us tonight um limited time tonight lots to go through but I thought we would uh share the perspective of the recap from the student athletes this time so because of time without further ado they're all
just going to kind of line up behind me introduce themselves and give a little recap of the program that they are part of so thank you for having us hello my name is Juliet my name is Kylie McCur and I'm Reese Norton and we are the athletes from the awesome packer
gymnastics team this year we had eight girls on the team captains were Kiki Rodriguez and Ree Snoran and we have three graduating seniors we were very close-knit group this year and had a very strong team bond one of our big biggest team achievements was being the section 1A academic champions for having
the highest team combined GPA even though our team was the smallest okay even though our team was the smallest it has been in several years we were very strong this season we had seven pool meet wins two duel and try meet losses and two invite wins we finished se
second at the section 1A meet losing to Byron by 1.3 points we put in the work and it paid off we had four girls attend the class A individual state championships kiki Rodriguez made her fourth state appearance competing in the allaround kate Claus and Caller McCrae both returned to state competing on the
uneven bars and I competed again at state um before exercise although we will have a young team next year there's a bunch of talent and potential amongst the athletes during the summer we'll practice and go to different camps to build our skill level
keep an eye out next year for opportunities to come out and support us thank you hello I'm Brend Doll and I'm Noah we're the captains from the boys dive team so this year we recently we started off the year having new benches done by Hunter
Peters for his Eagles Cup project and we have a ton of growth as more than half of our team are middle school students we finished the year with over a dozen all-time top 10 results team records pool records and conference and section records which is great for us and as a team we qualif qualified one
relay and three individual events into the state 1A meet in Minneapolis uh and then we had we had uh this guy Brent he won the state single A championship in the 100 backstroke and he was also named the section 1A swimmer
of the year for his second straight year and his state title is fourth among the boys and girls team since 2021 uh our team also finished with an academic gold award for the second year in a row and at least the seventh straight year where we finished as
silver or gold uh as we look into the off season we will be opening up the pool for kids to get some swimming done and there will also be opportunities this summer at the municipal pool and the YMCA and we also recently learned that our team will be asked to move up to class double A for next season and
this will be a challenge for us but it won't be a change in our approach to work hard and keep being better thank you hello I'm Brena Tashan i'm Lexi Yok and we are your varsity dance team the captains are Bernan Lexi Yoko Molly Williamington Savannah Mohouse and
Cameron Chewy our regular season highlight was taking first at our first competition in Burnsville postseason highlight was taking first in big nine and getting a ticket to state in jazz and kick our most memorable moment was dancing state finals and having our dance hit its peak performance the
strength of our team is definitely our mindset a lesson that we've learned was always to show up on time and our tradition this past season was playing pranks on our coach Kayla we have done many different fundraisers for many places like Pizza Ranch Perkins
and many more number of our seniors we graduate graduated was six seniors and there would be 16 varsity dancers returning to the team team summer plan is to keep practicing hard and to continue to always show up and give 110% outside of
our season we hope for our next season to move up some new dancers and continuing to keep getting that state ticket thank you i'm one of the basketball captains and my name is James Evans i'm Colbert and I'm the other basketball captain as a
team we were 10 and 18 which wasn't what we're looking for as a team we also placed ninth in Big N which is another thing we want to improve on this upcoming year next year we're hoping to be a 20 plus win team and hoping to win the Big N conference or at least be a top three we have a lot of our players
coming back this year we also graduated five seniors this was one of our favorite seasons not just because of how we played but because of how close we were as a team in the past there was a lot of different rivets but this year it felt like one big family everyone had each other's backs and that made the season really special and for our second
highlight it's Cole almost breaking the score high record in one game thank you thank you hi I'm Lman and I'm Lauren Bo and we are two of the varsity girls hockey captains for next season our regular season highlight for us was beating Morris
after they came away um over 6 hours to come play us and we beat them one of our notable wins was ending our regular season by beating Winona 4 to2 after losing to them six to1 um earlier in the season um a memorable
moment for us was winning more games this season than we have in the past three years combined um one of the biggest strengths of our team is our culture we got really close as a team this season and I'm really proud of us because we've become a family and some lessons that we've
learned are that good things good things happen when you trust your teammates and we're making choices as a team and not just by ourselves individually one of our traditions is listening to the miracle speech before every home game um for community involvement and service projects we rang the bell for the
Salvation Army and bought over $100 worth of toys to donate for the toys for todd last season we graduated three seniors and we're unsure of the number of seniors that we will be graduating next season but we hope to have a lot of girls come up and have a lot of
returning players too um our summer plans this year are to have a lot more ice practices than we had last year we have 10 so far and including drylands and hopefully some more team bonding this summer to get used to our upcoming players next year yeah and next season
we hope to have a winning season thank you hello I'm Kyler Flanders i'm a varsity hockey player uh next year's captains are myself Elijah Cougar Kate Overer and Max Joseph uh this year's regular season
highlights was our record being 179 and one which is the highest it has been in a very long time uh our postseason highlight was winning a home playing section game uh notable games were was beating Winona in overtime at home after
losing to him away earlier in the year uh some of the individual awards we had this year was two players myself and Grady Carney making all conference and then three other honorable mentions uh it this was our first section win since 2017 when my older
brother was on the team wow a memorable moment from this year was beating Fable four times after losing to them twice last year um a strength of the team was our culture in the locker room a lesson we all learned was to stick together and be
a family a team tradition was after warm-ups we uh for uh starting lineups we'd all take off our helmets and line up on the goal line as people were getting announced uh our community
involvement was we had 50/50 raffles at every home game uh we had nine seniors graduating uh our summer plans are we have team practices uh towards the end of the summer and then captain's practices kind of throughout the summer
uh hope our hope for next year is to compete at the DA level after being up this year and to become a stronger team thank you good evening my name is Marissa Shu and I'm Kenzie Brady and we are the varsity girls basketball team our team captains
this year were Ajam Quinn Kenzie and Marissa this season the team achieved a record of 20 and seven with a 20 win regular season our team was able to be one of 10 teams in the state that accomplished this goal along with our team successes we also had individuals
that exceeded expectations on the court the Packer girls had two allconerence players that consisted of Amagua and Marissa Shu along with two allconerence honorable mention players that consisted of Addison Walsh and Quinn Osgood aje and Marissa also achieved 500 career
rebounds aje also accomplished a remarkable goal of all state honorable mention and broke hope due to career scoring record with 1,695 points the Packers not only accomplished success on the court but also in the classroom merca and Kenzie
were all state academic and the the team was able to achieve a combined GPA of 3.7 earning the silver academic award for state looking forward to next season the team loses four seniors but they will not lose the family dynamic that has been created the team plans to spend
their summer in the gym and weight room improving their skills we would like to thank all coaches players and community members for making the 24-25 season a fun and memorable one thank you hello my name is Sam Winkles and I'm here to talk a little bit about the
wrestling team uh alto together we had a good season i'd say one of our highlights was winning our home duel versus JM on senior night with a big pin from this guy Michael Gary um I'd say we had a pretty good showing of sections i think we had four
four or five guys make it to the second day of sections we're probably one of the tough se toughest sections in the state being section one and I think we had a pretty good showing uh we had two guys make uh all conference myself and William Mullenbach and a freshman Cameron Reedle make all conference
honorable mention um we had one state ball fighter who ultimately fell in the state finals but it's okay uh I'd say for me personally wrestling's been a big part of me and my growth as a human being and person uh along the way
I've met some great people i'd say two of the biggest people and influences in my life has been Coach Bod he's done a lot for me helped me with the lift lifting program throughout the last four four or five years and uh Blake Walters I would not be where I am without the last three years of progression with
that guy uh thank you any questions i would ask if there's any questions but I know you're on a tight schedule tonight so again thank you for having us and thank you for letting them share their experiences great things are happening and we'll see you in June for the spring report thank
you i think we all agree that all if we could just listen to students all night long all the time the world would be a much better place okay thank you um our next agenda item is our
superintendence report from Dr jody Gage thank you Chair Bay members of the board uh happy to share with you some updates uh some recent highlights across the Austin public schools uh first of all I just want to congratulate teacher of the year finalist Kristoff Dunness kristoff
is a band director as you know him and one of the 12 finalists for the 2025 Minnesota teacher of the year award out of 142 candidates kristoff will be recognized on stage at the state banquet in St paul on May 4th where the winner will be announced this is a huge honor
for Kristoff and it's a great reflection of the power of music education and student connection our Austin Air show the 2025 show uh just wrapped up here this last weekend uh they lit up Chris Hall with uh their country roads show
which um was uh nothing short of hard work energy and talent uh that made for an incredible performance so congratulations to everyone involved um they sure did make awesome proud uh we also have a speech team that is headed back to state we're sending multiple
Packer speech competitors back uh we have Ela Chamba who will be um in her first state bed allison Osmanson and JB Holtor and Alani and Olivia Masara uh will also be participating in the state
tournament so congratulations uh to them uh art and advocacy is very important on April 23rd we have an event the second annual work of art uh this will be uh part of the hometown food security project and showcases our student art focused on food insecurity in more
county uh it's a powerful example of student voice and community support so hopefully everyone can attend uh recently on March 27th we had the Packer Showcase just a quick recap on that that was held at Austin High School uh this event welcomed families into the
building to explore student work connect with staff access helpful resources uh there was department displays and student projects uh guidance on our new uh school links platform infinite campus and of course the awesome assurance scholarship had information as well uh
the great support from our counseling team and also a Q&A session with uh building administration so I want to thank um the entire high school staff uh for their first packer showcase event also uh we have a male clinic research fellow at Austin High School robin
Abrain has been selected for the new research experience for teachers program at male clinic uh she'll spend eight weeks this summer working alongside researchers in continuing collaborating with male during the school year uh this is a really unique opportunity that's
going to strengthen our instruction and bring real world experiences back to our classroom so congratulations to her uh we have two Hobie Baker character award winners this uh winter season uh Grady Carney and Ally Davidson received uh the
Hobie Heritage Award so congratulations them uh to them on their leadership integrity and and sportsmanship we have a state champion here uh Austin Senior High uh senior Cali Hillman won first place in the 2025
Minnesota Junior Duck Stamp Contest uh took best of shill with her piece of Morning on the Lakeside and her work will now represent Minnesota at the national contest in Virginia so outstanding work to her speech uh history was made recently
from Alli Osmanson and JD Hor who made school history by earning a full bid to the National Individual Events Tournament of Champions uh they'll head to Kansas City after a first place finish in Chatfield and and second at Connor recently so congratulations to
them uh making it also just want to recognize you just uh heard from her Katie Carter our activities director katie has earned her certified athletic administrator designation from the NIA association marks a major professional
milestone uh shows her continued commitment to growth leadership and the student athlete experience in Austin so congratulations to her uh Minnesota uh aspirations and computing honores i just want to uh call attention to this i want to congratulate Brianna Linquist uh
Snowd Haley Peterson for being named the 2025 Minnesota aspirations and computing state rising stars and also congratulations to Austin High School teacher Joey Winter who was named the runnerup for the state educator of the year through the same program these recognitions celebrate our students and
staff leadership in technology and STEM finally uh last week was assistant principles week and I just want to congratulate and thank our assistant principles no matter Raymond Diaz Dave Bond and Allison Gunderson their leadership and
support are essential for the success and support of our students and I really appreciate all that they do so that is my report thank you maybe you have some questions on that report are there any school board
reports good evening everyone my name is Dan Zilki uh this last month has been challenging rewarding and honestly uh a little emotional for me tonight I'm reporting as a board member but I'm also a parent of three students in the
district a husband to a teacher in the district and a passionate community member from that perspective I want to share a few special shoutouts and some reflections on current events that have been brought to my attention aligning with our board's commitment to community engagement public accountability and thoughtful governance since our last
regular board meeting I had the opportunity to participate in the Austin High School Career Pathways Day in Hastings Gym this event demonstrates both the importance of connecting our students with real world opportunities and the strong support within our community i would also like to extend a few special shout outs to some
incredible staff and events that I was fortunate to attend this month first a huge thank you to Mr zack Drum and Mr kirstson Zan for putting on a fantastic fourth grade music concert at Banfield Elementary if you have not made it to any of the music concerts at Banfield this year you have truly missed out on
the wonderful talent of our students and the dedication of our music staff shout out to Mr jacob Nelson Mr riley Red and Mr andrew Gasmire our high school baseball coaches for running the third annual winter baseball camp at the Patrick Dome it's been an awesome to see that camp grow in such an amazing event
in such a short time i also had the privilege of volunteering in Miss Lisa Sanders 10th grade AP geography class assisting students with essays on global food insecurity this experience provided me with a firsthand look at what the relevant learning happening in our
classrooms shout out to Mr zleki and Mr whiten our band teachers at IG and Ellis for their dedication in organizing this year's honor band event this all day commitment was capped by an amazing performance in Milton Auditorium bringing together talent from across southeast Minnesota who have never
played before together this weekend I had the opportunity to attend my first and I'll admit my first concert special shout out to Mr michael Garary and the fantastic performance and thank you to all who were involved in putting together this performance especially Mr
kale Arian and last but not least congratulations again to Mr kristoff Dundis for making the final 12 for the Minnesota Teacher of the Year this last month I've had several meetings with community members teachers and other fellow board members i've also read the letters addressed to the board
and I want to take a moment to reflect on what I've heard and something that is foundationally important to me which is our district staff and teachers i believe our district functions at its fullest potential when our teachers and staff are fully engaged and empowered i'm not asking for perfection nor do I
think that's possible i think we can all agree that a little adversity has helped shape all of us over time however I also believe that our students do not thrive when our educators are disengaged and our community has made that clear that this is an issue that matters to them from my discussions with teachers and staff our teachers simply want to be
heard and valued as the professionals they are our teachers are not a data point data is a tool that only tells part of the story data does not capture the dynamic thoughtful human connection that our teachers bring to the classroom each day our teachers are professionals who possess the instinctive ability to
meet each student where they are and most importantly on their level academically emotionally and socially whether it's adjusting instruction offering support or providing a comforting word or a hug to a student our teachers can do what no algorithm can do if we begin to reduce teaching to
datadriven checklists we risk replacing human compassion with something robotic and maybe I speak for myself but I do not want teachers uh robots teaching our kids i do not believe that there is such a thing as a perfect day in the classroom our teachers must constantly ad adapt and adjust and work with the
resources they have and the information they've been provided this experience takes time practice and patience to develop a skill and that's what they are trusted to do for the job they are hired to do true value is not transactional nor does it come from the form of a line
I own on a budget it is a personal touch point that says "I see you i hear you i support you and it's not the same without you." Accountability falls on both the teacher and the administration to build a partnership that allows for our students to thrive in the spirit of trust and partnership I want to turn to
my second final point which is how this board is perceived in our schools it's important to me that this board is not seen as a decision maker from a distance but as partners who care deeply about what's happening at the ground level that's why I would like to propose a school adoption approach where each board member would choose a school
outside of their usual scope for example I have no desire to take Banfield IG or LSI kids in those buildings or approaching those buildings however each board member would commit to visiting their adopted school up to two or four times per year these visits will be thoughtfully planned to avoid classroom
disruption and would focus on building relationships with staff students and administrators examples of this could be reading to students serving lunch in the kitchen staff joining teachers in the lounge helping on the playground or simply grabbing coffee with the principal the goal would be to listen
learn and be present not to be not to inspect or to evaluate the goal would be to truly understand what it means to teach in 2025 i know our schools are not perfect and that's okay my hope is that through these relationships we as a board will be better positioned to advocate and lead effectively grounded
in a deeper understanding of daily realities within our schools lastly I just want to thank all of you for being here tonight your presence and your voice matters the more that we can work together as families staff and board members and a community the better we can serve our students so let's keep
teaching and leading from the heart thank you heat heat yeah done yeah as a member of the South as a director of the Southeastern service cooperative which
I did you're getting the you're getting the look his button you hear his butt can you hear me move it closer bring it right up not that far
thanks um as a board member of the Southeastern Service Cooperative which is a consortium of school board members and city administrators in southeastern Minnesota I'm happy to announce that the second annual Sorry but we still can't hear you
carolyn is yours working can you hear me try that try muting me we're not guessing uh the second annual welding competition
will be occurring at the uh Rochester Technical Institute at the Hein Center which is a state-of-the-art um manufacturing facility it'll be Tuesday April 30th it's open to all students who've taken welding who are
interested in going into manufacturing the trades or the military there will also be breakout sessions and uh a career fair it's open to 250 students and I hope that uh Austin is well represented
um kind of looping uh into what Dr page said about the Austin uh I took the plunge a couple Fridays ago and I went over to Ellis to see the Friday night production of The Lion King and I must tell you that u I can be a tough cell
when it comes to junior high theater let me tell you uh but this time I was real mistaken um if I summarize the my re reaction to play I use one word and that word is wow and I do mean
wow really where shall I begin i'd like to like I'd like you to ponder with me for just one moment three very simple words middle school musical if you didn't hear me middle school
musical now if you're starting to get a little nervous I understand if you're feeling overwhelmed no problem is your fight mechanism starting to kick in mine would be it's totally understandable but I will tell you that the director Ronda
Ronda Reagan tackled the challenges of a popular musical and she did it right heads on in a middle school environment uh somehow she swung a deal to get these headdresses and costumes from another
drama department they were amazing the actors wore them proudly she must be one master negotiator whatever she did it worked the costumes were eyepopping eyepopping
as were the sets the choreography was crisp and well executed the cast and crew performed awesomely a special treat was a strong vocal performances by several members and I'm sure that Mr acriman is looking forward to getting some really good
singers in his high school coral coral program all in all it was a great night of theater there was a large appreciative crowd an unmistakable energy was in the air the popcorn was tasty and everything seemed to go on
well the directing the costumes the acting and the music but most importantly the students had a great time on stage congratulations to everyone involved i'd like to say just uh something uh I
think it's important to take a few moments to address an issue that's received a lot of attention recently even over the past year and that's this idea of the involuntary transfers of teachers within the district reactions among among staff have been varied um
from acceptance of the district to have rights of transfer to highly personal responses of being sent without their consent to a different building how did this situation come about the language in the contract that we
currently have was agreed upon I believe some 20 years ago by the district and teachers union that states that the administration has absolute power to assign staff and that there's no appeals process
now talking with district leadership in recent days it was agreed that no such contract would be considered approved or adopted in the state of Minnesota in 2025 for obvious
reasons but my question is if that's the case why do we still have that language in the contract i think we can do better i think we must do better if you look at the word involuntary it means without choice and you hear a lot
of things about voice and choice in this district and though the transfer language is clearly written the intent of times has been perceived as being somewhat arbitrary in order to foster a sense of indivividual worth and value everyone
must have a seat at the table and all voices must be listened to for the overall health of the district and I just want to state unequivocally right here that as a board member I have no intentions
whatsoever of involving myself in the negotiations process or trying to sway or impact either side i simply want us to do what's right and it shouldn't be that difficult
i don't believe as the new contract negotiations for teachers begins I'm calling for both teams the administration and the teachers bargaining unit to negotiate negotiate in good faith to seek a compromise on
the rights of assignment contract language and agreement that will um honor all involved parties other big nine schools who we on many levels compare ourselves with have done so and I think we can do the same thing over
the next few months negotiations will proceed i think they're going to start working on language in the in the near future uh I want to keep a focused eye on that language that's in the contract and I hope it recognize the value of everyone involved and I hope we
agree create an agreement that's acceptable to all parties and u it just seems to me that's too important an issue not to do the right thing thank you who's
next for my report i first would like to do a little shout out for the McFale um and community choir concert tomorrow evening at Milton Auditorium at 6:30 over
110 uh third and fourth graders from all the elementary schools directed by Nikki um will uh do a concert uh with the uh adult community choir in Austin and it just um shows the the beauty of music in
this community that third graders to old folks like me will be on the same stage singing together so I'm really looking forward to that um I I too am going to make a short uh statement about um what I'm feeling like today um I'm sure many
of you were not expecting to spend your Monday evening at the school board meeting but I am thankful that you are here um my conversations in the last few weeks have been varied in many but all were about ways that we as a district do
our work and the need for some improvement um we hear you as a board we hear you um we were strongly encouraged when we got on the board by the Minnesota State School Board Association to stay in our
lanes we are a governance group we set and review policy and we provide oversight of district resources um this has been a noble job i am humbled to be sitting in this seat and and I'm proud to be a part of this
district but I also believe my job on this school board um is to establish expectations from our district for the climate and culture that we live and work in that is our responsibility
i will continue to work in the next few months to bring parties together to sit at a table sooner than later and work collectively to find ways actionable items that we as a district and as a
unit can work to improve and become a much more welcoming nurturing and collaborative system and in in response to Don and the contract it's um it is what it is but
just because we can doesn't mean that we should and I do believe that our classrooms hold our greatest asset and I think I think we are
underutilizing the expertise that we have in our district and part of that is coming coming to the table and offering assistance to make decisions not necessarily to have the final say but to
have a voice and so I hope we can all work together because this is about these great kids sitting here and the kids that come to the podium and those that don't come to the podium so we hear you and let's work together on this
please carol you're off first of all I would bring that bring that mic way down right right there thank you everybody for coming tonight i share sentiments of everybody on the board
who's already spoke um I love Dan's idea about adopting a school i hope that's something that um we can put in into motion um and that we can all work
together for positive change um a few things that I would like to shout out about is I did do a tour of Austin High School um with a couple other board me board members Dan and Carolyn um we saw the wait room um and
some areas of the high school that are on this the summer project list so that was a really nice tour um had a wellness committee meeting so look for some exciting wellness ideas to
do this summer with your friends family and co-workers also had an early childhood family education council meeting um and we were joined by several early childhood education parents and their
and their children and the parents offered valuable feedback on what's going well what they like and what needs improvement and Jen did an excellent job facilitating the meeting and engaging the parents so thank you Jen that was
awesome um last month's meeting I had just literally got back in town right before the board meeting because I was up at the state capital um at the Minnesota School Board Association and Minnesota
Association of School Administrators day at the cap it was an overwhelmingly positive experience it was more than I ever ever imagined um so
there was a legislative briefing of finance and policy positions um and an important accomplishment um we said thank you to our representatives for the inflationary
increase the 2.7 point um which equates to approximately $200 per pupil and Dr page keep me honest if I'm saying something here that is not right or that has changed since I was
there please jump in because I don't want to give any in misinformation um there were five funding priorities um that we talked about and one was to increase the general education formula
additional 3% increase to address the rising operational costs which include energy transportation insurance curriculum food wages and benefits and then increasing the
formula would provide approximately $223 per pupil in um fiscal year 26 a second priority was to create more
accurate compensatory funding formula calculation and hold harmless the current reliance on direct certification is imprecise and is creating losers at the district level which is less revenue but more students in need a more
accurate and comprehensive funding allocation model is necessary to properly identify and serve students in need long-term facilities maintenance revenue cap removal the current LTFM cap of $380
per pupil dis disproportionately harms smaller rural districts if the cap is not removed then the request is that roofs pavement and security upgrades be explicitly included as allowable expenditures
funding for new statemandated benefits unemployment insurance and paid leave new benefits should be fully funded to the state by the state to prevent shifting financial burdens onto school districts and if full funding is not
provided these requirements should be repealed to prevent budget shortfalls and local operational op excuse me local optional revenue levy adjustment L there's so
many in schools um to account for inflation and rising costs the l school board levy authority should increase by $250 per pupil $724 to
$974 to ensure districts can maintain financial stability without seeking emergency funding solutions l funds essential expenses such as leasing space capital projects and facility maintenance
the five policy priorities that we discussed were capital projects levy um and that grants school boards a one-time exception to renew capital projects levy enabling stability and funding for equipment facilities
supplies and technology related initiatives uh the second one was data requests amend the Minnesota government data practices act to authorize school districts to assess and recover actual
costs of searching and retrieving government data if the requesting individual abandons or fails to inspect the data once it's been prepared open meeting law allow board members to participate
in meetings remotely in case someone is sick or is unable to attend in person after the 3-day hosting uh fourth one was standardized testing for high school students so a transition from the MCA Minnesota
Comprehensive Assessment to the nationally recognized ACT and broaden the definition of instructional hours and that would provide students a wider range of electives and hands-on learning experiences that support students
individual paths whether towards college or vocational careers so the day at the capital was before the House Senate and Governor began discussing their budget targets so now for finance
um there's a plea for everybody involved to um protect education funding formula index indexing so the Minnesota Senate announced budget targets for their finance
committee and the Senate is provoke proposing cutting 687 million from schools starting in fiscal year 2018 and the concern with that is that it terminates the important accomplishment that we gain that links
the per pupil funding formula to inflation and maintaining the formula indexing ensures that school funding will keep place with inflation and preventing further cuts to staff and
programs and so that the house education finance target um that target reflects a $40 million investment in education and this target provides the necessary resources to
support the READ Act and then regarding labor um paid leave set the employer contribution at 50% so a uniform legislatively defined employer employee
contribution rate of 50% will simplify payroll and administrate administrative processes reducing burdens and potential errors associated with negotiating individual rates across the multiple
bargaining units and a 50-50 split for paid leave premiums provides crucial clarity and allows for accurate long-term budget planning and then summer employment for non-licensed work workers we need to
either fully fund that or repeal that um so the to advocate for full ongoing state funding of the summer employment mandate um to date that mandate has been funded and it needs to
continue and not shift the responsibility to school boards and local taxpayers um and it's imperative that the program be repealed if it cannot be fully funded to the state by the state to ensure that funds will not be taken
from the general fund which is the classroom or put on property taxes and then modifications to earn sick and safe time and um modifying the ESST legislation will bring greater
clarity um to employee youth management benefiting both staff and school districts so I I encourage everybody um these are very very important topics for our district um so I encourage you
to reach out to our representative and share your concerns and advocate for um some of the things that I just mentioned so um Patricia Mueller is our Minnesota House Representative and Jean Dornick is our
Senate thank you i'm so happy you're treasure thank you Carol oh Peggy's got a question just for clarity when you were talking that when you said summer employment are you talking about the unemployment guarantees or
Yeah it should be unemployment yes summer unemployment okay perfect and it's my understanding that those funds ran out like immediately the very first year and it continues to do so each summer that it's
increasing yes and it's interesting that many of the things that you picked up in the middle of your presentation were resolution that were agreed upon by the delegate assembly last December and forwarded to the
legislation it's two groups working simultaneously on the same thing so they're getting up there that's good to hear sorry Robert peggy you guys have anything to say good for
All right is this working now all right either that or just loud enough everybody can hear me without it so uh I'm going to keep mine short and simple because anybody who knows me knows if I start talking I'll never stop and uh we want to get out of here before uh next week
um really quick I just uh I had the opportunity the last couple weeks to to serve uh or to attend a number of our committee meetings i wanted to um with Carol for a lot of them we attend a lot of the same committee meetings i just wanted to thank everybody our staff our
community members um our other schoolboard members for investing their time uh in these committees um I've had the opportunity to set up the facilities uh committee meeting a couple weeks back uh the wellness and early childhood committee um this last week and uh it
was especially the early childhood um education committee um it was great seeing the number of of parents uh that attended for the first time um it's it's a great uh a great committee uh and what Jen uh and the staff over at Woods and
Ed with early childhood um is is just truly incredible uh and the amount of dedication they have for their students um that are there um and the same thing with wellness committee the amount of staff that that are there uh participating in that committee uh is
great to see as well um I want to call out uh upcoming this week we have um fifth graders and might be sixth graders I'm not sure participating in math masters uh this Thursday morning at IG Holton i want to congratulate everybody that's participating in that and wish
them luck um I believe um there was also a call asking for volunteers to help out for that uh that competition so um any community members other schoolboard members that might be interested in helping out with that feel free to reach
out to um the schools so um I also want to uh back what Carol was just saying about calling our legislator our legislators uh especially Gene and Patty
um in regards to the the changes to some of the upcoming mandates especially uh uh the Family Medical Leave Act um earn sick and sa save time uh there there just needs to be a couple minute um
changes to some of those different mandates um and our legislators need to hear our voices on those um otherwise uh just really quick with with everything i want to thank everybody who sent an email uh or
reached out over the last two weeks about uh the the topic of the um uh lo my train of thought here um the involuntary transfers um as somebody who
has a number of family in the the teaching profession five of my aunts and my mother um I truly understand the value of our educators i don't believe there's any any more noble profession out there than than teaching our our
youth um and I'm looking forward to hearing uh community members uh this evening so that's it see speaking of upcoming events isn't there a poetry event occurring in this room this Wednesday
night wednesday night so 7 o'clock 6:30 student 6:30 students from every school are going to be presenting and I hope there'll be as many people in the bed as there is for this meeting because it's always fun thank you
um I attended the facilities meeting with Bob we talked about exciting things like the lighting project and the insane amount of money that it costs to replace every single light bulb in all of our facilities or the ability to snowball light bulbs across the borders so those are our
options we are looking for funding just for the record um I was also lucky enough to answer Jen's invitation to visit the CLC and and see all of the changes that have happened there i walk in the building and you think about the conversations that we had when we were
moving Woodson from a kindergarten center to the CLC and the the concerns that were happening then and to see how easily that kindergarten migration back to the elementary buildings and the CLC migration to the Woodson as as an entirety happened
um it it was everything it was like everything was coming full circle and then to make that that walk around the building and see the kids just having a blast doing their thing and the the icing on the cake was being in I think
it was Mrs chop's room and this little girl come flying across the room just to give me a hug and I was not feeling the classroom that was it i was done like the rest of you could see her the rest of the building and I stayed right there but it was it was really great to see
everything um that was happening in the building she let us know about some things that she would like to see happen in the building and when we are invited to the buildings three of us at a time are welcome to come thank
you i'm going to wrap this up here um so I'm going to give my first my official like committee report on the Awesome Public Education Foundation um this year we were able to fund 45 grants to teachers building leaders and
athletics totaling just over $100,000 um grants range from I feel like that's something that everybody should be excited about yeah we got excited about range from Dakota for elementary classrooms and experiential play
furniture and accessories that support play-based learning to a food chemistry lab at the high school and singlets for the new weightlifting team um each year the foundation is able to spend the interest accured in the
hunting and packer endowments as well as funding gifted by the Hers family foundation there's a lot of generosity in this community and it's really a testament to the people who um had a vision for this foundation 30 years ago
to um make sure that we were giving uh funding to our teachers uh so that they can purchase things for their classrooms on a related note the annual Packer Classic golf tournament is scheduled for Monday June 23rd at the Austin Country
Club um proceeds from this event are adding to th those endowments the Hunter and Packer endowments which allows us to continually increase the amount of funding available to teachers across the district each year 30 years ago they started with $500 going out and now
we're at $100,000 annually which is very exciting to see and it's really great to see money um going into our classrooms um in all buildings across the district um so if you have any interest in sponsoring a whole or putting together a
team please reach out to our um ABF director Sarah Quali um as a mom I got to see a lot of things in action this last month um huge shout out to Ryan Stanley and Amy Christopherson with our
high school robotics team i went to two robotics tournaments one in lacrosse and one at the U of M and wow if you haven't been to one of those um those are some smart kids they are
they're doing incredible incredible things that I know that I could never have dreamed of doing back in the day um let's see um some of you all stole my thunder
um which is okay because that means we're all on the same page um Dan and I had a great conversation about um the adopt a school option this is something that we we talked about um
last summer last fall but we didn't want to quite implement it yet because um we had new board members coming up we wanted to give them time to get acclimated so now the time is definitely right for that so I'm really glad that you brought that that forward as as
something that we can pursue um to help uh encourage good collaboration with the whole district um listening to our students tonight uh the common theme that I heard from our kids
was teamwork and we are all on the same team and we are all working towards the same goal of watching each of these kids go from their preschool classroom to their elementary classroom all the
way up to walking across that stage anita in like a month um and every single person in this room and across our district plays plays
a role and um the more we can the more we can communicate and and bring voices together the better we are as a as a
unified team this is this is a a collaborative effort and um I I'm honored to work with each and every one of you um it is it is it is the the
biggest source of pride for me to look out and see teachers who do incredible work each day and I wish I could be in their classrooms all day long every single day i know it's not it's not realistic
but we we know that you are you are you are the life you are the person teachers are the people that that our kids turn to all day every day they're
the ones that they're seeking out the hugs from and um I know my three kids always come home with great stories about how they've connected with different adults and how much you guys
are pouring into their lives and I I know we don't say it enough but you all are pretty incredible at what you do so please please take that to heart and please know that that
is um that's my opinion but I'm guessing we all kind of feel the same way right okay all right thank you we're going to move on um are there any Well
are there any other board reports i'm pretty sure that was everybody question in order to volunteers you have to be able to math i don't know you don't even know the name of that what was that you get a
cheat sheet to double check the answers i have volunteered before oh good okay just walk back and forth thank you all right our next agenda item is our student representatives report
we're going to start with Anita who only has one more student report with us after tonight no pressure superintendent Paige chairperson Dubet and members of the board my name is Anita Raalo and I am
your 12th grade representative for this year and I will be presenting to you the first half of the student report spring has started and the end of the school year is slowly creeping up with MCA starting tomorrow and ACT taking place for all juniors testing season is in
full swing students are doing much to prepare for each as it can provide them with opportunities for their future although the ACT is not required by most colleges now a good test score can help obtain a scholarship so the free test provided by the school is an amazing
resource for our junior classes then with the MCAs taking place this Tuesday and Wednesday at the high school we will have an adapted schedule with a delay to the start of regular classes prom is also approaching with the event taking place on April 26th
this year's theme is lush and lavish the grand march will start at 700 p.m in Milton Auditorium with tickets selling for $5 then the dance will continue after starting at 7:30 in Packer Gym the school also provides an afterm where
students can bowl at bowlings enjoy pizza music and win prizes throughout the night it will take place from 11:00 p.m to 1:00 a.m so it'll be a fun day tickets for the dance and after prom will be $15 up until April 18th and then
will be $20 if purchased anytime after so get your tickets quick all the tickets are available on the Go Fan app or can be purchased at the doors of the event a big shout out to the prom planning committee as their effort in planning the big night goes a long way
with the end of the year many academic recognition events are taking place in the next couple of weeks on April 30th is the high distinction banquet and will take place to recognize seniors who maintained a 3.9 GPA up until their fall semester of senior year there students
can recognize a teacher who had an impact on their high school career and enjoy the celebration with friends and family next on May 1st Hormel is hosting the honor roll lunchon this event happens every year and recognizes all the students who maintain a 4.0 in their
first semester here Cornell provides an amazing lunch for students and recognizes the hard work that goes into maintaining high academic standards finally on May 7th the high school is hosting an awards ceremony recognizing students for a vast array of
accomplishments from high GPA to scholarship letters it is amazing to see all the recognition that goes into supporting Austin students as it keeps them motivated and pursuing their goals as you can see there are so many amazing things happening throughout the high school and me and Michael just share a
few thank you this concludes the first half of the student report do you guys have any questions okay anita Ernest speaker is superintendent page chair and other members of the school board now I'll continue with the second half of the
student award this year marks the inaugural season of the boys volleyball team at Austin High School and it's been an exciting journey the Minnesota the Minnesota State High School League recently sanctioned boys volleyball as an official sport and it's incredible to be a part of this growing movement across the state our team is proud to be
among the first to help build the foundation is for what's sure to be a strong and competitive program in years to come the enthusiasm from players coaches in the community has been amazing and is a great opportunity for student athletes to be something to be a part of something new and impactful as a
member of the Austin I can say this year has been one to remember we recently wrapped up our 52nd annual show and it was a result of months honestly a full year of hard work and dedication from early morning rehearsals to late night runthroughs we put everything we had into making something special the show
was a huge success and the energy from the crowd made it all worth it one of the best parts was seeing so many of our solist absolutely crush it on stage each one brought something unique and the audience loved it it was an amazing way to end the season and celebrate everything we've worked for together our
robotics team has also been active this spring they recently traveled to the 3M Marina to compete in the North State Regional Robotics Competition their innovation and collaboration continues to inspire younger students interested in STEM fields i would also like to extend a thank you to the Hormell
Engineers that are helping with the team and letting the robotics team use their facilities congratulations to Cali Hillman who won the M Engineer stamp competition this is a remarkable achievement that showcased both her artistic skills and her appreciation for wildlife conservation this also shows
how diversified Austin students are in activities and that they are talented in all works as part of the spring recognitions Grady Carney and Ally Davidson received the Hobie Baker Character Award which honors student athletes who exemplified integrity commitment and sportsmanship
we are proud to see these values upheld in our school community we're also really excited for culture week which kicks off April 28th with a schoolwide pep fest this week has been organized by our student culture groups who came together to create something that celebrates the diverse backgrounds and identities that make up our school
community it has been amazing to see students take this lead take this leap and we're looking forward to a week full of pride unity and school spirit and finally I'd like to recognize Christopher Kristoff Dundis who who recently advanced to the final 12 and teacher of the year this is a
significant accomplishment and reflection of his hard work and talent when talking to students they share that he is very understanding and can always help on any instrument whether you are new to it or experienced i'd also like to share a thank you to all the teachers who help make the school what it is
kristoff is being recognized every teacher deserves recognition for what they do for our school this concludes the second half of the student report any questions yeah i assume that you did some dancing at the Austin Air Show is that correct are you really dancing on that prom
probably okay thank you all right uh our next agenda item is our consent agenda i'm just going to because I know I know we've got a lot of people here who maybe don't know what a consent agenda is um consent agenda is a
single vote for a lot of items that um we have reviewed and been um discussing for quite some time including uh general reports you don't want us to read through all of the the bills
um requests for purchases and things and things like that so uh with that may I get a motion to approve tonight's consent agenda so second Oh motion by CC second by any discussion i think Mr deay
was trying to tell you it speeds the meeting up and that's good right try all right other discussion right all those in favor i Anybody opposed motion passes all right our next
agenda item is a update from our grow your own program uh with speakers our teacher mentorship coordinator Andre Mayo and special services executive director Sher Sherro and I brought guest oh you brought a
guest good i brought guests because they do do real work behind the scenes right all right our f our grow your own teacher program um I've helped coordinate the program but really the hard work has been done by Colleen Owens who's our future teacher coordinator and
Monica Okmpo who's our future teacher club leader and you'll hear from them in just a moment they asked me to come and and do the behind thescenes work and really tell you how it connects to the work that we're doing across our district so our mission is inspire empower and accelerate and our vision is preparing all learners to make a
difference in the world and as we think about that we know that as we prepare students for future jobs and careers looking at a teaching career is a very honorable one and they will definitely make the difference in the lives of students if they choose that career our grow your own program also
embodies the core values um demonstrating responsibility resilience learner communicator and contributor and they're learning all these skills in our grow your own program as we think about the desired daily experience from our students the
one area that I wanted to highlight here is my learning is hands-on meaningful challenging and helps me prepare for my future the activities that we're doing in our program is truly preparing students for a future in teaching as we consider our families they want their child to be
taught the necessary skills to be successful in whatever path they choose after high school so even if they're part of our grow your own program if they choose a different pathway what they're learning is going to help prepare them and as our staff as I get to work with these wonderful indiv individuals
um I am seen as a professional and given flexibility and support to provide students with what they need to be successful and they've really been innovative in the opportunities that they're providing for our students forgot to click the button and
really as we think about our desired daily experience our packer core values our grow your own program embodies what this is our grow your own teacher grant uh was started in the spring of 2023 we were awarded nearly
$750,000 for this grant project uh there's two types of grants we have our student pathway and there's also an adult pathway that Sher will talk about here in a moment it is a five-year grant which we can renew and we're looking into that in the near future our current grant is from 2023 to
2028 it aligns with our Packer profile work and pathway work at Austin High School and in Austin public schools helping students explore all the different pathways that are available to them and as they think about a career in education it's not just our teachers in the classroom but all the different professions and people that work in our
schools this grant program is available to help address the needs of the to the teacher shortage across our states and add diversity to our teaching profession because it's important for students to see teachers that look like them as well the goal of our grant program this
is taken directly from our grant the primary goal for this grow your own program is to cultivate interest and opportunity for our students of color and teacher education through the creation of a comprehensive pathway to completion of an education lensure program and back to Austin public schools while we can't force them to
come back here and teach we certainly want to provide an opportunity for them to come here and and be part of our teaching staff to accomplish this goal there's a number of different things that we're working towards we want to support students interested in pursuing the
career uh to participate in a club program and through these opportunities we're providing college visits job shadow experiences family engagement support coordination with our counselors and others to ensure college entrance and scholarship applications um number
two on the list is to offer education elective courses at Austin High School while we can't fund the courses through the grant program it is one of the things that we're adding in that are going to help support our students and this year for the very first time we're
offering two education elective classes at Austin High School uh support and coordinate the future educator club activities which you'll hear about here in a moment and the largest portion of our uh grant that we applied for is to support scholarships um starting this year we'll
be offering our first scholarships to students who have been part of our program um and really that is the bulk of the funds and so as we met with NDE this week they said "You haven't spent all your money yet but you need to." And said "Yeah it's coming scholarships right?" So really supporting our
students to be able to afford college and now I get to turn it over to our experts who again have done the work and have been doing an amazing job to support our students hello everyone so our very first year which was last year at the beginning we
started and right away we provided hands-on opportunities for our students we provided them experiences in the summer we also took them to a college visit at MSU Mano we had them participate in the career fair and this year we are now providing more college
visits we are also um giving our students a celebration we are going to be holding our second annual signing ceremony which I invite you all to attend it will be on May 5th so this is where we celebrate our commitment to
education and they will be um signing a paper where they commit to education alongside their family and a nominated educator hi I'm Colleen Owens i am the future teacher coordinator and I'm going to talk about what's happening during this
second year we have about 58 students engaged in our program in some capacity um we've been promoting the club we've had uh posters up around the building we've put things on social media and what's really been effective is we've
asked our other teachers to nominate students who show the qualities of being a teacher and our club leaders in group activities and that's really helped double our attendance at our club meetings and our official club membership we are now an official AHS
activity and so we did run into some hiccups getting students signed up for the club officially we found um that we created a letter to go home to parents in English French and Spanish version to help facilitate that and we found some
workarounds and that also really helped increase our official membership um we've been holding our meetings twice a month um and we've had guest speakers coming to meetings board members retired teachers um alumni teachers just sharing
their experiences with our students and um we also have monthly themes to promote teaching as a career via elevate teaching.org it's like they have a monthly theme teaching as collaboration teaching as legacy and so we kind of
focus on those different elements of the teaching career we have have students in elementary classrooms high school classrooms observing other teachers and u so that's been wonderful i really appreciate the other teachers being willing to open their classrooms to
them we've worked through Riverland and the Pathways program to help them uh explore the college path they want to go on we've had uh worked with volunteer activities also through the Austin Public Library and also through summer
school so they'll show up and volunteer during the summer school summer school experiences at the elementary and at J and Ellis okay and then oh and our trips and conferences so this year we we attended Geo Fest professional conference up at
the University of Minnesota with six students and we attended Minnesota State University Mano again with 17 students on November 4th we went up to St paul public schools and visited Avalon Charter School with 14 students january
14th we attended the STEM Forward AI conference um in Rochester with four students um we the students helped me man the booth at the Packer Pathway event in the gymnasium on March 27th and we are coming up going to visit the
Inspired Beginnings Learning Academy on April 22nd and we're going to go visit Winona State University and see their education pathway and department and then also hoping to bring some to our gifted and talented symposium here in Austin June 10th through 12th so we are
trying to get them involved in and we're a lot of events and then again one more reminder we have 12 seniors who are going to be honoring as they graduate um they've chosen educator who's inspired them and then we invite their families
there's going to be a representative there from the Minnesota Department of Education and hopefully our school board members as well it'll be in the age promise on May 5th at 6 p.m colleen can I ask you a question yes um I remember going last year it was so cool um have
you received any feedback from last year's graduates have they been in touch with you have they let you know where things are at for them are you know are they still all all in what what's As far as I
know they still are all in yes and I've met I've met at Caribou with some of them that are going to Riverland a couple of times once first semester and in second semester um some of them that well one that went to an outstate school I've been reaching out there's some of
them I only can reach them by email and not been so successful at that but yes great yeah colle what was your uh what was you and your students response to that uh STEM forward AI conference at
the uh Southeast Reserve Cooperative building in Rochester it was great they learned a lot and it's just it's such an eye openener for them to go to these professional conferences and you know AI is going to be a bigger part moving forward so I was excited for them to go
there and learn right away as pre-ervice teachers did you encounter Sarah Ness the u the director of Stamp forward she is uh on the cutting edge of all of these different things and I'm sure if you saw her you'd uh you know really
appreciate the work that she does yeah they had like a panel of experts and I believe she was a that's good that you take students and yourself in that that's good well and they and wonderful that they had allowed us to come and allow the pres-ervice teachers to come
free of charge it was wonderful we appreciate this thank you so at the same time that we were awarded the grow your own student pathway Austin public schools joined with some other school districts in our region and applied for and were awarded the grow
your own adult pathway and this is a program under which we can recruit individuals both within our school community and in the community at large to go back to school to become special education teachers which seems like a really good idea uh so grow your own of course is a
critical initiative to address the urgent need for qualified special education teachers there's a great shortage in that area and the program can provide financial academic and professional support to these individuals the goals are to increase the number of
tier three fully licensed special education teachers to enhance diversity uh in our teaching workforce so that the grant is focused on individuals of a diverse background and then to strengthen retention through uh a really strong mentorship program within this
program um the program will provide full funding for tuition books and fees it can also support some additional expenses where needed such as child care for individuals and then also as I said access to mentorship
programs um there are 57 school districts within our region uh that fall under the umbrella that applied for this grant of those 13 districts are currently actively participating and attempting to uh recruit teacher candidates we also are working with
various universities to make sure we have established partnerships with them to make the pathway easier this is the list of the 13 districts in our region that are participating out of those 13 only three have been successful in getting candidates through so currently we have
four participants under Austin public schools and there are two under Southern Minnesota Education Consortium and two under the Minnesota Statemies so I'm proud to say we have half the candidates right here in Austin that are participating in this grant and then these are the
universities we've established partnerships with any questions sure you said there were 58 in the program today on the grow your own for the high school students is that correct no this is for the adult pathway uh
there's 58 school districts within our region that fall under we call it region 10 did we say there was 58 students in the in the other one is that right yes that's the youth program though correct not the adults is that everybody that's in the program currently or altogether
so those are students who wanted to be part of the email group but um we have 27 currently officially in the club and I would say attendance at meetings is ranging
from 12 to 27 but more recently in the 20s thank you y Sherry are you only recruiting from colleges is there an effort to look throughout the community at people that
interested in going back to school no that is who we're recruiting from so like these colleges that No these are the colleges we've established partnerships with so that we can easily refer people from our district and from our community that want to pursue their
special education degree so for example we've had a pair of professional that we've helped to to get enrolled to go back to get their degree thank you thank you any other questions all right thank you all right our next agenda item is
um our early childhood programming update with community education director Jennifer Lawhead and it looks like we've got Amy Denny as well um Superintendent Paige chair deb members of the school board my name is Jen Lahen and I'm really excited to be
here tonight to share with you an update about early childhood programs in Austin public schools joining me tonight is the amazing Getty our early childhood coordinator so as we think about Austin public schools and our early childhood program I think it's super important to remember
that even when they are aged three to five and sometimes 0 to five in our programs we're working together toward that district vision of preparing all learners to make a difference in the world and we think about the desired daily experience of students it's
hysterical and awesome at the same time that we chose the same priority area of the desired daily experience as the future teachers club my learning is hands-on meaningful challenging and helps me prepare for my future that's what we're doing with our little ones when they're at preschool with us for
our families they want their teachers to know their children well to create fun interactive approach to learning which is responsive to the child's famil family's needs i would say our early childhood program does that in spades and we want our staff especially at the
CLC to feel there's effective communication across the district and community so staff and families have the information that they need so when we're thinking about our core values tonight Amy and I are going to work really hard to be good communicators to embody that core value of communication to listen
actively and share our learning and experience and I'm going to actually look at my notes so I don't forget all the important stuff I wanted to say so good teachers have some learning objectives for the for the lesson so we are going to hopefully teach you tonight
how the early childhood programs within Austin public schools align to the district's strategic priorities support and resources to ensure a safe and welcoming learning environment pepper profile for all learners district-wide multi-tered systems of support for all learners and excellence in resource
management so we'll start with our first priority and I would say that these gorgeous people that you can see in this picture here are currently serving over 300 students at the Early Childhood Center at Woodson we serve um preschool
students three-year-olds in general education and inclusion classrooms four-year-olds in general education and inclusion classrooms we have an incredible early childhood special education team some of whom go to homes to uh serve students in their homes with
their parents some of whom co-e in classrooms with general education teachers and some who teach in self-contained special education classrooms we also have an awesome early childhood family education team uh where moms and dads can come to class and even
grandmas and grandpas too with their babies through age five i met one of my oldest friends when I took Brock Lawhead to Baba's and arms class when he was 6 months old this is an awesome program we have classes like Packer Play and Learn parents and children together family and
child together events and early childhood screening we're going to tell you about all these things tonight so when we think about the Packer profile for learning I want us to remember that play is our brain's favorite way of learning and that scientists have recently determined that
it takes approximately 400 repetitions to create a new synapse in the brain unless it's done with play in that case it takes between 10 and 20 repetitions so a lot of the learning that we do at the CLC happens authentically through
play and I threw in pictures every other slide here because I want you to see these amazing kids and for example these little kiddos are learning to be mechanics i don't know if you can tell but she's underneath the hood of that car and she's fixing it right up so what
our preschool day looks like is we have large group activities with literacy and numeracy activities small group activities with skill work in all areas we have music which really works on literacy and numeracy movement we have an awesome partner with McFale School
for Music where every single student enrolled in our preschool program receives McFale instruction you never know what you're going to hear i heard some Vagner down the hall the other day and kids doing amazing activities in a three-year-old classroom to some Vagner
it was quite something we also this year been the beneficiary of um music therapy for our students in the um inclusion or self-contained classrooms and the development that that has produced in some of our little ones to be able to share and engage with their peers in
ways they didn't do before because of that music therapy is truly something beautiful we do a lot of instruction around meal times at the CLC with functional skills language development during free play we're teaching and assessing shapes colors numbers language
acquisition social emotional skills we have some opportunities for growth and fine motor development weighing with Play-Doh to riding bikes are those beautiful climbers outside the building another part is the early childhood family education program and so we what we look at here is
programming for the parents or like Jen said guardians sometimes even grandparents we really look to try to schedule classes so that all can participate so sometimes we have evening classes we have classes that run generally one time a week for most of
the class um most of the students and we do 16 week sessions after each of our sessions we do survey the parents that we're serving and others that have enrolled in our programming to see if we're meeting their needs and if we need to change up our classes any so this is
kind of it fluctuates every 16 weeks we plan at least two times a year for these classes our structure for these classes include the parent child together time so they come into the classroom they play with one another and their peers next to them then there's an opportunity
to sit at a large group and do like a story time and do some different activities and then there's the parenting piece so with our younger kids the parents don't separate they stay in the classroom with their children but they're kind of sectioned off so they can still have that parenting component
um with our older kids the parents time is actually in another classroom so the parents can talk about age appropriate um topics of their interest we are also part of a family lit program that's underneath our early childhood family education and that's over at Erdland and
that is for parents that are taking ESL classes their children are able to participate in our sibling care that has two of our staff run that classroom and they also have a parenting component that they um participate in weekly and
then last we have a family and children together events and so these are our big events that we have within the school year we started out the year with our transportation fair which we had around 300 people um really good community partners that brought in lots of different vehicles for the kids to climb
in and take pictures even had some um food trucks that came so it was a really fun time we do literacy events throughout the year as well so parents and children can come in into each of our rooms and do different activities and we end the year with our flight and float where we get to fly some kites and
end the year on a very positive fun note and here's one of the pictures out at the nature center so we have classes that are both here at McFale and out at the nature center on Fridays and so we kind of put the show on the road and get to go and explore different community
resources as well our team also works extensively with districtwide multi-tered systems of supports we've spent uh a lot of our time this year uh learning about um good instruction for literacy for young learners we're so pleased and so
thankful that when the state of Minnesota passed the Read Act that the district of Austin chose to have us do early childhood letters so everything that we were learning applied specifically to the work being done in early childhood classrooms so we can really improve our tier one instruction
and I have to tell you we didn't just learn this year we're already implementing the things that we're learning for example some of you that were at the CLC saw this um everything at the CLC has pictures on the wall to help the kids learn what their jobs and roles are well on our wall we have
pictures of words like rain and bunny and then when the kids finish their bathroom break they're given another piece of the puzzle to match a word that rhymes because we know that rhyming is one of the hardest skills that little ones have to learn so if they have the word trained they know they have to go
find the picture of rain so they can figure out that it matches so just a little example of something that we learned in letters that we've already put into practice we have active MTSS teams at the CLC active evaluating data to tailor supports for student needs we
look at um attendance data we look at behavior data look for patterns and trends decide what we need to work on as a whole school like for example recently we found out that transition time was the area where we had the most behavior referrals so we did some large group
work um boning up and improving our transition practices and then um attendance as well and then I uh oh I also wanted to I talk about her every time I talk anywhere but we have an incredible speech language pathologist in our building and she's
done a lot of work with our students in using assist of technology to speak and to communicate but she's also done a lot of professional development with our staff this year and so what she's been teaching us about language acquisition aligns beautifully with what we've been learning in letters and we're having uh
three-year-old classrooms talk about um letter sounds and what sound does the the th make and where you should feel that buzzing in your mouth when you're when you're saying that sound so we're really lucky to have an incredible asset like Dawn on our team and then look at that little guy
reading is that the cutest another large part of our MTSS is our pyramid model and we have been part of pyramid model since around 2012 so the pyramid model is a comprehensive multi-ter framework of evidence-based practices that promotes the social
emotional and behavioral development of young children and as a program we really focus on those tier one instructions having the effective workforce and the nurturing relationships and supporting quality environments are key so making sure that we're all using similar language having
those visuals up like Jen had referenced um and just making sure that all students are well aware of what their expectations are throughout the day even as a young three-year-old um one really neat thing with Pyramid Model is we have coaches so we have three instructional coaches that work with all of the staff
throughout the class or throughout the year and what we do with that is that we look at a teapot which is a teaching observational tool that goes into each classroom and we really look at those tier one resources and make sure that we're hitting fidelity and then we do
problem solving and we also do action planning around that teapot and just have that support that teachers can come to their instructional coach if there's any problem whether it's a behavior or if there's some academic things to go up that pyramid
and Tucker the turtle there is also part of our pyramid model and so he teaches our kiddos to stop and think and take some deep breaths and here's Tucker visiting one of our three-year-old classrooms we do this after the story has been introduced and kids are a
little bit more comfortable in the setting and not so afraid of soccer another key point of our early childhood programming is screening and so early childhood screening is actually a law in Minnesota that all students need to be screened prior to entering
kindergarten and so we help by offering screenings two times a month where we can get around 50 students screened we really strive to get kids screened early because we all know inter early intervention is best when kiddos come to our screening they
get a nurse visit so they get hearing and vision done and that has been a huge component of our screening because we've had so many vision referrals that have come back and they're like "Yep they needed glasses." And so that's really good that we're able to get that done early the kiddos also do cognitive
screening and the parents go through a social emotional screening about how their kiddos are doing and at the very end there's just the data review to see how the overall screening experience went if there's any concerns or next steps that we need to help with kids for
that early intervention we do partner with Austin Aspires and each kiddo that comes to screening gets a school readiness kit that has lots of neat materials for them to practice some school readiness at home another key component for the screening
and getting accurate data is our birth data and so we get this monthly from the state um but what it doesn't account for is that we have so many families that move in and are not born in the county and so we constantly work to try to make sure that our numbers are accurate because it not only gets kids in here
for early childhood screening but it also gives information about kindergarten and also our baby classes so that we can get them introduced to all the wonderful resources we have here in Austin and so if you're aware of kiddos that have moved here from 0 to 6 but were not
born here we do have a QR code that you can put in their just basic census information so that we can get them all the information that they need so a little bit of information for all of you about how early childhood is funded not by hoarding like this picture
shows um but we uh have some pathway scholarships that we receive a grant through the state of Minnesota austin was also an early do adopter of voluntary prek we do have some students that pay tuition and I just wanted to mention we already have 38 students on
our waiting list for the 2526 school year last year we always had at least 50 students on our waiting list even when we were moving students off the waiting list into class and Amy and I were talking about it this morning and she said when we left for the summer last
year we had 16 unfilled spots so we are already well ahead of pace in enrollment requests for next school year i know so cute all right here's the sales pitch portion of the evening uh
two Federal Reserve um social scientists did an economic study and they were uh it was the Nobel Prizewinning economist James Hecman and someone that I went to college with Rob Grwald they found that every dollar invested in a high quality
early childhood program yielded a 13% return on investment so what that means is for every dollar a community spends on early childhood they don't have to spend it later on welfare prison uh
prison time court systems and so on so for every dollar and 13 is kind of the middle of the road goes all the way up from 8 to about 1920 and then a study by Art Olnick former director of research at the Federal Reserve found that investing in
early childhood results in 18% inflation adjusted return with most of the return being public so you'll see there's a a wide array but consistently showing the value of investing in early childhood education for the community we're already sold on that it's important for
the kids now this is selling you on it that it's important for the community but I wanted to show you the impact of preschool in Austin so we're not talking about a national Federal Reserve study we're talking about in Austin when you look at the um the FAST scores from
students entering into kindergarten in our system this year the students who had no preschool experience 47.3 of them scored in the high-risk category if you look at the same students who did
attend preschool in Austin not necessarily with Austin Public Schools but with Austin Public Schools Head Start Blue Learning YMCA all of our great community preschool partners only 26% scored in that high
risk category or conversely 51% scored in low risk so nationally and in our state and in our community we're showing that early childhood investment benefits the students and the community last few faces do you have any
questions for us i just know the turtle is to calm down how often does the turtle Taco Vuro comes out for special events and by request in house taco provider
i think a a practical question clearly there's a need to expand our early childhood programming what are we do I don't know who I'm directing this question to what are we going to do to work to support
that potential expansion how how do we make sure that more kids fall into that category of having um access and um participation in early childhood
versus not i think that's an opportunity for the school district i think it's an opportunity for the community um so it costs money to run a classroom so we have to pay for the staff to run it we have the space i think another big challenge in our community is transportation getting the the children
to preschool and then I think continued work with our community partners to advance the information about early childhood and why it's important but we we have got 38 families already that know it's important so some of that work is already done
if you had to ballpark that number that would classroom I think getting started money like the general head lottery fund would be about 200,000 to get a get a classroom started clearly a very large amount to pay that
correct yes i was doing some rough math and I I math math like you were talking about before um what they're paying per hour is about $3 per hour when they do pay tuition so that does not cover the cost of the program
when you bring up the transportation piece when we when we had the early childhood meeting with the parents that was and you were asking positive negative that was about the the one only
negative comment that we heard was about transportation all right any other comments or questions for Jen thank you for coming and presenting to us
our next agenda item is our workbased learning and transition programming with special services education d executive director Sherry Wilr and a couple guests yes chairperson Dubet Superintendent
Paige members of the board i am beyond excited to welcome Todd Huspel and Jason Borlichek from Austin High School to tell you about our awesome workbased learning and Austin transition programs these programs really epitomize
our vision of preparing all of our exceptional learners to make a difference in the world and we do this through achieving the students desired daily experience of engaging in both the school and the community the parents desired daily experience of engaging in
partnership with the staff in order to prepare their students with exceptional needs uh to enter into adult life and the teachers I'm not very good at this microphone the teachers to be able to adapt and change as needed to meet these
individual needs this results in our students who are responsible and resilient learners communicators and contributors in these transition programs and without further ado I'm going to turn it over to Todd and Jason to share with you about these
programs all right thank you uh for having us thank you everybody uh Jason we cut it down to like two and a half hours so we should be uh No seriously though uh workbased learning uh ATP we work together very closely because we share many of the same students uh you can see here we
went on a tour back in manufacturing this year last year one of our students at the um construct tomorrow doing virtual reality painting uh just some of the careers and different things that we look at as we're uh going through our program so workbased learning we're
trying to uh uh teaching classroom work and the work life uh of the workplace we're trying to meld those two together we really the focus is getting out in the community doing different jobs working with different businesses um that whole program my whole program
starts in the Pays Lab which is downtown uh that pays lab is our um simulated work environment the kids come in every day they punch a time clock we're supervisors we're not teachers down there um we go through there's 274 different jobs down there i've never had
a student complete one yet um but they have to grade it on criteria how well they do the job they have to follow the directions themselves it's more self-paced than anything other than having to follow the guidelines that we set forth um so we have a great facility
down there um and then what we're looking for we're looking for again that classroom experience understanding labor laws what they're going to expect when they go out into the workforce what they need to know with their disability how they can make their work life work with
their disability um understanding different career areas all the career areas that they could possibly go into um you know again classroom work like payubs W2s uh applications resumes all those fun things that we have to learn as adults
and then uh work that workplace ethics uh relationships norms um and then basically we want to figure out where could we go when we leave this place once we leave Austin schools whether it's after graduating after 12th grade or staying with Jason in the transition
program where are we going to work how are we going to uh get through our daily lives and that's where what we're trying to find out uh for these students okay um we also Another very important part of what we do is we get
our students uh especially Jason students hooked up with what is either VRS vocational re rehabilitation services or workforce development WDI those are the uh programs like ours teach the same things help with the same things but they're there after they
leave us these are students that need support maybe their whole lives maybe just for a little while um but we're also getting them hooked up with that because that's a long process that takes time um and we work very very closely with our counterparts there to get those students those those uh services after
they leave we we always say we hand the baton off once we either they turn 22 and we no longer have them or they graduate um either graduate our program or graduate us so they're set up to have that help when they leave
here and then uh oh yeah uh our region 10 we're shar I mentioned region 10 before we meet with them once a month uh to and then there our counterparts from schools around the southeast part of Minnesota
um we try to pair those students the students that we have with interests you know businesses that they share interest with um try to gain real world experience um we do transport the students to and from work so that's one of the things one of the logistics
things that we have to work out with our program um and then we also provide job coaching for those students that need it and again we meet with our region 10 counterparts too and Jason will talk about the work skills challenge in just a little bit and then some of the businesses we work with this is not a this is a list
that we're working with right now um but we always need more so anyone in the audience if they help people businesses in town please hit me up um it is a great program and uh we've had a lot of great partnerships and we're we're always looking for more so anyone that can help out we're we're always willing
and want more help so and then Jason can talk about the transition program all right hi um my name is Jason Bichek i'm a teacher at the Austin Transition Program um the Austin Trans uh
Transition Program or ATP provides programming for students 18 to 22 years of age uh who need support and assistance um with life skills um so as a student gets older into high school junior senior in high school um they
they go to their IEP team and the IEP team then makes a decision saying you know you have met the requirements for the credits needed to graduate however there's still still some transition uh services that um are needed so then that
that student gets enrolled into my program um that being said so 18 I have 18 and 19 um if the student starts showing progress towards those goals that student could eventually graduate by 19 or 20 um they don't have to
necessarily stay there until 22 years of age it's a big selling point um goal of ATP is to teach every single student that you can live as independent a life as possible no matter what that may look like um I have kids um both ends of the
spectrum i have kids with high very high needs on one end and kids with not so high needs on the other end and then everything in between of course so then it's my job or ATP's job to teach those students the life skills and to meet them wherever they're at so that
they can live as independently as possible whatever that may look like all right so the transition areas that we teach um employment and this is where Todd and I do a lot of overlapping um he mentioned to you um vocational
rehab services or VRS um WDI or Workforce Development Incorporated um we collaborate quite strongly with them um they are a big presence in our programs um especially in my program they're there they're there weekly um bi-weekly
um to work with the kids but get them signed up for services and like Todd said in the end our goal is to um pass the baton if you will because once they leave us um they have someone else that can help them out as they mature and
move further on into adulthood and be able to hold a job um then we have postsecary uh postsecary postsecary can be as simple as um learning on the job skills it can be or or it can be at like an institution to learn uh technical
trade trade skills or whatever it might be uh next are independent living skills um these are skills like waking up in the morning showering brushing your teeth combing your hair uh mopping the floor doing the dishes folding the
laundry everything that you do um every day um when I used to work at the hospital we used to call these ADLs activities of daily living uh community participation this is a big one um there's a lot of services austin's an amazing city i um spent most of my adult
life up in the cities and I honestly don't think there was as many services up there and there I'm sure um but I didn't see them um I see them here um there are a lot of supports and services that are available for these students and students with disabilities that can
find help if they need it um um as they get older um recreational le uh find the recreation and leisure um again Austin is an amazing city there are a lot of different uh places um to go and find
and have a good time uh one of those being of course uh life uh life of Malmer County you know um that is a a service offered to students with disabilities or not students but adults with disabilities um to enjoy themselves to go and have activities i think they
have a three-month schedule that comes out and every week they have a couple different activities that they do and go play bingos they go to go to dances and they socialize it's wonderful and of course everything else that Austin has to offer um you know the parks and the um the nature center and the library and
you name it there's there's many i could go on and on uh transition lessons i'm not going to bore you and read every one of these out there but uh um these are something I um I create lessons for so um I create
lessons and then I I old school kind of lecture the students um um and they love it and they love it and um they learn I expose them to all these different things and then we we go hands-on um resume building you know we all created resumes and like Todd alluded to we um
attended what's called a work skills challenge day um just a couple days ago or last week and um the students were amazing they had to they had to hand over a resume and then they got interviewed and um you should have seen some of those kids when they came out of that interview you thought they uh
struck gold um it's pretty awesome um so we do all these different things so each one of these I I give I give uh plenty of times they're each units um and um the students really they really catch on to it they enjoy it and again I'm I'm um
exposing them to it and um they learn something from it it's pretty cool um ATP in the community um we ensure students become familiar with all community connections that are available again this is something Todd
talked about um big ones are vocational rehab services uh workforce development incorporated um and of course health and human services of course um um we have worked a lot with health and human services is a lot of our students when they come to me at ATP don't have
services through the county yet and it you know I sometimes question that so I get a hold of the county and we start what's called a men choice um assessment referral and we um we write up the paperwork and they get um assessed and
so far we've had a few different students that we've gone through this process and they ended up with getting county services and rightfully so um next um we want to ensure all community supports and services involved with the student the opportunity to attend um the
IEP okay so when we do have IEPs of course we want these services to be there i believe they used to call a triple IP right uh individual inter agency intervention I think plan um we want all them to be there because once again when they leave me and they leave
Todd we want them to go on further um should they need help okay um again I'm not going to bore you with reading all this but exposure to the community again there is so much out there in Austin so um we're blessed to
have as much as we do um and M County offers offers a lot i've made a lot of connections with the county and um so I'm able to keep track of students you know um you know as as they're going along in school so things they see they
can report on things I see I can report on so finally an overview of the program um ATP um exposes students to the transition areas atp exposes students and families to existing supports and
services atp exposes students to existing community places and events and finally ATP exposes students to real life activities uh just a couple success stories here uh the link that is there I'm not going to
click on it um but it is pretty awesome we have collaborated so the um work skills program the DCD program and myself u met with the park and wreck the Austin park and wreck and they are amazing there's a lot of parks in city
of Austin it's quite amazing and they have offered it all up to us in one way or another um to do nice simple tasks and and all of that is is true work experience so that's all resume building stuff and so um again pretty awesome um
a couple other success stories we have a lot of the students that have left the ATP program um go on to part-time permanent employment that's quite that's that that's happens quite often uh we have a few students that um have either taken a few college courses um or are
completely involved in college courses and one I'm thinking right now is finishing up his electrician program it's pretty cool um and then um success story living in in some sort of a a supported living environment so maybe moving out of the house which is a big
step for anybody but moving out of the house into a supported living environment whether that be in a group home or in a um like an apartment where like a REM person or the semi-independent living services will come in and check on you so those are
all pretty awesome um that is questions yeah um town mothers um I drive for smart transit we take kids to preschool bring them home but I also um drive a
lot of the students you're talking about or young adults you're talking about we take them from their homes to um um callers we take them to the bridge we take them to
um Lifemore County we take them to jobs at Hardies Walmart out to the college so uh whatever you're doing uh it's working really well they interact well on the buses and so it's it's it's really a a
privilege to transport them and to see them succeeding in in the community and if I forgotten any of the place they come go to uh sorry but we we see a lot of your clients and and it's good thank you so much for the work you're
doing thank you if you need to fail at any um next agenda item is a request for the approval of energy savings project and sale of capital finance funds with financial operations executive director
good evening Chairperson Dubet Superintendent Paige and the rest of the board so we're going to break this into two approvals tonight one will be the project and if the project is approved then I will turn it over to Michael Hart from PMA and he will go through the request for approval of funding so in
November we had awarded um to Imbrite IMBU I'm sorry I always want to call him in to do a study to look at our facilities to see if there's any savings we could get from energy so as they were going through this study also the state of Minnesota came out that come January
1st of 2026 fluorescent light bulbs would become banned in the state of Minnesota so as we were going through the facility study um through our facility committee they came in bill came to the board in March went through a work session presented their findings where they would do some building
envelope work they replace all of the um fluorescent balls we have and then do some fan work in our gyms so the net cost with some rebates and that would come up to about little under $2.5 million one of the great things with inbuild is they would work with WCO
electrical companies in Austin to allow them to do as much work as they can provide and then they would take the rest of the work so tonight we're asking the board to please consider awarding this project to in build so they can start putting the plan together we'd
start this project this summer would probably finish sometime over the MEA winter break um with bringing crews over the night once school starts to try to disrupt to have as limited disruptions as we can so I'll just turn it over to
any questions you guys have after going through their presentation at the work session is there a motion to approve the energy savings project and sale of capital facilities bonds second motion by Carol second by
discussion i know we've been hearing about the fluorescent light bulb situation for a little while everybody's tired talking about the light bulbs okay any other discussion i mean you you
and Joe show me some photos of gyms with this lighting in it it's it's absolutely phenomenal so it's definitely a good step and definitely an upgrade thank you i'm going to give all the credit to our buildings and grounds director for those photos they deserve all that credit
all right all those in favor anybody opposed motion passes for our energy savings project and sale of capital facilities bonds so one thing with the sale of the capital facility bonds I got to turn this over to Michael Harvey because there is a resolution that we
need the board to pass so I'm going to turn over to Michael right now good evening chair deb members of the board happy to be here tonight so uh you do have an action tonight to take uh to proceed forward with the sale of the financing mechanism that we discussed in
detail at your work session last month i'm just going to hit a couple of the highlights to to remind you these are called capital facilities bonds they will be paid back via the operating capital so capital element of your general fund that is required to be spent on on those capital items this
does not increase taxes on your taxpayers at all in fact some taxpayers um will see a tax decrease because of the way that the act to school credit functions by reducing taxes on agricultural land and buildings so those agricultural land and building owners
will see a tax decrease because of of um this action should you proceed forward it's going to be paid back here over the next 15 years and we have uh designed the financing uh payback so that it fits with your other capital facilities bonds that are outstanding to give you the the
most flexibility and opportunity to manage your budget going forward so the action that you have in front of you tonight is a resolution that we call a parameters resolution that authorizes proceeding forward with the sale of these bonds which we would intend to
complete this summer um the this author authorization lasts through September 30th and allows us to proceed such that the interest rate does not exceed 5% and um the either the superintendent or director of finance and operations and one of the board officers can execute
all those documents to put this in place and so we'll guide you through that process and report back to the board uh for final ratification after that is completed subject to your approval here tonight all right so we've taken another motion
in a second and approve that yes okay thank you um how do I phrase that can you say that word one more time yeah I think it's um the resolution is a parameters
resolution for the the capital facilities bonds okay um can I get a motion to approve the parameters resolution for capital facilities bonds so motion by Bob by Carol discussion
i just want Is your name Thomas michael michael i just want to thank you for the clear and understandable way you presented this to us so that we can understand just exactly what we're voting on and you've done an outstanding job not only
tonight but in that last session that she was in so thanks thanks happy to be here anybody have any questions or discussion on that right all those in favor i anybody opposed motion
passes our next agenda item is our request for the approval of our tennis court project funding yes so we have a awarded the tennis on court remodel to Rochester sand and gravel so when we had awarded that
project we had talked about the lease levy and that we'd be coming back to the board to um request that approval so Michael Hart from PMA will be going through a little bit of that information we presented that um at a work session previously um we are working right now
with the state of Minnesota to gather their approval so that's the process we go through we submit all the paper to them they are still reviewing a couple things they have a new individual up at Minnesota Department of Education so it's taking a little longer but once we gain their approval which we'll have in
the next few days this resolution allows us to move forward with um getting that funding in place so I'll have Michael go through that why we have both resolutions tonight is so that we have when we go to do the sale of these two we have one rating call and we have one
everything is together so that it saves the district um funding instead of having two separate rating calls so I'll turn it again back over to Michael thank you so the mechanism to fund the tennis courts is a separate mechanism that the board has authority under the lease levy uh to finance certain
instructional spaces which the tennis courts qualify for that this there are a couple key differences from the primary financing uh or the prior discussion this does implicate a small tax increase on your taxpayers is less than $5 on a a
typical home annually not monthly annually so um you know less than 50 cents a month on a on a typical home in your community um and again these are funds that that can only be used for capital types of items um and and really
only used for instructional spaces uh for your your program i get a motion to approve the tennis court project funding motion by pay second by Dan discussion
michael you said uh you said that the tennis court is viewed as an instructional environment iscot field is a dome but um what what facilities are and I I do
believe that a lot of these I think these activities are instructional but how is that determined yeah this is primarily determined because the physical education programming will use the tennis court space as a part of their programming so other school districts across the state have used
this funding mechanism for example not suggesting this but for example to put in a turf field um has been widely used across the state for that kind of of a project for under the same uh general idea it's also been used for classroom
additions although the funding is limited in size because it is based on $212 per pupil um so it is a fairly limited funding source but for a smaller relative project like you're considering here it's a good it's a good mechanism
to give provide more of that they would the physical education will be teaching tennis uh curriculum around tennis and pickle ball because there will be a few pickle ball course on that so that's where the educational requirement comes from is the teaching of the tennis and
pickle ball curriculum sorry do you suspect if we upgrade our turf fields we might do this as well in the dome because they are going
to reach their uh lifespan and eventually we might have to go down the road are those popular yeah in order to assess that at that time we would have to assess the capacity whether or not you have the capacity to do that i'm um I've seen
many fields done i don't know if the dome would be an eligible use of of this funding source okay thank you two questions any other discussion did I take a motion and a second yes all
right thank you all those in favor anybody opposed motion passes uh next action item is the request for the approval of donations chairperson Dubet Superintendent Paige
and the rest of and school board it is my honor this is the best part of this board meeting for me every month is to stand up in front of you and go over the donations we have received either from individuals entities or trusts um these have been reviewed these do meet school
board policy 706 um so I will read these off um one by one so Albert Lee Civic Music Association $48 for Ellis Orchestra dana Hall $100 Ellis Passion
Project allison Bundy and family in memory of Dave David Bundy $1,400 five elementary schools fullcourt Press Club $4023 Austin High School girls
basketball on time sports $125 athletic department and again we would like to thank everybody for their donations there a motion to approve the donations motion by Don second by Carol discussion
yeah I just like to echo what you said Todd is that the generosity of the organizations and the people in our community is uh unbearable so thank you all those in favor anybody motion
passes thank you um our next agenda item is the request for approval of non-renewal of probationary teachers this is an action item with human resources director Sus Chairperson Dubet Superintendent
Page and members of school board probationary teaching contracts are reviewed each year and tonight I'm bringing eight probationary teacher contracts to you for non-renewal and requesting approval of the following resolution whereas Barry Apollo Emily Brows Dylan
File Sharon Lee Valerie Jorgensson Low Jared Bolson Steven Register and Samantha Walls are probationary teachers at ISD 492 now therefore be it resolved by the school board independent school district 492 as follows pursuant to Minnesota
statute 122A.40 40 subdivision 5 the probationary teaching contracts of the probationary teachers listed above are hereby not renewed and their employment with independent school district 492 is hereby terminated effective at the end
of the 2425 school year the school board hereby approves the written notice informing the teachers of the non-renewal of their probationary contracts the superintendent is directed to sign the written notices of nonrenewal on behalf of the board
is there a motion to approve are no longer These are not roll calls sharon verified this is not a roll call vote anymore so is there a motion to approve
i'll make that motion second by CC um discussion discussion yeah say yeah I uh I I do that with a great
um just feeling badly and I certainly hope that these individuals find other employment and have successful careers and I thank them for their service to Austin public schools and it's not an
easy decision to make so thank you all right all those in favor i any opposed motion passes thank you all right we are going to move into
our delegation portion of the meeting um a reminder that each presentation is limited to 5 minutes and no response reaction or action shall be taken by the board during the delegation portion of the meeting the school board will not
hear complaints about individual school employees or permit discussion of such matters in an open meeting those complaints must be submitted in writing to a school administration and profanity and use of other inappropriate language will not be
permitted um our first speaker of the night is Rachel welcome good evening Superintendent Paige good evening Superintendent Paige chairperson bubet members of the school board and thank you for allowing me to
speak tonight my name is Rachel Stangy i currently teach science at Banfield Elementary but I have 13 years of service with the district including student teaching general education science and robotics i have experience with all grades K through six and I taught at all four elementary Zach and Woodson i've always jumped at the
opportunity to fill new unique positions especially when able to use my master's degree in science and literacy integration i also have two daughters in the district one at Banfield and one at Folton tonight I'm here to share my story along with others to shed light on why so many teachers including myself
are resigning or transferring to neighboring districts not because we want to move closer to home as some have suggested but because we can no longer ignore the conditions that are affecting us and more importantly our students during my first nine years at in the
district I felt heard there was open communication with leadership and I felt valued i had to stay in the way I taught and there were regular opportunities to speak up without repercussions in 2015 the most exciting opportunity arose when I became the science specialist at Nelin
i helped build the program from the ground up i was so proud of the positive impact of this program on our students then one year and a quarter into my science journey my family was re relocated out east with Hermel i was devastated i remember turning off the lights in my lab for the last time and
just sobbing leaving my dream job sadly the program fizzled and students went back to receiving an inconsistent science education when we moved back to Austin 5 years later I only planned to return to teaching if the steam opportunity arose two weeks later I was asked to be the robotics teacher at J
but something felt different the environment was no longer the supportive collaborative space that I once known communication from leadership had become top down and impersonal there was no longer room for dialogue and student behaviors and test scores were worsening after 3 years at it was announced that
each elementary school would have a science specialist and leadership directly reached out for me to join this team i couldn't wait to get back to my dream job quickly I realized I was actually entering a nightmare although the district website cites the average elementary class size is 23 i did the
math out of my 21 classes the average size is 26.3 three bodies makes a huge difference furthermore student behavior continues to declin in my first nine years I made zero office referrals this year I've written over 144 it takes
about 5 minutes to write the report 5 minutes to contact families that adds up to over 24 hours of my prep time where I could be preparing for these people's kids for my own student over one month of my prep time student behaviors and
that's not even mentioning addressing the behavior during class this uptick exists because there are no consequences in fact our PBIS system rewards all students each month with a celebration regardless of their behavior we also have inconsistent
parent support and our school support team is front bragging constantly pulling disregulated students from all ends of our school or being stuck subbing we have no forum to speak our minds on these crucial issues our first full staff meeting was in February i tried for weeks to schedule a meeting
with leadership in October and November to come up with solutions but about around Thanksgiving break I gave up leadership was completely absent from my classroom despite my pleas for help with student behavior i met with the behavior coach and the instructional coach who both assured me I was doing everything I
should be morale was fading and the common greeting in the hall was a collective sigh each week I came home from work more irritable and more depressed i felt I was no longer the good mother wife and daughter that I used to be the conditions at work have put us into a constant state of fight or
flight and you just cannot turn that off at home finally in February I had enough with the loving support of my husband we decided for the mental health of my family that I must resign the day I planned to submit my resignation something happened that made me confident I was making the right choice
a particularly difficult kindergarten class was in total chaos and in walks leadership i thought I'd finally been heard and would receive the help I needed after a quick glance around to make sure a student had arrived this person started to leave and quickly explained I had no pair and I quickly explained I had no pair for the third
session and I could really use help they looked me in the eye and said "You won't always have a pair." And they walked out the door i submitted my letter to HR and leadership that afternoon i never got a response from HR and leadership wrote back "Thanks for the information."
Wow all those years of service sparkling her views and that that is what I get my second grader is in the class across the hall from me she wants to be a science teacher when she grows up telling her that mommy wouldn't be her science teacher next year was one of the hardest things I have ever had to
do now I wonder if continuing her education at Banfield is the right choice she's a bright friendly and well- behaved student who's not receiving any advanced academics she deser deserves because our district's policy that one test score determines who gets pulled out my sixth grader hates school she's
Sorry I have to cut you off now like 20 seconds i can't i'm sorry thank you our next speaker is Kendra Hashkus i am not Kendra Hashkus i am her husband so I'm going to be reading to you her letter of
resignation to whom it may concern I'm writing to formally resign from my position as a school counselor at Banfield Elementary effective end of 2024 2025 May 30th 2025 the decision comes after deep reflection with a heavy
heart and I'm incredibly proud of the work I've done in my building i've built strong trusting relationships with students with staff and with families and I've been recognized as a vital part of the community i've gone
above and beyond my role often stepping into administrative responsibilities not because not because I had to but because I truly care despite this it's become increasingly clear that my contributions
to my school or the district are not respected or valued my voice has repeatedly gone unheard and decisions are often made through favoritism rather than fairness professionalism and collaboration
i've worked hard to maintain a positive outlook but I can no longer ignore the toxic and demeaning environment that continues to drain my energy and diminish my sense of purpose i cannot continue in a space where respect and equity are not upheld
and where the well-being of the dedicated staff is overlooked and repurposed to fit the district narrative i owe it to myself and the students and families that I serve to be a prof in a professional environment where my work
is valued supported and appreciated i thank you for the experience and the growth I've had during my time here i truly hope this me message encourages leadership to reflect on the culture being created in the district and the voices that go
ignored so now you get to hear from me so when my wife asked me to uh to read this letter for you guys um I obviously jumped at the opportunity um my wife was offered offered a job somewhere else and
when she was offered this position we sat down and I and I laid it all out as a financial professional right um we laid out what it's going to cost what it's what we're going to be giving up and how much friction it's going to create in our family's household
on a financial basis that's usually where the conversation starts and it stops i have goals of early early retirement we all we all don't want to work till we're 80 so but instead of looking at this as
this new job as a as a cost on our family I looked at it and I said how do we reframe this as an opportunity for investment would you pay the amount that it's costing us to have a leadership team that supports you that
trusts you to execute in the classroom where it matters to trust your judgment i think the answer is pretty obvious this decision isn't about running away it was about running towards something that's
better not just for her but for our family and her future students um that's what I had written um you guys have the opportunity to
listen and it's frustrating to me that you just had a veteran teacher ask for 20 more seconds of your time and you shut her down do better our next You're looking
good evening school board members in the community my name is Lynn Keenan a high school counselor who was involuntarily transferred to a sixth grade counseling position last year and I will be leading the district at the end of this school
year here we are almost a year since I last addressed the school board members and community at a delegation at a schoolboard meeting the date is different but my message is the same i can read what I shared last year word for word and it would still apply
today i will say a year later I had hoped for better our students teachers families and community deserve better since December of 2021 numerous administrators countless teachers
multiple counselors student support professionals and parents have been involuntarily transferred some more than once this has created a culture of fear chaos lack of consistency where support
history and relationships that were established no longer exist with students families and co-workers the SSPs student support professionals have been a target over the last three years first the most senior counselor in
the district was reassigned then the entire group of SSPs between two buildings were told they would loop then I was reassigned along with another SSP and then this spring once again the most senior counselor was reassigned in addition to these re involuntary
reassignments other SSPs are leaving the district a school psychologist two school counselors and several mental health practitioners ongoing through all of this it appears that all levels along with the entire group of SSPs were not
brought to the table to be part of the solution at a track meet at a track meet recently a parent came up to me stating how they and their student had missed working with me as their students counselor at Austin High School she went on to ask me had I planned to retire in
2025 i told her no if she had asked me two years ago would I be retiring this year I would have adamantly said no she then shared how frustrating it is to watch decisions being made in the district and folks who excel at what they do leaving the district or being
moved for positions which affect students and families recently two counseling positions have been posted and people have asked me "Will you apply for either of these open positions unfortunately I have no
confidence that the district I have no confidence in the district that if I apply for a job that I would even be granted an interview even though I may have done the job for 12 years been with the district 20 years and if I were lucky enough to be granted an interview
and released from my current position and offered the position that I was applied for I have no confidence in the district that I would be allowed to continue to work in the position I was hired for i still find it very hard to believe that the district can host a job
make it specific to a building hire you you could perform the job without standing performance reviews year after year and then be involuntarily transferred without any cause reason experience in the position they're
reassigning you to if there is a cause or reason it's never explained to you no conversation period the district's solution is to move you instead of working together as a team like we did under strong leadership we had prior to
2021 the team model where we solve problems together in collaboration gone the value the SSPs brought to the team and were recognized for gone after my reassignment and failing to secure enough counselors the district created a
position and made this person and that position department chair without any prior experience or lensure in the field the district then reduced the number of licensed counselors at a time when mental health concerns are at their highest increased case loads and now cut
the supportive breach program at Ellis for next year all of this clearly shows that the district continues to make decisions without bringing teachers staff and SSPs to the table personally I forgive you but I
will not forget again since December of 2021 numerous administrators countless teachers multiple counselors student support professionals and pairs have been involuntarily transferred in the end
just as I said last year it is not too late for the school board and Austin public schools to do the right thing it is not too late to do what is right for students staff parents and the future of Austin public schools and I challenge yourself to ask are we doing better than
we were four years ago and as schoolboard members with great power comes great responsibility we need to demand the best for Austin Public Schools thank you our students deserve that and they are counting on us thank you
mandy is not here okay sheila Fitson sheila is also not here to speak tonight kyle Wilson good evening my name is Kyle Nelson i was born and raised here in
Austin i was class 2007 um my wife's 2008 uh my family goes back generations in the district my parents grandparents are all probably my uh in the crowd tonight so why am I
here two reasons the two kids get up there my daughter Kingsley grade three my son Colton kindergarten of Anfield both of
them i'm here as their voice but I'm also here as voice of future students parents and teachers of Andrew it's both our jobs your job as school board members
and my job as a parent to make sure these kids have the tools and opportunities to get the best education possible and right now I don't think they're getting it my connection to main runs deep my parents moved across the street
from Banfield in 1991 back then Banfield was the school to be at i attended K through 5 at Banfield and I still remember the faces and my teachers K through five that I
had there miss Black Miss Olsen Miss Clumpin Marshall Wilson Mr king and Miss Schustster when I left Banfield for Elvis five of those six teachers were
still teaching in the district the one that was not retired Mr king was welld deserved but fast forward to today between my kids Kingsley and
Colton we've had five classroom teachers over the past four years and at the end of this year none of their teachers will still be in the district not one what message does it send in the
past and what does it lead us to for the future what's this message send to the community when I started asking around a clear theme emerged the teachers felt unsupported they felt like they lacked
leadership and they felt like their expertise wasn't valued i had to revise this a little bit from this afternoon uh Dr gates just sent out a message about the community uh message to the community this afternoon i appreciate the vision he laid out
he talked about how schools should be places where students feel safe seen supported and where staff can do their best work that's exactly what I want too but what I'm hearing and seeing at Bfield does not reflect that the
teachers don't feel safe they don't feel supported they feel alone burnt out and afraid to speak up in fact there were teachers who wanted to be here tonight to speak and were on the agenda to speak tonight but they
backed out they were scared that sharing their concerns publicly would affect their future jobs whether it's here or elsewhere just think about that they were afraid to come forward with their
opinion to the school board about what's going on if we're building that culture that silences those people that shape our kids education we're failing period we can't afford this at an elementary
school that's the building block for our school going forward it's the most important years of school for these kids if we have if we build a strong base here their entire educ educational path is clear but that only happens when
we keep veteran teachers we develop new teachers through strong mentorship we have real leaders in our schools people who show up support their staff and inspire trust when we do that the kids win
that's the goal for me for you guys and for everybody in this room so tonight I'm making this final plea on behalf of my family and others like us we need accountability leadership and some change cuz I've had enough and we've had
enough that's why they're here unless something changes soon more families including mine be forced to make that hard decision about where we send our kids to school our kids deserve better
standing good evening my name is Ashley Blly and this is my husband Dan i'm here speaking not only as a mom with two kids in the district Banville and Sumner but as a person that grew up with strong educators around me my mom who is an
educator and my grandma who is a retired educator have always talked about the importance of community within a school building and this starts from the top the main goals a teacher has is educating his or her students being a role model providing a safe environment
and providing them with the tools and building blocks to help them be successful these strong values are instilled in me as a parent and I have the same expectations of my children's schools this is my fourth year on Vanville PTC where I have served two
years as president i have seen firsthand that the sense of community and culture is broken at the airfield i have seen the shift from doing what is best for our students based on input from stu from teachers to sticking to a strict schedule that is AI generated and
treating a school like a business our children are not something you run through an assembly line as in a factory to a one-sizefits-all mold as a scientist I understand the importance of data and structure but when dealing with children data should not be considered
should be considered along with the opinions of teacher that have decades of experience data is important in the education process but the impact of this data is not seen when there's no shared collaboration unfortunately this district no longer respects the opinions
of their teachers and is focused on the outward appearance instead of creating a community culture within schools with a primary focus on the students growth and well-being this type of community culture encourages teachers to speak up without fearing retaliation we have lost
the focus on doing what is best for our kids district administration's recent decision to involuntarily reassign two of Banfield's most incredible veteran educators has caught the attention of parents and community members and shed light on the declining morale educators
within our district in the last 12 months Banfield has seen veteran teachers with well over a century of collective education experience walk out its doors and to neighboring school districts these are not retirement numbers or teachers relocating to
another Austin public school we are about to lose an additional 40 plus years bringing our toll to well over a century of collective education experience with the involuntary displacement of two field teachers i understand the current contract allows for these moves but shouldn't we strive
to operate better than the minimum and respect our teachers opinions when teachers who have given years of dedication and service to their school are given no notice in their future with the district they lose their sense of trust value respect and security with
their building leadership and the district as a whole since we began sharing concerns publicly we've heard from teachers all over the district and learned that while Banfield situation may have sparked the conversation the culture issues we're here to address are not isolated to
Banfield something is fundament fundamentally broken in our district now we will share some of these quotes some days I put on a smile and pretend that everything's fine but inside I feel like I'm drowning my passion didn't
disappear it was buried under data meetings impossible expectations and the feeling that no one actually cares if I'm okay i don't want to quit i want to feel like I matter again like what I do and who I am is worth something district
communications present a selective highlight reel on media outlets and district communications often manipulating and misrepresenting the truth to those who don't understand the structure of the education system i used to be proud of who I was as a teacher and proud of our building now I
barely recognize myself in this place i'm anxious exhausted and numb i'm not even sure who I am outside of school anymore this job has drained every part of me when administration does not value or respect teachers as professionals are
view or view their voices as integral to the success of a district that lack of respect trickles down and becomes the cultural norm unfortunately this is evident within APS while this is not what parents or board members would promote or condone it is what is being
modeled and tolerated my anxiety is so bad I get physically sick on Sunday nights not because of the kids but because of everything else this job and our admin demands of me these quotes show that our teachers are not receiving support and resources to ensure a safe and welcoming learning
environment which the district lists as a strategic priority how can we support our educators to show up and do their best for our children feeling this way about their level of support value and work it is hard to prepare all learners to make a difference in the world as stated in the vision when our teachers
feel invisible and not able to do their job to the fullest potential thank you for your time and attention i hope you remember to put our students and teachers first when making decisions our next speaker is Chad Don live hi uh my name is Chad Donic i
currently have one third grader and in Banfield and I have one seventh grader at Ellis Middle School both my daughters had the same most tenured second grade teacher at Banfield to date i can tell you that teacher is also their favorite teacher uh to date so far they love
tracking her down to say hi every time we set foot in the Bfield school for conferences for a book fair or for other school activities but that will not be possible for my daughters or any other students going forward with those longlasting relationships with tenure
teachers that are no longer at Banfield i'm now going to read a letter from a current teacher at Banfield that did not feel comfortable coming today to speak out because of fear of public retaliation but the message needs to be heard for the community to understand
what's going on behind the scenes at Banfield schools today and here's what the letter reads to the elected members of the school board i've been a teacher at Banfield for many years for a long time Banfield felt like a family like all families we weren't perfect but we
cared for one another we tackled problems together and we had fun together we celebrated each other's successes and we showed up for each other in times of hardship it's part of what made Banfield such a special place unfortunately the
sense of family has been gutted at Banfield self morale or staff morale is at an all-time low teachers no longer feel respected or valued decisions are made about our lives our classrooms without our voices educators are being moved without
input colleagues are leaving the district not because they don't care but because they can't continue to work under these conditions we are losing good people and it's not an accident it's the result of repeated poor administrative decisions that have chipped away at the hearts of the school
and our district this is not just about one person this is about leadership at multiple levels and that includes you our school board you were elected to represent the voices of this community we need you to be visible in our schools we need you to engage with our
teachers and staffs and we truly need you to understand the climate at our schools you are an essential part of the district's leadership not just supporters to the superintendent an independent advocate for students staff
and families we encourage you to ask the hard questions to seek out the full picture and to lead with the same hearts and courage we bring into our classrooms every day i say this all because I care about this district and our students i
care about the staff that pours their heart into this challenging work every day even when it feels like no one's in our corner i want to see Banefield thrive again but that won't happen unless something changes we need leadership that rebuilds trust that values its teachers and understands
you cannot run a school district without investing in the people that show up for your kids every single day sincerely a teacher from Banfield our next speaker is Ellen Bane members of the school board Superintendent Paige and community
members thank you for being here the past eight board meetings delegations has been number seven or less on the agenda tonight we are 16th thank you for sticking around my name is Alan Bang i have four
children here one at Ellis one at J two at Bfield i'm here tonight coming to you as a CPA and accountant with quite a bit of data that I'm going to have to really shorten down and get in my five minutes my initial concern started with the transfers of Sheila Pittson and
Mandy Leopole out of Vanfield Elementary mrs pittson has transformed literally transformed my son from a behavioridden student to one who enjoys the classroom and is now excelling needless to say when I heard she was
leaving Banfield I was concerned so I did my due diligence and as I did so my concerns escalated today I have concerns not only for Mrs pittson and Mrs leopold but extreme apprehension for the overall
loss of veteran teachers at Banfield Elementary i think it's important to note that no current teacher is speaking to you tonight there is volume to be heard about that they do not feel
comfortable prior to my after prior to this afternoon I was going to give you a bunch of data i had planned to move right into the statistics however I must pause here and provide you with some additional facts that came to my attention just
today first my son in Mrs mrs pittson's classroom came home and told me she was not at school today interesting second all of my communications to Mrs pittson his teacher since last week have been
ignored not answered third she was on the agenda tonight to speak to you all and I find it interesting she's not here i will let you draw your own conclusions and I sure have mine
i'm going to run out of time so I'm going to skip several of my data points but Banfield has the highest number and highest percentage of non-tenured staff at 14 this means that one in three of our teachers in that building are in
their first three years with the district why then are we moving tenure teachers out of that building these moves may be consistent with their contract but is it really what's best for our students as we see these tenure teachers
leave we are also seeing proficiencies decrease the profic proficiency level of students at Banfield in math and reading has decreased since 2021 is it a coincidence that this is the exact timing that we started seeing an
influx of new teachers in that location i also did some research into Austin residents open enrolling in other school districts nearly 16% of Austin's market share is open enrolling
elsewhere this is nearly double the 9% Minnesota state average the largest percentage of these students are going to Lyall where did you know that over 54% over half of the Lyall student body is from
Austin members of the school board why are our open enrollment numbers so high why are they higher than the state average and what does this say about our effectiveness in conclusion I sincerely hope this
information helps you understand why I'm concerned no one has all of the answers however I urge you I urge you elected members of the school board to ask ask questions of these teachers that aren't here tonight enter the schools and see
what's going on please have these conversations if you do I'm confident that what you will hear will help you better understand why we are all here tonight and ultimately help out what is most important our students the next speaker is Isaac Lake
good evening everyone thanks for having me my name is Isaac Lake father of three students in the district one at J and two at BU i'm here to remind the school board of their statutory authority and responsibility in governing the business
of APS schools i first want to recognize all the presenters before me who share their stories and information their passion for teaching and shaping our kids' future is evident and commendable the treatment they have all received from administration after all
they have done is truly appalling and representative of a systemic issue across the district i would also like to recognize my wife Elizabeth she's poured her heart and soul into understanding the situation and providing support to the
teacher and parent community over the past weeks she's been admirable in her relentless pursuit of the truth and is an inspiration to our family we have all been asking ourselves what can be done to address the concerns presented what can we
do we quickly concluded that if we want to change or if we want change in the district the power lies with all of you as APS board members the Austin Public Schools organizational chart clearly shows the
chain of command starts with the school board minnesota law empowers the school board with general authority to govern the business of the school district the law provides implied powers to manage the dis business of the district and the APS bylaws call on the board to perform
and I quote other acts as the school board shall deem to be reasonably necessary or required for the governance of the schools aps policy 2011 purpose of the school board states the care management and
control of the schools is vested by statutory and constitutional authority in the school board the school board should carry out the mission of the school district with diligence prudence and dedication to the ideals of providing the finest public
education we are asking the school board to provide the same dedication passion and level of effort all the presenters have demonstrated today in understanding and correcting the stated issues we're specifically requesting the
following be added as schoolboard agenda items for future working sessions one address the leadership issues across the district starting with Banfield two involuntary transfers
three teacher morale and employee retention we all know these issues are complex and cannot be resolved without proper dialogue context and facts we want to be involved in these discussions and work together to understand and
correct these areas of concern titler review of these issues is of great importance we are requesting review and action on these items by the end of the 2024 2025 school year we are all here because we're passionate
about our kids education and we want the absolute best for them and this community thank you all for your time and consideration our last speaker is thank you for letting me um speak to the concerns of teachers parents and
students school board members thank you for your time and willingness to be involved in the Austin Public Schools educational process i've been in a pain in some of your butts for a long time um but you sit at the top of the Austin public schools organization chart and you hold
the ultimate authority in this school district you are elected officials who have been entrusted with the care of every student's education primarily you react to the advice brought to you by well-meaning assumably
knowledgeable persons but how do you decipher it all you are left to trust those from which the information comes but what if their agendas have personal bias what if they're not considering the ramifications of your vote on the ones
under them how do you know and I do not say this to bring suspicion i say this to bring about scrutiny i say this for you to speak directly to full staff
everyone admitted admittedly education has changed since my glory days the world has changed the students entering buildings have changed the home lives have changed and granted the ex the educational system has to change but
when does Austin public schools come to a realization that change for the sake of change is not always in the best interest of our staff or students there are constant new initiatives and programs how can you as board members
keep track of all these changes and some that you're asked to approve how can instructors constantly keep up then there's transparency and openness with staff and families from administration this become an
issue we have social media highlights we've got emails they take priority over classroom communication with your teachers with your employees these voices are being silenced again and again and they give recommendations but those
recommendations aren't taken the breakdown of communication and trust our district has experienced over the last several years has caused a district-wide morale issue when have you spoken to teachers
or wander school hall hopefully the school adoption idea will improve that thank you just recently there was a schoolboard member who asked a food service person how life
was going and she says "It's hard we're overworked we're tired." But that woman called me and she goes "It's the first time anyone has ever asked." We have heard many firsthand stories tonight about how we failed to
prioritize those who hold one of the most important jobs in this world and that's to educate our children sadly stories have come from incredible teachers who likely will not be part of our district next year but at
the end of the day valuing our teachers valuing our staff is valuing our students it's time for parents and community members to step up and apply the voices of our teachers who don't
feel safe to do this anymore we have to ask hard questions and get specific about what needs to change or we'll continue to see our school district decline if not enrollment because of open enrollment then in quality and
certainly of pride tonight you have community members and parents some who are former students and former colleagues advocating for their students their teachers and
themselves that's a beautiful thing they are are here encouraging you to recognize an opportunity to work together to do better please do not take lightly our presence or our passion for
education and trusting you board members to do the right thing for our students and teachers thank you thank you all for all your for for speaking with us um this is a reminder of our school board study session Monday
April 28th 2025 at 4 p.m in the district office conference room uh the board is now uh going to be entering close session for a negotiations update can I get a motion to enter close session second motion by second by all those in
favor