This has been Good evening everyone. Welcome to our September 9th board meeting. If you would please stand and join me in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, boss, you going? All right. Good evening everyone. Welcome, welcome to our September board meeting. There
was really something missing over the last few months whenever we would get together for a board meeting because we didn't have our students of the month to celebrate. So, it's lovely to be back as well uh to celebrate our athletes of the month tonight too. Uh effectively how this goes is that each principal is
called up and the principal then will announce their student of the month. The principal will talk a little bit about their student of the month, say some wonderful things and then you get a lovely little award here and we'll take your picture. We'll go through all of our students of the month and then we'll
turn things over to our athletes of the month and coaches and folks will say wonderful things about our athletes of the month and then we'll take a picture and then we'll be done. And the lovely thing about all of this is that once we get through this section then uh you are able to dismiss and then we'll get on
with the rest of the board meeting itself. But I wanted to begin by congratulating our families uh on this incredible honor. Having a student of the month is a really big deal and we know that students of the month are not
made uh by accident, right? There are a whole bunch of folks who love them to this point and we are so grateful to all of our families who are here uh lifting up uh their students who are getting celebrated this evening. So, congratulations to all of you. So, with
that, we're going to get started with our Hornet Park Elementary School student of the month to which Mrs. Tanya Reed, who is our assistant principal, is going to introduce. [Applause] Good evening. I am filling in for Mr.
Adamson tonight. He went to watch his daughter play volleyball. He's missed all the games thus far, so he asked me to sub in tonight. And I said, "Well, of course, because look at this. You ready?" Every night, don't we? This is Rachel Hoy. And Rachel is Hornet Park's student
of the month. And isn't she absolutely precious in every way? Rachel being chosen as the student of the month makes sense for so many reasons. This is from Mr. Martin, her teacher. First and foremost, she is a hard worker. She listens, participates in class, and
always turns in her homework the very next day, even though I tell her she can turn it in on Friday. Secondly, she is a fantastic helper in class. Not only does she do her work and helps uh Mr. Martin do his, but she helps others in solving
math problems, passing out papers, and facilitates good discussions when working with partners. And lastly, Rachel is a great student of the month because she is such a positive student to have in class. She always comes to school ready with a good attitude, a nice smile, and I have never heard one
complaint or negative thing come out of her mouth. Um, thank you for being such a good student, Rachel. That's from Mr. Martin. And Miss uh Ryder, Mrs. Ryder says,"I got to have Rachel all to myself last year. She will brighten any day and
constantly gives the best hugs. She sets great examples in and out of the classroom. She has many talents, including art, drawing, making things from scratch, writing, reading, and being so creative. Rachel is truly the
entire package of what we look for in a student of the month. Rachel, I am not surprised one bit of this achievement for you. Keep shining, loving school and others and doing your very best. I love you and I'm so proud of you. This is I
love Oh, she says the word nungi. This is I love you in Burmese from Miss Is that the way you say that? How do you say that? I love you in Burmese. Do you know? I think she said it like that. And then Miss Zabala says, "Rachel is such a brilliant young lady.
She is quiet, very sweet, responsible, and a selfless great friend. She gives the tightest hugs and has the cutest little drawings to help her do math." Rachel is always one of the first students to raise her hand in class to participate and never hesitates to help
a friend. I could go on and on and on, but you guys get the picture. She is a wonderful student. Congratulations, Rachel. [Applause] Yep. Oh, let me find you. And that is for you. Amber can go take a
picture. Yes, you are. I'm so jealous. Okay. Uh, Mr. Carr, who is our principal for Central Intermediate School, had to take a sick day today. The poor guy is not feeling well, but he said that he
would come in, and I said, "Oh, please don't. No, thank you." So, you guys are stuck with me tonight celebrating the Central Intermediate School Student of the Month, who is Dylan Baker. Dylan, come on up. Everybody, you got the short end of the
stick here. All right. So, uh, Dylan, uh, Mr. Carr sent me some really wonderful things that your teacher said about you, so I'm going to share them with the rest of the group here. Okay. All righty. Dylan is Central's student of the month. Dylan is a kind and charismatic young man who works hard and
is a good friend to everyone. He can be found smiling through Central's halls on a daily basis. A couple of his teachers have the following things to say about Dylan. So those were all from Mr. Carr. This is from Mr. Laker. Dylan is a
student who routinely works his hardest and is a great role model for his peers. He is extremely creative and this shines through in his writing and opportunities he has to roleplay in class frequently. Dylan has been a all capitals great
student of mine the prior two years. quote, "I'm just disappointed I won't get to be his teacher a fourth year." That's from Mr. Laker. And lastly, from Mr. Reeds. Dylan makes the classroom and school a better place by being a valuable member of the school, making
everyone feel welcome. His sense of humor with both staff and peers brings a much needed sense of enlightenment to each day. When it's time to put forth effort and work into challenging work, Dylan makes the appropriate shifts
needed, showing determination, strong problem solving, and resilience. His cooperation with both peers, staff, and school expectations make Dylan Baker an ideal student of the scrim. All right, let's do that. So, this is
for you. Thank you. This is for you. I've never been in a suit that [Laughter] Mr. Austin, come on up. Carla Geralds. All right. First of all, Carly is
amazing. Um, Mr. Bush, who is the department chair for our math department, uh, he and his team recommended, uh, Carly as the student of the month for the high school. Uh, Carly is an is is outstanding in her
achievement in leadership in class. Uh currently excelling in dual credit pre-calculus, Carly consistently earns top grades while also serving as a role model for her peers. She frequently attends after school tutoring. But here's my best
part. Not because she needs the extra pract extra practice, but because she is eager to help her friends succeed. In fact, many students naturally turn to Carly for guidance before approaching the teacher. a testament to her
patience, her clarity, and logical thinking. On review days, she often steps into the role of an assistant teacher, helping explain concepts and strategies with kindness and precision. Carly's dedication, intelligence, and
generosity make her an invaluable part of our math community. And not only math community, but our entire high school. Please join me in congratulating Carly as our Beach Grove High School student of the month. That is yours.
So, a couple students of the month weren't able to make it tonight. That's okay. We can always invite them back to another meeting and we will celebrate them in some other way because we certainly have special students in all of our schools. But we are going to turn things over now to our athletes of the
month. If you happen to be at our football game on Friday evening, which oh by the way, we are now 3 and 0, you would have heard the name Mikey Renfro on the loudspeaker over and over and
over again because of some extraordinary playmaking that happened on the field. So Mikey Renfro is being honored as the athlete of the month. incredibly welld deserved. And coach Mosley is going to say a couple wonderful things about you, coach.
Welcome. So, um, have Mike here. Mike is just one of our one of our great leaders. A young guy, only a sophomore, would take on a really, really big leadership role for us because he not only leads by example, but he does a really good job of shaping the culture of what we want our team to
look like. Um, and that's on the field, but also in the classroom. Um, I think Mike right now is sitting at a 4.0 and and never really have a question about if Mike is doing what he's supposed to do. Um, as far as football goes, man, he just does a really really good good job of leaning on on his teammates and and
executing and and last week I said last week, the first game, he did a really really good job. I'm like, "Hey, Mike, man, how you doing?" And he was like, "Man, I just I just ran my keys. I did what you guys tell me to do and I make plays." So, he does a really, really, really good job at that. I think the best thing about Mike is is is also a
worst trait which is he he's a perfectionist and sometimes you have to remind Mike that it's okay to make mistakes because from those mistakes that's how we grow. Um and he's really really learning that and doing just an amazing job at it. So thank you Michael. I got you first. This superintendent gets very happy when
I hear student athlete before student before athlete. So well done Mikey. That's great to hear. And we also have Oh, so this is so exciting. We have our our brand new inaugural flag football team and we have uh Harmony Burks who's being celebrated by Coach Williams. Come
on up. This is We're going to practice right after. You bet. We got things to do. Absolutely tomorrow. Congratulations. Okay. Um I'm not used to being here this time of year. Uh I I'm pretty busy with
uh wrestling. Uh last year after um after Powder Pup, Garrett uh made a joke. He's like, "Yeah, Colts reach out." I was like I go, "Well, if you need somebody, I'll do it." I go, "This was a blast. These girls are really playing hard." And I figured I could recruit maybe some wrestler, girl wrestlers there, too, cuz we do have a
pretty good team, but not this one. I'm going to let her play basketball. She's pretty good at that. Um Harmony uh is been a leader uh on the field. Harmonies delivered an outstanding performance, racking up 172 rushing yards and adding five more
through the air for a total of 177 yards in our first game. She found the end zone three times, providing the spark to power BGHS girls flag football team to their first ever victory in program history. Not only that, uh this past week, um she got thrown into quarterback
a little bit. She threw for a touchdown. She also rushed for another 66 yard touchdown. If you gotten a chance to see this girl play, come by tomorrow night. She's going to get the ball very first play. I hope Kip's not listening, but she's going to probably score another touchdown, too. She scored on the first
play of both games. She hits the line like uh none of the other girls. She's explosive. Um and I didn't have opportunity to really know her because she is a girls basketball player and I don't think she likes me. I think she's starting to like me now. um
we're having fun and uh she was a no-brainer when it comes to this and then she's also stepping up and being a leader out there just taking on more than what she really she doesn't even realize it but she's definitely doing it and she's a great student athlete. I looked at her GPA yesterday. It's pretty good.
[Applause] So, we have two more presentations to make uh this evening. I would like to ask our business manager, Julie Smith, to join me at the table. Oh, Julie didn't know this. Well done.
If you know Julie, you know that this is the last thing that she wants to be done. However, we felt like it was really important to take a moment in our board meeting to uh celebrate something very, very special. This evening, I have the privilege of celebrating one of our very own, our incredible business manager,
Julie Smith. Julie recently earned her MBA. What makes this achievement even more remarkable is that Julie never mentioned a word to us about being in the program. She simply did the work quietly and diligently until it was time to
graduate. That's Julie in a nutshell. She is humble, committed, and always focused on how she can strengthen her skills to better serve Beach Grove City Schools. Truthfully, Julie is so smart she probably could have taught the classes herself, but instead she chose
to push her own learning even further, ensuring that our district will benefit from her expertise for years to come. We are deeply grateful for her dedication and so proud of her accomplishment. Please join me in congratulating Julie Smith.
She'll never talk to me again. We have one more celebration. Mrs. Reed, would you please come on up? She hugged me. Julie, so we are very excited to share some other wonderful news about one of our own leaders. Mrs. Tanya Reed has been
named the District 7 Assistant Principal of the Year by the Indiana Association of School Principles. Tanya has served Beach Grove City Schools as an incredible teacher, principal, and now assistant principal. She's extraordinary in every way. What stands out most is
how she loves our kids first and supports our families in countless ways. Tanya is always a voice of reason, of love paired with high expectations. She could not be more deserving of this recognition and we are thrilled to celebrate her tonight. And the good news
is this. Tanya is now in the running for the assistant principal of the year for the entire state of Indiana. But we are most proud that she is ours. Congratulations. So with that we are done with the celebrating part of our meeting as we're
so grateful that you all are here. We'll take about a 5m minute break that you can stretch your legs take any pictures that you would like to take and then you are welcome to leave. You're also welcome to stay but not many people like to stay for board meetings. So we completely get it. So thank you so much
for coming on out. Wait a minute. We have one more. Stand by. Oh, perfect timing, guys. Perfect timing. Mrs. Carter from South Grove Elementary School. This is Jeremy Powers, everyone.
He is super excited. We are student of the month. Jeremy was nominated by his teacher, his fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Norton, and she said that he has set a great example for his peers in reading and math classes this
month. He participates by raising his hand, works at a level one during his group work, models a level zero in the hallway and during work times, and he also writes a goal every single morning on his daily reflection sheet and works towards his goal each day. He also has
been very understanding of students when they struggle in class and invites others to play at recess. She said he's done a terrific job of modeling the Hornet way. Mr. J, our steam teacher said, "Wow,
J oh me. I've had the opportunity to work with Jeremy over the past few years, and he's got a contagious smile and a fun sense of humor. He's ready to crack a joke and be silly with his classmates and then get serious when he's supposed to. Congrats, Jeremy, on
being recognized as our SGE student of the month. Keep working hard and enjoy your fourth grade year." Mrs. Dodie, our literacy coach, says, "Jeremy has shown tremendous progress in the past few years. He has developed greater concentration and stamina through his
hard work and perseverance. His growing confidence is evident not only in his ability to stay on task, but also participate in class. This progress is proof of his resilience and determination." Mrs. Mrs. Feifer shared, "Jeremy has
made leaps and bounds in his educational journey as well as his social and behavioral journeys. I've had the pleasure of working with Jeremy for the past several years, and seeing his progress is truly amazing. He has worked diligently in the classroom to improve his grades and also worked on skills to
help him focus and become successful. I am truly proud of this young man and can't wait to see what the future holds for him." Miss Bowden, his third grade teacher, shared, "Jeremy is a fantastic student that I had the privilege of working with in third grade. He always
put forth his best effort and showed so much growth throughout the year. His perseverance makes him the perfect student of the month. I cannot wait to see him continue to grow. I'm incredibly proud of Jeremy as well. His perseverance and determination. Watching
him take ownership of his academics has been truly remarkable to see. second, third, and then fourth grade. All of these skills that are um playing off. Watching him uh last spring and then into the summer working on I read and
just continuing to um hit the books hard and and setting his goals and if he didn't quite reach his goal, he just kept going and kept going, which is what I'm hearing from his fourth grade team as well, which is absolutely incredible and something to celebrate. Look at that smile. Um, we hope that Jeremy, we're so
proud of you, but we want you to keep working hard, keep this positive attitude and strong, strong work eth work ethic. We will keep celebrating you. Okay, bud. Okay. All right. Awesome. Congratulations. I love that. That was good. That was a good move.
Here you go. Hold that. I guess. All right. And I get the privilege of introducing Annabelle Tany, our middle school student of the month. So, Annabelle's been busy with some cheerleading and then she is also a
competitive gymnast. So um she stays very busy outside of school but um also carries straight A's at the middle school. Um so Mr. Sanctus her English teacher had u recommended Annabelle as our student of the month and he says it
is with great pleasure that I write this recommendation for Annabelle Tanzy. She's a talented student who holds high standards for herself both academically and personally. She always maintains a positive attitude and is a determined has a determined work ethic and she
consistently demonstrates integrity always doing the right thing even when no one is watching. Annabelle is currently maintaining a straight A average across all of her classes and all while balancing extracurriculars. It is an honor to recommend her for student
of the month. Annabelle, we thank you for your leadership and all you do for Beachville Middle School. So, thank you. [Applause] Well, I am thrilled. We're five for five for our students of the month. We have our athletes of the month. We've had some fun surprise celebrations. So, now
we're done. And you all are more than welcome to leave or to stay. Um, but we'll take about a fivem minute break and get into the rest of our meeting. Thank you all for being here tonight and congratulations. All right, welcome back everybody. We will now have a presentation from our
director of transportation, Misty Mack. [Applause] Good evening. So, I'm nervous as can be. I'm just I don't mind I was just telling Brian I don't mind talking in front of 300 people at the STAI convention, but
small room makes me nervous. Um I also brought along Kevin Kinder. He's our routing and trip coordinator. So, just as a little bit of a backstory on myself, um I started with Beach Grove in 2009 as a bus monitor. Um it was supposed to be a temporary job. That is
when Beach Grove took on the special needs. Um my background before coming here was working with special needs. Uh so the director at the time had talked to me about coming in and kind of helping train some of the monitors, working with special needs children. I did that for a year and fell in love
with the children and just the job in general. Um, and so in 2011 I went ahead and got my CDL and became a bus driver for special needs. 2014 I kind of started coming into the office helping the director at the time. Um, we had grown so much and he was a
oneman show. So I had fallen actually and broken my arm. So they pulled me into the office to kind of help him and to help me at the same time. 2015 I became the assistant director. 2016 um I became safe school specialist
and still carry that um every year. 2019 I became the transportation director. Uh in 2023 I got involved with STI which is Student Transportation Association of Indiana. Um and was nominated to sit on the executive board and was voted in. So
I am one of four directors at large in the state of Indiana for transportation. Um, and then this past uh this past summer, I think it was, I got my student transportation director certificate through IASBO and STI, which was about
74-hour course. Um, I am one of seven now in Indiana that has that certificate. Okay, you guys get to listen to me. Okay, I'm Kevin Kinder. Uh, I hired in in uh 2014 as a subdriver and an assistant mechanic. Uh in 2019 uh I
moved into the assistant director position and in 2020 I became a safe school specialist also. Uh 2021 uh I left Beach Grove to take an opportunity to Eli Lily and in 2022 my real calling was here back at Beach Grove. So I came
back as the routing coordinator and the activity trip coordinator and I'm here to stay. Yay. [Applause] Um, so a little bit about what transportation consists of. Uh, there's one transportation director,
Kevin, our routing coordinator and trip coordinator. We have one mechanic, Johnny. If you guys have met him, you'll fall in love with him immediately. Um, we have one driver trainer. She was a full-time driver that had retired, but um, had done so well with our training.
I begged her to stay on PRN. um as new drivers or new applicants came in that wanted to get their CDL. She's been amazing. So, we have one driver trainer that only works when we have applicants trying to get their CDL. When I made this slide, we had 15 bus
drivers. Uh we just passed one through thanks to our driver trainer. We now have 16 full-time bus drivers, seven subd drivers, and seven monitors. Of those seven monitors, three of them hold what we call a yellow card. In the state of Indiana, you can have your CDL class
B um and not be able to transport children um even with the school bus endorsement unless you go through the three-day safety class to get your yellow card. So, three of our monitors have not received their CDL, but they have their yellow card. So, they went through that three-day class with this
uh DOE, and so now they can transport students on like our activity buses. And we have been so grateful to for this small yellow bus that we just received this year that they can actually run bus routes as long as there's 15 passengers or less.
Years of dedication to Beach Grove Transportation. Um we have six employees that have been here zero to two years. We have eight of them that's been here 3 to five. We have seven employees that's been here from for 6 to 10 years. Five
for 11 to 15. three 16 to 20 years, three 21 to 30 years, and we actually have one that hit her 40 years this year. Oh my gosh. So, that's just goes to show that we do have some turnover, which I believe here at Beach Grove, we keep our drivers
around quite often. That's because of you guys. That's because after talking to so many other directors, they feel like their transportation is their own world. Like they don't have contact with their superintendent. They don't have contact with their assistants. One of them even told me they didn't even know
who their special needs director was. And I was like, that's that was just so crazy to me because like I know I can reach out to our principles and they will help us. So I think that's just a it just shows how close that we are that we keep our employees that long.
Student enrollment versus students transported. When this slide was made, we had approximately 2,850 students enrolled at Beach Grove City Schools. Um, and we transport around 1,600 of those students. I'm not going to read all the numbers,
but you can see our high school has grown. And I'm not sure if it's um students not wanting to drive, not being able to afford to drive, or just the convenience of transportation, but transporting 390 high school students is
huge. It's probably one of the highest numbers since I've been here. Okay. I think the rest of it's going to be on me so you guys can put up with me for a little bit longer. All right. So, uh we do have a a small school district, but
uh we actually run 78 routes a day total school. Um the majority of them are gened routes, but we do run 19 or 18 Beach Grove special needs routes. And then we run about eight routes that go out of district to Franklin Central,
Blind School, uh Rise and all of that. So, huh, space bar. All right. So, for additional runs, uh, that's outside of the gened and outside of all that, we run shuttles and all of that. And we run a total of eight of
those. Actually, it's nine now because we have a sit route, which is a student in transition. Uh, that just got added. Um, we have run four buses for Boys and Girls Club. We have a bus dedicated for life bridge every day. Uh, we run an athletics bus for shuttling students. Uh
we run a late bus in the evening every day and uh we run midday buses for rise transitioning from the school to rise. All right. So activity trips, this is where I'm at. Uh we run n uh this is from July of last year to July of this
year. So we ran 916 activity trips last year. So, the majority of them are high school for athletics and then middle school is bringing up the rest of it with uh their athletics and then we of course all the uh field trips for special stuff for Hornet Park, South
Grove, and Central. All right. Okay. So, now here's more of the fleet info. Okay. We run a fleet of 33 buses. All right. Uh buses that are 1 to 5 years old, we have six of them. Uh buses that are 6 to 11 years old, we have 16 of them. And
buses that I can't even read it anymore. 12. 12 plus. I think we have 11 11 of them. I shouldn't have used orange. Uh buses that are 12 years old, they have to go through a byanual inspection. So the state police is a little bit more picky on them and it's kind of telling you, hey, it's time to get them out of the
fleet and get new ones in. And uh we are our bus replacement policy is we run uh two buses every year to kind of keep the fleet fresh. All right. And then just the last breakdown is uh the types and stuff like that. Thomas buses, we don't much use Thomas anymore. We have
activity buses for Thomas and there are old ones. Um IC buses which is international and there are diesel fleet which we are transitioning away from diesel going all gas which is phenomenally better for us. So we have eight of those left. And then our Bluebird fleet which we are moving to
all Bluebird. Uh they're just around the corner. And uh we have 20 gas uh buses and then two older diesel buses. That's pretty much transportation in a nutshell, everybody. All right. Does anyone have any questions about
transportation? Just a comment. It is amazing what this very small group does every single day. You all are extraordinary. this school year, the best launch that we've ever had uh for transportation. Full stop
ever. I I just what you all pull off every single day is extraordinary in my opinion. So, thank you for all that you do. Thank you. We're going to have to have Misty give more presentations. Right. Kevin. Kevin, you killed. Absolutely. So
good. Thank you both. I really appreciate it. All right, let's move into personnel and operations with Mr. Garmin. Uh before I start, uh it's kind of my overview. I just I left transportation
off this week since Misty and Kevin were going to be speaking, but I I would just re reiterate what Dr. Hammock said that um they are amazing over there. No matter what problems arise, no matter what uh things we need to solve, they
are on top of it. They do it with a smile. Uh they're just amazing. I And it has been an amazing start to the year. I don't want to, but it has been a great start. And uh you know, Kevin and I deal a lot with accidents. Not so many this year so far.
But Kevin's amazing. And I will say Johnny too, our mechanic uh has been an incredibly great investment. Um, and the lift that we that we invested in, uh, we are not outsourcing much of any of our mechanical stuff. And I'm just amazed
that every time we have a little fender bender on a bus, Kevin will say, "Johnny can fix it. We don't have to contact insurance." That's always wonderful thing. So, um, I just can't say enough good about my, uh, working relationship with them and what I've observed has
just been nothing but A+ in my opinion. So, we only ever hear positive things about any of our there. There's definitely tough things that come up that Misty and I have worked with, but she does it in a very professional way, and I just appreciate both of you guys. So,
thank you very much. Uh requesting board approval of the submitted personnel report from uh August 8th, 2025 through September 4th, 2025. And then just a few uh highlights from the different areas that um that I
oversee. Um as far as current job openings, I I'm happy to say that we I feel like are getting closer to filling our JRT JOTC instructor position. I did get a email this morning and um they are saying that sometime after September
28th, we should get the the the hire authorization. Um so I'm hopeful that that will happen and then we can get someone in place. Our target is to have the new person in place by the 28th of October, right after fall break. It has been a long
process, as you know. This will be it's getting close to a year that we've been working with this process to try to get this position filled. Um some success stories. Uh we did receive the um this year's K12 robotics competition grant. So that was really
good news. I was a little worried we might not get it this year. they had uh far fewer districts that received it, but we did. So, that's going to allow us to expand robotics um into South Grove. So, now we'll have robotics uh grades 2 through 8, and the goal will be to write
that grant again next year, and hopefully we'll be able to expand it ultimately to the high school. Uh that's the the long-term goal. Um I also want to just publicly thank Crossroad Engineers. They have been amazing supporters of of our robotics. uh part
of the robotics grant is uh you have to get in kind matches. So you have to have a community partner that will match the grant funds and so they've been great. Anytime I ask them um Trent over there is is more than happy to help and so we
appreciate their support. U you know a challenge for personnel right now I think is just as we enter into you know negotiations this year is Dr. Dr. Hammock is always on top of this and does such a great job of just trying to, you know, with financial um
restraints that we have currently uh just being able to provide competitive salaries for our folks and and and get uh raises for them and and just that continues to be a obviously a challenge. So, you know, we are always working on
ways at the central office to um save money in different ways and cost-saving strategies and measures that we come up with that will help that process, but it is difficult and I know Dr. Hammock's working on that now. Uh school safety, a couple things from from Mr. Man. Um the
building needs threat assessment that was done for each building. Uh they have torn that apart. I met uh Mr. Morgan and Mr. man I met the other day just to kind of look at all those needs and now kind of starting to to whittle away at at what we need to get done at each building to make sure that our buildings
are uh continue to be safe and are safer each year. Uh current challenge uh just implementing the new attendance requirements that were put into state law. Uh and again um you know making sure that our handbooks are updated that um the revised our tenants letters are
updated that we are monitoring all of this to make sure that we're in compliance. So that's a little bit of a challenge right now. Uh food service we did have another audit. We food service is probably the most audited thing that you will um ever come into contact with. Food service is
audited all the time. So, we were audited again this summer for our summer food service program and I will be happy to say that we had just one minor finding. So, again, thanks to Clara and her team, they do an amazing job of making sure that we are always in
compliance and it makes my job really easy when we get into auditing because I have everything I need to be able to uh present to the the auditing team from the state. Uh we are getting ready to renew our CACF which is the child and adult care
food program. That's a bit of a tedious process. There's just a lot of uh compliance uh things that go along with that, a lot of documentation and layers of oversight, but we're starting that process right now and um you know it just take a little bit of time but we'll we will be approved.
And from facilities, grounds and maintenance um the football press box has been a problem. I if you you probably haven't been up in there, but we have a we've had a leaking roof for a while. So, I just uh we're getting that addressed and uh AAA roofing has been
amazing. They've offered to donate the membrane for that roof if it needs to be replaced. I think it we're still not 100% sure if it will, but they've also been willing to come out and are coming out to to help us assess it and also help us with the repairs of that roof and uh at no charge. So, just wanted to
acknowledge their support of their schools. And our current challenge um I don't know if it's a challenge, it's also an opportunity. We've we uh as part of the negotiated new contract with HS, which is our custodial services contract. Uh we um added into that
contract some light maintenance at the building level. In the past, the custodial uh folks didn't really do any maintenance at all. It was all through Dale and his team. But that volume of tickets becomes really overwhelming. I I didn't realize that until I took over for Mr. Gearhart and see the the tickets
that come through every day. It is a large value. So, we worked that into the contract. So, we now have a new ticket system where everything will run through the principles and they'll be able to assign it either to HS at the building level or to Dale. Uh, and so we can hopefully we'll be able to take some of that stress off of our maintenance
staff. Uh, and I'll give you just a real quick example. We had a request today to move a desk from one room to another at the high school. that's something that HS can take care of and we don't need to pull our maintenance staff away and just more efficient use of those folks for the bigger things that need to be done.
So, I hopefully this will be a really good improvement and uh you know that we will maximize the that piece of the contract that we have with them and hopefully it won't be too overwhelming to our principles because they're now going to have to see all of those uh tickets and have to assign those either
at the building level or at our corporation maintenance level. So, that's it. Okay. Can I get a motion to approve the employment recommendations as listed? Brian, can I get a second? I'll second. April Lim. All those in favor?
I oppose. Okay. Right into a motion. Right. Can we do these in blocks? Can I get a motion to I'm sorry. I was going to say, can we do these in blocks or do they have to be
separated the budget? I We can do it. like I can just explain a little bit if you want me to about every one of them then you can just do them how however yeah in a block. So the first there's four hearings the additional appropriation hearing the budget hearing bus
replacement hearing and capital projects hearing. Um the additional appropriation uh we had last year when we did the budget uh we had uh two common school loans uh one from 2023 and one from 2024 that did not did not get in the budget
for 2025. Um the first payments were due in 2025. They got paid um but just to be you know good with DGF we need to do an additional appropriation for that. Um the budget hearing process uh as usual
operating referendum we're kind of expecting a slight increase in property tax dollars in 2026. Um assessed values increased a little bit and the legislation to cap the increase on the fund at 3%
came off this year with all of the budget bills that passed. So operating referendum, we expect an increase referendum debt. I don't think there'll be any change. Um we were able to maintain the education fund budget this
year um due to the 2026 tuition support formula. Our operations fund, as we know, it's no property tax because of the circuit breaker. Um so we will be transferring money from education fund to operating
fund. Um the of course debt service pays for all the bonds and leases. Uh we don't have any new bond or leases that we plan on doing in 2026. Um rainy day fund. We don't expect to spend
any money, but I did put a budget in for just in case. Um, and then after the DLGF finalizes our 2026 budget, we expect final tax rates to be increased over 2025 due to the budget bills that
were passed in legislature. Bus replacement, as you just heard from Misty, it's a five-year plan, and we always put two buses every year so that we can replace our aging fleet. capital projects, uh, three-year plan,
and every year we include equipment, technology, and safety for all of our buildings. Um, so that it kind of encompasses everything. And that's it. If anybody has any questions about the budget process. Okay. Can I get a motion to open the
additional appropriation ordinance resolution hearing? I'll make I'll move that we open the additional appropriation ordinance hearing, April. We approve the additional appropriation ordinance for 2025 debt
service and then close the Can I get a second for all of those? Second, Brian. All those in favor? I oppose. Okay. we having the hearing process or am I just approving? I can just go into it.
No. Okay. I get a motion to open the 2026 budget hearing. Motion. Janice, can I get a second? A second. Tara, all those in favor? I. Okay. And Miss Alfred, do we have any public
comment? We did not. Okay. Thank you. Can I get a motion to close the 2026 budget hearing? Janice, I'll second it. Terara again, all those in favor? I oppose.
And bus replacement hearing. Can I get a motion to open the 2026 bus replacement plan hearing? Janice, can I get a second? April. April. M. All those in favor? I
oppose. And again, I'm guessing no comments, Miss Alfred. Okay. Can I get a motion to adopt the 2026 bus replacement plan? Janice, I'll motion to close it too. Janice opening. Janice closing. Can I
get a second on both? All second. Both. Terara. All those in favor? I oppose. All right. Capital projects plan hearing. Can I get a motion to open the hearing? A motion. April M. Second.
I'll second. Janice. All those in favor? I opposed. And I know the answer to that. So now, can I get a motion to adopt the 2026 capital projects plan hearing? I'll move we adopt the 2026 capital
projects plan and then close the hearing. April on both. Can I get a second? Janice on both. All those in favor? Oppos. Okay. And let's move on to Dr. Hammock with
the superintendent update. Very good. Uh so as promised um several months ago, we uh gave the board and community an update on our newly released strategic plan. And I promised the board at that time that you would receive quarterly updates on the
execution of that plan. So we are at at quarter number one extraordinarily enough. Um, so, uh, I'm I'm happy to provide the board this update as well as our community. So, just, uh, letting you all know that on the first day of school, I shared our newly adopted, uh,
strategic plan with all teachers and staff. And since that launch, we have moved into implementation with the creation of our four strategic goal area task forces. Each goal area is being led by a designated facilitator. So, leading
teaching and learning is Mary's story. Leading community engagement and communication is Mitsy Garmin. Our wellness and belonging strategy is going to be led by Amy Reeves and leadership and development is led by me. Uh each
goal area has an established committee of six to 10 members to support the work. Our goal leads have convened twice since the start of the school year. Our first meeting was a planning meeting and that was where we established the cadence of our committee meetings and we
sort of backwards mapped the work needed to reach our year one strategy goals. In meeting two, this was our agenda setting meeting. We developed the actual agendas for each committee's first official meeting. Moving forward, each strategic goal committee will meet independently
with its lead to begin advancing the identified strategies. and our committees will meet in September, November, January, March, and May. Additionally, we are partnering with Education Elements, which was the group that allowed for us to execute the survey, to deploy a new survey that will
be administered this fall and again in the spring. The survey will measure progress on our implementation, and it will provide data to guide our ongoing work. Stakeholders for the survey administration will be our parents, students, faculty and staff as well as
our community members. And this is a very important survey because the results will also support the program reports that we are required to submit to the Lily Endowment as part of our accountability process. We are encouraged by the momentum so far
and we look forward to keeping the board informed as this important work continues. I have scheduled to give the board quarterly updates with this being the first and our next update will be at the December meeting. But in the meantime, if you have any questions for me, don't hesitate to reach out. We are
excited to get this work mobilized. Any questions on the strategic plan? All right, then. So that means that we move into um we have uh new uh statutory uh requirements for any uh curriculum
that is correlated to uh Senate enrolled act 442 which is instruction on human sexuality. The board has been given the curriculum for the I decide for me program and uh the board is is required to approve that curriculum. It is also
required to be posted on our website which uh we have um it is either posted now or Mitzy might be waiting to post it tomorrow but she is aware that that needs to be posted on our website pending your approval. I'll move we approve the I decide to
make curriculum I'll April and Tara all those in favor oppos um Mr. Chalice asks for these three actions. I just wanted to uh take a moment to welcome um two individuals uh that we have joining us tonight. Uh we
have Todd McIntyre and we have Liz Sliger who are both from uh K12 virtual schools, our our new partner uh with our virtual programming and they are here um to uh get to know you, to let you all know that they are absolute partners in
in this work. And uh we have three specific actions tonight that are related to our implementation. And certainly they're here to answer any questions that you all might have. But uh I let them know that you all had received the materials in advance. And um I hadn't heard any questions, but if
you have anything that you would like to offer up to these two individuals, I just really appreciate that they're here. Means a lot. Can I go ahead and get a motion to approve the student handbook as well as the attendance policy and the enrollment policy for the Indiana Digital Learning
School? I'll make a motion. April on all Janice on all. Okay. I'm sorry. We're going to go with Brian on the second. All those in favor? I
oppose. Okay, very good. Thank you. Thank you for being here. April, sorry, I'm getting caught up here. Uh, minutes and claims. Can I get a motion to approve
the minutes from August 12th, 2025? Janice, Tara, all those in favor? I oppose. And can I get a motion to approve the claims for August of 2025? Motion Janice again.
Second. Terara again. All those in favor? I oppose. Uh policy and guideline considerations. Can I get a motion to approve the Neola policy special update? I'll make a motion.
Brian, I get a April M on the second. All those in favor? I oppose. Um, other business, we had a bunch of fundraisers and we had a great um, donation. So, can
I get a motion to approve the fundraisers as well as the donation? Tara, all those in favor? I'm I'm sorry. Let's get a second. I'll second. Janice, all those in favor? Oppose.
And committee reports. Do we have anything from C9? Uh there's not much. There's a student of the month post name to Ivy Green for culinary arts. Um so exciting to see that start up again this year. Wonderful.
And uh you know I I I think that um there there's a little bit of uh of update with respect to the there was a plan to introduce potentially in the future three different um you know sessions uh during the day. that's been
decided to be put on the shelf because they just couldn't make it work with all the schools due to conflicts and transportation and scheduling. Um so it may be something that we talk about next year, but um it was an effort to try to increase enrollment uh and the various
uh um classes that they they offer. And there there's also um been another a couple of sessions on uh the adult education program which I understand is not the public but they are there's some intertwinement with the the funds I guess and so we're working through
trying to figure out a strategy for getting those uh accounts correct you know so we've been working with um Paul Gabriel who's a uh a consultant um and
trying to make those um uh accounts uh correct I guess for the adult education program I see other than that there's not much other than the successful beginning of the school year I mean well so okay uh board member and superintendent
success stories if nobody else has one if you aren't aware out of 40 school districts predominately all larger than us. Our very own Dr. Hammock
was voted superintendent of the year for district. You guys look at that. Oh my gosh, you're so sweet. Oh, you guys. It's so good. Oh my goodness. Okay. And if anybody can top that success
story, feel free. But if not, can I get a motion to adjourn? Tara, can I get a second? My goodness. I'll second. April, Tara, Tara, and April R on the second. All right, we are officially adjourned
at 7:02 p.m. Yay.