--------- Let's go ahead and start. I think we're expecting a couple more people. Um Stephanie may join us online and I know DJ is expecting to show up. So, we will when he joins us, he can join us, but
we'll go ahead and start the meeting. Up first, we have personnel and benefits. Jason, thank you for joining us. And we have a social media policy draft to take a look at. >> You bet. I'll start off uh good morning
everyone. I I'll start off just for an update on our implementation of the Minnesota paid family leave and then I'll ask Carla to join us when we're discussing the other policy on social media. But just kind of a quick update for the board. Um you guys may be aware,
may not, but as of uh January 1st, it's a new state law that will be putting in place um paid family leave and medical leave for all staff, anyone who earns more than I think about $3,900 in a year for an employer. And it provides for um
up to 12 weeks for an individual's medical condition and up to 12 weeks for, you know, family leave, bonding, uh care for family members. Uh up to a max of of 20 weeks total for an individual. Um we're getting letters. Uh the law
requires us to notify each employee. We're doing that. We're getting the letters and posters that'll be up in by Janu uh December 1st. Um, we're going to be using a um an equivalent plan by the that'll be
administered by the company that manages our LTD benefits. So hopefully we have kind of a a coordination of effort there. We also think it'll be hopefully a little bit of a quicker turnaround both for employees and the employer. Um, from what we hear, there's the state has
hired like 17 claims adjusters to adjudicate the entire state of Minnesota. And so, uh, we think we'll have a little better turnaround time through a private plan. >> So, uh, we're just going to be monitor, you know, working on that to get that out to date and and answer questions,
direct people to the deed website, the state agency charged with that. Um, and and then just monitoring the impacts of that. We we think it may have an impact on on attendance. Um but you know it's that is counterbalanced by the additional benefit that's for our
employees and for all employees in Minnesota. So that's just a quick update. Just wanted to see check in and see what questions any of you had. Not that's okay. >> Right. Move on to the next topic if you're okay with that. want to come on
up Carla. So yeah, I mean the what we've got in front of you here today as a first reading I think we have to go through three meet uh readings on our policy new policies here but it is a um social media policy and some guidelines as well
and Carl I don't know if you can kind of give a little bit of the history of where that all came from. Um, I was asked to develop something. There was something actually in the works several years ago when I started in 2016. Never went anywhere. And then Kelly asked me,
"Do we have anything?" And I said, "I do." >> But it's um based, it's been reworked since I first initially did it. It's based on um Moreheads had a really good policy at that, but I looked at like I don't know, there was probably seven different, you
know, I kept going back to other schools They've obviously had social media policies for years, guidelines for years. Um, and it was brought though just I think really the need was
uh employees posting during their um work times and is there you know trying to address that issue as well. >> Yeah. And I'd say a lot of the stuff in here is is I think a lot of people would see it as as common sense, but sometimes, as you know, common sense
isn't all that common. And it also gives us something from an administrative standpoint to kind of hang our hat on and just say, you know, uh these are the these are the rules we need to play by the boundaries that we need to to live within. Um not any particular instance
that has brought this up. It's just we felt it's time to get it in front of the board and get something like this in place. couple couple questions. Um does this affect any other policies that we have? >> It really should be working with
policies we already have. So, um like technology policies I believe and um >> the copyrights uh schoolboard policy on intimidation and bullying,
>> bullying relationships with between staff and students like not blurring that line because social media like if you have a team >> a team page, a sports page and you know or anything just not bluring that line between >> and cell phone policy. Does it I think
we have something in cell phone where we have uh no camera or no cell phone uh supposed to be no cell phones in bathrooms. Correct. >> Yeah. Bathroom. >> Yeah. Locker rooms >> specifically address that. But it does address also like hey if you're say
you're a teacher and you take a picture of your students you shouldn't be posting that online. >> Yeah. >> Um a lot of students have an opt out. A lot of parents have opted their students out as well and we have a list of that but it's just yeah
>> what if it's um taken like in the school you know it's a group of kids that were in choir or >> on their I'm sorry on their personal pages they should be >> they can still post on their school yeah you know or school Facebook pages and
that kind of >> I mean if they have I suppose if they would have permission but it's just kind of a yeah there's a blurry line there. Okay. >> So, you're not just going to let anyone that works at the school post on the school's Facebook? >> No, we have admins for that. >> Okay. >> And yeah, there's specific people set up
at each school >> that administer their page. So, this would be like their personal account. Like I know years ago when I was on Twitter, there there was a person, this isn't any anyone here, this is somebody who lived in South Dakota. She worked at a daycare and she was posting pictures
of her little kids that she watched at daycare. You can't be doing that. >> It's just not something you should do personally. >> Yeah. >> And then one other uh point that I have u wherever it said post in that new
policy. Can we add two additional words to post? Can we add repost or share? That way people understand, okay, I didn't post this. I shared it. Well, no, no, you posted it. Um, let's eliminate that maybe problem and just think about
think about think about that. Jason, >> don't even think about it. Just do it. >> Is that okay? >> What's the big deal? It's the same thing. What? Repost or share? It'sbody same. >> I mean, it's the same thing. >> Yeah. >> Posting something is re-sharing. Posting
>> cover your book. >> It's good feedback. Thank you. We'll work that in. >> Okay. So, >> um, so I have a couple questions also. So, as I read the as I read the policy,
um, it was pretty, it was kind of gray area to me about private postings or personal postings. Um, can you clarify that >> private as meaning your individual as an individual?
>> I mean, as an not on a district page. I wonder if we should we should specify that. I mean, because when I read this, it says employees may not post images on any social media network of students or
co-workers. Should we say personal or >> on your personal page? >> On a personal page or >> and then only district. >> Yeah. Or or even >> district admin or what the exact language is, but
>> yeah. a thought. >> Yeah. So, there's a clear line between what's personal and what's >> And maybe even an example to play off of Michelle, uh, throw an example in there. For example, >> you know, uh, >> yeah, >> if a person
>> I just I just think >> person does this on this on the school district page or if they do it on their own personal, you know, I I don't, you know. >> Yeah, >> I like that. I just think it needs to be really clear that um you know personal versus
district um postings are separate, >> right? And and I think you know >> the other thing >> Sorry, go ahead. >> The other question I had is um has has the lawyer looked at this or have we asked MSBA if it if it's uh um
appropriate? >> No, the lawyer has not looked at it. Yeah, it's a policy from what through MSBA and these varying school districts. >> Their own policy, you say. So, um they don't have a lot of feedback on it.
>> That's why we some other districts. >> No one uses no one uses social media anyways, right? MBA wasting time on something like that. We only got 700. You wouldn't want to have one on something like this, >> but we can certainly run it by our attorney just to give it a good look over as well.
>> It's just getting in front of your eyes. >> Yeah. Good question. >> None of this is unusual. >> If you were a nurse at the hospital, you wouldn't be able to just pop things on. >> The stuff that happened at work today. I mean, it's like >> think the police did it. Nice to see
this one I got last night. >> Yeah. >> It's like it's not this isn't unusual. >> Is there a benefit to um having this go to John? I don't know how quickly he can turn it around before we have it on the actual board agenda. Was it gone for
next week? >> Yeah, >> be nice. >> We got planned. >> Why do we have >> three readings? Three months. >> Yeah, I think we're I mean we we reviewed this with with Ryan and the rest of our administrative team and we didn't see any kind of glaring bright lines like we
got to get this reviewed. But we it's always good practice and I think we've got some time to of course correct. >> Okay. Anything else? >> Good feedback. Thank you so much. >> Yeah. Thank you.
>> Yes. >> Get out of here to do that. >> Stephanie, are you >> I see that you've joined us, Director Ed. >> Yes. >> Oh, wonderful. Um, if you are with us, I apologize, but you'll have to have your camera on.
>> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Well, she doesn't really need to vote. >> Yeah, that's true. >> That's true. >> So, you're all right. >> Yeah, that's fine. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I don't know if that's true. >> I'm not sure. >> All right. Well, we can do that.
>> It's just a workshop. >> All right. So we will move on to our budget discussion. The first thing we have in this discussion is the community survey draft. >> Is it there? >> Yeah, I didn't see any. >> It is now. >> Is it?
>> So um as we were preparing to determine what we want to do with moving down the road on our budget discussion, we thought we should try and get a quick snapshot from the public. And that's all this is is really a litm test. And we we
didn't create this on our own. We stole it from other districts and so forth. But if you look at it quickly, um the idea is to find out what would be the pulse from the community. >> Huh? >> That's this. >> No, it's >> it's an actual survey that would go out.
>> It's not. Okay. >> And so it's got um starts out with do you live in the Brain Public Schools? Uh district boundaries. Do you have children in our schools? which best describes your relationship with the district and then some priorities that
we would want to find out. For example, which are the areas of the district's work do you value the most? And we want them to rank rank those. Um, next one is funding priorities. In your opinion, which of the following should be the should the district prioritize
for funding purposes? And that's a rank vote. And the the whole purpose though is just to get a snapshot of what the public might be thinking as we move down this road. Um it's something that can turn over quickly so we can have at least a
database of and a idea of what the public feels especially those who are directly involved with our schools with their kids. Not meant to be a scientific one. It's just meant to get a quick snapshot.
I like this idea. I like that it's a little more generalized. Um, and that it's quick. Would this be something we put on like the district website or >> we use parent square? >> Square. >> Yeah. Put it on our website. And the
idea would be to get a quick turnaround so we can just find a pulse. How would we I I love that we're getting it out to parents, but I'd also love if it was out in the community as well in some >> It would be when it's on our website. >> Okay.
>> It's not just directed to parents. >> Yeah. I just want to make sure. Don't feel like they missed an opportunity. >> Yeah. >> Oh, yeah. mentioned that we can pay a minimal fee for >> toatch
>> their weekly newsletter or whatever. >> Yeah, there you go. >> Good. >> Can you see it? >> Okay. >> No, I know they're trying to fix that. >> One's from me, but I can't >> Okay. Yeah, we can't see it. So, they can't. >> It's not.
>> Okay. Sneaky. >> It should be what? >> Okay. >> Yep. It's there. >> Wow. >> I didn't know you couldn't see it. >> Yeah. We You're listening though.
>> Yeah. Now, this is simple and concise. >> How many I didn't bring my I forgot my computer. How many uh questions are there? >> Uh there's three sections. Um the next page unless you fill it out.
>> Five questions. Cool. >> Able to >> six. >> Yeah. >> Pretty quick. >> Good. >> Yeah. This will be on the agenda. Does this even need to be an agenda item? >> This is something the school's doing, I
think. >> Yeah. >> Y decision. >> Love it. >> Okay. >> Okay. Great. >> All right. Next. Um, strategic plan. >> Okay. All right. Good morning. Good morning.
So, I'm here um representing our our team uh to bring forward a potential tool to help with decision- making as we move forward with the budgeting process. Uh this came out of uh when we had our twoperson
meetings uh a few weeks ago after some of those conversations. Sarah had shared um a a slide deck with some decision- making options. Um but then we t talked about connecting it to the strategic plan. So how do each of the items on our
list align do not align with the strategic plan? So based on that that slide deck that was shared conversations um um we created a a rubric or a matrix whatever word you want to use of to help
with the decision-m process. So just to look at a couple of items uh starting with the uh matrix itself. Let me see that a little bit bigger. So
this is just a a sample of a draft. And so for example, um one of the items that we're we're coming back to today is the discussion around middle school activities. So that is in the far left column. That's the possible reduction
and then uh the approximate budget savings based on that that item. Then um the next column column three that is the identified strategic plan goal area. So we had four areas um increasing student
achievement, student and staff safety, fiscal responsibility, and student and staff well-being. And then the bottom uh item, community support, um put a little asterk next to that. that's not directly connected to
the strategic plan, but that's been a a topic of conversation at the table of having community support um as as part of our decision-making process. So then across the top um the options
are the alignment. So it's a zero to five scale. So, if I look at the possible reduction middle school activities moving to community ed, and then I'm going to look at how well does that align with our goal area of increasing student
achievement. And I would give it a zero, a one, a two, three, four, or five across that that row. And then I would do the same thing with student and staff safety. So, the reason the strategic plan is is linked um those are those those broad
categories, but our strategic plan dug into some of the details a little bit more. So, that's just there as a reference document. So, on uh page 14 of the strategic plan, I'm going to hop to that.
That gives the the overview of the strategic plan recommendations. So again, um, looking at, for example, goal area number one, increasing, uh, student achievement, there were some items listed underneath that that digs in a
little bit more about what that means. And then the same for item two, three, and four. And then beyond that um it also moves into identifying some of the action steps or the digging into the
plan a little bit more and what measurements we would look for for that for that area. So for example thinking student achievement again uh that starts on page 19. So in goal area uh student achievement
we identified or the the school board identified priorities. So for example priority one was increasing student achievement in reading and then there were some action items measures of success. Goal area priority number two increasing
student academic achievement in math. Some action steps measures of success. And then priority three was uh providing high school students with authentic learning experiences aligned to their career and or passion. So those were
those three priority areas under that broader CA category of student achievement. So then going back to the decision making, thinking about again our three priorities for student achievement based
on the strategic plan, reading, math, and college and career readiness, I would say. So then looking at my reduction, how does that align to to those categories? That's the intent
of this of this option. So, we would look at each item individually. You you could fill out this rubric for each of those items that come to you for consideration. And then, uh there's a a scoring page.
So, I would put my score for each of those categories. I have my total as the individual. And then there's space for for notes or if you have questions or things, additional considerations. and then we can use that as as part of
our potential decision making process to help navigate that conver conversation. So, it's just a potential tool um that that could be for you to use if that's something that would be helpful to to
guide your conversation rather than just, you know, having the yes or no. It's it might help to to dig into that a little bit more. So, is this something the school board would use or is this something the leadership team would use? >> The school board.
>> The school board. >> I think this is you. >> This is >> Yeah, I don't think we're going to use it. >> I mean, you you guys know all the ins and outs of all the different kinds of
um potential programs that we might have to cut. I just I mean I think >> you don't want us doing it. >> Sure she does. >> Well, here's the here's the deal then. You're Are you telling us whatever
we bring forward, you're going to approve? >> No. >> Then you should be involved in the scoring of the value of what we bring forward. >> Yeah, that's my opinion. >> All right. Well, you you have an opinion. I get to have one, too. So, it's all right. You can have different
opinions. Um, well, I don't know how anyone could ever say that whatever plan you bring us, we're going to be 100% behind. I mean, I don't know. Maybe maybe maybe it'll be maybe maybe I don't know, but I haven't seen a plan. So, it's hard to say yes, I'm for it before you bring it, but I would certainly
support you. I would think I would think most of it would be fine. I mean, what if you said you're going to close all the elementary schools? Would I supposed to say yes on that? I think I'd have to be a no. So, that there you go. You know, it's like it's kind of a it's a tough one, Peter. >> Yeah, I know. Yeah, I'm behind you.
>> But I think the important part though is we need to know what you value as you look through this rubric of does this fall in line with this the strategic plan? Yes or no? Of what that document is supposed to
support. >> Is the strategic plan like set in stone? Isn't the strategic plans? Aren't they supposed to move all the time? Because we did it three years ago now and it hasn't had any adjustments to it. So it just stay 23 to 28. It's supposed to be >> that's how it is >> plan >> cuz I'm looking at these things we're
going to do and you know these literacy scores and stuff and our math scores are slipping and then I look at our how we're going to fix it and looks like we should probably make some adjustments to me looking through here whatever I can do this when are we going to do this
>> I don't know this afternoon >> that's what the discussion is for >> why can't why can't both groups do it >> well we could I think We have to be really careful here though. Um there's recommendations and then there's
the drivers. Okay. You guys are the are the decision makers and the question is going to be are you expecting us to bring forward the things that we think fit into whatever the plan might be and either
you're going to say yes or no. And you know to kind of cut to the chase then I guess my question really is for the board is on the original document we did with potential reduction ideas and so forth and then we colorcoded them and we
did all that work. Are there items on that list right now that you say absolutely no? Because if there are we should know that so we don't waste our time going after those. >> We just filled one out. No, that was just Well, it's not consensus though,
Randy. It's not a consensus. What what I'm talking about is, for example, if we're going to look, we'll just stick with middle school activities. If you feel that's an absolute no, we can't then let's quit bird dog in that. Okay, I'll
give you example. So yesterday we met with um Josh and Jack and the concept of what we originally started out with we thought okay we can just move everything over to community ed was much more complex than that first of all fifth grade is more intural. Sixth grade
becomes more um activity against others and then seventh and eighth grade is full competitive against other schools and that the dollars then change dramatically but all the dollars are all based on personnel for the most part.
Travel a little bit and then you try to weigh the pros and the cons of do we want kids to be active? Yes. Can community ed manage a 58 program? probably not right away because that
takes time to set up. And when we first the last board meeting, you know, we asked you for a charge two things activities for 58 look at the high school thing. Um that was 5 to one to do the charge.
But as we dig into this, we have to have a commitment. Do you want that on the table or not? If you don't want on the table, that doesn't bother us. Take it off. And you because you say we don't want to take out activities at the middle school and move them over to community yet because it's
>> it's either going to be too impactful and it's not going to be enough to make a difference or is it going to drive kids away because they don't have the competitive edge that we thought they were going to have that we want to have? Because as you know, seventh and eighth grade, those are the feeder programs for
912. So it goes from either what it is or it goes more to a kind of an interural thing and then see if the associations in the community are going to pick up the difference of competition. >> I'm just wondering if it's fair that we
get this this um possibility move middle school activities to community ed, but we don't have the benefit of those other discussions. um and and yet we're still supposed to make a decision based on this. Th this
just seems really um not the best use of our time. I guess I would prefer that the school, the administrative team who really understands the impacts of all
these possible reductions brings that to us. I mean, one of the questions we were asked is, do we approve of reducing busing outside of the district? >> I don't even know what that means. Well,
and my thought was, how many kids are we picking up outside of the district that are open enrolling into our district? If we reduce busing, what kind of impact does that have on our student enrollment? So, it this is this is complicated. And
>> what would be wrong? What what just straighten me out, which I'm sure you will, is um what what would be wrong if let's just say that you came up with a plan. I understand you're kind of whatever the absolutely nos that makes perfect sense. Don't waste your time on it. >> Yeah. >> But
>> the here's my question. What would be wrong if you guys came up with a plan >> and you brought it to us and there's 20 different reductions on there and everybody was perfectly fine with 16 of them and there's four of them that hey we got to make a different plan on these four. Wouldn't that help a lot? Be 75%
done. >> Well, that's kind of what we presented already on that colored bar. >> It's really not. I mean, if you're asking me to vote whether I want to close uh building A, B, C, or D, I don't even know what the hell they are. So, how am I supposed to go with that? I don't understand what that is. It makes no sense to me.
>> So, during the meeting, we said those are the lowest enrollment elementaryaries. And >> fine, I know I was at the meeting, but I mean, >> and I think not all of them have not everything on that list has the same impact. And so even being able to organize them by
this, you know, this h is the furthest away from the student starting at the top and the least amount of impact all the way down to our recommendation would be to not touch these if we don't have to. I think, you know, we're we're not
the experts in the room on any of that. And for myself, and I can only speak for myself, I I support the expertise that would make these recommendations. They're they're not anything any of us want to do. Um, a lot, you know, a lot
of things on the list are are painful and I don't want to make those in a vacuum. I don't I don't want to when we've got experts that know what kind of impact that's going to make, I think we should lean on that. Can I just say so I think the reason why
we went down this route is because every time that something new has been brought up here we've tried to address it. You know we want to see how it's prioritized. So we did that with the color coding and then you had brought up like it would be nice to have a decision matrix. So we're so we're just trying to get to a point where we can start
getting some answers because we have a list. We we have ideas. We've presented them. >> So do you want to go through every item on your list and we all vote on it? Well, we've tried we've tried that. I mean, we've we went through the list. >> We tried that. What have we done that? >> When we did two on two, we went through
the list, tried to get feedback. Some said what they cared for, what they didn't. But if that's what today, like if you want to go through the list and we go through and say this is what everyone feels and we're not going to move forward, that would be awesome. We're just trying to get to a point
where we can have an idea of what you guys would support. So to clarify, if I were to look at that list, it's ordered from top to bottom. Here's top. These are the least impactful to bottom. These are the most
impactful. And we that would be your recommendation. Like the the reductions on that list, if we were to say move that forward, we're good with it. >> We prioritized by the color was timeline. We need to have a, you know, a timeline on those ones that are like, we
should have done this yesterday. >> But all of those things have been ideas generated from the team, right? They're not >> Yeah. My concern is that we're >> we got so much data and we got so many damn ideas come flying at us that I don't even know where to begin to be
honest with you now. Um I'm kind of a a gut feeling type guy as well, but yeah, I like data. Um, I think sometimes we get too much data and then we just >> you're looking and >> like a deer in headlights. So,
>> I like to get moving. >> I have Ry's, John's, and Stephanie's response to the things that we listed. >> I filled mine out this morning. >> I filled my >> Was it a day late and a dollar short? >> Well, you did. No one called me and told me it was in there. I'm sorry. I go home at 5:30 last night. What do you want me to do?
>> But I'll just because that's the only ones I had on right away. I'll just tell you for example on building A was no maybe and yes if it's Westby
um building B all no building C all no building D all no so if three out of the six are saying no on closing buildings let's take it off the books >> but no one knows what buildings they are Peter >> you're not you're calling them ABC D who does
>> the lowest enrollment buildings in our entry. >> Well, that isn't enough for me. >> Do you know that you know who they are? >> Are you okay? Stop. >> Which one's it? >> Harrison, Garfield, and L. >> Doesn't matter. >> Yeah, it does. Doesn't mean >> Well, then you that's the direction you
should give us is if it's >> Harrison. The answer is no. If >> but let's just go for a little bit of clarity. All right. Mhm. It really started out with four buildings, but we already know there's an inefficiency
in operations for Harrison, Garfield, and L purely on population of students. In 2018, there was a promise from that board to keep neighborhood schools.
Okay? I don't know what the populations were at that time and it doesn't matter right now but today matters. So the question is are you willing to allow those neighborhood schools to still operate even though their populations are shrinking and are you willing to wait to
see does become a critical point at some time down the road that we will have to make a difference in one of those four schools. This was a kind of a outsider because it's way to the north and that probably doesn't fit into the picture, but the other three do. And they're
averaging about 225 to 240 kids. You've got Riverside almost at 480 and you got Baxter almost at 500. Mhm. >> So in this concept, the idea is if you're looking for efficiency and saving dollars, are you willing to close any
elementary school that is significantly lower in population than the other ones? If you're not, that's fine. But then let's get it off the let's get it off the board so that we >> put fifth grade back in those schools. >> You can't because it doesn't fit in all the buildings.
>> What do you mean? >> Some of them aren't big enough. >> They're not big enough. They don't have enough room. How many are >> one? >> One or two. >> But can you see our confusion when we're asked to vote on that, but we don't
really know. >> Let me let me just Can I clarify one thing quick? Yes. Go. >> So, what you're telling us is that we got a school built for 425. We have 225 kids in there, >> but we don't have room to put fifth grade in there. And so, how are we supposed to explain this to the public? How are you going to explain it to me?
because it doesn't make any sense to me. I I mean, I'm sorry. I don't know. John, do you get it? Uh I I I I don't understand. You got 200 empty seats in the school and we we probably have what 50 60 fth graders per school kind of
sort of. But what do you got 450 fifth graders? 400 fifth graders. Is that right? >> The six schools. I mean, am I thinking right on this? We're like 70 kids a school and we got 200 empty seats and we don't have room. Where do you where do you get the 200 empty seats?
>> Right here. >> 185. >> I I asked for enrollment uh final enrollment uh uh for May of 2025. And just for example, and this based on blueprint 181 numbers, okay, building wise, not what the population of the
school was, but we're going to build these schools and this is how many available seats we're going to have. I mean, even Baxter, the available seats is 625 and we've got an enrollment at the end of 25 at 512. Riverside 625 available seats. School
enrollment 405. Now, that may have gone up a little bit. These are numbers from the end of 25. So, I mean, there's empty seats out there. And if if we're saying that there's one classroom that's got two kids in it, well, we're full. Well,
that makes no sense either. >> Randy, go through the low. The ones we're talking about LOL, Garfield, >> uh Garfield is that available seats under blueprint 181 was 425 and we have a school enrollment at the end of 25 of
248. So, we have 177 empty seats. Low 475 uh with an enrollment at the end of 25 of 357. So, we have 118 empty seats. Uh Harrison is at 375
available seats and school enrollment is 232 availability of 143 as far as empty seats. These are numbers provided by the school district. They're not mine. >> They're not mine. I didn't make them up. >> And you have to remember those were when they were being built, right? That's what they were being built at. But then
we actually got in the buildings and we're using them. And that's kind of why also Peter has said go walk the buildings because then you can see how it's actually being used. Right. So, in other words, we didn't follow blueprint 181. >> Not saying that, Randy. I'm I'm saying
walk through the buildings because maybe there's a different sped population now than there was in that year. I I I'm just >> And that's where I'm going because, you know, some people will say, "Well, our school building is full and we've got a couple classrooms that have two kids in
>> because they're in specialized programming." >> Is that efficient use of of of space? >> We don't have a lot of choice in some of that, Randy. It's not always >> for the significant disability of the student and what they need, >> you know, and the other thing is my
question would be >> because I wasn't part of that. >> Yeah. >> Is that based on today's present seat targets >> because one of the things we've we've worked on is especially for K3 is keeping them in the upper teens and low
20s. Okay? We've been trying to do that, but if we're going to address that as far as space within the question about raising seat counts should be yes and not no >> and that was I mean ad that was an adamant no do not raise seat counts. I'm
going to also offer this. The premise of moving fifth grade back to elementary schools is based on the probability of keeping enrollment from students that go from fourth grade to fifth grade and not losing them uh to surrounding districts.
We've mined the data from MDE. We have about 2% of our students that go other places from fourth grade to fifth grade. So, we're making big decisions based on 2%. When we could be talking about using the available space we have for
increasing early childhood programs, which are revenue generating, >> but we're not even selling that out now, Carrie. >> Keeping keeping fifth grade in elementaryaries is not revenue generating. It's going to cost money to be able to do that. So, if that's the priority then and you're asking for
information, this is the information. It's not likely going to generate revenue. adding early childhood will generate revenue. >> But we haven't answer me this. How many seats do we have for early childhood and how many do we have full? Because what I understand we're about 50 short. So what
good do you what do you >> We are 22 short and it's based on space. If we had more space, we would sell those 22 spots. >> I thought you already had the space. And how are we short then we're back? >> Because we did not expand to Riverside this year. If we would have expanded to
Riverside, we would have had more space. Welk is full. There isn't more space to add early childhood spots. >> And that's why that's why when I was talking to Jill at at Riverside, she said, "Ah, I don't want fifth graders. I want I want I want fourth I want the four-year-olds."
>> And you should want that, too. They're revenue generating. Keep kids in preschool, they stay. >> But but but for me to walk around all the schools, I've done it. I've been there. I had a meeting with the people at at uh uh uh BLC. Spent a half an hour there. I learn more in a half an hour
than I would walking around schools five times or longer. I don't need to walk around schools. I'm not saying I shouldn't, but I don't need to walk around schools to understand what's going on. >> Okay, just to to maybe back out of this a little bit and bring us back to the
original ask was, you know, this list of do we close do we close a building? And I think, you know, my perspective on that is, are we protecting student achievement by doing that? If I look at that laundry list of things that you guys put in
front of us, is is closing a building less impactful than some of the other things on the list to student achievement. That's the lens that I'm hoping our administrative team is
looking at and then making a recommendation. here's what we recommend that would have the least amount of impact on student learning and student achievement. I I would support that. I'm not going to say, "Yeah, I'd love to close the
building or heck no." Because if in your opinion that is something we can do and still preserve the student experience and student learning, I am open to that. I don't love it, but I'm open to it. I personally am not in favor of closing
any buildings right now. >> Well, except for maybe this one. Would you be in favor of that? >> Um, we're talking about the the elementary schools. >> Well, no, we're talking about building A, B, C, D. >> Yeah, I don't know. >> Peter said this is one of them. >> Oh, well, >> but he said it on his list.
>> Yeah, >> he's one of them. >> Yeah. >> I mean, why don't we I mean, would would you be adverse to that, Sarah? I I mean >> if we can make this work with like the red house and then there's we got some empty spaces around make it make sense.
Another thing I've noticed and Marcy's going to kill me but whatever. We got to get this over with is I don't see any administrative cuts. And if I'm in the public watching what's going out the school district, I'm pretty disappointed when every single thing is cut is got to hurt teachers,
students, all the people that are working with the kids and then the people that are at the ivory tower for I shouldn't say that, but at Wesby there's there's I don't see the cuts. I mean, I saw one clerical cut. So, is
that at a school? Yeah, it's at a school. So, there's nothing changing for our administration. >> And I'm just gonna respond to that. I presented, the auditors have presented. We are administratively thin. And so, yep, there may not be admin cuts on
there, but it's because we are already thin. And >> why do you think that is? You think that's because we we're signed up for too many other outside things and take all this paperwork that you have to hire people to do, or what? What is the deal? We have, I think, gotten by with what
we've had and not there has been ads throughout the years in admin. I mean, we talk about how HR never used to be a thing. So, but we're still low. I we just haven't been properly staffed. And so, I got that feedback from someone who
went to the chamber event, too. And I'd love to go back there and say that information. I I got the feedback that why is there no admin cuts? I I will share data that shows we are admin like we are thin on admin. So sure we can throw an admin cut on there but then how
do you expect people to operate like that it takes people in Wesby to operate the district? Well, it's >> you know great the uh some of the other information that we've got from ISD uh
FA um from um Andy Rangen uh from um the combination of those you know indicate um um some other options that I don't see addressed as well. And one of the things I'd like to say and matter of fact in in that report in those reports
um it talks about admin costs. I think five years ago were about six million and currently they're about 10 million if I'm if I remember that exactly. I don't have it in front of me but um so that's one thing I want to say. The
other thing I want to say is this. Um, we have a reserve fund. Um, and some people call it a rainy day fund, whatever the state calls it, a rainy day, whatever. There's a reserve fund. And, um, I'm personally I'm in I'm
in support of, uh, a lot of what the other area schools are doing, um, especially rural schools as they are in a financial crisis as well. and they're re they're using their reserve um to try
to balance until we can figure out a fair and equitable funding formula which may be miraculous but um you know how much can we go in our reser you know like I know that uh um you know Crosby's was is down uh under 7% or about 7%
reserve um and part of their uh their success in their operating levy was to uh you know try to get it back to um you know what's recommended by the state. So Marcy, how much could we go? How much
could we use of a reserve um to um alle to um help with the cuts because when I look at these cuts, I look at the big numbers. If we if we're going to nickel and dime this thing, we're going to destroy the the whole system because we
can't do it that way. We have I have to look at the big numbers. To me, that's that's less impactful than doing nickel and dime cuts. So, how much what couldn't we start with reserve and say um okay, let's get our reserve
down to what is sod when you when you have to go to sod is that under five >> two and a half% so 2.5 million. >> Okay. Two two. So, we got a long ways to go till then. However, um so let me just ask you that question. What what could
we do to get to use the reserve in anticipation of looking forward to maybe a um a potential operating levy uh referendum um next year. Uh you know, we got to think we got to think in the future. I mean, that that's what this
whole thing is about. And so for now, uh, the reserve seems to me that, um, need needs to be used, uh, rather than nickel and dime or impact student and staff anymore. I'll just leave it at that. And Marcy, maybe you can help help
me with that. >> John, were you listening in on my office the other day? Because that was going to be my second point was if you could tell us what's off the table. And the other question I was going to ask is what is the board willing to dip into to make a
difference in the reduction. So you and I are on the same page is how much of the reserve are we willing to use to soften the blow? And before you answer that question in the strategic plan
under goal number three for fiscal stability examine opportunities for capital and operation operational levies. Examine opportunities with alternative facilities funding. Examine opportunities for increasing revenue for instructional programs and
co-curriculars. Provide the board and community with information learned from regarding the above mentioned opportunities. And pursue financing options as prioritized. The district has not done any of those since 2018.
>> That's not true. >> We just took we just got the facility money. What are you talking about? applied for that and got that. So >> that was because we went to 1.5. >> Well, we didn't have to take that. >> That was optional, >> right? >> So we have done some of those. Well, that's one. I'm just saying we didn't
>> at the time we didn't qualify until this. >> I understand. But I mean, we weren't members. The deal was we were find out maybe we shouldn't take it and it was a you know. So here I know this is a this is not going to be easy and I've told all the schools this is going to be ugly and it's going to be uncomfortable and so
forth but at least two things could help us all of us. What's off the table and how far on the reserves would you be willing to go? If you can answer one or two that's helpful. >> Well we went three this year. >> We're going three this year right?
>> Yeah. >> Yep. So we went three. So we're going to be down to 10. Well, and we talked about, you know, we had typically come in better because we budget conservatively. >> So, you budgeted 36. >> So, I mean, it could be less than the three. Okay. >> And that's that's something you guys
have to take into consideration, too, when we talk about how much should we dip into the reserve. If we end better, that's good. But if we don't, >> then it could dip into the fund balance that much. That's I expressed my concerns about that yesterday is if we
say I'm okay with going into the reserve 2 million. Um but we typically end better. So I'm going to say 3 million but but we don't end better then we are going to dip into the reserve 3 million. So you have to think about all those factors.
Well, and the other thing too, Peter, I think uh hit on uh hit it right on too, is we in the past, this board has talked about um capital capital levy um you know, we we've talked about a number of other revenue generating uh ways that we
haven't that we haven't pursued. Um even if it's like uh Carrie mentioned um uh um you know early childhood being a um um money raiser for us and there's other um there's other ways to look at generating uh uh dollars significant
dollars to uh that we haven't used. So that in my opinion also should be part of the discussion. >> What would that be, John? >> What do you mean what would that be? Well, you just got done saying there's there's other uh avenues to generate large amounts of revenue. What what are
they specifically? Uh, one of the things that I've proposed and and and turned into all of us is that uh we we look at uh creating a um um both for the students and for the
community. Um a daycare operation at the high school as a service learning class um run by students um and and uh would would would uh would serve as a source of revenue for us.
I know I put that on my list, so you you've probably seen it. >> A couple other things that I I want to address, too. We talked about, you know, you guys have sent information that was from chat GPT or AI, and some of that information is not accurate. Um,
>> restricted funds, I suppose. Well, and I'm not an expert on chat GPT, but I am sitting next to one who seems to be. >> But when we looked at some of that data, it I mean, it talked about a number of principles and assistant principles that we don't have.
>> I talked to Andy, asked him if he'd be willing to sit down with you, and he said he would because I told him, I said, "There's going to be things that your computer isn't realizing. We can't just move that money from that person to that person because it's restricted, >> right?" which you know it's taking me a while to figure out
>> and one of the documents shared I tried to look up the source doesn't website doesn't go anywhere and then I tried to look up another source and it doesn't even relate to the data that was presented um another data point that was shared it it it's just not accurate um
it talked about administration and it had speech pathologists in that group like that to me is not administration I'm sorry but so >> it also listed administrators we my head since >> yes2 that information you guys are sharing there has been a couple of good ideas
that has come out of it but I want you to know that there's also a lot of inaccurate information in there >> yeah and and therein I mean you guys are the experts that's why that information was shared so that you could >> why are you coding why are we coding uh teacher prep and admin
>> we are not >> well that's what those 27 people are because I dug into it >> it's all from MD >> people are we don't have teacher prep people. Yeah. >> Well, you're coding the expense to that. That's why everything >> So, a teacher, >> that's what MDE says. That's what the state of Minnesota. That's where the stuff came from.
>> So, a teacher who's coded to math >> is coded to math 100%. There is nothing coded to admin. There may be data points where they're submitting what their time prep is and that's broken out. But coding wise, they are 100% math. They're
not. Well, the answer I have is that uh a percent of school districts have all done this. >> Not sure why. >> And if we were >> not the only school district that's all of a sudden put this teacher prep in admin. >> And if we were that would mean that we
were wolffully under an admin then. >> Yeah. >> Because we're already under an admin. So if we're coding teacher prep there then yeah >> I'd like to get back to what Peter had said earlier. We need to decide what is important on this sheet and what's not
important. Uh my fear is that we're not going to move forward very fast. We're going to slow this down and somebody's oh well we can't do that now. We can't do this now. Can we at least do that?
We don't have to vote on anything, but let's give Peter an idea of what's important on this piece of paper and Marcy and the rest of the staff. At least they have an idea. I mean, >> so I would like to piggyback on that. I
I'm okay with saying these are things that we're not willing to discuss. We don't want on the table, but okay, moving fifth grade to an elementary I just learned today that only 2% of our
fifth graders leave um if they don't go to So I that so there's so many variables in all of these items. I would I can see just getting our list of things we're not willing to consider and then maybe going back to the admin team to weigh in on
the rest of the items that we don't have all the information but they can give us the information. Can you give a 2%? Can you give a number of students >> instead of a percentage? >> 2% of 400 students. >> It doesn't matter. Okay.
>> That that's I mean Jason showed me these numbers the other day. How about the ones that didn't even go to school in kindergarten here because they were already worried about it. Does count? >> Well, >> I don't know. 48. >> I was just curious what 2% was. So, okay. >> We lose a lot because they have different prek programs than we do.
>> I don't know. If if we can just >> bring it back. The the very first two items on the charge was middle school activities, high school plan. Talking with Josh and Jack,
um their concern is that if we would do that and move it to community, what would the programs look like different from what they are today? If they're not going to be if they're going to be non-competitive outside of the community, what's that
going to mean to the activities that those kids would participate in? Would we would we want the associations to take over? And what would that look like? The 420,000 that we thought we could save becomes really difficult because we weren't clear about what does fifth
grade do, what does sixth grade do. We kind of know what seventh and eighth grade do. They are revenue generators, but they're also expenditures. And the concern is, and we all kind of worry about this, if we moved it, are we going to lose kids or not? I've had four
parents tell me if there's no activities from middle school, we're going someplace else. >> Yeah. >> Oh, no question. >> And I understand that, but is how >> Well, let's take it off the list. I'm >> Well, I'm for that. >> That's all I want to know. >> That's all I want to know. I think you
guys have to realize that >> multiple oh multiple items on that list we could lose kids. I mean that's the whole list we could lose kids. So if that's going to be your stance is there's a potential we could lose kids then does that mean the whole list is >> out the door. That that's our struggle.
>> Why is it a take it or leave it? >> Not a take it or leave it. >> Well yes it is because it's either 420,000 or it's zero. How about we restructure how the Josh is doing his deal and maybe Josh has had another job plus that job or maybe Jack takes a little bit of it over. We hire somebody
way cheaper and so we save a hundred,000. Is there is anyone look This is what's bothering me about this. >> So that's last month you approved us >> diving deeper and that's what we're doing. We're running data. We're trying to get this is how much the program >> So we really can't make a decision on that one.
>> Right. Right. so on the same page, >> but you're in support of us going further. That's the whole point is like, should we be spending time on this? Our time is precious. We need to know what we should and shouldn't be spending time on because if we do all this work, come to the table, and it's like, I don't
know why we even brought it up. That's the whole point of this. Well, we are all one big team and if we don't work together, we're going to have problems
and uh we need to start moving forward, making some decisions. >> I agree. And I think that we can support you guys with what you what your recommendations are. You're the ones that are here every single day. You know a lot more about than we do. Um, I would like to see some, you know, when we when
we already know that our cost per student on like health insurance, Jason and I have talked about it, is $2,000 a kid and the state average is $1,000 a kid and we have 6,000 kids, that's $6 million a year. Where are the reductions there? Oh, that's negotiated. Okay, fine. Are you going to negotiate it out
or are we going to cave? What are we going to do? And there's a lot of money there that people like me anyways I have a tough time getting behind a levy knowing that Brainard schools are spending six million. You know, let's say that the staff is pitching in third.
Okay, so that's $4 million a year. So we're spending $4 million a year more than our neighbors are at $400 a student. We won't even go there. That'd be 10 million, right? So, let's just say that we're spending $4 million a year extra on benefits that our competition
isn't. How do we go to the public and say we need more money? Like, I have a tough time. And that those are big numbers. Like, that that right there solves our whole deficit for the year. It's all gone just like that. Um, are we going to lock down? What is our plan with health insurance? Are we going to
say this is the end of our contributions? The increases have to be passed off. Like, I know that there's contracts we're in that won't be up until next year. That's the way we have to go forward because >> Jason, how much was our health insurance renewal? Six and a half >> percentage or
>> percentage? >> Yeah. Well, that's our 10ear average. >> Okay. So, 6 and 12% and the state gave us two and a half. We're backwards. So, what are we going to cut? We going to cut things for the kids? We going to cut students or teachers? Are we going to make the class sizes bigger? What are we going to do? This is simple stuff. like
we can't continue to do what we did back in the 80s, 90s, and 2000s, I guess, because it's gotten out of control. And so, we have to make these decisions. And I don't see those on the list. I can give you a solid yes on that, right? And I'll back you up until the burn the
hulls down. You know, like, you have to do that. We have to stop this problem from carrying on. Um, you you didn't do this. You didn't get us in this boat. You know, it's for sure you didn't, Peter. I didn't either, by the way. Um, but we have to face the music and we
have to deal with it. >> So, what you're talking about is in the blue category on the list. It is on the list. We just don't have a dollar amount that we can put towards it yet. >> Um, but everything on the list is what we are currently working on. And what
we're telling you is where should we focus our attention? >> And same with closing a building. Like we're not saying tell us we're we're closing a building. If you are in support of us exploring that option, we can explore it just like activity. I >> think you have to.
>> I think you have to. Don't you? >> Okay. So just an example. So Teresa, it's not for Don't write this down as forbidden. Get me in trouble. I'll have to move. Um let's say we're going to close an
elementary school. Here's going to be the process. We'll go through the demographic stuff. We'll come up with the numbers and so forth. Say, doesn't matter if it's 6:30 or 4:30, whatever. If you say, "Okay, let's do that." You're going to have to have a public hearing to take input from community
first and foremost. >> And then you're have going to say, "Well, okay, if we do this, we have to redesign the boundaries because let's say it's Harrison. whatever the boundary is for Harrison, those kids are going to get absorbed someplace else. So then you have to
redesign those boundaries and then decide where are those Harrison kids going to go because there won't be a boundary for Harrison anymore. And the that's you have to get that done ASAP because once you do that the other
parts of that start to take place is got to start figuring out transportation for that change in boundaries. Are there other ramifications in the change of boundaries that impact walking, busing, um, classroom size at wherever they're
going to get melded into and then getting those other two schools prepared for those other new kids and how we going to do it equitably so that let's say there's 200 kids at Harrison just to keep it simple. You're going to want 100
and 100 to split to keep it balanced. The question is going to be in this and the 100 100. What happens if there's four siblings in this that should two go here and two go there to balance. You have to be careful. So the hard part about that and
it happens all the time. Closing schools is not new to anybody in the in the state of Minnesota. You just don't say fine close it. There's a lot of process that has to take place. What are you going to do? Then you have to look at where's the staffing going to go because you don't if you're not going to raise seat counts those staff have to follow
the kids. Okay. And that's going to take time for us to understand and there will be elimination of some kind of FTE. Doesn't matter if it's administrative, secretary, custodial, whatever, principal, whatever. Oh, I said administrative. So
the question is going to be do you want that to happen or not for us to investigate? If you say yes, we'll investigate. >> So, we all filled out this spreadsheet >> and when it looks at closing buildings, >> it was no. >> It was all no.
>> When it middle school sports, three of us said no. Two of us said maybe. >> Right. >> Um, >> are my numbers on that? >> Your yours are on here. Sarah's are not. So, um, >> I said yes to everything. I think it's all on the table. >> Okay. You said yes to everything. Okay.
So, I mean, is this document worth looking at? >> That's what we're trying to figure out. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Is it valuable to all of us or is it just a gut feeling? >> Well, like I said, the building thing, the building situation is
I there's a couple buildings I think we should close and I don't know which ones you're talking about, so it's tough for me to answer when it's ABCD. That's I guess maybe my fault. I didn't realize that there was a correlation that equal those schools was this was A and this was B and this was C. But I mean I think
you probably know where I want to go. But >> or do you want >> I would be yes. I would be yes on building >> or do you want to wait until it's critical because of the change in population? Because I'm going to tell you this right now. In 5 years, there's
going to be a lot less kids in this district than there are right now if if the trends are accurate >> because Jason brought us some really good information. This year's kindergarteners are the first group of kids out of CO
and we're downund and some kids since co that ripples through for 13 years. The question is going to be what's next year's kindergarten group count going to be? It could be if we got lucky could hold the same. I'm guessing it's going to be less because there were less
babies being born coming out of 2020. There were less babies being born 2021, 2022, 2023 because we went from 2.25 to 1.85 household births. that takes 13 years to go through unless
something changes again where younger people begin having children again or they don't delay their their decisions. But right now, we don't have a stream of revenue coming in because of our increased population. It's going the
other direction. The 181 had no clue that was going on. They thought we were going to have another thousand students in what, five years. >> Mhm. we're going the other direction. >> So, the financial stability is out the
door compared to what was thought of to what we are today. So, we have to re-evaluate and um do you do it now and maybe you should do a demographic study and find out really exactly where are our kids at for
the next five years? Because if we're going to be down another 150 kids over the next five years, at $15,000 a pop, >> that's a ton of money. >> Yeah, it is. >> And that is going to force closures of
something. So, do you want to wait until you get more data to do that? You want to say go ahead who go ahead and dig into one and see what happens? Because when you close a school, it is we can talk about the
data side of it. It is 100% emotional >> because you're going to have some that say, "Great, I don't live in that neighborhood anyway." And others are going to go over my dead body. >> Correct. >> Yeah. And I think we've been through that as a district. And for me, it's not
it's not in a vacuum. It's on it's on the table because for me, if we don't do that, then then where are we restructuring? What's the tradeoff? and how does that impact student achievement in student learning?
>> And I don't know that >> and I hope your team does >> and I'm relying on and will support that recommendation. >> There is going to be some significant right sizing that's going to take place. >> Well, what you're saying Pet is it's it's
>> the running's on the wall. We know what's coming. >> You know, it's like the hurricane coming. Are you going to go put the plywood up on your windows? You just going to wait till you see it out the door and then start running to the hardware store, you know? So, isn't it all the time that we should be going through everything and just getting lean
trying to get rid of all, you know, frivolous spending? And does it make sense to you? >> Well, of course it does. I wrote down four things I explained to these this group the other day. Uh what financial decisions can we make right now that we don't need your approval? >> Yeah.
What activities do we need do we do that are that cost time andor energy and money that we could stop right now? >> Randy, you mentioned the other day about a hiring freeze. Maybe that's what we got to do unless it's a critical position.
>> And I put down freeze all budgets. Evaluate what is critical and what we can do without starting whenever. >> Yeah. We're already talking about for having Jeff look at how you know if we lower the temps in this winter months
raise the temps in the air conditioning months how much can we save our goal would be 10%. I don't know how much that is because we're still waiting for the data. But there's some things we can do right now that we we can just tell, hey, this is over. But the the difference is going to be some people going to say,
"What happened to that?" We're not doing it anymore. You know, it's the way it goes. We're not going here. We're not going there. We're not doing that privilege. Whatever it is, we can do that. You don't have to tell us to do it. We'll just come back and say,
"Here's what happened. We stopped this because >> please, >> it's frivolous." Happy days to make you go. >> Please do it. >> Yeah. So, I want you to know this isn't >> the direction you can provide us at least for saying don't go there would
help with all the other things we want to accomplish. >> You got our little chart. >> Y >> um >> can we what do you want us to follow? That >> I I would be fine with it. I I I >> because I that would make us all exhale a little bit.
>> Well, can I clarify then? So only uh items that everybody agrees no on are the ones that we shouldn't talk about. Or is it a majority of board members that agree on that we shouldn't? >> It's just a more majority. >> I think it should be the majority. Yeah. >> Okay. Cuz that makes our life easier.
>> Yeah. I I know for sure for me that those buildings that I put no no on I'm Yes. Yes. On a couple of them. >> Uh you you put maybe. I think. >> But I put maybe. That's because I don't know what buildings there. >> You put nothing. >> Yeah. It's a neighborhood elementary. I'm not liking it. >> Yeah. >> Oh, you're thinking about
>> I'm thinking more like this building some stuff that we can maybe be on doesn't affect as many people. >> Did you guys have on that form how much fund balance you're comfortable going into or is that a >> that wasn't on there? We can put it on there. >> That's that's where we need to start in
my opinion is how much money can can we >> No, >> that's No, I'm I'm talking about today's discussion. Can't we decide what we're comfortable with and using the reserve so that we
know this is what's left to figure out? Marcy, that's what I hear you saying, Marcy, and I think she's absolutely correct is, you know, as a board, how much are you willing to go into the reserve and then figure out what we need
to do from there? And the other thing is I want to say is everything you know like somebody already said everything that we do is going to be impactful and we continue to keep talking about losing the number of students. I know that there I know that there are staff that have and are going to leave depending
upon what happens. um a and recruitment. Recruitment and retention is another problem is another issue that I think that um that we're going to have no matter no matter what what we decide here. So, it's not just about dollars
and cents. It's about losing students, losing staff, kind of ret recruit, retain staff. It's a long-term kind of deal in my opinion, including revenue generating as as uh Carrie Rosa suggested and looking at those options.
So, so what so I I from this board members perspective, I'm in favor of using the the reserve for the whole deficit from my from my perspective. Um and and then and then go from there. Marcy, tell them.
>> I was going to say, so if everybody could fill that out, that would be great because >> Well, the deal is you predicted our deficit for next year is going to be five half million dollars. >> So, John, we got 10 million. You want to spend five and a half? >> It's not solving. >> You would spend five million of our 10
million reserve >> next year, >> right? You mean not? You mean you mean right now? >> No, next year. We're spending three million this year. Three and a half. Yep. >> Then Marcy's estimate for next year is five and a half million. So we have 10. So we'd spend 55% of it.
Then we would be 2 million from bankruptcy or whatever you call it. SO >> so I feel like an I feel like an so if it happens >> I'm not I don't want my name. I'm not signing on that deal.
>> Is there a second to that motion? >> No. >> Good thing we're not >> I think we could go a million. I think I think you know you should set the goal at zero. I >> mean it's kind of like >> yes >> you know I mean that should be your goal
and then if it's like boy it's really be pretty painful to get there. We got to spend a million and half our reserves then I guess we can do it >> you know but I don't think we should start out saying that we want to be at >> John we're not going to solve any of our budget problems. I mean for
sustainability into the future you can't keep digging into a reserve. We've got to we're remodeling our house and we got cracked foundation. We need to fix the foundation in my opinion and if we have to go into
our reserves a little bit um for it but not that should be the last thing we do. We need to structurally in my opinion get our budget in order >> and I agree sustainability. >> I I I to I totally agree. What I keep
hearing is nobody talk or thinking about uh future revenues with levy opportunities or revenue generating opportunities. All we're talking about is cut cut cut. We've also got to take a um we also have to have the realization
of yes, we need to to generate more revenue. And there's not going to be a you know, I I I I emailed some legislators yesterday saying, why don't we just take all of the money that's spent in education totally with every school district and divide it by by 333
and each school get whatever they come up with? That'd be a fair That'd be a fair formula, a fair funding formula. Well, you know what? That's never going to happen. We all know that. But my point is um we we don't have a fair
funding formula. Um we do have opportunities to um try to raise revenue um with with the voters's help. And all we keep talking about is cutting cutting cutting without talking about okay part
of our plan needs to be um some revenue generating. So I agree with you Randy. if I'm gonna if if I don't have the money to do to do my um uh foundation work, then I'm gonna go have to take out a a equity loan from
the bank or whatever. I mean, >> we've got a lot of loans, John, >> big ones. >> And I do think this is a land, right? There's there's items of consequence that are on the table >> that are urgent and important that we
need to address. And this is just step one. I mean, and whatever we decide on as that package of what the budget looks like, it's not like it's done. We can still come back and make adjustments, add things to it, delete as we learn
more, but having a a something um to react to and work off of gives a is step one. And then step two is long term. How do we figure out long term how we stabilize our finances? And that
includes, and DJ, you spoke to this and I agree with it, some sort of task force, budget task force that is tasked with, you know, maybe it's looking at enrollment and where where are kids going? How how can we retain them? Just
a study on that. Maybe it's somebody who's doing operational audits. um you know within that task force helping us continue to keep the focus on being efficient and effective so that when we
get to this position next year because we will we'll have to do a budget next year as well. It's it's not this monumental lift that it's some of that is already spelled out for us. But the task for today is we have to figure out
because time is of the essence and some of these decisions are going to slip away from us if we don't make some here shortly. What are some of those major things we can do right now to set ourselves up for success for this upcoming budget?
>> So to expedite this so we can get to the end of the agenda because you have another meeting coming up. I heard you say if it's three, if the majority is no, move on. Correct >> for right now. >> What was that? >> What was it?
>> You could talk us into it. >> Switch some votes. I mean, you could >> John, I said information >> just to help expedite where we're at >> on the list of where if there's a majority of nos, don't go there. >> Move on. >> Yeah. >> And if there's a majority of yes,
>> take aim at that. And if there's a maybe included with a yes, that doesn't eliminate it. >> Right. Right. >> Is that good enough? >> Yep. I think so. >> Yep. >> I'm just going to add a caveat to that. If there's something on the list that the administrative team thinks would be
a real cost savings and we didn't have enough information to make our decision. Sure. I would like you to Okay. >> How do you feel? Good. >> Okay. >> Yeah. The other thing I think that is that that that list the other thing I think
that list points out is that most of us want to protect the elementary >> um especially class sizes and and EAS and things and such. That's that's that's a priority for I keep hearing that's a priority from from my colleagues or whatever. The one more
question I would have is as we talk about closing an elementary or whatever, what would be the possibility of uh trying to legislate a change in you Peter, you talked about school boundaries, what would be the possibility of changing the school boundary up in Niswah so that becomes
the Pqua Lake school district and um then um uh you know uh then the rest of the school then the rest of the boundary is you know what we currently have. What's that possibility? >> What? >> What's the
>> I didn't quite follow what you were >> want to kick the kids from Niswah to Peekquat. >> You want to annex Nisa into Lakes? >> Yeah. Change that school boundary. I think you have to do it legislatively, but what you know, is that a possibility?
>> In my experience, >> why would you want to give up all that revenue? >> It's a very long process. >> Yeah. Holy moly. You'd have to propose a bill that would need to go through the legislation in the next session and then it would probably wouldn't if it was
approved it wouldn't happen until 2728. And my question would be why would you want to forfeit a that community school? >> I I I wouldn't I'm just trying to brainstorm. >> Are you okay, John? Tell it however you want.
Hey, you even heard Stephanie on that one. >> We got a we got a direction to go. Okay, we appreciate that. >> All right, remember one thing, okay, is I've said this before. 81% of our expenses are payroll and benefits, >> right? >> You've got to pay attention to that. We
can't just thing in the public, >> right? We got to kind of get right sided. We're just got a little off. Maybe it's too much vacation. It's whatever. You know, we talk about healthcare. All these different things. That's up to you. We don't need to talk about it. You know what I think. But it's not competitive. It's not competitive with our surrounding
districts and it's not competitive with private industry. And you have to get more competitive because you're right. Peter's right. We're going to keep losing students. And if we get ourselves straightened out, which we have time because we have reserves, we can stomach some of this for a while. Um we'll be in
a lot better shape in a few years when if this birth rate thing continues. The crazy part about it was there was of course Crosby's and Crowing Colony. So it's Pqua. There was like 650 first last year. You saw. >> Yeah. You got peek.
>> Yeah. Peek. You got a >> Well, we're growing. We're just growing the wrong way. >> You got to remember >> get older. >> Yeah. >> Those those births that you referred to doesn't mean they're all in Crowing County, though. >> They're just born in Crowing County, >> right? >> So, they could have been from Cass County. They could have been, you know,
the border lines >> because we got the biggest >> facility for hospitalization. >> Cass County. What's that? >> There's no hospital in Cass County. So >> people come here. >> I'm not kidding. >> There's not. >> Doesn't locker have a hospital.
>> Kid got a clinic. >> That's why Staples. >> So I think also we want to add a line item. How much of the reserve we would be willing to tack into to help you guys? Um, >> you might not have to answer that right now,
>> but as we keep moving forward, >> okay, >> we're going to come back in the next work session and say, "Here's what we know. >> This is what what do you want to do?" >> Okay? >> Because I think right now to tell us 2 million, 3 million, 52
is more emotional than factual. >> We should be shooting for zero. We should try to get zero. We've we've been deficit spending for three years. >> Every single year on the board is deficit spending. So the state, don't forget, we have a policy of we have 10%
reserve and we're right there after this year, right? The state has the recommendation of 30%. >> So we're 20 million in the ditch from what the state would like to see. So let's say the state's crazy. So what do we want to be at? 15 20%.
You know, look at this shutdown with the feds right now. Think if the state were shut down and they weren't sending us any money, how long can Marcy fake payroll? That's what that's for. That's the idea with that. So, we can't pretend like that's just funny money and someday we'll get it back. How are we going to
get it back? We need to have a few years where we have excess money so we can stuff it away for a rainy day. >> Marcia, do we know the uh compensatory aid? Because it says on this sheet here was going to be based upon October 1, 2025 student count. Do we know what that
amount is yet? >> So, it says October 1, but we do the submission as of October 1. reports don't come out until like December. >> Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. So, it's just the numbers based on October one. >> You got it. >> And the state is >> working on that. >> Yeah.
>> Does anybody Oh, just one more. Does anybody have um information of how many Minnesota school districts went for an operating levy? >> 74. >> 76. >> How many got one? I think >> 53%
>> 76 voted in >> depends upon if depends upon if they were metro or rural >> metro districts did well. Rural districts didn't do as well. >> Okay. >> And there was 96 there was 96 ballot questions from 70ome districts.
>> Did Minneapolis pass there? St. Paul had one. Did >> I thought Minneapolis didn't have one? St. Paul was 6535 vote. >> Yes. >> Four. Minneapolis didn't have one >> and they need one. >> 75 million in debt. >> That's a chunk change to them.
>> I know because there's a lot of people. >> It's a lot of people. I I get it. >> All right. Okay. >> Um All right. >> So I This is really difficult stuff, you guys. I appreciate there's a lot of emotion involved here. There's a there's a lot of people knocking on the doors
and sending emails and um I appreciate that we're a team in this working on it together for the good of the students and and I love that this team at this table has come together around this. So, thank you for stepping up, stepping in
and being attentive. Um, when we get back together, it sounds like you, your team would be willing to present a recommendation for where we are at right now and the things that we could restructure. >> And it sounds like the group at this
table is is willing to support what that is based on your professional expertise. >> Um, >> do you want an update of what we're talking about with the high school >> or not? >> Right now. right now. >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
>> Yeah. So, we've had one meeting with the high school admin um and we've talked um a wide range of possibilities. What we're asking them to work on currently is we've given them a dollar amount um that would be um the target for
reductions. How would that look like in their current seven period day or would it be more effective and more efficient? um to go to a sixth period day, how would that impact um graduation? How
would that impact electives? Uh all of the things that we've heard talked about in this room uh are things that we've asked them to put a finer point on and more detail on. Um we've talked about class sizes and minimum class sizes in
order to run a course. Uh all of those things. Um and then ask them to define what the non-negotiables are. What are the things that we have to um continue to uh find a way to embed in our course schedule based on those items
that have been listed in the strategic plan? >> So, we're Christina and I are meeting with the admin at um um DHS weekly. Um and then do you want to just talk about the data that we've gathered so far?
>> Yeah. So we um [Laughter] so the the first set of data we pulled um for the team to look at is current course enrollments for every class
that's offered first and second semester to look at class sizes and where students are um enrolling in classes. We've looked at uh number of students enrolled in online classes, number of students enrolled as PSO, number of
students that have an open hour, and the number of students that have a service center. So, that was kind of a broad broad data that we started the conversation with the high school team. And then um at our last meeting, we're going to have them look at by grade
level, how many what number of students are actually taking seven classes during a semester. So, you know, thinking of the impact of if we did move to a sixth period day, how many students would that impact that are truly taking advantage
of that uh opportunity to take seven classes, not not a study center, not an open hour and things like that. So, we're going to get that data, too. Um, so we'll have all that for our next uh meeting with that team. >> Good information. >> Thanks you guys.
All right. Um, we are going to adjourn the work session and we have a special meeting with Barb. >> I just want to say something about I wanted BLC on here. >> Oh, absolutely. >> The reason I wanted it on here is not to talk about the program. Uh, I think the program is fantastic. Um, I was invited
to their uh to their meeting a staff meeting and I think I mentioned this. I found it very valuable. Uh, I've uh asked Jim at U Harrison uh he is going to send me information on their uh
continuous improvement meeting. Um, and he said yes, we would like you to attend. I guess what I'm asking Peter is to let the principles know. I know they've a lot there's been a lot of emails going to board members and uh you know come on in and visit the school and da da da da da da da da. I'm just
speaking for myself personally. I've been in all the schools before. What I'm asking for is is if if they want to extend an invite to any staff meetings or any continuous site improvement meetings. I think it's more valuable for the board to go to maybe a an hour
meeting and we're going to get a ton of of good information than walking around. I mean, I'm not saying don't walk around if you want to. I've just I've done it. I've been there. I would much rather sit down and and uh cuz Jessica, I mean, they were very open and they shared a
lot of information and I think it's great. So, if you could put the word out to the principles, um, hey, you know, let let the board members know if you have a continuous, uh, improvement meeting or just a staff meeting. Uh, I would I would much rather go to those.
>> Okay. >> Just me personally. >> Thanks, Randy. >> Yeah, thanks. >> Um, all right. Well, we are going to adjourn the work session. Barb Dorne is going to join us at 10:15 and we'll
restart um that meeting at 10:15 then. Part: 2
This is an actual meeting, so I will call the meeting to order and we'll start with roll call. >> Here >> Stephanie Edman. >> Randy Hidman >> here. >> Spear >> here.
>> John Ward >> here. >> Thanks, Kelly. >> Uh, we'll do the pledge of allegiance, please. I pledge algiance 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. >> Uh, this meeting of the Brainer School Board is being conducted in accordance with Minnesota statutes 13D.02. This meeting is being recorded. Access to the recording is available on the
school district's YouTube channel. Due to this being a special school board meeting, there will be no public input allowed during the meeting. I will take a motion to approve the agenda. >> So move. >> Second. >> We've got a motion by Director Heidman
and a second by Director Breen. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying I. >> Opposed? Hi. >> Motion carries. We have um a couple things on the agenda for today to just
>> Sorry. Roll call because >> Oh, >> everything's roll. >> That's right. Because we've got Thank you for um reminding us of that. So, because we've got folks that are uh online, we'll have to do roll call votes for everything. So, we'll go back to
approval of the agenda. or yes, >> yes. >> Randy Hidman, >> yes. >> Sarah Spear, >> yes. >> John Ward, >> yes. >> Joe Breen, >> yes. >> Thank you, Kelly. Thanks, you guys. All
right. So, uh, new business and up for action today is discussing and deciding superintendent search timeline, hiring criteria, stakeholder involvement and procedures, and um, the things necessary for the hiring process. And we've got
Barb Dorne from MSBA with us today. Thank you for joining us, Barb. And we'll jump right in. >> Sounds good. Thank you, Chair Spears. Nice to see everybody again. Uh, time goes fast. I was up here last a year ago and um most of you will be very familiar with the search process, but we're going
to go through all of it again for those who are familiar with how a superintendent search process works. Um so I don't think we need to do a round of introductions. I met everybody at one other time and nice to see uh Director Ward and Director Enderman online as well. Um so we're going to review the
statutes first and foremost. There are two statutes in Minnesota law that will apply to your superintendent search. uh that is the open meeting law and the government data practices act. Just as a reminder, every step of this process will be done in an open meeting. You will not be closing any sessions for any
part of the superintendent search process. That needs to be balanced with the government data practices act, however, because the names of every single applicant or private data. So when you're discussing the applicants in a public meeting, it will only be candidates A, B, and C with no identifying information so people can
figure out who you're talking about because those names are private. You, as the board will have access to every single application and all of the application materials therein. So I just want to caution you not to look at those in a public space. Don't let anyone walk behind you when you're on your computer because they might catch a glimpse of a
resume or something. Those names need to be handled very, very carefully. So, those are the two statutes that will apply to the search. And just a reminder, board ownership. This is not MSBA search. It is the school board for Brainer Public Schools superintendent search. So, you will not only make all
of the decisions, but you will own those decisions. My job is to guide you, provide you with information, make recommendations as appropriate, but make sure you have the information you need to make the best decisions for the students here in Brainer. So, as we move along, I'm going to give you options.
you can at some point in the process go this direction or that direction and that starts today with a lot of decisions here in the planning meeting packet. So any question on that overview again familiar ground I think but a refresher is always good. Okay so on the agenda uh the first thing we're going to
talk about is the timeline and this is often what takes the longest in a meeting because people's schedules are very very busy. All of these things can be adjusted. I built this timeline based upon um availability and a standard three and a half month search on
average. So today's the special meeting to plan the search right away. Um we have the proposed public survey opening on November 10th and closing December 8th. Again, we can talk about that a little further down here as well. Surveys can be optional depending upon
if there's survey fatigue in the district or not. So we want to be able to talk about what that means for you. Also costwise, there is a savings if you decide not to do the public input survey and our listening sessions or focus groups. Um those are an option that are included in the search if you feel it's
uh valuable. Um you will see we're proposing posting this November 13th to January 11th. Um that'll get you out early, but you do not want to close before January 1st. You definitely want to get into the new year and that posting can be adjusted however you'd like it to be. We just don't want it
open forever. having it open for three months is too long. You want to build on momentum. Um, and search season has heated up. We are doing five searches right now. You are one of those five. So, it started earlier this year than it has maybe in some past years. And there's going to be a lot of movement, I
think, across Minnesota. Um, but when we start pulling out your calendars and looking at timing, you guys can make any changes you want. I'm just going to do a quick review of the timeline so everyone knows what these uh meetings would be all about. Uh the Q&A session we would do on November 19th. We want to wait and do
that after uh the survey has been posted but before it closes. Uh so we can share with any stakeholders what's happening when and why. And we record that put it on the district website. We did it for the last search as well. But what's new is search preview meetings. Um we did not do those I believe two years ago.
So, we've added search preview meetings, which means early in the process, we meet with your um administrators and separately we meet with the leadership of your bargaining units. And the idea with those search preview meetings are to bring people into the loop as soon as possible. Um we share information. So,
we talked about timeline, survey, brochure, etc. We answer their questions and it's a smaller group so they usually have a whole lot of questions and we ask for their help. We asked for their help to get people involved, to pay attention to the search process, to watch the board meetings, if you have a survey, to
fill out the survey. So, those search previews came out of um a couple of searches we did a few years ago where people felt out of the loop until the end of the search. So, we started bringing the loop much earlier and I think that provides a great deal of stability to a search. It's a good foundation because the information we're
sharing is accurate. I give all of those people my phone number and my email and say reach out if you have questions about the process. So, we're trying to bring people, the internal district leadership in as soon as we can, but it's not a focus group. It is us sharing information, making sure they understand the logistics of what's going to happen
over the next few months. So, those are new. Um, I'm suggesting some dates for the interview training. Um, that'll be a refresher again for most of you, but we will need to still do it. Um, if you have a survey report, we'll discuss it that evening as well. Also, the interview questions and procedures and
interview questions have changed in the last two years. We're doing them differently as well. And as always, you can submit your own questions in advance so we can talk about them at that meeting and choose which ones you really want to use, particularly round one and then round two. Uh so that's going to be
done potentially here in January or uh December. If you're going to have application access, as I mentioned, if you need hard copies, let me know. But otherwise, it'll be up in the cloud through rella secure password, all those sorts of things. Uh you will name your finalists. Everything in yellow are
dates that might need to be determined today. Um, and finalize things like the interview questions and such. First round of interviews, you could do again perhaps three to five, six people on two evenings backtoback. You could do them all day on a Saturday. You could do
interviews however you would like to do those. Mostly five or six people is the average. And then round two, it's probably two or three people. And that tends to be on the same day for round two. and that's when you might have additional stakeholder input on the finalists. There would be district tours. If you want more community
interaction with folks, we can sure talk about that um in conjunction with round two. Uh last time I believe you had a board designate who was uh designated to negotiate the contract on behalf of the board knowing that it comes back to the board for approval and you as a board
initially set the parameters about where you are comfortable with the compensation package. Traditionally, the board chair has done that perhaps in consult with HR or legal counsel just to make things move more quickly, but it could always be a board committee or the full board negotiating with your candidate if you'd like to do that. Um,
you might have this approved by February and then the new superintendent would start July 1. We would also come up here and do a transition workshop with the new superintendent. We have not had the chance to do that with you yet. Uh, but it's once you have a superintendent who assigned a two or three-year contract, we come back up. We're doing them right
now for last year's searches. talk about expectations for their first year at the helm. What do you want them to focus on? How will you evaluate their performance? What metrics will you be using? All of that compensate uh conversation is included in the transition workshop at no cost to the district. So, that's the
timeline. So, now I'm going to open it up for questions and I have my uh computer along for my own calendar if you see things you want to move around or change in any way, shape, or form. So, I'll turn it back over to you, Chair Spear. >> Sure. Um, so anything Michelle, you look
like you had a question. >> No, I didn't have a question. No. >> Um, any questions on timeline? Anything? >> Well, maybe I'm >> Why did you say that? We don't want to do anything till after January 1. >> You don't want to close before January
1. You know, you wouldn't want to advertise now and close December 23rd. >> Okay. >> Yeah. People like to use people like the holiday breaks, whether it's Thanksgiving or the Christmas break, to work on all of their materials and upload everything. So, I wouldn't close until middle of January at the earliest.
>> Okay. >> That's the application process, >> right? Right. >> Is there I I know DJ asked this question or director Donna Linger asked this question. >> We roll around here. Um, is there a
benefit to having it open longer? Should we hang on to it until closer to December? >> Yeah, you sure could. You sure could. They'll start they'll start being posted within the next couple of weeks. We'll see people posting their positions. So,
um, you can do whatever you want. Again, this is the board's decision. So, >> we're looking for your advice. >> I remember last time you told us that, you know, we were so late. I mean, when do we even call you? Like the 20th of March, 23rd. What was it? It was late. >> It was late.
>> Um I remember you saying that. Well, I don't remember. 75% of our stuff comes in over Christmas break. And I thought that the ideal time was like the 15th of December. But if you say it's Thanksgiving, I'm fine with that. >> Just know when things stay out there, they kind of drip down the list. >> Yep.
>> So sometimes it's like better to >> just strike when the iron's hot, you know? >> You can do that, too. Yeah. As far as giving advice, it's hard to say. We've opened searches, we opened searches last year in October, >> um I think and then we also opened a search in April.
>> So, did you feel any big Well, there's obviously a difference between October and April, but >> did you have better luck? I mean, if you notice that doesn't matter. >> They they were all successful. It doesn't the timing of it is not as important other than you can be too early. Like you can close in December,
that's too early. Don't do that. Um the um biggest drivers are going to be location, salary, and reputation. That's what drives the size of the candidate pool, not when you announce it. If you're too late, however, there's people that are looking to make a change that have already committed to other
districts. So, sometimes you miss good candidates if you're closing in March or April, but not always. You know, we had a search in the metro last year that was very late and got rockstar applicants. So, um it really just depends. We could push this back several weeks and open
early December, mid December. Push your whole timeline back and you'd be interviewing in the middle of March probably. Um, depends on your availability. If anyone's going to be gone on vacation and can't join virtually. >> I I I don't want us to be interviewing in March because I feel like people will
have made decisions by then. So, I think it's soon into the new year that we can start doing that. But, I just was wondering about having it open. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. you want to push it back even by two weeks um post right before Thanksgiving and close at the end of January.
>> I don't know if it's going to make a difference or not. Honestly, again, they're looking for location, salary, and reputation. That's how you're going to get applicants, not when you close. Exactly. Exactly. >> I like closing early in January, whatever that is. So, wherever that puts
us then to open, if that's seems relevant. >> Is there a benefit to open Well, I guess we're already in November, so I was going to say October, but I'm a month late.
>> I I just if you're going to be closing in January, I'd open before Thanksgiving, >> okay? >> Because that's a that's a long break for a lot of people, and that's when they start looking ahead to the next year. >> Now, there are going to be people in January that are just starting to think about whether or not they want to make a move. But if they have their eye on your district, it doesn't matter when you
open and close. If they have their eye on this job, they're going to apply. They'll make sure of it. >> They're going to hear about it. >> Yeah, I'm good with this timeline. >> Yeah, >> that's fine.
>> November 13th to January 11th time frame. >> Yeah, I don't have a problem with that. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So, if we're going to um open on the 13th, close the 11th, that's the week of the leadership conference. And
so I just selected it to be early that week so that we can start reviewing them immediately after the conference ourselves. >> What do you want to um do about the survey and our focus groups and such? And we do vis revisit it later in the meeting because there's some financial consequences for those things as well or do you want to decide during the
timeline discussion whether or not to do those things? >> Um any strong feelings survey? >> Well, so you want to know if you want to do the survey. >> Yep. And have you told us how much the survey is >> included in this price, but if you want
to remove it, it'll save you $1,500. >> I would like to do the survey. I think we need to get public input. >> Where does the survey go? >> Where does it go? >> Yeah. How do you get people to fill out the survey? >> Uh, every single communication channel the district already uses. We'd be using to get the word out through email
blasts, um, website, social media, newspaper. Perhaps if you have good relationships with the newspaper, um we have a template that people um copy and paste into their own district communications protocols and there's a link in there for taking the survey. Um we last time I think we talked about
doing it in English and Spanish, but we can do it in Somali as well if you need that. Um we'll also have a link in there for the Q&A session and for people to submit questions in advance of that Q&A. Not everyone's going to be able to come to the Q&A on the 19th, but we'll answer questions that come in in advance during
that live session, record it, put it on the website as well. So, the communications blast, we call it, has a whole bunch of different things in it that the district can use and modify to really fit how they want to get the word out. You want hard copies of those surveys also in the district buildings on the
front desk of, you know, reception desk for everybody that wants to take it or needs to take it in a hard copy as well. do it. >> Do you guys want to do a survey? >> Yes. >> Okay.
>> We'll we'll say for now we will and then when we get to the back which is the proposal pages. I didn't actually write a proposal but it's the same one that you saw last year or year before. >> Um we'll talk a little bit more about what that means and then how and if to set up additional stakeholder input sessions. We can talk about that. >> Are we going to survey people out? I mean uh we're going to do surveys with
the budget, right? We're going to be doing a survey with this. Are they going to >> I don't care one way or another. I'm just asking a question. >> Yeah. >> When's the survey for the budget going on? >> What is that survey? Is there really going to be a survey? It's going to be a
little five question thing, isn't it? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> I just feel like we need to offer the public the chance to give input. >> Whether they want to or not, that's up to them. But to at least we can offer that.
>> Well, our only defense would be is that we just did it a year and a half ago, but I'm fine with doing it. >> Yeah. I mean, this just the question. >> I think things have changed and uh I think that more that we can update, bring it update and and involve the public is the best thing to do. So, I'm
all for it. >> Okay. >> Okay. Cool. >> Great. Okay. Um so just moving down the timeline then here we have the next decision to make then would be the board meets for interview
training and to discuss questions and procedures and we could do this it looks like in December or in January. My recommendation might be January just so because then it's closer um to when we'd actually do interviews. is kind of top
of mind for folks. >> Yeah, because it looks like that would be the earliest to do the finalist interview questions, etc. January 21. So, yeah, it's a good point. >> We have
>> sometime in January then. >> Okay, we have our regular meeting if you want to try to >> 12 >> January 12th. six, seven, or eight. >> If I could make a suggestion, maybe it
would help to set your interview date first and then look backwards to when you want to do the interview training and final questions. You may pick a date for interview training, then it turns out you're going to do your interviews further out than you thought you might because of the availability of board members. >> That's a good idea. So if you look ahead
down to conduct first round of interviews, we're saying in the end of January all the way through the middle of February. And I'd suggest you hold spots for six. You might not need all of those, but two evenings if you want to do that again or all day on a Saturday, you can sure look at that. So interviews, when do you want to perhaps
conduct those? What does the 20 January 27, 28, and 29th look like for folks? >> Good for me. >> Good for me. >> What is it now? >> Except I'll be I'll be doing it virtually obviously. >> What date?
>> Um January 27th, 28th, 29th. >> This is for these um having these interviews. >> Yeah. Or February 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. That's to determine finalists, right? >> Interviews. >> Interviews.
>> The actual interviews. >> We're kind of working backwards because the interviews tend to be the most pivotal date. >> And once you know when you're interviewing people, then you can okay >> back up when to announce and when to train. >> I just wanted to make sure I was looking up the right dates here.
>> Why does three have an asterisk? because that is um there's some dates you cannot meet and on February 3rd it is precinct caucus day so you cannot have any meetings or activities after 6:00
>> but we could meet and be done before 6 o'clock >> okay got it >> I can't make the 27th 8th or 9th for >> I can't either actually sorry I asked about that and I can't do the 21st or the 23 >> 23rd
>> 7th probably. Yeah. >> Okay. So the second February 2nd, 3rd, 4th and February 3rd should have an asterisk in all three of them. I had it in the first one, but I didn't carry it over. So that is precinct caucus day.
>> Oh, gotcha. >> Okay, got it. Yep. >> So again, this date is to determine the final second. Okay. >> Can we do that? >> Randy, can you make the second work >> for what?
>> For interviews. >> If you do interviews, you're going to need the >> first round of interview. >> Say that again, Barb. >> These are for interviews. Round one might be six people. So, if you're going to do February 2nd, you're going to have to do it that whole day or most of the day starting at noon perhaps until 9 at
night to hold space for six people. Unless you want to bleed over into the third as long as we're done before 6 p.m. on the third. >> Okay. Last time I think you held two evenings back to back. >> I think we should do I think we should do two. >> How about second and the fourth? Second and the fourth.
>> Yeah, we could do that. Um the thing we ran into last time was not being able to do them live or put them out there so that candidates didn't see the questions. But I think we got we worked with that. I think that worked. Okay.
>> We recorded it and put it up later. Okay. But we can live stream. >> Okay. Yeah. Should I mean 2nd and fourth? How does that look for folks? Good. February 2nd and 4th. >> Unless you want to do all day Saturday the 7th.
>> I don't. >> Nope. >> And this is to conduct first round interviews. >> First round interviews in the evenings afternoon. >> Two things. Two requests. I like the second. I think we should do the second and the third. And I think we should do these in the afternoon. I I know it
sucks to take the afternoon off, but everyone's fresher. The people we're interviewing are fresher. >> Yeah, that's >> we're fresher. This whole interviewing somebody at 9:00 at night who drove up here from flipping Oatana or something like that, it's like, holy cow, they're just, you know, it's like it's not >> I just it's a pretty important deal.
>> Yeah. So, if we start >> that or we just do a whole day and we just line them up and do them from morning till night, >> even for ourselves, I mean, if we then we've got like an hour and a half break for lunch or something, you can kind of get your wits back. gets long. Start daydreaming stuff. I do
>> rather do whole day or the second and third. Just do it two days back to back. >> Well, I think we can't do the third. Otherwise, >> have to be done by six o'clock. >> Oh, we have to be done by six o'clock. >> If we did them in the afternoons, which I think it'd be nice to do I mentioned that the last time like noon one at
noon, one at two, and one at 4. >> Is that how you do it, Barb? >> Pretty much. The only thing about that that I worry is um access for the public if they want to be there is nice for them to be able to have in the evening when they're not at work.
>> Is that important then they may have I mean >> it's an important position that we're dealing with. So I'd like to see people fresh and sharp. Um I don't think any No one's doing their best work at night. >> Yeah. you know. >> Well, true.
>> Depends upon what your job is. >> No, Randy. >> No, no, no, no. I'm not going anywhere. I'm just saying that, you know, I mean, I understand what you're saying. I mean, I wouldn't want to drive all the way up from Owatoner or wherever and then do an interview at 7 o'clock at night. No, >> you're not going to be very good, you
know. >> No, I agree. >> So, if you do it in the afternoons on the second and third, you could start at noon or 1. Now on the third, if you have three, we're saying three and three, you might have a total of four people. So it could not like somebody just like them.
Just don't >> we will need to allow time for deliberations on the third to decide who to bring back for the second round of interviews. So the interviews would need to be done probably by 4:00 >> on the 3. So that you give us a half hour to tabulate the EMD forms. You start deliberating at 4:30, quarter to
5. That gives you an hour, hour and a half. I don't think it'll take that long to narrow it down from let's say six to two or three. >> We can start at 11. >> What's on the third that's so important? >> Precinct caucus day. >> And the state law says there can be no
meetings or activities after 6:00 p.m. on precinct caucus day. >> Oh, who monitors [Laughter] >> I won't be here. You can all meet. I won't be here though. That's okay. um
>> cannot participate in nefarious activities. >> We won't make you Barb to ask that. >> And that's assuming we have six candidates if we have >> you may not. >> What's wrong with just doing the second and the fourth and we get a break in
between there, too. >> All right. Well, I'll probably be on Zoom on one of them. >> But that's okay. >> Which one? >> I don't know. >> Oh, okay. >> Oh, probably the fourth. >> Okay. So will I. >> One of the >> I think we should second and that's do the second and third so everybody can be
there. >> But you remember what you saw yesterday. >> If you split them >> really go apart it's like well I don't remember. Did I >> It is a little tougher. That's true. That's true. Your brain is rush. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Let's just get it done. >> I just want to leave enough time on the
third that we're not rushing. >> Let's just start at let's do noon on the second >> and 11 on the >> 11 on the third. >> Yeah. You know, most of the time we never really We never really interviewed anybody over an hour >> last time. >> No, you didn't.
>> No, you took a 15-minute break between >> Yeah. >> I don't even know if you need to start at 11. If you do have three people, you do a noon 1:15 or 1:30, quarter to 3. >> By quarter to 4, you're done. If you start at noon, I'll do that.
>> You could do noon both days. >> That's fine. February 2nd and 3rd. >> Noon both days. Okay. >> Noon both days. >> Yep. On the second. >> Yes. >> So, February 2nd and 3rd for round one. Then let's identify round two moving
forward then. So, if you interview on Tuesday the 3rd, you could interview on that weekend, the 6th, 7th, or the next week on Monday the 9th, Tuesday the 10th of February. So by the middle of
February, you might have someone selected and hopefully have a contract signed by the end of February. >> Feel good. >> We stick with the same schedule. The 9th will be a board meeting. >> Say that again, Kelly. >> If we stick with what we've done in the past with the second Monday being a
school board meeting, the 9th would be that day. >> Okay. >> So we could possibly do the 9th at >> noon. >> No, the nth just be our school regular school. >> Regular school work. I know. >> Yeah. >> What do you mean? I'm talking about second round of interviews.
>> Why couldn't we do it on the 9th before the school board meeting? >> Oh, can we do it that fast? >> If you have three people, it's going to take a while. In deliberations to choose who to hire, it can take a while. So, I I worry you wouldn't finish in time for your board meeting. >> Okay. >> You don't want block out probably five
hours for round two. >> If you have three people, you might have two or one. >> Should we just do it on the 10th? >> On the 10th, >> I guess on that. Tuesday the 10th. >> What time we doing that? >> Take us five hours.
>> Could we start? Midafter afternoon. Late afternoon. >> 2 o'clock. >> 2 o'clock. >> You like that, Barb? >> I'll be here whenever you need me to be. >> 2 p.m. on the 10th. >> John and Stephanie, does that work for
you? February 10th, 2 p.m. I'd rather start earlier, but yeah, I can make it work. >> Okay. All right. So, now let's work backwards. So, >> if I don't,
>> are we done? Okay. Okay. February 10th at 2 p.m. round two. Round one is February 2nd and 3rd at noon both days. So, now we're going to back up as to when you're going to name people publicly. So, if you're interviewing on February 2nd,
uh you could name them the week before, the week of the 26th of January. >> We're all going to be gone. >> We're all gone that week. >> You're all gone. 26, 27, 28, 29, and 30. >> Well, at least three of us are. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I was going to say, what do you mean all?
>> Well, I can hop on Zoom. >> Well, no, I can't. Not on that deal. I'm going to be at this meeting and >> one of you. >> I don't know if I can be honest. >> We need one person here. >> For what? >> I I'm I'm going to
>> I am too. >> Yeah. Let's Let's uh How about the 21st? >> Is anybody going to be here on the 21st? >> Um I think that's what No, I'm not. I leave that day. So, we're kind of screwed up. So, we
probably can't do the second and third on the interviews [Music] >> because then because you guys are going to be gone the whole um other dates >> this meeting is relatively short when you select your finalists. Maybe an
hour, maybe >> um 45 minutes. Sometimes if there's consensus real quickly about who you want to bring in to interview, it can be even shorter. But >> um Well, we don't want weeks between naming finalists and interviewing them. If you name them and you wait two or
three weeks to interview them, that's too long. That allows for lots of shenanigans to occur relative to their candidacies. So, we try to name them closer to their interviews so that there's not a lot of time for people to dig up all sorts of things on people that may or may not be true.
>> Gotcha. >> Why can't >> And why can't we do this v virtually? Why can't it be done virtually? >> We can. We just have to have one person here in the room. Randy, will you be here the week of the 27th, 28th, 29th? >> Uh, >> I will be back. >> We're talking about January.
>> Yeah. Okay. I'll be back by >> January. The week of 20 the 26th. >> Yeah. >> Why can't we do it on the 26th? That Monday? >> I'm gone until the 27th. >> Oh, okay. >> I could be here the 28th or the 29th. Um, >> well, if we only need one, isn't there
somebody that's going to be there on the 26th? >> Randy could be and then we would >> then everybody else zooms in. >> Yeah, I can zoom in. >> DJ, could that work for you or No. >> Yeah, why don't we do it a little earlier in the day? If we're just gonna
if it's only going to be 45 minute meeting, what difference? >> Do it like two or three. You can go out for you're on your trip and you can go do what you want. What What What date you guys are picking? um 26. >> I'm not available at night on the 26th, so I didn't list it as an option, but if
you meet during the day virtually, I can join you as well. >> Okay. >> 26 is the first day of this meeting I'm at. I'm done at >> 12 Eastern. So, I'm done at 11 o'clock here. So, 1212, >> probably not two. Yeah. >> Still here in the afternoons. It's like we're all going in these boats, you
know? >> Yeah. >> I'd say the earlier the better, too. >> Noon. >> Noon. >> Noon. Yeah. Does that work for you, Barb? >> On the 26th. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> Kelly, does that work for you? >> So, this is where we where we determine
we're going to we're going to interview um >> candidate one, eight, >> 10. >> Yep. >> Whatever. >> And then that after you've decided who to interview, I'll read the names out loud on that day on the 26th. So between January 26th, that's a that's only a
week. January 26th to February 2nd is a week, which is good. That's long enough, not too long. Um, then candidates will have a week to prepare >> for their interviews on secondary >> 26th. At what time? >> Noon. >> At noon. Is that the day that we get
training on the interviewing process? And >> um, we could, but normally that's a separate meeting. >> Okay. >> So, we would back up from Janu January 26th. now. And so this is why we kind of did this backwards because if we picked interview training for December 16th, for example,
>> January 26th is a long way away from then. So we don't want to have too much time elapse between the interview training and when you actually >> um determine finalists. So now if you're going to name your finalists on the 26th and interview on the 2nd, >> uh are there folks that might want to uh be trained? I put January 6, seven, or
eight, but we can go later than that. >> Yeah, maybe right after the leadership conference. the week of January 19, 2021,22 can't meet on the 19th and I do have something on the 20th, but the 21st, 22nd or 23rd of January or we roll it
into the 26th. It'll be a longer meeting then for those of you who are out of town on the 26th. >> Then that'll take that'll take an hour and a half, two hours. >> I like going on the 26th. Let's just do it all in one day. >> What? The training?
>> Yeah. >> Where's the training? >> It's on the 26th at noon. >> No, the the interviews or the pick our people are on the 26th at noon. >> I'm not doing it on the 26th. >> Should we do it?
>> I'll be for that deal. I have a meeting from 7 o'clock till noon and then afternoon deals are like oh >> I don't even know what kind of internet kind of >> connectivity I'll have. So um what if we did it
at our January as part of our January meeting? >> Our board meeting. >> Yeah, great idea. >> Perfect. >> When is that? >> 12th. >> Sorry that's not on your list. Barb possibility. When do you meet? >> We meet at 6.
>> 6. Can we do it before that or as part? Can I join you virtually? Because the leadership conference starts the next day. >> Oh, >> okay. So, I have to be in downtown Minneapolis Monday night. >> Yeah. >> Have organizational at 5:30. >> At 5:30. So, um >> 4:00. >> 4 o'clock.
>> That enough time for you and a half. >> I mean, >> I think so. >> Five of us have been through it. >> Yeah. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> Yep. >> This is for interview training now. interview training and to discuss the stakeholder report that we gathered from the stakeholders. So, >> interview questions and procedures. Okay. >> Monday, January 12th
>> at what time can we start? I'm sorry. >> Four. >> What? >> Okay. >> January 12th at 4:00. >> You had to get yourself like a date planner, Randy. I got a phone
[Music] >> and I got >> Okay. So, I'm going to repeat the dates that I wrote down to make sure that my notes reflect what you just decided. Okay. >> So, um I will work uh probably with Kelly to set up search preview meetings
the weeks of November 10 or 17. I'll send um send you an email, Kelly, and just say this is the groups I typically meet with and it's usually virtual. and then if you could help me set up a time for me to talk to those two groups um the week of November 10th or 17th. All right. So, meeting for interview
training and discussing the public input report is Monday, January 12th at 400 pm. I will join you virtually. Uh then we're going to go down to the next meeting would be January 26th at noon to name your finalists
and then you would interview February 2nd and 3rd if you have six people save you know save spots for six starting at noon both days and then round two would be February 10th beginning at 2 p.m. And we'd have district tours earlier in the
day as well. And that means right away on February 11th, someone would begin negotiating with your selected finalists. Do you have a regular meeting in February that you could approve the approve the contract tenatively? >> It's February 9th. >> Okay. It's too late then. So, do you
have any special meetings coming up in February? >> No, but if all we have to do is approve a contract, we can throw a meeting together for 15 minutes and vote on one thing. >> Yeah, absolutely. So, should we leave it February to be determined when you're going to approve approve that contract? >> Okay. >> So, those are the dates. Um, so let me
take a look here. If you're going to name your finalists on the 26th, I'm just looking at the application deadline. Uh, I'm going to go back and look. I'm still thinking January 11th is a good day to close,
but the 11th of January is two weeks, two weeks and a day before you would name finalists. So, we could potentially push it back to the 18th and let people apply till the 18th and you'd have access on the 20th and you'd have six days.
>> That's a good idea. >> That's fine. January 18, we look at them on the 19th. You'd see them on the 20th. You'd have six days to do your research. Meanwhile, we're doing our vetting. Um, we have eight days to our vetting to recommend some folks to you. So then I
don't know if we need to open on the 13th. If we're going to close January 18th, we could open on November 20th. >> Maybe a week. It's a little closer to Thanksgiving. >> Yeah, >> good idea. >> Okay. So, post November 20th, close January 18th.
>> Why would you send us an updated >> Oh, yeah. >> timeline. Thank you. >> Yeah, I'll I'll fix it and clean it up and Okay. >> I'll make sure Kelly proof reads it for me as well. So, >> uh, so then we'd still be looking at closing the survey on December 8th and we report to you with a full report on
January 12th. We could leave the survey open longer as well. Then I might push back the survey a little bit also, but I'll I'll do that to be determined. I'll figure that out as to when the survey opens because then it doesn't need to open on the 10th, >> right?
>> Maybe people aren't quite in the mode yet for superintendent search. So if you push that back because if we don't need to discuss a report with you till January 12th, um we can push that back. So there'll be some different dates on here for that survey, but we'll make sure it's still open for about three weeks. Okay, great. Thank you. The
timeline is always the most challenging part of the meeting. So, I appreciate you pulling out your calendars and walking through that. So, >> so no, November 10th to the 17th, that doesn't involve us at all. That's a district leadership, right? >> Correct. Correct. Does not involve the
board at all. >> Okay. >> Thank you. All right. There is a proposed vacancy brochure in here for your review. Hopefully, you had a chance to take a look at it. Um, all of the information was updated. I want to thank Kelly for her her help getting all the numbers in
terms of by the numbers and some of the points of pride were updated as well. I will add in the search timeline and things like that. Uh financial highlights were updated. The leadership pro profiles on page two and so you can certainly take a look at that and I'll just turn it over for the board uh to
the board for conversation about what you want to advertise. What we always say with a leadership profile is you don't want to list everything because sometimes a leadership profile is a page and a half long. It's very hard for candidates to discern what's most important to you. So, we're starting to use the phrasing, uh, you have high
priorities in the district, you have higher and you have highest priorities. Try to base the leadership profile around the highest priorities in the district. And I think your strategic plan would be a great place to start with that as well. Um, but we did try to model it based upon not only the
strategic plan, but there's the results in here on the page that's colorful green and yellow. That's the hiring criteria survey that all of you took as individual board members. So you can see on that next page past the brochure that um in green were the most responses.
Five people had school finance, six people had honesty and ethic man ethical manner. >> Lots of people had other ones in yellow. So we incorporated all of those. You also had a 4-2 split about previous experience. Uh four people said yes, it's important they have experience. Two
said it's not. So, in the brochure under the leadership profile, we put that previous superintendent experience is preferred, but you word it however you want. This is your profile. So, if you see anything that needs changing or updating on the points of pride about the community or the leadership profile,
now is your chance to edit this with me here. >> So, you think we have too many? >> I don't think so. No, this this is a pretty standard. How many there are? for what? Eight bullet points. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. Yeah, there's eight bullet points. Usually it's six to eight.
We've just seen some leadership profiles that are on an 8 and 1 half by 11 sheet typed and it's an entire page. It's like listing a job description for a superintendent, but you need to look for someone specifically for Brainard. I think it looks good. >> I do too. >> Yeah, I do too.
>> Five and five and six just seem to be I don't know. They seem they seem to be kind of the same. I don't know. I think it's better than the last time. >> I think the intent on the first one was more internal and the other one was more external, but they are similar. Randy, you're right. You could combine those or
eliminate one or something, but one's more about inside the walls, one's more about outside the walls. >> Maybe just even adding collaborates effectively with community. >> Why not? Yeah. Add that to the one, two, three, four.
add to the fifth where I mean to me it I understand now that you mentioned you know one's inside one's outside the walls can't we just add engaging with diverse stakeholder groups somehow into that discussion excels in team building fostering a culture of shared responsibility
continuous improvement across the school district and engages with diverse stakeholder groups >> and then eliminate the six >> is that the only one that talks about outside the building because I do think
that is important. I don't want to lose that. >> Oh, I think it's important. I'm just saying what why can't we just add it excels and team >> I think you want >> I think you want to keep them separate. I think you want to keep them separate talking about the school district uh
environment and then the community environment rather than saying stakeholder groups. I I would say diverse community groups. Does that help Randy clarify take out stakeholder input community? >> Yeah, >> that's a good suggestion I think John too. >> Yeah. No, I mean I was just
>> I think you could just take it out personally, but you guys do what you want. I mean >> Yeah. I mean it's like a nothing burger. Collaborates effectively earning trust and engaging with diverse stakeholder groups. What does that mean? >> See, I I guess I want my superintendent to be visible within the community. And that's what that is.
>> Is aren't they all? Is that kind of how it works? >> Yeah. I want that as an expectation that they they work within the the the district, but they also um have relationships and connections with community organizations.
>> Doesn't say anything about community organizations for stakeholders. That that means >> Yeah. Well, >> and I like the edit for diverse community groups. I think would be a good edit. >> So, like, you know, they were connected to Rotary or the Lions Club or
>> um Chamber Yeah, this >> how about we just put in gets along with everybody >> plain language. >> I like the community versus stakeholder. That's for sure.
>> You guys okay with that if we Yeah. >> make that change to community. Okay. >> I just don't like I mean I just try to get eliminate some of these >> Yeah. words that
seem to permeate >> y >> the educational industry. >> Buzzwords. Yeah. >> Sometimes buzzwords. Yeah. So >> otherwise I think this is a really good list. >> This is what we'll build our draft
interview questions around as well as these eight bullet points. But you of course in advance of the meeting where we talk about questions. I'll give you deadlines to send me your questions in advance so I can include them in our list to give to you to discuss and choose what you want to ask about. But this is what we guided on. We'd also um
go through your applications with an eye on these things to make sure that people match experience in these areas before we recommend them to you as finalists. What about the previous superintendent experience is preferred. Do you want to leave that off or do you want to put
preferred but not required or as is? >> I like it as is. Any preference? >> I don't care if they've been a superintendent before. Somebody has to go first. You know, >> I think it's preferred. I think leaving
it at preferred just >> it leaves the door open the door open. We don't have to. >> Yeah. But it's nice that they've got >> it's just another one of those things that we're saying that don't mean anything. >> If we don't care, then we don't care. And if we care, we care.
>> How about we >> I just like to see as many people as possible. I don't like the limit. >> How about we satisfy both parties where we say preferred but not required? >> The reason it's not in here now is we
ran out of white space. There's one I'd have to I could take out Brainer Public Schools with opportunity innovation success and you'd have room to move everything down and make it a little less busy and have more white space. I could add but not required. >> I would just need to find room.
It's fine the way it is. It's it's Yeah, I just >> I don't think it's going to >> I don't want to limit the opportunity. I want to see who's out there and um >> so I don't see any re I mean what is it? Oh, that's one we Oh, they weren't a superintendent before. Well, if you're
not interested in someone that's not a superintendent anymore, then don't. Then that one's out. What's the big deal? They send their application in. Who cares? It doesn't cost us anything. Yeah. But it can stay in there, too. That's fine. >> We had people apply last time. We had that in there that weren't superintendent before.
>> The guy from Albert Lee [Applause] Going once, going twice. >> That stays in as is preferred. >> Okay. >> All right. So then you can go past the results of your hiring criteria survey. Uh the next page is the compensation
language. So what's different from the first search I did with you all is you now are required to have a salary range in your posting. So, you can use this language right here, but the next page does have some comparable districts and
uh benefits. So, what I'd be looking for you to give me today is the salary range to publish in your vacancy brochure. >> So, can we do that when we're like not in session? >> Are we okay doing that?
>> We're in session. >> This is regular board meeting. >> That's right. We did. That's right. We recording everything. Hello. >> Oh, yeah. Okay. >> Well, I think we need to bump >> your calendar. >> Need to bump it up. >> I think we should bump it up and take
some vacation away. 40 days. Wow. >> Well, 40 days was what Peter got, but >> negotiated. >> 30 is what it was, plus the 11 paid holidays. So, yeah, you're you're on the money stuff. >> But it includes his sick days if you
look all the way to the right. So, yeah. Yeah, I added those two columns up. I added the vacation PTO holidays and sick pay up and they range from um you know 48 to 102 if you add them all up. If you add up
the days that they're entitled to have off. >> So >> it's 102. Holy cow. >> Um what we're deciding on right now is a salary range. >> Range. So, is there a bottom and a top at which
we feel comfortable? I mean, just looking at this list, maybe um our bottom is where we're at now and our top is >> 220. >> 220. >> Well, I'm with Stephanie. I don't think
that you can't do one without the other. It's a package. I mean, let's just say that we paid way less, but we had a huge donation to your uh 403b and we gave you twice as much time off and it's a package, right? So, >> it has to be negotiated. So, depending
on that's why you have a high and a low range because they can decide what's important to them. Maybe salary is not as important to um as days off or 403b contribution. So,
>> I don't know. I'm just saying that >> Jason, you have any thoughts? >> HR guy. >> I mean, just one thing to think about is, you know, uh, for what it's worth, right? Um, think about CEO versus workers and and in the private sector,
how that's a massive difference. Here, we're maybe two, three, four, or five times depending on where someone's at in the work chart. I don't think that's unreasonable. I think you got to get over 200,000 to have a reasonable shot at getting a good pool.
But I would defer to the the expert on that, you know, and if you got a low low range of 170, I guess that starts that that works. But um our our admin comp seems to be kind of low market. >> I agree, Jason.
>> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> I think we should go 25 days off. We were at 30. Peter negotiated that because we're not paying in his HA. He doesn't have any of that stuff. So, Peter still was a little different because we didn't have those other costs with him. So, it kind of makes sense, right?
>> Well, and we'll start fresh with a contract to negotiate when they come in. All we have to give them right now is a salary range, but once we go into negotiations over the contract, then we can talk vacation >> because that was put down that so the stuff doesn't go. >> That was negotiated.
>> Just salary, right? just a salary range. And then we do have the options in um italics. Some people like to throw in something that might be unique to their district. You know, benefits such as health, dental, life insurance, you know, that kind of thing. They can throw I don't know if there's something really
unique in Brainer that you offer. You know, >> I don't know. Do we do any of this stuff? Jason, have you seen this? >> I'm just used to verbally saying like an an excellent benefits package. Keep it short and sweet. I mean, >> you could do that, too. Yeah, I mean that's what I've done for a lot of my >> benefits package.
>> Most just people who apply know that there's a pretty decent benefits package and is it getting in the weeds on all that? That's probably not why they're necessarily going to apply or not apply. >> How about benefits commensurate with experience? >> Well, that's not really the case. We
have to offer benefits based on reasons that aren't based on experience. I like that idea though of just um includes an excellent benefits package. >> Yeah, >> I like that too. >> Um so back to the range because that's
the piece that we have to decide on. So we're saying 178 to 220. >> And I hear Jason say >> I'm not cool with that. I think it's 200. >> I think we um probably eliminate start at 200 >> that we start at 200.
I think we start at 202. >> Okay. >> What you think? >> Well, I'm fine with that. I'm good with that. I I had just heard the other number before, but >> didn't really starting it to I think that's fair. What is What would
our range be then? What's What would be our top that we >> The only reason we're doing a range is because we want to attract people at a higher number. Mhm. >> Oh, I mean what are you seeing with these deals? Is that does it end up getting the problem with the range is I
don't have a problem with the range. I guess I do it for years. You know, before we had the rule, you know, you put the big high number in there because someone will maybe think they can get there and it's like, well, yeah, that's the way you're you're 19. You're not going to get that now. You know, you
work your way up there. Um, >> my concern is that if In the end, we negotiated 200. Would they feel like they're getting the low end of the the offering? >> Who's doing the negotiation? >> Because we don't really want to go much
above 200, do we? I mean, you look at these other districts with their >> Well, I was looking at St. Michael Albertville. That's kind of commensurate with our district and they're at two What? 220. >> Yeah, but they have 6,500 students. >> Huh? They have 6,500 students.
>> Well, we're 59 and that's not that big of I mean >> Yeah. >> Well, moreheads of 220 in there at 7,200. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> At 214. They have 8,000. >> Yeah. >> Let's do Should we do 190 to 210?
>> What do you think of that part? >> I like 190 to 220. >> It's never stupid. >> You do what you think on this board. Because then if 190 to 220 >> 220 because then if they're getting 200 they don't feel like they're getting the
low end of the salary range but 19 >> started at two started at 200,000 then >> no I want to start at 190 so that we give them maybe 200 feel good about it >> and they feel good about it. Yeah. >> Okay. >> They'll either feel good about or they won't take the job.
>> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. We'll get a sense for that. I think >> well it might be it and might be like Sarah said too and they they might defer some salary to some other benefits that they might want to have too. So you know >> Yeah.
>> Okay. Okay. >> We comfortable with that team. 190 to 220. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> All right. >> Okay. 190 to 220. And then just including an excellent benefits package. Super simple. Okay.
>> Okay. Thank you. So, the next piece in your packet is the um survey, and it's similar, but we've updated a few things since we did it a few years ago here. Um so, I'll insert the date. And uh as far as respondent categories, these are
traditionally what we'll see. Um for sure, community member, parent, guardian, staff member, and student. Um whether or not you want to have the additional one of business owner or district partner or agriculture is entirely up to you. Some districts choose one of those or two. some remove it entirely.
Depends how big a contingent you might have in that category that would fill us out. >> What are you going to do with the information? >> We'll give it to you broken out quantitatively. The first two and a half, three pages will be broken out by respondent category. So, you'll say this is what the student says mattered to them as far as top six. This is what
staff said. This is what parents said. This is, you know, so you can see and compare and contrast the quantitative stuff. Um, so you you'll see the trends, but you won't see the raw data. We have a report that we'll share with you um in that stakeholder summary report on that one meeting where we bring you the
report. >> So what we're doing is comparing what our six most important things were with the communities. >> Yep. Correct. >> Gotcha. Okay. >> Correct. >> See how they align. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> So I guess do you have enough of an agricultural influence in the area that
you want specifically? Sometimes people who are an egg fill out community member or parent. >> Yeah. Yeah. Um, do you have a business community that's going to want to be specially called out as a business community? Usually the respondents in that first category are pretty low. Maybe five to 15 people choose it versus, you know, we have 500 community
or 600 staff or whatever. So, >> it's not chosen a lot, but if you want it in there, we'll put it in there. >> It is nice to know what's important to that group as stakeholders, but I could go either way. Do you guys have a preference?
I don't know why you would leave it on there. >> What does it accomplish to get rid of it? >> Nothing. >> It just simplifies it to fewer choices because most people if they're a business owner are probably a community member probably. It's just a matter of whether you want to call out or if they even
choose business as their category. If they maybe they'll choose parent. >> There's so many cross hats that you all wear up here that it's just it's one more piece of data, but it's um I just wouldn't leave it with all three. That's a lot. Business owner, district partner, or agriculture. So,
>> yeah, winnow it down if you can. >> Get rid of district partner with the district partner. >> Well, agriculture, too. I'd get rid of both of those. >> Yeah, I think business owner is is good. >> Good. >> Yeah, >> just business owner. Okay, >> we'll eliminate district partner or agriculture. Do you want this in Spanish
as well? >> No, >> just in English. Are we good with that? >> How many How many ESL families do we have in the district? Terry. Yeah. Oh, no. She left. >> I know Spanish and Vietnamese
are high. >> I can I can get that information if we're interested in >> Okay. Can we hold on that decision until we have a >> better Now we push the survey back a little bit. A little bit. You certainly can. Um,
>> we love to offer it in multiple languages so that people feel it's optional. However, what we find is even people whose first language is not English will fill it out in English 90% of the time. >> They have their kids help them fill it out or a neighbor or a cultural leaison. We're always surprised even in districts
that have a very high, for example, Spanish speaking population. We get very few surveys in the actual language, but offering it is an inclusive thing to do. We just get very few actual responses in languages other than English. So, but it's your call >> if it goes on the parent square.
Depending on how Carla puts it out there, parent square will translate >> so at least for the district piece of it. >> As long as it's >> okay specific, but >> Okay.
So, knowing that, are we comfortable just offering it in English? >> I'm comfortable with that then. I just want to make sure we're inclusive to all of our >> English only. just in English. Okay. So, this is the survey. Uh, let's see.
There we go. Uh, so then we're going to look at the Oh, I wanted to talk a little bit about um the Q&A with MSBA. Again, when I send the communications blurb out, we'll have people send me questions in advance that I'll answer. I'll record it. We'll put it on the district website. I do encourage everyone on the board to watch the Q&A
so you know what I told people and you'll know what questions they asked me. That way if you get stopped in the grocery store, you can tell them to go watch it themselves. Um the search preview meetings I think are going to be very helpful. Those have been a really good tool for us to get those internal leaders in the loop as soon as possible.
Um staff survey, community survey, it's all the same. And then the finalist interviews, you're going to wait and decide on that. Um if and how you might want people involved in um in the sur in the interviews themselves. Last time you did not have anyone interview uh the candidates except the
board. That's what the vast majority of boards do. However, if you wanted to have input from people on the candidates through an electronic form or through interview committees, you can do that, but we don't want you thinking about that till you've seen the the input report from the the stakeholder survey. That'll help you make the decision about
what's next and do we want more community input? What does it look like? how do we put guard rails around it so that we don't end up with I mean sometimes if you put an online form for people to fill out about your candidates, you end up with people spamming the survey um with an orchestrated campaign against someone or
for someone else and the data is actually pretty useless. So you want to be careful how you offer opportunities for input and to whom. But we will talk about that later. Uh so then if you look at the next page, it says page three. This is from the proposal that I originally submitted to you uh for this search. Um, the question
I'd have in addition to the survey, which you just decided we are going to do, um, we'll do the Q&A session, search previews, um, do you want me to schedule any focus groups or listening sessions during the time that the survey is open?
They used to be normal every day. Everybody did them. I haven't done those in five years. I think because the survey is such um a universal tool and everyone's voice is heard at the same volume um I am doing some listening
sessions in a district right now and we have had people RSVPing if they're going to come and so far um I have two people signed up for listening sessions and they've been promoting it for a couple of weeks now. So attendance is typically low but that doesn't mean you shouldn't
do them. If you want me to talk to people in advance in addition to the survey, I will do it. I just want to make sure that you have the opportunity to say yes or no because they're they're always optional in the beginning stages of a process. >> Yeah. >> Um
I just worry with the Q&A sessions also scheduled that that's a lot for people if they choose to be involved. I don't know. >> I agree. I don't think we need >> any strong feelings.
>> I I mean I think the best data we're going to get is from those folks filling out the survey. >> I think so too. >> So I Yeah, everyone will have my phone number. If someone really wants to be heard, they can call me and I'll take notes, but I
always want to make sure they also fill out the survey. >> Okay. >> So we won't be doing listing sessions. Is everybody okay with that? Okay. All right. Um the next thing on the agenda is to discuss um in district
meetings, but we've already talked about that because on the next page, if you notice where it says page nine, I normally join you virtually for those two middle meetings. But because we've also the timing that we discussed with the timeline, I'll be joining you virtually for those two meetings anyway. If you wanted me here in person, it
would be just $300 a meeting. But you don't want me here in person, so we don't need to worry about that at all. Okay? Okay, I'll join you virtually for those those two meetings. So, no additional charges for inerson meetings. I will be here for all of the interviews, round one and round two. Uh, but those two meetings I'll be virtual.
They had the red asterisks by them on page nine. Do you want any national advertising? Page 10 in red. If you want them, we are happy to provide it for you. We do not mark it up. These are the actual costs to advertise your position
on any of these national sites. What did we do last night? >> Did them? >> We did all of them. >> I don't think we did all of them. I think we listened to of >> I think we did the >> think the one we did. >> And didn't we have an applicant that I
talked about last year? >> Not a name, but just a >> Yeah, >> they were from Indiana. Were they not? >> Oh, we had one from Chicago. >> Some Gary. Might have been Gary. It was right there. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. >> What what is your experience, Barb? Do you see good results when people do
this? Do you see more applications or less or the same or what do you see? >> Um it depends on the district. So larger districts, metro districts post on all of these. Um also communities that have a high population, for instance, if we're working with um again a community
with a high Hispanic population, they might want to advertise on ALA. um if there's districts that have reservations included in the boundaries, they want to advertise on the National Indian Education Association. So, it's sometimes driven by the demographics of the district. I'd say if you're looking
for just um exposure without specifically trying to reach diverse candidates based upon their sites, I'd say that the AASA is a good one. Um and maybe Top School Jobs Ed Week. I don't know that anyone has applied for a job
because they were convinced to do so because they saw it. Most often they're thinking of already coming back to Minnesota and so they've maybe worked here before or they have family here. No one tends to, you know, click on a site and go, "Oh, I've always wanted to move to Minnesota." But I think it at least
could peique their interest, but then they're going to do their homework. You may get one, two, three people that see it on a national site and go, "Hm." Because by spending the money on a national site, you're also putting yourself in um sort of the destination
district kind of category that we are going to spend the money to make sure that people nationally know. Now, you're already national because of Rella. All of the schoolboard associations that do searches use that. So, we have it in Revelis. So, Texas, Michigan, Nebraska, Wisconsin, they if they're looking for
jobs on their schoolboard association site like ours, they'll see Minnesota's already at no cost. But you could choose if you wanted to do just a couple of the bigger ones. We usually don't see Minnesota districts do it though, unless they're big districts or they're in the metro.
>> Let's not do it then. >> That's fine. Doing it early enough in advance. I think last time we were really wanting to get a bigger >> Yeah. A bigger candidate pool, but yeah. >> Okay. >> And then what do you think about background checks? You can wait and decide on that as well. This is the
in-depth um national criminal background check as well as educational credential verification that if they say they have a masters, you confirm they have a masters 39 >> citizens. We don't want to be like de mo. >> That's been an interesting scenario.
>> I think last time around we only did background checks on the two finalists, I believe. >> I think so, too. >> Um >> not every not not >> correct. And I think you probably paid for them because the districts does your own background checks. You you have to
do them for every employee. I mean, everyone fills out a background check, but it's usually Minnesota. And this is um a national, but it doesn't go back 20 years. And it also doesn't do I9 verification. That's the thing we learned from the whole De Moines mess is the only people who can do the I-9
verification is the actual employer. So, a background check company, no matter how good they are, would not be able to verify that they're eligible to work in the United States. That's on the district's shoulders to do that. No one else has access to the I9 form other than the employer. >> What is the deal with? Um, so they would
have checked out that guy's education. >> Someone should have checked and confirmed the educational verification that yes, he did have the doctorate if they' done a background check. Yes. And our our firm does that. >> Did he have the doctorate? >> I don't know. I think it's what do they call it when it's um doctorate in
progress or something like that? ABD. All but dissertation. >> Faith that they need >> a doctorate but ABD. All but dissertation. I'm not sure, but >> that happened. >> I don't know. Yeah, that that that was whole thing was unfortunate. Um, but everyone learned a lot and double checked their background check processes and we're doing everything we possibly
can. If they're a known commodity in Minnesota, many districts say, "Well, we don't need to bother because they've been a superintendent here for 12 years or whatever." Some districts will just say, "No, our our $15 background check's good enough." >> Can we just wait on this? Yeah. >> And to see who our candidate our final
candidate >> Yeah, I would think we would do um I think we kind of negotiated to get down what we did last time. I remember you didn't want to pay. >> Um, sorry. >> Trying to save money in places that don't affect student achievement.
>> I'm with you. Um, I think we should, um, I think we should, if we get down to five candidates, four candidates, six candidates, whatever our final list of candidates is that we're going to actually interview, we should do all of them because we'd be pretty bummed out if we went and cut it down to two. I I >> then had the background check done if
only one of them was a >> I think if they've been in a district for 20 years and in an administrative role, we can trust that that that's good. >> I'm not a very trusting person. >> Yeah. But that that's why we should just that's why I'm proposing we just wait
until we see who our final candidates are. >> I think we should do that. I think we should do the ones we interviewed, not just the weed down to >> the finalists. >> Well, because then if one of them is bad, then now we don't have two finalists. We only >> I probably >> We could still wait though. I mean, >> I just
>> How many we end up with? >> Yeah. >> How many we actually >> Let's push that decision. >> Yeah. >> And we'll we'll know a little bit about their history. >> How much are they? 300 bucks. >> 400 >> 395.
>> Yeah. >> Well, it's car dealer deal. >> 399.99. >> That's 300, isn't it? Close enough. >> Okay. So, we're going to come back to that at one of the meetings when we maybe maybe the night you determine your finalists, right? >> That night, maybe you say or day, whatever we chose. >> I have a sense. >> Okay.
>> All right. So, finishing up the agenda here. The rest is um sort of review as well, but the role of the current superintendent, generally speaking, they are not at the meetings. They're not a part of this other than um they're a cheerleader for the district. If someone calls and said what it's like, you know, great staff, great district. Do you have
any other role and vision for Peter during the search process? No. Okay. That is what is traditionally what it is. Um, school board spokesperson, if you're contacted by the media, it is usually the board chair. Good. But something Sarah, you're comfortable with
doing? >> Yeah. Spokesperson. >> Yep. >> Yep. Here's our cell phone number. Give her a call. >> Um, we have added uh we've added ground rules and dos and don'ts uh just as a review before the search gets rolling too much further. So, I share this with
every single board. Couple of things, please. If you are asked for a letter of reference for this job, please don't write one. >> Okay? >> It puts you in a weird spot if someone asks you to write them a letter of recommendation and you're on the board. Now, if they're applying for site
Albertville, I'm not saying, but if they're applying elsewhere, feel free to write letters of recommendation, but please don't write letters of wreck for your own job. Also, please turn down the opportunity to be a reference for someone. And sometimes it happens with internal candidates. They'll say, "Hey, you're a board member. You know, I'm doing a great job. would you be a
reference for me? Again, it just puts you as a hiring authority in a weird spot to be listed. So, try not to do that for your own search. Um, if you're contacted by candidates with questions about the search, please don't handle those questions yourself. Just have them call me. My number is in the vacancy
brochure and on the survey. It's everywhere. But don't handle those questions yourselves from candidates. It's a lot safer for you to just turn them over to the search firm to handle those as well. It's tempting, but don't do a deep social media dive with every single
candidate that applies. Um, about 75% of what you read about them on the internet will not be true. Maybe based in fact, but be very careful. We do a deep social media dive and the background check actually we've added the social media sweep to that as well. So, you can see what their social media footprint is
like. Um, but just don't go down rabbit holes. If you do and you get concerned about something, call me. I'll back up to the surface of the world and try and get you out of those dark deep holes sometimes with your candidates because everybody has a history. Um, everybody who's a leader has people who hate them
because they've made very difficult decisions and there's people that have access to grind. Uh, because names go public in Minnesota when named a finalist. Even if someone's coming from out of state, you might be lobbied against people from their current district because they have a tickler file set up that if their name ever pops
up, you're going to get spammed by people trying to convince you that they're not a good leader. So just be careful of that and um take it with a grain of salt. Uh you will be lobbied and I think you know that from the last time. So just listen, thank people. Um it's a board decision ultimately. If
you're related to anybody, let me know that you see in the pool. If you if you are related to the fourth degree to anyone that you're going to potentially hire, it changes how you vote. It has to be a unanimous vote of all six of you. um if one of you is out sick, you can't even take a vote if it's someone related
to one of the board members. So that um in education it happens. It's a small world kind of. So let me know if that's the case. >> What what has to be unanimous? >> The vote to hire somebody. It it cannot be a majority to be >> related if somebody is related. >> Yeah. If you're related to the fourth
degree. So there's a chart about how far down a fourth degree relation is. >> I usually defer to your attorney to figure out how far the fourth degree is. But um >> what if we've had a >> third degree? >> What if we've had a direct relationship,
>> working relationship with um a candidate >> doesn't matter. >> Okay. >> Yep. Doesn't matter. Education is a small world. So very often people know people in education and are serving on a board, but that doesn't matter. It's just the one relational thing as well. >> Uh let's see. Oh, as far as candidates,
the last do and don't that we're adding all the time is please don't recruit candidates yourselves. Um we're going to get the word out. Word is already out with Peter being an interim. But the caution with recruiting people as a board member is if word gets out that you've reached out and recruited somebody, it will deter other candidates
because they'll think, "Oh, I'm not going to apply because the board wants them." So, it will make a much much smaller po pool if you are trying to get people interested in the job as a board member. So, leave that to us and our service providers to spread the word as well. Plus, it puts you in a weird spot. if you actually have recruited them and
then you end up not hiring them, they're going to feel used because they felt like you indicated they had a really big leg up on this job when in fact they may not. And the last caution is we sometimes see people put blinders on. Um if you've recruited someone, you have your mindset that they're the best
person, you end up with a pool of people you really don't take an honest look at because you're convinced that this is the person. So your own bias comes into play sometimes if you're involved in the recruiting process yourself. So don't do that as well. Any questions on the dos and don'ts?
Okay. Uh in district contact person. I've been working with Kelly. Is that this person I should continue to be emailing and with? Um when I send her information, I'll always copy Sarah as board chair so she's in the loop with the requests I'm sending to the communications like that as well. And
then who would be the confidential employee for all of the application materials when the search is done? >> Jason. >> Is that who is sitting here? >> Yeah. >> Jason. Did we have a list of the dos and don'ts in this pack? >> No, you did not. >> Okay. All right. Sorry about that.
>> No, that's okay. Uh, what's Jason's last name? >> Olson. >> Olsson. >> Olsson. >> Thank you. Ian or Owen? >> Owen. >> Okay. All right. The last thing I have on the agenda for you today is to pick two questions. It's the last page in
your packet that you'd like to ask in the application itself. Um, the nice thing about Revelis over Applet is that you can customize the questions. We always do ask based on the leadership profile, why are you a match for this district? That's always asked. These are
15 samples, but you can make up your own question. What would intrigue you enough to want to interview them? It's the very very first questions. So, I've got about seven of them highlighted that uh that are I are
important to me, but there's some questions that I've got highlighted. I don't like how they're worded. And I'll give you can I give you an example? >> Yep. >> Um I like number two, but I it says, "What are some strategies or initiatives?" And then, etc., etc., etc.
I I would say, "What are some actions and ways that you have?" I don't like strategies and initiatives. >> Okay. >> Well, let's just scratch that question anyways because I don't like collaboration. >> Trust, respect. I mean, it's all just
bunch of word salad. >> I knew you'd say word salad. I had a bet with Amy at the office. When I was up here two years ago, it >> I I said, I bet you DJ's going to use the term word salad. >> People that, you know, >> I I remember that from two years ago. And she said, okay, I'll take that bet. I win.
art. You know what you're doing. What do you get for the What do you get for the win? >> Nothing. Just the satisfaction of being right. >> So, what do you want? What do we have to do? We have to figure out two of these. We like >> two of these or make up your own. It's a question that when you're screening the applications and you're reading their answers to these questions.
>> Um, >> they're going to write out they're going to write out they're going to write out an answer, aren't they? >> Yeah. >> Hopefully, they're going to write it out. We actually had a search last year where a couple of candidates had the exact same answer. Imagine that >> chat GPT. >> Yes.
>> And so when we talk to candidates, we say do not use AI for your answering of these questions. >> Proof it. Maybe get a start with AI, but we we immediately take folks out of the pool when they they do that. That's just and we like AI as a tool, but we have
seen people unfortunately use it as a crutch and they don't even try to be themselves anymore. So, >> what do you guys think about a question? I've talked to you about this, Sarah. I don't know who I've talked to about it, but like uh let's just say that, you know, if you could be king for a day,
you know, money is no object. Um what would you do to fix the what do you think is wrong with the reading and math scores in Minnesota? What kind of changes would you make to to get kids reading scores back up where they have traditionally been in our
state? You know, I mean, it's not about brainer. I mean, this is a this is a statewide deal we have going on, >> right? Nationwide. >> Well, no, it's not nationwide. It's a statewide. Public schools, people believe in public schools is a nationwide. But reading scores, some states are going up, some states are
going down. And we happen to be in one of the ones that's going down. >> I just like to hear what, you know, they said, "Well, I think we need to get, you know, wouldn't it be interesting if, you know, Sarah's applying and she says, "Oh, I think we need to get these these computers out of all the little elementary schools from fourth grade and down. No computers till fifth grade."
And then Ry's like, "Well, I think we need different software on these computers." and and Michelle's like, "Well, I think MDE is giving us some bad information and we need to quit wasting as much time on SEAL and MTSS and all these other things because there's not enough time to really get the kids up to speed on things that they need for the rest of
their lives." I I think it'd be a pretty open question that could have a whole bunch of different answers. What do you think? >> I think it's a really big qu question for the application. I think it's a great interview question. >> Oh, this is for application. >> This is for the application. So they
could use AI to answer that question without having to actually think about it. But if it's in the interview, they're going to have to really think about it. So the questions usually start pretty broad on the application. >> That's why the things in yellow are kind of like buckets of things. But then first round is more specific. Second round is very specific. And that's where
I think last year or two years ago you wanted your specific questions in round two. >> I remember we had to pick out these questions and then we didn't get to weird. >> But we ended up having three or four I think though that night. I think John was writing some and we we we took questions from you that night, but we're going to do it in advance this time.
>> I think it's a great question, DJ. I just wonder if it's better for an interview with your finalist than >> I really like to hear what they have to say about this. So, this really what we really want to hear from. So the purpose of this question as a screener on the applications is kind of to give us an
idea of um how how they would what their approach would be to the position and to to the job. I remember last year we had some or the last time we did this some sort of um variation of question number one and I really appreciated that
because it was so vague. you know, what's your vision for the future of education basically? Um, and so it kind of let people lay out their philosophy about what they think education should be. >> I'm let John uh number one, I don't mind
that qu it's a good question. Why don't we ask them what your vision is of public education? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. You know what I mean? Rewrite that thing. Just a titch. >> Yeah. You >> think I like that? >> Yeah.
That's different. >> So, are we only like answering this? >> Are we only pick >> Are we only picking two questions? >> Yes. This is for the application. Any of these could also be interview questions. >> The all these questions are more broad though than we typically see in the
interviews. But you can keep this list and pick from them for interviews as well. But we're just talking the application. So, if you get 20 people to apply, all 20 of them have to answer two of these questions. And so that's what we're asking you to choose today is what do you want us to advertise in the application?
>> I like number four. >> I I like number seven, too. >> Sometimes with question four, people remove the things in parenthesis and they just say, "How do you manage resources?" And they see if people mention human resources, financial resources, technology, they just wait
and see what they answer instead of prompting them to address all four of those. So you could >> I like that better. >> Yeah, because that that would fit. Number seven would fit in there. And >> so then you just go with how do you manage district resources? The rest of it's gone. >> You could include the second sentence or
not. The second sentence, you know, expands. >> Well, I think the second sentence I some of these things to me, now this is me, me being my weird self, is they're given, you know. >> Yeah. >> How are you demonstrating ethical leadership and professional conduct as a
school superintendent? Well, I hang out at strip bars and I have a small cocaine problem. You know, other than that, I'm really kind of okay most of the time. You know, I'm pretty levelheaded on most days. Every now and then, you never know, I might go a little kooky. Like, how are they going to answer that question? To me, it's just a st but I'm
a cynic. So, I think that's a stupid question myself. Like, I would just I would never put that on my application because someone like me be like, I don't want to work for those people asking stupid questions like that. You know what I mean? I mean, I'm just nuts. I understand. I have issues. All right, let's go back to the two
around resources then. How do we because I hear people saying there's interest in that. How do we manage resources or experience with school finances? >> My point is Sarah is that I worry that when you go to ensure accountability, efficiency and equity and allocation and utilization of the resources. All I'm
going to do when I write my answer to that question is I'm gonna try to make sure I make you happy about my equity and my allocation and my this and my that about the resources, which I would think that anyone that's qualified to make 200 grand to run this school district, they better know how to do that or we've made an awfully poor hire,
right? >> Y >> and I just think it's those you want to put in there, >> how do you manage? >> Hallelujah. I would say, you know, they come back and say, I spend it like it's my own money. I think it's very important. I think you know D. I don't
know. >> How do you feel about number 13? >> Why is 13? >> I'm just kidding. >> Not >> Well, if we're going to have only be one of our two questions. >> Once again, if somebody can't handle that, get rid of them. >> It was a joke.
>> Okay, fine. >> I knew that. I would like that, but I knew that. >> How about 14? What do you think of 14? >> I I was looking at that. That's interesting. >> I It is kind of interesting. >> We don't care.
>> You know to DJ to DJ's point about academics. What how about on number 12 simply say how do you address the academic and emotional needs of all students period because you're you're addressing
academic and you're and you're well you can include social too. Social and emotional I mean that covers a lot of bases there. academic, social, and emotional needs. >> I like that. >> And all students, too. >> I think it's broad, all students. >> Right. Right. >> They're part of the package.
>> But get rid of the back end of that question. >> Yeah. You don't >> because we're almost giving them the answer. >> Yeah. >> You know, we want to know what >> we want to know what they >> talking on his questions and it's like, well, you're telling me how you want me to answer the question >> and just stop at all students. >> I think so. >> Yeah, I do.
>> Yes. >> Yeah. That that's great. That gives us a real good sense of who they are. >> Do you keep all three? Academic, social, and emotional or >> I I think we need to because >> I don't know that socials they're just they're they're um
>> Yeah, >> maybe it is. I mean, I know it's a thing. Yeah. >> It's just that I don't know what they can really do with >> I want to see how they address it, though. I want to see what they're how they react to that. >> What do you think, Stephanie, about these questions?
I I think we should just take social out just academic and emotional needs. We don't >> Yeah. >> Well, like do you like 12? Do you like one? Do you like 14? Which one do you like? >> I like seven. I like seven and I like one.
>> Can we have three? >> There's only room in uh you can take out the question. It says based on the leadership profile, why are you a good fit? And replace it with something else. But that tends to be a direct response to who you're looking for. So, >> but Stephanie, did you see number four? Did >> Oh, wait. We wouldn't. That would be a
separate one. Yeah. Okay. I mean, if if we were going to go with resources, I would want one and four, but I do I kind of like 12 just because it gets us a sense of who they are as a person. >> So, if we take one and then just shorten
it up just like >> What do you think, Sarah? You're the one like that question. Yeah. and just go and say, "What is your vision for the future of public education?" >> Yeah. >> Yes. I like that. >> I like I like that. >> Four, how do you manage district
resources? >> That's just two questions. They're just short and sweet. >> For us, it's important because >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> I think our resources haven't been managed very well over the last few years. So, it would be >> managed well by some. >> Yeah.
>> Okay. So everybody comfortable with that? If we go with a version of one and four, we shorten those up. >> Y. >> Okay. One and four. What is your vision for the future of public education? How do you manage district resources? >> Yep. >> Yep. And then get rid of the
accountability efficiency again because we're kind of leading them on. >> Got it. Those are the two that will be in your position when you post it on 20th. >> Make them think. >> Okay. What questions might you have for me? That is all I had as far as kicking
off the search with you. And I still will adjust the public input survey dates and um I'll get the vacancy brochure updated and the timeline. I will send them to Kelly to proofread and when she says they look the same with her notes, I'll send them to everybody and I'll give you until a certain day to
let me know if you want to change anything. Otherwise, this is what we'll go with. Okay. >> And we're sending that application out. Applications will open on November 20th and close January 18th. >> About the brochure that you're going to that we're working on now. When is that going to or is that
>> that's what will go live on the 20th, but I'll have it to you this week. Is today >> the 20th of November? >> Yeah, I'll have it to you. I hope by tomorrow. I hope I can get it to Kelly tonight to look at. Do you work tomorrow, Friday? You >> bet. >> Okay. So, um maybe after noon tomorrow, I will send it to the board and say, "This is what we're going with on the
20th as an FYI." And I'll send you the timeline and the brochure at the at the latest. I'll have it to you next week, but if we're not posting until the 20th, we have a little bit of time. So, we won't necessarily have to rush this with that extra week in there now. >> Okay. Well, look forward to working with you all. Thank you so much. >> Thank you, Barb. This is excellent.
>> How many candidates should you say again, Barb, are out there in Minnesota now? >> Stephanie, >> how many candidates are out there? >> You're putting your coat on. You got to stick around till we adjourn. >> Um, we're doing five searches right now. We're doing five searches, okay? And
we've interviewed in two others and have had requests for RFPs from probably another three districts. I think there'll be a lot this year. >> Okay. >> But there already are five. >> All right. >> You have five. >> All right. >> We have five. Correct. We have five. >> I make a motion to adjurnn.
>> We've got a motion. I'll second. >> Yep. >> We've got a motion by um Director Breen, a second by Director Edman. All those in favor? Hi. >> Oh, roll call. Sorry. Roll call. Thank you.
>> Yep. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> John Ward. >> Yes. >> Breen. >> Yes. D. >> Yes. >> I think this. >> Excellent. We are adjourned. Thank you everyone. Thanks for the time today.
Thanks for