you okay thank you e e e ready when you good evening and welcome to the regular meeting of the ISD 728 School
Board today is Monday June 12 or June 10th 2024 it is 6 pm and I'd like to call the meeting to order and I'd like to invite everyone to join me with Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the flag
of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all good evening and welcome everyone it's a beautiful Monday
night lovely night for a board meeting I'd like to remind everyone of our protocol reminders particularly for the board to please review the agreed upon protocols and again review the statement of core values with that I will entertain a motion in a second to
approve the agenda so Mo second I have a motion in a second to approve the agenda all in favor say I I opposed say nay motion passes and at this moment we are going to move into the public comment portion of the
meeting e e e e e e e e e
e e e e e and that concludes our um open forum for this evening and public comment and we do appreciate comments from the public and from community
members with that we will turn to our general reports for this evening and first up this evening we have the superintendent report and I will turn it over to Dr bitman great Madam chair members of the board thank you so much for the opportunity to talk tonight it's hard to believe it's the end of the school year already right so these last
couple weeks have been particularly busy for each of us so I want want to just express my gratitude for each of you as well as our executive members our collaborative leadership team and all of our staff families parents community members for the work that they did in supporting our kids throughout the
district we had a lot of events and we had a great end to the school year and people notice that you were there you were engaged and we appreciate that so much work happens behind the scenes and again uh just grateful for the people in our school district uh in addition those of you who have been on the board know
that I just kind of give an annual reminder that summer is a busy time in the district office and so just reminding folks that the district office is open and one of the busiest times of the school year for us and I listed a number of things in terms of finishing a
year starting a year reports and hiring and all the things that go along behind the scenes uh but that when they don't go when they don't happen things don't go well so again just a a piece of gratitude and a reminder grateful for folks who are working with us to support
our kids families and staff all summer and again uh hopeful during that time that people will still have an opportunity to catch their breath but with that I'd be happy to take any questions if board members have any any questions or comments for Dr bitman no it was a great week of
graduations it was a great week all right we'll move to Item B School B School Board member reports and uh we have the public comment report and I will turn it over to uh director fryberg thank you chair
Thompson tonight's public comment two individuals requested to speak and both were allowed they both reside within the district topics identified were District happenings and the board and superintendent evaluations on behalf of the board I would like to thank those
individuals for speaking and their participation within our district wonderful thank you director fber we'll move on to governor and first item is the superintendent evaluation summary and the isd728 school board has completed the annual
evaluation of Dr Daniel bitman for the 2324 school year all seven Schoolboard members had the opportunity to participate in this evaluation the evaluation focused on superintendent competencies and the completion of District goals negotiated between him
and the school board and a summary of the superintendent evaluation is attached um I'm all board members have an opportunity to review that evaluation and again on behalf of the board I would like to thank you Dr bitman for a successful year we've had a lot going on
and we've accomplished a lot we do it together and thank you very much um Item B is the school board evaluation summary the ISD 728 School Board chair and superintendent have completed the annual evaluation of the
school board for the 2324 school year all seven school board members had the opportunity to participate in the evaluation and goal related activities and again a summary of the evaluation is attached for board members and the public to review and again for the board that is
something that again we can re reevaluate this summer as we look at our goals if there are things that we'd like to change and look at differently there'll be an opportunity to do so uh item C we're clicking right along this Monday evening we are the
superintendent search uh this evening we have a representative from the Minnesota School Board Association that will represent that will present to discuss a process for a superintendent search and this evening we have Miss Barb Dorne
here that um we have all been presented with a copy of her proposal she is here from the Minnesota Schoolboard Association welcome and she is here to answer questions for us if we have questions um regarding the proposal but
I will turn it over to her first welcome thank thank you very much I'm very glad to be here uh chair Thompson directors of the board superintendent bitman it's very nice to be here my name is Barb Dorne I'm the director of leadership development and executive Search at msba and I did provide you with some
information about our search Services some suggestions I made in terms of your upcoming superintendent search I know it was a lot to review so I don't want to take a lot of time in your meeting presenting it so I would simply open it up to any questions you have about any of that information contained in the proposal I will turn it over to board
members if you I would if you have questions yeah we got a few thanks for being here Barb um and I've read this over a couple times thanks for sending it out last week so we had a chance to look at over the week and Sarah that helps a lot because um things are moving
along quickly now um explain to me and I'm not critical of this but it seems like a conflict of interest that msba would help us with a school superintendent search I'm just not familiar with that last time we hired an outside firm that did it but now we're
talking to you guys as the potential walk me through that because we are part of the msba we pay fees for that talk to me about how that seems like a conflict of interest to me but and I I read a little bit in here where you tried to address that but yeah thank you for
asking that director Nelson I appreciate it so there's been a bit of an evolution in superintendent search in general across the country over the last 10 years uh traditional superintendent search firms conduct searches through a different lens than msba conducts them or other school board associations
across the country the difference tends to be that Schoolboard associations who do superintendent search first of all only provide them to members of the association not to anyone who is not a member and so all of our members in Minnesota we would provide search
Services if interested in um having us work with them our lens is entirely Schoolboard leadership so we do not represent candidates we don't have um a pool of candidates we don't Place candidates we represent the school board and we understand what you are looking
for and we support you in the search versus US conducting a search that we tell you what's going to happen so the lens is very very different the approach is very different at least in our estimation uh one of the largest is that we entr trust the search process to you
because you know this District far better than any search form or msba as well so we support you in making those decisions but we provide you with every piece of information you need in order to make an informed decision that's best for the stakeholders of isd728 you also in an msba search see
all of the applications that's one of the largest differentiators between msba and other search firms because we believe that school boards can be trusted with private data it is private data names of applicants are private data per statute until you as a board select them to be interviewed regardless
if it's round one or round two so you as the board are the hiring Authority it is not the search firm it is not msba so we believe you need to see all of those applications and we go through some training with you to understand the importance of private data and what it means to hold that information in
confidence we still do vetting we still do reference checking we still have a team of former superintendents who serve msba as service providers to help us look through the applications look at your leadership profile really vet who we feel is strongest and do pre interviews with them and talk to
references we'll come to you with a recommended slate you however will have seen all of the applications so you have the option and the very much the right to interview people that we are not recommending so I would say it's not a conflict of interest at all in fact it's an extension of services that msba
offers because we understand what it is like to serve as a school board member and we are looking out for the school boards in our search process we also believe in supporting the candidates and and respecting the opportunities they have however we're Team School Board um
1,000% of the way super superintendent search so it's different last year uh there were boy how many superintendent transitions like 64 superintendent transitions uh 22 districts did their own searches with internal resources and
as msba we helped them and maybe offered some training around that area uh we however did 78% of the searches in the state of Minnesota last year and this year I think we have done about 90% of them so we are now the leading search provider we have not been that
always uh we started doing this about 14 years ago and have fine-tuned it over the years and in the last two years in particular have become uh the number one provider of services to our members for superintendent searches kind of a long answer but did that get to your question yeah no I that helps me a lot I should
explain I'm I'm in the search world as well in a different realm than you guys are in but so my questions you know are because I I live in that world and I and I I kind of want to make sure that we're doing things right and um um other
questions though right yeah I've got a few more questions stakeholders input how valuable is that in the process extremely difficult excuse me extremely important yeah how but difficult explain to me a little more of that process okay
because we're the ones that hire right but you you talk in this Pro proposal about getting the input from stakeholders in our community it is extremely important I'm going to turn to the page that talks about stakeholder input to cover that with you so page three in the proposal
so um as long as stakeholders are aware of their advisory capacity only the biggest mistake search firms make when inviting stakeholder input is to perhaps call them a hiring committee I mean semantics matter ultimately you are the
hiring committee and only you so we want to be really careful around expectations and expectation management with stakeholders so first and foremost the online survey we found to be the absolute best tool we can offer it in multiple languages we have it in hard copy because not only one c not everyone
can or will take a um electronic survey but that's the best way we have found to gather input from all different facets of the district and you have a lot of stakeholders uh the largest tend to be staff parents students um Administration community members taxpayers but there's
a lot of people with a stake in 728 so you want to make sure that it's available to them and the 247 access is really important now one of the things um that we've started doing the last few years that no one else does is a Q&A with msba session we believe in accurate
and transparent information from beginning to end of the search and very often rumors can take flight in the early part of a search process and they overwhelm the actual information so we will do Q&A sessions it's something that we invite stakeholders to submit
questions in advance of it we do it usually in the middle of when the survey would be open and we answer all of the questions during a live session that we host we also though that not every know everyone's not available at that particular time so we record it so we answer all of the information that was
sent in advance about what will you do how will this happen is the board going to do this and a lot of it is unfolding as we go so I don't always have the answer I can explain however how the process works uh we also answer questions during the live session and it's Anonymous people type them in the
chat box so there's no power imbalance of who's asking which questions or anything and then when that session concludes people have seen uh the timeline the vacancy brochure we've talked about the survey showed them that and so we remind folks how important it is that their voice be heard so that
recording is shared with the district and put on the website for the duration of the search and um a lot of people will watch it more than once because there's a lot to a superintendent search and having it available in a recorded session having answered the questions that stakeholders submitted to us does
help I think uh Tamp down the misinformation that can be very very toxic to a search process uh we also offer the input forums or interview committees during the interview rounds typically it's the second round but if the board wants to do it in the first round you certainly may interview
committees are a traditional method that people have used in the past maybe you've used that in past searches where perhaps a staff group or a community group or a parent group or a mix of folks into interview the candidates typically in round two in addition to the board interview so that will be an
option also input forums is something that we use where designated stakeholders representing different groups across the district watch your interview and then they submit a form in lifetime that asks for up to three strengths and up to three areas of growth or weaknesses for each of the
finalists and then we provide that information to you before your deliberations so all of that is included because we think it's really important we have options on the alart side because sometimes you want to do things in addition to that so the first would be the focus groups or the listening
sessions early in the process that usually runs concurrent with the stakeholder survey being open I always caution boards around focus groups or listing sessions however to be very aware at the obstacles that do exist for people to participate in those Avenues
so it's a lesson we learned from the pandemic prior to the pandemic msba and the other search firms always did the survey and always did focus groups or listening sessions or Community sessions that was just standard practice the pandemic really caused that to be a bit of an issue because we could no longer
do all of that in person everything went online everything went online on like March 16 2020 so right in the middle of search season everything went online and people didn't participate in the same way I remember having a focus group with some staff um in northern Minnesota city
and I was very excited because we had 34 people on on this call and I really thought I was going to get a lot of input by the end of that half hour 45 minutes only four people said anything everyone else was lurking and listening so people weren't speaking up it was
more uncomfortable to speak up um online than it seemed to be in those traditional in-person ones so then we went back to inperson ones and the numbers were much lower people became uh very comfortable using that online survey tool as the primary voice voice of their representation there were no
language barriers there were no travel barriers no child care barriers none of that and so the information was more of a Level Playing Field through that survey we have occasionally still done them and this will be a board decision it's not up to us we'll simply say the
opportunities and pitfalls of focus groups and listening sessions is sometimes if you hold those in addition to the survey you do Elevate some voices over others because they're heard twice or they're comfortable telling the board what they think or speaking in front of a bunch of other people so as long as
they're carefully designed and the expectations are set we will definitely do those for you early in the search if you'd like us to and then the last piece of the puzzle is toward the end of the process we're happy to facilitate any additional stakeholder input or interaction opportunities with your
finalists those could be anywhere from um a meet and greet uh it could be a community Q&A of the finalists um it could be tours tours of the community tours of the building meeting with administrators those sorts of things we could arrange that in any way that you
might feel is necessary toward the end of the search as well and there's a big difference between getting input from people and allowing candidates and stakeholders to Simply interact with one another they serve different purposes so our role will be to suggest to the board these are the things you want to think
about now what would you like to do in 728 and so that's that's all the stakeholder oh I forgot one that's not in here um last year we started doing search preview meetings also early on because your internal stakeholders have
enormous um influence on uh Word of Mouth correct so we started doing search preview meetings very early in the search with your administrators and the leadership of your bargaining units those are basically the same Q&A session that we do online with anyone and
everyone who wants to join us we do specific ones in person with your administrators cabinet principles however you want to decide that um and also with the leadership of your bargaining units because we want them to understand what's going to happen we want them to understand what the process
will be and we want to answer every question they have so for those internal stakeholders it's not on this proposal but that is something that we started doing this year and it helped tremendously in keeping rumors and endos from floating around during the process we brought them in early everyone also
has my cell phone number and my uh email address it's on the vacancy brochure I mentioned it in the Q&A a few times I will take phone calls from stakeholders at any point during the process just to make sure they understand what's going on and what's
happening another long answer but that's that's what I think about stakeholder input extremely important very difficult if it's not managed well it can take you sideways pretty quickly go negatively quickly or people with a loud voice might say some things or demand some
things and think they have the right because they're in a meeting or whatever correct after you receed the stakeholder summary report and I I don't think people appreciate how good our stakeholder summary reports are until after they've seen it I've had a lot of
boards with a lot of different personalities and constituencies being represented and they're always thinking my people are going to have to go to a focus group because they're they're not heard they're never heard right well then they see you and stakeholders see the report and one of
the last things I always ask is can you hear the voices of the people you are elected by in this report and at least to this point in 5 years people have always said yeah they're they're in here it's not just all the good stuff we're going to make sure that people understand that they were heard we also
want candidates to understand where the district is and what the stakeholders are feeling we want to look for alignment between your stakeholders and the board if the leadership profile you developed is lacking something that rose up in that survey aren't sure we're going to have questions about that during the interviews starn sure we're going to
make sure that stakeholders know that we're paying attention to that so after that report comes out and you've read it and we've talked about it and we've compared where you as board members sit in the you know top six characteristics versus how your stakeholders are what your staff said what your parents said
what your community members said what your students said we're going to look for that alignment and if you're out of alignment with one of those stakeholder groups we're going to address that as the search continues to progress and so at that point I'll ask you what do you want to do with your interviews do you
want to rely on the stakeholder report as the voice of the stakeholders because I want to make sure you keep it in front of you from beginning to end or do you want to have input forums watch your interviews and provide you with feedback on their strengths and weaknesses or do you want to have some interview committees and if so who is on
that and how will we select who is on those committees and how will they be tasked with providing you their input because we don't want to set expectations that they get to tell you who to hire because if you don't hire who they say and you've LED them to believe that they get to have a voice in the hiring process and they get to tell
you that they really liked John do or Jane Smith and then you don't hire those people that resentment lasts a really long time so I think I use the words expectation management over and over again especially when it comes to your
stakeholders did that help okay thank you for asking that other questions do you have director any other questions Nelson sorry oh you yeah you can go internal versus external candidates what's in your professional opinion talk
to me a little bit about that um what you feel if we have good internal candidates will external candidates apply uh are they scared to do that are they you know what have you seen in your professional
opinion I have to give you the standard it depends so it depends on a couple of things um if there are internal candid candidates and they're making it publicly known that they want the job now remember you're the only ones that have seen the applications and even if they're in there you can't tell anybody
so if someone says to you hey I heard that soand so applied you have to say I can't comment that's private data if they are telling people though that they've applied and they want it yes it can have a chilling effect on the number of applications it can it doesn't always however and we have had on occasion
internal candidates tell people that they've applied how excited they are are hoping they get an interview and then they don't get an interview and so their name is not read aloud and they've told 1500 people that they want the job well that's awkward you however didn't share
their name so we always advise an internal candidate I keep LD on it until you're named a finalist and then feel free um but that just depends now there's also some pools that are larger because people think there's no internal
candidate and someone unexpected I mean a lot of people have superintendent licenses so someone unexpected throws their hat in the ring as an internal candidate so all these people from the outside that call us and say so is there an internal candidate I don't know and if I did know I couldn't share it with you
anyway people have to make their own choice we don't go out and talk people into applying it goes back to us saying that we don't work for the candidates we work for the board we also don't want to talk someone into applying if they're not all in because it's very flattering to be
recruited and sometimes you just want to win and you want to be the one that's you know gosh they're telling me I'm the one I want them to think they're the one and then they will apply because we'll Market the heck out of it they'll know about this opportunity and word of mouth again is very very powerful everyone's
going to know it'll be open um but we'll make sure people know we'll advertise it nationally regionally Statewide you may get a very robust pool which does include internal applicants um you may have a very small pool without internal applicants you really just don't know
the most important thing though is they must go through the exact same process whether they are internal or external it's very important to the Integrity of the search that they be treated exactly the same there are no shortcuts for internal
candidates um so you just you just never know who's going to apply my last is a comment uh I'm very confident in your ability to help us I wasn't as confident after our last search and I felt like some of the
applicant that they brought to us didn't know our community didn't know our people and weren't at all qualified to do the role that we needed in our community so I think msba is going to be a great help for us because you know our community you know our school board you
you know Minnesota you know who we are and you have a vested interest in helping this school board succeed so I I'm very confident that you guys can do a great job oh thank you George neelson I appreciate it I appreciate the questions too thank you any other board members have
questions yes Dr fber thank you so this January we could potentially have three new uh School Board directors and I know that this is a significant uh decision and ideally they would all be a part of the process wondering about the timeline
um because I did review what you proposed and could we push it back and what would that you know pros and cons and sure thank you director fryberg so I will turn to the timeline page on page
15 um so I based the timeline on two primary things uh one is that superintendent bitman is staying through December 31st versus a June 30th so he's giving you six more months and many superintendents that might have left you
know two weeks or so so with that middle of the year uh retirement you have an opportunity for someone to start January 1st um so that was one piece it's just a little bit different in terms of when the position is open if you don't find someone to start January 1st because some people won't if they're under
contract or they can't uh you could get an interim for those six months and have someone start July 1 of 2025 so that was one consideration it's the timing of the resignation um the other was typical searches are 3 to four months and if you
want to get out ahead of it ahead of it because we do often say earlier you are sometimes the better for external candidates in particular uh search season starts to heat up quite a bit for us now starting in September and October it used to be very quiet until January
and then everything in the last three years has sped up so we are getting inquiries we actually met met with another District on last Friday so we're starting earlier and earlier all the time um so a three to four month if we started in July I just said that kit puts us somewhere between July and the
end of October you can certainly start later if you want you could lengthen the search to be six months that's pretty long uh we don't want a search to run too long because you lose interest um and we don't want it to be too short last year we did a couple searches in three weeks at the end of the search
season I would never recommend a 3- week search because everything has to happen you still have the same scaffolding for every step you still have to do all of those things but it's very very difficult so the impact him an election boy that has been top of mind for probably the last year and a half to two
years on every search that we've done it's always a conversation and it's a conversation that we just defer to the board on as far as what is your community looking for what are you looking for as a board when might you want someone to start what does that mean for the timeline this was something I put together thinking if we could
start early and I didn't want to go over four months that felt like a lot but if you want to lengthen it you have absolutely as a board the choice to do that okay do you think that would make it harder to find candidates just depending on how
our board is running now versus if we had well that's a great question you know um I don't know I I go back to it it really depends it depends on the district depends on the reputation depends on the community and how people are feeling about
things um I've had boards say we should wait till after the election and let the new board in January conduct the search occasionally that backfires is too strong of a word when people start in January it's like drinking from a fire
hose as all of you know when you first started it's a lot and so for people who' have never served on a board before to select the superintendent does not always go very well they don't have the institutional knowledge of having been on the board a long time like all of you have um and they're also just inundated
with so much that the superintendent search becomes sort of a luxury versus a necessity other things take priority in front of them so generally speaking I tell boards if you can start it in the summer or the fall at least wrap it up before the end of the year because you'll be making it very difficult for
brand new board members if you have them because you always don't but if you have them be very difficult and a lot on their shoulders to make decisions very quickly um especially because they didn't have a part in identifying the hiring criteria or the leadership profile that will fall on the board that
initiates the search and so the ownership of it is best if it's with the people that start the search whether it's now or in the fall that's up to you again okay does that make sense yes okay so an interim superintendent I have not
gone through this process before um how does that work could you hire someone internally for that and then see you could good um two kinds of interim superintendant and it's not just internal or external the two kinds of interim superintendents are usually
people who can step in just for a season like one year or six months and then they're out of here it's just a it's a project and so there's a beginning and an end the other kind of superintendent who's an interim wants the job and they're hoping to prove themselves in that interim position so that you'll
just want to keep them and there's a lot to that because before you hire an interim superintendent you really need to understand which one of those are they and so if you have someone who's I've heard it called auditioning for the permanent role by serving as an interim
that's going to affect the decisions you make relative to the rest of the search do you even need to conduct a search because you're not required by law to conduct a superintendent search it's a very good idea it's a very good best practice um but it's not a requirement for you so then internal if there's
someone who chooses to step in and offer services as uh the interim superintendent they have continuing contract rights no matter what and so even if they're in temporarily with an option to apply because you'd want to talk through before you hire an interim does our
interim even have the opportunity to apply for the permanent job some boards say no no matter what we want to make sure the interim knows it is just for one year and so the interim has to know that in advance so that they're not
hoping to have a shot at the job if they're the interim so that Clarity and expect expectation management is really important with interims as well and sometimes they're internal sometimes they're external it depends boy I hate saying it depends so much it's just there's so
many moving Parts in every part of what you're about to do um I just want to give you the information so you make these decisions so did that help director fber it does I'm just thinking um since we are uh would be uh you know
fiscally providing for you know both salaries of two superintendents for you know is there a cost for interim versus the is it just all negotiations or a cost for our services or for the contract for the contract if it's an
internal person you would pay them as the interim superintendent and have a very short-term contract and you'd have to figure out how to fulfill their duties in the meantime because they can't do two jobs as whatever their current job is and an interim superintendent that's too much for anybody so you'd have to figure out how
are you going to cover that while they're serving as interim superintendent um and that's a conversation the board just has in terms of negotiating with that individual um talking to your HR Director making sure that everything is okay and that contractually there's no hiccups there
can always be hiccups with contracts you guys know that I'm sure so you want to be really really careful with that talk to your legal councel talk to your HR person as well okay thank you you're welcome thank thanks for asking any other board members have any questions I just wanted to comment to
thank you so much I had a few questions but they were answered I think through throughout the uh answering of of the variety of questions between uh director fryberg and director Nelson um just appreciate it very thorough information um appreciate um the timeline and the comments as it relates to kind of
getting out in front of um all of these things and giving us ample time to really go through the process that is needed the vetting uh the stakeholder input all of those steps so um really excited about the time that we do have um that's warranted
to us to to try to do a very positive and complete and thorough search um and the proposal here is just is very thorough and and has all the information um in here so um that's that's kind of for me as we as we start to begin this
process um and then kind of looking to to kind of move forward tonight I believe so yes absolutely thank you director Weiss so if I'm not hearing any other questions then I think if the board is
ready to then I would entertain a motion in a second and if we would like to propose a motion to move recommend a motion to move forward with msba with the search I'll make a motion that we move forward with msba to do the search for
us I'll second okay so I have a couple of comments on that yeah if I can do now do a motion in a second I have a motion we have a motion you got a second okay yeah before we vote Yes okay I just think it's really important um every school
district has to have a district superintendent yeah and we can't be without one correct yes so delaying this would not help us in any way shape or form and Dr bitman has given us six months of time for us to do this in the
right Manner and I've done searches that take longer than three or four months and it is it is more work and more of a problem and a hassle and you lose all that momentum and you're spoton with that three to four months I think this gives us the time that we need to find
the right replacement and to move forward so I think that's why it's important that you're here and it's important that we're having a discussion tonight it's important that we move forward and not delay it I agree and I think for the for our staff and families and our communities to continue to see
the work of the board moving forward is important um for all of us and and for all of those that we that we represent across the district keeping keeping our keeping the business moving forward I think is is prudent and positive so I agree I would also add the timing of
gathering the information in in um capturing what the stakeholders are wanting as a district with the Strategic plan in the direction of the district as well as with leadership um for our next superintendent as
well so yes and how many of us were Herold when we were hiring Dr bitman there was three of us um so we went through that process with the previous search firm I am very pleased with the proposal and I appreciate Miss Dorne that you took this much time to put this
proposal together and it seems very robust um a lot more detail a lot more and so I'm really appreciative of you taking that time today to share with us some of the details and the things that you've learned along the way in the 14 years to make it a more comprehensive search process that's incorporating
stakeholders I don't know that we had that level ofor Nelson that we had that level of detail so I'm very excited about going through that process because I think that that will help us get the outcome that we're all looking for agre so um
with that I have a motion and a second comment pardon me I have a comment though so on the flip side side we've proposed waiting for the repurposing and other various things um until the next election the superintendent that would
come in would not know what kind of board they're working with um so just something will we get many applicants with that uh maybe we'll have one that wants more governance versus I don't know we could have a different board so
how would that I just worry that that would conflict with the next superintendent you may not and it might be great you know but that's my caution I am totally comfortable going with msba
for the search I just think the timeline should be pushed back and I think the timeline as it's it's a proposed timeline so I think the timeline line will unfold as we start to work through the steps um to ensure that
we're thoroughly going through all of those initial steps to set those things up the leadership profiles all those things that go with that so we know what we're getting and then taking full advantage I think of those stakeholder input um opportunities will absolutely give the the candidates a very good
sense of what the community is is looking for and give that and then that St stakeholder report as you mentioned um will give very insightful information that can help to lead that so as it's a a proposed timeline um we just want to make sure we're we're getting the the
steps moving forward and working with msba and then we can kind of dig into the steps and the details um here in July Madam chair just a point of order so the the recommendation or the motion and the second that was made was to
approve msba as the facilitator of this process and to have the process be the three to four months as outlined in The Proposal so just want to make sure everybody knows what they're voting on oh thank you yes
yes yes all right I still just believe in my heart that waiting would be the best but that's okay if we don't agree I do agree with msba as the search any other questions or
comments I guess I don't see we don't know for sure what the board will be we have no idea so to wait just seems like putting thousands of people parents student staff in like a uncomfortable unsure position and that doesn't feel very responsible so me that doesn't feel
like a good idea to wait thank you okay so I have a motion in a second to Pro approve msba as our search firm to conduct an a superintendent search within a 3 to four month timeline
beginning essentially no July July July um all those in favor say I I I opposed say nay nay motion passes thank you Miss dord we appreciate your time and we look forward to working with you forward to working with you as well so would I
reach out to superintendent bitman about a planning meeting sometime in July would that be my next step to line up that meeting okay I'm happy to facilitate that we'll facilitate it set up for y great thank you very much we definitely look forward to helping you with this if you have any questions at
all my phone number is in the proposal as well and my email can reach out anytime okay thank you thank so much okay we will move on to faculty and staff item a it has been recommended the school board adopt the following resolution relating to the termination
of probationary teacher contracts whereas Minnesota well whereas Minnesota statute section 122 a.40 subdivision five states that that the first three consecutive years of a teachers first teaching experience in
Minnesota in a single district is deemed to be a probationary period of employment and that the probationary period in each district in which the teacher is thereafter employed is one year and whereas Minnesota statute
122.4 subdiv subdivision 5 further states that any annual contract with a probationary teacher may or may not be renewed as the school board shall see fit provided that the board gives the teacher written Noti notice of the non-renewal before July
1 now therefore be it resolved by the school board of Independent School District 728 as follows one pursuant to Minnesota statute statutes section 122 a.40 subd digit subdivision five the
school board thereby declines to renew the annual teaching contract of the following probationary teachers effective at the school at the end of the school year as listed below to as a result of the res resolution the district's employment relationship with
the above named probationary teachers will terminate effective terminate effective at the end of the current contract three the school board has reviewed and hereby approves the written notice of non-renewal for each affected
teacher the notice to each affected teacher States the reasons for the non-renewal the school board chair is directed to sign the written notices on behalf of the school board the reasons for non-renewal are classified as private personal data under the Minnesota Government data Practices Act
unless the non-renewal represents the final disposition disposition of disciplinary action four the superintendent or design is directed to serve the affected teacher with a copy of this resolution and the approved
written notice for that teacher before July 1 if possible the notices should be hand delivered could I get a motion Motion in a second so moved second I have a motion in a second any questions or comments from the
board hearing none I will call the question it's been recommended the school board adopt the following resolution relating to the termination of probationary teacher contracts as previously stated all in favor say I I opposed say nay motion passes moving on
to Item B resolution non-renewing probationary teacher contract with contingent offers of employment recommend the school board adopt the following resolution relating to the termination of probationary teacher contracts whereas Minnesota statute
sections 122 a.40 subdivision 5 states that the first three consecutive years of a teachers's first teaching experience in Minnesota in a single district is deemed to be a probationary period of employment and that the probationary period in each district in
which the teacher is thereafter employed is one year and whereas Minnesota statute section 122 a.40 subdivision 5 further states that any annual contract with a probationary teacher may or may not be renewed as the school board shall see
fit provided that the school board give teacher written notice of the non-renewal before July 1 and whereas certain probationary teachers who hold a conditional out of- field permission or limited tier one or limited tier 2 license have been offered condition indent employment with the school
district for the upcoming 2425 school year and whereas in accordance with the professional educator licensing and Standards Board hsby the out of field permission tier one and tier 2 licenses cannot be renewed until after July 1 of
the current year and whereas as a result of the conflict between Minnesota statue and pby rules the school board must non-renew the following probationary teachers with contingent employment offers for the 2425 school year as stated below now therefore it be resolved by the school board of
Independent School District 728 as follows pursuant one pursuant to Minnesota statute section 122a 40 subdivision 5 the school board hereby declines to renew the annual teaching contract of the following probationary teachers effective at the end of the
school year two as a result of this resolution the district's employment relationship with the above named probationary teachers will terminate effective at the end of the current contract three the school board has reviewed and hereby approves the written notice of non-renewal for each affected teacher
the notice to each affected teacher States the reasons for the non-renewal the school board chair is directed to sign the written notice on behalf of the school board the reasons for non-renewal are classified as private personal data under the Minnesota Government data Practices Act unless the non-renewal
represents the final disposition of disciplinary action the superintendent or design is directed to serve the affected teachers with a copy of the resolution and and the approved written notice for that teacher before July 1 if possible the notice should be hand delivered could I
get a motion in a second so moved second a motion in a second any questions or comments from the board hearing none I'll call the question it's been recommended the school board adopt the following resolution relating to the termination of prob probationary teacher contracts as previously stated all in
favor say I I opposed say nay motion passes moving on to item c teacher appointments it's been recommended the school board approve the following appointments effective August 26th 2024 Aaron Fleming Zachary
hack and Tanner tweet can I get a motion in a second please or Motion in a second so move second a motion in a second any questions or comments from the board heing then I'll call the question it's been recommended this School Board approve the following appointments
effective August 26 24 as previously stated all in favor say I I post say nay otion passes moving on to finance item a long-term facilities maintenance plan first up is
the 10year m the 10e plan and Mr Andy Almos the Executive Director of Business services will be here to present information to the district's 10-year long-term facilities maintenance plan welcome Mr alos thank you chair chair Thompson members of the board Dr bitman and our community um as we as we do in
every June we have a conversation about our ltfm plan this time of year this is a required report that we have to fill out um we spent a lot of time with Ellers and with our finance team going through this report to make sure that mde has what they need from us and they know what our plans are moving forward
for ltfm so that is what you have linked in your packet and if it's agreeable to the board I'll I'll um both of them are connected so I'll make a few comments about both um the first one is the 10year plan linked there is the 10year revenue projection and the 10year expenditure plan the one to really
probably pay the most attention to is the expenditure plan because that that actually has a combination of some revenue and some expenditures the revenue plan is really where we capture all things ltfm general fund fund six everything that comes into the district uh on the revenue projection and again
that is to inform mde of what of what our plans are with those funds on the expenditure plan um this is is where we capture what we intend to do with the money and so our uh in partnership with w and our facilities team we've laid out
what this looks like over time for the next 10 years it really is a 10year plan that we look at every year it's a one-year plan that we lay out 10 years it really is and so that's uh that's what we have for you there um items to note in this plan that are different um
on this plan we are increasing ltfm what we had previously in Pre previous ltfm plans was 13 to 14 million in ltfm funds and this plan increases it to 22 million and gives us the chance to do $22 Million worth of work you might
ask what are the reasons for the increase why do we need 22 million as opposed to between 13 and 14 the first is inflation uh our money just isn't going as far as it used to when it comes to maintaining our buildings and so inflation is playing a key role in the work that we get done um and then um um
some of our our facilities continue to age the example I'll give you is Rogers High School hard to believe that that building is over 20 years old now and in public education buildings 20 years is kind of a wear point for some of our work that has to be done and so that those two reasons right there are the are the reason for the increase to 22
million I'm happy to report that we can make this change without an impact to our taxpayers um given the growth that we've seen in the district this will this will be spread across our taxing community and and our taxpayers will not see an increase with this plan the last
uh two other things to note in the plan is the graph that's included in the packet shows how we intend to structure the debt so there will be some Steps step down in taxes as it relates to ltfm um so that's a nice way for us to be able to build in build in those decreases when we look at taxing
overtime the last piece is the resolution and that's in the second item on the bond sale um uh to do 22 million worth of work over two years so that would technically be 44 million we need to sell $ 32,5 45,000 in bonds and again
this is part of our normal normal routine that we've done this every other year for quite some time uh to accomplish maintaining our facilities with ltfm dollars and so the resolution is linked there the um 10-year plan is also linked there and we will be back at
the end of June uh for action on those items and I would always stand ready for questions either tonight or in between now and the next meeting if you have those board members do you have any questions from Mr I do John yes um thank you chair
Dobson so what would happen if we didn't and we left it alone if we if we didn't if we left it at the 13 to 14 million sure our um our debt would be structured just as it is now and so there's a graph that that we did before when we left it at between 13
and 14 million and it it it actually has some step step Downs as well they would be bigger step Downs if we didn't in increase it um and then we would have less money to go towards maintaining our facilities long term just feedback from constituents
that taxes keep going up and our test scores aren't going up and you know it's hard to ask for more money we're not we're not asking for more money we're not asking for more money yeah yeah director fber if I can you explain it yeah yeah director
Friberg if I could first of all our achievement is going up and so we have presented that and we continue to go up but the second piece is this does not raise taxes and the reason for that and in the report the reason for that you might remember that the board directed
the superintendent and executive cabinet of which you were part of to raise this ltfm and the reason that you approved that and directed the superintendent and executive cabinet was because inflationary costs to do what we said we
were going to do in 2019 is significantly different and so the board's Direction was please uh increase that amount so that we can fulfill our promises to our community as long as it does not increase taxes for our
taxpayers the uh board then asked that we follow up with Ellers the financial planner the financial planner said that the district could raise ltfm up to $26 million from the 13 and 14 we chose not
to make that recommendation we chose to go less than that so that we could again just fulfill the promises that the board made recognizing that prior to covid inflation and the cost of things were significantly cheaper than they are now
so that was the direction that we received from the board okay thank you yes I do remember that so I just wanted wanted to make sure we weren't doing this again so thank you for the clarification any other questions or comments from fellow board members we're
going to vote on it next meeting yeah yes that's is correct Yep this is just the initial presentation yep yes and of course if you have any other further questions comments I'm sure that Mr alus will be happy to field them
between now in the 24th wonderful thanks Andy with that we will move to the consent agenda is there anything um board members would like pulled from the consent agenda before we appr the consent agenda wonderful I will
entertain a motion in a second to approve the consent agenda so moved second I have a motion in a second to approve the consent agenda all in favor say I I oppose say nay motion passes uh fellow board members please look at the upcoming dates of importance looks like
we are uh have all of our dates up here up until we go back to school in the fall in September so please look at all the dates um accordingly and with that I will entertain a motion in a second to adjourn shall move second I have a motion in a second to adjourn all in
favor say I I opposed say nay motion passes we are adjourned thank you all for coming and have a lovely evening enjoy the rest of the evening still have a couple days of sunlight a couple hours of