Thank you. Oh, yeah. Thank you, everyone. Sorry for the feedback. Thank you, everyone, for coming out to our 04/21/2026 Elkhart Community Schools, regularly scheduled board meeting. At this time, I'd like to call, the board meeting to order. Could you all please rise for the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for
all. Thank you. You may be seated. The Elkhart Promise. Every student is known by name, challenged, and supported by highly effective staff, which we will be honoring tonight. And in partnership with the community, we'll graduate career and college ready and life ready. For those of you, it's your first time to a board meeting, we have a, invitation to speak protocol for public comment. You can speak on any agenda or non agenda item when we enter, public comment section of the agenda. Please step forward to the microphone and state your name and your affiliation with the
district. You'll then have three minutes, to, discuss any agenda or non agenda item. I always remind people to, because of the Family Rights and Privacy Act, please refer to no names when it comes to staff members or students, any issues or grievances. This is not the proper, place for that. We have a, a process and protocol that, can effectively, handle those things in a
more efficient way. So everybody should have received one of these on your seat or got received one from Dora. And there's a section. Just fill it out and give it to her. If you haven't had an opportunity to do that, you still have a a moment to do that. But if, not, it's, we will enter into the public comment section of the agenda. Okay. Taylor Bryant. Please be careful coming down the steps. Hello. Hello. My name is Taylor Bryant, and I am here on behalf of the Mary Beck
Intense Interventions team. Okay. Sorry. I'm here to advocate for my students. I wanted to express my concerns regarding the proposed change to the current structure of our k two three five separate setting classrooms into the k five model. I appreciate the ongoing efforts to meet the diverse needs of our students. However, I feel a significant concern about how this change may impact both student outcomes
and staff effectiveness. It is essential my students' voices, particularly those who cannot advocate for themselves, are represented through the professionals and teams who know them best. I respectfully urge that before any district wide changes to placement structures are implemented, there is intentional collaboration with special education staff and the careful review of how such changes will impact students with the most intensive needs. Our students deserve to be seen, heard, and understood as individuals first.
Ensuring that their needs remain at the center of our decision making is critical to providing a free and appropriate public education and least restrictive environment, not just looking at it through the view of their homeschool, but looking at the student as a whole. First, I am concerned about the lack of collaboration in the decision making process. As a classroom teacher directly responsible for implementing instruction and managing student needs, I feel that input from those of us working with these settings daily is critical.
Greater collaboration would help ensure that decisions are both practical and aligned with student needs, not to mention the difficulties that will arise trying to collaborate with sixth grade levels to support inclusion within the general education environment that is meaningful and impactful with lack of staffing to support our students' needs. Sorry. Additionally, the proposed model introduces a wide developmental and behavioral range within a single classroom. Combining kindergarten age students with fifth graders presents challenges related to safety, social dynamics, and
appropriateness. Older students, particularly with those more intensive behavioral needs, may unintentionally pose risks to much younger children. At the same time, younger students may require a level of support and structure that differs significantly from that of older students. There are also substantial academic concerns. The range of standards from kindergarten through fifth grade is extremely broad, making it difficult to provide meaningful standard aligned instruction across all grade levels simultaneously. Even with differentiation, the gap in content and expectations may limit the effectiveness of instruction
for all students. From a social emotional standpoint, older students may feel uncomfortable or even stigmatized being grouped with significantly younger peers. This can impact their engagement, self esteem, and overall school experience. It's important to consider how placement decisions affect not only academic growth, but also students' sense of dignity and belonging. I respectfully ask that these concerns be carefully considered before moving forward. Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. Alright. That is all we had, for public comment.
Next, we have a moment of pride. Chloe Ivory. Please step forward. Thank you, president Scott, school board, miss Reese, and community. My My name is Chloe Ivory, and I'm here to represent this month's Moment of Pride for Elkhart High School. Our teacher of the year this year is miss Booker. 12 teachers were nominated for EHS teacher of the year. After committee review, she was selected as the best teacher of the year at EHS. Miss Booker works at HBS and teaches geometry. On March 26, the performing arts department hosted its annual coffee house talent show.
Many acts were presented that included vocal solos, puppetry, and more. It was a well attended event and a lot of fun. Also also, March 26, Reagan Iannarelli was recognized as the McKinney's realty realty student athlete of the month. She represented the Lions at state finals in board in bars and floor. Spring break. I don't think I really need to say much about that. On April 13, 25 students from Yamate, Japan became began a ten day visit to
EHS. They did multiple day trips, attended classes, and hosted a cultural expedition in Tubbs Gym. Our students will visit Japan this summer as a part of the exchange program. On April 11, sophomore representatives from student government hosted a fundraiser at Martin's to support the Elkhart County Humane Society. April, seniors in business and international relations participated in two financial literacy seminars hosted through Lake City Bank. Lake City Bank was provided $25,000 from the Federal Home Loans Association to give to
25 soon seniors for expenses they will have post grad. Our upcoming events, we have ISMA Festival on April 24. April 26, we have NHS inductions. Lots of athletics throughout April and May. Prom, May 2. School of study awards, week of May 18. Senior awards, May 27. Our last day of school is May 29, and commencement on June 11. Thank you. Thank you, Floyd. Great job, Floyd. I'm always amazed at how you can get in front of people and stay calm
and collected. And so as a dad, great job. Alright. Next on the agenda, why most of you are probably here, we have the distinguished staff, awards, Ms. Lozano. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening, president Scott, members of the board, miss Reese, community. We are very excited to be here today, and it is a pleasure to have you here tonight so that we can take this opportunity to thank and celebrate you. So tonight, we have the honor of recognizing individuals who are often quiet, the quiet
heroes of the district. These remarkable staff members were nominated by their peers and administrators for one simple reason, they make a difference. Through their dedication, compassion, and tireless support, they help keep our schools running smoothly and support our students every step of the way. Whether they work behind the scenes or directly with students, their impact is felt deeply. And tonight, we shine a spotlight on their hard work and heart. Each nominee will be recognized for their outstanding contributions. So with that being said, for many of you who may not be familiar with
the distinguished support staff awards, we have four different categories in which our staff could have been nominated by their peers, administrators, colleagues. So we'll be recognizing, individual at the end of the day, for one of each of those categories but also all who were nominated in those categories as well. But also all who were nominated in those categories as well. And the categories are elementary, secondary, district, and certified staff, particularly those who are not assigned to a classroom. So tonight, we have with us many of you who were nominated.
And what we will do, just a couple of housekeeping items to make sure that we're able to get down, get the awards, and have a moment to recognize you, is we will call your name. When we call your name, please come forward. And if you can go to that side where miss Reese is, she will be there to provide you with your award. Once you receive your award, if you can come down in front of the stage and just stand in front of the stage until all the nominees for that category have been called. Once we've called all the nominees for that category, we will have a opportunity for
a picture. And then if you may go and take a seat, and then we'll go over the same process for our secondary, our district, and certified staff. Make sense? Okay. Perfect. Alright. So now with the housekeeping out of the way, let's go ahead and get this started. Now we do have, quite a few nominees that, unfortunately, were not able to make it with us tonight. However, I still feel it's important that we call their names to recognize them. So know that the first few names, I am aware they're not here, but we still want to say thank you to them.
So with that being said, our first nominee for the category of elementary, distinguished support staff is Jessica Berg, Eso Corona, Kathleen Davis Stowell, Nicole Dinehart, Amanda Dixon, Tony Elswick, Right over here, please. Alright. So, hopefully, Sierra Green is here with us tonight. So quiet. I know. I could play music.
Hey, Sierra. Yes. Christine Hack. Hannah Harmon. Hey, Chris. Chris yet. Cynthia Coopler? Alright. Feel free to give a round of applause. It'll give us a practice for the end. Hannah Licta? Alicia? Faith, Mira Montes? Mia Osoria. Luz Palacios. Heidi Pauling? I see Heidi got the memo. Bridgette Peterschein?
Abigail Quiroz Garcia. Megan Rodman. Margaret Schnippel. Jessica Scofield, Jennifer Souder. Starting to be a tight squeeze. We got room. That's right. Joseph Temple and Crystal Sullo. And that wraps up our elementary distinguished support staff. If we can give them all a big round of applause, please. And at this point, I'm going to have our director of communication communication just lead
the team as to where you would like for the picture, and then we will have our board members join us for the four winners. So you're more than welcome to, but you will have a photo opportunity at the end. You gotta get to the game. Alright. One more round of applause, please. Thank you. So on to our secondary. Thank you. For our secondary distinguished support staff, the following are the nominees. Again, we have a few that were not able to be with us today. Jesenia Alvarez, Dylan Bogart, Lindsey Boomershine, Sylvester Brown.
Thank you, Lindsay. William Cody. Jovan Deal. Brenda Ejig, Brandon Fontes, Andrew Gears, Maria Gonzales Alvarado.
Dana Hunt, Aurora Leon Bautista, Dalida Mood. Justin Nelson. Christine Otto. Mary Peyton. Madeline Rodriguez. If we can have a great round of applause for our secondary distinguished support staff. More one more picture. Can we come back? Take your pictures. Alright. From here, the list keeps getting longer and longer.
So are we ready for our certified alright. So for our certified distinguished support staff, Laura Christensen. Shelby Eby, Angelina Lasovit. Alright. I'll stand with you, Shelby, to take a picture. One big round of applause, please. Thank you, Shelby.
Alright. This next one, I think we'll have enough space here at the podium. Now we move on to our district distinguished support staff. Are you ready? Yes. Cheryl. Cheryl Stevens. Alright, Charles. I still have a picture here. One big round of applause for Cheryl, please. So for all the nominations that we received, we did narrow down the winner of each category. So we are ready to announce the winner of each category. We're going to start with our elementary. Alright. But before I give you the name, let me tell you a little bit about our winner for elementary.
This individual has played a vital role in their building, fostering both organization and strong sense of community. Through compassion and a willingness to listen, they help unite staff and ensure everyone feels valued and supported. The genuine care for students, families, and colleagues create a welcoming home away from home environment. This individual exemplifies the excellence of Elkhart, and we are proud to recognize them as the elementary distinguished support staff of the year. Drum roll, please. Our winner is Chris Hack.
Chris, come on down. Chris, when you're done, if I can have you stand on over here, please. Right over here. Would you like to give a speech? She would. She would. Nice. Nice. Not gonna say too much, but I do wanna say you have to have heart to work in a school system. It doesn't matter what you're doing, what role you're playing. You have to have heart, and that's what it's about. I believe in Elkhart Community Schools, always have. I went to Pinewood as a kid. I've been there for twenty four years now, and, I just think that everybody has
to stay together. And it's also we are a family. We're together more, more waking hours than we are with our families at home, and you have to remember that. And, no, we might not get along all the time. Do you get along with your family all the time? Mm-mm. But, you just you come back and you work together, and that's what's gonna make it work along with the families. We work together, and that's what's gonna make our students great. Thank you, Chris. Alright. Right next to me.
Yes. Next, we're going to have our secondary distinguished support staff. Okay. So here we go. This staff member consistently treats students with kindness and compassion while maintaining a strong and respected presence. They are highly visible and actively engaged with both students and staff for actively addressing concerns before they escalate. Even in challenging situations, they remain steady and supportive. By greeting others and taking the time to learn names, they help foster meaningful connections across the building.
Their impact is felt across multiple areas. This individual exemplifies the excellence of Elkhart, and we're proud to recognize them as a secondary distinguished support staff of the year. Alright. Drum roll, please. Lai Brown. Alright, Sly. It's only fair that you give a speech. Yeah. Wow. Where do I begin? Oh, shout out to Jamie who hired me, you know, security. Appreciate appreciate it. And miss Jakoviak, you know, love you. Love Northside. But, no, I was always told that if you love what you do, you never work a day in your life. And what I try to implement to these kids on a daily basis is mentoring.
Constantly guiding them, constantly redirecting, constantly being patient with them. And the results, we may not see, but right now, but in the future, we will. So I thank you all again. Appreciate it. Thank you, Skye. Alright. And on to our certified distinguished support staff. Alright. This certified staff member provides clear guidance and brings a depth of knowledge and support both staff and students. They are consistently present in classrooms offering hands on support where it's needed most.
With a strong focus on student success, they step anywhere necessary to ensure continuity and quality. Their reliability and commitment to excellence makes them the cornerstone of their department. This individual exemplifies the excellence of Elkhart, and we're proud to recognize them as a certified distinguished support staff of the year. Drum roll, please. Shelby Evey. Alright, Shelby. Under three minutes, please. Don't worry. I'll be brief. I'm honored. I'm mostly honored to, work with such a great group of people, and support our
English learners in many different ways. But, really, I work for a great district, and I work with a lot of great staff. So thank you. Thank you, Shelby. Alright. Last but not least, our district distinguished support staff of the year. I know this one is very suspenseful because there are so many names that you may not know which one, but let me tell you a little bit about this person. The staff member makes a meaningful impact across the district, helping to keep their department
running smoothly even during times of change. They are reliable resource I'm sorry. They're a reliable resource for others, consistently providing answers and following through. And additional information is needed. Their approachable nature ensure staff feel comfortable seeking support. Colleagues recognize that their presence strengthens Elkhart Community Schools each day. This individual exemplifies the excellence of Elkhart, and we're proud to recognize them as a distinguished support staff of the year for the district. Drum roll, please. Oh, the anticipation.
Cheryl Stevens. And if I may invite the board to come also and join as part of the, pictures, that would be wonderful. She's gonna give a speech first. Oh, that oh, that's right. Cheryl. Cheryl. That was fine. Thank you, mister Burnett. Under three minutes, please. I find that it's very humbling to even be nominated, so thank you so much. But we couldn't do this without our team. So, I work with exceptional learners and student services, and it's been an honor and a pleasure to work with them. So thanks. Our board members, miss Reese?
Big round of applause. Alright. And as we close this evening celebration, I want to once again extend our heartfelt congratulations to all of our distinguished support staff nominees for the work that you do each and every day. You're a vital to our school success and our students' well-being, and tonight was just a small token of appreciation. Have a wonderful evening, and thank you once again for being part of this special night. Thank you for coming. Doesn't anyone wanna stay for contracts or, no? Okay. Alright.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Again, congratulations to all the distinguished staff who received awards tonight. The job they do is obviously very, very important, and and we're honored to have them as employees of the district. So we'll keep the good vibe going, and we will have the Beardsley elementary report. Lucis, the floor is yours. Good evening. Good evening, board members, president Scott, missus Reese, community members, and Beardsley Bulldogs. Thank you for this opportunity to talk about the great things happening at Beardsley School.
My name is Michelle Cease. This is my second year as the head principal at Beardsley, and this is missus Nagy, our assistant principal. What do I hit? What we are trying to create with our students and staff in our building. So you got to see some of our students saying that school creed, which we repeat every morning on our announcements. Beardsley has a lot of opportunities for our students. We have many extracurricular opportunities such as student council, chess, all kinds of sports activities, girls on the run, and all of these opportunities are empowering our students to discover
their passion and to build many skills. So this year at Beardsley, we have been working really hard to improve our attendance rate, And you can see the excitement on these students' faces every Friday if they have earned perfect attendance. So they are present every day for the week. They get a free bag of popcorn on Fridays. And this was an idea that we came up with with our leadership. And on the next slide, you will see what our numbers were.
So before we started, we had a 152 students present every day, and then we jumped up to over 208. The numbers in blue represent weeks where we had an elearning day or a built in shortened week. So we can see we have a little bit of work to do to get more students involved on our elearning days. But then as you can see, the numbers have jumped every week. They are very motivated by a bag of popcorn. A bag of popcorn. And the another great thing about that is we have some parents that are coming in to volunteer on those days, and they've pretty much taken over.
We don't need to help them anymore. They come in, they run it, they deliver it, and they say that's the best part of their day is delivering popcorn to kids. Last year, we had the highest growth in our district for our passing rate for iRead. We grew by 27%. That is a huge celebration for us. We were almost at 80%. So we have attributed this growth as a direct result of having an amazing literacy coach in our building. She spent a lot of time in classrooms coaching teachers on instructional strategies, helping us
look at our data and determine specific skill interventions for our students. And we also were able to have an after school tutoring program. When reflecting on this data, teachers have stated that ensuring they were holding their students to high expectations while teaching every student grade level curriculum has helped to, reach this growth on iRead. This year, our goal is to continue to build on this increments every year, and
we have attributed this consistent growth to, teachers using DMR's daily math review, which is based on grade level instruction and also following our district created curriculum maps. And we hope to have another 10% at least growth this year. This slide shows similar data for our iLearn ELA scores. We had very good growth last year, almost not quite doubling it.
And, again, we attribute this to utilizing our curriculum maps using explicit teaching methods in the classroom, and hopefully, we will show an additional 10% increase over what we saw last year. Our younger students are also showing some great successes this year. Our kindergarten students began participating in a five minute intervention daily after our holiday break. We recognize that they weren't growing at the anticipated rate for learning their letters, both
upper and lowercase, and their letter sounds. So we implemented this daily five minute quick intervention one on one. Three teachers did this, and we had amazing success. So you'll see in January, ten percent of these students knew their upper case letters, and by April, we are up to sixty percent, and the growth is continuing today. We had some very good feedback from our kindergarten teachers and parents, and one comment from a parent really stood out to us. This parent stated that at the beginning of the year, her student didn't even recognize
her own name, and now she is reading books. This parent, as you can imagine, is very happy. And teachers have stated that with the new curriculum, students are not just learning how to read, but they're putting all of those pieces together into practice. More kindergarten students are reading this year. So what we continue to do are going to continue to do is to support our staff. We are going to continue to implement ongoing professional development and lesson planning. Our staff will finish out engaging in letters training to strengthen our literacy instruction modeled
after the science of reading, participate in more staff celebrations to build morale and positive school culture. We are collaborating and developing curriculum apps and creating more rigorous daily math reviews, And we are planning a summer Beardsley family event to welcome all of our new staff members who will be coming to Beardsley next year. For our students, we are continuing to plan monthly themed activities to help build community and reflection on their learning and their behavior.
We have pride assemblies to celebrate their achievement. Students earn rewards for positive attendance, such as popcorn. And we are doing quarterly whole school reading and math events. For our community and families, we will continue to host events such as our Wellfield Botanic Gardens family night. If you have never come out to that, we hold it in the fall, and it is one of our biggest events. We have huge turnout. We plan it around a theme, which we decide as a leadership team as a building. And, we have lots of families and students come, and it's been a wonderful event
to just create that community for for Beardsley. Our next family engagement night is May 7. It's our Loteria night, and we did have a Polar Express night, at the holiday time. And we are going to continue to build and strengthen our PTO. It's in the very beginning stages, but we are excited with the parents that have started to come out and the participation from our staff. And we will continue to encourage and increase parent volunteer involvement in classrooms and school
events. We, have been able to implement an after school tutoring program, which was paid for by our full service community school grant program. And this year, we had 34 students participating in that. Eight and these are students who are at least one grade level below where they should be. Eight of those students passed iRead. Eight of those students scored over 400 on their iRead assessment, and passing is four forty six. Five students had significant growth from the previous school year, but all students showed growth
on their progress monitoring data, and the feedback from classroom teachers has been very positive. They can see where the after school tutoring is making a huge impact on their students who attend. And we are very blessed that we have boys and girls club at our school. We have 78 students who attend boys and girls club daily. Boys and girls club has been amazing to help us with our tutoring program. Our students leave school, go to club. We check them out at 3PM, bring them for tutoring, and then we take them
back to the club. And without that opportunity, many of those students would not be able to attend tutoring due to transportation, struggles. And they have also awarded us with 80 scholarships. So those students who are going to tutoring get to go to Boys and Girls Club for free. So that's been an amazing opportunity for our families as well. So we are going to, like I said previously, continue to engage the community, invite our stakeholders to our events, and get more people involved.
We are hoping to continue to create a school culture of growth and positivity, celebrate all of our excess successes, which is so, so important, keeping our students' success at the forefront, and strengthening our database decision making. That's it. Any questions or comments? No. Thank you. Great presentation. Thank you. Could we have, the staff of virtually please stand up so we can recognize you, please? Great report. Thank you. Thank you so much.
And I just wanna say thank you, miss Assis. You've, really led the building well with my short time as overseeing the elementaries. I've gotten to know the staff a little bit, being in and out. I was there on a popcorn Friday. It is true. They do love popcorn at Beards Lake, but you guys have really focused on academics and making sure that students are attending every day, and I do appreciate that. As overseeing the elementary, you guys were spot on working on your curriculum maps, putting them in place, doing all the things right. So continue to, center on your success that you're having and keep it going.
Okay? Thank you so much. Thank you. Alright. Next on the agenda, we have the excellence of Elkhart. Miss Wood. Thank you, president Scott, members of the board, missus Reese, community members. I'm grateful for the opportunity to share the highlights in the areas of academics, arts, and athletics. Eastwood's math bowl team earned first place at the competition held last week in the auditorium of Elkhart High School, demonstrating strong teamwork, problem solving skills, and academic excellence while representing Eastwood with pride. The business and international school of study at Elkhart High School gave seniors the opportunity
to attend a presentation from Lake City Bank as part of the money master scholarship program where students learned real life financial skills, including budgeting, credit managing, and planning for life after high school. In the area of arts, Elkhart High School sophomore, Natalia Gonzales Acampo earned the highest honor at the cash award and top cash award at the People's Next Door student art and creative writing contest for her painting, fearfully and wonderfully made. The awards were presented on Holocaust Remembrance Day, April 15 at the Mishawaka Public Library.
She was on one of four Elkhart High School students recognized in the competition. Also in arts, the middle school and elementary youth arts month awards and celebration showcased student artwork from across the district. The event filled the welcome center at Elkhart High School with elementary and middle school student work, providing families an opportunity to celebrate student creativity and talent as youth art month was wrapped up in March. In the area of athletics, Elkhart High School at athletes Steven Sandifer, Riley Drummond, and
Ava Walker were named All American strength and conditioning athletes of the year. This prestigious award was given to the high school athletes whose athletic accomplishments reflect their dedication to strength training and conditioning. Also in athletics, Raelee Drummond broke the high jump record last week at five foot seven inches. She is officially the best female high jumper in Elkhart Community Schools history. Some of our future happenings, April is our high ability parents night. April 25 is Bristol Elementary's the final round family and community event.
April will be our consolidated school open houses. The twenty seventh will be the inaugural Lions launch for middle school sports. And May 4 will be the fifth grade open houses at the middle schools. And as always, please be sure to follow our district and school social media pages as we share each day the excellence of Elkhart Community Schools. Thank you. Wendy. Okay. That gets us through the feel good portion of the agenda tonight. Now we, move on to the consent items. Do I have a motion? Motion. I have a motion.
Do I have a second? I have a motion. I have a second for the consent items. Do I have any discussion or questions from the board? Well, so it's still a feel good moment. We have at twenty seven thousand and twenty dollars, we received donations from our community. Let's start first with Alliance RV that donated $5,000 to HR for the staff recognition event that will be on May 6 to celebrate all at the Wellfield. Then we received at a thousand dollars, three donations for our softball team, one from HRP Construction, one from Welch Packaging, and one from Asolo Township Voluntary Fire Department, all
at $500 a piece. Inova Federal Credit Union donated $1,350 to support our field trips and any extracurricular programming that needs to amount to the field trips being successful. The track team received two donations at a total of $8,975, 8,000 from Linda Homo and the Elkhart, the Elkhart athletic club donated $975, and this will be used to grow our track team and our future runners. Belmont Mennonite Church, who is always so involved with our school, donated to Mary Beck
for youth bikes and helmets to be used for the spring break reading and IXL challenge for our students. And our boys' volleyball team received two donations at a thousand dollars total 500 each one from coons and coons CPA, and one from Michael and Cara Coons for growing our volleyball team used for travel gears, jerseys, etcetera. Now this is great. Our marine biology trip received three donations. Alliance RV kicked in again. Forest River in, and an anonymous donor donated $2,500 to be used for our marine
biology trip. And then our Elkhart Area Career Center received from Monteith's best winter and service, which listen, you guys. There are three locations in Elkhart. If you're not using them, please do because I cannot tell you how much they donate to our school. They are phenomenal. So they donated $4,000 to be used for our automotive technology program. Also, might I add, they hire a lot of our students, so really support them. But we received one of the most blessed beneficiary of an annual, streaming allotment to
our career center from the CFEC and Steven Eldridge. So this will be a ben a benefactor that donated to our career center that will go consistently year by year. So let's see. I think I nailed it on. Let me turn it over. Got it. So $27,020. We were blessed by our community. Thank you. And I did a plug for Monteith Tire. Yes. You did it. Thank you, miss Mullins. Any other, endorsements, plugs, or questions?
Seeing none, all all in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion for the consent items passes. Next, we have old business. Mister Thorn, we I believe we have four contracts for final consideration. That is correct. The administration presents four contracts for final consideration. The, the IAC travel, Mazi Educational Consulting, JFW Specialty, and Boys and Girls of Elkhart County. Do I have a motion to accept these contracts as presented? Motion. Do I have a second?
I second. I have a motion and I have a second. Do I have any questions or discussion from the board for mister Thorne regarding these contracts? Seeing or hearing none, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Next, we have, mister Thorne, board policy 3213, dot zero four ACS student and staff relations. This is for final consideration. Thank you. President Scott, members of the board, missus Reese, the this evening, the administration presents this
policy for final consideration. Do I have a motion regarding this policy? Motion. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second. I have a second. Do I have any questions or discussion from the board regarding, policy three two one three, staff student staff relations? Seeing or hearing none, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. Missed Otto, personnel report. Good evening once again, President Scott, members of the board, miss Reese. The administration recommends the personnel report as presented. Sorry.
I was That's quite alright. Good evening. I wasn't paying attention. Just present just present it. The administration recommends the personnel report as presented. Thank you. I have, a motion to accept oh, wait. On the personnel report, do I have a motion to accept the personnel report as presented? Do I have a second? Do I have any discussion? Yeah. So this is where I do my retirements now since this change in our agenda. Okay. So we wanna recognize seventy six years total of retirement this time. Tony Kraybill will be retiring from WVPE as director after eighteen years of serving them.
And John McClure, many of us have met him over the years. He has taken care of nursing and different aspects of it twenty nine years. And I have to start by saying, yes, Elkhart Central at first, but then also Elkhart High School. But if you ever went to Central and you had to walk through the office after twenty nine years, one single person sat there doing absolutely everything, directing all the students, taking phone calls, making sure mister Serge knew where he was supposed to be for years, and that was Sue. And then she what kept going right with Elkhart High School, which was just wonderful.
So we say happy retirement to each one of them, but after twenty nine years, definitely happy retirement, Sue. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. You're welcome. A motion, and I have a second. Do we have any further discussion? Seeing or hearing none, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Thank you. Thank you, miss Lano. Next on the agenda, we have the approval of the resignation of doctor, Larry Hoff. Do I have a motion? So moved. Do I have a second? Second. I have a motion and I have a second. Before we, vote on the, approval of the resignation, I'd like to take a moment
to recognize his, dedicated leadership and meaningful impact he had, and made on the district during his his tenure here. Essentially, you know, from the from the time, he came to us through the interview process. There was a difference, a noticeable difference. It wasn't just me who felt it. I think think everybody felt it. And it was his first, first, time, you know, venturing into superintendent and and and
and venturing into this role. And, you know, you you know then that when a person, is going through the process and he's making a difference, you know that he's going to make a difference within the district. During his time at Oak Park Community Schools, doctor Health, doctor Health helped lead efforts focusing on improving student achievement and strengthening instructional practices across the district. He was steadfast, with that charge. And in 2025 and '26, the district saw an improvement across the academic metrics, including
increased graduation rates and growth at IREED performance, earning recognition from the Indiana Department of Education. I think we had the largest urban growth of any district in the state of Indiana. He also received, you know, other, awards and recognition as well as the district both from the state and, nationally. And I knew at that time it was a double edged sword that I welcomed success, I welcomed the achievement, but I know people would be calling and and and
coming. So, you know, I'd love to see the recognition and the difference he was making, but I knew that, we were bringing attention to to his leadership. In addition to the academic success and progress that he had, He he worked tirelessly with the challenges we've had financially. He worked with a couple CFOs. He hired miss Ross, brought her into the fold, and instituted, some cost saving strategies
that, you know, that were that were meaningful and made a meaningful impact, approximately $5,000,000, in the first year, the twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six school year. These efforts don't come easy. A lot of hard decisions needed to be made, but decisions like this will set the district on a path for long term stability, financially. And we have some work to do. We can we'll continue down that path, but, his efforts in in in helping us,
you know, get to where we are today is is is not lost. One of his most significant accomplishments is something that we just finished up with, which is a very complex and challenging process of consolidation. Nobody likes to go through a consolidation process, including doctor Hough, the board, his team, but it was, it was necessary. You know, it it it probably could have been done many, many years ago, and yet it wasn't.
And he stepped up to the challenge. And through thoughtful planning collaboration, focus on long term sustainability, this work was successfully completed. And I think it positioned the district with this consolidation into a a greater efficiencies and enhanced opportunities for not only the district but for the students, in years to come. He certainly loves a lasting mark on this district, in the community.
We're grateful for his service. His unwavering focus of making decisions that were student centric, student first, academically focused, and a lot of hard decisions, he he never wavered from. The commitment to that for somebody in the superintendent's role that's tenured is impressive. For someone to come in and and do it in his first two years in this position is something that, I would I was very impressed about and impressed with.
He he has set the district on a path that the team that is currently still here, the cabinet, administrators, staff, and we saw some great staff tonight are gonna continue down that path, to where this will be the academic destination in the state of Indiana. We will get there academically. We will get there financially. And so he played a very important role, in that. So I'd like to extend this sincere appreciation for doctor Huff for years of service,
and dedication. I, wish him continued success in his future endeavors, as the next superintendent of the Rockford Public Schools. I'm sure he will, have, you know, great success there. So, at this time, you know, I just wanna thank doctor Hoff, for the work that he's done, and I'm sure that he will continue the great success in his next district. So at this time, I have a motion and I have a second. All in favor of approving the resignation? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes seven zero.
Next, we have the approval of appointment of Michelle Reese as interim superintendent. That's gonna be effective, 04/03/2026. We're doing this to ensure the continuity of leadership. She was, approved a couple board meetings ago, to take, the role superintendent on July 1. So this isn't a surprise. She will be filling the role of interim superintendent, effective, immediately with the approval of, appointment of interim superintendent.
So do I have a motion? Motion. Motion. Do I have a second? Second. Do I have any discussion or comments regarding the approval? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes unanimously. We gotta go a couple other housekeeping, appointments. We We next have the approval appointment of doctor, Rausch. Again, interim deputy superintendent. There was an approval for her to be the deputy, deputy superintendent effective, July 1. With this time frame, we will just be stepping that up. Again, continuity of leadership. We're we're in great hands not only with, Michelle, but also with doctor Rausch, to
carry on the directory that the district is, we find ourselves in. Do I have a motion to accept the, approval appointment of doctor Amy Rausch's interim deputy superintendent? Motion. Do I have a second? Second. I have a motion. I have a second. Any discussion or comments? All in favor? Aye. That motion passes. Well, opposed? That motion passes seven o. One last housekeeping. We need the approval of the appointment of Kristen Cederberg as interim director of elementary schools. And again, this is effective April 3, 2026.
Essentially, fulfilling the position of Michelle Reese, was her position that she'll be vacating to be the interim superintendent. Do I have a motion for the approval of this appointment? Motion. Do I have a second? Second. Thank you. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? And that motion passes seven zero. Okay. Next on the agenda under new business, mister Thorne, we have the Elkhart Aquatics Center addendum. Thank you, president Scott. Members of the board, the administration recommends approval of the First Amendment to the agreement
concerning the aquatics facility. Thank you. I believe we've all had an opportunity to, read through the, first amendment to this agreement. So do I have a motion? Yes. Do I have a second? I have a motion and I second. Do I have any questions that have not yet been answered regarding, this first amendment to the agreement? I do have a representative here. Who is introducing? Okay. We do have somebody here. Do we have somebody here you'd like to be introduced? Sure. I'd like to I don't need to.
He apparently does not want to be introduced. However, behind us is is Pete McGowan, who is the president of president, right, of the Community Foundation, who has been a great partner through this process, first in terms of actually developing the agreement starting back in 2016 and most recently in terms of working with us through the process of putting together this amendment to the agreement. So I thank the work of the Community Foundation and Beacon in terms of working with us to move this process along.
Yes. I will, I will concur with that, Pete. Thank you for, yeah, your efforts and everything you've done, to initially get, arguably, one of the the finest aquatic centers, if if not in the state, in the region. And, you know, I I would put it up against any in any one of them. We're very we're very privileged to have a, an aquatic center to where our students, can not only, learn to swim but also take, their their athletic endeavors to the
next level. So, Pete, thank you for everything that you've done. I will see the opportunity to to And come to the mic They don't have to come to the microphone. Now you have to come to the microphone. We're delighted to be partners with both Beacon and Elkhart Community Schools. It it seems to me that I think we've come to a a good agreement that I don't need to build a case for. But you should be proud of the fact that the NAIA, essentially, the small college and university national swimming and diving championships were just held there for the second year
in a row, and it may be the third and fourth year in a row. But I think the feather the the greatest feather in the cap of this aquatic center is the fact that the states of Illinois and Iowa hold their state high school swimming and diving championship in Elkhart, Indiana every year, and they travel from Chicago and Saint Louis to come compete in our facility that we created together. So thank you very much. Thank you.
And, also, I wanna thank, Beacon for their partnership as well. I have a motion and I have a second. No further discussion. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Alright, mister Thorne. Under new business, we have, contracts, for initial consideration. Thank you, president Scott. Members of the board, missus Reese, this evening, the administration presents seven contracts for initial consideration and requests waiver of second reading for the following contracts, Integrated Technology, Qualtrics, Elkhart County Youth for Christ, DBA Lifeline, Five Star Life, and Education Advanced.
Did you which one are lab network solutions for initial reading? It'd be easier to Network solutions. Well, we'll come back for a second reading, as well as seesaw learning. Yeah. So do I have a motion, to waive second reading for Integrated Technology LLC, Qualtrics, Elkhart County Youth for Christ Businesses Lifeline Yes. Five Star Life and Education Advancement Incorporated. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second. I have a motion, and I have a second.
All in favor of waiting second reading and accepting these contracts as presented, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes seven o. On the ones that are here for initial consideration, please, direct any questions to mister Thorm in the interim before they come back up in a couple weeks at our next board meeting, if you have any. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next we have, under new business, board policy seven five one zero point zero one, use of school district vehicles. Thank you. This evening, the administration presents for preliminary consideration proposed new board policy seven five one
zero point zero one, use of school district vehicles. This is for initial consideration. Anybody has any questions, or concerns, please address those to mister Thorne in the next two weeks so we can bring this back up for second reading and get this approved. Thank you. Thank you. Miss Ross, the financial report. Thank you. Good evening, president Scott, board members, missus Reese, and the community. I'm here to provide our monthly financial update. Starting with our education fund. So we are looking at our March expenditures, but before we dive in, you'll see
our budget here for you for reference in that, second column. And in this next column labeled March, you'll see our total receipts highlighted here of 7,700,000. I'm rounding down a little bit. Our total expenses, and you find here highlighted our net revenue for the month and ending cash balance for the education fund for the month of March. This year to date synopsis, you'll see right here in this pie chart, we are
spending over, 95% in wages and benefits. We should be closer to 80%. So with that said, here is our cash flow for the education fund for the, for 2026, landing at 1,100,000 for March. If no questions, I am moving on to the operations fund for March or March expenditures. Here's our budget for reference for you and the community. And here you'll find our March expenses I'm highlighting.
I'm sorry. Beginning cash balance, total receipts, which is, typical as our major receipts are, come in June and December. Next, you'll see our total expenses and our net expense for the month, which is typical for this fund. However, our cash balance could, definitely be a little higher to sustain to be more sustainable. Here's a graphical representation of this fund, and you can see the larger areas in blue and red, comprise our, wages and benefits.
It's pretty much in in line where it should be. On average, we spend about 3,300,000 a month in this fund, and just some things coming up. We have some bond revenue proceeds, we expect in April and our next regular tax payment expected in June. With that, here's our, cash balance for our operations fund, for 2026. Typical trajectory until we get our large receipt in June and December. And lastly, our rainy day fund, no change since last meeting, which gives us our
combined cash balances for our major funds, rounding out March at 9,200,000 rounding. And, oh, last but not least, just a reminder of some of the savings initiatives that you spoke of, president Scott, and we're continuing, one that we've got some static pieces here that we still want to note, but the number that's changing, that's updated often is the staffing cost here I just highlighted. So from this time last year, to this year, from August to roughly March 31,
our our, payroll has been reduced by 3,700,000. So total, our savings initiatives are, coming in at 6,500,000. Last last report, last time I showed you this, we were at about 5.3. So we're continuing in the trajectory of cost savings. And that concludes the financial report. Do we have any, questions or comments from the board regarding the financial report? Alright. And then we'll move on to the insurance report. Miss Ross. Yeah. Just one slide here. Our insurance plan update is, I like to report our loss ratio as 59 at
this point, versus, 86%. That's where we were last year. So in some, our March plan is, faring quite well, and our expenses were less than our plan premium. So that's how we get to that favorable loss ratio. So good news to report on our insurance plan. Very good. Any questions? We'll keep the fingers crossed. We'll keep the fingers crossed. Fingers crossed, yeah. Alright. Thank you for the insurance update. Thank you. Alright. Miss Reese. The floor is yours. Just a couple of highlights and some things to look forward to and so that
you can get out of here at a decent time tonight. So staff highlights. We did recognize her already. Brandy Fontes, a nurse at Pierre Moran Middle School. She was selected, as an Indiana Immunization Coalition award winner recognizing her advocacy and commitment to student health and immunizations. And the award ceremony will be held May 7 in Indianapolis, so let's give her a round of applause. That's a great opportunity. And if you ask me about that award, I don't know much about it except
it has to do with immunizations. So we'll see, kind of what that all entails. So congratulations, Brandy. Also from the student highlight, Brendan DeVito, earned individual medalist honors at the Goshen Invitational, helping lead the boys golf team to a first place finish. So congratulations, Brendan. Looking ahead. Yes. Let's go ahead and give Brendon a nice round of applause. Good job. Looking ahead, end of the year celebrations are being planned, including opportunities for community members and alumni to visit our consolidating buildings.
So please watch for upcoming dates and times, and I believe believe that Wendy has already highlighted our first one with Bristol being on April 25. So please come out and celebrate with them, and I believe it starts at noon is that celebration. So I hope all the board members will also come out to Bristol at that time. The next exciting news that we have is Elkhart Virtual School. It will be opening this fall and providing additional flexibility for our families while keeping students connected to our community. This pathway helped meet students where they are and support their individual success.
So please stay tuned because further communication will be coming your way later this week. So we're gonna be starting registration for virtual school later this week. So please make sure and stay tuned for that. But in closing, I wanna thank you thank you to all of our support staff for the important work you do every day, and a special congratulations to Christine, Sylvester, Shelby, and Cheryl, our support staff of the year nominees and award winners. So congratulations to all, and thank you board for a great first meeting. Welcome.
Thank you. Alright. Anything from the board this evening? Before we do that, I do wanna officially welcome you, miss Reese. I'm excited to to work with you. We had a great first meeting. I a full faith and confidence as as stated earlier, I think, from everybody on the board. The, communications, your your willingness to to ask questions and say how was this done or, you know, what's, you know, how was this put together? I appreciate that. And, you know, you've already, I think we we communicated, what, three or four times
today? Yes. Three or four times. So we But who's counting? Yeah. I'm not counting. So no. Welcome, and I'm very excited as this board to work with you and your team, going forward. So with that, meeting is adjourned.