e e e e e e e good afternoon everyone at this time I will call to order the uh special meeting and work session for the fal
Public School school board here on March 3rd 2025 uh Miss budro as acting clerk will you determine if there's a quorum present yes there's a quorum thank you uh would everyone please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allei to the flag of
the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with libery and J thank you agenda item uh two is public comment um there was no public comment
Miss Kenny no comment okay is there we uh Miss Kenny should we have an agenda item for approval of the agenda uh yes okay so could I have a motion for approval of the agenda as presented thank you Mr Wolf do have a
second thank you Miss budo I discussion discussion discussion all in favor of that motion signified by saying I I I opposed motion passes so we do not have any any public comments so agenda item number three is special meeting uh
business item 3A excuse me consider approval of the 2025 2026 budget reductions could I have a motion for approval of the 2025 2026 budget adjustments please I'll give it to Dr Rish show and
the second to miss budo thank you and discussion so I Mr benty I don't know if you want Mr racler and yourself to come up and review this once again or if we just go to discussion amongst the board yeah so um thank you Mr chair the budget
presentation that is on there is simply the one that was rolled over from our meeting two weeks ago at this time we have not made any additional changes to what was presented to the school board um so we do have the presentation ready uh but it's open for you to ask
questions we do have our uh principes and directors here as well in case you have specific questions around buildings uh but at this point nothing has changed since the last time we presented this um so we'll open it up for discussion very good so with that uh board members
discussion Dr Moore yes Mr chair yeah I have a few questions here um I see we're quitting Elementary specialist says 2.3 and Elementary interventionist um do do these two
categories of of um Personnel or staff do they work directly with the students so what um you mind me asking what page you're looking at oh oh I'm well it's not really uh the uh budget
adjustments whatever because it's not their Pages aren't number I think it's page 10 16 page eight I see two 25 26 budget adjustments and you're asking about the elementary Specialists yes and do they work directly with the
students and the interventionists I'm just so Specialists and interventionists are different Specialists would be fied art um music those are our specialist work directly with the what about the interventionist so interventionists if Julie if you want to come up and explain
what the interventionists do I'm having Julie come up because our interventionists well I I guess they come out of our Adis funding that's right I used to be jul Julie Andor Rob can come up and explain the role of interventionists yeah so our
interventionists do work directly with kids um they work with small groups of kids on very specific instructional things to be right at their level to get them at grade level so I guess I'm concerned that we're that um um
secondly uh I see we're adding ferbal Middle School an academic specialist an interventionist and the sixth grade transition program um now the specialist you said works the the art and things like that
what did you say so the so the reduction that you see in the interventionist is a reduction and an ad we're simply moving it from one site to another site so it is it is a cost neutral it either would be on both reduction or add um to
because it's it's a cost neutral piece so the elementary specialist is being moved to the uh no the elementary interventionist is being moved to the Middle School oh all right because that was one yes okay no The Specialist is a reduction based off of the
reorganization yes which is an efficiency piece that we were able to make be due to the reorganization okay uh and also the sixth grade transition program I've heard that you know that has worked with I don't know if you do it a couple of days but now this is going to be a whole
program uh I guess I'm I I guess what what I need to know is what scientific data from the online databases uh do you have such as J store or Sage uh that would suggest that adding these positions will affect um achievement so the first piece
is that it's a cost neutral to move the interventionist over I see that all right inter only additional cost to the sixth grade program would be that $28,000 for an academic specialist
because that has then funded um 52% out of the adsys grant okay um so so we're paying $288,000 to get a uh well I should say we're get we're paying $28,000 to get a program and and these are separate
programs the the one that you're talking about with the interventionist and the specialist is for math interventions at our middle at our middle school and and I think it's a good idea um with the uh the special ed teachers I think that's a good thing um to add and uh because I
think you gave a good presentation and I guess one of the things is that I have a as you know I really think Paras are a great asset and so one of the things when I was talking about this is I did actually found a
study where it talks about uh and this was through Sage database it's a peer R review journal and they said that uh it was with logit study 2001 to
2012 it included 150 school districts in North Carolina yes it's in North Carolina but they were a fairly poor District I think or poor um uh school districts and that the they did it was like I said 115
school districts and they found that Paris uh when they put with the correlation there was a positive correlation that was consistent with um consistent positive effects for Paris and reading and math and I think they
they also found larger effects for students of color and students in high poverty schools so sometimes I'm looking at this and when I did uh I did some uh study for min Oda Paris and the average is about $34,000 I think we could I still
advocate for adding some Paris because I think some with this even like this $198,000 with where we have these three added at the bottom you could get six Paris for that and I I really think we're overlooking that group and it's
you know as I said $34,000 um I also would like to make one more comment I think that we really I know you said we have a lean budget I don't agree with you on that but I think there is waste in every
budget and I think actually I think the finance committee at some point should just go through like Miss madro did and uh you know find some of the things for instance with $1,200 for Community lunches I mean we've got to tighten our belt here and so uh I'm having a problem
with this with what is proposed here because of that and because of the fact we're we're kind of eliminating the Paras and I think they are but I found a study actually that uh and it was a longitudal study and uh with 115
districts and it showed that Paras are really a good uh a good investment if if you want to want to say that so that's my opinion second call for discussion Mr chair Mr Wolf uh superintendent venty
just following on Miss Moore's comments um I am on Page I don't know if anybody wants to share it or not entirely up to whoever's driving the presentation but I'm on page eight of 16 I think which is the
big one where it shows the 79420 of budget adjustments uh page eight you said yeah that's what I'm showing on mine um keep going that one one more you
would please that one there thank whoever's driving it um Miss Mor said we're reducing pairs I do see the reduction of the Elementary media pair of professional I don't see any other pairs on there unless I'm misre well no
I didn't say that we I we reduced them last time and I think I think what we need to do is add them okay on in the future and I I have a problem with that because I think we you know with the some of the additions here do we have any sound data uh from maybe from
scientific research that shows that this will you know this will advance our achievement or increase our achievement levels uh you know we've been doing this for five years we add things and it's still our numbers are going down and I know people say that achievement is only
one aspect of it but it is an important aspect and it looks really dismal so I think we need to start looking at even at waste in our budget we also have to start uh looking to see what scient and
I say scientific evidence from the databases like I found this this research study and peras are uh under research group and uh but according to this they're very this is a very efficient
investment to do that and I think in the future we should start adding Paris Dr Mo can Mr wol finish yes thank you superintendent benty um so if we go to page 10 where it talks about elementary instructional
support are those four items those adjustments are all from the reorganization that is correct okay thank you I just wanted to confirm that that was the case okay thank you I appreciate it Mr chair I have no further comments or questions any further
discussion Miss buo do you have something if you don't it's okay I just you I'm not sure okay I do I have a question Mr chair Miss G okay so um so are these
additional Elementary Specialists and interventionists and 10 and 1.0 Media PA professional I mean so those are all elementary additions no the the slide that's up there right
now those are reductions based off of the okay yes those are reductions based off of the reorganization efficiencies okay so we won't need all of those okay sorry I was looking at it wrong thank you okay Mr chair if I can ask one more
question Mr Wolf certainly uh page page 14 if you didn't mind superintendent Ben when you talk about the Middle School academic Specialists and the math interventionist I believe you told our board at a meeting in the last month or
two when we were talking about goals and where we've seen movement in our goals and where we happened that middle school math is one where we had not seen the movement that you had hoped for and I think you also said that's one of the areas where you felt where we did just
simply did not invest in this is an investment to move those goals that is absolutely correct yes so that our third goal based on middle level math is a goal that that was approved by the school board here that we just really did not put resources towards um and
likely we didn't we did not see any uh growth in that area so now we're looking to to try to add resources to that area thank you any further discussion Dr Moore yeah I I guess my point is that with these
additions do we have any hard data to show that this will increase the achievement so we we can provide research articles and research to show you that the pieces that we're looking to put in do move the needle um I can
tell you that the program that they're looking to put in the sixth grade here is a program that we had in the ninth grade at the high school and it showed remarkable results so we have our own kind of internal data that we can pull from but we can absolutely pull um research AR articles as as well to show
that this is because I I think that with the internal data do you have um when you do all the surveys and everything like that do you have reliability and validity statistics for for that well are because I know you give a lot of surveys so no
it wasn't based on surveys it was based on it was based on when we did it at the ninth grade level it was based on students that were passing classes students that were staying on track to graduate concrete uh it was concrete data yes thank you Mr chair I think it would be
helpful if maybe superintendent benty went line by line on these and which ones are related to the reorganization I know we were given information but sometimes we forget and
it's maybe a good um review and then also on our enhancements I know some of those the half funded half by the federal government and so um regarding special
head that's another page but um it may be good just to kind of review this a little bit more thoroughly so Nasco if you could go back to page eight please thank you so here are the
reductions totaling $794,000 um so what you'll see up here and I'll just go line by line since that's what I was asked to do the funding shift of an in instructional coach we were able to move that into our title funds so that comes out of the general
fund the elementary Dean position there is a reduction based off of the reorganization the administrative assistant is a reduction based off of the reorganization the media par professional is also a reduction based
off of the reorganization the elementary Specialists the 2.3 FTE is a a reorganization reduction so is the elementary nurse at a 1.0 right uh the FHS instructional staff
for one and a half FTE is based off of enrollment in class sizes uh with our smaller classes moving into our uh upper secondary level the elementary interventionist that one .0 that is adsis funded so you'll what
you'll notice is that comes off of here and is added back to the enhancements so it is a wash of 85,000 and then the utility expenses at McKinley are simply from us not needing to
um keep that building at the same temperature level lights uh cleaning supplies custodial all of those pieces so when those total um almost $800,000 there in uh budget adjustments thank you that that's
helpful because the majority of these are from the reorganization yes the vast majority of them are and then the enhancements I don't know if members are interested in you reviewing that or not but um I think
they Mr chair would you like me to review the enhancements if she's asking you to I will okay yes so uh the enhancements that you see up there is a 2.0 element treat teachers that is added in to get our class sizes back into the area that we're looking at um we're
we're hoping right now um that our class averages are going to be you know 26ish at the upper elementary and a little bit less than that at the lower elementary obviously with our kindergarten we're hoping to settle in right around 20
okay um the 2.0 Elementary special ed teachers so the next two the elementary special ed teachers that the elementary dape teacher and the Seven Elementary par par professionals we we rate these on um you know enhancements usually come
in the areas of we talk about needs and wants um I actually created a third category anytime it comes from Rob it's a have to um so this is simply these three areas are a have to um because of
our numbers that are growing um in case you haven't looked at it sometime look look at it the the percentage of specialed students postco that are working their way through our elementary system is much higher than it has been in the past so therefore all schools
that serve as special education students are in need of of hiring more people around that so that would be those next three the 1.0 Middle School academic specialist will work with that math interventionist both of uh the interventionist is like I said that
85,000 is a wash from the reductions that is also funded at 52% um from the adsys Grant and the academic specialist we were able to get into the Adis Grant as well um so for $228,000 uh enhancement we get two
people to work with our middle school students uh towards our math goal and then the 1.0 Middle School sixth grade transition program is the program that we were talking about um which is basically introducing our students students into what going to seven six or
seven different teachers a day versus one you know being required to take notes all those pieces of middle school that students are not always ready for uh for them to be able to get those pieces that they need uh so though when you add those up they total 537,500
5600 256 800 thank you so it's it's a uh overall reduction of $256,800 thank you Mr benty so just to summarize it looks like many of our most of our adjustments are from the
reorganization savings um and reduced enrollment and moving shifting some positions around and as well our enhancements our additional costs are to reduce our class
size in our elementary which has been a concern to deal with the growing numbers in our special ed program to help our middle school math students grasp those Concepts as well as adding a program for
sixth graders uh transitioning into Middle School okay I think that's very helpful to have you share that and I supportive of The Proposal thank you Mr buo uh Dr Robo
just a couple of comments rob it just shows that nothing changes when I was sitting out there you should put behind must do this behind your recommendations the point so many years ago it was the same way so
congratulations um I just uh have a a question and I support the um the recommendation as well but I wonder if it would be possible Dr Fox just to talk a little bit about how the math interventionist would work in the in the
U Middle School just kind of a brief program description of what you envision because I I really support it but I think it'd be nice to hear how that works well and thank you for asking for clarification I appreciate it um so
what we would do is we would take the data we get from our fast Bridge we have a comprehensive test that looks at um all areas of the math um and fastbridge is great because it actually tells exactly where students need support and it gives specific interventions that
have showed that have you know evidence-based interventions that have shown that um it'll help increase students math skills so our math interventionist would work with that data um and assign student students to targeted instruction groups um and they'd work with the academic specialist to teach those groups and so the
students would have really targeted instruction based on exactly what they need from the fastbridge data great thank you very much yeah thank you okay any further discussion last call for discussion seeing none we are ready to vote all in favor of the motion for
approval of the 2025 2026 budget adjustment signify by saying I I I opposed no motion passes 51 3B uh consider approval of new uh
attendance boundaries for Jefferson Elementary School Lincoln Elementary School and Roosevelt Elementary School at the end of the 2024 2025 uh school year so let's have a motion for approval of the new attendance boundaries for Jefferson
Lincoln and Roosevelt Elementary schools at the end of the 2024 2025 school year I have that motion please so move thank you Mr Wolf and we have a second second thank you Candace thank you Mr Ken and discussion I guess to begin with
Mr miny I will turn it over to you thank you Mr chair so one of the pieces where uh due to the reorganization was looking at how to redo our boundaries um we sat down with farbo Transportation who has done an excellent job at working with us on this um and what we looked at was we
gave them kind of our ultimatums where this is what we we will allow this is what we won't allow one of the pieces that we said was any student that is currently a Lincoln student remains a Lincoln student any student that is currently a Jefferson student remains a
Jefferson student so we would only be looking at redrawing the Roosevelt boundaries into those two District into those two schools so the map that you see up here is drawn um to accommodate
having two elementary schools and when I say elementary schools I'm talking grades one through five it allows Lincoln to be a little bit larger than Jefferson uh due to a couple different reasons one of those
reasons being that if students come back possibly from certain charter schools in town they live within the Jefferson border right so we wanted to have some room there secondly almost all of the housing that is currently being built in
farbo is currently in the Jefferson boundary so we want are also looking forward to saying okay if we have increased enrollment due to some of our apartment complexes that are going up we need to have some space and room at our in our Jefferson boundary as well um so
what you see here is a line um and Barbie has the the uh streets listed but basically the line that goes all the way over to the downtown area is not changed so from west to east all the way over to downtown that line has not
changed um it's simply where it picks up on so um so we've got the the little top hat if you will the little uh area that has always been Jefferson and then going down Sixth Street that's kind of where Roosevelt would take over so if you go
down six street over to division then going uh East and West anything above or anything to the north of division is going to be Lincoln anything to the south then is going to be Jefferson so that's how we took that Roosevelt area
and divided it up to Lincoln down to uh Jefferson the only other unique area is we did take a little section um again to hit the the enrollment marks that we wanted at each site so we did take a section that basically goes across um
across Division and then it goes down around the correctional facility and then back up hitting highway 60 so it's just that little little dip there if you will and that gave us uh an enrollment amount then that allows us to have the
desired number of students families and students in the Lincoln uh School District boundary boundary versus the Jefferson all right discussion Dr robish couple questions number one um as a result of this re boundary are there any students
who will have increased transportation to school um are we extending any um kids that would have to have transportation um no actually we're probably lessening the time um especially for our youngest ones uh when
we spoke with FBO Transportation they said absolutely no more than 30 minutes on the bus for our youngest Learners to get into town and the nice thing is that our kindergarten will be uh direct to the school so there's no transfer site for our kindergarten and the other
question what is the boundaries due to the diversity of the district does it distributed to both elementary schools or I think we have three elementary schools but yeah so it makes it a little bit more difficult because the the way
that the boundaries were already drawn it it's it's difficult unless you're going to really kind of get wonky with your drawing um we also have noticed that our diversity is spreading out across town as well they're they're not just um we don't just have pockets of it
anymore so so with that being the case we we're still going to be a little bit lopsided um but not tremendously so the boundaries don't impact that directly no the significant as it no no thank you
thank you Mr sh Mr Wolf superintendent benty assuming this passes tonight when will families be communicated with and and I think you said I mean essentially if you're at Lincoln or if you're at Jefferson your grandfathered in there uh but just when will families be notified
so well if it's if it's voted on tonight they'll have the map that we will load uh we will upload we are in the process of getting uh fairow transportation system to speak with our system so that parents will then be able to use the portal and I'm not sure how far away we
are from that but I know we're getting really close yep so we're in testing mode right now to um ensure that transversa which is the the uh software that the uh fairwell Transportation uses as well as our Infinite Campus student system so what we want to do then is it
you know as soon as this is approved then we'll be able to start loading that data into transversa so the the the trans company's uh software and then it will speak to Infinite Campus so that our parents or our families can go on to
Infinite Campus and see their bus route time uh bus number those different kinds of things so we are currently um in testing mode we think that we have it pretty much nailed down so we're we're feeling very optimistic that that's
going to be available um yet this spring we know that the fedw transportation would like a very much as would we for all parents to know by the end of March um be notified by the end of March what they're uh what what building their
student will be going to so good thank you further discussion I just Mr chair Dr uh yeah I know from calling talking to you this afternoon John that I know that you have worked quite extensively with fa with the transportation company and so I
think that's very good and it sounds like you've got it nailed down so I think it's a good thing oh the other piece I will say is that that one of the pieces that we talked about in here was that we wanted
to keep the cost neutral as well so that is one of the pieces of this that the way these boundaries are drawn the rules that we've put in keeps the cost the transportation cost neutral um and fairbow transportation has also been an amazing uh business partner in this as well that if they can find efficiencies
they do and they actively look for them so that they can pass those savings on to us so last call for discussion I think Mr chair I think with fairbow Transportation we've really had a good relationship with them and I
think they're very you know trustworthy and so uh I do appreciate the fact I think they've been for many years we can rely on them so I think over 50 years so yeah decades yeah yeah because when my children rode the bus I felt very safe
with with them so thank you to fairow transportation and to all the work so we do have a motion for approval of the new attendance boundaries for Jefferson Lincoln and Roosevelt Elementary School at the end of the 2024 2025 school year we're ready to vote all
in favor of that motion signify by saying I I I opposed and that motion passes thank you uh agenda item number four entertain a motion to move to a work session thank you Dr robish show second
by miss budo all in favor of that motion signified by saying I I oppos we'll move to a work session