Speaker 1: Go ahead and call Speaker 2: The the, Speaker 1: Okay, let's go ahead and call our December 3rd board meeting to order at 5 35. If you would all please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. Scott, do you mind leading? Speaker 2: No, my pledge to 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, Liberty and justice for all. Speaker 1: Great. And if you could please remain standing
for just a brief moment of silence. Great, thank you. Okay. Alright. Alright. So may I get a motion to approve the agenda for the December 3rd, 2025 meeting? Speaker 3: I get a mo I'll make a motion to approve the agenda. Speaker 1: Great. For Speaker 3: The December 3rd, 2025 Speaker 1: Meeting. Thank you. May I get a second, Scott? Thank you. Sharon, may I get roll call please? Yes, Speaker 2: Al Aye. As aye. Hi Aye Jenkins. Aye.
Speaker 1: Aye. Okay. And now on to the oath of office for our newly elected board members, Megan Heel and Steve Belu. Speaker 2: We have to work on that one. Speaker 1: I was like you're, you're you're Steve BI don't know, that's all I Speaker 2: Need. Speaker 1: So if you guys would like to please stand and we'll get your oath. Speaker 2: First I'm gonna give you your certificates of election. This one is for, oh my gosh, my name here Megan. There you go. Congratulations. There you go. Those are your certificates. So the first one we're gonna do is the oath of office
so you guys can lean together, but just make sure you make your name clear when you say it. My photo off? Yeah. I'll step out of that way. So whenever you're ready, just raise your right hand too when you move this thanks together. Yeah. Yes you can. Aye. Speaker 4: I, Megan Hele do solemnly swear that I will faithfully perform the duties of the office of the school director as required by law and will support the constitution of the United States, Speaker 2: The Speaker 4: Constitution, constitution of the state of Colorado and the laws made pursuant there.
And too. Speaker 2: Jamie, you want notarize those for you? Ones up. Thank you. Speaker 1: I Speaker 2: Know we have to, we recycle. We do it all together again. Every year. There's a re reorganization of the board. We have to do it. Oh, if you, if you want, fine but I do have something for you. Oh, thank you. Did you not bring the cake? Good for you guys. It's good for you. It's so good to see the old cake. Bring the cake. No cake. Scott. Scott, you Good luck.
Okay. Stand up. Yeah, you have to stand up. Steve, you Steve, you can come to your seat seat step. Thank you. Don't so appreciate Get outta the camera shot. Okay you guys, can you write your right hand and can all repeat it together, but just when you say your hand kind of slow us or break kind of here like any chance you go then fathom than me. Okay. I Chance Speaker 1: Jenkins Fathom Jensen, Cassie Speaker 2: Haskell Speaker 1: Being first duly sworn
to state and affirm the following. I'm a member of the Board of Education of Garfield RE two School District. I am aware and will comply with the confidentiality requirements and restrictions applicable to executive board as described in CRS 24 dash six dash 4 0 2. I will comply with these confidentiality requirements regardless of whether I participate in executive session, in person or electronically. In accordance with the board policy adopted pursuant to
CRS 22 dash 32 1 0 8 subsection, subsection seven. Speaker 2: Place there for your signature. If you guys sign it, Jamie will cross for Does sign right there for still you one? No, I got one. Okay. Do Speaker 1: You need my id? Speaker 2: I'll just have you guys sign. Okay. So ready? Did they already get there? Am Go further. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. Speaker 1: Are you good? Yes, Jamie, you good? You got everybody's signature. Sweet. Thank you. Okay.
Alright. And now on to the board reorganization. May I get a nomination for the board president? Speaker 2: I'll nominate Fathom Jensen. Speaker 3: Oh yeah. I nominate Fathom Jensen too. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 3: Being to it. Speaker 1: I got a first and a second roll call please, Sharon. Speaker 2: One second. I gotta catch up. Speaker 1: Sorry. Speaker 2: Okay, we have both of you. Aye. Hascal Aye. Kyle Aye. Jenkins. Aye. Speaker 1: Aye. Okay. And a nomination for Vice President. Speaker 3: I nominate Chance Jenkins. Speaker 2: I second.
Speaker 1: Thank you Sharon. May I get roll call please? Thank Speaker 2: You, will you? Aye. Haskell Aye. A Aye. Jenkins Aye. Speaker 1: Jensen Aye. A nomination for board secretary please Speaker 2: Nominated Cassie Haskell. Speaker 1: May I get a second? Speaker 2: I'll second. I Speaker 1: Can second. Sharon, may I get roll call please? Speaker 2: Yes, will you? Aye ask Aye Kyle Aye. Jenkins. Aye. Speaker 1: Aye. Okay. And nomination of board treasurer.
Speaker 3: I nominate Megan Hile. Speaker 1: Okay. May I get a second? Speaker 2: I'll Speaker 1: Second. Thank you. Sharon, may I get roll call please? Speaker 2: One second. Okay, will you? Aye. Asco Aye. Hile Aye. Aye. Speaker 1: Aye. Okay. Speaker 5: They ask for a board board president and there was that Speaker 2: Long silence. Speaker 1: Let's not go back there. Alright, so now on to our agenda. Continuing, we've got public audience. I am gonna say a few welcoming notes. The board's meeting time is dedicated to its strategic mission and top priority for focus areas.
Public participation is an opportunity to present brief comments or pose questions to the board for consideration and follow up. Each person is asked to focus comments to three minutes. The boundaries are designed to help keep the meeting focused and in no way should limit conversations beyond the board meeting. Please be aware that any individual student or personal matters are considered confidential under Colorado law. It is out of respect for the individual students and staff that we ask for those conversations to be held in executive session. Insights are needed and welcomed and the board encourages you to meet
with the most appropriate person among the district's, many leaders. Okay. Alright. Right. Alright. Okay. Alright. Our first public audience, Nathan Hodge. He's working. He's working. Will he come back or should I put him at the bottom? Okay, put him at the bottom just in case. Okay, Emily. Okay. Speaker 6: Good evening. My name is Emily Hodge. I have a son at Riverside and RE two and a daughter at TRCS. Last month's board meeting made something painfully clear. This district and its new superintendent are willing to trade a child's wellbeing for money.
This entire conflict with TRCS could have ended with one simple action. You could have simply agreed to the bus routes. That's all The statute you're referencing requires no money, no lawsuit, no drama, but because you refused. This now heads to court and the community has seen exactly what re two is choosing monetary gain over the wellbeing of children. Just remember this is a problem you created During last month's meeting, we heard from your own board members, Megan openly stated her own child doesn't attend re two because she wanted smaller class sizes for him.
Yet she supports absorbing up to 144 TRCS bus riders into already overcrowded classrooms and overwhelmed teachers. And re two still hasn't stated how they will accommodate that. Cassie, you said the last meeting made you uncomfortable. It should make you uncomfortable. Trading kids wellbeing for money should make everyone uncomfortable. This is not about following the law, it's about money and continuing to deny it at this point or dress it up by calling it resources. It is embarrassing it wasn't about money. Why would Mr. Banhart tell Mr. Nims they could keep the routes if they paid him? So I'm not here to change your minds tonight.
You've already stated where you stand. I'm here to point out the hypocrisy. Parents like me cannot ignore because hearing re two accuse another school of breaking the law lands a certain kind of way when re two isn't even following the laws that protects its own students. When my son transferred from two Rivers to Riverside, he came with an active IEP under IDEA and Colorado ECA rules. RE two had legal obligations as they're receiving school to provide comparable services immediately request records immediately and meet with me within 30 days.
None of that happened. No contact, no meeting, no services. His IEP simply disappeared. It's been a year and a half. This is a direct violation of federal law and once I spoke up about this, my inbox became filled with parents with similar stories where RE two has broken the law and I do have receipts. A malware link was distributed through a rifle high school email confirmed by CrowdStrike. It knew the district knew and parents were never notified. Violating Colorado's data breach law. Stories of FERPA violations, uncertified SPED teachers in sped rooms.
Special education students left outside unattended paraprofessionals kept on staff after inappropriate restraints. So before pointing the finger outwards, you should probably look inwards. This is not about legality or safety and it's definitely not about what's best for kids. You follow the laws that are convenient for you, fix your own house before you try to tear down someone else's. Hold yourselves to the same legal standards you're demanding from everyone else. Or children deserve leaders who put them first. Not last. Speaker 1: Thank you. Lila Bagga. Hi Lila. I like your hat. Thank Speaker 7: You. Hi, I am Lila. I go to TSCS.
My mom and dad made me take the bus in kinder and I loved it. I, all I wanted to do is ride the bus and that was my favorite time of day and I had to ride the bus. So that's how I got to school. And that's how other people do too. Some people do hate it, but after you stay longer, it is so fun. So at least please think what you are doing, taking away one of my most prized possessions. Speaker 1: Thank you. Lila. Speaker 2: Allison Speaker 1: Blazer. Luna. Hi Allison, public
Speaker 2: Speaking. Speaker 8: I'm Allison Blazer. Luna. I have a kindergartner at TRCS Community School and I realize that there have been some recent developments with regarding the TRCS transportation. I'm here to talk about love. Love for our students, love for parents, love for ed educators such as yourself and our profound love for TRCS community. We chose TRCS because it's more than just a school for our kids. It's a safe haven and a nurturing home for their education and development for us.
TRCS wasn't just a random choice from a list of schools in our area that we live. It was a heartfelt decision for most made with great care and consideration for what would be best suited for our children's unique needs. We were drawn to TRCS for its unique philosophy, its supportive environment, and the sense of community that's woven into its very fabric. It has provided an educational experience that goes far beyond test scores. Curriculum fostering in our children a love of learning. It's strong moral compass for our kids and a sense of belonging that we will, we've never seen
before in any school, including re, RE two schools. It's not just our choice of schools, it's our choice for a better life for our kids. We hope that RE two looks beyond logistics and sees the human element in the DEC decision, the families, the children, and the cherished school community. Furthermore, although it's been stated that funding is not the primary driver here, words and actions on behalf of re two have indicated otherwise. And as the saying goes, actions speak louder than words. Our actions must match what we convey to the public,
to the students in our schools and to the community as a whole through our words and deeds with honesty. Beyond the honesty as upstanding educators, community members, superintendents, parents, and the like. If these statutes aren't consistent, then what lesson are we teaching our kids? I petition everyone to rally and look at the whole picture on whom this might benefit, or rather who it might be a detriment to including RE two. Has that been taken into consideration by re two on a large,
big picture scale? This does not only affect TRCS parents and students, but it will in a great way affect re two. This should not be a fight between re two and TRCS, but rather a fight for all on what is right, moral and just Speaker 1: Thank you. Allison. Nikita Bagga. Did I say that right? Yeah. Okay. Welcome. You've got three minutes. Floor is yours. Perfect. Speaker 7: I'm Nikita. I'm a parent of Lila. When I first started, I was just a parent and now I am an employee. But when I first started and my daughter started, we depended on the bus.
That was our lifeline. It was not an easy decision. It was a very hard decision. It was a very, we were scared. It was such a long ride for someone so little. What if something goes wrong? How will she reach us? But when the day came that we had to put her on the bus, we met the bus driver and everything went away. She cared about the responsibility of our children as if she were there, as if they were her own. In that moment, every fear that we had melted away from us. She cared. She paid attention, she took pride in her work. Driving that bus wasn't just her job, it was a commitment
and safety and wellbeing of our children. Within the within weeks, Lila loved the bus and she loved her bus driver. The students from kindergarten to eighth grade became her protectors, her friends and her community. She didn't just feel safe on the bus. She felt a complete belonging. And here's the truth, you heard it from her. She preferred to ride the bus than ride with us. She knew she became a school family before she even knew what a school family and a community even meant. Today, because I work there, she doesn't rely on the bus anymore.
Some days she wished she did, but when I say rely, I don't mean just for a ride. I mean that they need that first caring face in the morning. They need that sense of protection. Children need a bus family, and for some of them the bus is not just a transportation, it's a safety, stability, routine and love. For some kids, it's the very first friendly face they get to see in the morning. Someone who makes sure that they get somewhere safely and get home safely. Since becoming an employee to TRCS, I've learned even more about the dedication behind the system. I've learned that the school is built on people
who give far more than beyond their job description. Our many of our bus drivers wear multiple, multiple hats, many of which you have heard from their teachers, pairs, custodian, subs, parents, even our head of school drives. People pitch in where they can because they love the school and they love the community. TRCS itself carries responsibilities that many do not see, let me clarify that. We own our own buses. They pay. TRCS pays its own employees, not RE one TRCS carries a mortgage on its building and has monthly bills.
Just like any home as is a, it is a home to many families and many students. The TRCS has an independent board of directors that make the decisions for a families. We also get to call our own snow days for our students because our students and our families come from parachute to Carbondale. Can I say my last sentence? Yeah. It's an essential part of the foundation. Removing and reducing is not just a small decision. The decision that will affect children, that doesn't have just the control over the circumstances or a voice in this room. There are five year olds up to eight eighth graders.
But think about the families that rely not just on the transportation piece, but think about the village that might be getting taken away. Thank you. Peter, you got, Speaker 1: Did I butcher that? Yeah, but it's okay. I'm sorry. How do you say it? Speaker 9: Your guidance. Speaker 1: Yeah, I was, it's okay. Way off. Yeah. Alright, sir, you got three minutes. Gloria's yours. Speaker 9: All right. I don't wanna be here. I don't feel like I need to do this, but I feel that with not getting any responses from the board, I feel like it's necessary. I've sent five different board members, three separate emails. It's 15 emails, total zero responses,
not even one on your website. There's a communication statement with a goal that reads, quote, maintain an effective two-way communication system between the school district and its stakeholders. I'm a stakeholder, I'm a stakeholder, a rifle resident. I'm even a husband of one of your employees. Your silence is a complete avoidance to the very people you serve. Last meeting the word transparency was brought up a few times. Someone in the audience even asked what Mr. Bang Hart's proposals were, and I believe it was Mr. Jenkins that stated they weren't gonna get into specifics.
That was a choice. The specifics were already, already existed from the superintendent himself in writing. Mr. Bang Hart wrote me on November 7th, that 6:02 PM I'd asked him what he offered to two rivers. Peter, I was able to meet with Mr. Nims and propose a compromise that included single stops in each three towns. Financial compensation and collaboration for eighth graders to understand their options for ninth grade transition that had already started in the spring. This past year, Mr. Nims denied this compromise. I'm happy he denied the compromise. Sounds like coercion and extortion to me. The board even stated in the last meeting that this isn't about money and the quote, law is the law.
But the superintendent's email proves this is about leverage. And yes, money that you claim is not a factor. You have the power to end this immediately with an agreement that does not involve shaking down a school for cash. But you chose to start this ethically questionable battle. You are using children as bargaining chips. You should be ashamed of the actions and you should not be in an education space if your moral compass is this far off. It was a recent article in the Post independent as Mr. Benhart quoted stating The Garfield RE two school district is saddened that two Rivers Community School chose litigation over learners.
Garfield RE two approached the two rivers head of a school in a spirit of negotiation only to be rejected by Mr. Nims spirit of negotiation. You demanded financial compensation to make this go away. You started this and Mr. Nims is only protecting what this community has worked tirelessly to develop. Also, let's be clear, the declaratory judgment is an official court ruling that clarifies legal rights most commonly used. When a lawsuit is threatened but not filed. Re two has threatened a lawsuit, Mr. Nims is simply seeking legal advice based on your threats. Regardless of these results,
my family has made our decision, difficult decision. But if this bus route is disrupted, my wife, who is a Grand Mesa employee, has decided to find different employment to ensure our kids still have safe transportation to the school they belong to, school they belong to for over four years. Tonight I'm asking you to actually live up to your own words and stop acting and start acting like leaders that truly put kids first. Not politics, not power, and not money. Just kids. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 1: Kelly. Adrian, Speaker 2: You put her at the bottom of the list. She had bus her out tonight. Yep. Okay. Speaker 1: Bailey Olmsted. Hi Bailey. Hi. Three minutes. My dear floor is yours.
Speaker 7: Hi, I'm Bailey Olmsted. I am a graduate of Two Rivers Community School. I attended two Rivers since third grade. I moved from two reverse from CVEA school in silt. And I moved there because I was put in a corner of a classroom and just not taught anything at CVEI was basically nothing to them. I feel like I was considered too difficult to teach. I struggled at CBE and two Rivers allowed me to grow. When I got to two rivers in third grade,
I was at a kindergarten reading level, a kindergarten reading level in a third grade. And they had this one teacher, Ms. Turner, she's the SPED teacher. She helped me grow so much because she helped me gain my confidence, my love for that school. Those buses got me to a school to that helped me grow. And it's an amazing school with amazing teachers that are all, some are here now and it's flashbacks seeing them here tonight.
And also I was held back because of the challenge at challenging start at CVE as smart enough to tell my principal that I needed to get held back. Because of that delay in learning, I experienced an RE two. He didn't want to at first, but then he agreed because he saw how I, how last he agreed. And he saw how last year, last year, how it helped me. And I know he doesn't regret there. That there is no way in the world that I wouldn't be
where I am today without T-R-C-T-R-C-S buses in school. There's no way many more students have experiences like mine who take the bus every single day. You also have mentioned how you are losing money because of students from this valley that are attending TRCS. I wanna tell you, when a student goes to TRCS, it is mostly likely that they have experienced or heard something bad about the schools in this district like mine or someone else's story. I know you not, might not fully acknowledge this situation,
but some students need TRCS just like I did. And now I am mostly have A'S with some b's. And it was all because of the buses that brought me in to their community and they helped me gain my confidence. So I take that away from a kid. I just want you to understand why what we went through, I don't know if you have kids, but if you do, please put yourself in our shoes. Imagine your kid comes home with a note saying they have a DHD with no evidence. You take them to Grand Junction to test then to see if they were right, they were wrong, they don't,
they have dyslexia. Would you still wanna keep your kid in a school that made such accusing accusations? I wouldn't. Then you get to a new school and learn that they have a kindergarten reading level at an, they get to eighth grade, they have grown to their level. Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Okay. Natalie Vijo. Hello. Speaker 8: Hi. Speaker 1: You've got three minutes. Alright, Speaker 8: Thank you very much. Hello, my name is Natalie Vial and I'm also an eighth grade graduate from TRCS. And I am in the unique position where I have been in both RE two districts
and I have gone to TRCS. I moved to TRCS when I, after my third grade year at CDE, due to personal decisions within my family. Also, we did not very much appreciate how the school was going to be coming back after the COVID years. So I moved to TRCS. Moving to TRCS was one of the best decisions my family has ever made. I moved to TRCS with a first grade level of math knowledge and my fourth grade teacher helped me so much and I have grown so much from her and I now feel comfortable being in algebra. Now that I'm in high school, I understand
math and I understand all my classes. I, last year when I was in eighth grade, I was the student council president. I helped work with all of the kids at tier CS. And now that I have graduated there, I now work at Tier CS. I am a, I am the student council advisor and I am a TA and I work in the sec. I work as a secretary in the front office. Being in this position, I get to see all the kids coming in and out. And I also get to see all the buses coming in and out. I'm only 14. I cannot drive. Having my job at TRCS, I cannot drive myself from SILT to Glenwood every single day. So the buses for TRCS have been driving me
and that is so incredibly considerate of them. And when I was at TRCS, I had to take the bus a lot because my mom is a nurse anesthetist and my dad is a flight paramedic. When they are out and they are working, they don't have time to come and take me to school, especially when all the way to Glenwood. So taking those buses helped me get to that place that I really needed to be at. And it helped me grow into the person that I am today. I have nearly straight A's in high school because of what TRCS has has done for me. And I am so happy that I had the teachers that I had because they are absolutely amazing people. And I love all the staff, all the bus drivers,
everyone at TRCS because they're such amazing people. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Christina Central Speaker 2: Plus Speaker 1: I, I, yeah, I looked at it. Oh, it's French. Nobody around. Yeah, I took German. Sorry. Speaker 10: That's impressive. Hey everyone, my name's Christina. I am a rifle resident. Here I go. There was an opinion piece written in the post independent on October 19th titled, creating Opportunities and Efficiencies for Garfield RE two Families. Mr. Benhart, you made in a statement in that article that stuck with me, especially after my recent attendance to a conference in Texas where I listened to a keynote speaker named David Segger,
who wrote this book to a room of 500 plus leaders from various hospitals all around the country. His keynote presentation was on the topic of trust. You mentioned trust in your opinion piece. Mr. Bang Hart, you wrote, momentum doesn't just happen. It's built through hard work, creativity, and community trust Couldn't agree more. Certainly you, Mr. Bang Hart clearly understand that trust is the fundamental backbone of relationship, society, performance and growth. It's also the greatest asset you have in every relationship. The amount of trust our community has put in your hands as our new superintendent is astronomical.
You understand this? I hope you also understand that trust is earned and built through hard work. Sorry, I lost my place and demonstrated behaviors over time. Imagine the entire community's surprise. Within the first four months of your brand new position as superintendent, you submitted a cease and desist letter threatening legal action against the small charter school called Two Rivers to discontinue their busing operations. This action went against the very behaviors necessary to build trust. I will refer to David ER's book Trust Matters. To help highlight why your actions have eroded this
community's trust in you. In his book, David Segger outlines eight specific traits that form a framework of how trust is built. Let's begin with the first trait called clarity. People trust what is clear and simple? The number one question asked amongst attendees At our first and second to River Town Hall regarding your letter, all the parents asked why? Why is he doing this? We were confused. Your lack of clarity is left the community feeling as though this matter is about money. You've stated this is not about money. Again, this is not clear and further eroding. Community trust. Trait number two,
compassion people put faith in those who care beyond themselves. Caring is founded in the ability to imagine someone else's situation. Your decision to submit a letter to cease and desist the busing operations for the children. Attending TRCS is perceived as being absent of compassion. Do you care about the undue stress, financial burden and time that will be required to plan for and implement a no busing situation for all the families who depend on the buses? How did you show compassion to these families? Mr. Bang Hart, did you reach out to ask any of the parents why these kids go to two R-C-T-R-C-S?
Did you care enough to ask Jamie Nims anything about Two Rivers Community School when you met with him in person? Asking these questions is a far more compassionate approach than sending a cease and desist letter. Trait number eight, consistency. People are wired to identify patterns and predict behaviors. Inconsistency can Dang, I tried man at home. I got it at three minutes, 15 seconds. I'll skip to the point. For reasons of time, I'm an unfortunately able to speak on all of the eight traits that David talks about. I will end my comments this evening with a request to the board and Mr.
Bang Hart to prioritize improving trust please within the community. Because when people trust your leadership, your schools too will have wait lists. Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you. Speaker 1: Gifts tonight. Carrie Rowe. Did I murder that one too? No, Speaker 6: You actually did. Perfect. Speaker 1: Okay. That's awesome. Alright, Carrie, you've got three minutes. Speaker 6: Hi, I'm Carrie Rowe. I live in Newcastle. I have two kids who go to Two Rivers and truth be told, they ride the bus most of the time. But some mornings I'm like a C plus mom and I drive them.
So truth be told, if this bus route ends, it's not gonna change anything from my family. You won't get my per pupil funding back. I will take them to school. But part of being a member of a community is speaking up when there's something that's awry or unfair or wrong in your community. I listened. I wasn't here 'cause I was with my kids, but I listened to the last board meeting and I wanted to address some of the things I heard from you. Things that stood out were we are just following the law. As many people pointed out already, that's in your hands. The law doesn't say you can't give authorization
to the school to run the buses. So the question we all have is why, why are we, why are you standing the way in the way of, if the law is truly that TRCS needs your authorization, why can't they have it? Why are we standing in the way? Something I heard that really frustrated me, quite frankly, it made me really angry. One of you mentioned that your kids go to a different school and that you didn't have bus service, so you drove them. And the words I heard were you need to take responsibility as a parent to get your kid to the school of your choice. But two rivers, those buses aren't Jamie NIMS buses.
They're not just two Rivers buses. They are the community buses. These are clearly parents who took the initiative, they took responsibility, they got their buses. And then I heard from you, I had to drive my kids to school. So you should too. And that is just the antithesis to what you should be providing as educators and role models, leaders in this community to say, I mean, as a parent and as a teacher, we should want better for every generation. And to say, you know, our grandparents walked uphill both ways in the snow to school, you should too. That's not what we're here for.
We are building the next generation. My goal in life is for my children to have it better than I ever had. And it broke my heart to hear that. Your your reasoning was that? Well, I didn't get a bus. I drove my kids to school and you should too. The other things I heard were saying that, you know, they felt bad that Kirk Benhart had to take the responsibility and the finger pointing. I heard what you all had to say and after all of your comments, I don't lay the blame with him solely. I am pointing my fingers at all of you. If this bus route cannot continue, if you've refused
to hear me now, you will hear me in the next election cycle. I am a voter, I'm a member of this community and we all who are sitting here are as well. Yeah, you will hear our voices one way or another. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you Jen. Hans Chinook. I'm sure I murdered that one. Yeah, sorry. Alright sir, you've got three minutes. Alright. Speaker 11: Hi, my name is Han Young and I am speaking today as a father of a Two Rivers Community School first grade student. I would like to encourage the Garfield Re two school board and superintendent to retract all demands
that TRCS stop busting its students from Garfield RE two district into TRCS. If you wanna encourage student enrollment within RE two, taking away a student's option to leave is not the way to do it. You should start by looking inward and fixing the problems within your own struggling district. Figure out how to increase standardized testing scores and school district ratings for re two and encourage students to come back by showing to them that you are their best option. Make re two a desirable district for students to be enrolled in demanding that a charter school stop its busting
of students from your district to their school only proves that you cannot compete in the marketplace of good education. Sorry, I lost my place. Speaker 1: It happens. Speaker 11: Demanding that a charter school stop busing its students is antithetical to the concept of school choice. Something which I strongly support. Furthermore, I would like to point out how pathetic it is that RE two is attempting to portray themselves via recent comments in the post independent as the victims in this situation. After TRCS and a group of concerned parents were forced to bring a lawsuit against re two, asking
for a decla declaratory judgment to resolve the dispute that you yourselves started. You were the ones who demanded that TRCS stop busing. You were the ones who made three unreasonable demands if you were to allow the busing to continue. Number one, you demanded payment from TRCS for each student. Bust out number two, you demanded that TRCS bus could make only one stop within your district. I think, I believe it currently makes three or four. Number three, you demanded collaboration from TRCS to encourage students to come back to re two upon graduation of eighth grade and completion of their education at TRCS.
These are clearly unreasonable demands on your part. Your attempt to portray Mr. Nims and TRCS as the aggressors in this situation and yourselves as the ones seeking collaboration and discussion is disingenuous. At best, collaboration means working together, not making a list of demands and refusing to compromise on them. Thank you. Speaker 1: That takes us back to Nathan Hodge. Did he make it? Okay. And then Kelly, Adrian. Okay. All right. Okay.
All right. Onto the consent agenda. So we've got approval of the November 12th, 2025 draft board minutes. May I get a motion? I'll make Speaker 3: A motion to approve the November 12th, 2025 draft board minutes. Speaker 1: Okay. May I get a second please? A second. Thank you. Sharon, may I get roll call please? Speaker 2: Will you? Aye. As aye a aye Jenkins Aye. Speaker 1: Aye. Okay. Alright. And then are there any changes to the consent agenda? Speaker 12: Yes, we have a few changes to the consent agenda.
We'd ask that we add approval for a course instruction for forensic science, for the rifle middle school for grades six through eight, and also add approval for the easy grant for Graham Mesa Elementary for professional development. Okay. And then third and final change is the second bullet from the bottom should be termination, not resignation on your current agenda. Okay. That was just a typo. We apologize for that.
Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: Alright. May I get a motion to approve the consent agenda as amended? Speaker 2: I'll make a motion to approve consent agenda as amended. Speaker 1: Great. May I get a second? Speaker 2: I second. Speaker 1: Thank you. Sharon. May I get roll call please? Speaker 2: Will you? Aye. Asco? No. Kyle? Yes. Aye. Aye. Okay. Jenkins. Aye. Jen Speaker 1: Aye. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: And the assistant superintendent report. Speaker 13: Good to see you all. I've seen you in various places since
the last time we were together, but just some of the things that I've been doing in the last month and that I wanna call attention to at this report. So we've been continuing our visits to schools to talk with staff members about how the strategic plan implementation is going. And I have attended the, I attended the third grade music program at Cactus Valley and Elementary. The energy was on inspiring both on the part of the kids and the director of that whole musical. And lots of excited kids
and proud parents attended the Catherine Senior Elementary PTA meeting to talk with parents there and find out about some of the things that they've been doing in their school and what they did with their playground and how they're doing awesome things for the school. So it was a great chance to hear from them. As you know, Riverside Middle School has a very long standing tradition of harvest days, which is an incredible collaboration between the school and the parents and the community to bring super fun
and quite frankly, a lot of food activities to the kids. It was a blast. Animals food archery, just a really nice community event. Attended Veterans Day assemblies at Riverside and Rifle High School. And again, just a great time to talk to the people in our community who have served and to hear their voices and to hear Dr. Coleman talk, some of you know him from the hospital. And just a very meaningful opportunity to visit
with and thank our veterans. In mid-November, one of the district team attended the Consortium of School Networking or Cosan AI Summit in Denver. And this is really about creating a strategic roadmap for what we're going to do with AI in the coming days because it, it is, it's already upon us, but we are working on the finer points and you are gonna hear a lot about that in January from our tech team and our district team.
And we're very excited about this weekend. I have to make a plug in an advertisement. It's Hometown holidays. We are pretty darn excited about the Polar Express that we are constructing, and a hundred Cole Ridge and Rifle High school band students walking with us in the parade. And one door, the Grimley Pierce building a parking lot will be transformed into Elf City where there will be all manner of mischief and Mary making is what it's going to be. So I hope you're coming out for some of that.
And then there's more festivities on Friday night, and so it sounds like there's gonna be snow, so it should be, as it always is, a pretty fun community event. And really nice to see everybody out at those Thanksgiving meals. The number served is 4,589. And so obviously Mary McPhee and her crew have worked their tails off. We had volunteers from the community, we had volunteer staff members, we had volunteer parents, we had people who went to the schools
and helped cut all the vegetables and prepare all the meals. And so again, it was just a great day to be together and enjoy each other's company and very, very excited about that. I wanna thank Penny and her crew because they have seen us through the first snow and ice storm. And I was coming back from Denver and hit Glenwood Canyon at the same time. They closed it on Sunday. So I spent an hour performing the sociological observation of people during a storm who want to get places.
And it was highly entertaining, but got back. But boy, I I don't remember there being so many cars off the road both Sunday and last night. And so thank you to Penny and her crew for getting everyone safely to and from. And I also wanna give a huge shout out to Theresa and Chelsea because they, I, they work so hard to get to so many things and provide ongoing communication about what is happening,
what's going to happen, what has happened, and to provide pictures and to get that out there. And so whether or not people take it all in, because I know we get a lot of communication, right, is a different story, but they work really hard to keep the information flowing. And I'm super grateful for that. And so, yeah, my theme would be I'm thankful, I'm thankful for the work our educators do and and for our community.
So that's my report. Speaker 14: Yes. Speaker 13: Superintendent report. Speaker 12: Yeah. Well, so my report is that I get to ride on the coattails of Jenny Nipper. So all those events she talks about, I get to tag along with her. So my report is, yes, I get to hang out with Jenny Nipper. Speaker 14: So it's always fun, especially because being new to the community, Jenny notes everybody and so it's great to be with her. The other thing that I want to provide the board is a draft of this year's strategic plan. And so I wanna thank our incredible directors
and our comms team for taking the hard work that they did. And so this is a draft, that's why you did not get it in your board packet because it is not for primetime players Speaker 12: Yet. But I do want to give it to you all so that I'd ask that you take a look at it, see what your directors have done as far as taking the work as part of the conversations we've all had. My goal as superintendent was not to take the work of the community and your staff and your directors and go in a different direction,
but yet, yet to continue the hard work that's been done. And so you'll see it's a continuation of that work. And so what we're looking for is for you to take a look at it, not at this meeting, but, and your free time. And so when you get a chance, we'd love feedback. So then I can carry that on to our directors. If there's any things that we'd like to clarify, we'll do that. So then when as we get after the new year, they'll come back and give you full reports on each of their sections as we do shine the light on in that components.
But the other part that I really am probably more, more excited about is really to talk about our, our survey that we do with the Aspen group. And so one of the things that I think's been really exciting is some of the feedback that we've been getting from our staff around the surveys that we've been doing. And so, you know, as, as the board knows throughout the year, we do pulse surveys, we do full surveys and then we, we, we continue on that so that we know what our feedback from, from our staff and all of our departments are. And so this spring we were able
to do our pulse survey and get feedback. And so one of the things that I think was really great that I wanted the board to really know is that overall our district around the net per promoter score, so these are the was 11 points higher. And so this is our highest score since 2023, since May of 2023. And so these are our staff who would, would promote our district. So it's gone up. And so that's very exciting that we're seeing that trend continue to go on. We also, at the same time would say that our distractors have gone the opposite direction.
So these people, these are people who would not recommend our district as employment. So that's hugely exciting to see that we're seeing a net growth in that area. Also, our engagement level is very high. At 46% of our staff are raking their engagement as very high or high. This is about a 20% jump in these categories. And so that, those are, those are very exciting. So overall what we're seeing is that in our pulse survey. So I always, as the board knows, these are, this is only a sampling of what we're seeing,
but we are seeing our highest engagement from our staff that we've seen since 2023. So that's really exciting. We just are getting our data back from our full staff survey. And so we'll have those results and be publishing those back to the board once we are, we have those processed by, by our survey company. But I wanted to get those out to you all so we had that because I think it really speaks a lot to what's going on in the district. Not only what you've been seeing in the shine, the light about the positivity about what we're seeing in our student achievement scores,
but also what we're seeing in the, the feedback from our staff. And it's not just anecdotal that you're hearing from your principals and you're hearing from Jenny and I, but you're also seeing it from quantitative data around what your staff is saying about how they feel about being part of our E two. And so it's really exciting that we're seeing those positive trends in that direction headed in, in the way that we all want to see it go. So that's exciting. So I just wanted to report that out to you all in my, in my superintendent report. Speaker 1: Great. Thank you. Yes, thank you. Thank you. Okay.
Board reports and requests. Steve, welcome. Hey, thanks. Do you have anything for your first board report and future request? Speaker 15: Not explicitly, but I excited to join. Thanks for welcoming. Let me in and yeah, you know, it's an interesting time to jump in here, but you know, I've been involved in a lot of, well I show up to the meetings and all the things, PTAs and DAC and all that. I'm excited to kind of, to continue the hard work. It's gonna be a hard job. We have a lot of a big lift,
but I'm ready to get the work done. So yeah, Speaker 3: Welcome. Speaker 15: Thanks. Welcome, welcome. Winter formal tomorrow at ECE. So I'll be serving food that, so that should be a cute experience. Oh, that's fun. That's my one thing to report up, up until this point. That's awesome. Next time a tuxedo. Speaker 3: Yeah. What are you wearing? Speaker 15: Probably flan in my coming from my house would probably be flannel. A big flannel and a little flannel. Hey, that's all Speaker 3: Right. It counts. It counts. That's awesome. Speaker 15: But yeah, Speaker 3: No, that's awesome. Well welcome. Thank you. Yes, you're welcome. Appreciate it.
Yeah, holler if you have any questions, I Speaker 15: Will, I'll take you up on that. Speaker 3: Cassie. Yes, I would love to give a report. I went to the fifth grade CVE play at Cactus Valley and yes, I would have to agree with Jenny that the music teacher there does a phenomenal job engaging the kids and engaging the crowd and just so excited to do what she does. I've known her for many years and she does a phenomenal job. So I also went to the Thanksgiving lunch at Cactus Valley. I handed out napkins
and silverware to every single person that ate. So I was there from like 10 something until one something. It was a long time. And then we helped clean up me and some of the PTA parents there. And it was just really a fun, fun day seeing all the families together and the kids were so excited. There was some tears 'cause moms and dads weren't there yet and you know, but overall experience was great. I wanted to say thank you to Jason and Kirk for our special board meeting regarding the mil levy and financial information that was shared and insight.
Appreciate your guys' time to come together and you know, explore stuff with us, train us, teach us, we don't know all. So we appreciate that. I appreciated that specialized time for that. Thank you. As far as something that I really do wanna address from public comment, we as a board, I don't know if he's here or not, I don't think he is. We are not responding to emails. It's in our board norms that the president
responds on our behalf. But if you send an email to each one of us, we will not respond. Just wanted to let you guys know because I get that question a lot. Why didn't you answer me? We forward it, make sure that she got the same email or if she didn't get the email so she can see that. But I just wanted to clarify that little bit of information as far as request, I was gonna ask about the strategic plan. So thank you for that update. Yes, awesome. That's it. Thank you. You're welcome. Megan. Speaker 4: I attended the safety meeting on November 11th at Cactus
Valley Elementary. October's meeting was canceled due to a scheduling conflict with a bunch of the building counselors. So it, it had been some time since we had met, so there was quite a bit of information to kind of share. I think just briefly the rifle, rifle police department, school resource officer will be transitioning out and Rifle PD will be replacing him. They work off of basically a rotation. So I think we are all saddened that Officer Allison will be departing and moving on to different duties.
I, as part of my request, would like to ensure that the board acknowledges and recognizes his service to the district. However, that seems appropriate. But I, I do think that we need to, to do something to both honor his time and also thank the rifle chief for committing so much of their resources to the, the safety and engagement in our rifle schools. So I I definitely wanna applaud that. Was Speaker 3: There a date on that? Yeah,
Speaker 4: So do you know when I, I did not get a date. He was, he was there so I didn't feel like it was appropriate for me to say like, when are you leaving, when are you out? But we, we probably need to investigate that a little bit further. It's, it's soon. Okay. Amanda reported that Safe to Tell training had gone really well for new hires. Stevie reported they are working on a program to kind of encourage staff to engage in making sure that all the doors are locked and all the door. They're doing a great job, but they made it, they made it fun so it didn't seem
so maybe nagging, they call it the Caught You program, which means that they were rewarding staff for, or acknowledging staff specifically when another staff member caught somebody actually checking a door to ensure that it was locked with some, some small gift cards as as rewards. They turned it into a pretty fun game in making sure that staff was, was just going above and beyond what they're, what they're already doing to ensure that our schools are safe.
And I absolutely appreciate that. Yeah, Amanda talked about how they are actively working to engage strong relationships with each of the law enforcement jurisdictions from Newcastle to Rifle. There are a variety of different law enforcement jurisdictions that would come in and out over each of our schools. So engaging those personal relationships was really important. And Amanda was talking about how she's, she's working to secure those relationships. Let's see. Oh,
SRO Allison reported that he was actively looking into some new AI software. It is very, very preliminary at this point, but he has found something through his channels that essentially will photograph license plates of school, bus stop runners and issue, potentially issue tickets. Now there's so much to work out and obviously that have to be brought to the board for, for some kind of review, but I, I appreciate how ingenious he's being about trying
to ensure the safety not just in our buildings but out on the roadway so each of our kids are arriving safely as well. That's great. That is all I have. Speaker 1: Awesome. Thank you. Alright. Chance? Speaker 5: That saddens me, that officer Allison's gonna be leaving. Speaker 1: Yeah. Is he leaving the force or is he just leaving the SRO. Okay. So he'll Speaker 4: Still be, he'll rotate outta SROI don't believe he's leaving the police department. Okay. Speaker 5: Okay. Well he was instrumental in the door stop. Yeah, that was, yeah, he's done a lot of really good work.
Going to piggyback a little bit off what Jenny brought up with meals. She mentioned 4,589 meals for Thanksgiving and total adults and parents attending was 1,688. It's up 200 from last year. So that's trending correctly. That's awesome. And then we, as to date, we have, we have served one th 156,846 total meals. Speaker 1: Oh Speaker 5: Wow. So that's to date. And then last summer we, 'cause we keep the Meal Monkey going through the summer,
help the community 17,536 total meals and then an additional 4,969 served through the Boost Camp and they, they set up there at Rifle High School in summer. So pretty neat. One other cool thing, 'cause of the roads, our buses have traveled just in field trips now. Field trips have gone off, off like they've gone crazy. You've probably seen 'em on the consent agenda all every time they've traveled 500, 5,784 miles activities. You know, they range from hiking, camping research, which
I think that's a couple fourth graders looking at rocks. That's fun. Rafting, rock wall climbing. We got one of the best places in the country that we have access to. So that's handy. Rifle Falls, rifle Mountain Park, of course Fish Hatchery always favorites. Then we went to take kids to Maroon Bells, Hallam Lake up to Ashcroft and even a camping trip to Mount Albert overnight. So that's a junior high trip. So that was, that's pretty neat. On top of that, just, I went to Coleridge high School
football banquet last night. Oh nice. That was neat. They had, it was good to see all of the kids recognized and they're, they're, it's it's, it's just neat. It's neat to be there. The program and and athletics in that school are trending very well. They're on the, they're on the rise, which is really exciting. Student athletes, I think one of the head coach student athletes have a average gp, like if they're holding about a 3.1 GPA.
Oh. So that's really good that I'm, that's exciting. Anybody that had anything to do with sports in high school, that's a, that's a big thing. They set eight school records this year in football. That's awesome. So yeah, that was, it was just really fun. And a, I guess a request I would have, we had explored last year some meetings regarding an SRO in Newcastle. Speaker 3: Oh yeah, Speaker 5: I would like to pick that up. I kinda where glad I'm gonna lay that on you.
I, I'm not sure where that was left. I know it was funding of course that's usually the problem. But we were trying applying for some grants and just, I'd like to get that an update on where we're at on that. Speaker 3: And I think Coleridge was a little Speaker 5: Ridge is Speaker 3: Off because it's county. Speaker 5: It's county and the sheriff's department does that. Yeah. Speaker 3: Yeah. Okay. And we had met Chance and I had met with the mayor of Newcastle and who else? Oh, was it Ryan Fis. Speaker 5: Fis, yeah. We met Fi we had a meeting, we had a meeting Speaker 3: There at his school. Elk Creek. Yeah, Speaker 5: John.
Yeah, yeah. Going yeah. And a couple, there was a, you know, parent that was right during the crazy times of when all the swatting events were happening, knock on wood. So I just like to make sure that isn't overlooked. Yeah, Speaker 1: Thank Speaker 5: You. And that is all I have. Speaker 1: Okay. I don't have much, I would like to welcome Megan and Steve. I'm excited to be able to work with you guys. It should be fun, right? I think so that's, yeah, I'm definitely excited to see
where, where we will go and the things that we'll do. So excited for all that to come again. I think I said the last time we did the Veteran's Day assemblies, I was able to make it here, which was the first time they had done an assembly and they did the flag rising, which was pretty awesome. And again, it still just warms my heart to hear kindergarten through fifth grade try to say the Pledge of Allegiance together. It was said and it was pretty, pretty amazing. Megan, you were here. It was good.
And also the Thanksgiving lunches. I went today early to my son's and still sat and had lunch with my son. 'cause it's my job to embarrass him. But I heard Thanksgiving lunch was great. So that was, that was awesome to hear So I'm excited to see basketball is underway. Rifle had their first home game, varsity home game last night. Middle school boys is ending. Girls will kick up here pretty soon for middle school and then wrestling and all the things. The play at Rifle High School that weekend,
November 15th was fun, was great. They did an amazing job. Yeah, that's pretty much all I've got so far. I would too. I wanted to, to touch on the SRO for Newcastle and we'll definitely have to get a date for Officer Allison to make sure that we, we recognize his service that he is. I'll work on that. Awesome. Speaker 13: Adam? I did, I neglected to put in my report that the camera installation Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 13: Is moving very quickly and anticipated to be complete in January. Nice.
Speaker 1: Great. That's awesome. Speaker 5: Yeah. The last we heard there was cameras that were, pardon me, back back ordered. There was some equipment, it was back ordered or something. They are moving Speaker 13: Very quickly. Even with a few things that need to be ordered. The time that they are taking to get 'em in is phenomenal. So that's awesome. And they've been great about providing updates and letting us know where they're at. Speaker 5: Is there any facility that's online? No. Speaker 13: John says no. No. Sorry Speaker 1: John. I should, John I refer to you online. Yeah, yeah. No, that's exciting. Thank you for that.
So I know that was, that was a big lift too, so Yeah, I'm glad everybody made it back from Thanksgiving break and hopefully everybody had a good break and we've got three weeks now and then it's Christmas vacation and then CSB is next week. So we're excited for that. And it'll be fun. Lots of learning. You'll be drinking through a fire hose. So that's it. Alright, we kind of did committee reports I think in our board reports. Was there anything else that anybody needed to add? Okay. Silence is golden.
So then we'll go on to our district accountability update. Yay Hannah. Hey Hannah. I was Speaker 16: Getting a water before. Speaker 1: No I otherwise I'll be clearing my throat at y'all. I looked at Holly and she's like, it's not me. It's not me. Holly's like, no, no, not it, not it. I drew the lucky Speaker 16: Ticket this time. Speaker 1: Alright, that's Speaker 16: Ready. Well first of all, hi board. Speaker 1: Hi Speaker 16: Jenny and Kirk. I'm Hannah Raza. I am the voting doc member for Grand Mesa Elementary
and one of the co-chairs of D And we had our last meeting on November 18th. Couple of main things we talked about. This was a more informational and conversational meeting. We didn't actually have any action items to vote on, which worked out well. 'cause for the first time this year we didn't have a quorum. Speaker 1: Wow. But that's good. Everything works in, its in mysterious ways. We're Speaker 16: On vacation earlier or something Speaker 1: Just, Speaker 16: But we'll get that that towards the end of the report. We're gonna get to back to that quorum bit. So first we, we've been talking a lot about parent engagement, trying to talk
with folks from the various schools about different creative ways that they've, if they found success in getting more parents involved in different types of activities. Not just academic but also like building, yeah. Social culture, making sure people are involved in their kids' education, whatever that might look like. Whatever the parents need and things that maybe aren't working so well. We heard some good news from Riverside with the talking tech with the parents. A quarterly meeting they've initiated. That sounds really interesting. In fact, I think they're having the second one tonight
actually if my notes are right, talking about the theme is navigating friendships and healthy boundaries. They provide food interpretation, they've enlisted their counselors to kind of help them develop a facilitated conversation and so far that's going really well for them. Meeting some of their needs. We also talked about some parent engagement at Catherine Sr. With parents helping to build a new playground, which was really heartwarming to hear about, but also like very important use of parent volunteer time to help kids get what they need. And somebody said in terms of engagement, they,
they thought it was really important, important that it's giving purpose. And that kind of resonated with me. It's so many of us, like time is so precious and we don't, we don't have a lot between our families and, and work and volunteering. But it was kind of keep in mind as we adapt, kind of explore different ways to get our different parents engaged. It's so important to know that they felt that they contributed and had a meaningful purpose to that. The playground was obviously like a very easy one. There's a tangible result from that. But it is really challenging to get folks to something when they just feel like, oh it's a meeting.
Oh I just sat there and did it really make a difference. So something to just keep our wheels turning about in DAC is like how can we ensure there's purpose when we're developing different parent activities within our respective schools. The big bite from our last meeting was a district financial update from Jason and sounds like there's gonna be more of that tonight. So. Speaker 5: Oh, exciting, huh? Yeah. Oh Speaker 16: Yeah. Well, I mean fun with finding, you all know this already, but he's got a knack for delivering. Yeah. Speaker 5: Yes. He, he, he does And I'm Speaker 16: Pretty sure he could present on
anything. It would be a good Speaker 5: Time. He would've been like one of the greatest teachers to ever have. Speaker 16: No doubt. It's not, it's not too late. Speaker 5: I mean he did turn into a lawyer but we won't hold that against him. Easy. But we got him back. Yeah. Speaker 16: Yeah. I I won't reiterate all the details 'cause y'all have had the same presentation. There's gonna be more tonight. But it's just one of those things where it's so important. Especially I think in the DAC setting. A lot of us who have been there for a couple years hear this presentation year over year and we know what to expect and, and that's important to stay in the loop. But there's something about the first time you hear the
financial presentation where some eyes might be opened and, and so I just encourage like DAC meetings are available on Zoom. Anybody can watch these. They're so good for like deep information on things that we hear about peripherally. Oh, there's budget cuts. Oh we're gonna, there's gonna be a struggle something something mill levy that's not really like Speaker 5: I, that's what I got the first time too. Speaker 16: But it's like a word that gets tossed around in community but it's like it's, it's difficult to actually describe or really understand the impact. Right. So anyway to, to this point, the stat
that always blows my mind is just like locally that our per student funding from the state is over a thousand dollars less in re two than it is for each of our neighboring districts. Just by conditions of how their calculations work and what a rock and a hard place that puts not just us but like so many rural districts in. But the other mind blowing stat and that this is actually an improvement is that we're now 150 first and funding out of 178 schools in the OR districts in the state.
But that's actually up, it wasn't the one sixties last year. So anyway, Speaker 5: Small wins. Speaker 16: Small wins that is progress in the right direction. But no, that was just grateful to Jason for all the information and then sticking around for a myriad of questions so that we all can then go out to our respective communities and like share to our best ability some of this information that's so important Speaker 5: 'cause people are always willing to just sit there and listen to financial updates. Speaker 16: A hundred percent. Speaker 5: Sorry I quit interrupting you. I'm just No, you're Speaker 16: Good.
Speaker 5: We're engaging. Speaker 16: It just makes me think. I was like, you know I went to that meeting and I don't know that I have sat down with anybody and had an in-depth conversation, but if it comes up I'm gonna have numbers for, I Speaker 5: Felt like that for like the first three months I was on this board, I was there. I'm not sure what happened. Oh I heard it. I heard it. Speaker 16: Let's see. Yeah, that, so that was the bulk of our time. We did have a quick update from Kirk towards the end about transportation. Again the same information that's been shared in op-eds and in school newsletters to the public regarding transportation
with RE two and two Rivers. And then that opened the floor for just some like back and forth, just questions from folks in the room. And that was very helpful. And finally we discussed everyone and D's favorite thing, DAC recruitment it. So DAC members sit for a term of two years and as it so happens something like 11 of our voting members have their terms expiring this month. Now some of those folks will be renewing, but many of them nodding along over there. Yeah, we're gonna lose a lot of our folks
because their kiddos have done what they set out to do and graduated or about to graduate. So to this point that welcomes anybody to come to the meetings to come see what it's about. If you, you're looking for a way to feel like you have a real meaningful involvement in your kids' education. We need parents. I noted especially from Elk Creek, Riverside and Rifle High, but I'm sure, I know I didn't capture them all. So all schools, we would love to have folks sit in our meetings, see if this is a good fit, happy to
vote them in and send them your way for hopeful approval. And, and also just given the timing with what's happening with the budget, this is a really crucial time for, it would be helpful for DAC to be at full capacity as well. And then my, my final note, our next DAC meeting is December 16th at Cactus Valley. And you don't have to answer me right now, but I did have a quick question for the board. We're hopefully meeting next week to set the agenda. You guys got a last minute meeting from me like 10 minutes before this meeting started. If there's anything that the board would be interested in hearing, any feedback on anything on your mind
that might fit well into our agenda or not, that's fine too. I just wanted to put it out there in case the board is interested in any input from DAK and we'll make sure it gets on the agenda and that's it. Well Speaker 5: As usual, I mean DAK is crucial to the governance of the school district. It, this boardroom isn't always great for having indepth conversations. No. Okay. It's not, I mean everybody likes to see, think it is, it it it's not, Speaker 16: It's not like the format. It isn't Speaker 5: Like a back and forth. No, it's, it's not a great format to have conversations. Dac, your school accountability committees are, is
where those conversations are had. And I'm always been a big proponent of if you're gonna complain, go educate yourself. Right? Like ignorance is just ignorance unless you put the effort in and you'll, you'll be surprised. So, and this next few years if we can get Dak, keep DAK at full, like that's gonna be pivotal in a lot of these issues coming up. Yeah. Speaker 1: And Dak was instrumental in the PO some of the policies and stuff too last year.
Yeah. So Speaker 16: And in being, I mean stepping ladder to the board Speaker 5: Yeah. Hundred percent Speaker 16: That graduates Speaker 5: It give, it gives you Yeah it might give, it might actually give you a leg up from a person like me. And I dunno if Steve, if you've gone back or school account, I came in not even thinking, you know, about school. I just, you know, and I got to drink from a fire hose. Yeah. For, and there's still times, like believe it or not, I've learned more about charter schools in the last
six months than I probably ever cared to know. You know, but everything is different and you don't know what you don't know exactly, but you just ask. And I don't know, those conversations are very crucial. Speaker 16: Yeah. I'll a second. All of that. It's been, I I didn't really know what DAK was when I started going. It was something that popped up in a newsletter and I was like, I'll, it was at my kids' school and I was like, I'll just see what this is. And I, yeah, I just, I kind of wish I'd known sooner. It's such a, a nice format for like very open discussion for a lot of information and a lot of, I don't know.
I have, I have glowing reviews. It's great. Everyone should come to dac. Speaker 1: One thing I really do appreciate about DAC is it it was very easy for 'em to be able to have discussions and to be able to agree and disagree very respectfully. Yes. That was the one nice thing. 'cause we didn't, we didn't all agree and it's not gonna be all sunshine and rainbows, but we're able to have those discussions, which is nice. And then be able to, to bring it to the board if there's, you know, anything else or, you know,
table it for another time. But I, I really do think deck is, I I enjoyed being on deck, so I know 11 spots you Speaker 16: Said. Yeah. And they won't, some folks will be seeking renewal of their terms and so I don't have the exact number of how many are vacating, but I know quite a few folks had either graduating seniors last year or due this year. So there's not much of a point to starting a new two year term. But it's, yeah, it's, it is just a to some, something happened in 2023
where we onboarded a whole bunch of people all at once and, or sorry, 2020, what year is it? That was 23. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Speaker 17: 'cause they didn't know that they had to have people sign in. Like they didn't know that they had to make it official. Speaker 16: Ah. Speaker 17: And so we had been doing it, we had been, you know, Speaker 16: Officially Speaker 17: Unofficial for years and then all of a sudden they're like, we actually need it to be like in writing now. And I'm like, Speaker 16: Yeah. And they sign the, the agreement and get approved and Oh yeah.
That, that trash, that's when, Speaker 17: That's when the formality of it started. And so all of us that had never, you know. Yeah. Yeah. And so that was like everybody, Speaker 16: Everybody. Exactly. And yeah. Then there's been a few that have like turned over out of turn and so like we approved them recently. Speaker 15: Is there any way to stretch that out at this point of I know what the two years, so Speaker 16: I, the folks two's terms are up are already not, I mean so the folks that's graduating seniors from last year, they're, they're already, Speaker 1: Yeah, they're out. Speaker 16: I don't know if there's a way for the bylaws to stretch
beyond two years or if two years is like a good fit, but it, it would be kind of nice if we had them staggered Speaker 1: A little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Speaker 16: Maybe that's something stagger Speaker 17: Room, but that just didn't happen at that particular Speaker 16: Yeah. Speaker 17: Legalities. But we Speaker 16: Could put that on our agenda for next week and Speaker 17: Still come and not be be, you know, voting member. Speaker 16: Yeah, absolutely. And then I think that's another, like, I don't know if there's a way to address this, but there's, and I don't know if this is a misconception, but it was something I didn't understand before attending dap. That like, everyone's there, everyone has the same voice,
everybody has the same like le level of interaction in the meetings and then once in a while there's something that voting members vote on and Yeah. And then we have to have our quorum there. So, but I, I definitely don't wanna like, don't want people to think that if you're not a voting member, that doesn't mean you don't have a say. It doesn't work like that. Like it's a level playing field in there and everyone gets to say their piece and ask their questions. And Speaker 1: That's a good point. Speaker 3: I don't have a request or anything, but I do have a suggestion. Sure. Maybe you said your next meeting is December 16th
and I'm nervous about your turnout again. It's the week before the holiday. Yeah, it's last week of school. Maybe when you guys set your DAC calendar, look at those holiday weeks and move them closer to the beginning of the month where they're not so close to the holiday. I don't know if you guys set that or if it's the district office or something. But really look at that and take that in consideration for Thanksgiving week and Christmas week breaks and even spring break week that you do it a couple weeks before. So you do get a good turnout. Speaker 16: That's a great idea. I'll absolutely bring that up. And Speaker 3: That's Speaker 16: All I my head
to remember when we approve the, the calendar. But thank you. Speaker 1: And Speaker 5: Definitely brainstorm ideas how to stagger like options that we have to stagger terms. Speaker 1: Yeah. Speaker 5: I don't know what that looks like legally. I, Speaker 16: Yeah, I don't, I'm sure there's something in our bylaws so we'd have to explore. But that would be a good topic for our next meeting to sort that out. So this doesn't happen every two years. Speaker 5: Just so like we we're flying for two years and then oh we need 12 people. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you so much for your time and your commitment. Thank you. Speaker 16: Thank you all. Thank Speaker 1: You. Thank you Hannah. Sorry,
Speaker 3: This from last week. Speaker 1: Alright, are we food doing okay? Okay. On to the mill levy certification. Jason, what's up buddy? Woo. Speaker 5: Fire frog here buddy. Speaker 1: Hold myself a glass. I Speaker 18: I wanted to start by saying how much I enjoyed the workshop that we have. How much I enjoyed. Speaker 1: Yeah. Speaker 18: I love sharing what we do with the community and the real reason I love the DAK meeting so much is because I always tell a story about how we moved to Colorado
and I always mention that we moved here because of my smoking hot wife. Speaker 1: And Speaker 18: I've told that I've, I've told that story for three years now and someone at DAK works at the hospital with my wife Speaker 1: And the next day Speaker 18: They ran up to her and said, your husband said you were smoking hot and that I will speak at Dak anytime. Amazing reception. I don't do much. Right? But I got that one. I wanna thank you guys for having me in December. December is my favorite time of year. I'm always shocked at the decorations. I love how the community comes together, decorates their houses.
I love the snow, I love how people sing and exchange gifts. It never ceases to amaze me how excited people get over mill levy season. Woo hoo. I told that joke last year, but we have some new members so I thought if you'd like, we can start with the presentation. I'll tell you about our agenda. The first thing I wanna do is talk about what our mills Good question. Thank you. That's a good question. And then show you how we calculate those and then what, what the plan is for the rest of the month. What our, what our calendar looks like to get those certified and and end
you. Just a dramatic pause. You want me to wing it? Speaker 19: Do you want my presentation? Presentation go. Okay. I was like, Speaker 18: You can have, I've got one if you'll go down. I see it. I'm sorry. Why don't you, if you go down a couple slides, we'll talk. So let's, let's start with what our mills and what are mill levies? The mills are the local portion of the total program. So we, we have the ability to tax the community. We're a taxing agent agency. We can tax, we have to tax to pay out for the local portion of our entire total program. But then the community can also authorize other taxes,
mill levy overrides bonds. There are others allowed by the CDE, but those are the only ones that we have. So we are assessing, we're saying how much mills do we need to put on property so that we can collect the piece that the community's given us and what the state has given us. So that's what we're doing right now is we're saying on your property tax, here's the amount that we're going to take so that we get the amounts that we know upfront that we're gonna get. We've had questions in the past like, why don't we just up these and just give everybody some raises, which would be great. But all this stuff is set statutorily and in stone.
And so we're gonna talk about three different types of mills, the local share of our total program, our mille override, and our bond mills. And we're gonna walk through those one at a time. I, I think I came up with a new way to explain it. Made more sense to me. Ooh. Hopeful it makes more sense to everybody. Let's start on the next one. So the first thing we have to do is we have to get the, the assessed value from the county. From the county assessor. They give us one of those in August. They give us a a preview. And in two board reports ago I gave you what I thought the mill levies would look like based on that assessment,
knowing that was probably gonna change they have until December 10th to give us the final assessment value of the county. If they'd have waited till December 10th, we wouldn't be having this meeting right now. I would, I don't know what I'd be saying, right? I'd be, I'd be putting on a song and dance, but we needed them to get those in. They did me a favor. They shot those to me on email about a Friday ago so that I could get those in time for the board. So I have to take them cookies next week. But they assess the total value of the county. Once we have that number, we can move forward and figure out based on that, how much mills do we have
to put in place to collect what the school district needs? Our assessed value for the county was $855 million plus some change. Is that a lot? Is that a little, last year it was 950 million. The year before that it was 1.3 billion. The year, year before that it was backed up I think 950 million. So our assessed value fluctuates quite a bit. It goes up and down. That affects how much taxes are levied on our local program, which I'll show you in a second. After we know the assessed value, we're gonna find out what is a mill. A mill is a thousandth of that. So every mill that we raise raises
$855,603 if you round up the 91 cents. So we just divide that by a thousand and that's what each mill is worth. So that's the first step and that's why we have to wait for the county. 'cause I don't know those numbers until they give them to us. Okay, so let me show you what we get. And I, I gave you these I'll, I'll stand up one time I promise. So this is what we get. We actually get three of these and I put 'em in your board packet and you can see here's last year's value. I don't know why they put the number I care about in line four, but there it is in line four.
But you can see last year's value. We get three of these, we get one for the general, we get one for the override and we get one for the bond. They all have the exact same assessed value. In fact, the one they sent us in August didn't, and I sort of panicked 'cause I couldn't figure out how you do the math on different values. And I contacted them and then they fixed it. They, it was a mistake. So there's one other piece, it's abatements and the abatements are different for each of the three assessments, but they're all pretty close. They're all about 14,000. Those are taxes that were put off last year
that we should have collected and we get to, we get to go get those since we didn't get 'em last year. So that that matters. Okay, can we go to the next slide? So now we have to assess the program mills. We talk about all the time the total program that we get this big formula with 200 lines in it and we get 53 million bucks at the end of the day. That number is set by our PPR, which we just heard was lower than our neighbors. And we get that total amount. What piece of that is paid for by local taxes and what piece is paid by Denver?
What piece do we get from the state by our income tax? The way that we calculate the local piece is the state tells us to use 9.7 mills. I was looking at the historical mills today at the office. We found these old notebooks going all the way back to like 2004 and we used to pay as low as 4.7. And in 2021 the state said, oops, you guys should be actually paying 16.2 and we need to move that direction and we're gonna add one mil a year. So if you look at this presentation last year, that would've said 8.7 year
before 7.7 next year that'll say 10.7. So we take 10 this year, 9.7 times our mill that we just calculated and that's how much will come as a local portion of our total program. If that number was six times higher, the school district doesn't get any more money. We get 53 million that, that's just the park that comes from local versus the park that comes from income tax. So that piece right there is set in stone and that's the piece that the local community pays for our total program. That's not all that we get When you,
when I do a finance 1 0 1, I says, is there any more, and we always talk about the mill levy piece. So if you'll go to the next slide, the mill levy is calculated in reverse. If you're a math person. We had in 2004, six and 18, we had those three mill levees. We talked about that at our workshop. So we say, okay, to get 2.7, how many of those $855,000 mills do we need? So we just divide it out and figure out we need 3.17 of them. We do that for each of those and add it up. We round to three digits,
which actually causes a little bit of discrepancy. So you'll see we won't actually get 9.2 million. We get just a little bit more. It could be a little bit less. The state allows for that just 'cause three digit rounding on such big numbers can cause a little, little discrepancy. But we take each of our mills, or sorry, each of our mill levy overrides divide by this year's mill value and we get our mills that will be assessed so that we can get our $9.2 million in mill levy override. So that's 10.753 this year. Alright, on the next slide we have one more thing. We have a bond. We talked about bonds at our workshop bonds.
The community agrees to be assessed mills to raise enough money to pay our annual bond payment. So what is our annual bond payment at the district? It is $9 million this year and there's some bank fees in there. So that's our total payments. So 9 million divided by the 850. We need 10.61 mills to make the bond pay. So that next month will be in the very boring fund, 31 column that we never talk about. It'll have that exact amount that's raised in taxes over the course of the year. So those are the three mill that we put in place.
We add those together and that's what we'll certify tonight. Okay, so this is them added up. I didn't go over the abatements. It's only $40,000. So it's a little bitty mill. But we would do the same thing. We would take 14,000 or 41,000 divided by the 855,000. So that is the total mills if you add 'em all up. And the total amount that we'll get the mills for the local share are predetermined. Like I said, next year it'll be 10.7. Next year it'll be 11.7 until they get to 16.2.
And the other ones we divide into this year's value so that we get a flat amount. We get a flat amount to pay the bond and we get a flat amount for our mill levy override. So we're gonna get 26 million total. Roughly nine of that is for the bond. Roughly 17 of that is the local share. You'll hear me in March and April start to squeak. That money's getting tighter and tighter because we don't get that 17 million until May. And so it's like getting all of your paycheck in December or getting 20% of your paycheck in December.
So that's what we're gonna certify on the next slide. This is what the effect of that would be on a hundred thousand dollars house. So for every a hundred thousand dollars residential takes 7.15% of your value. So if you have a hundred thousand dollars house, we don't assess mills against a hundred thousand. We assess it against 71 50 $7,150. So you take the number of mills times the value at 7.15% and you can get the amount of mills raised by a hundred thousand. It's within like $26 of last year
or a hundred thousand mostly because we went from 8.7 to 9.7, not because the district gets any new fancy money. Okay? This is, this is our deadlines. You guys don't care about this as much as I do, but we get our preliminary assessed value in August. I use that to give you guys kind of a preview of what this would look like November 21st. This year we did get the final one. They could have done that. Like I said, their deadline is December 10th. We have to have everything in to the CDE by midnight on December 15th.
We have to have your signed mill levy certification. So for some reason the county was delayed. We would've a five day window to have a board meeting with the mills certified and get it back to the state and to the county. We have to run it over to the county to, but by the close of business. So that's all gonna happen after this meeting tomorrow. The next slide is what the certification looks like. That's a little small. I have several of these printed if you need them. I've got the whole packet printed if anybody needs it. But essentially we do have to read it. I'm sorry, everybody has to have
to read all these dumb numbers. We read those in, sign that, and then I'll take a copy of that and give it to CE and then I give a copy to the tax assessor and then we'll be done with mill levy season and we can all open presents. What else people do in December that, that's a terrible lesson to have to learn on board meeting. Number one, like I need you to quickly assess 26 million in, in taxes. But are there any questions? I tried to set that up a little bit at the last meeting and then hopefully in some of the board reports there's, there was a little bit of setup with this stuff.
But that's what we do. Anyone have any questions? Speaker 2: I don't. Okay. Speaker 18: If you do, I'll be hiding in the corner. You can come back Speaker 15: That, that total assessed value, that's the total value of all property in the in the in the county. In the county. Yes sir. Speaker 18: Gotcha. Yes sir. And that's why it fluctuates. Generally won't Speaker 15: Depending on the market, Speaker 18: But yeah, business prices and only gas prices Speaker 2: And Speaker 1: That's, that's everything. So commercial and residential, okay. Speaker 2: Yes. Just the whole, the Speaker 18: Whole ball of wax. Speaker 2: Okay. Okay. Okay. Speaker 18: I'll be here when you read it and Speaker 1: Thank you Jason. Thanks. Speaker 2: Thank you. Should we
Speaker 5: A slow clap? Speaker 2: A slow Speaker 1: Clap. Speaker 15: Make anybody cry. Speaker 2: Expect my present in my office. Speaker 1: All right. Speaker 2: Okay, Speaker 1: Now we're on to governance action items. So we have approval of the mill levy certification. Speaker 2: Alright, lemme find. Speaker 1: Okay, who wants to read it? Speaker 2: Okay, sorry Speaker 1: I had to stand. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 5: Everything Jason, Speaker 2: Right?
Yep. Okay. Speaker 5: In compliance with Colorado revised statute 22 dash four zero dash 1 0 2 subsection six, this is to certify that the Garfield R two school district Board of Education met in a business session on December 3rd, 2025 and took action recorded on the official minutes thereof to establish a total Garfield RE two school District mill levy for property tax year 2025 to be collected in 2026 at 31.112 mills. The millage total is based on the net assessed value of $855,602,910
and is comprised of the following total program 8,299,348 with a mill total of 9.7 hold harmless $0 with zero mills. Voter approved mill levy overrides $9,200,298 with a mill total of 10.753 abatement $41,925 0.049 Total
general fund $17,541,571 with a mill total of 20.502 bond redemption fund 9,077,947 with a mill total of 10.61 transportation fund, zero zero special building and technology, $0 zero mills debt-free school supplemental capital zero construction technology maintenance and other zero zero mills total non-general fund $9,077,947
10.61 mills Garfield re two school district total $26,619,518 31.112 mills. And then check figure must be zero. I have to write, read that Speaker 20: One Speaker 5: Zero. Looks like it's zero. Estimated full funding mill levy. Oh, do I have to read that? Estimated full funding mill levy, 58.233 projected gross funding from state $43,754,643. Speaker 3: Okay, thank you.
Speaker 1: Jason, I do have a question on the abatement. Yes, it's 41,925 with a mill total of 0.049, but it looks like it is crossed out. Speaker 3: That may be printing. I've got one not Speaker 1: Crossed. Okay. I just wanted the one you Speaker 3: Signed. Yeah. Okay. The one you signed does look like, has a line Drew? Speaker 1: Yes, please. Speaker 3: That was the question I had. Thank you. Speaker 1: Yeah, I figured because it wasn't that way in the presentation but, okay.
Alright. May I get a motion to approve the Garfield REI school District property tax mill Levy as presented? Speaker 3: I make a motion to approve the property tax mill levy as presented. Speaker 1: Great, thank you. May I get a second? Speaker 3: Hmm. I'll second Mayor. Speaker 1: Thank you. Sharon, may I get roll call? Speaker 3: Will you? Aye Asco Aye. Kyle Aye. Jenkins. Aye. Speaker 1: Aye. Speaker 3: Okay. Speaker 1: Alright, that was it on our agenda. So next we are future requests.
Speaker 3: We have one, Speaker 1: Megan, I believe it is your board report for this one. Yay. So if you can get that to Theresa by Friday at 10. Speaker 3: Yes ma'am. Speaker 1: Thank you. Is that right Theresa? We appreciate Speaker 3: That. Okay. Speaker 5: She likes it when I'm not the one. Speaker 1: Don't worry, I'm usually, I'm usually late too. Speaker 3: Just saying we appreciate that there's no judgment. All she's saying she, Speaker 5: She asks very nicely. Speaker 3: It is amazing how fast Friday at 10:00 AM really comes. It is after every board meeting on Wednesday. Like you're like, and Bobby's like therea.
Speaker 1: Alright. Any future, any future requests? I believe we were gonna start with the section review for policies starting in January or are we gonna do hr? Speaker 12: We're gonna do h HR has some requested policies that they're bringing forward and so we'll start that in January. Okay. Your HR director has, has been compiling some that she, that she's requesting. And so we are gonna start with her, her her compiled requests section and then we'll, we'll start from there. The alphabetical sections on review,
but we'll start with what she's compiled because she's come across some that she's specifically requesting to do. So I honoring her requests because of legal compliance that we will look at that She's, she's put in a file Perfect. That says please can we look at those? Speaker 1: Perfect. She asked very nicely. Yes. Okay. Speaker 5: What I, I know we don't want the specifics getting out, but maybe when the cameras are operational we can have like a presentation, high level presentation of kind of what, you know, so the public knows kinda where, no specifics
but you know, but something Yep. That would be really neat. Of course. Really interested to hear what the tech team has from ai, their AI conference. Speaker 3: Is, is there a way we could honor the DAC members that have been serving? I know that there's a couple that have been on there a long time, like the one that was sitting in the front Speaker 5: Row. Yeah. Speaker 1: Holly. Holly. Speaker 3: Like, I mean they've been on like some sort of basic recognizing them either here or if we can make it to that deck meeting. I don't know. Okay. Get them something.
Yep. Thank you. Yeah. Speaker 4: Okay. I would rather do that here than at the DAC meeting just because we've got a, a slightly bigger audience and their service has been so instrumental to the, to the board. Speaker 3: Yeah, that works. Speaker 1: And it's Speaker 4: Recorded. Speaker 12: Yep, you can, Speaker 3: Okay. Speaker 1: Audit update will be February-ish. Speaker 12: We hope to have it Jason by the end of February or end of January. I think that Speaker 18: Either the second meeting in January or February, we'd have, we'd have something from Paul. I think everything's in We, we asked Mike today if he had anything else he needed.
We haven't heard. So hopefully we have a draft soon. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 5: We haven't heard from Bo. He's in a while. Speaker 3: Yeah. New director. Speaker 5: New director. Like to meet him. Okay. Talk to him about services offered services that we're utilizing. Okay. At what he sees his vision for moving forward. Okay. CMC. We haven't Oh yes, I, I would love to give I go ER Ms D. Yeah. Tin Ms. Dulo or is it de de Tinker Dulo, yeah. Hmm. And I'd just love to see Okay.
The concurrent certifications we give, you know, and I know we give a lot of those and just see how we utilize that service. Be interesting. Okay. Speaker 12: At the piece Speaker 1: Calendar is February ca from Speaker 12: CS is working on it. Yeah. And they should be, we should have, we have a meeting Friday and I think there's a survey survey out right now and I don't know the closing date. I need to, Speaker 2: It's today's Wednesday, tomorrow night. Speaker 12: Yeah. So we, we should have something coming. Speaker 5: And that's two Speaker 12: By February? Yeah, it's two.
We're looking at a two year recommendation to you all. Speaker 1: Okay. Anything else? Speaker 3: I don't think so. Speaker 1: Okay. I'm good meeting debrief. Speaker 3: Okay. Poor Scott Speaker 1: Meeting debrief. Do you have anything? I'm gonna start with you. Speaker 15: Where's Speaker 1: Meeting you first? Yeah, that sounds start, Speaker 15: Start with me all around. Yeah. I mean it's, wow, I've had a lot of meetings with Jason. It's been a, or so far all, all of my interactions with board has been financial and that's good. That's what I mean. I'm here to talk about the money. Yep. Yeah, I mean, you know, said I will try to do my best
to get spun up as fast as I can. I've been digging around in the background trying to get my research done with all publicly available information and yeah, signed to get after it, but it's a bit overwhelming so yeah. I'll do my best. Speaker 3: You're Speaker 15: Welcome. Thank Speaker 3: Cassie. Do you have anything? I just wanted to give Hyland a shout out. We're doing great job and I all love that the teacher that was recognized. Heidi? Heidi. Heidi. Yeah. Thank you. I want to call her by her maiden name
and I knew that wasn't right. I was like, I wrote it down. She is amazing. I'm like, like what teacher goes into a school and starts shoveling snow. I was like, oh my goodness. Heidi. Heidi does. Yeah, she's, she goes above and beyond and I just really appreciate that. I remember the last year when we were here, she was starting up that group, the homework club or whatever to work with kids to get 'em caught up on their homework and work with them. And I remember thinking, man, that is just a really dedicated teacher. So it was fun seeing her get recognized tonight
and the rest of the staff, I'm just excited for them. I'm sorry that CKLA is a lot of work, but I hope it pays off for all of them over the years. I know it will. And Simone, thanks for doing all that legwork to get that going. The lift, I know it's a lot, but I personally received a text message from someone from another school that had a letter from their teacher that their kid had surpassed their year end goal and like the, the mom was just like so overjoyed
and so thankful to the board for approving that and for the curriculum department diving in and trying to find the best tool to help our kids. And it really speaks volumes when parents in the community are seeing this and like, just like tears of joy because their kid is doing so good. And so I just wanna give a shout out to you, Simone, for kind of spearheading that. Thank you. And just keep encouraging all those teachers. Like it's gonna pay off, I promise, once we get through this first year. So thank you for all you guys do. Thanks.
And we'll see you guys. You too. Next week at CS B, your first Cs B you get a lot of me. Yeah. And it's your first one. Yeah, I'm excited. All right. That's it. Thank you Megan. Speaker 4: I also would like to echo the lift, but I, I look at it slightly different while the, it's, it's like when you're, you're when in the gym and you're first doing a few reps of anything, it hurts. So this, this lift probably hurts right now, but I think when you accompany that with the fact
that you've got some buy-in and of some goals, you at least know why you're doing the reps. You, you know, why you're getting up early, you know why you're breaking a sweat because you're working towards a common goal. And I think that in combination, we're not just asking you for hard work and dedication. We're showing you where it pays off in the end with your hard work and dedication. And we're giving you some buy-in by helping to establish those goals. And I think that while, while we're probably still wiping sweat from our brow, we're recognizing that
there there is an end in sight, the proverbial end in sight where maybe that lift doesn't feel as hard and the reward is, is profitable. And I, and I think we're gonna see that. I'm really, I'm really excited about it. Very excited about it. Speaker 3: Awesome. All I have. Okay. Chance? Speaker 5: I really like the, during the Shining shine, the light with Rich and his leadership team. They and the mentor, Speaker 3: The RHS. Speaker 5: Yeah. The high school kids, they bring into Mentor Speaker 3: Lily. I think Speaker 5: LI was Yes.
Yeah, yeah. Lily Ruiz Speaker 3: Ruiz. Speaker 4: Yeah. Speaker 5: I, I think we overlook that at how important that is for kids, especially in grades, especially in elementary school. I know in kids have a tendency to idolize kids that are bigger. You know, they come from the high school or the middle school and oh my goodness, they're talking to me. I remember it, you know, in my small school doing that. And it's a great way to, to get buy-in from the kids. I really, I just really like that, that that method. And it's really neat that we have some high school boys, some girls that are wanting to do that also.
So that, that just shows that, that we need to always do our part. The successes we've seen in C-K-C-K-L-A early, I think it's testament to Simone's pilot program, you know, that that we really started with Eureka last year. And I'll be completely honest, I wasn't a hundred percent sold on doing three different curriculums across five facilities. I felt that there was gonna be some, it wasn't an even playing field, it was the way I felt.
However, those feelings and and fears were dispelled with last year's after we, after a full implementation, after over last year's math scores. So I, I definitely think I know I the proof's there, it works. And to hear the teachers talk about the difficulty of the lift, but, but they weren't, when they were discussing it, they weren't apprehensive, they weren't complaining, you know, complaining. They weren't regretful discouraged. They weren't discouraged. It was, it was, you could,
you could tell that, yeah, it's hard, but we'll get there. We want more. You know, that's what, that's what they said. And that's super motivating to me to hear that. And, and it comes back from having a, a unified vision of where, where we're going. And that changes wherever the facility is. 'cause every facility's different, every facility faces different struggles, different, you know, metrics. Are there different circumstances, different, you know, just different. So the, the fact that we've gone through
and set 10 goals or you know, some, I think some schools have four or five where each school sets a a, a guide collaboratively, not just from an admin, but you know, they're not just sending out to this teacher and saying, Hey, this is what you're gonna do. They're collaboratively making these goals together. I mean you get automatic buy-in and I, you're, I really have seen that throughout this school tour for our meetings this year. I've seen a staff buy-in that I've not necessarily, maybe it's a vibe, hasn't been there previously. You know, I mean every, every
teacher's dedicated and I know that. But just the vibe this year is different. So that's all. I'm just super, super excited to see where that goes. On top of that, the mill, you know, as always, Jason is awesome. Speaker 3: Delivered Speaker 5: An amazing, just delivered amazing mill speech, mill speech. Speaker 3: We're gonna like chant it. Speech Speaker 5: Mill. He still has the greatest joke I've ever heard when you were at Coleridge and he was in front of everybody at the district. You guys, you guys were there and he said, let's party. Like it's fiscal year 1999.
And all the teachers like, oh that was the funny thing. That was the funniest. But anyway, so funny. Thank you Jason for all you do counting jokes and that's all I got Speaker 1: Run with finance for sure. Speaker 5: Fun with finance. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you Jason. No, I think the meeting went very well. It's always fun to come into the schools. And I think one thing, I mean, even though all the schools that we're in, we get, you know, they've all got different struggles. They've all got different goals. The nice thing is, and you know, one thing that that I know that I have, I have tried
and preached on this board for the past two years is consistency. So I think the nice thing is, is now there is, there is consistency in the forms. There is consistency in the buy-in and there is consistency in the pride in the schools. 'cause I think the, the staff actually being able to collaborate and not that the administration didn't listen to what the teachers had to say, but now the teachers actually get to participate in the goal setting, which I think is extremely helpful. And again, to echo what Chance said about the mentoring program with RHS, again, I remember,
I remember being in elementary school and a middle school and seeing the high school athletes and students coming in and going, I wanna be like them. And I think that's, that's huge and I think it definitely gives a very positive, positive role model for somebody that's doesn't seem so out of reach. So I, I really like that. I, I'm curious to see if the chain link will get up to the third grade hallway on the second floor here. And I think it's gonna happen. So I also like the kindness campaign that they did, and I'm glad that some teachers ended up wearing paint. I don't know if their aim was necessarily off,
but definitely fun to see. And I do wanna give a shout out also to Angela. I have ran into her a couple of Monday mornings, getting the coffee and the excitement. And a lot of the things that are going on are from the volunteers of the parents that are in those Monday coffee sessions, including the Veterans Day flag rising ceremony. That was their first question is what are we doing? And it was like, oh, I don't know. And so they, it was nice to have, have that input there. I think the meeting went well. I'm excited for this next year to see what's gonna happen.
And I'm excited for, for this five of us to see what we can do collaboratively together. That's all I've got. So look forward to seeing everybody at CS b. Yeah. So. All right. And with that we'll go ahead and adjourn the meeting for December 3rd, 2025 at 7 37 Oh.