Alright. Why are we approving an invoice? These are services that we've already approved. Yes. But we capped it at $2,025,000, and it went over $2,852. Can you repeat the number? $2,852, I believe. Okay. Are we good for a vote? Set the, the judge with the amendment. Roll call, please. Do we have a first and second? I will. Sorry. Thank you. Becker? Yes. Rajeev? Yes. Keaton? Yes. Fortress? Yes. LaFromboise? Yes. Hinton? Yes. Okay, next is, public comment.
Anybody wishing to speak? This is a meeting of the Board of Education to conduct business. It is not considered a community public meeting. The boards provide two times for public, to address the board, and rules are on the wall over there. If anybody has any questions, John Giddens.
1337 East Grant. I'm here again to bring up some kind of the same issues. First, I wanna know, I asked a few guys, the board of questions and all that. I wanted to know who took the banner down originally, through the because both at the time, ADs did not do it, and superintendent said in the meeting that she did not do it. I never got those answers for all those questions on that one. I also wanna bring up that the trophies are all missing out of the trophy
case now. Mainly all the ones with picture of me on it. And then my picture is even hidden personally. If this wasn't this whole object wasn't a vendetta against me, you guys are sure making it look like it is. And, you can go to the trophy case. I got pictures of it. It is a, this is getting insane taking down accomplishments from kids and, from all eras. You know how proud people come back and look at those things and to take them out, especially for the heritage of wrestling. To only have four trophies in the trophy case for wrestling is kinda crazy.
You you guys were a wrestling school. You guys have over 25 district championships, and we already lost so much of that history as it is because of the flood and all that. And you guys are willing to keep killing the sport. Keep killing this. And it may not just be my sport. I might just be overlooking it on mine and this one. But if you don't put these accomplishments back up and keep doing what you guys are supposed to be doing, who's gonna wanna come here to to become Allstate or win a district title? No one cares.
You you guys are showing that the village or the school administration doesn't care. So at a certain point, when do you guys start caring about sports? When when are you guys gonna start acknowledging that there's still plaques in the trophy case without names on it? There's still kids supposed to be on the wall that I've been asking for for months and months and months, a year now. This is getting ridiculous. You guys still don't have a coach. You guys still don't have nothing. You you guys sent out a letter saying that it was fair. It was definitely not fair.
I yet of me being applied still haven't got a call yet. And the only thing that you guys say that I could ever even done is what? Speak up. So if freedom of speech and coming to you guys, showing you guys my issues is a problem, that's a problem with you guys. That's a problem in your school staff that's not doing what they're supposed to be doing. And you guys are hurting these kids, saying that you have a schedule ready. I looked at the schedule on MHSA with my page.
You guys have three duels, which just has the same address, and one tournament. We did over 20 something meets last year. And you guys are telling me that you guys have, we got something on schedule. That's that's that's good enough. When are when are you guys gonna hold someone accountable? Are are you guys gonna finally do your job, or make them do their job? Or you guys just gonna let it all crumble, and get rid of all their accomplishments? Because that's what you guys are doing. You don't believe me, go to the trophy cases. Look. I'll show you pictures last year in them. Let's go look at the banners.
Why were they took down? Why were they moved? No one can answer it. If it wasn't directed by superintendent through AD, no PO orders, no nothing. You guys are getting your guys' school ran by who? Who's following the policies and procedures? Who's following the orders? Whose orders are they? This is getting ridiculous. I come here week after week to get criticized everywhere I go and cold shoulders to come here here to tell you guys to show you guys these concerns and you guys are just throwing it away.
You guys don't care. You guys need to direct. You need to stop listening to saying, I don't do the hiring, but it well, apparently, you guys need to do some kind of hiring. HR doesn't know what they're doing. Super tenant doesn't do it. ADs don't know what they're doing. When are you guys gonna hold someone accountable? I have, Caitlin McGinnis. Caitlin McGinnis. 1337 East Granite. How are you going to have the AD send out a mass letter calling us liars saying you guys have a full schedule in place for the wrestlers? There are only the required league meets in one tournament for girls.
What is that? Five meets out of 20 plus tournaments you could be scheduling for the season instead of waiting for a coach to take the position and then schedule? Five meets is not having a full schedule whatsoever. So clarify that by putting the full schedule online if that's what you guys do indeed have. You can't wait around for a coach to schedule. Tournaments fill up fast, and your athletic department will be responsible to do that. We even spoke to another school about that, and they do, in fact, fill the whole schedule for the coaches.
You're paying coaches to do their job. Give them a full schedule to do their job and do it to the fullest extent so these kids can succeed. Or don't give the coaches who only want to commit to part time practices and tournaments full time pay. It's that simple. You're rewarding laziness, and that's where your HR department should be stepping in. Wrestling requires five days a week practices with a meet during the week and one to two tournaments on the weekend. You are accepting bare minimum, and it's concerning.
Your schools will never be successful with the current administration you have in place. The board needs to fire the I mean, the superintendent and work their way down. Now kindly cease any further commentary and govern yourself accordingly. Thank you for your time. Thank you. I have Joe Hill. Joella. 22135 Dock Street, Warren, Michigan. I'm here because my son's been at, you know, wrestling since he's been four. You know, he's 15 now. Hasn't missed any, any years. He's gone far in seasons as high as second in the state.
It's concerning because with wrestling because you have to be in shape. I mean, you have to you know, there's a there's a lot of things to go over. You gotta get in wrestling shape. You can't just show up and participate because it's just not fair. And a lot of these other schools, what what what's happening is they start in early in the summer, and they have camps. They have open, you know, wrestling mats. They come in and a lot of people come in and they show them, you know, moves. And they're very versatile then, very well rounded. You have to be on your game for wrestling. It's not something that you play. You have to show up and you have to compete.
And it's a lot of heart. You know? Also, you know, these kids, they give up a lot of Saturdays, you know, after school, Sundays. You got new kids coming in. It's uninspiring to see, what the situation is currently. And it's kinda lackluster on administration's part because I feel like you should kick the door in for these kids. These are COVID kids. I didn't have to go through that coming up. You know, they've already had so many knocks against them, and you keep shutting the door. It's uninspiring. You have to you have to really, you know, get on these kids level and
show them that you'll fight for them because, you know, they are our future. I don't mean to sound corny, but it you know, they don't give in. You know, they wanna fight and they wanna compete. You know, it it's uplifting for them. It's a very rewarding sport, but it's also demanding sport. You know, a lot of time and effort has to go into this. And with the kids not being able to, be touched by, you know, coaches and so on and so forth, you know, we sign up. We do a background check. You know, personally, if I see anybody touch a kid, I'd probably rip their head off. You know what I mean? That's ridiculous. This is why wrestling is such a strong community.
We we reach back, and we wanna give back, and we wanna help, and we wanna see these kids succeed. First, your kid, you you have an opportunity right now with girls wrestling. It's gonna it's taken over like United States. It's North America is you know, it's it's the number one growing sport, and you're shutting the door on that. If you have an opportunity right now to, you know, take a leadership role and make decisions to change these kids' lives because there's opportunities for scholarships, you know, just
just to overcome. If you get in that wrestling room and you grind it out and you work hard and you succeed, there's nothing that you can't do. It'll they'll excel in school. It's it's really uplifting. It it's it's such an awesome rewarding sport, and you have an opportunity right now to do the right thing. All hands. All everybody should be on deck doing this for the kids because, like I said, I don't think anybody in this room had to go through COVID, right, with the mask and the shields and the separation and all these other things, all these knocks
against these kids. And you guys you have an opportunity right now to do the right thing, and I think you should. And my son is depending on it. These new kids, and he got kids coming up from the middle school. Everybody wants to wrestle, but who the heck's gonna you know, who's who's gonna guide them? Where's their leader? You You had an opportunity. You had a person who wanted to give back. You had another person and Gary Hurston wanted to give back. You got people that generally wanna give their time. They don't need the money. It's not about the money. That's ridiculous. They come out of pocket. As teachers know, nobody makes money when you when you participate. You wanna help. It's out of your heart.
That's it. A 100% or nothing. It's all in or nothing. You have an opportunity to kick the door in. I suggest you do so so these kids are gonna remember everyone here because they're watching. They're always watching. Right. And they have questions of their own. My son is not inspired right now, and it's disturbing me a lot because he he's he's got a very good pedigree. You know? All my boys have wrestled since they've been four. And even there's kids that are undiscovered right now, they have an opportunity to do something really great. You really it it'll it'll this will transit to to all through school too, and
you you'll notice kids that normally wouldn't, you know, come out and and and work hard, they get an opportunity. You'd be surprised. I've seen it time and time again. There's so many athletes. There's so many student athletes. It's inspiring. Wake up. Do the right thing. Thank you very much. Thank you, mister Hilla. Okay. Moving on to our, board presentation. We have John Bouschette. I'm gonna say I probably slaughtered it. Alright. He's here from ACRA. He's gonna teach us some things about our our new data presentation, data analysis.
And so welcome to you, Johnny. Thanks, James. I think they're so it can be recorded. If I was gonna speak with my Oh, yeah. You can use if you wanna say Over here. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for having me. It's always great to be back in the great state of Michigan. I I don't live in Michigan, but I did for nine years, so I thank you, Jabraosh. You're ordering. It's not at all like it's, spelled, so just hardening across the moon. So, great great to be here. Looking forward to giving you some a big overview of your data, but also, today,
what we're gonna do is we're gonna focus on some of the different ways that we do, data at ECRO. So ECRO Group, just for those of you who who aren't kinda all that familiar with what we do, is we're a we're an analytics company. So we work primarily with k 12 schools across the country. I myself was a former district administrator for a little over twenty years before going to work with Decker Group. And, the way what we do is we take in all of your, student level data from from both your state assessment scores and also your benchmark assessments, like your
I Ready, meaning like that, and we build that and we build a local growth model. We'll talk a little bit about that. So today, we're gonna go over some of the foundational concepts of growth. We're gonna talk about the district's data as it pertains to relative efficiency. And then, we're also gonna get a little brief summary kinda like as we get analyzed all the all the data, some some suggestions for the future. And, of course, if you have questions, I wanna Right? So, as we get started, the two major things that we look at in our platform is we look at obviously proficiency. That's did the children meet the, the standard on the test.
So for you all, it's you and the the end step or I mean PSAT SAT. And so we'll be primarily at that, and do they meet the state and veteran. Okay? And then, of course, we look at growth. And with us, with growth, we're looking at every student where what is typical for Hazel Park, Michigan, your district, and then we build a local growth model, and we'll just give you a kind of a little bit of a visual of what that looks like with us. So we take all of the district's data. We build that into a local growth model, and every child gets a unique propensity score, which is a fancy statistical term for a projection based on an equated score.
And so that every child gets a projection from where they've been, what's typical for Hazel Park at every possible iteration of growth, and and then that's projected in the future. And then the way we look at growth is, a little different than, you know, typically, like, where did a child start? Where did they finish doing a simple subtraction? That's growth. Right? So if you think about, like, when you're you have your own children, you know, they started the year at five foot. They they get to five three. They grew three inches. Right? Well, the question for us is not just did they grow three inches, but where were they projected from?
And so that's why we take the local your history of Hazel Park and we utilize that history to project in the future so that a child's growth, your standardized assessment, I Ready, and MSTeP, PSET, SAT, it's not just a matter of did they grow from the previous year, but where did they grow relative to where they should've And that's how we measure growth. So I'll just pause and say, any questions on that? Because that's a little bit different than probably what you're used to seeing. No? Mhmm. Okay. So the way we we the way we color code growth through the system is,
blue is higher than expected growth, green is expected growth, yellow and red are are low growth. Okay? And so you'll see in your district, quite a bit of green. So meaning you're kinda on pace. Some some yellow growth, some areas of opportunity, and then some blue growth as well. So we're gonna look at all of those. And then the great thing, again, it's not just where did the students start, where did they finish, but also where they projected you. So then as you stack years of higher green growth and the blue growth, then you start to look at how do we then achieve higher proficiency. But for most kids, for most schools, we we always recommend the NECRA.
But just nationwide, the focus and I do appreciate appreciate your district administration, your building principles, always being kinda like acutely focused on child growth. That's that's where you focus on growth and proficiency stuff comes down a little. Right? We say that to everybody, not So, just some of that. I wanted to give you kind of a smattering of some of the different uses for for the for the data that we provide. Many of many of our students schools, including yours, are utilizing for personalized learning. Meaning, what what it where is the how is the child growing?
What are their needs and how do we better program for them? MTSS systems or RTI, meaning, like, the bigger system supports. You know, are we targeting the right students for the right programs? Do we have the right programs? And can we integrate some more student some more programs in that might better address the needs of our students? Again, that is I can tell you, without equivocation that your district is looking at those really well. They're looking at the data and they're trying to find out. They're also utilizing it to set goals. So meaning, what is a goal? So for instance, when you're setting goals in the district, you might set a district,
proficiency goal or something like that. A lot of times what those conversations boil down to is, you know, like, aspirational goals from the adults, which are not bad. But are they based on the students? The nice thing about us is we because of our projections in the future, you can set goals based on how your students have done and where they're projected to be. And you can still set stretch goals, which I would argue your district is doing, but based on the needs based on where your students are at. So that as you start to grow students at increasing rates or accelerated rates, you see those goals going up year over year. And that's that's sort of the way to do it.
I will also say your district is looking acutely at program evaluation. How you know, what are the supports in place? What's working? What's not working? What's working more effectively? How do we get more students into those? What's the profile of students that are in there? And then also equity and impact. Are are you seeing the same growth across the board for all of of for all groups of students? I'll say you'll see you'll I'll I'll give you a preview of coming attractions, but towards the end of the presentation, you'll see that, your district, while we don't have the data pulled together, we're working on pulling together data for students who are higher
mobility, meaning your newer students, versus students who have been here a little bit longer. And that's not to say that one group or the other is is is has more importance, but it's that all students are important. And making sure that all of your students are getting the right, needs when they come in, whether it's for a year or two, or they've just been here for a year, or they've been here for five years. What are their needs? How do you program for them? How do you know? And that's that's one of the new things that your district is doing. So with with that, I'll pause again. Any questions? I do have a question. Yes. When you talk about students that have a greater level or a a higher mobility,
I think you said Yep. Is this is this data that could potentially follow them from, like, LEA to LEA? I if you know, say they're coming from a neighboring district into Hazel Park and then maybe moving and and following through so that you sort of have that same level of projection or you're able to, like, pull relevant data from the past, or are they sort of, like, starting fresh when when they come here to Hazel Park? That's a great question. We can work it both ways. Typically, what districts wanna do is they wanna start with, like, a fresh start.
Okay. We have had districts, who have given us that data in advance. It's it's oftentimes hard to ascertain from the previous district. Usually, when that happens, usually, we we tell them, like, don't focus on the previous district's benchmark assessments. Like, you're using iReady. Okay. Yeah. Students might use MAP or might use FastBridge or some other assessment, which we can use, but it doesn't mean the same for you because you're using it. You're you're kinda getting to know a different system. So we usually recommend that if we're gonna take that data and keep it at the state assessment level, you know, because we we trust those scores.
Okay. That's a great question. Any other questions? Do you just pull your mic up closer for us? I'm always wary about pulling the mic up. I've been told when I was for years, when I was a teacher, So we're That's Try now? No. No. Do you wanna give him mine? That one worked when he brought it closer. Mine is good. Matt? What's that? Do you wanna bring that one back and have him bring it closer? Yeah. That's fine.
So I'm getting some, side input from somebody that's at home watching saying that, it's pretty loud. So No problem. Is that better? There you go. Yes. Okay. I don't know. He'll tell me in a minute. I'm always leery of the microphones because I have been told I have a booming voice when I when I get into the classroom. So I don't wanna blow you away or hear your ears ringing. It was his microphone. Any other questions? Okay. Ready to get into your data a little bit? Okay. So this, we're going to look primarily at your benchmark assessment data. We're going to look pretty high level, kind of give you an overview of what's been going on, what's been going on in the district.
And then, we'll give you some, some of the recommendations. This is not new to your district administrators, just so you know, they're, they're sort of acutely aware of these, so these aren't surprises. Okay. So when you look at your data, overall for ELA and math across all grades, you see that, your percentage meeting benchmark, that's the state benchmark, has been relatively, relatively constant in all subjects. Your growth is relatively it's green. Remember, green growth is as as expected, meaning meaning across the board, your students are
doing kinda as projected with the exception of social studies, you see exceptionally high growth there. So that's a real bright spot. Alright? And when I say exceptionally high growth, I I usually don't use the word exceptionally in there, but you'll notice that the effect size for growth is point three, and it's doubled that. So that's about, like, two grade levels worth of growth or a standard deviation two standard deviations. So that's a really high note. But otherwise, across all subjects in math and ELA, you're you're right on target. Don't don't pay too much attention to the negative numbers in front of it.
Remember, there's a range for projection. So as good as we are projecting human behavior, we are still projecting human behavior predicting that. So, we're we're we're within the really good acceptable range there. Okay. Can I I just ask you, yeah, a quick question on that? Yep. Sorry. I'm not I am paying attention to negative, because I'm a math. I was a math teacher. So are you saying that our projected growth is to go down? No. You're that's a good question. Your projected growth is your so think of this, with ECRA's growth model, one year
of growth, which typically equals one, is zero. So a child is projected to grow, and if they hit zero, that means they hit their anticipated projection. If they're slightly below that, which is just like the negative number, it's slightly below zero, but still within the range of that one year of projected growth. If they're slightly above, then they'd be a, then it'd be positive. All right. So typically, that's why that green range, if you look down right below that point two nine to negative point two nine to positive point two nine, that's the acceptable growth range. Okay. Okay.
So that's like zero equals one. That's probably if there's a number that you need to remember here is that zero equals one. That's one of the hardest things. You why do training across across the country? And that's sort of like the most the hardest thing for people to unlearn is like, but what's one year of growth? It's zero. Oh, okay. Are these Hazel Park numbers? These are. Yes. I'm confused on the sample size then. Why is it only the highest one is sixteen seventy two? Why is it so low compared compared to where our people come? So those would only be the subjects that took the standardized benchmark tests.
Wouldn't it have to be all students? No. No. Because, like, your k two don't take it. Okay. Yeah. Does that answer it? Yeah. Yes. Yep. They take I Ready. They take Which you'll see in just a second. Take the pieces that we bring together to give you this analytics. Yeah. So this is the percent. Remember, the benchmark is on the state assessment. You can't see my pointer, but it's on the state assessment. So this is only the students who took both the state assessment and had and then had a growth score going into it. So the state assessment is m M STEP PSAT SAT? Correct.
So any student that didn't take one of those three tests is not recognized in this data set? Right. So, like, k through two and then, obviously, twelfth grade. And you said only the ones that had a growth, or is everybody in there that's the average growth? So that is the that is everybody. So that's across all subjects. All all subjects for grades e l for ELA and math only, because this is just, like, your your federal accountability ESSA. That's the overall growth for all subjects. Okay. So if they took the the M STEP or PSAT or the SAT, they're not
included in this number? No. If they they are included. Those are the ones. Yes. Yep. But for example, if they took just the I Ready because they're in k one two, they would not be in this number. Yep. Yep. So everything I just said just changes about a slide. So, that's your overall. That's like, so this is like your 60,000 foot. This is what's going on from a proficiency in growth across the district, alright, overall. Now we're gonna dig into proficiency and growth relative to math, reading, science, and social
studies. Okay. And so this is the grade by grade growth. You'll notice on the left side, that's percent benchmark. Okay. So not to be confused. So that is the state benchmark on M STEP, PSET, or I or SAT. But you will notice, call me a liar for just a second, and it's okay. I can take it. That there is percent meeting benchmark all going all the way down to kindergarten. That's because we are able to take what the state benchmarks are and map them backwards to first, second kindergarten, first, and second grade, so that you get sort of
a preview of coming attractions. So that's the level of it. That's the level of analytics we provide is we can take that benchmark data and map that backwards to k one two to kind of give you a better indicator of where your kids are at and what's coming up. Okay? So that's why the percent benchmark goes all the way down to k. But it's not in the official ones from the previous slide because that's this is actual benchmarks. Okay? These are benchmarks on I Ready. And then you'll notice that you've got your growth. You've got I Ready growth, and then you've got m step growth. And you'll notice that the m step growth or PSAT growth only goes from grades
three through eight down down below because those are the only grades that took them. Okay? I Ready goes all the way back. So you'll notice across the board, you see pretty, pretty steady growth across the board with some with some potential opportunities. Again, this is just math that we're looking at. Obviously, there's some opportunities there, on the M STEP, particularly. So as as your district is looking at I Ready growth in math, there's some opportunities in third and fourth grade and seventh grade to kinda what are the needs of the students. And they're already doing this.
And what are the subtest areas to see what what are the needs of those students. And how can we get them better ready, a little bit better ready for the M steps when they take them in, what, five months or so? Should note, high growth, really high growth in eighth grade. So that's a really nice one as those students launch in the high school. Really good really good launching point last year for your eighth graders. Okay? Then doing the same thing for your whoops. Sorry. Looking at your ELA and reading, you'll notice that, very similar story.
You'll notice that for ELA and reading, I do wanna highlight a couple of things on your percent met benchmark, that that those two columns in the middle, you'll notice that a little hot slightly higher than in than in than in, math. And I think that was to be anticipated, but also shows that the newer reading program, that's what's at about two years old now. Three. Three years old is really starting to take root, and you're starting to see some gains there. So that's a really nice positive from a proficiency standpoint, especially on the percent meeting benchmark on I Ready.
Additionally, you'll lot you're also seeing that in grades five through eight, very consistent growth. I do wanna point out again that eighth grade class last year, really high growth, that point two five, while it's not blue, which is what we consider high growth. It we, we as a company always say anything above point two zero is green turning blue, so a really real positive there. Again, some opportunities in in the fourth and fifth grade for ELA and reading, which I think you're already looking at. We know what those are. We're looking at the subtest to see what those students need and how we can
how we can intervene. Okay? And then finally, to kind of wrap this one up, not as much granularity here because not as many testing, not as many tests. But when you look at your your social studies and science, we just kind of lump them all together because there's not as much data, not as, not as many grades. You'll notice kind of what's to be expected in science and social studies. Pretty, pretty high numbers in both of those areas. Particularly social studies, which, which is not a surprise given the exceedingly high growth overall as a district in social studies, but you'll also notice grade eight in particular, and
and again, this seems to be a theme for that grade last year, they had a really good year for ELA, math, and then also, science and social studies. I also wanna point out social studies for grade five, really high. Social studies across the board has just been really, really good. Science, again, also kinda kinda in line with with what you're seeing in ELA in particular. So, that's some real good numbers there. But I do want to point out again that social studies and science proficiency, relative to the math and English, a little bit higher, but really good.
And I'll pause there. This is sort of the overview of the k eight assessments. What questions might you have? I I'm curious. I think it was two slides back. You don't have to go back. It may have been the the science where we sort of broke down the growth between the I Ready and the M STEP PSAT. And and some of them were I'm sorry. Not science. Math. Math. I mean, there there were some pretty big deviations between the overall growth on one test versus the other. And I don't I mean, maybe that's a better question for our internal team.
Do we think that that's, like, the test style, the time of year, the just the material that's involved in it. Like, it's just interesting that there's that there's such a a big difference between the overall growth on one test versus the other. A mixture of all of those things, probably. Yeah. So when you really look at M STEP and I Ready, there are two while they both benchmark and they help us understand where students are, they're very different assessments. And so your I Ready assessment is a norm referenced assessment that really is digging
down into some very specific grade level standards. Whereas, M STEP is really, again, measuring some really big high level principles and really also helps us understand how we're doing in terms of the curriculum we're delivering. And so I want to just kind of jump in on the social studies piece. You notice that really high significant growth. We can attribute that directly to the fact that, during, the 02/2324 school year, we had a whole team of people rewriting the curriculum.
High level, very rigorous curriculum. And then all last year, our social studies coordinator spent a year coaching. And I happen to have the privilege of being in some classrooms for social studies last year, and I saw some really dynamic conversations and work going on. And we see a direct correlation into that work with high quality curriculum, with a lot of coaching for teachers, and opportunities for students to dig in, and we're seeing that big bang for the buck. So, that's what you're going to see in an M STEP like test versus I
Ready. Got it. Okay. Any other questions? I'm just clarifying. So on the left hand side of all these slides, it is the percentage of our students that met the state benchmark. Correct. I guess it'd be your right. Pardon? It'd be your right side, not left side. Yeah. I flipped it. I read I'm in the mirror here. Alright. Moving on a little bit. This slide is, a little bit of a deviation from what we just saw, the the heavy charts. This is what we've done here is we've taken your I Ready assessment scores for math and ELA, or math and reading.
I apologize. And we looked at them and where do your scores sit relative to the national percentile year over year. So, it this is kind of a really helpful slide to give you an indication of where where has your district been, where are they headed relative to the national. Now, while, of course, it's probably your your it's not where you want to be sitting nationally, necessarily, in the in the bottom third average. But I do wanna say, like, when you focus on growth, you see those percentiles. They're going up. And that's the most important thing.
You see in both math and ELA, or math and reading, you see those those increases in growth, particularly over the last couple years, in math, where you're seeing a a big spike. So that focus on growth can can go up, and that's what you're looking at when compared to their peers across the country. Is math blue? I don't know if anyone else is blue. It's really small for us. Yes. Math is blue. Okay. Math is blue. Reading is like Orange. Burnt orange. Maybe everybody else could see that well, but I certainly didn't. Sorry. So this this just kinda gives a nice context, and and it's it's nice slide
to kinda keep you grounded as to where you're at relative. So so sometimes you folk we focus so much, particularly as a company, but with your district as well, on local growth, local growth, local growth. And that's really important. But as you grow locally, sometimes it is nice to zoom out and see, well, how are we doing relative to our peers across the country. And you can see that you that's that steady increase in local growth shows steady increase against your peers across the country, which is what you're seeing here. The next one is we're gonna look at some growth by cohort. So this is this is your M STEP by co I'm sorry, not growth by
cohort. This is proficiency by cohort. So, what this does is it shows you going back, you know, two, three, four, five years. How have your grades done on the M STEP for math, relative to when they started? So, typically what we see in in it's sort of a little bit of a mixed bag in some of these instances where, but we're seeing pretty high gains in third grade. That that, sixth grade and seventh grade cohort seem pretty, pretty, pretty consistent in math. Again, and what I would say is this is pretty consistent with what you saw with the growth in proficiency across the board in math, which was pretty consistent, staying
at the same level, some opportunities there as we've talked about. But you're also seeing some, as you know, that that as you as you focus on those younger grades, especially k one two, which we saw in the previous slides, you're seeing some growth there. So, hopefully, that's a preview of coming attractions as well. So this is proficiency net growth? This is proficiency. Yes. On the m step. So just so I'm clear at what I'm seeing. The blue grade three on the far left, and then the next blue is when
they're in grade four? The so each blue is the grade three for that cohort. So last year's seventh grade cohort goes all the way back, what is that, five years to grade three. So blue is always grade three. Red is always grade four. Okay. So then the blue in grade three would be the red in grade four, which would be the yellow in grade five. So it got, you know, look at the different colors to see how that group of students did. Mhmm. Okay. Yep. Not quite. No. So the blue see, the 20 all of these are the twenty twenty four, 25
cohorts. So these are last year's fifth graders going back to their '22, '23 year when they're blue in third grade. Right. So they're blue in third grade. They're red in fourth grade. It's the same group of kids that are blue and then red and then yellow. Yes. So just so we're clear, when you look at the seventh grade cohort, the purple is where they are in seventh grade, and those same group of kids is blue where they were in third grade. Correct. Making a comparison of the growth that they've made throughout the years. So that's why these are our third graders from last year.
And when it says 25, 26, those third graders will move to the fourth grade cohort. This will be a a Not that correct. So really what you're looking at is how are they growing over and over? And And you need to remember, right, as they get older, you show less growth. When they're younger, they're growing because they're learning so much. You don't see the same growth. So what you're seeing is our third grades as we've gone along have really done well, and then the growth has gone up in fourth grade as well and last year in the fifth grade cohort.
Not as well as they had done the year before, but better than the seventh grade. So they're different kids, but those are all those kids together. Yep. So if I'm looking at this and I'm looking at the seventh Seventh grade. Cool. Yeah. The yellow, which is them, and in the fifth grade, they had the highest percentage of growth. That when they were in fifth grade. In the sixth grade. Yep. And then they went back up a little bit in the seventh. That's correct. Okay. Yes. And remember, it's important to note, this is proficiency. So this is the percent of that class proficient at each one of their Grade
levels. Grade levels. That's correct. So that's why the focus on growth is really important because proficiency and I will say too, and and Michigan is very similar to most other states that Michigan's benchmarks get more difficult year over year. Meaning, in third grade, it's usually the easiest to hit the benchmark. And it gets increasingly more difficult as they go through school. Meaning, the third grade usually hovers right around the forty seventh percentile nationally. By the time they get into sixth, seventh, eighth grade, it's up around the sixtieth
percentile, seventieth percentile. So in order in other words, in order to be if you stay at the forty fifth percentile nationally, you'll be you'll be proficient in third grade. If you stay there your entire career, you won't be there by the time you're in fifth grade. Does that make sense? Can I also ask a question to analytics? So when we look at all the individuals in the seventh grade cohort, let's just take that one because that's the largest. Those are or are not necessarily the same students. So while they did come, we have a tremendous amount of transition and moving in
the state of Michigan. So are those every single child in that cohort or just the ones that are have been here the whole time? Those are every single child in that cohort. So I think that's important for us too to remember that when our students that that fifth to sixth grade is there's a lot of transitions of people moving in and out. So we had a lot of new kids coming in in sixth grade, and we have fifth graders that go out and move to a different day than high. And Yeah. Yeah. And that's and that's something miss Dolmich has has looked at as well too. So we've looked at, like, the differences between the overall cohort and those who have
been with us two, three or more, four or more. So that's a that's a really good one. And those numbers look different. The longer they're with you, the better those numbers get. Do we have bad data too? Not in here, but we do have it. And then just to give you give you the same thing, same look now, now that we know what we're looking at. This is the same look, but now looking at your ELA reading. And so as you can see here, similar story, high a little higher, which we we anticipated with that reading program and what we've seen across the board. But you're seeing, very good numbers across the board.
Little more steady increases, especially in that fifth grade, sixth grade cohort. A little bit of dip in that seventh grade cohort, but but, similar. And again, it is a good point that, that Amy makes that that when you filter in the students who have been here a little longer, these numbers look a little better. And again, this is proficiency, not growth. That is correct. Growth is amazing, but proficiency is kinda like, wow. And that's why a hyper focus on growth is really the most important thing. And and we would say this even if the numbers just so you know, because
I presented all different districts. If these numbers were in the eighties, we would still say the focus needs to be on growth. Because growth is the most important metric for students, especially year over year. Versus a child achieving at the ninety fifth percentile in the nation. Well, you don't want that child to grow at the same same rate year over year. Otherwise, they start losing ground. Meaning, if they grow at the same rate as the fiftieth percentile, they'll lose ground. You wanna keep that child. So what are you doing to grow each individual child at the rate that's appropriate for them? So we would say that no matter where you are. And I and I just wanna share.
If you remember, I also shared with you that link for kids count in the state of Michigan. And in the state of Michigan, you aren't looking at Rochester or Birmingham. You need to look at districts. And the average growth is 17% of districts of poverty. And, unfortunately, that's that's Hazel Park in many of the school districts. And so our actually, our growth, when you look at that, is a little above districts of our type. And then you need to look at the size, which makes a difference as well. Yes. Absolutely. So just so I understand and just clarity reasons.
So if I'm again looking at cohort seven and I'm looking at the sixth and seventh grade, at sixth grade, those students were under 20% proficient at their grade level. Is that what I'm understanding? Yes. Remember. It's important to note that proficiency. Is a is a policy based Benchmark. It's not necessarily. A scientifically or evidence based benchmark. So meaning that's why students proficient. You do. Absolutely. And if you're telling me that only 20% of our students at grade level are
proficient for that grade level, that's kind of concerning. Concerning. Yeah. It's it definitely makes the focus on growth. Yes. Absolutely. But what I would say this is I'll put it Shouldn't the focus be both on proficiency and growth? It should. Yes. I mean, growth is important too. I understand that. But shouldn't it be both? It should. Yeah. And that's why that's why we present both of them. But some kids are a little further away from the proficiency benchmarks, so that's why you focus on growth. In this instance, what I would say is, proficiency is here's here's another way to
think about proficiency. And again, we've we've done these studies across the country. A student who's not proficient in reading at third grade, That does for for according to the state, does not mean that that's that child can't read. Does that make sense? Yeah. But they're not just they're not able to read at the level. Established by the state. Correct. Right. Yes. What I would say is the state benchmarks are usually set somewhere around the fiftieth to sixtieth percentile across the state for proficiency. So that's the minimum benchmark for proficiency, is usually around the fiftieth to sixtieth percentile
relative to the grade. If across the country where you would start to program for a child is around the thirtieth percentile. Twenty fifth to thirtieth. Just for for context. Not to say that growth that proficiency isn't important. It is. And ultimately, that's part of your accountability system. So that's why you you have to focus on it. Well, I think that's also why the state of Michigan, when they they give you your rankings and your numbers, they look at multiple They do. Factors. They look at proficiency. They look at growth. They look at inside the different categories as well, and that's why you've seen an
increase in the numbers every year. And why you've seen an increase in the weighting of growth on all state accountability systems, whether it's Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, across the country, you're seeing growth as a bigger indicator. Proficiency is still part of it, but not not as big as growth, believe it or not. And I would add just, I wanna read a little snippet from the MDE's memo on state assessments because I think this is really important. So, this was the state sending out a memo trying to help people, put in perspective the, the state assessment.
The M STEP assessments are rigorous, not meant to measure reading ability or math ability by themselves. They're meant to measure understanding of a broad set of rigorous subject matter standards. Because these assessments are high bar tests, students who score partially proficient are not necessarily performing below their grade level. And many who are below the proficient benchmark are successful throughout school, in high school, in college, and in their chosen professions. So I think that's really important with how to really think about the M STEP assessments. Certainly, that doesn't mean we don't want our kiddos to do better than we have
right now, but I think it's important to contextualize what that assessment is really measuring. And just that very first statement that I'll reread it again. The M STEP assessments are rigorous and not meant to measure reading ability or math ability. And that is from the State of Michigan about the M STEP assessments. So just to bring a little bit more context to the purpose for those assessments and how I know, as John said, it's a state, set Criteria that they set. Up here, that doesn't mean that we won't wanna get to there, but we do
have to contextualize what they mean. And it doesn't mean, again, that the students who are not scoring at some of those levels are not reading or cannot do math. Good questions. Any other ones? I'll move on. We're gonna we're gonna get into some high school stuff here in just a second. Alright. Just another this is even a a bigger macro look. These are your student growth rates for math and ELA across all grade levels, on your on your M STEP, PSAT, everything, k 12. So this is the entire ball of wax. So this is remember, we had broken it out just for M STEP, just for
I Ready. This is putting everything together. What's the overall growth rate in particularly math and ELA and then the combined? You'll notice across the board, it's green. It's expected. Alright? It's you're you're where you're you're you're projected to be. Now that doesn't mean that that's where you wanna stay, but it's where you're at right now. And now as you look at achieving those and staying consistent, now you wanna start incrementally moving students up or accelerating their growth. And so looking at that, we'll look at your high school. PSAT, SAT, all grades. A little bit of area opportunity, overall for ELA and math.
PSAT and SAT, showed a little bit a little bit lower growth. Your SAT, was was your higher one. They were kind of right as projected. I'm gonna say for for the sake of the students, if there's one that you wanna do better on, it's the SAT. It's the one that really matters. So while there was a little bit of a, lower growth in ELA and math for ninth and tenth grade, your eleventh grade showed consistent or a rebound between sophomore and junior year. So that's a that's a that's a good thing. That's the good part.
The the interesting thing, and and I think you're gonna start seeing it as as these students start to transition from the eighth grade into ninth and tenth grade. That's where your area of opportunity is. It looks like you've got some stronger seventh and eighth grade students coming up in the next couple years. Hopefully, you see those ninth and tenth grade PSET scores continue to go up. That's a really real area of opportunity as well, which which your your high school is looking at, which is what are the subtest areas for PSAT and SAT, and how do you align your curriculum to those. That's always an area of opportunity when looking at those tests.
To kinda get a little deeper into that. Oh, that's it. That's it for that one. And then we'll gotta give you your state report card analysis, which is just kind of a bigger state of the district. So any questions on this one? Whoops. I'm sorry. This one? I went back. I didn't move you back. Hearing none, I'll move on. So what we also do at ECRA is we kind of take the state data, and we were able to make it into, like, the growth percentiles, and we look at where does your growth and where does your proficiency sit relative to the rest
of the state of Michigan. And so when you look at your ELA, math, science, and social studies from both a proficiency and a growth standpoint, you'll notice that in '23, '24, alright, we're we're about to get to '25 data, so you'll get an updated report with this. What is that, a couple months? Isn't that right? Yeah. I think we have. We'll just see. Well, it's the embargoed data. Yeah. We just sent it to you. Yeah. Once we once we get that, we do it for the entire state, meaning what we do is we take the entire state's data, we analyze it, then we figure out, the numbers that you get on the state report card are the numbers, the
district values. Your the state value there that you see is the is the fiftieth percentile, so it's the medium. Alright. Your district's percentile tells you where does your state value where does your percentile sit relative to the rest of the state of Michigan. Okay? And so in this instance, you'll notice that your ELA growth percentile is the highest one of all of them. So meaning, you're you're in about the the twenty fifth percentile over both years. Not really surprised given the emphasis on reading in ELA in the district, that that's
your highest one. Your proficiency, believe it or not, from 23 to 24 did go up in on on on your state assessments. Math proficiency, similar, I'm sorry, math growth percentile, not quite as high, but there that that that the growth data showed that that was an area of opportunity for you, and and you're looking into those standards. Again, science and social studies, they don't have a growth metric there, but they do have the proficiency metrics. So you see where you sit relative to the rest of the state. You'll notice that both in both of those over the last couple of years, relative
to the rest of the state, you both you've gone up in both raw values, but also relative to the rest of the state as well. Okay? And then this last slide here is your student achievement. So that's your your college readiness in all subjects. So this is your what we just saw was your k eight. Now you've got your your high school. So where are you at, relative to the rest of the state? Not quite as high as your k eight, but hopefully with the k eight moving up, hopefully you see those those numbers translate. It takes time, for a district, and a larger district like yourself, and also takes
time when you're having students moving in and out. So that's, that's, those are real things. But you will notice that, your, your, your district values, remain relatively constant across the board. And your percentiles, unfortunately, are probably not what you're looking for, but looking to go up. By the way, if you're trying to do the math year over year, remember those last columns do the math for you. So we don't like you to have to do any of the math for yourself. And And then finally, I just got a couple summary slides based on everything you heard, or a summary slide.
You know, based on everything you saw today, growth growth in all subjects remains relatively constant consistent with previous years. We're recommending, and and your district is well aware of this, and already doing much of this work. Continue to focus on the subtest analysis. Those are those areas within mathematics, reading, science, or social studies. What are the particular areas that your students need, or groups of students need? Continue to focus on those, and then target the interventions for those. And then continue to target resources to the needs of students, particularly in math and reading. Meaning, put the right, you know, put put the students who need the vocabulary support
in the vocabulary resource. That makes sense. You know? So that's that's sort of target the right resources to the needs of the students. Students in K-eight continue to show improvement relative to national benchmarks. That is a really important one. And so, like, as we zoomed out in that one slide, it's important to note that that sometimes you can get bogged down in the minutia of looking at the the little pieces of data. And sometimes it helps to zoom out and say, are we are we moving the needle relative to what we see across across the state or across the country? You are seeing that, so that's the nice thing. Alright? And it takes time to do that.
And then, again, continue focus on growth, particularly with higher mobility students, which we're doing. This will yield increases in proficiency over time. Okay. So our our goal in any given year is to be in the blue section because we want to increase more than expected to eventually make it so that more of our students are getting the benchmark. Is that an adequate assessment? I would say targeting blue is aspirational, for sure. What I would say is your your first if you're setting growth goals, what we
what we recommend is setting trying to hit those positive numbers. Hit those numbers in the green, but with the plus next to them, and then try to get that plus as high as you can until you hit blue. So in other words, we would usually rec rec recommend, like, if you're gonna set an aspirational goal and growth, be realistic. And we would say this to anyone. So this is not unique to Hazel Park. If you're gonna set an aspirational goal and growth based on where you've been, I would say a good growth goal would be, like, positive point one zero, point two
zero, somewhere in that area. It's still in the green growth, but it's showing an an additive effect based on what was done previously. If you hit blue, that's great. It's important when setting growth growth goals or proficiency goals to set them within reason. And remember, the the projections that we're utilizing are your actual students. So we're not kinda like magically pulling them out of thin air. So that's the important thing. So when you set a growth goal, in some respects, it becomes what's it unfortunately, when we project and we're accurate, it becomes harder.
You know, so meaning, you it takes time to implement new, new, new programs and new procedures, as as I'm sure your district administrators can attest to here. And so the idea that you're gonna move aggregate metrics really quickly becomes difficult. So that's why setting realistic goals is important, but getting those into the positive is what I would recommend. Anyone else? No questions? Do you think, John, do you think you can send this to doctor Wilcox so she can distribute it to the board?
Yep. She got it. Perfect. Thank you so much. Yep. Anyone else? No? Well, thank you very much. Alright. Thank you. Great to be up here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Appreciate your time. Alright. Moving on to new business. The first item tonight is, personnel with, miss Kales. So the memo in front of you talks about oops. Sorry about that. The memo in front of you talks about what our FTE movements have been so far this year. I've separated that by building and given you a description of which positions we, didn't
need. They were approved in the spring, but as counts came through, these are positions that were, not necessarily needed. So as we do as a year, we don't hire unless it's there, unless the kids are there. You'll notice there's a plus there for the grant funded position for MTSS that's completely grant funded from the fund that the grant that we just received. And our overall savings right now is about 1,150,000.00. I wanna just tweak that a little bit about positions not needed. Across the board, we increased class size for everyone, and that is how some of
those positions were able to be changed. And so that's important to know. With that comes some stress along the way. And also remember that some of the positions, we already decreased and gave that information to you in the spring. So this is on top of those positions from the spring. So, since you said you we increased class sizes, do you think maybe we can get a schedule of what the class sizes were last year compared to what they are this year by grade? We probably can do that. We will work on getting that to you. Yeah. It would be interesting to see.
Thank you. So this one is twelve. This report is twelve. And I asked the question, and I and I'm not sure. I wanna know, like, is 12 it so far for 2526 school year? That's all that we've done. I mean, that I mean, that's a lot. No. That's not all we've done. If you remember in the spring, we gave you a presentation, and in the budget presentation, it listed positions there that when I returned, that we eliminated more. And so it's that on top of this for the 2526.
So when they How many have we brought in? So so so like the We haven't added positions. We These are rough envelope positions. So this is on top of what you gave us in the spring when I returned inside, Monica's presentation, if you remember, these are all the positions that we said we were like, Stephanie lost a position. We combined, we combined Chuck's role. We also did, there was a reduction in, like, a science teacher.
There was a reduction in other high school teachers as Tammy worked on the schedule right before she left. So there were several changes that took place. A social studies teacher was reduced. Didn't we create a cup couple position not create is not the right word. Approve approve a few positions for, like, paraproes that are one on one? Well, these are just certified positions. Oh, these are just certified certified teaching positions. Okay. That was what I was trying to I gave you the paraprofessionals, and I believe we were down seven. I don't know where we are now. I think we're down six. So from what you guys approved in the spring, we've been moving some around as
well. And so not really needing additional approvals because, like, we had them at this school and we well, we don't need them there, so we moved into a different school. And the proof will be in the pudding when there's a draft budget that's attached to the actual staff that are in place. And I, you know, that when you do this, it doesn't come without consequence. When you roll, you know, two jobs into one, doctor Dolmage finds additional time in the twenty four hours that are there, or we we have a less supervisor. And so doctor Papazian is we're not in the buildings as much as we normally
would be. So there's changes that there's ramifications that happen, with the staffing that we have. But, it is not cutting people's salaries or doing anything along those lines. I mean, every dollar we are looking to count and to be adequate. We are still following all the, agreements with teachers and such. Just we've been really low in the last few years, which is really beneficial. We know low low class size makes a difference. When we say down six parapros, that is six fewer approved paraprofessional positions.
Not that there are I mean, there are there are open jobs for parapros in the schools currently. Correct? Yes. Is there I mean, I don't think we would go into any building where they would say, hey, guys. We're great on parapros. Everything is true. Actually not true. There's a couple of buildings that aren't completely hired out. But yeah. So that is where at as a for instance in Webster, we we pulled two preschool classes. So we didn't need all the paraproes for the preschool classes. Where else did we move? Can we afford to be down 6 Parapros?
I mean, is that we did that strictly per budget, not based on need? Well, where classrooms had less special education classes, then we could reduce, the paraprofessionals. But just to remember, just putting a body somewhere doesn't make a difference. It it takes time for training Yeah. And having the right person in place. So it it takes the whole village to make it happen. Okay. Everything's good. And we, move on to policy. And I I would just say, president Hinton, that this will not be on the agenda. This was strictly informational for the board as requested. So this would not find its way to the next meeting.
Oh, okay. Okay. Policy, any comments? I think another meeting is coming up. Maybe next week. Next week something or two weeks from now is yes. Twenty eighth, I think it is. Yeah. I think so. My only comment for policy is I still sent an email that I've never got a response on about why HR is not involved in these. Well, HR, it's not in their job description to be involved, and these are board policies, not administrator policies. These are policies the board has three jobs to hire superintendent, dual budget, and write
policy. So, you know, it's not in the job description. And you did bring that up before that you did ask and you wrote to the superintendent, not the board president, and the superintendent did answer you. So I did not. I would just like to know that, you know, even the attorney that we're working with that we hired advocates for having administrators that are that deal with the policies that you're working on. That it's it's it's better to work that way. So I would advocate for us at least having the administrators that that the policies
apply to to have us there because we we need to work together. I think that was discussed and that was gonna happen. I just wanted to make sure that that was that we were still on board with that. Yeah. So you're saying if it's if it's an HR policy, HR will come. If it's a Absolutely. Teaching and learning policy Yes. Okay. Yeah. That was sort of the vibe that he gave when finance then. Yes. Got it. Finance with them. It's curriculum. That explains it. Thank you. I'm I'm looking for direction, then because policy, the HR director is responsible for implementing
the policy. It it it is in her tasks in the spreadsheet, and I have invited everybody, I believe, by group to attend those. I believe the next ones are finance and buildings and grounds. In the three. Yes. And, both, Crystal and Monica have been invited to attend this. Yep. See you there. Okay. Next is new business, building some grounds. Yes. And that's Yes. So this is not anything for, approval. This is really kind of bringing to you in the old fashioned buildings and grounds
situation. Last year, I became knowledgeable about some work that had been developed by, Partners in Architect. It was in December when they brought this to my attention, and I met with them. And so, since I've been back, we've remet on this again. And Invest has come forward because there were some promises that were made to them along the way, and they were three promises. One was the develop of a practice soccer field. The drawings that were done were not only a soccer field, but a tennis court and some other and a playscape area.
And since then, I've had conversations with, Invest, and we've looked at the parking lot, next to that. Some of the Park District parking lot is actually on our property. But if we elongated that out, it would be a very wonderful practice field for soccer out there, which their their boys and girls don't have a area to to play as well as it would be something for the community. For everything, it was a 180,000. Obviously, without having a tennis court and such, it would be less. But I just wanna bring this to your attention because this is their first wish
of what was promised to them, by the business department, early on. The second one is a science lab renovation. Their children do not have a lab to work in with gas and to do the experience experiments and such. And so this renovation is a $140,000. This is obviously, we'd have to bid for it. So it may be less, maybe more. But this is their second request. And the third one is a greenhouse installation. They purchased a greenhouse three to four years ago, and, they have been waiting for it to be put up. I did, work with, Greg to have partners in architect go out.
It's not simply just building a greenhouse. There's all kinds of emergency exits and things that would have to be put in because it's for a school, as well as lighting and a pad and such, but that's the third wish. And my hope would be to continue to talk with you more, but I felt it's important that you're aware of these three things and that as we're developing our long range sinking plan sinking fund plan, that we know that, Invest is one of our schools and one of our facilities, and thus, we need to think about, maybe
in the three to five year plan, having at least two of these in there for completion out of the seeking fund. So explain to me. It seems like there's no price for the greenhouse. That would be the easiest one to complete at a low cost, it seems like. I I to me, it I'm sorry. Had it, and it's been purchased for four years ago. So I went back and went to them. The problem is is it's not easy. It's not like just I think it would have been the one that they had, but it's not easy because you have to put a gas line into there. The guy gas line has to be run.
It wants to be in the, interior of the building, which makes safety, fire, exit things. It's in the interior of the building? Yes. It's it's in a courtyard is where they would like it to be put. So it's their third choice. Their first choice would be able to have a field where their kids could practice, when they're outside and enjoy. I would view this as a spring thought, and we would rebid that. And it would be significantly less than what it was to put a tennis court in and to do other grounds. This would be simple. It would be clearing and then putting you know, leveling that out.
I didn't go out and redo prices because I didn't wanna spend extra dollars, but I did send our partners and architect over to look at the greenhouse installation, because I wanted to see if that was the easiest. And it's actually not. It's probably the most difficult. Really? Yes. Because of all the safety features you have to have with it being in a school. So they have this greenhouse they purchased four years ago. It's probably gonna be outdated or not purposeful won't by the time we get to it. Well, I asked them to prioritize their wishes, and this is how they prioritize it
knowing that they had the greenhouse. And it it's, I can't answer that, because I'm not a greenhouse expert. I know how much they change. But, I put it back to them and and said they have a buildings and grounds operator now, and that person took it back to the. And their wish first is to have a place where their kids can play soccer. And my I guess my final thing is that you said that the parking lot is on our property for the city from the Yeah. There's a there's a part of the parking lot that actually when you look at, at whatever time that that happened.
So it's not a huge piece, but it's a piece enough that it'll cause some disruption there as well to to make this feel a little bit uncertain. City aware of this? Not at all yet. We haven't had a conversation about any of this. Because I we just found out in the last two months, this year when Greg, has worked with partners in architecture. We look at this again. What is the curriculum for? I'm trying to make sure what it even says. No. Right. Senator. There's a piece of it. It's not, like, a huge part, but there's a piece of it that would cause disruption if we Okay. So that part that's allegedly touched by. Mhmm. And it will on the freeway.
Okay. So this isn't gonna be coming for any vote? Absolutely not. It's not coming for the vote at this time. It is, simply to make you aware because you haven't been aware of this, as I wasn't aware until December. And I wanted to make sure that I brought this to you because we should begin integrating this into our long range plan. This is really for the person to go out and and discuss it and talk about money and get a a plan, and that's just unethical.
But I put I have I I looked. Okay. We have a three year repair plan, and we don't have a sinking fund balance. And, you know, so, anyway, the three year plan is until March until 2026, and it says they need a roof and they need windows. And the Roosevelt bond was they need HVAC, they needed a new boiler, they need a new furniture, they need a new sign. And I'm like, they wanna for the citizens, this is the citizens' tax money, sinking dollars, and they're going to be like, why is that school getting all this?
So I'm glad it's not up for a vote. I'm glad it's informational so you all can, learn about it because some of those things, we have to maintain our buildings. And we also wanna have, like, the soccer, so kids can get involved. So you have that it's a balance. And so when I read that, I'm like, wait a minute. Well, the beautiful thing about the field is it's something that can be collaborated with the park district on the off hours, which they're also looking for items. And the size of the field would not be a varsity field.
It would be enough so that we could have a couple, you know, young groups playing on that soccer field with everybody. So it's a win win for everybody. I I can't say that it's unethical. I could say that there was movement of forward to have an architect do some drawings that not everybody was aware of, and I needed to bring it to your attention. We we don't have a sinking fund balance because we have to have the audit as was explained today in those questions. And as soon as the audit comes in and that at the November board meeting, we will have some suggested three year plans, which will include the sinking fund. I agree.
And as I discussed with all of you as well in my emails, in my memo, that, as the rotation goes for this, it would be strategic plan, out of the strategic plan. It would be time, next spring again to do a building evaluation every five years. The last one was in 2021. And then from there, looking at the strategic plan and look at the at the building and grounds and the needs of the buildings to potentially go for a bond in 2027 when the tax rate would drop again, because then it would perhaps it would be a bond that we've spent several years working on.
And so, just wanna make sure that I shared that with you again, and I wanted you to be aware of these items, as simply informational so that you know that they're there. So, my only comment is, to me, sinking fund is a saving, savings account for a rainy day. And while these are fabulous things, and I wish we had the money to just do them all right now, I don't know that that's should come out. I'm I'm hoping it can come out of the bond instead, is my thought process because it's a wish list as opposed to a Well, sinking fund is not a
savings. Sinking fund is to update things across your district every year. You get about a million two. So, if we had a big project that we were recommending to all of you, then you might save it for three years. But every year, you want to take some items out of that. That's why that's separate from the bond. This is a this is seeking fund. This is for district improvement along the way and upkeep. And so we'll have a proposal to you guys and give you an opportunity to be able to have some conversations back and forth. We have not even had a moment to do that yet, but we will have
it in place for you in the November meeting. I guess see, to me, I and I'd like so we we spent a $130,000 on a on a soccer field. Bad deal. Soccer's my favorite game. And then the HVAC system goes out that we need to replace. I just wanna make sure we're not cutting ourselves short for Upgrade. That's why, just for example, we did sets of bathrooms every year at the high school, and we made a long range plan. We're gonna do this. We're gonna do this. Those came truly out of the sinking fund.
Right? So we the plan that we would have would say, this is what we're thinking about this year. And I think you have to look at the old three year plans and say, stop. You know, like, we're gonna put those off to the side and we're starting fresh. Right? And here's the items that we have suggestion. And you'll have an opportunity in the Committee of the Whole to look at those kind of things and give us some input of some ideas and thoughts and the documents we have behind that. I also want to you have to remember that it said a 180,000 when there was tennis courts as well. Yes. So it's definitely not going to be that big of amount.
Yes. And I didn't wanna go back and price that because those would cost us dollars. So, we just wanna be kinda clear along that way. Probably significantly less to do that. Alright. Thank you for that information ahead of time. Metal detectors. This is doctor Woot. Oh, no. AED per test. AED per test. So this has been on our agenda since last June as well is to look at updating AEDs to make sure that, one, with the use of Longfellow that we have an AED that's available when items are in, Longfellow, especially with the gym being
used. So we wanna make sure that we have an AED in that area as well for everyone's safety. And then the high school deck, currently, the AED sits outside of the entrance. And in order to get there, you'd either have to go out to the door and around or you would have to jump through the bleachers and down out and then come back and then jump since we don't have an accessible area into the bleachers. And so we're we're recommending that we put a standard AED on the deck of the high school for safety. Then we would take the one that's right outside the door and move it down towards the the athletic office closer to there so that When you say on the
deck, you mean on the pool deck? It will be on the pool deck. Yes. We'll be inside the pool on the deck. And we're using our pool quite a bit. So Yes. And then we would have another portable AED that can be used in sports, but also can go up anytime anyone's going to Camp Hazelwood. So it's a purchase of four AEDs. This would come for, hopeful approval at the next board meeting. The class that we have is fifty eight forty, so it was written as not to exceed 6,000. Small price to pay for someone's life. That's right. I agree with you. I just have a question. It's off topic, not on the agenda and not in finance either.
Sorry. But I saw it on Camp Hazelwood and, you mentioned that there was, the caretaker position. Has that been fulfilled? It's been posted and, our book would be to fill it in the spring. Okay. But it is posted. Thank you for the update. Would the Camp Hazelwood AED stay up there? No. It would not be a good idea. Okay. It would it would be something that you take on those trips. When you oh, they would take on them. Okay. So we would have two portables, one for athletics. We already have one. And so we would have the, yes. We'd have another, portable AED.
And, so one, two yes. So we'll have really three portable AEDs that we could have available, in the main office of the high school. So if anybody goes up to Cat Cason Wood, they would have to come? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Next is, metal detectors. Doctor. Wilcox again. Yes. Thank you. This is also one that we would bring for recommendation, and this would be to add another metal detector to the high school. In order to do this, since we don't have all of our security guards in place, we would have to pay teachers, right, to command the doors, but it'll also
make easier entrance for our students into three different areas into the back, the second entrance to the parking lot and then to the front. And so we could navigate getting children in sooner, more quickly. But, we would have to pay teachers at the curriculum rate of pay until we can get all of our security guards in place, something that we have not been able to be successful with at this point in time, to to do so. Anybody have a question? Do we have an anticipated cost of the teachers? We do not, because they do get, dollars 45 an hour of curriculum rate of
pay, and so would be the amount of time that they have to be up there. Every day? We would take at least two at each entryway, and we have three guards. We do have a SRO that's there. We do have prince three principals that are out there, but sometimes they have to be in the office as well. So we're getting one more metal detector? One more metal detector. So that would be free that we have Yes. For the high school. And we so now in all right now, all the kids enter through one door. Correct? And now we would move the just three separate locations Yes. So they can enter in three so that would probably alleviate a lot of the parking Yes.
That hassle. Okay. The recommendation in the memo was for two metal detectors. Is it one or two? It's one. Okay. Oh, it's a n additional. N additional. And it's not Does it say n? In four books, it says two. Oh, it does say two other it's only one. Okay. I can trust you're only getting one for 23,000. I figured. But I just wanted to make sure. And I and I appreciate your, grace, because I was attempting to take memos and and doing them on my own, without my dear name. So, it's one, and I will make that correction for the board meeting that one
day. Okay. Well, I think the price is probably more important. I just wanted to make sure. Thank you for that correction. Alliance Coalition under the damage. You're on here. I'm gonna open that one up. So this really is I don't have one of my colleagues. So this agreement here is, the agreement for us to partner with the alliance. The alliance, every year, gives us a portion of the funds that we use for the HPCC nasal part community coalition. This is a partnership that we have had since, the coalition's inception, and they not
only support our coalition with funds, but they also support miss Williams and the work that she needs to do. So this is a yearly MOU. We wanted to bring it forward to the board to get this in place so we'll again, we can leverage those funds, and we can take advantage of all the positive, support and, substance use and abuse tools that they bring forward to our, coalition as well as the community. The purpose for bringing this forth also is that the board had concerns about us supporting organizations.
Like, in the past, we did Promise Zone, we did the Junior Vikings, and then also here. And so, we wanted to make sure that, as requested, that this was brought in front of the board. It should be a month ago that that it got sent in an awkward time. So, this is really late, but I let them know that this had to wait until after the October board meeting for approval. So this isn't costing us anything? No. It is directly flow through In N Out. And, with a $125,000 a year that we get from the DFC grant, all everything's
covered. It has never cost us anything. Okay. Well, it just says funding source general fund, so I wasn't sure. Just Well, because it's flowing into our general fund and out again. Would you like me to write that differently? It's really your board packet. So Okay. We're good. I hope that answered my question. Millennium copier, doctor Wilcox. Okay. So you approved in June a copier, contract. And when they delivered the copiers, they delivered us black and whites with scanning capabilities, which is not what we needed to make the transition. And so, we needed to bring forth this agreement that increases the cost with color
copiers. The trade out for this is that we don't have to pay anymore for any ink or that's all included into this cost, and that we will be removing all those printers. They've slowly been removed as people need ink, as we're not purchasing any ink. And, the copiers are working fine. We still have to implement the codes that are going in and the scanning capabilities where when you come up, you'll scan. But that happens to be with some software that they, they didn't get the right level, so we're waiting on that. But, the copiers the colored copiers are in and in place.
Anybody questions? So it's just oh, an additional 15 about $1,500 a month? Yes. Yes. We wanted to make sure that we had that approved. And that's across the board. Right? Not like every building, every half year? No. No. No. No. That's across the board. Okay. That's all the buildings? That's all the buildings. Half years are very important in building. Sure. Yeah. So is the paper. Okay. 35 m literacy. Doctor. Donnor? So we shared, maybe a couple of weeks ago in the board meeting that we were awarded a grant fund with grant dollars in the amount of $288,842.
This allows us to support our elementary buildings in doing some additional training in a, intervention and a program called Work and Building Plan. It is an explicit direct instruction program that builds strong foundational skills. This is not a replacement, certainly on our core, that's our tier one core resource, but this is something teachers teachers can use in addition to that. This includes, as you see in there, training, it includes resources and materials. It also includes consultation and coaching from INSE, which is the organization that provides the
training. So this is, a nice sum of money that can really positively impact students from teachers from preschool all the way up to fifth grade, which ultimately will have a positive impact on our students. So we're bringing the budget forward in the hopes that we can approve this budget and move things forward. And note in there, the budget gets I always say, you know, a little bit of flex with this. You know, we might have a few more teachers that we have to train and spend less on materials, but, essentially, this is what those materials are going to go
for, and we're ready to move that forward, and make that approval next week from the board. The exciting part of this is this is continued work on raising those scores and best practices that are in place. So kudos to our Teaching and Learning department that continues to win these grants these competitive grants for Hazel Park Schools. And this is 100% grant funded? Correct. Mhmm. It's a nice grant. So, I had asked, I'm sure that we have to repurchase materials or digital licenses. Will we be possible to get a grant to cover those in the coming years?
Can we extend our grant to rebuy? Perhaps. I think there you know, if you looked at the new budget, one of the things that the state has definitely prioritized is literacy. That is is a strong, vein through, purchase of materials as well as professional learning for teachers. So while I can't guarantee that there's going to be more grant funding, I certainly think the states want to try to prioritize that. As as doctor Miller Cox and I always say, if there's money out there, we're not leaving it on the table. So while it is sometimes challenging, some work for myself, as well as the business
department, we have a a lot of a lot of meetings out with those, we know it's important for our students, and we're gonna go for anything we can to help our work, and help move things forward. I just knew that we were in that stuff that has to be renewed every year, and that would be something that we'd have to renew every year. And what the only actually, with this, really, the only thing that we would renew every year would be the digital piece. It's a very small cost. Actually, it's I think we currently use this anyways, and I think we spend making
$1,500 a year to renew the digital access. Certainly, over time, as with anything, there might be folks in materials that we would have to replace, but that would not be a significant amount of money. So these aren't necessarily workbooks there? Correct. We actually did not you can purchase workbooks. We chose not to do that because we feel that we have a strong foundation in our core reading program in which we do purchase workbooks. This is really just enhancing our teachers' ability to provide strong instruction. Thank you. That was fabulous. Thank you. Thank you for the hard work of all the grants.
I keep saying we need a grant writer. We've had as everything gets thrown at you guys, and you can't pass up the money. So, thank you. Bid threshold. Missus Papazian. Hello. The memory I have before you is what the state issues every year around this time, highlighting their minimum bid threshold. So the minimum increase roughly 2.7%. It's now at $31,003.21. So this is just informational, nothing that needs to be approved. I just had a quick question on this.
The top half is for ISDs only, and the bottom two are for schools. So the top half doesn't really pertain to us? Correct. Okay. I thought that was true. I just wanted to make sure. Okay. Thank you. We have monthly financial report. You're oh, Crystal. If anybody has questions, I don't have any. I've had spent their most time with it. If I had questions, I'll email them. Can we get, all of the bills as a board for the Allen Law Group and everything else we have paid this year? Can you say that again?
I missed part of it. So I noticed that we had two Allen Law Group payments. I just wanted to see the bills. For just Allen Law Group? Nope. For all of them. So Trude, Clark Hill. Please. Sutton as well? Yes. Is that it? I mean Oh, Miller. I don't think there's any Miller Johnson. Sorry. Kevin Johnson. Another one? Miller Johnson. Thank you. I thought about his name after I said it out loud. He hasn't sent a bill yet? I I couldn't tell you today. If you asked me yesterday, you might have known, but not today. Okay. Okay. Next I have, Open Schools MiStar Extension, the ISD Internet fee with Mr.
Wilkins. But I don't think he's here. I don't think he's here, so I'll take it on. So we have MyStarlight that, we have to renew. And, if you have questions about this specifically, Megan or Stephanie can tell you about that. And then our yearly consortium fee is Internet agreement. And so this is some of the questions that you've had along the way that I've been listening to over the last several months is how come we don't know about that. Well, these are fees that you just have as part of being part of the ISD and and part of the work you have to do. And so we're trying to make sure that we highlight and bring all of these ahead of you for your for your approval, but they are just year to year
costs that that you don't really sign an agreement to. You just do them. So Do we have MyStar Lite just because it still holds data that's not in PowerSchool? Correct. The so there's there's a both hand. For this particular fee, this 4,000, 4,549. Okay. That actually was to extend our access to all the data in my star for six months because we're still pulling data out to put it into, PowerSchool.
Okay. We have two or three years in there, but we have to pull all of our historical data, and it takes time to grab that data. And then because it's a different system, we can't just take information out of mySTAR and push it right into PowerSchool. There has to be a lot of analysis and cleaning up of the data, and then we can report it. So this gives us that period of time. In addition That's how we bill Medicaid. So eventually, we won't have to reach back into mySTAR or just, like, hold the historical data there because it will? With this fee, this just in particular was to have more access.
But on a yearly basis, we do, obviously, as doctor said, we bill Medicaid. Medicaid. We bill Medicaid. So and that's a huge Yeah. How much was it last year? Well, I think around 700,000. Yeah. I remember that. So, there will be some of that. And the hopes are as more school districts have joined PowerSchool, you know, a larger majority in, that they will continue to build their PowerSchool, and maybe they'll make allowances to think through both programs, just not my start when they're looking at all these
items. So we're gonna have to pay the consortium team because we use it for medic in the future? We're just gonna have to keep paying that 10,000 because we use it for something else. Well, the 10,000 is for Internet. That's for Oh, okay. Center. Gotcha. Alright. Oh, it says Okay. Next is, Dan Sobey conversation. This is on here, well, because we know next week we vote on all of these items that we've received. So, I have some things to say. I guess I'll say mine first. The school district has always had a structural, deficit for years and years.
And we had, five, six years of deficit when we hit the 8,000,000. And, we went to Lansing, and we wanted an extension so Oakland Schools could help us. And president Knopf, really pretty much begged them, please, please let Oakland Schools try to help us because back then, they had emergency managers that came in and they took over your school. And, now they have partnership agreements. They don't come in and take you over anymore.
But, however, we were in deficit for ten years and we had, Oakland Schools cost us a lot of money. We had quite a mess in the finance department and we had to pay we had to pay the bills. We had to have the experts in here. And that's how I feel about, Mr. Sovey and his, site assessment and his business. We had, Doctor. Wilcox Head, Terri Les, come from Oakland Schools.
She said we have critical areas that need improvement. And she mentioned over and over about, reconciliation. We have a two and a half page report from her. There's a lot of work to do in our finances according to her. Also, according to mister Sobe. Both people feel that our finance people are very good and very equipped to do this. They have full confidence in in them doing, leading us out while we need help like when we had Oakland Schools.
The audit in 2023 and 2024 both cite that our process was very bad. We did not reconcile our books. The audit process included unavailable revenue in the general fund of approximately $230,000 that we didn't even have. But for two repeated audits, the twenty twenty four also cites that we are not efficient in our our reconciliations. And miss Lutz also says we're not that's, like, major.
And she says it's hard for our department to catch up. And I just think that we need mister Sobeys' services like we need at Oakland Schools. And Oakland Schools wrote our plan, and they took us out of the deficit, and we stuck to what they said. Now I I know we're gonna hear if we have a deficit or not, in the next couple weeks. But we still, according to these two reports, have a tremendous amount of work to catch up on, I I think, from what they're telling us.
So I have every confidence in Monica and Crystal myself also. So I think they do a fine job, and they were given quite a bit of work down there. And, you know, we had Matt Miller here for ten months. He was also helping us. And he he's he's excellent. He he was helping them. He was teaching them. And, we were fortunate to have mister Miller, back here. So, anyways, even after ten months, we have two reports that say we have work.
And we have to do our money. We have the staff to pay. We have kids that need teachers. We have people here that need to get grants and do special ed and a number of great things that they do. So I just am in favor of, you know, hiring him. And he also would do the zero based budgeting. Miss Les told us last week that position based budgeting, they can work hand in hand. Position based budgeting is looking at staff, who's working here, how much they're getting paid,
a breakdown of of that area, and then his 15% would be purchases of, curriculum, purchases of supplies, etcetera. So he would handle the other part that the position based budgeting is not handling. Do we have an estimate on what he's expecting to get paid from all of this? It's a lot more, and we're already asking in a little bit for us to pay overages. I'll say at 25,000. It's a small price to pay. I'm I'm it's not a small price. It is a small price. It's not. Clever.
So I think when he was here, he said it was gonna be about 50,000. Oh, yes. That's what he told us when Give or take down the length of time that it would take to get it done. Yeah. This was so he estimated I'd also like to Go ahead. Sorry. Sorry. I thought you were going on. To also reiterate that, we are five months into doctor Wilcox coming back, and this was part of the plan of assistance that was agreed upon by the board and voted on by the board unanimously.
It was never agreed upon to just be done. So be and then we we did a cap of 25 to our community, and now we're gonna be asking for 50,000 more. Mhmm. For an eighteen month period of time? Sounds reasonable to me. I I don't think it's for eighteen month period of time is $50. I believe that's just for the next session. For the next session. And then he does the next session. I I spoke with Bevin. I'm gonna go ahead and and jump in now. I I think we all agree, and maybe Monica's can speak to this, that Don Sobey has a tremendous amount of bring.
But the first step that was suggested by Terry and we also are recommending is giving us a chance to finish a cycle, to and I placed that all in front of you as to work on the steps that Terry had shared with us to get our position based budgeting in place. You also then out of that 15%, which you asked a dollar amount for that we haven't been able to do, you have to subtract all of the buildings and grounds, the energy, the trash, all those things because you can't really change those and and talk about the supplies that are less. We would like the opportunity to be able to step through this process.
We have negotiations coming up. We have strategic planning coming up. What was suggested by Terry in order to finish, the reconciliations was another position. I was asked to remove that position, but that position is vital to stop us from having to, which is what was happening before, to stop just rolling step to step, which the rest of us are doing, step to step for the next report, the next grant that's due, give them an opportunity to build and to do the budget so that it is position based, and then readdress this, in the June time
frame or July time frame with mister Sobe after the position pieces are put in place. I also suggested that I write milestones, based upon this eighteen month plan to be the goals that we're strategizing for moving forward. It is the decision of the board. I, I believe and I believe that our business department believes the same thing. This is the best way to go about it for us. I believe that we're going to, struggle if we're trying to put zero based budgeting in while they're still trying to do the process and we're not resolving putting a
position in place in order to make sure that we're reconciling our books so that they can focus on the other items that need to be done. It's that that is, I don't know if you Monica, you have to yeah. I just don't wanna interrupt anyone. I very much appreciate what Don or mister Sobe has to bring to us, and, I respect he has a great deal of experience in this. I respectfully would ask, the that we could have additional time consideration before we think about bringing him in just to give us a chance to get on our feet.
And, you know, there were a lot of things that Terry detailed that we need to do, and and we're well aware that we need to do these things. And, truthfully, the account reconciliations are still an issue. Crystal and I are dealing with all of the daily processing and all of the reporting, and that is just one piece that is still falling behind a little. So, you know, with what knowing what we have on our plate going forward, negotiations for all of the groups. You know, we're we are I've already talked to some people, at Open Schools that
have implemented the position based budgeting, so we're trying to move forward on that. We're also trying, and this was an audit, recommendation, to get our Fixed assets, integrated into business plus instead of tracking that on a spreadsheet. I've already initiated that process with Open Schools and talked to Southline who's just gone through this process. You know, there are a lot of and I think Terry touched on this a little bit, but there are a lot of processes that we're trying to tighten up
so that we can have better procedures. Just payroll, accounts payable, grants, and even for the audit, which, you know, account recs are part of that. But there are a lot of, work pieces that we're really focusing on so that we're in a better place. And then, I think we would be better suited at that time, have more time to devote to, what mister Sobey wants to walk us through. I I think just postponing it, would make our time with him more effective and,
give us an opportunity to prepare for that work. I do know that said just a little bit ago, that she wishes she had a grant writer. So if we brought this bookkeeper, I think it would give you guys time to do more of that. So that the bookkeeper came in and did the reconciliations, took some things off your plate. That grant writer that that wants, which would also be great too, but it would give you guys that time to be able to do that as well. And things would be getting done on time. The reconciliations would be getting done on time. So I do think maybe we should go back to looking at that bookkeeper to help you guys out to maybe if if we do push Don Toby off, but
maybe it would bring it a little bit closer to us doing it sooner with getting everything done. I'm prioritizing looking at our processes so that we can have more meaningful data to work with. You know, and that's the thing. Right now, I feel like we're operating. We're drinking from the fire hose. And that's what Don's helping you with, is setting those processes, getting you structure, getting the zero waste budgeting in place. I mean, why learn something and then we're gonna switch it? The board is not getting the information they need to move forward and accurate information.
And listen, I've been on the board for six years, and I've heard, let's push it up. Let's push it up. Let's push it up. To me, six years in, I feel like we're camouflaging the issue. There's definitely an issue with our financials, and I love that you guys are working so collaboratively together to get them straightened out. I think mister Sobey is just the piece to add to that, to get us where we need to be and to get the board the information we require. I don't disagree with that.
I just I think he's more focused on one component of what we need. Still with case. But but he wouldn't and I'm not arguing I'm not Yeah. Argument. Yeah. No. I am But it's really, we're trying to work with Business Plus and see what we can do, you know, more automated so that we're not doing some things more manually. And and that's why I wanted to focus on using our system. And I think that could help you get to that point. And I I, I would hope that we can let each person stop before we
interrupt, but I think the most important thing we need to think about here is Terry Les absolutely recommended that we do not do zero based budgeting until we have position based budgeting in place. I am also recommending that heavily. I believe Monica is in on that. I believe Cheryl, Crystal's there as well. In our experience in doing these things, these steps need to be put in place and they're what we have been asking before to happen. But Matt and Jason, that wasn't their step. They were just strictly rollover. And so it was the recommendation that Terry had to all of us. Let's get this in place first and then go to that step.
It is what I've been communicating to Bev as well. It certainly is a board expectation, but I can tell you that you are going to drive your business department, to put those both things in at one time. It's not possible. And we've heard from Oakland County's, assistant superintendent that shared that with you. You've got to do one, then step into the other. He he did not share that with me. No. She did. Terry did. Terry loves. To all of you last week. Didn't she say that position based budgeting is a tool? It is not a budgeting.
It's not a budget. It's a tool. Zero based budgeting is how you budget, and and a position based budgeting is a tool to help you with that. Isn't that what I heard last week? She Yeah. Sort of. She she did say that position based budgeting was not a method in and of itself, that it was a tool that existed within another budget structure. Correct. She did, however, also say, I mean, like, flat out verbatim that she strongly recommended that Hazel Park not adopt zero based budgeting at this time because it was incredibly
time consuming. That it would cut into processes and procedures that they were still working on, and that it would effectively grind to a halt any of the other things that have been making progress and have been moving forward. And I do I I think Don Sobeys' presentation and Don Sobeys' site assessment report are they are, like, 100% focused strictly on zero based budgeting. I his entire thing is, you know, even back to his engagement letter that they
cannot create, policies, they do not detect errors, they they do not do anything other than make these recommendations. Again, solely focused on zero based budgeting. And I don't I'm really uncomfortable with the amount of money that it would cost to solely work on this one individual thing. Also looking back, I'm I you know, he came and he gave us this presentation. He had a partner that was with him, Rochelle. They spoke really, really highly about the work that he had done in Lance Cruz,
the work that he had done in Charlotte, the work that he had done across the state. I went back and and looked at the business office structure in Lance Cruz and the things that have happened there over the past three to four years, which is sort of where we are right now. And it is it is a community and uproar about their business officials. They have I watched a couple of their board meetings, and they even have someone that comes to a public comment and says specifically that Rochelle and their superintendent had to abandon ship, just as soon as they were coming through.
We also heard that Don Sobey was, highly recommended by MDE, which is where both of those staff went to. Lance Cruz, where Rochelle and Don both sat at that table and told us that they had made significant progress with zero based budgeting, that everything that they had done was solely focused on this. Over the past three years, since 02/2003, they have overspent their budget by $2500000.0.5100000.0 dollars, and $5,300,000. I am you know, his his engagement letter, was one thing.
It gave a dollar value of $245 an hour for him, $125 for $125 per hour for his assistant. He had he had no recommendations that were related to zero based budgeting. In his engagement letter, of his recommendations, most of them were for, headhunting or searching for business office staff, which is not something that he would be doing for us here. His this report that we paid $20,000 for, that we're about to pay an additional
$2,500 for if we have to, is entirely unoriginal. I there are almost no recommendations in some of the things that we really badly need to focus on, which is business office process, revenue generation. You know, we say that he's going to help with grants. There's there's a whole portion in here about grants, and he has the considerations for enhancement are completely blank. And we know from two of our audits in a row that reconciling grant revenue is something that's really important. It's something that was put in the wrong spot.
You know, it's it's one of those things that sort of, like, put us in a catalyst into this position that we're in. This is a lot of money, and my worry is that this is not the guy. We have somebody that is that has dug into our finances that have said zero based budgeting is is not what you need right now. It would she strongly recommended against it. I mean, she she was here. We can go back. We can watch the video. We can, you know, get exactly what she said. If this is something that we're going to do, if we're going to have a consultant come in, if we're going to have them work on it, I still I've
I said this a couple months ago. I still would like to see it now. This needs to be an RFP. This needs to be somebody that comes out. Don Sobey was a recommendation from, Tim Gardner at Truin. And the rest of his recommendations have not necessarily led us in a very positive direction that has been cost effective or successful. I don't if if this is something that we're going to do, if it is something that is part of a plan of assistance that we did unanimous we unanimously
voted to have a plan of assistance. We have not created one. One has not been written. We have not approved that plan as a board. If this is something that we are going to agree on, this needs to be an RFP. This needs to be something that we put out. We need to have people come in and and explain this to us in a much more engaging and a much more holistic format other than, you know, here's some books, here are some cut and pasted PowerPoint presentations, and the future lives and dies with zero based budgeting.
I I just I think it's too much money for another gamble. Okay. Miss Les, I would have to go back in, and I'll have to watch the video, because she said zero based budgeting and position based budgeting work hand in hand and can be done at the same time. There was a plan of assistance. Everybody was sent the plan of assistance. Everybody gave input to the plan of assistance. Mister Becker came to my house to give input. I have your notes that you put in my mailbox on the plan of assistance. Everybody received the plan of assistance for a second time about two or three weeks
ago. I sent it to all of you. So you all have had the plan of assistance. The plan of assistance was voted on to in response as an assistance plan, it's not it's and anyways, it's an assistance plan. You all did see it. You all did get a copy. You all did give input to it. But it's never been voted on to get approved. Miss Les cannot come here where mister Sobe can come here. Rochelle can come here. He has a sterling reputation. He has tons and tons of places that he's worked.
He's worked for the MS what is it, m MSBO for years doing presentations on zero based budgeting. It's like his his expertise area. We have a whole book here of what he would like to do. This certainly doesn't say zero based budgeting. There's all kinds of things in here he wants to do. And to to say he's just doing one thing is totally inappropriate or totally wrong. It's not just one thing. But I'd like to see the plan of assistance that's been approved at the board
meeting. I gave it to you in the office, and you rejected it three times of accepting the plan of assistance. This is the board that gives direction to the superintendent. You work for us, we don't work for you. And you keep refusing to take the assistance if this board voted seven zero to give you. But we never approved you. A plan of assistance must be done. Hold on. Hold on. Be I I just wanna make sure that we're not equating that that we're not equating the hiring of Don Sobe or his consulting firm specifically to, like, we're we're
debating two separate things. We're we're debating whether or not a plan of assistance was voted on. We're debating whether or not to pay an additional $55,000 for the next phase of consulting from Don Sobeys' consulting firm. We I don't think it's a good idea to mesh those necessarily in a conversation because, one, we're we're talking about we we can't just speak about discipline in an open session. Second, a plan of assistance. We did give feedback.
We did not vote on it as a whole. And I think we would really perhaps mister Patterson can chime in and stop us before we get ourselves into a bind again. I don't think we want to tie this to that plan because we are we are essentially admitting to making a decision in a closed session that we were unable to make a decision in. If we're going to hire him, it needs to be independent of any type of plan or discipline. Otherwise, we're we're sledding very fast down a very icy slope.
Should focus on mister Sobe hiring up. What's that? We should focus on whether or not you wanna bring aboard mister Sobe at this point. We're discussing his services. Okay. So we we're gonna end discussion and vote on it next. Yes. We want you to. Okay. Alright. 39 n. Wait. Did I miss something? '39 n budget. Where's this calendar? That calendar was the plan that administration puts together to move forward the finances and the school district. I just don't see it on this agenda. It's underneath Don Sobe because it is the plan that the administration has put together
with the recommendations of what next steps we believe need to be done. I love your agenda because I've been following it. And I I because it has the words, I see '39 n budget. Is that next after this? It is. Yes. Okay. '39 n budget, and it has doctor Dolmage on the paperwork, but not on here. So do you wanna speak to it? Absolutely. So thirty five m and thirty five m going in and, As noted, the, state
of Michigan is gonna lock dollars in their literacy. The second one thirty five n was a competitive grant. That was the one that the district was awarded. We were 39 out of a 115 applications that we were awarded. This grant really primarily focuses on the junior high. And in the $187,500, the vast portion of it is going to go to adding a third MTSS teacher. As you know, the junior high transition to a teaming model this year, and one of the priorities was to make sure that there was an MTSS teacher that was
dedicated to each team. So there's a sixth grade dedicated MTSS teacher, there's a seventh grade, and we're done in eighth grade. In addition to that, you'll see a small portion of dollars for training as well. So training, being first half member, and then the final base is that we know that some of our students would benefit from more opportunities for before and after school intensive interventions, and we do have some dollars allocated to paying our teachers to implement
those. So that is the whole of the 35 n budget targeted for the junior high. So it it has MTSS teacher a 120,000. Who who is the staff before and after school? Is that, like, a para person? Or No. Those would be teachers. Those are teachers. Those are teachers. Mhmm. And they would be paid the hourly curriculum rate to do the before and after school tutoring. And the goal would be, again, having some of our Awesome. Potentially, some of our training intervention is doing that so we can positively impact our
students. Thank you. And this also has some of that Orton Gillingham, so that they would be able to scaffold on that k five that we just found. I do just have one clarification about the memo, to be sure that it's not an emergency. Does this need to be expended by 09/30/2026? Like, this isn't one of those where we have to hurry up and spend it. Right? Okay. Thank you for noticing that. I will leave that. Well, I know before we had some that we had to, like, spend out really great, so I wanted to make sure we weren't gonna put you at a loss if we waited. Thank you. I appreciate that. Okay. P card approval. So, we are coming to the board with a request to consider allowing our CTE
teachers, and our CTE teachers are doing woodworking, the welding courses. I think probably as we know, when we think about those things in the business courses, they really need a lot of access to materials and resources. And sometimes, they don't necessarily know ahead what they're going to need. So we are imposing that those individuals have a pay card with a limit of $2,500 per month. And when I say $2,500, it doesn't mean that they would spend $2,500, but they would have that ability. We know, for example, our Wellman teacher for years, he's actually had to go to
another company to have this company make some pieces that he uses because he can't get them in a really quick, fluent manner. Sometimes, you know, they're bugging and they're building things. Sometimes they just they're building something and they need a new tool. So what we hope to do is get them the ability to be very responsive to what's happening in those courses. Now, of course, just like with anyone that would have a p card, they would have to be training. There would be oversight to ensure that that was aligned with the budgeted dollars that we have for CTE.
Not all of it necessarily would be covered with CTE funds, but the vast majority would be. And they would have to come up with some sort of a a proposed budget for each course because we have four courses that we would be using those funds for. We just really think this is really important. I know that in other districts, and I'll just speak from my experience. My son works in Rochester. He is a STEM teacher, and he too sometimes needs things in a very quick responsive manner that would take too long to go through the regular process.
So it would be very helpful, and we're just asking the board to consider that these individuals would have that ability to have a p card, know that there would be oversight around not only utilizing it, but also what they were spending the funds on. And I just wanna mention this was a request from them because they were having to spend their own dollars and then oftentimes lose tax because not all the places takes the tax exempt in that manner that he had to do it quickly versus and then wait for the receipts and wait for the reimbursement on their own dollars, which should never have to happen.
So this is a way to they have pieces and parts they have to get in order for the kids to move the projects forward. Okay. A quick question. So, four classes, metals, wood? Just metals and wood. So, it's not four it is there two because it says, specifically for the district, four career and technical education teach teachers. Metals are high school and junior high. There's our Great teachers. Yeah. There's admin. Yeah. Eton, and then I do believe that this is a score sometimes I don't think he needs one. I don't think he needs. Yeah. Oh, so it's gonna be three.
Three. Okay. I guess my question is, what is the what is their budget on a yearly basis for spending for material? I do not have that exactly in terms of how much they usually spend. I certainly believe he told me 4 to 5,000 a year is what he spends in metals. Then I think if he if the budget's that much, why are we giving him a $2,500 limit? So Oh, that would be what he spends in a year. But when you buy metals, you have to buy a larger amount at that point in time. And so and or he has to just go get some small pieces to to
fit in something. It is, we we need to help move our classes forward. We have a full array of metals and woodshop, and ordering things take time and being able to go and get it as quickly. And this way, it takes them from off of having to do this themselves. Do the junior high so is it $4,000 for wood, $4,000 for metal at the high school, another 4,000 and 4,000 at the junior high? No. How does that I I can't answer that. We can attempt to have them bring back what the amount is. But when I asked, how much it cost, he said to me about 4 to
5,000 a year is what he spends on metal and things that he has to go out and run through his own credit cards. It costs money to run those. We certainly can try to do a pull. Again, because we don't have those positions in place in the budgeting process, I don't know if that you can easily pull them out in a way which is what we're working towards. He's being reimbursed when he spends this on his own credit card. When he turns it in? Okay. But it takes time. Yeah. We don't like teachers to do that, and we've tried to stop that as well, so we can help. Well, I also even the thought that there's a teacher spending $4,000 out of their
own pocket. Okay. All all set. So, now, to the other business, Regular meeting is October 20 at 06:00 and the audit is October 30 at 05:30. And somebody asked me if we we should talk about combining. Do you wanna just do October 30 regular meeting with the audit or do you wanna have two meetings? My problem with the thirtieth is I have something at well, that day we do our trick or treats. That is the only day that we can do the audit. And the and so that's the only day they can come unless they come in
November, and then your audit would be late. Do you want to move the twentieth to the thirtieth and have one meeting? And how's everybody else feel? No. I would rather leave our regular meeting the same thing because At least you can come to one. Yep. My question is gonna be how long if we put them together. How long is she gonna I'd rather have two two RVs and one for RVs personally, but It doesn't usually take that long, but it just depends on the audit presentation, that goes forward. Will we have the audit before that to review? I don't know when you'll have the audit, at this point in time.
You may get it at the table. We don't have it yet. Okay. Alright. Then we'll leave it at two meetings. I think that's pretty agreed upon. November 3 at 05:30 is a workshop student system of support and data presentation. And then we have portrait of a graduate. This is beautiful. Yeah. I wanna draw your attention to the second page. There were changes that were made and that are are not uploaded. We met with, some parents on Thursday night that are really excited to do strategic planning with us and, join in. And it wasn't as large of a group that we had.
We've, over a year, we've lost quite a few of our parents that were in there with us, but we they made some changes to to just make it a little more concise, and to stop some duplication of this. From this, we would then request the ability to go out for an RFP that would be approved at the October meeting. And in November, companies would come in and, do an RFP for you presentation, overview the board would feel more comfortable with doing a strategic plan. And there the piece of that RFP, which I've written in the next one for
you, is to make sure that we can incorporate all of these ideas into our strategic plan that would hopefully be done by May. You said by the what meeting? That November, they would come and present. And the next memo is, RFP that if it's if it's approved on the twentieth, then we would send it out to get people at the Committee of the Whole for November to approve a company, hopefully, in November. What are our choices of companies for the strategic plan? In the memo, I wrote, some examples of companies, I believe. Okay. In the first paragraph that says adapted.
What was that? I said my printer's stacked. Okay. It says with the pending approval of the portrait of a learner, our next step will be to convene a diverse group of stakeholders to develop a strategic plan for Hazel Park Schools. Okay. Please find attached proposed request for proposals that will be shared with several organizations, including AASA, the Michigan Leadership Institute, the Metro Bureau, the Michigan Association of School Board, and our previous facilitators, the ones that did the original strategic plan. We would send out this request for RFP that I've written unless you have some suggestions to change it, and they would determine if they wanna come and present to
us. Some may not. As I spoke with, MASB, they only allow their people to do two at one time and not everybody does strategic plans. So depending on the organization, you may find that you can't start until later in the spring or something along those lines to get the facilitator that you want. They would work to match a facilitator that would meet the needs. And so these are the, organizations that I'm aware of that do it. AASA has the Portrait of a Learner organization that's up and underneath them there.
And so we would send this out to all of them and see what they bring back and we would determine I'd be with Bev and determine if she wants to see all of them or just a few. Are you gonna send these out, like, right away? We would need approval at the direct support meeting. So so this is for approval on the this is for discussion and any changes. And then next Monday, we would do it, and it should be pretty easy to go right out after that because I believe I have it all written unless somebody sees some errors, which could be. Perfect. I do wanna say thank you real quick to the two parents that did show up for the forageable error. Doctor Wilcox did say it was small, but it was it was mighty.
We were a good group that day. And I do just wanna say thank you to Chartwells for the amazing dinner because those dove shells were awesome. Yes. They were. There's not a specific amount of days that this needs to be out for RFP, is it? No. Okay. But we would, set for them to come back at the committee of the whole to do those presentations. I just wanted to make sure that we weren't going to kneecap ourselves and then have to wait. Like, there's not a it doesn't need to be out for, like, a minimum of seven days. No. You're not you're not gonna get anybody to come until January or February at the earliest at this point in time as I've kind of explained along the way.
You go for RFP, then they get a chance to respond. If all of them can't respond in that time frame, you may say, hey. Do you wanna do the presentation in December? But you we would push to have that at the, Committee of the Whole in November so that we could get it approved at the November board meeting and then, start getting dates and and the strategies put in place. They're all gonna kinda look the same. They're gonna get stakeholders together. They're gonna hear what, you guys say, what teachers say, and have groups, and it'll happen over a period of time just like the portrait of the learner. Perfect. Okay. My agenda's a little different.
I don't isn't the invoice? I have, like, six things, and you said after number four. We have retreat December date. Yeah. Retreat. Retreat December, and then is it after there? Yes. Okay. Yes. So the the retreat, we cannot do a retreat in November. There's just not enough dates. And so Jamie, was not here to put out in December, and the question is do you wanna push your retreat to December, time frame, or do you wanna push it to January? Doing a Saturday? It would be a Saturday. Well, I personally like to have it as soon as possible because Mary pushed it
from October. Unfortunately, you guys didn't have dates in October that we worked. And then November's not working? November's not working because it's Thanksgiving, and missus Hinton's taking a well deserved time break. And, and so it pushes it off into December. So it'd be sixth, which is the dance competition. The thirteenth is the dance competition. It's the sixth of our Which is the dance competition? Sixteenth is dance, December 6. December 13 is holiday basket. And December 20 has nothing. I don't know. That's just close to Christmas. December 20 is, like, by definition, not a good date.
This is what we talk about putting everything in. There's it's a lot. So if we move to January, then January 10, is open. January 17, it's in the I United, Oaks has a open school day, so that could be okay. But the nineteenth is, Martin Luther King Day, so you might take a long weekend that people might not wanna do. Then there's the twenty fourth, that's fine, as well as January 31. So January seems a little bit more open, and you could do a January and then extend into February.
You could move that one to March. So you do the two of them? I'm open to any date from December or January. I mean, if our two best choices are December 20 or January 10, I You're gonna go to would just as soon push the Saturday before Christmas is not a super long holiday weekend. It's just it's not gonna I can't imagine any of us are gonna wanna give up that whole January 10. Is that what that's what I'm hearing. I've not cross checked January 10 because I didn't, until we're talking out loud, think that we'd move to January. But, I will just make sure there's no school board conference that weekend.
I don't think that there is. Like the tentative date. K. So we'll do a tentative January 10, and if you can check your can calendars, and it looks like it could be January 10 or January 24. Could be the second date if somebody has something big on the tenth. Is that fair? I think so. Great. That was a challenge. It was. But we're not there for two months. Okay. Before we go into full session, I'd like to make a motion to, extend the school and municipal advisory services from 25,000 to, $27,852 which is an additional $2,852 and
for this invoice to be paid ASAP. I just a a comment. Support. Go ahead. Support. Bills are paid on Thursdays, and I don't know if they're paid this week, Crystal. Yes. So it would go out Thursday. Perfect. That's as soon as possible. Is that right here in full? Yeah. I have a question because on the bottom it says amount due is $69.69. Yeah. But you're saying $28.50 Yeah. His original invoice was $20,883. Oh, I see. I see. Okay. $20,883 So this so part of this is covered by what we already approved?
Correct. Gotcha. Okay. Okay. Roll call. Is this it? Real quick. Like, this is Go. Oh, sorry. It's good. I'm late thinking. It's good, James. Fortress? Yes. The LaPron Boys? Yes. Becker? Yes. Rithee? Yes. Bean? I I know that we have to I know that this is an invoice that is sitting in front of us, but I you know, last week, we just told students at the high school that they needed to fundraise for their own drama trip because we didn't wanna spend money on something prior to our audit.
It's not. And it is I mean, it's go for it. I it doesn't it doesn't sit well with me. I know, but I can I'm allowed to explain why I'm voting. And I he knew how much money he had. No. Kenton? Yes. K. The motion carries. Need a motion to go recess into closed session. Motion to recess into closed session, eight h to consider material exempt from discussion or disclosure by state or federal statute. Attorney client privilege and eight c. Is this I mean, does it cover both of them or are we having two
sessions? No. We'll do it all in one. Okay. It would be. And eight c for strategy and negotiation sessions connected with the negotiation of a collective bargaining agreement if either negotiating party requests a close hearing. Support. Alright. Motion for closed session by April. Support by Debbie. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Meeting is to order. Motion to return to open session. Support. K. Motion by A. Z. Support by Monica. They call it to order. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Alright. Motion carries. We're up to public comment, and I have look at your little Gary Harrison.
We can't hear you, Gary. I really just thought you I wanna apologize to James Patterson. Last time I came here, I really didn't know what I was talking about. I watched stuff. And after doing my homework, I apologize and I hope you can forgive me for that. I'm here because, I, I applied for the wrestling coaching job. I talked to Amy several times. I talked to AD. I, talked to Christine Herron. And then I called, HR girl.
I apologized to her because she told me she'd have nothing to do with it. So the high school job was open, and Pat Wright was still the coach. It was he was the coach for a couple weeks after. Like, I'm stepping down. I'm stepping down. I'm stepping down. Okay. I'm I have no problem with Pat Wright. Not at all. I'm not here to cause problems, no friction. Hazel Park is my home. I love Hazel Park. I'm here. So it kept on going. Pat's like your it's your job your job. I call, AD, and AD is like, we'll we'll be doing something next week.
Christy here puts him on in the back. I have it on I tape record it. Every conversation I have with Amy, everybody else, I didn't say nothing about it. If if you guys wanna have a meeting, use school board, believe me. Vice will really show up because they're Amy is like, I don't even like wrestling. Did you know my dad was a, state champion in West Virginia? Oh, it's gonna be a down year. We put Pat right at the junior high job because, you you know, he didn't feel comfortable being at the high school job and, you know, he was getting a
lot of backlash. Listen. I talked to a former AD for twenty years. He said that is unacceptable. Unacceptable. One day, he gets he steps down. The next day, he gets hired at the junior high job. There's no high school coach. Am I wrong here? I I I just listen. There's there's one person in the background dictating everything. And then I get told, oh, you can't touch the kids. I'm or girls. I'm not wrestling with no girls, but you gotta show moves on the kids. No coach in the state of Michigan can coach a successful program without showing on
kids. I'm not here to break them down or no. If you know me listen. Wrestling is my life. I'm from Hazel Park. I'm a Hazel Park guy. My dad's from here. My dad has cancer. He he was all willing to come to every wrestling meet. You know? It it's it's so upsetting to me. And then Amy says, Jerry, stop calling people because I called HR girls. How did this even happen? How did someone get hired in front of me? This is crazy. I wanted to coach a junior high program, folks. Just so you know, I can build the program.
I'm coaching the youth program. I wanted to build the high school program. Gary, your time is up. You waited for three minutes. That's what happened. So Alright. Thank you. Kaelin? Why is the superintendent speaking on finance issues? Shouldn't she be on discipline for finances? That is why she was placed on leave, correct? Speaking on that, what is her discipline? Where is this information? Why is she even speaking on this matter? Why is she not signing the plan? Is there some issues that someone is afraid might come about? Ladies, make sure you're doing your job and doing it diligently.
A few select board members need to stop trying to cover for your superintendent. Do your job. Isn't that the slogan for football? How fitting. Stop kissing somebody's backside. This is absolutely ridiculous. Board, you have to see the corruption. Fire the warden. Thank you. Don McGinnis. Don McGinnis, +1 337. Please grant it. You guys have to be getting tired of this, hearing it over and over from multiple people, from parents, from children, from former coaches, MHSA referees, not just for the
sport. I mean, if this is what she's doing for the sport, I can't imagine as a leader for the school. This is why you guys are getting people moving their kids out of the district. Me is one of them, who talked so highly of Hazel Park for so many years, who still lives here, who still helps out Hazel Park. You guys need to see the bigger picture. You guys are seeing not seeing the corruption. You guys are going all off and saying, well, they said they did it right. I mean, when is enough?
You guys got you guys are hurting the program. You guys are hurting the school district. You guys are not willing you guys are all up there as electric elected people to help the district. Well, help the district. You got people you had you guys just said you had two families, two two parents helping out at an event. Well, stop pushing families out. There's, there's a limit here guys. You guys have to do better. These kids are hurting. You guys, they're sending emails out with lies, you guys are doing investigations that you
have no proof on, with foils, with no informations, you guys, I mean, what are you guys doing? What are you guys are allowing to do? And what they did, not only to me, this is another whole separate case to Gary over here. Gary has more qualifications than most wrestlers anywhere. And you guys are not only pushing him away, and he sees it too now. He did a full three sixty in a month. When is enough enough? When are you guys gonna step up? It's time to grow a pair.
It's time to do it. And that's why I will be running for school board next to all you guys to fix this corruption because you guys ain't doing it. Take care of your employee. Okay. Board member and administrator administration comments. Can we ask just, I know mister Plimus isn't here because there are sports going on, but can we ask clarifying questions just so it's clear? We can't find questions too. There the diversity high school wrestling position is still open. Correct? Yes. So there are no candidates that have applied have been turned down yet?
I have no idea. Do you know? No. Mister is, was on a vacation day today. I at the last conversation, he was looking at, what he was gonna do on Friday. I can't answer at this point in time. He's on vacation today. Okay. So we but we can reasonably assume that anyone that has applied is still in consideration for the position. I don't believe. Have you received a letter, Christie? You did? Yeah. She's received a letter. Okay. I have not. I don't they don't come to me. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I just want to thank everyone, for mainly all of last week.
Homecoming, is a lot to put on. Miss Brodsky and the student council did an amazing job with decorations, and the DJ was amazing, and the kids looked beautiful. Also, thank you to all the parents, siblings, and friends for the cars. I know the kids love that. I actually heard kids from the other schools. And that's so cool. The float and the parents and students that helped with that. And Kevin didn't clutch officer Piper to hook it up to his truck and do it around for us because they did not have that situated. So thank you to officer Piper for that.
And I do wanna say, I know that the yes note was hard with, paying the extra over the 25,000 we did. But I also knew that we have to pay our bills. So that was hard. But I would like to talk more on them so it'll be going further. Anybody else? Yes. I do. I have to say that, I'm seriously concerned with statements were that were made that said that I refused to sign paperwork. I the paperwork was given to me. I asked what we were doing with it and if it had been approved by the board, and it was said that it was approved by the board.
And then the next meeting, Bev came in, and I handed it I had it on my agenda again to talk as well. You are not required as an administrator to ever sign anything, nor was it appropriate today for you guys to mention anything about discipline. That's a violation of me personally. I did not give you permission to do that in public session, and it is a violation of my rights as your one employee. I have not been given a discipline that's been approved by the board, nor have I had an opportunity to discuss anything in closed session about that, which is my right. And that is what Bev and I spoke about.
That if that's what the board wanted to do, I'm more than happy, but we needed to have a conversation. My attorney needed to be involved in this. I'm not sure how any of you would feel that if people shared things about your personnel or evaluation when you're not in an evaluation in a public session, how How many of you would appreciate that? I had this conversation last night with the person that stopped by my home concerned about this whole situation as well. This is not how you move forward in a positive manner. Your administration has made a recommendation on how to move forward. I've also made a recommendation that I'd be happy to develop goals collaboratively with the
board, sign off on them, and put them in my file. Not sure that that's been discussed with everyone as well. I work really hard here as well as it does my team. And as you continue to berate us in a public session, that is not how to get us to move forward collaboratively holding your hand. I think we all deserve much more respect than what I was given today and the comments that were made regarding me personally and my personnel evaluation. Thank you. That's I just had a request, to check out the trophies for the wrestling Oh,
can I answer that? I've been told that there's a bunch of trophies in the room where Athletic Goosiers used to well, we're back storying now, but we were out and I heard there's a lot of trophies in there, so maybe they're in there. I would love to answer to that. So it was a decision that I was not again involved in in the athletic department to split up the cases. I don't know if that started last year while I was gone. So you will see that everybody has less less trophies. But if you go in there and look, there is because I checked it this weekend when I was at the dance. There's baseball that's sharing one and softball.
There's wrestling's that's sharing one. I don't know how else they shared it. But but each group swimming has one now. Dance has one now. And so they have split them up. And so they took the oldest trophies down, and they left the newest ones. And so, that was done with the athletic department and is a decision at the building level and the athletic departments, on how to move forward with that. So then I can talk to Chuck Plantis about this? No. I will find out why the trophies are back there. Are are is the is the boosters or is the board asking me to remove
them out of that room? Is that what you're asking about? No. I'm just asking if they're stored in there. Where did they go to check, are they in there? Oh, I thought you said they were in the Boosters Room. I don't know whose room it is. It was cleared out to be Chris Rattee's room, and he never went in there. And we were sent to a a garage to store our stuff, And then we went back in there while you were not here. And now the twenty twenty six parents have things in there for all their decorating
and wonderful things that they're doing. And I heard there was a bunch of trophies in there. So I just would like a phone call or something to check what are those trophies. Or are there even trophies in there? Maybe I can we can check that out for you, about what's in there. I'm not aware of what's being stored. But, again, the question was about the showcases. The showcases have been downsized for everybody to share then. So Drama has one, Band has one as well. As far as where the trophies are, mister Richardson told me they were being stored
in the storage units in the basement. But I certainly I Oh, yeah. It looks like I I'm sorry. Are you asking if if that's the boosters area now? Because I did believe you voted for an area, and I don't know what was decided on with George. So I'm I'm I thought she was just asking where the trophies are. That's Greg told me they're in the basement, but I have not physically seen them myself or talked to Chuck about that yet. So I will just ask mister Plentes what is in that room, or I'll go and see for myself what is in that room.
And if the trophies are in there, and if they are not in there, it's a simple question. Can you call and say, are there trophies in that room? It doesn't matter if it's a booster's room or a classroom or a storage closet. I just wanna know if there's trophies in there. And I have to say, I worked at the high school for fifteen years. I don't know who's doing showcases, but I think the Phycote showcase is is awful that those girls all the history is gone when people come back in there They're
they're they were a vikat and half of I mean, three quarters of that trophy case is empty. I think it's people I I just went to rural high school and they had trophies from 1992 in their in their big showcases. I think that what's happened in those showcases, I think it's wrong. I used to be in charge of having to clean those showcases and take every single solitary trophy out of there. I just wanna know if they're in that room. So, I'm I'm sorry.
You talked about boosters, and so I thought you were asking about that room. We will, number one, find out what the building procedure that George and Chuck has done with the with the showcases. And number two, find out where the showcases are. That would be a building based plan. We wouldn't tell somebody else how to decorate their boards or what have you. Understand people's concern, but it really is a building decision with George and with Chuck. And I believe some of that started with Tammy before I left. But I will get a written plan in my weekly update about what their plan is for those trustees.
I I agree that it's their decision. I think as a citizen, it's my right or my opinion to say that I think that it's wrong to remove those things. And I would tell Tammy and I would tell George to their face. I think that it's wrong to remove those things. So and I understand it's up to them. I get it. I get it. I think it's fortunate for Royal to have bigger showcases as well. I mean, ours are not ginormous by any means. But to say the dance one is awful, I think it's a little harsh.
I mean, I get where you're coming from. People do wanna see things like when our reunion came in. I understand that. But I do also think those same people like to see what's going on now. Our students are in there now. They like to see what's going on now. So if things that were older are now gone, I understand some people's frustrations, but you also have to consider our students now, and they wanna see themselves showcased as well. Yeah. Anybody else? I like to, just add that Hoover has their trunk or treat on this Thursday. And I, was confronted by a walker, and they inquired about the stairs for the
pool. They gave us our communities community group a a couple years ago, gave us money, and those stairs have not been purchased yet. And they were just requiring inquiring when those were gonna be I think, we would have to look back if they get every call, that, it we found that we could not do what they were asking for in that pool area in order to keep it working out. But, I can certainly address that again. But they gave a thousand dollars to purchasing those stairs, and it's not as easy
just to push something in and pull it back out again. Was it a thousand or was it more? No. It was a thousand. I know. I tried to go back in the minutes and I know exactly. And it was a few years ago. But Jason answered that in a meeting for you guys before he left, but I can certainly get that either. Yeah. He did. And and it's, it's not as easy. They're very, heavy, and so you wouldn't be able to move those in and out when you have a swim program going on. Can we just get an update or something? I'd have to hire somebody to come in and determine if something else can be put in there because that would not be any of our expertise.
You Couldn't have possibly asked a coach if there was something? I don't know that he is, I certainly can ask him. I don't know that he is qualified to be what would be accessible and appropriate in the pool. Okay. Cool. Just give us an update in mid in your weekend minutes. Yeah. I will. Yeah. I'll look into it. Thank you. Maybe the following week. Maybe not this week. Yep. You're on. I understand. And motion to adjourn? Motion to adjourn. Second. All in favor. All in favor.