--------- Call this meeting to order. Welcome everyone. We had a work session prior to this and we went straight into this meeting. So I appreciate you giving us a little bit bit of grace and starting four minutes late. Um thank you everyone for attending this evening. The
first item of business is the approval of the agenda. I'll entertain a motion. I want to make a motion to table the board manual until next week pending changes that need to be made to reflect recent legislative updates.
So I'm hearing you you'd like to amend the agenda um to table item number 12. Yes. Okay. Do I have a second?
that is until next until se September meeting. Okay, I'll second. I'm going to make sure you got that. Um that's so we're going to uh his motion was to table item number 12 to bring
back up for the September meeting. Yeah, we have a second from Jill. Um, so, uh, we now need to approve the agenda with the amendment. Do I have a motion?
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yes. Any discussion? Go ahead. Yes. I have a question. Um, would we be able to have a work session, an extra
meeting sometime between Now September, we'll be able to discuss this in a little bit more detail. What the ideas? Yeah, I think that we uh possibly are going to need to do another meeting at
the end of August. Um yeah, potentially. So yes, because we possibly discuss this or discuss the board manual. Is that what you're asking? Yes.
Okay. So, now we need to vote on the amendment. So, yes. Or can we do an I? All All in favor? Okay. Let's do that way. All in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay.
Okay, the motion carries. Now we're going to entertain a motion to approve the agenda. I move to approve the agenda as amended. Second. Any discussion?
All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Um, first item, uh, I guess it's the second item is the request of district citizens or employees to speak this
evening. We do have a, uh, request this evening. Board policy C1 140P addresses concerns by public board of education meeting and states that a total of 30 minutes are allocated for public comment. Each individual or set of parents are allotted five minutes to
make remarks. We ask that individuals give their names, home address prior to their statement. Comments or questions are not to be addressed by individuals on the dis. If you would like to address the board of education regarding student matter, personnel matters or potential legal matters, the issue can only be
heard in closed session. Comments are only to be made related to directly to the agenda. The next item for business is the approval of the consent agenda. I'll entertain a motion. Second, Dr. Grant.
All right. On the consent agenda, we have bills totaling 8,376,56328 as printed. This is compared this is up compared to last year. Um we were last year at this time we were sitting at 7,798,924.93. Um so this year we are finishing up
construction projects and we've replaced doors at Chrysler Stadium. So, a multitude of those items as well as um ordering different items, new furniture coming in and um so that's kind of where we are with that.
Any discussion? Okay. All in favor say I. I. Those opposed say nay. The motion carries. Next item is the um superintendent report. All right, Grant. Thank you again. Um I have to say this
time of year is my most favorite time of year. I have benchmarks, we have leadership retreat, we have new teacher academy, we have all the teachers returning and then we have convocation and those are all within a span of maybe two and a half weeks. And so we have all
of that going on and um uh teachers reported yesterday for their workday and this year we have 119 new hires to the district and compared to last year we were sitting at about 144. So quite a difference there and um today we are
sitting at 14,262 students versus that's K12 that does not in include prek. So I need to make sure that that's in there. So that would be up a little bit with preK because that enrollment is occurring as well. But last year at this time um for K through
12 we were at 14,681. So we're down just a little bit, but those enrollments are still coming in and that will change just a bit. So really excited. It's a great time of year. Very excited about complication. And yeah, that's my report.
I um I should have asked you this earlier. How many open positions do we still have in the district? So, we have you're going to test my knowledge. We have one, I believe, open position still and Dr. Robinson's in the back. We have one open position at Independence Academy for social studies. Um, but I do
believe that there were an applicant. Those were the interview was happening or they reaching out today for that. And then we do have a few sped positions left and we are working with the staffing agency on that. Um, and from what I recall last year, we're kind of
in the same situation with that. And when you when you say sped, you mean at IIA or at various district one. Great. Thank you for that clarification. Any other discussion? Okay, we'll move on to new business. Um the first item of new business is the
approval of the 2025 2026 professional development plan. entertain a motion. I'll move to approve that. Second. All right. Um, we have the approval of the professional development plan for
the 2526 school year. This is something that is required annually by the board of education and I would like to turn it over to Dr. Boight as her office handles that. All right. Well, good evening. As Dr. Grant said it's been really really busy the last several weeks out of my office
and so we're excited to bring to you the plan for the 2526 school year. Um this plan has several layers aligning our building's school improvement plans to the district comprehensive school improvement plan and it's also aligned to Senate Bill 681 and the MSEP
standards. Hopefully I can do this without dropping all of the papers. The district's prof professional development committee is composed of one representative from each building, one grade level administrator from each educational level. This committee meets
monthly to review, evaluate, and strategically plan professional development initiatives across the district. The committee's overarching goal is to ensure that all staff within the ISD engage in a high quality professional development that is collaborative, job embedded, and focus
on continuous improvement of student learning outcomes. The committee members work closely with the representative building leader teams to design and implement professional learning experiences that also align with both the district's comprehensive school
improvement plan and their individual building improvement plans. The district's professional development is intentionally aligned with and guided by the goals and priorities outlined in the CSIP. In addition, the district professional development committee
evaluates the effectiveness of those professional learning using the national learning forward standards for professional learning. Ongoing assessments are conducted to measure the impact of those professional development on teacher effectiveness and our student achievement. These evaluations ensure
that professional learning remains purposeful, highquality, and resultsdriven. The district's professional development framework is intentionally designed to support all staff of multiple levels with particular emphasis on both new and existing employees. We have our
induction program for our new educators, which we just completed last week. This induction provides structured and comprehensive training experiences for all new hired teachers. This initiative reflects the district's commitment to continuous professional growth and is directly aligned with the action steps
outlined in the high quality staff focus area of our comprehensive school improvement plan. And then the ongoing professional development for all staff. This is to ensure that continued growth of both our new and returning staff. The district offers multiple professional
development days during the school year. These days feature a diverse array of learning experiences including cross district grade level collaboration building based team activities and content specific professional development funds are
allocated through the primary channel through three primary channels. We have district level funds. These funds are supported district-wide initiatives and training programs. We have building level allocations. Each building receives funding aligned with its specific professional development plan
and then these funds are used to support initiatives that reflect the unique goals and priorities of each individual building. And then we have the departmental funds. These are designated funds to support the ongoing learning and development of our specialized departments such um which are commonly
referred to as our electives or specials. The professional development handbook provides a structured framework for prof professional learning ensuring that sessions are strategically designed to support district and building goals. It
details when sessions will be offered, the method for the delivery of those sessions and how they will be financially supported. Any questions you have on the professional development plan? No question. Oh, go ahead. Sorry. Um, I
was looking at the special project funding guidelines. Is that Are you moving on to that or is that No. Should I ask now? Yeah, go ahead. Uhuh. Um, I just noticed that um that does not cover meals or transportation. So, what a special
project used for? Do you have some examples? So special projects um could be used to um pay for registration. Um it could be used to pay for hotel, but it wouldn't be the actual travel or meal part of it. So a lot of times
what'll happen is a building will cover that piece of it and then they'll ask for district additional funds because maybe they don't have enough building funds to cover the whole expense. And so it's usually a lot of times it's the registration because registration can be pretty hefty, right? I just wanted to make sure they could
find other avenues for Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. Okay. All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed say nay. The motion carries. Next item is the approval of the
curriculum plans. Uh, Denise, I heard with a Denise, did you I'm sorry, you did not respond. She did not respond. And then because we're sharing a screen,
yes. I'm sorry. I voted yes. I thought you asked the question. Okay. Oh, okay. Yes. Okay. And then um I'm going to see if I can change the view.
Okay. Next item is the approval of the 2025 2026 curriculum plan. Entertain a motion. So moved. Right. All right. So, each year, teachers,
instructional coaches, administrators, and building level coaches collaborate in a structural four-step process to evaluate, update, refine the district's curriculum. This process ensures that instructional content remains relevant, rigorous, and responsible, and excuse
me, is rigorous for students needs. The steps are are as follows. We assess current reality. We identify the areas of need. We have curriculum revision and then we provide professional development and implementation support. All proposed curriculum updates are
directly aligned with the priorities outlined in the district's CSIP. Specifically, they support the areas of focus in aligning the state and national standards and the implementation of researchbased instructional practices. Each year, curriculum writing teams make
targeted revisions based on teacher feedback gathered throughout the school year and during dedicated curriculum writing sessions. These revisions focus on three key areas. Pacing adjustments. So, the revisions to pacing are made in response to updated academic calendar
and instructional needs. The scope and sequence revisions adjust, excuse me, adjustments may include combining related topics, reordering units between semesters to support prerequisite learning, or refining the logistical progression of instruction to enhance
student understanding. And then the assessment modifications, unit assessments are typically revised to reflect changes in that scope and sequence and to address areas of need identified throughout the data analysis process. In our elementary curriculum updates at
the um through ELA, our kindergarten updated their mentor text and the responding comprehensive checklist aligned to the UFly pacing. First grade updated their mentor text and corresponding reading comprehension checklist to incorporate science and
social studies within those contents. Third grade embedded the DESIE MO leap blocks, the Missouri learning engagement and preparation blocks in the reading curriculum as well as the Desi Tesllets that are aligned to reading and writing for the state assessments. Fourth grade
assessment questions changed based on historical data, performance level descriptors, and teacher feedback. And in fifth grade, they embedded the DESIE, MOAP, and ELA tests. A Tesla is a practice assessment provided by Desi that mirrors the format and rigor of the
actual assessment. They are only available in ELA and math and they are meant to help students and teachers familiarize themselves with the types of questions asked on the state assessment and the and the rigor of those questions. And this was something new this past year that DESIE um put out as
a pilot for school districts to use. And so they were very successful with our staff and they really appreciated the the tesllets and the direction that Desessie went with those. A the Molite blocks are resources that support the classroom instruction and can be used in
part or whole and are woven into our current curriculum. They're aligned to Missouri learning standards and performance level descriptors and the materials focus on foundational skill learning progression as well as the spiraling of content. In math, our third grade embedded the
MOIP um as well. And then in fourth and fifth grade, MA in the math, they provided math formative quick checks aligned to those performance level descriptors and the grade level standards for elementary and science. For math and
fifth, for fourth and fifth grade, they also incorporated the Moly block. And then in fifth grade, they incorporated the Tesllets that split the science. And then they also split science unit assessments away from the reading. So they're now a separate assessment. In social studies, our second and third
grade embedded the MOT leap um learning blocks as well. At the secondary level, as part of our ongoing commitment to improve instruction and student learning outcomes, they have implemented a series of strategic updates across both middle
and the high school levels for ELA for all content areas that all the unit assessments were updated, the pacing guides, and a focus on tier 2 and tier three academic vocabulary. Additionally, the integration of Newella articles and text into the unit
enhancements literacy developed by providing students with highinterest standardized aligned reading materials that support comprehension and content engagement. And if you remember back to I believe it was January um we you all approved the new resource of the EL um
Newella and so we're really excited to be able to use that across the board for middle school in um we included the weekly comprehension checklist guide that will help to align reading and writing of the mentor text and the use of the testlets and the writing prompts.
At the high school level, curriculum teams focused on strengthening writing instruction through the incorporation of the MOIP writing uh resources and they incorporated particular priority standards to have reviewed and updated to align with the state expectations. In
math, all courses updated their unit assessments. They included the Desi Tesllets and they added the spiral math resource to algebra 2 to support the reoccurrence of topics and the standards over time. In science, all courses updated unit
assessments. Eighth grade added a constructed response question to the unit assessments and moved the genetics unit from beginning of the semester to the end to allow more time on an ecology and natural selection which shows up on the eighth grade state assessment and to
support the students in that area. Physical science was a new course added to the program of studies in 2526. This course covers both basic chemistry and the physics content. And this course was um created and developed by teachers
this summer. All elective courses have updated their pacing guides to reflect the new academic school year. Adjustments were made to semester overviews as needed. During the summer of 2425, our high school Spanish teachers um also dedicated some time to aligning
standards and expectations with MCC dual credit. The work that was built upon the efforts initiated from the previous summer. And then the final two courses um also will be aligned this year with MCC. Additionally, the foreign cultures
course was reimagined as an introductory world language course encompassing French, Spanish, and German. This newly revised curriculum offers students the opportunity to explore the cultural, linguistic, and geographic influences of each of those languages, providing a
broader foundation for future language study. And that's for our middle school students. So they have an ex opportunity to be exposed to all three before they make that decision on which one they may want to move forward with. And then our elementary LMS updated their quarterly lessons to reflect STEM activities for
each text and added new text to quarters one and three for students who are not getting so that they don't get the same books every single year. Any questions that you have over curriculum updates or changes? I do just want to add this is no easy task. Dr.
Bro, writeight and her team do a phenomenal job, but also kudos to the teachers that give their time to do this because that's a lot of hard work. So, I think that that needs to be recognized. Yeah, absolutely. Any other discussion? The foreign cultures class that you said
was middle school. Yes. Is that um seventh and eth? Yes. Okay. Yeah. I see you. Um, any other discussion? All those in favor say I. I.
I. I. Those opposed say nay. The motion carries. Next item is the approval of the membership of the following cooperatives. A. Oh.
Approval of the 2020 2025 2026 assessment plan. One more miss. Sorry. I mean I had it here. You're good. It's here. I just picked it up and moved it on. All right. So the district's assessment
plan is designed to support high quality instruction and student achievement through a variety of key objectives. differentiation with instruction, student ownership of learning in a culture of achievement, real-time feedback, and alignment with the district and building goals. The differentiated instruction assessments
provide teachers with actionable data to tailor their instruction based upon individual student needs and ensure all learners are appropriately challenged and supported. It promotes student ownership of learning. The assessment plan empowers students to monitor their own progress and take an active role in
their learning journey, fostering readiness for college and career. And then the foster it fosters a culture of achievement so that regular and purposeful assessment practice help to cultivate a learning environment where academic growth and high expectations
are the norm for all. It also provides that real-time feedback and for our teachers with that ongoing formative assessment, it allows them to check for understanding throughout the instruction rather than waiting till the end of a unit. And then it ensures alignment with district and building
goals. The assessment data is used to evaluate the effectiveness of instruction and to confirm that the curriculum aligns remains aligned to the district's CEP and each building's school improvement plan, their goals, and the state standards.
The 2526 school year marks our second year of implementation with the STAR assessment platform. STAR is a nationally norm screening tool that offers a comprehensive view of student performance in both reading and in math. It provides valuable data at the individual grade level and building
level supporting instructional planning and progress monitoring and ensures compliance with Senate Bill 681. In addition, the district utilizes a DNA platform to administer end of unitit assessments in the core content areas. These assessments serve as one measure
of student learning, helping to evaluate mastery of of specific topics and standards covered within a particular unit. Together, these two platforms play a crucial role in informing the instruction, guiding inter interventions, and supporting datadriven decisions for our teachers.
Our STAR early reading and math assessments. These are given to our K1 students. They will be given these assessments during our designated testing window. The STAR screener and curriculum based measures will be administered to all K5 students
as outlined in Senate Bill 681 and the dyslexia legislation as well as STAR math three times a year. Students in grades 610 will be administered the star reading and star math screeners three times a year in the fall, winter, and the spring. And students will be
administered the assessments during the district testing window. Grade level and department core content in the um unit common assessments. These assessments align to the grade level and department units and are administered at the conclusion of the unit of a study.
The the ISD administers several assessments annually as required by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. These assessments are designed to monitor student progress, evaluate academic performance, and ensure compliance with state and
federal guidelines. WEDA access is for our EL students. The access assessment is administered annually to students in kindergarten through 12th grade who have been identified as English language learners. This assessment measures students progress in acquiring academic
English and evaluates their proficiency across the four language domains, listening, speaking, reading, and writing. In the ISD, the access assessment is typically administered during the months of January and February. The MAP or Missouri assessment program
or for our upper grades are EOCC assessments. Grade level assessment goes to students in grades 3 through eight. They participate in ELA, mathematics, and for our fifth graders, and for our eighth graders in science.
Our endocourse assessments are administered to our high school students enrolled in algebra 1, algebra 2, biology, English 2, and government. Any questions that you would have over
our assessment platform? The star reading, is that something that they do on the assessment? Do they do that on the computer or with a teacher? Yes. Yeah. No, they do that on a computer. Yeah. And it's a normed test and it's um we give it in three different windows. And so, in fact,
they'll start that August 25th is when our window opens. Okay. Any other discussion? All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries.
Okay. Item number four, approval of the membership of the following cooperatives. AA by Board, Education Plus, Kansas City Suburban Joint Purchasing Cooperative, NPGV,
Omnia Partners, Pep PM, Sourcewell, and TIPSUSA. Alexa motion. So moved. Second.
All right. I am going to turn this over to Dr. Stout. Thank you, Dr. Graham. Uh as a cost savings measure for the purchase of supplies, furniture, and equipment. Administration recommends the approval of the memberships and the and I've got written down the following cooperatives, but since uh our president has outlined
those, uh I'll go as presented. Thank you. Um so, thank you. The savings comes by being in a large group with other school districts and businesses and thus enhancing the purchasing empower with many items including furniture, equipment and supplies. And as a matter of fact, I think our next action item will take advantage of one of these
coins. Happy to answer any questions. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Item number five is the approval to
accept and sign proposal for a chiller replacement at Independence Academy. The IIA Sorry. Second. There we go. Ready to roll. There you go. All right.
The IIA Chiller, Independence Academy till Chiller runs off of R22 Freon. This is costing us thousands of dollars annually because a gallon of R22 is approximately $1,500 and I think in visiting with Mr. Ree, we spent about 20,000 over the last two years on this
unit. Uh the new carrier model is more efficient and does not use the R22 PON anymore. The new PON is significantly cheaper and better for the environment. This is the same unit we put in at Non Truman and Chrisman. Uh this chiller was
installed in 1996 and the plan is to install it over the winter months since it's going to take 12 to 15 weeks for it to arrive. We would ask that the board of education approved to accept and sign the proposal to replace the existing chiller at IIA from Libert Mechanical under the NCPA
Omnia cooperative contract for a total price of $461,596 and a couple other considerations and I greatly appreciate Greg working with Dr. boat ride. But, um, we're going to make sure we stay away from the spring testing window. That's important. And we
get better rates by ordering in the fall. So, we're going to take advantage of that as well. Did you say 400? 461,000. Yes. I pay. Okay. Sorry. I just had one question. It says
sales tax NOT is included. So is sales tax not is included or is it include what is NOT? Is it an acronym? Yeah, it should not. So So sales tax is not included. So they just transpose those two. Okay.
Do we have any idea how much I mean is it 8% or whatever it is? Yeah. I'm speculating that but I don't. Yeah. What's the life expectancy of this new chiller? I paid 20 years.
The initial 30. Yeah. Plus $20,000 in R22. Okay. It is. Okay. All those in favor say I. I.
I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Next item of business is the approval to let bids for the storage facility at the field at George Caleb Bingham Middle
School. I'll make that a motion. I'll second. Dr. Stout again. Thank you. Bingham and Pioneer do not have ample storage space for all of their extracurricular activities. The small shed between the two buildings has
to come down once we remove the underground system. When this occurs, they will have no storage at all. So, the proposed storage facility will allow both schools more room for storing their equipment and also provide a small press box for the turf field allin-one. This will be located on the west side of the
current football field. We would ask that the board of education approved letting bids for this storage facility as proposed. So, kind of a win-win. and they kind of had that makeshift if you're familiar press box over there and unit. So this will look a lot nicer and
serve as storage and the press box. Great. Is the goal to have it completed by next fall or Yeah, we can. We should be able to do that this year. Yes. March. March. March.
Okay. All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. The motion carries. Next item is the approval to let bids for partial roof replacement at Glendel Elementary School. Yeah. Make a motion.
Okay. Can I make that motion? Second. Dr. portions of the roof we're looking to replace are the upper and lower central north south entry northeast and southeast roofs. So those of you that are familiar with our schools there's
lots of little areas and different pitches. So those are the focus areas. They were installed in 2002 and the work ended in 2010. We're asking for approval for the partial replacement
discussion. That was a lot of broo. What is left? I know. Uh Mr. McGee, what's left? Two two of those. All of those. Okay. Okay. All those in favor say I.
I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Next item is the approval to increase breakfast priced for adults. Second.
Dr. Stout again. Good. Yes. Our nutrition services department has completed the desk mandated pay lunch 26 school year and based on this information that's been gathered there
are no student necessary. So that's the good news. However, we must raise our breakfast school price by 15. So we're asking this evening that the board price. Do you have any idea how many adult
breakfast we sell? At this I can look up and let you know. I'd have to get into our software system to look that up. It's nothing to stress about. I just was like curious. I mean, it's obviously some some reason
significant enough to be I mean I mean I've seen the breakfast and I still think they're getting a good deal. Absolutely. Yeah. So, it's not. All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries.
Next item is the approval of the district tuition rate for the 2025 2026 school year. We'll enterain a motion. So moved. Second. All right. This is done on an annual basis for each school year. And for the
2526 school year, the recommended tuition rate is $14,193.86. Compared to last year, we were at $13,1118. This is due just to overall increase in expenses for the district for a difference of just over $1,100.
Discussion. All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Item number 10 is the approval of the resolution to Re read ad readopt the board of
education readdopt the board of education ethics policies G 265P G270P and G275P so moved second Dr.
All right. Thank you. This is required to be approved by the board every two years and documentation of the approval submitted to the Missouri Ethics Commission. These policies address disclosures of potential board member and employee conflicts of interest in transactions in excess of $500 per
transaction for the Independent School District. There are no changes to these policies since the last time that they were adopted. Discussion. All those in favor say I. I. Those oppos say nay. Motion carries.
Next item is the approval to schedule the tax levy rate hearing. I make that motion. Second. All right. It's that time of year again when we need to set our tax rate hearing. This must be done prior to
October one of each year. The administration is recommending the hearing to be set on September 9th, 2025 at 5:45 p.m. prior to the regularly scheduled board meeting. This is also required by law.
Discussion. All those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed. Those opposed say nay. Motion carries. Last item is the approval of the selection of superintendent search firm.
entertain a motion. I move that we um select or because we're not having discussion. We're just actually moving for or we're just making the approval right now and then I guess we'll discuss, right? We're going to
we're going to do a vote after we make the Motion to discuss it. Okay. I move that we discuss it in the approval of selection of superintendent search firm. Second. I don't think Okay. So, now we're going to discuss.
There we go. So, in our work session, we talked about how we would um just do a roll call vote for um the search firm that we would choose. Um so, we'll go ahead and do that now. And so do you want to just call our name
and then we will say which firm that we would want to do and then Dr. out. We'll tally those. MSBA, MJ, MSBA, MSBA, McFerson, and Jacobson.
McFersonson and no McFersonson and Jacobson. Okay. Um MSBA MSBA has it by the majority rule and so uh I will entertain a motion to approve MSBA as our
superintendent search firm. I make the motion to approve MSBA as our search firm. Second. All those in favor say do does anybody want to discuss? I think that
the other way. I thought she was discussing um if we do go in fact with MSBA, my biggest concern is the community engagement piece and so I'm going to urge the board to ensure that that is a full transparent and open engagement process with all of our
stakeholders. I agree with that. Same. I agree. Likewise, uh the language thing, I only really heard the emphasis with Mac and Jake. Mac and Jake uh emphasize the importance of diverse language translators and all that fun stuff. So whatever resources we can
leverage from MSBA which I believe they do have those resources um that we would just really emphasize that on the forefront as well. And I would emphasize more than just a survey like I would really liked meeting in person options and things like that.
So obviously a survey is great for those who can't be in person. So I I just like the multiaceted approach. Yeah. Okay. Okay. All those in favor say I. I. I. I. Those.
I. Those opposed say nay. The motion carries. I will entertain a motion to adjourn to close session. I move to close to I move to adjourn to close session
pursuant to Missouri state statute for legal matters 610.021 one real estate 610.0212 um oh sorry legal matters real estate and personnel issues 610.0213 and then also students 610.0 0216
second. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. We are adjourned. Part: 2
Are you ready for us? We did it. Um, we're going to go ahead and call this special board of education meeting to order. Um, we'll begin with the approval of the agenda. I move to approve the agenda.
I'll second. Um, all those in favor say I. I. I. Those opposed say nay. Is there any Well, I guess I should have asked if there was any discussion about the agenda
and then you're gonna Okay, we're trying to get our act together here. Um so, we're going to start with new business tonight and that is the presentations um of the superintendent search firms.
Um Lance, do you want to speak into this for for us? Okay. Okay. Thank you, President Dixon. Uh good evening board members. um audience uh this evening. We're very pleased. We have two finalist search firms. Uh the first one is McFersonen and Jacobson or
M&J or Mac and Jake and and we have two representatives that are here in person, Dr. Joel and Dr. Buck. And I think uh I'll turn it over to Dr. Joel at this time and he can introduce I think he has two other colleagues that are going to join us via Zoom or whatever Todd has set up. So, we're going to ask everyone
to use their microphones tonight so that our um board members that are online can hear us. Um does that help you guys when we talk into the microphone? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr.
Style. Appreciate it. Um my name is Steve Joel. I'm a recovering superintendent in my fourth year of recovery. I uh 37 years as a superintendent, last 12 in Lincoln, Nebraska. I've been with McFersonson Jacobson for the last 25 years and I'm the Midwest director for the for the
company. So, um we uh you'll see in in a couple of minutes we've got a pretty good footprint in this this part of the country with ease. Um let me uh introduce then Dr. Buck. Yes, my David Buck. I'm your next door neighbor at Lee Summit School District. It's my 30th year in education, 24 years
in administration uh and 11 years as a superintendent. And I know Mac and Jake from the other end of this. uh they're the ones that did the search and Lee Summit six years ago when I was hired. So, I know the process very well and I'm very excited to be here to help share about it and uh maybe we can help you as well. Well, we're looking forward to uh
assisting you in what is arguably the most important function of a board and that is to identify and work with the next superintendent. Uh there's a lot at stake. We know that we've done about more than a thousand searches. Dr. Judy Sclarstein is the third member of our
team. She's based out of St. Louis and she led the lease summit search that brought in Dr. Buck and she's going to be working with us. So we put together the eight team of consultants with McFersonen Jacobson and we're excited to uh to present to you. Um you have a packet in front of you that is
comprehensive in nature. We're not going to go over that. Um I appreciate Dr. Stout providing some uh questions and we're going to cover those very very quickly in the PowerPoint and then we want to leave some time at the end. Uh, we know we only have 30 minutes, so we want to leave some time at the end for you to ask any questions that you might
have. Um, so about us, you know, we we're about kids. We're we're I' I've been involved in about 70 searches in the last 15 or 20 years, and I can tell you it's magic when a board and a superintendent and a community and a staff come together around this most
important uh job that you have. But our mission is to make sure that it's a successful search and that your students and your staff and again your parents are the beneficiaries. Um we're we're a wellestablished national firm. We've got
130 consultants. We're a national firm which means that we do searches in just about all the states. I keep waiting for Hawaii to call. They haven't. Um but that be the only state I think that we haven't done a search in. So we've got a pretty good footprint around the country. We customize every search based
on what you need. Um, we are your arm to candidates, but we're also your arm to your community and to your staff. Um, we believe in authentic in engagement with stakeholders. At the end of the day, one of the most important things that can happen through a superintendent search
is that you come together as a unit around the most important function that you have, but also your community does too. And so we'll talk very briefly um the important of that and then track record of successful placement. So um
you know it's no secret it's there there just aren't you don't list it and they come anymore. Uh we have to be recruiters and then we have to work after the fact with superintendents and boards to make sure success is uh preeminent. There's our there's our map. We've been all over the country. It's
been sort of fun to watch our model evolve. We started on a napkin in a couple of small districts in Kansas and Nebraska and you know since then we've really done a lot of searches and very very proud of the work. There's our our uh we've introduced ourselves. Um here's the difference. We think we believe and
we hear this and I think you'll hear Dr. Buck say this. We are trusted as consultants and because we're former superintendents and HR directors and in some cases board members, we develop authentic relationships not only with you but with candidates. They trust us.
We're honest. We're transparent. We don't play games. We don't have a stable. What we do is we make sure that we set up a process that's designed for them to uh to meet what it is. bugle. If you look at our packet, you'll see that
sustainability of leadership is our hallmark. We have a very very high percentage of our superintendent that stayed 5 years, a really high percentage that stayed 10 or more. And because of our model and how hard we work, not only during the search, but after the search,
our superintendent really, I mean, they stay. And and we know this and I say this to every board that I'm working with and I'll say it to you. Superintendents have to be on the job 5 years. If they're not on the job 5 years, it's very very difficult to move the needle. So we built our model around
that five-year tenure. Now it doesn't always work out that way for uh various reasons, but we know that if they stay five years, they're there. Uh we talked about the high degree of stakeholder involvement. Stakeholders will on your on will work on your behalf. they will
appreciate being involved in this process. And again, Dr. Buck and myself, you want to speak to that? It's so I can tell you going through the process, I've had 12 people work for me uh that gone to become a superintendent and none of them went through a Mac and Jake process where they knew what not only what the board was looking for, but what the
community wanted. I can tell you at least some I did. There was many, many, many engagements that helped create that leadership profile with the board of education. And then during the interview process, I can tell you that there was multiple rooms that I had community members or parents in rooms during the interview process. So I knew because you
got to remember the interview, it's a two-way interview. You're going to be interviewing candidates for the next superintendent of Independent School District, but they're also interviewing you to see if this is a place to be. And I can tell you that was a wonderful thing. Even my spouse was involved in our process. You can do that as well where she was part of a dinner with the
board of education because it is a family decision. Uh it's you know when I came my my wife and I and our family who were coming right uh when we go to the you know summit waves pool and Lee Summit you know my wife's identity part of it is hey you're you're Dr. Buck's wife right um so that's an important
piece too that you involve people so we'll tailor do it however you want but I can tell you as a former candidate and went through the Mac and Jake process I really appreciate it I got a full view of what the district was from afar. Thank you Dr. B. So, we're transparent. Um, there are no secrets. There are no,
you know, I met no games. We have to be confidential with regard to candidate attraction and and then ultimately vetting, but at the end of the day, we'll keep you updated on what's happening with the search. Um, some of you may have some names of some people in Missouri. Certainly, Dr. Buck is
going to know and Dr. Sclar Stein are going to know a lot about the Missouri candidate pool. Um, but not necessarily, right? That you, your next person is going to be Missouri. If you bring us in, you're going to get national coverage in a pretty significant way. We
work only for you. We don't work for candidates. And I want that to I have to emphasize that there is no pulling somebody from a search we did three years ago and say we've got another opportunity. Um, we don't do that. So for us, every search stands on its own
merits and everyone is unique. And that's the fun part of it for us as consultants is that we don't really know exactly what we're going to end up with because that's where the work has to be. Um, extensive educational partnerships. We're very connected in the state of Missouri. I've spoken a couple of
different times. I don't, you know, I'm I'm a nobody in Missouri compared to Dr. Buck and Dr. Claire Stein, but I can tell you um you know we we are well connected in all the states with associations and with a lot of the superintendents that we know and a lot of that's through our national connections and then we stand on the
strength of our references. So hopefully you've been checking on our references. A couple years ago I did gardener Edertton Kansas. Um that superintendent still uh doing a great job there and um other searches in the area as well. All right, so we have five phases. I'm just going to gloss over these. Um sorry
about that. So phase one, we come back, we meet with you, you then help us identify what it is that you're seeking and through that we'll begin to learn the culture of your district. Um we'll also then um and
something that we've started to do and this would be we want to talk to you about this through our first meeting is uh we're having board say to us now go find out what the community thinks and the staff thinks and bring us that data first before we so that you can analyze
it if you have an interest in that that seems to be working in some other districts. But in phase one we're going to set up the calendar. We're going to ask you, you know, what do what do you need for us to intend to be successful? We want to develop a profile that when we make a phone call or somebody calls
us, we us, we can say independence is an opportunity that you really need to pursue. And we think with your size and location and I'm learning more and more about all the great things happening in the Kansas City area. Um, we think that this will be a very attractive spot. Um,
so phase two is we meet with those stakeholder groups. Now, we do it a couple of different ways. We like to do one-on- ones with each one of the members of the board. Um, we like to do it in preliminarily as soon as we're hired just to find out, you know, what are you thinking in terms of the work
and the people. And then we want to connect with your admin team, your teachers, your certified staff, your non-certified staff, uh, your community. And we never forget students. We feel like students are very, very important part of this. And honestly, um, those
are the meetings that we like to, uh, we look forward to. Um, so we we get that, we bring you that information. It's sort of like a needs assessment, if you will, of what does the community think today with regard to the independent school district and u certainly it's about the
search, too. But you'll get some very, very viable information, sort of a report card. And again, we don't we don't smoo that over. We want to be honest with you because it's really about hiring a superintendent and going forward as opposed to looking backward.
So whatever is in the past is in the past because now it's the dawn of a new era. So that's uh and then phase three. This is every consulting firm has to get this right. That's the referencing, that's the vetting, that's making sure that candidates are who they say they
are. We don't ever want to bring anybody to you that we haven't fully vetted. And I can just tell you, we do a preliminary interview with every viable applicant and the last question we ask them, are there any are there any skeletons in your closet? Because we know this on the night that we come to present candidates
to you, you're going to start googling them. And if you find something that we didn't find, that's embarrassing. Unfortunately, it doesn't happen. That's phase four. We then phase three. Phase four is really we bring the candidates to you. It's set up the interview
process. We handle all of the applications. We handle all of the communication. We like to keep names confidential until such time that we have to produce them publicly. And then um we ask the finalists to produce a
video so that you can actually see who they are and you can put a face with with a resume. Um and by the way, résumés all look great today. People are having them professionally done. It's really what's underneath the resume that matters the most. And so from that,
we'll work you through a process on who you're most interested in bringing in for a formal interview. And then we'll help you establish uh that interview process. Phase five. Uh so that gets you to superintendent, right? You make that selection. One of your questions was
what about service after the fact? Well, this is the one that quite frankly I introduced to McFerson Jacobson when I was a superintendent because we need to be with you and that superintendent for an entire year after they come. And so
one of the things that we build into our bid is a planning retreat with you and the new superintendent 30 40 days after they begin to really identify firstear performance objectives. What are the measurables? a lot of them's going to
flow off of that profile, but even more importantly, some team building so that you and the new superintendent can get to know each other and begin to craft that working relationship. We did the exact same thing at Lee Summit when they hired me uh through the Mac and Jake process. And not only did we do um what
are our goals, we also made commitments and and how we were going to work together and and so big deal for Lee Summit at that time um was hey, what do we do when we disagree? Well, that's part of our commitments is, hey, we need every voice to be heard, but then once we make a decision, we're all behind it.
Eight of us, the seven board members and superintendent. It doesn't matter it might have be 43 or 70. Once we have consensus, we're committed to that consensus. And so that was one of the things that came out of our commitment in the first literally the first month and it was invaluable to me and to the
school board members as we try to figure out how to navigate those worlds because you got to remember that we were entering COVID right then, right? CO started February. I got hired in January. CO started February and I started July in the middle of COVID. So there was a lot of opinions in 2020. Um so we needed to have that piece. Macka
Jake Judy Clarstein who is on here we were hoping she could talk and unfortunately couldn't get that part to work. Um she led that piece with Lee Southern School District and it was invaluable. So that get you a superintendent and a year's worth of support with that
superintendent. And then as um Dr. Buck and Dr. Clare Stein and myself have found we often get invited back into districts to continue to do that every year. We're big promoters of that annual board retreat with the superintendent to look at last year's goals and achievements and then set new goals and
achievements because that way when when we know when you know what the targets are every year, superintendents have a tendency to stay which by the way I will tell you money matters not as much as a lot of people think. What really matters is the board. What really matters is the
community. What matters is the work. Good superintendents, quality superintendents don't want to come someplace and mark time. They want to come to a district where they can make a difference. And they can only make a difference if they have a great working relationship with you. And so that
really is how we view our role. Um our our uh package is bid at $25,900. You can see in there that gets you phases one through five. We used to offer phase five as an option. Um we don't anymore because we just feel like if we're going to guarantee the search,
we'll put a two-year guarantee on the search, which means we've never had to pay off on it, but which means that if for any reason the superintendent leaves, then we come back and redo the search uh at our costs. You know, hope is we don't ever have to do that. We
never have, but you know, sometimes something can happen medically, too. That has happened in a few other states. um advertising outline. You can see it in the proposal. We'll work with you on that. Uh David's uh and and myself, we're members of ASA Education Week.
We'll talk to you about ALAS and NABS. Um in terms of, you know, we've now got uh pretty good competitive pricing for that one day of stakeholder feed uh uh uh stakeholder feedback gathering. Uh we'll we'll come for one full day and we'll meet with your anybody that you
want us to meet with. And if we can do one-on- ones with you, great. Um, we'll meet with your admin team, your cabinet folks. Uh, if you'd like, we'll do an open community forum someplace in Independence, maybe at the Truman Museum, which I've never visited before. Um, we'll you can invite we we would
invite everybody in the public to come participate in this process. Again, we're trying to build capacity and we're trying to let people know that this is the most important decision independents can make in a long time. Um, we partner with K12 Insight. We're going to collect
as many voices as we can humanly collect regarding this process. And the partnership with K12 Insight is an online platform that will be open for about 2 weeks and through your website and perhaps whatever other communication
vehicles you have, we'll be able to um we I'll just go out on a limb and say we'll get 2500 people that will submit online survey information that you can use. that will definitely help support that profile. Um, we're going to present
to you the stakeholder feedback. We'll do that um at one of your board meetings. We need about 15 minutes. Uh, we'll give you a copy of it that you can put on your website. We share the stakeholder feedback with the candidates so they know what they're looking what they will get when they uh when they
become a candidate. In other words, what are the challenges and what are the opportunities. Um, we now do, this is our second year of leadership behavior assessments that's built into this too, which really is on our finalists. It's really about developing a personality
profile on them so that you can see what are they really good at, what what are their triggers, what are their non-negotiables, what do they like to do, what they not like to do. You know, if they're not a good people person, if that shows up, you probably aren't interested in them. But that's big
difference in a lot of our searches. uh video interviews of selected candidates and then c we do all the background checking criminal, financial, educational and then uh this includes that bid includes and by the way that's a not to exceed amount that bid that
includes visits to the school district. I talked about um these are I'm not going to I don't want to spend any time because I want to give you a chance to ask some questions but uh we do an awful lot with districts after successful searches and you can see what those are
and um including strategic planning is one that we've uh we've just launched into and a lot of districts have been taking advantage of that. We've got some great partnerships out there. Innovate K12 on a strategic planning side. Kold Insight. You might be a K-1 insight school district which is a
communications platform. Um districts they're in about 40% of the districts in the country. They give us this at uh at virtually no cost to you which is of benefit to us as well. Okay. So uh with that in my last two minutes I talked about the fee structure. I have a sample
calendar here that I put together. And if I may, I'm just going to have um I already brought four copies, but we looked at and this is this was done sort of like on the fly. Um but we looked at starting September 25th, the the dates
or the parameters that that you had. Um and the goal would be that that would be our first meeting with you. That's about a two to threeh hour meeting. um October 15 to December 3, we want to advertise for about six weeks. And during that
advertising period, we do recruiting. And one of the things that David will do and Judy will do and I'll do is we'll we'll call the people that we know and trust that work in your associations and say, "Who's on their way up the ladder and who can we begin to have
conversations with?" Um in October, we'd like to come back in and again, these dates are very random. uh we that's when we want to finish up the stakeholder gathering and feedback. Late October, November, a board meeting where we give you the feedback. We develop interview
questions, which by the way, we don't use a bank. You're going to when you work with us, you you give us the questions that you're interested in asking and then we put them into a format that makes a lot of sense. We'll talk to you about interview procedures. We do some coaching if you haven't gone through something like that before.
um we'll help you with compensation package and then um with regard to if you choose to use those stakeholder groups for feedback gathering during the interview cycle, we'll work with the designated chairs of those groups. And a lot of the districts that we work with
do that. They have a student group, they have a community group, they have a parent group. Um and those are very very effective. And again, they don't make the decision, you do, but they provide some feedback in terms of what did they see. We close the applications on December 3, uh, late December, early
January. We come back to you then for that final meeting with the list of candidates that most closely align with what you and the community and staff have told us they're interested in. And then we work with you on a process to narrow down those finalists. Mid January
interviews, late January, early February, you select your next superintendent. And then the starting date is, you know, typically July one in Missouri and Kansas and Nebraska, but um a lot of times a sitting superintendent gets a job and the board says, "Hey, if
you want to start early there, you can start early there, too." I mean, if you had an interest in it, we know you have an interim. Um, so that's the calendar. And the nice thing about starting now is you're going to be in the arena first because come January, come February,
that's when we get that backlog of searches. Um, so I I talked about you, we learn your culture. We know a little bit about it now, but we'll learn it from you. We'll learn it from your community, and we'll be able to share that with candidates in terms of what you're looking for. And every community
and school districts are different. What have we found to be helpful in the process? Here's without question what I take when I leave a district. If you've come together and really began to focus, begin to focus on the most important
thing which is helping your superintendent and ultimately you become successful. This has been a great search. Second qu the next question is what about boards with different opinions? Wow. Okay. I don't know that I've ever worked with a board that doesn't have
board members with divergent opinions. We're all about coming out as a unit if we can, but that doesn't always happen. But at the end of the day, we structure our model to make sure there's plenty of conversation and everybody's opinion is important. I talked about the followup
and then the guarantee is a two-year guarantee through FA take phase five. It's a two-year guarantee and we stand by that and we think that this would be a great opportunity for our company, for the three of us, but even more importantly for you because we think
you're going to get some good candidates and that's exciting. So, Dr. Buck, I have two more things. One, um, if you choose Mac and Jake, I'm right next door even after the search. So I I'm I'm here for an ear for whoever you hire to help out to to be a a helping hand because to
me that's what we need to be right Mr. Ro I'm doing convocation tomorrow at Cable Dime Marina here at Independence. Um I I will have you know Mr. Rogers up on the screen behind me for part of my speech because that's what we are. Um we're the people growing people business and my personal mission is that every
kid grows up to be an adult you'd be proud to call your next door neighbor. they can take care of themselves, right? And they can help others when they have the opportunity to and ability to. You know, you're a good citizen. You can take care of yourself. You can provide for yourself. Those are the two big things for me. And I want you to be
successful doing that just like I want us to be successful in the summit doing that. And it'd be an honor to be part of the search to help you find that person. We have four minutes. So, questions. I have a question. You mentioned good,
right? Um, your percentage who have stayed for 5 years and 10 years. Do you know what those numbers actually are? They're high like 80% or 85%. It's in the packet. It's in the book. You you'll see it in the booklet. Um, and I think they even do a listing by state. So, you know, it's I I didn't look at that
before I came, but it's high. It's um it's very very high, which by the way, when I say 80%, that's not perfect, right? But the average tenure for a superintendent in this country is a like 3.3 or 3.4. So, uh, if
you believe in you need to be better than the average, were significantly better than the average. Any other questions? Mine isn't necessarily a question, but just a comment. I appreciate at the beginning of your presentation you me
you said the most important thing is um us coming together. So I just appreciate any strategies and tools you'd have um to help us make that happen. Thank you. I have another one. I'm sorry. Does anybody else want to go? Um, and I don't
know if this has been decided yet, but I heard that the city is also obviously looking for search firms for the city manager, and I'm not sure if that's been decided. Are you all in that mix? We are. Um, but I don't believe we've anybody's reached out to us from that, but we have done those searches as well.
Okay. Including some college searches, I mean, but honestly, my preference is K12 space. Yeah. Would it be a conflict to do both if that were to come up? I I don't know. I mean, that's a good question. It depends on like how you would perceive that, right? But we're
talking about completely different groups of people. Okay. I think it's interesting that they're looking for a city manager and superintendent at the same time. I mean, there's a those two are going to be good friends. Yeah, we hope. Anything else? Anybody else?
Um, when it comes down to that selection process, can you explain a little bit about how you might rank or um, go through that process with us and deciding what candidates would be the best fit? Okay. So, what we do, imagine it's that
night and again, I don't know if we could do that in closed session or open session. So, if it's open session where the public can come in, that's fine. We do a lot of those. We make sure the candidates know that their name is going to be made public. And then when we come in, we're going to bring you the completed applications. We're going to
bring you a review of our reference checking. If it's public, we have to focus on the positive, right? But um there there are other ways to get to that. Quite frankly, the folks that we're going to bring in are not going to have a lot of negatives. Um and then we're going to show we're going to talk
about each of the candidates in alphabetical order. And then we're going to show you their video. You're going to have their packets. You can make annotations. You can make comments. And then when we're done, let's say we bring you five people and you want to interview three. We'll work you through
a narrowing process. And what we really um it's just a consensus building. We use a rubric. Everybody gets a vote and then that's how we make the selection. And again, if we don't have to make that selection process public, um it's a little bit better. But we also have done
a lot of I've done a lot of searches in Florida where your votes get public recorded requested and so that's all part of it as well too. So we have a bunch of different ways to get to that. But at the end of the day we really want consensus and consensus doesn't
necessarily have to be a um a unanimous vote but it but we need to have unanimous support because superintendents have too many choices today. And when we're done with our work with you, uh, to your question is we want to know what those issues are that
are obstacles for you to work forward and can we address them through this process and I think we can. The leadership profile you put together is going to be key. So, you know, when we're bringing new applicants to consider and you choose how many you want to interview out of that, it's going to be who we think has a chance to
meet that leadership profile. And then when it comes to actual selection of the person, again, we're going to be referring to that leadership profile because that's what you've told us you want. And so we're going to try to keep guiding that conversation back to you guys come to consensus. All right, we think this is the candidate that means it the best.
Any other questions? I want to be totally mindful of the five:00 uh ending point. Okay, with that, let me just close by saying this. We stand ready to work with you in this most important endeavor. Um, we've got a proven track record of
success and we've got a lot of experience in this part of the country and um, all over the country. I want to say thank you for your service as schoolboard members. And you know, as somebody that has um I think I've done
10 board retreats this year, this summer, and a couple more left to go, I can tell you that um the challenges that board members have within themselves, in their communities, and in their states um are real and it's it's making it
hard, which is also why recruiting is so important because I think your next superintendent has no inkling that they're about to apply for something because if they're in a good spot, it's going to take a lot to get them dislodged. And that's our job. Our job
is to get them dis identify them, get them dislodged, and make sure that we can profile the kind of opportunity that Dr. Buck and I were talking about on the way over here that we think that this represents. So, with that, we wish you the best of luck. Thank you for giving us 30 minutes. Thank you, Dr. Stout, for
the for the questions and the guidance. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I think we've allotted um some time to have some discuss. Um, so we'll give that just one quick second and then we'll get that started.
Does anybody have any discussion that they want to talk about? I was interested to find out that their uh fifth year seems to now be included in the price. I don't think it was originally maybe when we looked at that. So
yeah, that's a very important step in my mind a a year and even beyond any kind of wraparound services. So yeah, I like the um depth that they go into when they talk
about stakeholder input. um the variety of stakeholders and also that they will provide that summary report um and I would really be interested in just looking at that data but also um
they will provide in multiple languages as well and just for everybody's um knowledge I did just find it in their packet But the over the last five years almost 80% of administrators are in the position for which they were hired and almost 60% of administrators are still in the position
for which they were hired within the past 10 years and then 40% or 15 years. I was noticing that it does seem that they do have some things in their proposal that are kind of all a cart. Um, and so it's kind of a my
understanding that they were saying that up to that amount that they'll guarantee that it will go above it. So what you guys were saying Does anybody uh know anything about the K12 insight? No. Todd, you don't know anything about
it? We obviously don't use that service. Were you talking about like on page 21 of the proposal of additional services available? Um on page 20 at the bottom is where it says the total not to exceed.
Yeah. 25,900. But that does beg the question, the additional services, right? So like he was talking about an advertising like when they go to advertise, I think that's an additional cost. Um that's outside of his proposal.
They're just talking about the their fees and their structures. Lance, I'm sorry. We're we're bringing you in on something. Um we were a question. Go ahead. Sorry. Specifically to the advertising piece, the underneath or within the main
quote, it gives like 30 days on certain places. But then at the bottom, it says expenses may increase if additional advertising or alternative advertising venues are chosen. So it looks like outside of those things,
can you use your microphone? Sorry, that is my understanding not to exceed the 259. Um, I did just visit those gentlemen, thank them for their time, and one of the comments they made to me right at the end is they would be willing to price match if that's what it came down
to, and I said I'd share that with the board of education. Thank you. Um, this talked about stakeholder meetings. It says two days of in-person stakeholder meetings, but didn't he say one day
in his presentation? Yeah. So that was that's an interesting because I actually made a note about that that it was you know he'll they'll do whatever they want on one day.
Huh. But it even says if the district requests additional state holder input days, it would be an additional fee, right? Because yeah, I mean this I very specifically wrote one day of stakeholder feedback
and remember he was saying how you know that that could be however we want whether it be a forum or individual meetings. Maybe he did. Yeah, that's what I would Let's see. Yeah, the focus is with what's in print. I think we could say we
need you, Dave. And then over here on page 21, it does talk about the institutional services. So, creating a brochure of for vacancy, um attending candidate interviews, like those are all additional things. Does that mean those are additional
costs? Sorry, you guys are unable to see this. I apologize for that. Yeah. I mean, right here it says that um page 21. And don't forget to use your mics, please. Yeah. on page 21. It's all of those things
seem to be additions to those are additional services that are available, but those are not included in that listing on page 20. And for Denise and Blake, um, this seems to be the same packet that we received
about a month ago when we first looked at them. So, if they want to follow along, it should be the same. Thank you. Okay. So, if they create a brochure for the vacancy personality strengths assessment, those things do cost more
if we do. I really appreciated the emphasis that he put on consensus and community involvement and how they would be willing to truly, you know, seek out the best of the
candidate, what we want in this community. Um, I really do appreciate that outlook. He understands seemingly the importance of a community agreeing on the next leader opposed to it just being seven people saying, "Hey, I like that person." Even student involvement with family involvement, too. I think
that was really impressive to hear. There was also talk about translators being made available too and I didn't. So that's something that would be really important too. I think really really important for sure. I have a feeling that maybe there
could be some um not native Englishspeaking families that have an opportunity to feel more prioritized when we do focus on their specific languages and not just Spanish. So I don't know if that's a question we
can ask if there's more languages that could be addressed or offered for translating. Um just I mean I was impressed with just uh McFersonson and Jacobson will work with the district to obtain the necessary translators. So I think that
is anybody that would need a translation from English they would help us do that. I mean I know we've got some in house but they also have 10 and we'll let them pay for it. Yes. Yeah, perfect.
Anything else uh Denise or Blake that you want to share? Yeah. I just want to make sure I'm confirming that I did hear that they would priceatch. They did say they would price match. I'm I somewhat suspect they're price
matching outside of those additional services like Yeah, [Music] it says that on page 23 as well. So, I did figure out it's in the packet, too. That would have nothing else.
I just mention I did that on 23. I just want to make sure that they consider MSBA a comparable level of services. Yeah, I don't know that we have specifically told them that MSCA is the second vendor. Um, we decided to like
allow them both make their own presentations without telling us who was the other vendor. [Applause] older stuff. [Music] Hello. Welcome. And uh get settled and then
we're ready for you. Yeah. Thank you. Good evening. Thank you so much. Good evening and thank you so much for this opportunity to speak before you and to share with you the MSBA. I call it the advantage of the MSBA superintendent search. So,
we're looking forward to that tonight. I know we're on a short time frame, so we're going to keep it right to it. Also, I did want to thank you for the questions that were sent to us. So helpful and we've embedded them into the presentation. Excuse me. Start right there. So, first let me introduce everyone. So, I am Janette Coward. I am
the retired superintendent from the Parkfield School District. So, I've seen several of you around. I currently work with MSBA, and I'll get this tickle in my throat in a second. Uh, to do that, would you be willing to use your put your microphone closer? We've got How about that? Can I do that? Yes. How about that?
We got some board members that are attending virtually. I should have told you that. So, they're they're listening and watching your present. Perfect. Well, we'll start again. So, my name is Dr. Janette Coward. I'm the retired superintendent for uh for Park Hill and I am also a superintendent leazison for the Missouri School Board Association. and it is my privilege to
also work for them on their superintendent searches and so I'll be leading the search for you would be my role in this so I would be your main contact as we do this I do want to introduce my other members of the team so Trent good evening thanks for being here hopefully you can hear me okay uh Dr.
Trent Brenmer uh administrator in Iowa and I've led searches around the Midwest actually for about the last 14 years I would tell you the last couple searches I led down here in Missouri was St. Joe's last spring and Hannibal um in the spring as well. Also Gallatin and a few
others, but I would just mention that I'm thrilled uh for the opportunity to serve uh serve your district here. And then Katherine Harrison, happy to be back. It's good to see all of you. Um and so I work for Missouri School Boards Association. I'm one of the board trainers and would help with your all's um follow-up supports after the
superintendent search. And then we can't get the clicker to work. I don't know if you guys have suggestions, recommendations for this. There we go. Turn it off. It looks like it's on. Looks like it's on. Oh.
It's okay. They took the batteries. No, they didn't. I'm just kidding. Just kidding. Just kidding. Tricky. You think we're good now? Uh, yeah, we are. There we go. There we go. All right. We'll hand it to you. Thanks. All right. And then just a little bit about Missouri School Boards
Association. Um, I think what's special about hiring us to do a superintendent search or selecting us to do a superintendent search is we are the only association in the state of Missouri that is governed by schoolboard members and everything we do is literally for schoolboard members. I think that's what
makes us unique. Um, and then also part of using us for your superintendent search would include these wraparound services because our expertise is professional development for school boards. You all would get the benefit benefit of all of that included with your superintendent search. And then um
just a little bit of facts about what we've done um since we've been doing superintendent search. So 40 years of actually doing superintendent searches. So that's a long time. Um 600 over 600 superintendent searches have been conducted and then we've had zero contract um contracts terminated or um
had to enter into litigation. So just a couple key areas right there. Okay. And I want to talk to you just briefly and I want to give us an overview first and then Trent and Katherine and I will divide this up a little bit to go more in depth about what this search will look like for you.
And so I think it's always important to start out with the district's mission of what you have. And I really do love the vision statement particularly around community united because I really feel like this is an opportunity to bring your community together and to bring the board together. One of the questions we
had is how do you make sure that we have a good fit for our community? We're going to talk to you about that when we get down to how we get our feedback and how we get information. But boy, it starts frankly with you. What is the board looking for? What does the board want in a superintendent? So, we want to
understand that and then bring that all together for you. So, when you talk about a superintendent search, we're going to talk about the planning. We're going to talk about the recruiting, the screening process, the hiring process, and what I think is unique really is talking about the post surge supports
that we're going to provide for you. So, Trent, do you want to talk a little bit about our planning, please? Yes. Thanks, Janette. Appreciate it. Uh, one thing that you'll see in our proposal hopefully and we want to answer for you tonight is you asked some key questions about unifying the board and how do you understand what a good fit is for independent school district and and
I think this really is the start when we talk about it. We frontload our process with establishing and trying to uncover what does fit look like for what type of leader you need, not just for your district, but your larger community. And when we can get the board unified on that, the rest of the process, I'm not
going to say is easy, but it's more objective, right? Because now we know what we're looking for. So when we're out recruiting, we start screening. We're holding you accountable to the things that you said up front before we had names. Now we start to figure out what kind of candidates are the best fit
for you. So it really starts with this planning process and this would be as soon as MSBA was hired. We would outline things like salary and benefits uh timeline so your your stakeholders know what the process is and when the new superintendent would be hired so you can think about a smooth transition
hopefully and all of those details so we can we can recruit uh and answer those candidate questions as well. So those will be some key pieces in the planning uh process. And then I want to uh if Where's the clicker again? Thank you. Um I I want to mention this because I think
this is unique. You specifically talked and asked us about community involvement and that unification process. One way we can aid you in doing that is getting a stakeholder survey out to your community and your staff and get as as much feedback as possible from people in
what's going well in the district. What's your points of pride? What are your opportunities for improvement right now? And then what are people saying they're looking for in the next superintendent? It's not their job to hire the superintendent, but they're informing you and giving you feedback upfront. Then we analyze that feedback.
And let me back up. We can also do specific focus group meetings to also get input from different stakeholder groups on top of that survey. So between the survey focus groups, you get a lot of transparent communication through us to provide a thorough report back to
you. And in that conversation, when we bring you that data back, you as the board, your privilege and responsibility to hire the superintendent, you really solidify or confirm these are the top qualifications we're looking for so that we can go out and recruit for you and
then again be objective throughout the process from recruiting to writing screening questions to screening candidates to even, you know, making an offer in the end. back to what you said initially was the fit, the survey, the focus groups, all of those things to get input up front will help us be objective
and uh lead a good process from the start. So now I'm going to transition into step two as Janette mentioned there and that is the recruiting process and you see a quite a list here of uh national recruiting, state recruiting and then additional recruiting. I want
to highlight just a couple because some of those are typical spots that you would post a lot of jobs. Others that are unique that I think separate MSBA a bit. Uh one of those would be a new partnership with NAS. The National Association of School Superintendent have a strong partnership and we are one
of the only organizations that can post and recruit through the NAS organization. So we think that's a supreme advantage for for your district. Social media is big. We actively recruit on there. And then the other one I want to mention that um is really critical is
the active recruiting that takes personal phone calls and just work because some of your best candidates I can look in the eyes and tell you aren't looking for jobs. It's going to take a phone call and convincing them to look at independence and they're going to say why and what are they offering and we
want to be able to answer those questions clearly so they'll strongly consider coming here and leading your district. I'm going to kick it back to Janette to talk about another advantage of us which is the SLT program around the state. Right. As I talked about superintendent lays on, one of the things that the Missouri schoolboard association has
done has hired 10 retired superintendents statewide. So we teach, we reach every place from Kenet, Missouri all the way up to the far corners of northwest Missouri. And when Trent was talking about those connections and making those phone calls, that's part of this advantage is calling these people. You're the 14th
largest school district in the state of Missouri. you've got 1,400 students here. This is a great job. So, we really want to push and get you the very very best, but as Trent said, sometimes it does take that personal phone call in order in order to get that for you. And so, we want to do that. So, we just want
to point out because we think that is also a unique advantage that we have because these are people that already have the relationships and that is a key piece for you in the state, but then also we will do all the national search parts too. The other part that I want to talk about is just what it looks like
for you whenever we sorry when we do the superintendent search of course it'll be on the MSBA website and so this is just a sample of what that looks like and what that's going to be. The other part I think is critically important and this is not your data for now. So this is
just draft so please don't take this if we just turn off. There we go. But this is really what your posting is going to look like and this is really what candidates are going to read first. So they want to know what are the qualifications, what does the contract look like, what are the some of the
demographics, who is on the board. There's some suggestions I would have around the board even to make a short video to introduce yourself and to welcome people and to have have them introduce yourself to them so they want to apply for you here. But when you talk about your qualifications, what you want
to have, how many years of experience are you looking for? Do they need to have a doctorate? What are those key things that you're looking for as a board that will best fit the independent school district? So, we want to give you an example of that. But again, if we were hired, this would be one of the first things we would do is go through
this process with the board and identify what is important to you. Everything from residency on down, it's all of that. And then the next part on page two and I think Tren I think we run back to you right now because we do want to talk about just the search process a little
bit in more in depth for you. You bet. So you might be interested in some of the statistics and and we just want to thank you. Sorry it's hard to lean back and see that and keep up with you guys. Yeah. And this is last year's numbers. So just letting you know that upfront.
Um you can see there that the average number of applicants we've had from smaller districts to obviously larger districts is 14. We anticipate this will be a destination job for a lot of candidates that like your district and like your area. So we would work hard to make sure you had at least 14 or more
qualified candidates. Um 41% of our candidates were were from out of state. Um so just to search that there. 63% had a doctorate degree, which you know in a lot of districts in this one too that might be a requirement or for sure a preferred qualification. 36% female
candidates, which we're very proud of. I believe the national average is about 21 or 23%. And then um 8% of candidates in our pool are minority candidates that we work hard to recruit as well to align to your demographics. Um, so we will work hard to uh meet and exceed those, but I
want to be real transparent that those are our numbers uh from last year. And then the next thing, thank you, Katherine. I can summarize this slide fairly clearly uh from recent numbers as well. If you look in the middle there, um our our superintendent searches last year, 27%
of our new superintendent hires had previous experience, but 55% had some central office. So that could be assistant soup, director level experience, deputy superintendent, but high level district office leadership experience. And you should expect that
here, that level of experience as well to lead an organization uh this large. But I wanted to just be transparent on the norms and the trends in in the state as you start your superintendent uh search as well. And then we get to stage three, which is the screening. We actually have a handout for you that
that we are going to provide to you to talk about this. The screening really has several processes from reviewing the applicants to presenting to I don't know why this keeps going off. The board will see every applicant. I think that's very important for you to
know uh that you will have that opportunity. We'll help you narrow that down, create those formal questions for you, conduct those initial interviews for you in the screenings and then help with the final and formal interviews for you too. the document that you have in front of you. The first one talks about
presenting the candidates to you by tears. And so one of the things we will do, I'm going let it get passed around here real quickly because I think this is very unique and this is an opportunity for you. We're not going to tell you who it is that you should hire. We're going to tell you who
it is that is most qualified and matches your requirements. So we literally put them in green, yellow, and red for you. And so and the web doesn't mean don't ever hire them, but they may they may not have their certification. There might be certain things that they do not
have for you, but this really helps you start to put them in groups so that you can understand where you want to be on them. And then if you turn that over, the other piece that's very unique for us, reading through applications is very tiring and can be very complicated
because what they're doing, we actually provide a summary to you about every candidate. So, you'll get a one-page summary on every candidate from their background information about what they have, their current role, and their current salary because those are going to be key pieces that we'll have to talk
about around negotiations. And the other piece is who are the references. And we are going to go into references just a little bit more later, but please know we're always looking for no less than five. And then Trent's going to share with you a couple of things that we do that are different so that we really get great references for you.
Yeah. Thank you. And I know this is only questions actually question four you asked so we want to hit it directly. Uh we do a couple different things on references but the key piece to the references aren't probably the ones that they submit with their application. We expect that and I'll be honest with you we we we read them we review them but
the ones we really key in on are the confidential references that we make. Uh and as Janette mentioned we try to have five on every candidate before we present them. Combination of calls, emails, references. We think that's important to vet people above and beyond the letters that they submit. So that's
important and we do that criteria that we look for on the reference form. Uh how long has somebody worked with them? In what capacity, what are their strength areas? What are their opportunities for growth? What's their background in finance and community engagement? Then we certainly ask for other categories as well. Have they ever
been terminated or released and all those things. One of the other pivotal things we ask in our references, whether we call or email or anything else, is who else should we talk to to to know more about this person, which gives us a lot of autonomy to track down other people that may have information. We're
very transparent. Janette shared with you that summary that board members tend to like because we try to summarize all the references and the qualifications on a page for each candidate. Then the other thing in this day and age I want to mention here is social media. Um, and I could probably share stories on this,
but we do a seven-year social media check. It's through another company. Uh, but they do a public public before everybody panics. Public social media check of any platform that a candidate may post on. And we are very transparent on your finalists. We just do it on
finalists. Um, but you will see everything in that report that we uncover. So there's no surprises. We think that's important. The other thing that is very unique to us, I can look you in the eyes and tell you with confidence that we have a very good track record of landing your top candidate. And I'm going to give a lot
of that credit to this process. When we get down to when we start the process, we talk about salary and benefits. So there's no surprises. And so when we're recruiting for you, we can have those conversations with candidates and not get a candidate where it's just not going to work. But in the end, we kind of flip it and we say, "These are your
top candidates board." So before they come in and interview, we ask them, "What's your commitment to the job right now?" And if it's not a nine or 10 on this form, we're calling them. Don't waste their time. Don't come in and get people excited if you're not committed. And it's usually kids or a spouse that's
nervous about a move. If we know that, then we can anticipate and kind of uh address some of their concerns up front. So that's critical. The other piece of this form that's critical is we ask them what are you expecting if you get the job offer and how manyear contract in
salary and benefits. And so when you land uh on your top candidate, we simply pull out what we call their pre-negotiations form. And then we can help you efficiently negotiate that contract, which often is is term, maybe
insurance or salary, and get that that that offer and that acceptance hopefully turned around very quickly. And we're proud of that and been able to land most top candidates because of that. Okay. And then the next thing we do want to talk about is just finally is on that
final support part is what do we do to support and how do we handle this on these negotiation pieces but what is the post search and we think that is very unique to MSBA and so Catherine's going to talk about that. Yes, it is very unique to MSBA and I feel like it's one of the no offense to them and all the hard work they would
potentially do for you all but I do feel like it's one of the most important things. Um, you guys have had longevity in your superintendent. You're very lucky for that. Um, but none of you have onboarded a new superintendent before and a lot of board members don't know how to do that. Um, and so that's something that we bring to the table is how to onboard a new superintendent.
Where' the clicker go? There we go. Oh, thanks. Um, so this is unique to what MSBA does and that's why I feel like um, it's really special to be able to partner um, with you all potentially to do this search is these postarch supports. And so here's kind of a list of what that would look like. Um the first is the new
governance team workshop. I think it's really important for whoever I mean uh potentially new board members and superintendent um come July 1 of next year um and having the eight of you all in a room just kind of talking about what does a board meeting look like? How do we um work backwards to plan it? What
are the expectations of the board for the new superintendent? What should communication with the superintendent and the board look like and feel like? We like to come in and help have those conversations before the school year gets started. Um the other is an onboarding workshop. Um we've had that in Colombia. We also have come to you
all and done that as well where we do a deep dive into finance. What does it look like? Making sure your new superintendent understands what that um is. Sometimes you get um an out ofstate hire. Um and Missouri finance is much different than other state finances. And so making sure they're good with that. Same thing with APR. APR is unique to
Missouri. So making sure they understand um what MSIP 6 is and what all of these acronyms stand for. Um and then the next one um is six months of superintendent evaluation support. It's really important to get that started um immediately. And so all of those supports are included in your
superintendent search. Um other things is a finance data deep dive um superintendent leaison support ongoing. That would be with Janette since she's here local in the Kansas City area. And then we also have depending on the need um new leader uh board finance mentorship um which doesn't come
included but it is a discounted price if you all choose to um utilize that. All right. And then the timeline mine's better than yours. Sure. Thank you. I prefer that. Thank you so much. We did want to provide you a sample timeline because we want you to have an idea in your in your mind of what this is going
to look like because this is going to take time. And so as we look at this that we have time built in to do the posting as you will see and so after the posting and we have that then there'll start the applications and the recruitment process will begin and then we want to start the community survey
pretty quickly. We want to get that going because I want the community survey back and if it's the will of the board then we would host community forums for you and that would include everything from your administrative team down to your communities and to your teacher leader groups. We'd want to talk
to all of those if that is the will of the board. We would like to lead those for you. That way you have a very unbiased piece. So we have processes in place to make sure we hear all the voices, not just the loudest voice. So we want to make sure we're getting all that feedback for you. And we would bring information back to you as a board
and present that to you so you really know what those key things and key items and attributes that your community is looking for which you think is key. Then also we would um start to review uh the the feedback and look at that. But then we'll start giving you the candidate pool. So remember I talked to you about
the red, yellow and green sheets. We'll give you all those. We'll also send you all the applications too so that you can look through those. We'll provide you those summaries. We would have the screening interviews and then our recommendation would be after the winter break would be to do the interviews. This is simply a draft just just to give
you an idea of the timeline. This is simply strictly up to you guys what you'd like to do. there's advantages and disadvantages that we'd like to share with you about when you close and when you host your interviews and your screenings so we can have that conversation. And then the next thing was around just the MSP and that is
listed on here also. And so our cost for our search would be 22,000. And when you talk about a fee structure, MSBAs is very simple. This is the total cost. All the supports that Katherine was talking about is included. All of those different pieces are all included in
this cost. The only additional cost you would possibly have would be if you wanted to bring in candidates, it would be just their transportation coming in. So that would be the only thing you'd have. I think the other thing that's very unique is the guarantee. In this day and age, unfortunately, not
everything always works out. Uh, our goal is for it to work out, but just in case it would not work out, if you have done those things that were in yellow, so the new governance training, the onboarding workshop, and then the evaluation support, then for $2,000, we would do another search for you for the
for the next year if that was needed. I don't believe that would ever be the case for you, but we want to have that just in case. We always want to have a backup plan. So, that really is the total cost that you would have. It's a very simple structure. And then some of the questions were just around what does a successful search look like? And we've
talked about this a lot. Uh a lot of it is just about collective work. It's about us working with you and working with your community. And I cannot stress enough communication and transparency. That is really when you get the buyin from your community is when you're
really sharing with them everything we know every step of the way and what's the information that we have. We want to be as transparent as we possibly can be on all that. And then also just the board's role, the board being committed to doing the work and it is work. Uh but
having that out there for you is just super important for us to have. It is a unifying two time. It's assuring and also it's an exciting time. It's an exciting time that we can introduce your new superintendent to bring you and your community together. So we think it's one of the best that you can do. So in the
end honestly uh we do feel like it is an MSBA advantage for all the different aspects that we provide to you and all the support that we do want and we hope that you will consider us. We're open for any questions that you might have. I had one uh question and I don't know
that we we haven't talked about it that I know of. It might be as simple as it sounds, but the difference between an open or closed search. Sure. Um in general, an open search is when your finalist names are public. A closed search are where um your finalist
names just aren't made public. But you certainly would announce, you know, who gets hired as soon as an offer is accepted. In a nutshell, that's an open versus closed search. Advantages and disadvantages to both. Some for some candidates because many of your candidates are going to be sitting
superintendent and so they don't want to fracture the relationship they have. So there are some advantages for having it closed, but there's advantage to having the open or having it open when you get to the finalist stage. So that could be handled in a couple of different ways.
Thank you. Good question. Thank you. If there's no questions, we just want to say thank you so much. We appreciate this opportunity to present to you and we look forward to hopefully working with you in the near future. Thank you so much. Thank you folks. Thank you. You see it?
The um tiered candidate selection process is something that each reference I contacted um complimented them on. They said that that was just made it so much easier to narrow down their candidate. So, it was just I was really nice to see
the paper and hear them describe that. I also like the fact that we will see every applicant. I don't know that the other group mentioned that or that we even had that question, but I did like that they pointed that out.
It's not fair because this was not asked of the um of Mac and Jake, but the 14 um the average number of applicants per search feels really low to me and I don't know what is common, but and like I said, it's not really fair because we
didn't hear that stat from the other um organizations, but I'm assuming none of us have any idea what a normal amount of applicants would be. I thought the same thing. I thought it was kind of low. I'm like, uh I hope we
see more than that. I would imagine it's lower for smaller districts and higher median might have been and maybe we should have asked districts of our size approximately One thing I like about I agree. I anticipated more Missouri
state. Um, I did notice that background checks weren't covered or anything like that. Um, and I know Mac and Jake had a more extensive process for that. I didn't see like actual formal checks
or social media or any Oh, no. He did talk social media, but not the um yeah, just regular background check. I did not say verify candidate background
and review case and social media history. No, that's just the online Missouri court system. [Music] A little bit more comprehensive. I think the impression that
they might be a little bit more focused on those applicants but national nationwide and also the diversity of applicants too comments There were I thought that little
And just to clarify, that was only the additional one copy of the schedule because each of us had our packet that they prepared all seven of them like folder and everything. Yeah, it was just that one additional piggy backing onto that. I'm sorry. I
appreciated that MSBA was prepared to show the audience as well. I had a presentation on screen. So, just, you know, we've got 14,000 students, not 1400, not making a big deal out of that, but covering a lot of information, but
speaking of small nuances, I'm like, that's tremendously different. Um, so anyway, I do appreciate the familiarity that MSBA would have with us. Um, I think there are positives and some pause in there. Um, I really am interested in
seeing a really vast widespread net focused on our next leader and maybe Miss PA can bring that to us. Um, maybe not. I don't know. But I was really impressed with the previous uh presentation slightly more than what I
just saw. So, I know we need to vote on this in our sessions. I did like Mac and Jake's um stakeholder engagement process. It felt much more extensive and I think that
that is something that our community has really placed a lot of value on. Um and I think it would be important to ensure that we do a good job at that. If I can just not necessarily echo but just add on to that. Um
I just I'm just making a statement. It does not have any respect to MSBA or any other candidate or any other uh resource that we might have. But I really found Mac and Jake to be um it's just something moved me deeply about believing what they're saying. I truly
truly believe that they're committed um and truly believe in transparency. I just I something deeply moved me when they were speaking about their process, their experience, and their commitment to really involving our community, our
board, our administration, our students. uh I just really feel strongly convinced that that that they're believable and that their work will will truly uh benefit ISD's next selection. So I also think it's great that one of our
former superintendent is sold. So, I mean, it gets uh I think both sides of that like you've got the Missouri connection along with um a nationwide search. And I'll also add pause that MSBA has
worked directly with us um as a board um and some of our planning and um some of our challenges as a board. Um and so I do think that there
unfortunately a lot of those challenges were not resolved um and continued to persist um even after that and I not that that was them um but that well yes they will have insight into um
some of our challenges. is I keep using that word. Um I also don't feel that where we used them brought us much benefit when we did do that in the past. So it might be
helpful to try something different. Are we conclusion? I guess my question is how do we do it? Do we vote? Yeah, that's whoever had the highest score. What are your thoughts?
Um, I would suggest we all share who got the highest rubric. And I'm not sure because we can't vote on it until we're in open session because this is well I guess we need to make a decision. I think we just vote honestly as to which one of the two when the agenda item comes up somebody
moves for one of them. Just going back to our last meeting where each board member went through and I think at that time we wiggled it down to you guys. My second and see if we're in consensus and if not
I suppose we would need a motion to that effect during the open session. Do we want to take temperatures before that happens or do we just wait and share it then? I I wanted to share that I
I both firms gave goodations. Um I feel like experience and they have followed through all of our requests
that we requested. So I don't know for us feel confident. I don't know why, but I feel like they're just their availability to us almost at a moment's notice would be
better, easier, quicker than M&J maybe. Who knows? That's speculation. Can you clarify on what you mean by at a moment's notice? just not maybe a moment's notice, but you know, quickly like we're gonna have we need to have a meeting next week. Would you be able to
come be here with us? They have shown that in the past that they are available. I am leaning toward McFersonson and Jacobson. They've scored higher to me on my rubric. Um I think it's very important that
um one of our challenges that has been culture and I think it's really important that we expand our scope from um and not choose someone who's too close and I know we all love MSBA fantastic conferences so much education
um but I think there's value in moving outside of our box a little bit especially if They're going to price match. Background check this morning. October single position.
Is there any more discussion? Um, I'll go ahead. I already made some points, but I do think um for me the most important piece is stakeholder input and I um felt like M&J had a
better package of that. Um and also think that um the price match is a great like that was another piece that I was concerned with, but if they're price matching then then we're good. I think MJ just laid out a more
substantial process. Hey, lastly, were you gonna say okay? Lastly, I just wanted to emphasize for those who um may not know, we do have a relationship with MSBA where we can reach out to them for resources um at
any point. Uh so we have an existing relationship and we can continue to rely on them based on that agreement and relationship that we already have. So be it we select them or not, we're not losing resources or their commitment to this district by any means. It's this is
a different phase of their support and I think it speaks highly of them to be considered in our top two uh considerations uh in this process. Anyway, it does speak to how well they work. Um I just my position in this
align somewhat to Director Bayards is they've been up close with some of our challenges and we do appreciate the work that they've offered in alignment with President Dixon's statements. Uh they did what they were asked to do and that's that. Um I do think it would be
advantageous for us to think um just in a different scope about what we're bringing to this city and how critical it's going to be to show up differently um and and be very intentional about that effort uh in this in this time. I think it's a critical time for this city
across the board many many different ways as we can see while looking at social media the news there's just a lot of change and um I think we really should should take a a deep look into those things I also want to close with this I don't think or imagine that there
are any things uh that were mentioned by either groups that we couldn't bring to our ideal uh group and say hey could you include this or change tweak or add um so just to kind of throw that out there and keep that in mind.
I'll make the motion to return. Second. Yes. Yes. Yes.