##VIDEO ID:https://vimeo.com/1050882260## Of the United States of America and to the public for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible Liberty. Justice. First item is public comment, but we did not have anyone sign up for public comment. So we'll jump into, uh, first our school safety report with Mr. Sampson. All right, thank you board. Um, we'll tackle this information and, um, you know, we're free to answer any questions, obviously, but, uh, anything that comes up, I just wanna let you know that, uh, any of us can answer these questions and the folks who do the work in the buildings as we talk about school discipline and some of the data, uh, related to it. It may be Brian and maybe Aaron or, or Jeff and, and, um, Jane, um, that can answer those questions. But feel free to, to jump in with anything as we go through. We will be a bit informal here. Um, we are going to, um, try the clicker. We're kind of in a dead zone with our clicker, and so it worked. All right. So today we, we wanna present some information on gang activity, uh, law enforcement actions, uh, which will show you a two year trend data of student arrest, uh, from our, our buildings. Um, and this information that we'll share with you on law enforcement actions will be comparing last year's first semester data to this year's first semester data to see, you know, are we, are we having similar type of things happening? Are we, the actions that we're going through, uh, with our DA safety data, uh, is it similar? Is it more, is it less? Uh, then we'll take a look at school incidents. And the data that we'll share are the ISS and OSS. So our suspension data and the, the items that our kids are being suspended, uh, for, uh, we kind of honed in on our drug and vaping. Um, and also then our battery fighting and intimidation. So kind of more of the violent type of actions that are going on, but also the drug and the, uh, vaping, um, information. So, so what we have left out is like failure to comply, dress code violations, those things we have pulled out, uh, so that we could have a discussion about safety. So, we'll, let's start. Thank you, Matt. We'll start with, uh, gang activity. We don't have specific hard data on our gang activity. We have more anecdotal evidence and, and conversations as we, um, kids who are in, in the, um, office and talking with our officers, talking with our admin, um, and we interview and investigate things through conversations. We get a whole lot of information about our gang activity, um, and what is going on. Was the action that happened that led to the suspension or the arrest? Was it, uh, related to gang activity, or was it just two kids doing the action? And so what I think our officers will tell us, and what they have shared with me is that the gang activity this year has been kind of on the lower end. Um, and when we talk about gang activity in our school in the past few years, it's been kind of, um, narrowed down to more of initiation and like beat ins and beat outs, like in our restrooms to where, so the gang initiation might be, um, Hey, you have to like, get hit by every member of the gang, like for 30 seconds, and then they just pumble the kid for 30 seconds. Now they're in the gang, and if they want out of the gang, then that has to happen in reverse. Like, and so those were the type of activities that we were seeing in our restrooms in the last couple years. Um, we haven't seen a whole lot of gang activity of people coming to school rival gangs and enacting revenge or retaliation, uh, for gang activity outside the building and bringing it inside the building. We haven't seen a lot of that. And so what our officers will say is that our gang activity inside the school buildings haven't been, um, well, the word they used was it's been relatively quiet. Um, and they, they recognize two different things that they believe is, is, um, responsible for that. And one is a zero tolerance, um, attitude and, and actions by our administrators and police officers for that type of activity. Uh, but also the staff education and recognition of early warning signs and the interventions by staff. So beginning of every year, uh, part of their required videos that they have to go through is, is, um, recognizing gang activity and finding this early warning signs and seeing the early warning signs that have early intervention of, you know, we're not talking kids outta being in the gang, but we're talking them out of, Hey, let's, let's chill here. You're at school, you know, the gang activity that happens outside the building in our neighborhoods is what it is. Don't bring that stuff inside the school building. And, and so that's, that's our first goal. Chris, is there a an age or a grade where you begin to see those things? Yeah, that's a great question. Uh, in the past I would say that it was typically a high school thing. Um, I will tell you in the last two or three years, we've seen much more middle school activity. Um, probably a whole lot of, a lot of reasons for that. Um, there hasn't been a whole lot of convictions and of the arrest, uh, for middle school age. Uh, people under 18 tend to get released to their parents. And so gangs have gone to them and say, you know, Jeff, you're a youngster. Go do this for us and we'll take care of you, and by the time you turn 18, it'll be expunged. And so the, the fear and the danger or the risk, uh, isn't there so much. Um, and, and I think that's confined to Marion County. Um, so yes, we are seeing much more conversation, more kids in the middle school who are self-identifying as gang members, uh, in those conversations with admin and, and counselors and, and police officers. So, but yeah, good question. So, um, over the summer, uh, this Indiana State police gang assessment, uh, every summer they go through an assessment for your area. And these are the, the most prominent gangs in our south side of Indianapolis that they've identified. Um, the Asian boys, the only, only the family, the gangster disciples, MS 13, um, the m and then the, um, the bam. Um, those are the ones that are most prominent, I will say, for the activity that we see at our schools. The Asian boys, only the family and, and bam are the three names that pop up quite a bit, um, in conversations with kids. Um, but that was the Indiana State Police Gang assessment. So it's a constant, constant, um, battle in that gangs have been here for many, many, many, many years. It's not a new phenomenon. Um, it is our task and our role and our job to make sure that kids come to school in a safe environment and that the gang activity stays outside of our school day and, and school grounds. So the next two items, we'll start with law enforcement and student arrest data for the last two years. So as we present this data, we have a bar graph to kind of give you the big stark contrast of what, um, the arrests have been for. And then as the slides that are coming up, you'll see the actual data chart, um, is superimposed. And, and as we talk about suspensions, we'll have 'em broke down by building. Um, so we can kind of, you can kind of see it two different ways. So see a macro and then a micro version of the data. But, uh, the rest data has been, uh, pretty static over the last two, uh, years in the first semester with, uh, 12 and 11. Uh, and you can see the reasons why, uh, they were arrested there. So, um, probably more, uh, arrest for disturbance, um, and fighting, um, this year than, than last year. But again, we're talking about three versus seven. Um, but, um, but that's, it's a little bit telling in that not much change in the, in the year. Amen. And then we'll jump to the incident reports. Again, these are outta school suspension and in-school suspension. This data has been pulled outta skyward. And one thing I will, will warn you is, or at least share with you, is that these numbers should probably look, be looked at as gray and not black and white numbers in that, as you look at 23 different school buildings and some with multiple people entering data into Skyward, they're all interpreting these things a little bit different. And so we may want to talk about drugs and vaping as kind of one big number and look at as a, as a, a comparison, uh, and then kind of look at battery fighting and intimidation, uh, as maybe as one, you know, if I could put parentheses around those three things that maybe those numbers are a bit skewed a little bit because of actually some of the work that Aaron and Mc Brian had been doing in trying to normalize those incidents. Like we may have an incident where, where Jeff bumped into Jane in the hallway and, and she slugged him. Uh, well, in one school they may call that fighting in another school, they may call it intimidation, and another school may call it battery. And, and so what the work that Aaron and, and, um, Brian and I should say, um, John, John Romine thanks, um, are working on, is to try to get everybody on the same page and identify exactly what we're calling, what, you know, for instance, battery, battery is gonna fall in for the police. A battery falls into the category of they were fighting and bodily injury occurred. That's mattering. If you were just fighting and there was, we didn't need to provide first aid to you, or you didn't have broken limbs, that's fighting. And then, but we also see a, a, a, a discrepancy in people reporting intimidation, you know, where I bumped you in the hallway. Well, somebody may call that fighting and somebody may call that intimidation. So, so as you look at those numbers, keep that in the back of your mind. Um, and, and I would encourage you to kind of just add those numbers together to see if it's more or less. So we look at the bar graph, we're like, oh, wow, fighting is really up. But when you think about it in that prism, then it may be that, well, maybe it may be. Um, but it's, I think what you'll see in the corporation, it's, um, with the older kids, we're gonna see as we go through here that it's probably, uh, for the, for the fighting battery and intimidation, it's about same from last year to this year. Uh, drugs and vaping corporation wide, uh, you can see that, uh, vaping is up quite a bit, um, and the drugs as well. Now, I would also tell you that sometimes it's the same issue with vaping and drugs. So if I, I catch Kent more than likely Kent vaping, um, if I catch Kent vaping and there's THC in his vape, I may call it drugs, Jeff May report it as vaping. Okay. So that, again, that could be the discrepancy between there Is, is each, um, well, like, okay, let's use that as an example. You've confiscate, we have a vape that has THC, it is only going to be classified in one of those categories, correct? Correct. Okay. Correct. It's now, it's now represented twice. Okay. Correct. And, and if we had fighting because of drugs, the drugs that are present, it's only gonna be in one of those categories. Okay. Every one of those is an incident. Okay. Okay. Also, Mr. Sampson, on that top chart for the suspension date, is that representing number of days suspended? No, that's an incident. Okay. No, I do believe because I did it. Yep. It's, it's an incident. Yeah. So it could have been three days, it could have been two days, it could have been 10 days. So those are incidents that, and the chart that I pulled those from. Do we think that, um, vaping has increased because of our weapons detection? Like those wouldn't be included in Us. Mean, uh, I'll defer to our building folks. You have opinions on that. Uh, Weapons detection probably only get Now For our times, something Would, are those in these numbers. Okay. Yeah. So it's sometimes you'll have to where you get a report in the bag and find, Do, do you have, is there number repeated students or just That's a great question. Yes. Your, your question is, can we tell you if these are unique situations or are these Repeated? Do you have a number data that, what number percentage are repeated students or, We don't have that information in front of us tonight, but that's a great question and we can get that information. Do you think the follow up on what you had mentioned when you, rightly and I, I appreciate you kinda saying it's really what we're looking at is two categories here, not five different things. So when you look at the three on the left, really we're, again, if my math is correct, we've come down actually a little bit, but when you look at the right side, there's a noticeable increase. So do we, I guess to follow up on what Ms. Hartman said, do we know, is that more vigilance? Is it policy? Is it, um, usage? Yeah, I do. We know, I guess From the seat that I sit in, I would say that, uh, it's probably more vigilance. Uh, I also say would say that vaping has become more popular, uh, in the last three years. Um, but I think we've been more vigilant in terms of looking for it, finding it, and acting on it, uh, to where maybe when vapes started to become popular, it was like, ah, we're not gonna take that from you. Just keep it, like, don't bring it, bring it back. And now it's a, it's an initiative. Like, no, we now have a, a program in which, uh, if you're caught with a vape that you have an option of going into in a class to defer, to defer the cost of your ticket that they give you. And, um, but yeah, so I, I think it's probably all those things. What particular class do you have to educate students to be aware of this safety issue? In what grade level or every year? How do you do that? Yeah. Does anybody wanna talk about that in detail? Sure. Talk about it. Um, so it happens at many levels and in many layers, right? I mean, I would say even at the, um, elementary level, they're talking about things that harm your body in health class at the middle school level, they're talking about it again in health class. And so that tier one, that information that everybody gets comes through regular curriculum. But then we've also added a couple of layers recently in the last couple of years. So, um, if a student is caught vaping, there is a, a education piece that we give to them, um, that tells them specifically, like, this is something you have to pay attention to and this is the harm that can cause to your body. And, um, Mr. Sampson referenced the, um, diversion program that we started with the police officers. And so if you are caught vaping, there is a ticket that you are assigned. If you're a high school student and you have to pay money and you can't, uh, you can reduce the amount of money you have to pay if you come to the class that's taught by the police officer that talks about all the harms of vaping and, and the, both the legal implications and the medical implications of that, if you bring a parent with you to that class, it, the ticket gets reduced even more. And so that's something that we've recently put into place this school year. Um, that makes me very intrigued about the numbers that you're talking about. Like, is that working? So, uh, every time they are caught, the parents are noticed. Absolutely. Just like any discipline. Okay. Um, referral. Correct. Yeah. Just pardon my ignorance on this, but when you have a student that has vaped or regular caught with a vape, they get a ticket. Is that, uh, is it a law, is it something that we do? I, I just dunno where it falls on the spectrum. So it's an actual legal ticket. Okay. Um, but I believe the first one, now, we, we had to work on this because of the diversion program. So Chris, help me with this, but I believe the first one is not because if they attend the class and we knock the funds down, it doesn't actually show up then in their legal record. Yeah. Brian, you wanna talk to them? Yeah. Brian's like, let me talk The first one they get, we write the ticket and we hold the, if they get caught a second time, we then issue the ticket and then they can attend the class. When they attend the class, there's a fee to the class is what they actually pay. So we can't actually, 'cause their ticket is like a Marion County. It's underage possession of tobacco products. Gotcha. Okay. Basically. So, so they get assigned that ticket, I think it's around $170 is what it is. They attend the class, they pay the fee, um, to attend the class. And we don't ever have to actually formally issue. So the ticket's written, they get a copy of it, we don't file it. Second offense file it. If they don't attend the class, we attend the class, we still won't file the ticket charge fee third time. And then we start with other Interventions. And the intent is to educate them as much as possible. Sure. It's, Hey, we're not just making this rule just because we like to make rules. It's because we have concerns about the health risk and, and those kinds of things with it too. And so it's, you know, less about the punishment initially than it is the education and then also getting the parent buy in on that conversation. 'cause most, more likely than not, that money's coming outta the parent's pocket, um, for that ticket. Well, that was kind of, that's why I didn't know if, if it was a, you know, it was a law and IMPD kind of handles the ticketing and the collection, or whether that's something that we did. Speeding. Okay. Okay. Yeah, don't have any, I don't have any base knowledge for it, so I appreciate the info. And the first time too, I forgot to add, there's a campus course, not just that they don't get the tick second players, then you have to attend. Okay. Kind of play rather than just, Okay. Thank you, John. Cooperation. Great. Thank you for the info. Okay. Here you can see the high school data again, won't beat us up too much, but, um, we kind of hit the highlights. But, um, our high school data is down a little bit on the violent offenses, but also up on the drug and the, and the vaping. Uh, our numbers are up. Uh, you see it's the, the bar graphs represent all three of those entities. And then the data charts are all broken down for you. So if you wanna see it in, in smaller detail of what's happening on each campus. So, um, alright. Matt, middle School again. Um, as you look at the, the violent activity, the numbers kind of pan out to be about the same, uh, through end. But again, we're seeing an increase in vaping into middle school level. And then as we look at the sixth grade academy, um, we're seeing a big increase in fighting. Um, and again, it, it may be the work, it may be the work of Aaron and, uh, Brian, as we start talking to administrators about documenting incidents, sixth grade is kind of that extension of elementary to where you're like, we're not gonna do that anymore. Come back tomorrow, we're gonna have a better day. And we don't put it in skyward. Um, it's kind of a, an an elementary type of approach. And that may be a reflection of why numbers are bigger in one year than another, where it's more intentional that we are now gonna document things this year of, of the fighting that's going on that we see in the sixth grade academy. Okay, man, You see, vaping is becoming, even in sixth grade, vaping is, is an issue. So, and then the elementary is all lumped together. Um, I didn't break those out by building, but, um, uh, you can see that, again, a concerted effort of of, of kids acting out and acting out against each other in, in the violent areas. And, and again, um, you know, sadly enough when, again, a first semester you say we have four kids with vapes, but there are four elementary kids that have vapes. And, um, it's not a huge number, but it is a, is an issue and know that our kids are exposed to those things early on in their lives. So, but, um, that's the data for you to digest. And, and again, uh, anything that, um, questions or any ideas that pop up later, um, or we could talk about now or even feel free to reach out to all of us, uh, with other Yes. Questions. It looks like fighting is the most very repeated, offended things. So looks like we are going to have a lot of wrestler from here. Maybe we just need to redirect them, right? Yeah. Do you, do you have a ethnic based data? Last time we hear from middle school, uh, what ethnic data, uh, immigrants group are doing more or less something like, do we have that I, We'd be able to disaggregate it through Skyward so we can put something together to send in the board. Um, as a follow up. I didn't hear the question. Yeah. O one thing interesting is that if the migrants group, uh, oh, brings something that the, the culture, like if that's more I'm interested to, to do like, particularly like bur ese ethnic group students in and last time we deal with the gang six man years ago when Tom, Dr. Tom Little was there, a lot of Burmese student get involved in gang activity. And, and then we, we met them, the parents, students, and they told us that they were not aware of that, like being gang members, like signs and, and being photographed with the other gang members and such thing because a youth culture that related to the youth, uh, way they plug into some, uh, I think that may be what you see. Another question I have say I think sometime ago we talk about in a public meeting here is there's anything we can have the, uh, educational slides. So with the cliff that we can create for the parents to, to know, be aware of that. So I think, uh, we don't have a a means to educate the parents before it happens, but only people who have committed that rules, then you notice them. But, uh, I think it's in general principle education, the parents, especially like new commerce, they don't really know what's going on in school. So I think that's would be what you have that, uh, educational, informational, uh, booklet or where we can hand out to the parents. Mm-hmm. You bring up a really good point. Um, when we were dealing with this at, at its height several years ago mm-hmm. Um, we did partner with our chin church leaders and the education they gave to parents, um, both with showing them what the vapes looked like and telling them the flavors. You remember that when we passed those all around Yeah. And talked about the flavors and smelled them all. So many people didn't really know that that's what we were talking about. Mm-hmm. And so then they were able to be more aware in their home. So yes, education is a big part of this. And our schools try to do that in back to school nights. They will involve our police officers in helping to educate, but it's never enough. Right. And not everyone, but If you have that video clip or something we can share, I would be interested to share pass on to church leaders and network the network that may help at least some extent educational. I just, I just had two quick questions, but, um, do the, do the gangs typically stay within their own ethnicity, for lack of a better term, where we typically, if you see gangs fighting each other, it may be a Mexican gang fighting against the chin gang. Yeah. Do they recruit cross ethnicity? I mean, Yeah. It's, it is been an interesting phenomenon. The Asian boys were the first Asian gang in this area for a while, and then they spl it off, um, and they start accepting other ethnicities into their group. Um, which then formed the, um, oh, I've looked the other ones. Yeah. Yeah. Only the family. Okay. Um, which was this ethnicity only. And, um, and so interesting, interesting. The bam uh, the Asian boys and, um, just the family were our, um, all splinter groups. Okay. Of the Asian boy. The other two are split splinters of the other two. They had a falling out and started their own. Gotcha. The other, the big activity we see between our kids is more retaliation than it is. They don't go rob each other. They may in a drug deal somewhere down in town or something, or they're stealing guns or, or whatever. But there's, retaliation is a big thing between the gangs. Um, I dunno if you remember maybe two or three years ago, we about five murders, uh, that they were able to track back to. One happened over to Baxter y in the parking lot. Yeah. Um, they tracked it back to a so pickup soccer game on the weekend out at Holder Field to where you disrespected me. And so I shot your brother in the leg. Mm-hmm. You shot my brother in the leg, so I'm gonna shoot your friend. And we, they tracked and were able to pin five murders back to that soccer game. Wow. So how that's how that retaliation kind of builds and, and, um, it, it, it's, it's a real thing. So, um, probably the biggest danger that we have in our school's retaliation. Okay. Um, but they work really hard. Is like, keep that outta here. And then the other question I had was, um, and, and maybe it's not a thing now, but, um, does, are you seeing much use with alcohol and kind of, does that fall in like the drugs Section? It be the drugs. Okay. Yeah. I don't know that I, our skyward doesn't go to that, that definition of those. And you know, maybe Brian or Jane have some perspective on that, but, um, I, it was even marijuana in that. Okay. Yeah. The alcohol guy, it's gonna go much more. Gotcha. Okay. Thank you. For the fighting, is it usually, um, the same kids fighting or is it just a, like that many different incidents? Or is it the same people having a Yeah, that's a great question. We do have that data. I didn't, uh, bring that with me and, and compile it, but we do have recurring incidents of, you know, how many kids have repeated. Um, and then we can drill down to that and, and take a look at that as we to look at for some of our proactive measures. You know, what type of programs are we putting these kids into? Um, you know, we, we may have a hundred incidents that are, that are created by 70 kids, you know? Um, and so that may be part of our approach as well. Got two more. Yep. Um, were there any differences between the elementary schools that you found? Uh, yeah, ironically, yeah. Um, a little bit. Um, I don't know, I kinda laughed a little bit in that you can tell which elementary principals used to be high school people. I mean, they, they tend to go ahead and, and move forward with a, a suspension of some kind quicker than maybe someone who's been in the elementary all their long. Um, but that's just maybe a mindset of, I mean, would you agree with that? Yeah. I think some of the work that Aaron's doing with our assistant principals who are really the ones that do a lot of that work is to create some alignment and common expectations. So we do think that some of the data right now maybe is not really a representation of what's going on. And so we think this is kind of the baseline and as we keep going forward with the work they're doing, the data will be able to tell us a lot more insights than what maybe we currently have. 'cause it is very different across the board. I think this kind of ties into what you just said. I noticed intimidation went down like a crazy amount for all the schools. Is that just the difference in language or, Yeah, I think, um, again, this year's kind of that baseline year of, um, Brian Jane and John Roman have done some, Brian Aaron and John Roman have done some great work, uh, with our and with Matt to kind of make sure that our code's aligned to what the Indiana law is and then have conversations around what does that actually mean and why we're coding it that way. Um, it's been a while, but we had a year where, like a previous one that we did a, a presentation on where, I forget what the title was, but like, not completing work dropped like 92% in a year. And it was just because they called it failure to comply the next year. So we've really, you know, the last two years really worked to start laying the groundwork to make sure that we have common understandings of this is what that means, and then this is, this makes sense as consequences or things you would follow. So again, uh, Aaron, Brian and John have done a great job with that and we think it will just continue. So what I would add is that why I think if you just add those numbers together, you'll have a bigger picture of, because they each represent one incident. Um, and what Jeff is saying that it, um, it, it, it's only represented one, so it's in one of those three categories and it may just look different. Um, but um, you know, we would ha have our head in the sand if we believe intimidation would went way down. My first thought when I looked at it was like, oh, well they're, they, it is not intimidation. 'cause now they're fighting over it. Right. It's not putting up with it anymore. Can uh, sorry. No, go ahead. Uh, uh, what about the gun detector is working? Have, do we have the data? How The weapons detection? We installed gun detector last year. Right. So Yeah. So it helps. We initially, well a great story is on the first day we got 56 vapes at Perry High School. Wow. In the bushes outside the school because they did a perimeter sweep on the first day and to see if kids ditched anything. And they ditched. It was like 54, I think 54 or 56 vapes. 'cause kids thought that it was gonna catch their vape. Ah, okay. Um, so all told we've, we got to the number 10, um, pretty quick. Mm-hmm. Um, in terms of weapons that were caught by the weapons detection and, um, have had a lot after that. Uh, you know, a few, a few knives and things, but not nothing, nothing major since then. So, um, Well, and I think something important to make sure we make a point of, um, just about all of those were adults who had the weapons on them, not so much students. Yeah. Seven out of the 10 were adults. Yeah. And so it's just, you know, making sure they didn't know kind of what they could and couldn't. And being in an open carry state, sometimes the, we don't think about those as much as, um, we probably should as well. So, So an interesting, uh, sidebar, um, that one of the, uh, officers asked a kid who was in a knockdown drag out fight is like, what are you doing? There's teachers, there's police, everybody's right here, you're fighting in front of us. And he goes, this is the safest place to fight. You have weapons detection. I know he doesn't have a gun that I, that, that kind of stunned all of us. So we did not expect that, but that was the mind of a 17-year-old kid. Yeah. But, um, any other questions pop up? And again, the ethnicity, uh, issue we have those da we actually have those charts so we can be glad to send that out tomorrow. One, one last questions there. How serious this is the gun, uh, the violence and vaping and fighting, uh, do you see this minor or how, what level is this critical to the school's? Uh, performance, students' performance and uh, do we see a lot of student, uh, delaying their study achievement due to discount activity? Well, in school, boy of course, I I don't think elementary fighting would be the big deal. Harmful to each other. But in high school level and middle school, they can cause a lot of mental, uh, discomfort and stress for student and yeah. Do correlation. Do we have any correlation that this violence and that being and drug issue cause students performance? Yeah, I don't know that we have specific data. I don't know, um, if Brian or Jane have any anecdotal e evidence of that or conversations about that. Whether you're hearing, hearing that from students or I, I would, I would tell you that our, um, our school behaviors are changing, as you all know, that our community behaviors are changing. And that is certainly reflected in our school, which makes teaching and learning that much more difficult. Um, as we grow the capacity of our teachers and our administrators to be able to, to, um, address these issues, we're all learning. Um, when students have these discipline incidents, um, many times that changes their educational placement. We, we believe that we're not gonna separate students from education, but if you're not safe in our schools, you're not gonna come to school with us. We'll find a different way to educate you either through one of our alternative programs or through some online learning or whatever it needs to be for whatever length of time it needs to be. So in those situations, it definitely can disrupt their educational process, but we are committed to Not letting it disrupt others. So that's kind of my question is just can you just help me understand, um, what the out of school suspension and in-school suspension process is? Like, how many offenses does it take for you to get out school versus in-school? Like how does that, how does that work? Help me And then, and then how does that trickle down to JWR Encompass? Yeah, go for it. It's not a clear headache concern. Right. So I think there are, there are two things I think you're describing. So we have larger incidents like things, the acts of violence and fighting and that that's gonna immediately result in, And that's what this data is right here. Correct? It's both. It's both. It's both. Okay. So most of the Time something like five is gonna resolve the obstacle. Half the time may not removed from the bill to the other side of that. You're kind of representative kind of some share or bigger ones levels. And, and in that too, some of is just kind of, you know, policy on discipline, category one, category Three, These things marked as battery. Like we wanted to move for an expulsion even though, you know, past years we wanted move expulsion on a, on a fight. We had to label it as battery even though we probably were gonna all fight, it's still different. Um, but then reported JWR and play, depending that didn't, this happens, this kid, this happens. This has had some kids in the hallway and just somebody bumped into somebody they really don't past years, my aggression. Now our might not resulting expulsion and that is a lot of have an, somebody's gonna break up with it. Mm-hmm. We, we try not to do that. Right, Right. Okay, good. We have a grid that says you did this and it's the third time you did this together and say this. Right. What we need those severe incidents and some separation and at day, like Mr. Monk's question of like the educational act. I always felt like if earlier in the week probably gonna have another mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Later in the week, it might be good then for two weeks after that. But anxiousness brings that they all, and also when you look at fighting numbers, do realize divide by 2, 2 44 incidents, divide that by two and Yeah, That's not a one person's, two person over One. I think something just to keep in mind is that they've done a lot of work and, and we've tried to see how consistent we can be so that we do have longitudinal data and then we can do it, which we haven't been able to have, um, in the past when we take a look at some of the student discipline data, which is where we want to GE be, and then be able to do the comparisons, basically their ethnic groups or, or socioeconomic or, or whatever that may be. Or this side of this district versus the other side of the district. So, um, we'll be getting better with that always. You know, and, and I think the other thing is that is it is what it is. The numbers are what the numbers are. Um, I don't know that they represent a, an increase necessarily or a decrease, but they are what they are. And we, we do have very safe school environments. Um, we have, um, some kids who make some poor choices. Um, some make the same poor choice more than once in their academic career. Um, but we've got great educators in those buildings who work with them, work with their families, but also have a line of tolerance of whether that kid is going to be able to continue their education in that school environment so that everybody else is safe as well. Well, I just wanted to say thank you for Mr. Samson for bringing out the, I just never in a million years even contemplated that. Okay. Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna fight here 'cause it's the safest place to fight. It's kind of crazy in my mind, but I'm also not 17 anymore, but I learned something I never even thought of before tonight, so appreciate you sharing that. Yep. Well, thank you for the work that went into, um, putting all this together, you and your team. Sure. I also just would say thank you to the building administrators who this is their world every day. That is not an easy job. Um, and so just, we appreciate their efforts, um, and, uh, know that again, what they do is not easy, but we couldn't do it without him. Um, next we'll look at a Lilly Foundation grant update with Mr. Spencer and Mrs. Pollard. Yeah, thank you board. Uh, we're really excited to come to you tonight and give you some updates on the Lilly Grant. Um, Jane and I have spent most of our day talking about it, so, um, and still very excited. So just some background and just some reminders. So, uh, Lily, um, gave us the opportunity in three phases to access some money. So the first phase was the planning phase. So that was a $50,000 grant award, which we received. And we've used that to, uh, visit Fort Wayne as we've reported out before, and, and do some other things that kind of help us think through how we wanted to phrase this grant. And now we are into phase two. And so phase two is a non-competitive, it is a, um, a non-competitive portion are, it's based on number of students in your district. So for us, that will be about $8 million of funds that, uh, we could receive from this grant. And we're really passionate about telling the story of this. We think we've got a really compelling story, as you can see the title, empowering the South Side, inspiring Dreams and Cultivating Realities. We want to, um, one, meet the needs of our, our diverse students. As you all know, over half of our students are multilingual. We have a large number of EL students. We have a large number of, um, economically disadvantaged students. They also have lots of gifts and talents that if we can provide the right things for them, that it can really transform this community. And so we feel that, um, there is this need, especially for our students to, um, become aware and have a vision for themselves of what career and post, uh, K 12 can be. And so that's kind of the focus of the grant at the K eight level and maybe into ninth and 10th grade. And then Jane will talk about then what that looks like at the secondary level and talk about the entrepreneurship pathway, which we've, we've previously talked about, um, and the connections with Fort Wayne. And so the other exciting piece of this grant, it is, it is connected to our three year strategic plan. Uh, all that work we did last year really set us up to know kind of what's next and, and align these grant goals to that, that work we're already starting, which we think, again, from, from Lilly's perspective, um, is an attractive, uh, ask on our end. So then looking at the key initiatives, uh, we're gonna continue our literacy journey. Obviously we've started that already and we, we've brought the board, um, up to speed on that a number of times. We're gonna continue to provide, uh, opportunities for our staff to grow capacity and create some systems that allow us to address literacy at a K 12 level. We feel like that's a foundational need and one of the first things we need to make sure that our students are able to do. Uh, the second piece is, uh, through the use of project-based learning and, and student-centered learning, giving our teachers a tool in their toolkit to bring community partners into the classroom to show off different careers. Um, we're excited that, um, we're gonna continue to partner with Magnify on this and they're gonna help embed literacy and n it into that training. So it's not gonna be the teachers go to a training on five different things. Um, they're gonna have an opportunity to see how it fits within our existing structures, which throughout the grant we kind of build on past work that we've done. 'cause again, I think that's attractive and that's sustainable and, and that makes sense. But also through that in entrepreneur and innovative piece, which I think also is, is aligned to the outcomes that Lilly wants. So we're gonna have at that lower levels of education opportunities for students that if they didn't get it at school, might not have the opportunity to interact with an engineer or doctor or, uh, other professionals to see, uh, the options for themselves after they leave us. And so then at the secondary level, let Jane talk about that and then some systems at the district level. So as Jeff said, one of the things that we've been really thinking a lot about is we've been planning for this is what opportunities our students haven't had before. They land with us here in school. And we know that, um, that we've thought very, all of us here in this room have thought a lot about, um, how do we expose our kids to what they don't know? How do you teach kids something that they don't know and how do you teach families that? And we've tried some things through the years with the University of Minneapolis partnership and the college camp that they have. And, and so that really is a thread that we are taking not just at the high school level, but all the way down to the kindergarten level, kindergarten all the way up to high school. How can we start to have those conversations and those real life, real world learning experiences with kids so they can start to understand at, at the very lowest levels, what, what does that mean and, and what does it look like for me to be in that career or going along that educational pathway? So let's talk for a minute about that entrepreneur entrepreneurship pathway. So you guys have heard about the Fort Wayne visit and, uh, we wanna bring that to Perry Township Schools. Um, so we've written that into this grant as a, as a way in the phase two element to start. Um, as you know, the entrepreneurship pathway is an opportunity for us in Perry Township schools to not have to staff and, and, um, narrow students down to one pathway. Um, so instead of saying, um, pick this one, pick this one, pick this one, this will be a way for us to meet those educational competencies across a variety of educational experiences. And again, modeling after Fort Wayne, they have, um, experiences with business and digital communication and marketing. They have experiences with advanced manufacturing and, and some abilities to create things. They have some agricultural grow culinary spaces, and they have some digital communication spaces. I might have repeated that. I don't know that that will be where we will land necessarily, but we will have an opportunity, we believe through that entrepreneurship pathway to say what exactly what type of experiences do we wanna expose our kids to? And the flexibility then to kind of move through that as we get student feedback extra. So we're excited about that part. Another piece to, um, this grant is, um, we've learned through our strategic plan, and if we're going to reimagine and reshape what learning looks like for our students here in Perry Township schools, we're gonna have to grow the capacity of the people who are doing that learn that teaching and learning, including our leaders actually starting first with our leaders. If we're gonna, um, expect some different changes, we're gonna have to support them in that, that process. So some leadership development, um, threading all the way down through some teacher capacity building, um, and strengthening those systems is built into this. And then finally, um, a way to know whether or not the work that we're doing is working or what the impact is. Um, and as well as some early monitoring systems through, um, the data you have heard us talk about Aubrey, we've written that into this grant as well, so that we can sustain that through the, the grant cycle and beyond. Um, Aubrey is gonna allow us to do the data lake piece that, um, my colleagues are very excited about. Um, but also to, um, to know then as we put interventions in place and, and we do different programming, um, what's working and what's not working through actual data sources as opposed to just anecdotal. So then just some outcomes that we, we see out of this. So, um, the, the Lilly grant there, there's three outcomes that they expect, which is to, um, increase student achievement at the K 12 area, um, to increase post-secondary outcomes and then remove barriers. So we think that our plan is going to address all of those and, and have a positive impact on our students. Uh, the other piece that we're really excited about in, in, um, Melissa Morris, who is our director of grants and strategic partnerships, she's done a lot of listening to lots of people and then going and doing the boots on the groundwork of, of writing this. And so, uh, we've really pushed her on telling the story. Like, we think this can have an impact on changing the south side of Minneapolis. And because our students have all these gifts, and if we can get them where they need to be post-secondary, they're gonna come back into our community and be the entrepreneurs and be the people that will give back. And so we think there's gonna be a, a significant increase in, um, a stronger community connection here on the south side. Uh, because of this, um, sustainability wise, we think that growing the capacity of our teachers, especially in a strategic way that aligns our, our initiatives is, is a way that will make this sustainable. Um, purchasing a program doesn't necessarily do that, but if we build, if we build the capacity of our people as an opportunity to create that change over time, uh, we also think the community partnership piece is, is gonna be a sustainability, um, aspect of that. And we think that, again, Melissa's role as strategic partnerships will be a, a big piece of that, of, of getting people to the table. And then if you create this awesome environment where we see all these results, um, eventually businesses are interested in investing in that. So we do think down the road that there'll be some sustainability related to some, some fundraising that people will see the ideas that we're, that we've put together and they're gonna wanna invest in that. And we've got some, again, some early learning in Fort Wayne where we've seen the results that because they did it that way, they, they have business partners now coming to them. And so we think we can replicate that here. So those are kind of the, the outcomes. Yes. Dr. Mong Quick questions there, particularly in the committee engagement. Uh, what particular programs are, do what? Can you explain to me a little more about that? Yeah, absolutely. Actually it takes us to our next slide if I can get there. Am I rolling wrong? Okay. Um, so one of the things that, um, like we talked about it a few minutes ago that we really believe that our kids need is that authentic learning experience. They don't need to read about it in a book. They don't need teachers to put together a project where we sell something that's just for the benefit of selling it. They really need our community business professionals to come alongside them and be present in the classroom so that it's authentic. So we, and we know that our community as, as wonderful as our community is, they don't always know the ways to get into our schools. I, I wanna help support classrooms. I don't exactly know a way to do that. Project-based learning gives us a way to do that. And so we believe that while we've done some project based learning, we can make this experience more authentic and more real for kids. So that's the, the easy first answer when we talk about the entrepreneurship pathway. What we saw in Fort Wayne was community members, as Jeff just said, actually coming to the school and saying, I own a business. I have this problem and this, I need some help figuring it out. Can you gimme a team of students to, to work with me? We've seen that transfer then into some of their students starting their own businesses and, and getting employment from those businesses that they've worked with. So we think it can be, uh, uh, everything from just a, an influence in the elementary classroom up to a partnership as the students get older. And Jeff stole my thunder a little bit, but um, because I have, we've talked about this all day. Like he said, we met with the University of Indianapolis for a good part of our afternoon. And one of the things we really are trying to do in this grant is to try to tell the story of the south side of Indianapolis. It's changed over the last decade, right. And we believe that we can convince, if we can convince Lily to invest in our students, that truthfully they will be changing the south side of Indianapolis. Our community, especially those who have come here and chosen to live here, they're going to, we believe, choose to continue to live here. They've worked hard to build a community on the south side of Indianapolis. So therefore, if we can just shore up the skills of entrepreneurship, problem solving, thinking, literacy, and we can close those learning gaps for our students, we believe that they are going to make this community thrive. In fact, we were laughing with the University of Indianapolis folks this afternoon, um, looking at some of the empty, um, oh, strip centers that are over next to the University of Indianapolis and maybe in a few short years if we grow kids, maybe those are full of businesses that our kids have started or our families have started because we've planted those seeds of what it could be for these, for these kiddos. I know that's a little bit Pollyanna and I tend to be that way when I'm talking about this grant because it is something we have really longed for. It is quite an opportunity. Um, we, this is phase two, we have to go on to phase three. We will go on, we tend to go on to phase three as soon as we submit this one. Um, but that's where we are for the non-competitive portion. Uh, we'll be back still dreaming about the competitive portion in the next phase. I didn't steal your thunder. You were much more passionate about that than I was. Good job. So phase two is due February 14th. Okay. I knew it was soon. Yes. Um, and it is non-competitive, so even if we don't, aren't awarded phase two, we can still apply for phase three. Is it, so phase two, I think the right way to say it, to talk about phase two is to say that Lilly has funded that already for the Marion County schools. Okay. So I think the right way to think about it is if we've done the work and it's a reasonable idea, the funding is there. Phase three is limited funding, therefore not everyone who wants it is going to get it. We have to compete for that. Got It. And that looks like turning in a one pager by the middle of April, and then they would invite us to pitch if selected over the summer. Okay. And, um, while $8 million sounds like a lot in my personal budget, um, it really isn't in the school district budget. Um, so is, is the entrepreneurship pathway in making that come to life? Is, is that the large chunk of this? That's a great question. Kent. Jeff and I spent the morning working on the budget and our initial budget at first Lance was, um, more than double what the 8 million was. So you're right, it goes fast. Um, there will be, uh, it certainly is a large portion of it, but I would say right now we've got it down to about one third, about a third for the entrepreneurship pathway, about a third for growing the, the K 12 programs, the capacity building, et cetera. And then another third for some, um, partnership stuff. Okay. And, um, are we using what staff we currently have or is this hiring additional staff? This is hiring additional staff. Okay. Right now, I mean, I don't know. When we start, we'll have to think about a program director that's all written into the grant. I think eventually if this goes then, then we look at trading FTEs. I dunno. I have no idea. Perfect. And then, uh, one more question. Um, Fort Wayne has already written the pathway for this, is that correct? Great question. It's already a pathway in with the Department of Education, so we don't have to do anything for that. Okay, okay. It, but it's just a pathway, it's not curriculum. Correct. We'll have to choose curriculum. Correct. Correct. But I I, those pathways still have to be approved by the state department. We're developing our own if we're developing our and this one is theirs. Got it. It is perfect. Thank you. Great question. Quick question. Uh, so this is really for me that, uh, we're curious. I, I'm curious to see that the students are very good with hands personal skill comparatively in, I think this area we're far behind some other serious district because the location, the demographic, we don't really have a big business. I've been here more than 20 years and diversity growing. But, uh, business entrepreneurship growth I think is very minimal. And I think this is really, uh, critical that we train students hands full and hands on skill training and where they can, uh, plug in, uh, even if they don't go to college or, or while in college. So my question is that the, uh, in the near future, how soon we going to expect to see the visible results or the impact, or how can we make sure the success of that program? That's a great question too. We worked on the timeline this morning. So there will be some, and if we once we're awarded the phase two grant, there will be some initial things such as starting the project based learning training and, and making sure that we are, um, starting to build the capacity of our people that will start right away as early as this summer. As far as the entrepreneur entrepreneurship pathway. So Pathways in Indiana take a principals course and two concentrator courses. The high school principals are very excited about this. And so both schools are offering the principals course for entrepreneurship in anticipation that we'll get this pathway going. And so we'll be ready to, to do something with these kiddos that have taken this principals course. The fall of 2026. We've got a lot of work to do if we think we're gonna have a FA or a place and all of that, but as soon as we possibly can is the answer. Good. Thank. Good. Can you talk more about the teacher development? You wanna talk About that? Sure. Yeah. So, um, so we're working with, uh, magnify Learning. So they've, they've already had some success working with our district and project based learning training and so that, um, it will be our leadership teams go first is the model we found works really well because if you train teachers but you haven't built the vision of the leaders and had the leaders have an understanding and conceptualization of what this looks like, they can be a barrier. And so typically our leaders are gonna go first and come up with an implementation plan, and then that will look like it, it's customized. So it depends on, different schools could go different routes with it, but it looks like training a first group of teachers is kind of your early adopters and the people that are really excited about it and they go first and we support them and then we just continue to fold out more and more, uh, people into that training. What's gonna be unique about this and a little different from what we've done previously is that idea of taking our, what we've learned with literacy and some of our NRAT structures, and then also the, the social emotional component and adding those into the PBL training so that it's streamlined for teachers so that, again, it's not six different trainings, it's one that then, then they're going to use to implement in their classroom. And I'm really passionate about project based learning, so I can talk lots more details if you'd like, but that would be my big picture answer. I'm just gonna add one other piece. So NIET has given us a lot of frameworks for instruction and what good instruction looks like, et cetera. Um, this past three years we've been working really hard on student ownership as a piece of our NIET structures. And so, um, project based learning is going to bring the how, so they've got a lot of that foundational knowledge, but sometimes it's difficult to put it into implementation and that's what we think project based learning will do for our Students. Yeah, that's a great, because, and Lee could attest this as an NIT district, that the higher ends of the rubric are asking a lot and it's, it's really student ownership, as Jane said, and, and the students being a part of the learning and, and this gives the teachers a really practical tool on their toolkit to be able to do those things. I like that you mentioned that because you know, you just think, oh, put more on the kids, make them own it, but you literally have to teach teachers what that looks like and how to teach kids how to own. Right. Uh, just as much as you have to teach them literacy or math. Yeah. Um, and uh, I did like to hear that, you know, when you hear Pathways doing the work that we do, you think high school, you get to high school, we gotta figure out a pathway, but it sounds like this is a more long sided, uh, K 12, you know, components throughout. So I think that's really exciting too. Any other questions or comments? Your, um, PBL tree, your project based learning tree is, um, becoming quite vast. Um, is that a, um, can that be used to our advantage now? Because I mean, I know people from Southport l have are in different schools, so do we have people already in mind, I guess that are um, like a principal that's really good at PB or has done it more? Do you know what I mean, more familiar with it? Do we have people kind of pegged like, can you do this? Can you help this? Or leading can, can we train our own trainers kind of thing. So that's the Yeah, we were reviewing this today too. That's kind of the beauty of it is that yeah, over the five years we're creating local sustainability. So, uh, we're making this investment, um, within Magnify they've got, like, you go through a jumpstart, which is like the first experience, and then there's an advanced, and then if they choose they can get certified and then they're like train the trainers. And so we've got probably seven of those people in our district currently. Um, and Southward Dale is a demonstration site for them, so they're already identified our model school, I should say. So they're already identified as a place that's doing it well. And so yes, over time this will by the end of the grant, um, once we get into the nuts and bolts of like what it looks like each year, you'll see that the cost eventually gets lower and lower for that because we've created our own, um, sustainability within the district. And the training, is it specific, um, elementary versus secondary, or is it kind of the methodology crosses over the whole way? So we've done it both ways. I mean, Brian trained his entire science department, so he had some really specific secondary trainings that made sense. Um, but we've also had jumpstart weeks that had both secondary and elementary together. You come together for some of the like foundational pieces and then you'd split up, uh, when you got into more specific content. 'cause obviously it looks very different in elementary classroom versus a high school classroom. But again, magnify has been able to customize that for us and it's, it's worked well for us thus far. And when Brian and Jeff were both, um, building principles, we did some community partnership breakfast. You might remember those Yes. Where we brought kids together from the high school and the elementary school that had done projects so they could showcase those. And we envision bringing those back. Yep. I think that's so important too that we start, we do more of that because then you get the buy-in early, but also the I saw it. Do, you know, and when you see it and it's like poetry in motion, you know. Um, but I think that that can get more community buy-in. It's just, it just keeps rolling and rolling and rolling. So, great. Thank you. Well, thank you both and your team. And obviously it sounds like with Kent involved, it's, it is truly another team effort. Um, so great to hear. Um, with that we are adjourn this evening.