--------- And to the Republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay. Alright. It looks like we have four people that have, uh, signed up to give public comment. And just to remind each of you that, that do go up, um, we have three minutes and then we'll, we'll ask you to, to, to wrap it up if you would please. Okay. So first we have, uh, Alex and, uh, up to the podium please. Thank you. I'm here today to talk about the distance between a policy and a person.
My name is Alex Vance and as a junior at Prairie Meridian, I've spent the last week watching my classmates. Friends I've grown up with carry a weight that no teenager should have to balance alongside their schoolwork. Prairie Meridian is a beautiful, diverse community and we have many families who are here under temporary protected status or are currently navigating the complexities of our immigration system for these students. The recent conversations around ICE and enforcement aren't political theories or current events to be debated. They are matters of whether their dinner table will be full tonight or if a chair will be empty tomorrow.
These are our friends and for some of us, our family. Last Monday, we were told over at the PA that the administration's goal was to remain neutral. While that word sounds fair in a textbook, it feels very different when your family's safety is a topic to the student wondering if their parents will be there when they get home. Neutrality sounds like our school is choosing not to take a side in their survival when you are told to keep the main thing. The main thing we have to ask, how can a student focus on the main thing learning when they don't feel seen or protected by the very people in charge of their environment? We aren't here to argue about the logistics of a walkout.
We are here because there is a human crisis at Prairie Meridian. You cannot tell students to walk to the office instead of the streets and then not be there when they arrive. We are asking the board to ensure that our administration moves past neutrality and toward active support. We need leaders who are available when we are hurting and a school that understands that for many of us, safety isn't about a locked front door. It's about knowing our community stands with us. Specifically, we are asking for an immediate commitment to fully staff all promised safe spaces in a transparent schedule for administration to meet face-to-face with the students they have previously turned away.
We need concrete actions that prove our voices are being heard rather than seen as second best. Thank you. Thank you Alex. Next is Aiden. Hello, my name is Aiden er. I'm a current junior at Perry Marine High School. And I'm speaking today out of personal experience and on behalf of my fellow peers who might not be able to. The following is a message from one of these students over the course of the past week following the walkout at Southport and the hold placed on par, ensure a walkout did not happen this past Monday. Many parent students have, many Perry students have felt unsupported. I would like to make clear that our issue is not
with whether there should be a walkout or should not be a walkout. We understand that the school was concerned with our safety and the walkout was not well planned. What we do, however, take issue with is how Addin followed up with students complaints during the rest of the week. On Monday, our principal came over the PA system at the beginning of the sixth period with a message for us. This message was recorded. Recorded and I will quote a piece from it. Now we have the responsibility of keeping the main thing, the main thing, which is learning, being neutral in our views and the safety of our campus. This message was interpreted by many students as a call for neutrality at school.
Perry Meridian is a school with a large num, with a large immigrant population, including many students and families who have lived in the United States for years under temporary protected status and other forms of legal protection with ongoing changes to immigration policy and increased enforcement by ice. Many members of our school community are experiencing fear uncertainty in the very real possibility of family separation. With this concern in Perry, preaching from a stance of neutrality can be seen as very controversial trying to come up with a solution. Perry Stu members met with the principal
after school on Tuesday and came up with a solution, a safe space where students could talk to counselors, translators and English language learner teachers about their experiences in dealing with new immigration policies in and outside the classroom. This was supposed to be a safe space where students could express themselves. However, instead, many students report the space to be understaffed. Many students walked in looking for support and instead there was no faculty. Students were hanging out in the space without any supervision in the room. They looked for a place to express their emotions and instead were faced with no support from faculty. Farther the admin has been refusing to
and standing up several students who need their voices concerned with them. A student journalist was told to come down and talk with the admin during fifth period. They were busy, so they said they would send a pass for him when the principal was free. It has now been over a week since that same student came forward to voice concerns and he has not been able to meet with anyone. I even asked to meet with the principal after school, but was told he was unavailable for meetings at this time. The amount he is willing to meet with students while saying in his emails, don't walk out, walk into our office is shocking. Students do not truly have a way to communicate with admin despite them saying they're open for discussion.
Admin does not have time to meet and listen to concerns of students, but is also limiting their rights to protest in other ways. Thank you guys so much for listening. I appreciate it so much. Thank you, Aiden. Next we have Caroline. Hello, my name is Caroline Smothers and I'm a current senior at Perry Meridian High School. I would like to start off by thanking you for your time and willingness to listen to the voices of students who have felt the impacts of the last week. From my perspective, students feel confused about where our rights end and where the school steps end. The ruling in the famous Supreme Court, tinker v Des Moines states
that students do not shed their first amendment right at the schoolhouse gate. There is a policy at PMHS that any poster placed on the walls must be signed off on by an admin. However many students were not aware of this policy. I have a friend who placed posters around the halls to advertise for her small business and she was never told to remove them. But the same friend post placed posters around the school that were political in nature and she was told to remove them. Both were not approved by admin and only one had to be removed. Another student on Tuesday was walking down the main hallway holding an anti-ice poster.
A little bit after the seventh period tardy Bell had rang. She was being followed by an assistant principal who was allegedly saying she was going to get her for truancy. There were many other students still roaming the hallway, but only the student with the poster was addressed. None of the posters or acts of protest have been vulgar, explicit, or aggressive to my knowledge. As Aiden said, Monday during fifth period after South Port's walkout, we were placed on a hold. During sixth period there was an announcement made over the PA system. I will not repeat what Aiden said, but the concerning but concerning the message over the pa, the point
of being neutral is what was perceived. I believe after taking, after speaking to some of my peers that this message was what perpetuated the tension between the student body and admin to my peers and I at the moment. The message about neutrality appeared to be directed towards the student body, while in retrospect we all understand teachers must remain apolitical. However, the students of PMHS felt that it was addressed at us. I believe if instead PMH S'S administration had led with claims of recognizing student concern and empathy while not compromising the student body safety,
the situation would've deescalated, for example, if the admin would've said they understood the circumstances, but it is still their priority to keep us safe. Therefore, they asked, we not walk out. It would've resolved their vagueness appeared to be reason less if they had used specifics and answered why. I firmly believe there would not have been the same level of resistance from the student body. I am here because 70% of Perry Township's population is minority. The goals from the student body have been to prove to our fellow classmates that have been impacted by policy that we stand with them not to be mischievous or aggressive.
This is my perception of the last week. I would like to thank you for your time. Thank you Caroline. And the last one is Alexa Alexia. Hello, my name is Alexia Bradley and I'm a senior at Para Meridian High School. I like to start by saying that I was in fact one of the students that joined a group chat of 130 plus students that felt concerned that for our first amendment, so we planned a day and time for people to gather to do a walkout while administration found out
that I was the one who created, they created it. Although they preached that education comes first and that we shouldn't waste our time, they pulled me out at 8:30 AM and kept me there all day. They did not let me go back to any class and would wouldn't even let me go grab my backpack until administration knew where I was going at all times. By that, I wanna continue to say that the topics that was brought up in the discussion with administration while I was there all day was how and what, why I made the group chat for students together if I knew the consequences to my actions, how there was a better way to show that we care to show that we care instead
of walking out trying to provide alternatives. And lastly, administration getting information on what all 130 plus students were standing up for as them trying to provide alternatives. They left an empty room of students to gather with no administration eyes watching us. There was no paper, there was no students as they said that they would be there. They also tried to provide alternatives to say, come to your counselor, come to your principal, voice your opinions. Yet they were not available for us. They never were and they never have been when it comes to what we were standing up for. As a Mexican American myself that has great grandparents
that were immigrants, I believe what I'm standing up for, I do not want my voice to be silenced as us teens are the next generation. We want to voice up for the adults, uh, who have misspoken for us and their actions are doing us great injustice. As Perry Township has one of the largest populations of Burmese immigrants and refugees, we are doing them in injustice by staying quiet with that, we won't stand for what's wrong and we never have and we never will. For that. I appreciate the board gathering and taking your time outta your day
for letting us speak our truth and having a safe space for us to be heard. Thank you. We wanna thank all of you for and we, we appreciate how respect, respectfully that you presented, presented your position. So thank you for that. Um, we are going to move forward with, with our agenda on this. Um, you're welcome to stay if you would like to leave now. You can leave now, uh, up to you. Okay. That's fine. Alright. We will move on to the consent agenda. Move to approve. Second.
We have a motion. My bad. Sorry. Had a motion to approve by Mr. Shiley. Seconded by Mrs. Hartman. Any discussion or questions? There being one? None. Uh, let's uh, vote then on the consent agenda. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed nay. The consent agenda passes. Okay. Uh, Items of information requiring action. Um, item 4.01 consideration of supplemental personnel report. Mrs. Baker,
Good evening board. I recommend approval of the supplemental personnel report. Move to approve. Second, we Had a motion from Mr. Lewis and was second by Mr. Shiley. Um, is there any discussion or questions in regard to the supplemental personnel report? Alright, There being none. Let's vote on that. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Nay. Item 4.01 is passed 4.02. Consideration of curriculum adoption. Mr. Spencer,
Good evening board. Uh, we, uh, rec ask your, uh, approval for a literacy curriculum for our early childhood center. Uh, so this is a science of reading backed, um, early literacy program. It comes out of a state grant, uh, the high quality instructional materials grant that focused on, uh, early, uh, literacy in the pre-K area. And so this was, it actually we applied for it a number of years for it ago and just never heard about it. And then found out in October, yes, you got it. So it connects to the targeted students or schools that were at the time, districts that were under 70% in I read
and at the time we qualified for that. So it is a fully funded, uh, fully grant funded curriculum that will, uh, give our pre-K teachers, um, some structure with that literacy program. Move to approve. Second, We have a motion by Mr. Mertz and a second by Mrs. Hartman. Any questions or discussion? So it's like you knew. Um, so this curriculum, does this also go with the other, like correlate with the other, other curriculums that the state has approved and like the, um, the reading,
and I'm assuming these all mesh, but you know what assumptions do? Uh, so there was a, a list that you had to pick from for pre-K as well. So there was not amplify, which is our CKLA curriculum. They didn't have an option. But, um, Mrs. Probus, our director of elementary and Anthony Osborne, our, uh, principal at the ECA, uh, they vetted those curriculums. And this one we felt like aligned the best. Um, so it is science of reading aligned, uh, but there wasn't any direct, this is the curriculum that pre, that starts before amplify. And I know the science of reading has like additional training
and things that teachers can, does this curriculum require our preschool staff to attend additional training? So a couple pieces of that. Um, with the, the money from this grant, we we're able to produce, uh, purchase professional development through that company to be trained specifically in this curriculum. Um, we received another grant that is also allowing them to have the letters, which is our, our Science of Reading, uh, preparation program. There's one specific to pre-K and early literacy. And so we have that on the, on online for them too. Are we aware of anybody using teaching strategies LLC at
This time? There are, yes. Um, so there was other programs that used this, so we, we got some feedback from that as well. So it was, it came well regarded. Um, and again, with our, the process we went through it aligned well with what we do at the elementary level. Okay. Any other questions? Alright, we'll go ahead and vote on the, uh, curriculum adoption. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Nay. Alright. Item 4.02 passes, uh, 4.03. Consideration of resolution 26 dash 0 0 7.
The issuance of series 2026 refunding bond. Mr. Hatcher Thank you board. Um, we have an opportunity to refund one of our bonds that, um, is callable in April. This will allow us to save quite a bit of money on the amount of payment left on the bond. Um, approximately $2.3 million will be, um, the payments will be lessened by approximately $2.3 million over the life of the bond. So this is a good opportunity to take advantage of better interest rates and a, um, called a tax exempt refunding opportunity for these bonds.
So we ask for your approval, Move to approve. Second, We have a motion by Mr. Mertz, second by Mr. Lewis. Any questions or discussion? Okay. There being none. Let's, uh, vote. All those in favor of resolution 26 0 0 7. The issuance of series 2026 refunding bond. Um, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Nay. Item 4.03 passes 4.04. Consideration to void Outstanding. 2-year-old checks. Back to you Mr. Hedger. Thank you very much. Um, every two years
or every year we come to you with the 2-year-old stale checks. Um, we've made attempts to reach out to every one of the people on the list. On the back is the list of the checks that are, um, stale at this time. Means there they're two years issued and have not been cashed. Um, we've reached out to all of these folks in different ways to try to, um, either reissue checks or, um, help them find the check that they've lost. Um, these are the ones that we either could not reissue or, um, nobody could locate the check or we did not hear back from the vendor.
So we asked for void. The, the approval to void the checks Move to approve. Second, I have a motion by Mrs. Hartman, second by Mr. Mertz. Uh, any questions or discussion? Should any of these people on this list wake up tomorrow and think here. Indiana in corporation contact you? We will write them a check. We would absolutely. Thank you. Yep. Alright. We'll vote on 4.04. All those in favor say aye.
Aye. A Aye. Opposed nay 4.04 passes, uh, 4.05. Consideration of acceptance of donations. Uh, Mr. Spencer and then Mrs. Pollard. Thank you again. Board. Uh, we have the following, uh, donations on behalf of the elementary. So we would asked to, uh, to accept Atlin Young Elementary School. Uh, Brenda Sullivan, Judy Buckingham and Thomas Wright and family donated a total of a thousand dollars to support families, uh, for the outdoor education camp that they attend. And then we also had Driver Driving Academy donate $300 for their literacy night that they had. Recently at Douglas MacArthur, kindergarten, EG
and P Incorporated donated $270 and 91 cents. This was from a dine to donate and will be used to supplement student activities at Bur Henry Burkhart Elementary. We had $290 from a Bost Endowment Fund, uh, through PTEF. Uh, so that will be used to recognize teachers provide classroom supplies, teacher trainings, or special projects in the classroom. Jeremiah Gray Elementary had multiple families donate $250, which supported all six of their elementary robotics teams, uh, for snacks and supplies. At, uh, the, this season, Jeremiah Great Kindergarten Academy Meyer donated $900 to support, uh, the purchase of Healthy Snacks.
And then Jim and Vivian Leach donated a a large variety of snacks directly to the school for the same need. And then our Perry Township School's Robotics Program got two separate donations from Robotics Education and Competition Fund Foundation. Uh, $1,355 was one of them. And then $2,130 was the other. And that concludes, I'm sorry. Uh, and then REC also donated, uh, uh, $1,235. Got a longer list tonight than I thought. Um, at Rosa Parks, uh, Mike and Roberta Sipe, uh, donated $2,000 to Ro Rosa Parks Elementary.
Uh, this donation will be meet the needs of the Physical Education Department. And then Rainer Wright Hold Trailer Inc. Donated $300. And this is going to be given to the music department at Southport Elementary. They donate. Uh, office De Office Depot donated $634 and 83 cents, which will be used for office supplies and gift cards. Kristen Dozier, a fourth grade parent, donated $65 for the, uh, fourth grade trip. And then a third grade parent donated $3 and 50 cents to support an upcoming field trip. And finally, at Winchester Village,
they received an anonymous $300 donation, which will help support students for the Outdoor education program. And that concludes elementary donations. Good Evening Board. On behalf of our secondary schools, the Indiana Construction Roundtable Foundation donated $1,690 to the JWR Success Academy to pay for the wood shop materials, equipment, and supplies On behalf of our student services department, Peter Peter and Sarah Shank donated $50 in honor of Kelsey Kitchell to be used to support the pantry. Um, we also received a donation of $50 from Philip and Deborah Arm Booster in support of the pantry
and another $200 from Sharon Cheney for the same cause. On behalf of Perry Meridian High School, the Van Boosters donated $517 and 95 cents to be used to support the orchestra. And on behalf of Perry Meridian, sixth Grade Academy ran a Reinbold Trailer Incorporated, donated $300 to support their music program for Southport High School. Anderson Hauser donated $500 for boys lacrosse. The Southport Developmental Football Incorporation donated $4,000 to be used to support the football program. And Lifetouch donated $21 and 54 cents for Southport High School Athletics.
On behalf of both the elementary and secondary schools. We ask for your approval of these generous donations. Move to approve. Second, We have motion by Mr. Shively, second by Mr. Lewis. Uh, any discussion or comments? One quick question. The, uh, dine and donate for Douglas MacArthur was e, g and P. What restaurant was that? Do we know? That's fine. It doesn't, that's fine. Thank you. Anything further? Further? Alright, we will vote on, uh, 4.05. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed nay 4.04,
4.05 passes. Uh, we're gonna move on to the comms from the board, but, but first I, uh, I have something to do. Um, we need to, to recognize Lee Shively, um, for there for Yes, we do. Uh, for, for being the, the, the president, the, the past year and, and he has stepped in a, as Mrs. Hartman has la last few years and done double, triple duty. And, and for me personally, last time I was in this POS position, I got sidelined, uh, with, with some help things.
And Lee had to, to, to step in at that, that, that, at that point. Uh, this time I'm, I'm doing my best to not, not have that happen. Uh, have some unfinished business with this. Uh, but, but we would like to recognize you for, for always stepping in and everything that, that you do. And we'd like to present you with This. Let me, let me back up. No, It's not ticking is it? Wait for that. Oh, nice. Thank you. Yeah. Oh great. Well, thank you. Alright, well, way over there is Mrs. Harton, you haven't been at the end
of the table in how many years here? It's delight. Delight. It's been quite a while. Delight means I get to talk first, but you get to start us off. Thank you Lee for all that you do. Thank you. Um, I will speak from my heart to you my friends. Um, I love Perry Township and I can tell all of you love Perry Township too. It's a pretty great place. When I was your age, and I know I sound like an onk right now, okay, I know that. So bear with me here. Okay. Um, my diversity in Perry Township was bused here.
Think about that. It was a classroom full of Caucasian students and they bust diversity so that we could understand what diversity was. And I am, hear me, I am so grateful that of the leaders and our mayor at that time who did that because it's made me a lot better person. Okay? Now it's our neighbors. It's the people we go to church with. It's my coworkers, it's my friends, right?
That are here in our community. Our community is so rich with diversity and we are better because of it. Right? My children don't know anything different. And what a joy that is. Right? It's almost a disgrace that we kind of have to, to talk about that, right? Um, it's embarrassing a little bit on my part that we have to, to say these things, right? Because we Perry Township, when I say we, I'm not saying me as a Caucasian woman,
I'm saying Perry Township just knows it. We love it. These are our friends and our people. It's who we educate. It's who we employ. It's who we love. It's who we serve beside, right? It's who you guys have bounded with together. And come here tonight to say it's not them and us, or it's not them and or me and them. You know, like two different groups. It's all of us together. And that is what I celebrate now because years ago when I was at Burkhart Elementary
School, it wasn't that way. My friends of color were bused here. And then if they stayed for something after school, this is where my injustice I used to fight for. They were then stayed after school and, and bust home 45 minutes after school or after football practice or volleyball practice or those things. And it was a divide because they didn't live next to me. They didn't work with me. They didn't go to church with me. Right? But now our community is so beautiful and we have embraced it.
And I commend you. I commend you for loving others. Well, I hear it in your voice. I also hear your frustration. I understand. I hear you. We see you. We are listening. And although at times it might not feel that way, your administrators are listening to. They are. They are. Okay. So I thank you for coming today. I thank you for speaking.
I also encourage you to not stop, right? Because this is what makes it more beautiful. When one day I pray for this all the time, that one of you will be in my seat because that's what makes Perry Township so beautiful, okay? Because we just keep making it, it just keeps going. Okay? So don't stop. Be passionate. And you know what, if you end up somewhere else other than Perry Township, still be passionate, okay?
Because this is how things happen. This is how change happens and this is how growth happens. And that's what we're learning, right? We grow kids here, we grow adults too, right? So we're all in this together and I appreciate you coming and I do want you to know, know that we do hear you. Um, I will share 'cause there's been a lot said about this, right? Caroline brought up Tinker versus Des Moines. Okay? And so just as a basis, 'cause I want everybody to understand that I think we have all been, the Indiana School Board Association has sent out
information, you know, just trying to educate us as well because I do not have a law degree. But from a legal standpoint. 'cause Caroline brought up, um, tinker Voice versus Des Moines school officials. Um, it's a 1969 decision of Tinker versus Des Moines school district. And this case held that students do not shed their free speech rights at the schoolhouse gate. And thus, students cannot be disciplined for engaging in free speech during school unless such conduct is disruptive to the school environment.
Or there is substantiated foreseeability on the part of the school administration of harm or disruption. The student discipline at the issue and tinker was a suspension from school tinker involved wearing of black armbands by students during the school day. So it was not a walkout or a protest within the school building or even on school property, but they were wearing black armbands. So, um, school administrators are given some discretion with, um, how they can address student walkouts and protest.
Um, but teachers and other school employees or other staff members, not just teachers, but they are, um, unlike students, federal courts have ruled that teachers and other school employees are not protected by free speech. Because while they are on duty and working for a public school when doing so, courts have considered these employees as public officials and concluded they are subject to the same neutrality requirements as school officials that, um, talked about.
Thus, teachers and others, employees may not participate in walkouts, protest or encourage or discourage students participation and voice their own opinion about walkouts. So that's just general information about tinker and, and the law. I think we have all learned a lot in this, um, and, and trying to be respectful on all, all sides. So I thank you for coming. Um, on a different note and not to like switch gears here. Um, last Saturday I volunteered at a robotics competition at
Perry Meridian Middle School. And it was a state, um, qualifier. And this was my first robotics competition because my kids, they didn't have Project Lead the Way Burkhart was the last school. So Project Lead the Way was a little bit after my kids' time. So we never really got into robotics. And I text my son and I said, you would've loved this. But it was such a joy. And, um, the great thing about this competition was it was two teams working together,
not against each other. And, um, to see the collaboration between teams that didn't even know each other before they got there was something very special. And, um, it is encouraging to me that, um, all over the city, 'cause you had way north to, to even further south, um, the amount of, the amount of, um, cooperation and teamwork that took place from complete strangers was just an absolute delight. And I would be extremely remiss if I did not congratulate
and thank, thank more than anything, all of the robotic sponsors, the teachers, and the amount of time that they spend. Um, I actually came home and looked up to make sure that they were getting a stipend because it's a lot of work. And those on the bargaining team, I would bargain for some more from though, for those stipends 'cause it was a long day. But, um, thank you to everyone who in our township, all those robotic teachers who are, are those sponsors who are giving these students opportunities, um,
at this and life skills were learned that Saturday. Thank you. Um, first and foremost, to the students that spoke, thank you. Um, we do appreciate what you guys have to say and we do listen to it, but I wanna take it a a step further. Um, you guys have all watched the same things that we watch. And you see not only people your age, people my age, not doing things in the appropriate manner of the appropriate way. Hats off to you for doing that. Um, and um, you are looking at the base level of the democratic process in our country starts at the
school board level where the, where the base democratic process here and it builds from there. We all work with each other. We don't necessarily always agree with each other, but we vote and we move on. But I will challenge you with this. Don't let this be the only time you come to a school board meeting. Um, there's a lot of stuff going on and we are always open to the public. So come back to a school board meeting. Maybe there's something more passionate. It could be a sport, it could be a club, something that you're interested in or you're passionate about. Um, so don't let that be the last time that you come to a school board meeting. I always say that to everybody, whether it's an adult that may come with a complaint, come
and learn about the process, what we do and how we do it. Um, 'cause you may find yourself in this seat one day, um, wanting to provide input. Um, the other thing that I would say, and I can't take credit for this, I'm gonna quote a movie for the, and I just realized this movie's 30 years old, so you may not have seen it, but it's called the American President. And there is a, uh, quotation in there that America's advanced citizenship. Um, and we're seeing that right now at its at it at its crux. And the, the gist of the, what the movie talks about is how does one person's view, um,
supersede the next person's view, even though that you may disagree. Um, so if you get a chance, just watch that. YouTube, it, you, you can see the short clip. But, um, that would be my challenge, I think. Uh, um, one, I'm grateful that you at least stepped to the mic. All of you were young, uh, professionals. You, you acted appropriately. Not something that we always see. Um, so, um, I commend you for that. Um, but please don't make this the last time you come into a school board meeting. And, um, that was all I had to say. Excuse me. Uh, Alex, Aiden, Caroline and Alexia, uh, what you did tonight was really hard
and I commend you for coming up here and speaking to us. Um, I really appreciate your respectfulness and just your overall tone that you took tonight. Um, like the, the first two have said that, you know, we hear you and, um, keep fighting. Um, like Mr. Mer said, I wanna switch, you know, gears here. But, um, we had like, uh, I know where you're coming from and it, it, it's tough right now.
That's all I, we'll just leave it at that. Um, we had sectionals and regionals here for various sports. Congratulations to the athletes that participated and, and advanced. Um, like Ms. Hartman said, we had the, uh, robotics competition. That was really cool. If you haven't got a chance to see it, um, I wanna say thank you to Ms. Hartman and all the other volunteers that came out and, and ref the thing. Uh, that in and of itself is kind of difficult to understand all the scoring in, uh, various ways for the, the, the teams to acquire points. But, uh, it, it's quite a production
and it's, it's definitely worth your time if you get a chance to do it. And then, uh, I wanna say thank you to the, the, uh, you know, custodial crews for getting all the snow off the ground. Uh, they did a really good job getting the lots clean and, and, you know, in a, in a condition where it's, it's usable. So, uh, thank you. That's all I got. I just wanna say thank you to Alex, Aiden, Caroline and Alexia. You guys are so brave. I know at your age, I would absolutely have not gotten gone up there and spoke at all, even if I did have
strong convictions about it. And I also probably would've been afraid, um, just to step out and say something when, you know, it could be a hostile environment. And you guys are really showing at, even at the, the youngest people, we need to listen to you guys and thank you for engaging in this way. And a lot of adults could learn from you guys. 'cause usually it's like no one in here and you guys showing up and knowing that you can have a voice here. It makes me happy that you guys trusted us
with your stories and thank you for sharing. Um, that's really all I'm really proud of. You guys. Please come and talk to me at, at the end. I'd like to hear more from you guys. And, um, best of luck to you. Um, I do want to quickly give credit to, um, Mrs. Boone, her staff Perry Police. Um, there's a line in a communication talking about a line between expression and endangerment. And I think they responded as quickly as they could to make sure as many students as possible were safe. Um, and I think
that was not an easy thing to do in the moment. So thank you, most of all for keeping kids, uh, safety top of mind. Um, Caroline, are you taking AP government? Okay, I thought so. At Tinker versus Des Moines. Um, the key there is the, the way that they discussed that, that protest was not a disruption to the school environment. I think what you all put on display was your commitment to, um, respect the learning environment, but also want to make sure that your, your voices are being heard, your concerns are being heard, that you have a position to be able to speak up for issues
and, and worries that maybe some of your classmates don't feel comfortable, um, to do so. And I, I think that's for me, what really stood out to me was, um, that you did in this respectful way. I also get when you, you know, perception is reality. They say they set up a safe space. They say they're here to listen, but I get there and X, y, and Z happens. And do they really mean it? And I do wanna say, um, both as now an adult and a profession, but also as a young person at one point be grace, right?
I'm confident knowing the administrators and school leaders that told you the things they told you, they meet it even if they need a reminder of what they said. Um, and so I I just encourage you to continue to, um, respectfully voice those concerns. Respectfully follow up and say, Hey, we said we were gonna do this. We said we were gonna talk about that. Um, not to make excuses, but to just be understanding that, um, in a, in a busy day of operating a high school, things, uh, can get in the way. But again, I, I do appreciate your all of you's willingness
to come and share with us. Um, again, as others have said, it's very impressive the way in which you were able to voice, um, your concerns and your views. Um, and again, as I mentioned, as kind of referencing tinker as well, the way that they did that, and, uh, you did that in a respectful way that was not meant to be disruptive. Uh, but to take a stand is, is very impressive. Very good. Now, I am an attorney, but these guys said about as good as what I could do. So, um, thank you, uh, again, Alex, Aiden, Caroline and Alexia. Um, you guys did a great job.
And, um, one, one point on the, the, the whole thing with, with Tinker, et cetera, is that what, what does need to be kept in mind too is that what may be viewed as neutrality. You have to watch that, that there cannot be a viewpoint discrimination. So that one thing is a, you know, boy, we agree with you. We do that, but another group does something else and we don't agree with it, so we're gonna do something different to to, to them.
So part of that, in some cases that followed, um, kind of, um, honed in on viewpoint discrimination with that. So, uh, couple other things. Um, there was a nice list of donations that we, I always have to say something about the donations. Donations were great and I really appreciate those people that, that recognized the importance of the, the food pantry and, and getting those donations in, especially what we we've faced here in the, the last few weeks too. And, and trying to get, uh, get,
get those services, uh, out there. Um, looking forward to this year, what this is a really, really good board and I think you all heard, um, their commitment, their, their passion on, on everything that, that, um, that, that we have to hear from everybody. But, but also, uh, in, in working together, uh, in trying to address a lot of these, these issues and, and working with, with everybody, uh, in the district here. So, uh, again, thank you to everybody and, uh, Dr. Spray,
Um, Thank you you, um, for coming back in on my invitation to come back. 'cause I knew that the board members would want to have a couple of things to say. I would really didn't want you to leave and think that there was, there was no comments about the topic, et cetera, and about your, um, activism and your, um, input today. So really do appreciate that. And I promise you it wasn't very long meeting, but I think the last bit of it here was, is probably, probably worth hearing on your part and, and the time that you put in. Um, I can say that, um, many times when we have things going on in our school district, um, we have controversy, we have issues.
Um, the professionals that work on our classrooms typically are not neutral. Okay? They are here to, to serve kids and to work with kids and do whatever they can to make sure kids are taken care of. Um, but sometimes in tough situations things can feel a little sterile. Um, I'll give you just one quick example 'cause I'm not gonna lecture you. I'm not gonna keep you any longer than I have to. Um, sometimes we have o opportunities to have, um, religious education in schools and, and that's allowed by, um, the state of Indiana that's allowed by law and those kinds of things. But we also understand that once we open up that platform,
like a student club for example, we open up that for all and all the different viewpoints and all the different things. And so what I tell people, whether it's a student club or a community group that comes in and does weekly day religious education, it's like, please help us do it the right way, okay? Because help us do it the right way. Help us make sure that it remains a, a free speech environment and that it remains someplace that we can be proud of and come and come to school and, and do what we want. And I appreciate the way that you guys are committed to doing things the right way.
Thank you to the families that are here to support their young people as well. So, um, that's all. Thank you very much. With that gavel back back, we are adjourned. Part: 2
We will start with allegiance. Allegiance to the pride of the United States of America, for which his hands or issue under God and Liberty. And we have you signed up for public comments for this part of it, please. So we'll move on to the 3.01, which is the Directed Forecast Study. Dr. Gray and Susan b Susan, thank you for joining. Well welcome everybody, members of the board, Dr. Ridges with us here today. Um, um, beginning in the fall of 23, um, to take a look at what we feel like our student enrollment,
um, is doing, as well as kind of any, um, observations in the makeup of our community as well, and in students. And just the different impacts, um, that she'll go through that put together the study. It's important for us to do this on a regular basis, just to try to stay ahead of things. One example is, you know, right now we are in a construction process, some design process of, um, at both of our high schools and, and making sure that we align some of the data that we see in our enrollment trends in the study with kind of what we're thinking for those, those facilities and that sort of thing, which is also just kind
of keeping a water down the road even a little bit farther, um, with our demographic study. So I'm gonna turn this over to Dr. Ick and have her kind of, um, run through this and she, um, be able to, uh, answer questions you may have. You also have a hard copy in front of you to follow along with. Sometimes the screens still a little bit difficult to, to see from a distance. Okay. And thank you very much for having me back again. Again. I was here about two years ago and things certainly have changed. Uh, you do have the, uh, presentation that I have in, in hard copy. And so my intention today is not to read word for word
or slide, first slide, but to highlight the most important things that I think you should know and takeaways. And of course, there's, if there's a, there's little questions or details, we can dive into those as needed. And, and I do apologize once in a while. I'm, I had my shift, um, I've got these older eyes. I, I sometimes need to see a larger screen. So if I see my head turned, it's only for that reason. Um, I am moving forward to, in the next slide, I am not gonna read this slide, slide four. I'll leave that for you. Um, but I do wanna talk about what the population
of Perry Township looks like. Uh, so this is Perry Township Schools. Um, this is district boundaries. It is, um, specific to the boundaries and its estimates. So the reason I'm kind of saying it's estimates is because it is based on survey data. So it's not actual counts, but we can use it as an indication of trend. So these are children that live in your school district boundaries regardless of where they go to school. So we are seeing this upward trend and an estimate at about, um, over 27,
almost 2700, 20 7,000, sorry, extra zero, um, students, um, living or at least population living within the school district boundaries at 2021. Uh, one thing we're seeing is it looks like maybe it's capering off this pad. And the reason I'm kind of belaboring this as well as the date, it's an estimate, it is an estimate of a small area. It has a lot of variation. You look at it for trend, but it's also a five year average. So it's a look back. So if we're looking at 2021, it's actually more akin
to a number that's probably around 2019. And that's one of the things we tend to see is that's right before a kind of a pre COVID number. And we are seeing things taper off. You actually see that in your own numbers. We're seeing this replicated here in your child population. Okay, so I'm gonna go to the next slide, which is a little different. Look, uh, this again, is specific to your school district, and it is the kiddos that live in your school district that are state funded regardless if they go to your schools or they go somewhere else.
So they, they're, uh, children who are residents and they can be, um, attending another school district. They can be attending a public charter. They could be having choice scholarships. What would not be included here would be homeschool students, students who are otherwise opted by these numbers. For instance, our, uh, uh, all private pay when it comes to a private school. So it's also another snapshot of what's occurring in your school district. And it's actually a little bit more current. So state funded children, actually, we're seeing a little bit of a peak there on 2024.
These are fall numbers, but I'd also point out last year's numbers, fall 25 was about the same in a total basis of 2023. So that's one way to look at the numbers. Um, another way to look at the numbers. If you compare 25 to 23, your enrollments actually declined. So one reason I'm saying this is sometimes when you look at a number, you're like, oh, there's a peak. Why was that a peak? In a way you could say, well, maybe 24 was a bit of an anomaly. So it's just one different way to look at the numbers. Hey, Susan? Yes.
Do you have a guesstimate on, on that breakdown of, uh, residence not enrolled? What would be homeschooled and what would be private school? I don't have access to that data. I actually wish I did. In a way, it's the holy grail that we don't have. Um, mainly because private schools, even though they report data as you know, um, through through DOE, they don't make that necessarily available as a breakup. So we don't have that. So I, I Have a little piece of data to go with that might be helpful. So the state puts out a transfer report every year, which,
um, collects those kids. And so from 23 to 25, all 23 to 25, there was some movement. So, um, students transfer out, um, to another option of the public school. That choice scholarships grew about 200. That doesn't necessarily mean 200 unique kids picked up and left and went over there, just 200 more choice scholarships, um, because of the different, um, um, voucher responsibilities, et cetera. Only about 15 more kids in that two year period chose another public school.
Um, and then about 131 additional kids between 23 and 25 chose a charter. Um, many of our kids who are choosing a charter is a virtual charter, so they're not attending a brick and mortar school. They're doing typically online. So taking that mobility report, just those numbers from 23 to 25 Me. And, and do we, do we know from COVID that, you know, there were a lot of homeschool kids at that point. Do we know the trend on, on homeschool at, at all? Not, not really. I, I face that in, in, in my,
with my home family, that, um, kids were, were homeschooled and that it took, took some convincing from grandpa to bring them back to, to the school a little bit. And, and, you know, if somebody didn't have, you know, something like, like we encouraging them to come back, was that, you know, but like you said, that's probably the holy grail knowing some of that information as to capturing some, some of those numbers. But we don't know in general what homeschooling in Indiana has been. Okay. Okay. I'm gonna, uh, go to this sec. Next slide, which is slide um, seven.
Um, one of the reasons I wanted to bring this up, this actually was embedded in a prior slide, uh, that there were bars, but this is children estimates of children in Perry Township, uh, school district social district boundaries. And it is a number of preschool age only. So we can use this as an indicator of the number of children who, um, basically would be potentially in your schools. Also, because it's an estimate's not perfect. I am looking though for trends. And so the number of children who are preschool aged is declining.
This also tees up with our birth data. And this is the next slide on slide eight. Now, I'll, I'll note, I'll note that there's not a zero, um, at the y axis. So I have won it up to magnify the change, but I actually wanted to do this to point out some of the things that are occurring that are important. So I look at it a graph like this, and I, um, say, well, we have 14,500, um, and we're going above and below that line births in Marion County. So these are births, no matter if they're, um, mom
or where they occur, mom is a resident of Marion County. So we've got this, uh, 14,500, 2000, right? Right at the turn of the century, that number goes up. We see a birth peak. Those are children born somewhere around, uh, 2007 plus or minus a couple years. And those are children that are in high school and or have recently graduated and graduated, graduated. So these are children, this large bubble is moving, has moved through, and they're being replaced by fewer
and fewer children. So we were back at that, uh, 15, 14, 500 number, again about 2010, and barely went above that. And we had this trough, and that's post COVID. So these are years 20 20, 20 21 where we're, uh, you know, from peak to trough, we've lost 12% of, in terms of the number of births to residents of Marion County. And then we have a reversal, and this reversal is 2022 to 2024.
These are children that are not yet in school, maybe preschoolers, but are not yet in kindergarten. And we do know they were born to residents of, uh, Marion County. So one of my challenges is to understand how we can use this to forecast to. And, um, another piece that I actually wanna bring up is, um, to whom were these mother who, so whom were these children born? So I, again, I kind of use that COVID marker 2020 as before and after, because we see a lot of different patterns across the board.
Enrollment is not just your school district, it's across all school districts. So in Marion County, um, what the change in trend that we saw pre and post COVID was that increase largely was due to children born to mothers who are foreign born, meaning they're not born in the United States. We also see this in the second panel, um, which is again, Marion County. And that is just a change in the population that has current occurred, foreign born. Um, so is it largely occurred
because more people have moved in who were from, um, outside the United States? Not necessarily. They could have been somewhere in the United States, but born, born and complementing, that was a decline in the native, um, born population. Those who were, were born in the United States. Um, so about 17% of foreign born populations of Marion County resides in Perry Township. Um, and so the, the reason I'm trying is your share of the pie hasn't changed.
Believe it or not, that 17% was pre COVID and post COVID. So the changes that would be occurring with, with regard to births, I cannot necessarily attribute to where we call mother's mentality, where mom was born. Okay. And so it, that really didn't matter that at least from this perspective or from, you know, kind of, um, um, viewing it from that perspective across the board, that increase, at least from this perspective, happened in other functions also as well as in Indianapolis.
So, I'm sorry. There we go. And so one of the things I wanna look at is what can we reasonably expect for an increase? And when you can't expect bursts to increase based on this, um, last forecast I held the, the bursts flat. That was the anticipation. But we did see that very significant change in trend in the last couple years. Now, of those firsts, what can we potentially expect for very talented schools? Which is a different question on slide 11.
What I'm doing here is I am relating or coating the firsts to your entering cohort kindergartners. So what we're seeing here is a very inverted, very of, of inverted u pattern. So about 2010 or so, about 7% of births we could pretty much reliably count on as entering kindergarten. That actually increased over time to over 10%. And then we have this, oh, COVID happened and we have a change in trend,
and now we have a decline in the percentage of births who become kindergartners. So even though we've seen this up in the number of births, your share of those births are currently declining. So I think that's a important point to keep in mind, even though we see those births your share, we would assume be consistent unless you see a change. And here we see this inverted B pattern. So Susan, if, if I can interrupt her with just a question,
Um, on that share of births, the, the slide 11 that you just went over. So all of those dots take into consideration the births in Marion County or in our township as well as our kindergarten enrollment. So yes. So this is actually your, so if I misspoke, I apologize. This is specifically for your school district. Okay. But, but our kindergarten numbers for those years are in this slide. Thank you. So, mm-hmm. Yes. Okay. So I am, um, jumping ahead a bit again.
So I am jumping to more look at some of the patterns and what we can make of some of the patterns with regard to your enrollment change. So this is a 10 year look at your total enrollment. It's 12 and it's K through 12, and it is your certified or a DM counts. Again, we see that peak around COVID. And so that at, uh, just pre COVID number fall of 19, that was when your full enrollment was at its peak and has since declined. Um, we, you were continuing that little bit of a decline.
And then you had that little bit of rise above in, uh, fall of 24 and has since declined again in fall of 25. And it's been a decline of about 570 students compared to last year. The next slide on slide 15, I'm doing a different analysis and I, I just wanted to kind of walk through this just a bit to wrap your head, to wrap up sometimes wrap my head around. But what I received was in student rosters by student ID and grade.
So what I was able to do for these three school years, I was able to match them. So I'm asking a question from fall of 23 to fall of 24, the number of students who are on those rosters, how many of them did you keep from year year? I'm asking the second question. How many of them basically you lost, meaning they were in the first year and not in the second year? And then how many students are new that you acquired are in the second year but not the first year? So those are basically three pieces.
I'm looking at the retention of students from your year. So how many are those and how many students have you lost? So they weren't there previously. And then the new ones, so a couple takeaways. Um, losing students isn't bad because they graduate and we want them to graduate, right? So you lose about 20% of your students on average from year to year, at least in these two years. And about a third of that was due to graduation, but um, um, two thirds of it wasn't. So ballpark, you're losing, uh, six, 7%
as students because they graduate. But about 13% you're losing because they don't continue from one grade to the next. So they don't continue from kindergarten to first grade or first grade to second grade, for instance. So those are the students that you lose. Um, what's important about that, that is, that's basically of an attrition rate. That's what we consider attrition. And it's at 13%. So I like back of the back of the envelope math, right? So 13% is one in eight students. So on, on average, one of eight students, you're not retaining from year to year.
Basically, those are students who are in the seats that you would, are not retaining from year to year. It does not count for graduates. And then the next piece I look at is one of the students that you acquired. And this is really what tells the story about why your enrollments increased in 2024 is because you acquired many more students than you had lost. Um, so that was ended up being a positive enrollment change of about 200. Compare that to last fall. You didn't a acquire the students to offset the losses.
Um, this is another kind of different way to think about it. Um, if, um, if you had a match on, um, the number of students acquired, you basically would've been at, at net zero, no loss, no gain. And so your enrollment changed largely was driven by that number by not compensating for losses elsewhere. Hey, Susan, got another quick question for you. When looking at acquiring and losing students in that net change, typically, is it always a net gain
or is, you know, is it a net loss? I mean, what's, what's a good percentage? What's a bad percentage? Yeah, net. I don't know that there's a good or bad percentage. And the reason why I like to do this is because if we're just looking at net change and you say, oh, it's, we grew by 200, but what's going on underneath is that bit of a story, right? So, um, you, you could gain 200 because you just acquired 200, or you could gain 200 because you lost 2000
and gained 2200. So that's one of the things I kind of wanted to, there's quite a bit of ins and outs, there's quite a bit of flow going on. So I don't know that I'm getting completely to the question, but that was the reason for doing it because without doing this, you really don't know the magnitude of floats. I guess what I'm getting at, I guess a statewide average, I mean, typically is it a 10% loss? I mean 10%. So, yeah, so Oh, you mean on enrollment change
or on, um, so I would say ballpark. Uh, I don't know next actual number. I do know though, and I I working for a variety of school districts, we how much that's one of 'em, or probably county is one of 'em. So larger school districts, everybody's seeing this pattern of decline. So there's very few exceptions, but Beach Grove might be an exception, you know, so there's very few exceptions to the rule of thumb that we're seeing. Um, maybe Hamilton, I used to live in Hamilton,
Southeastern Hamilton, Southeastern for a very long time was an exception, but we're seeing declines regularly across the board since COVID. And, and there it is due to basically not having enough students coming in. And I'll share more of this story, we'll get to it, not enough of those students coming in to compensate for those who are graduating. And it seems kind of, um, it, it is like we're so successful that we're graduating students, students, right? We want our students to graduate,
but we're not bringing enough in to compensate for that. And that tends to be the, the story and theme that I see regularly. So am I kind of getting at to the kind of the feel that you're going for? If I this characterize that, I apologize When Dr. Gray gave me this paperwork, that was a question that I had. Like, is there a standard or typical like, 'cause 13 and 15, you know, because you talk about younger children, is it 15%? So I, I too ask the same question like is there a standard or is there a, you know, this is what you're expecting,
but I hear you saying there is no expectation, like, or no consistent number, I guess. Yes, there's, there's no consistent number. And I will also tell you, I've only started doing this too, going beyond this net, right? Because, you know, you, you, we can talk about net change, all, all, all we want, but at the end of the day, we are talking about whole students, right? So what are the flows? So I also don't have that body of experience of, okay, uh, I've looked at five school districts
and looked at the rosters because rosters are not something the public can get. And so I, I literally would ask for, for that. Um, and uh, thankfully, you know, various, uh, administrators wish to share it and to understand it, but the rosters again, are IDs only. I don't have student student data. They just have an ID and I and day. Um, great. Um, so I think this is, I think it is telling, I mean it is telling in the way, um, you know
how I interpret this, if you just think about a one in eight loss without any compensation, you have to have a con something to compensate for the loss. You can also say these last two years are very unusual. So we do know lecture year was unusual and, and COVID was very unusual too. We saw a change in, in pattern. So I, Susan, I think I, I think what I'm trying to get with, with my question is, is like there, there's funding tied
to the number of students you have. Mm-hmm. So if we, you know, are losing X amount, are we now going to be facing, you know, a financial situation? If we acquired more, then we're gonna be flush with funding theoretically. Great. So, um, I, I do have more for you and I, I do have numbers that get to total enrollment and the implications and so Fine. Okay. Yeah. So then we, we can get there. Thank you. Okay, so It would be a little bit of time to, we get about 20 minutes, just we can go over a little bit, but I just wanna,
Yeah, thank you. And I can always come back to some of this. I did do some breakouts by, um, um, your multilingual students as well as your native English speaking students. Just quickly, there is a difference in, um, administrative categories. So whether or not somebody's classified as an immigrant or refugee, they are only classified that way for, for a period of time. Okay? So to really kind of get a handle more on
the change in patterns, what I did is I looked at the data, and this is data that's submitted that folks that submitted to, um, the Department of Education and using, um, the indicator of whether or not the home is multilingual for the student. What's important about that is that is the home survey, and that is a record that follows the student, right? So I can track, we can track that student over time compared to an indicator of student as immigrant or as refugee.
That is a short period of time because that is tied to funding. So I broke the two categories, these groups out, and we're gonna say, let's find out if these two groups have enrollment that's different, right? So this is a bit different than I way, way I did this two years ago. And uh, so we have our multilingual students, um, since 2022, they actually increased by over 600 students, but last year they declined by a hundred or about 1% when we go
to our native English speaking students. So these are students where English is a primary language used in the home, they in the lab since 2022, they've declined by about 450 students, which is 6%. And last year declined, um, declined by 1100, which is, but I mean apologize since 2022 by 1100 students, which is minus 13. Okay? So that, that's on a total basis. I can also look at these groups separately by the question of why, so why are we seeing increases or decreases?
So a positive number of intention and that's, now I'm back to a net number. This is more students coming in than reading in, in the grade groups that are basically students who you actually have. So, um, those numbers have been tended to be positive for the multi-lingual group that's at red bar, but negative for the negative speaking group. The replacement piece is your kindergartners in relates in relation to the prior year graduating class. So now we're getting at to that dynamic of having
with births involved and on the multilingual group for multilingual groups, um, they tended to have larger entering classes and smaller graduating classes. That's the blue bar. When you go to the native English speaking group, they tend to have smaller entering classes, but larger graduating classes, that's why it's a negative blue bar in particular last year, that's 150 students more graduating than entering as kindergarten. So this gives us a clue of, in terms of the, the dynamics we're looking at for two groups.
And when I'm doing the forecast, what I'm doing is I'm forecasting for these two groups specifically looking at the dynamics that change and then adding them back as a total for. So I, um, don't wanna totally read the to you, but I did give you a nutshell of what I'm doing. When I do the forecast. I'm looking at kindergartners, I'm looking at their two groups. I move them through time. Students graduate students enter in kindergartner and they move through time. There's not one right number. So I have a base forecast, which is the most likely trends,
the trends that have been occurring. I have a high forecast, which are the best case, but the trends that are a bit high and the low forecast with the trends that are a bit low. Uh, and this gives us a forecast for the next 10 years. So we would expect, or I would expect your enrollments to continue to decline. You have been in a period of decline since 2019. Okay? So it's not unusual or un anticipated. If we decline, it looks like a big decline. But you're also a large school district. So we're looking at on average, um,
a decline about 300 students per year. That is, if the current patterns continue as they are, what is the reason for the decline? What I've done here is I've taken, um, five year periods on the right hand side, it is the last 10 years. And on the left hand side, or I'm sorry, back backwards on the uh, uh, right hand side, it is the future. And so it is what will happen in the future. And on the left hand side is what's happened in the past. So between before COVID, your enrollment grew, wait a bit.
And that was because of replacement. You had a lot of kindergartners, elementary schools, schoolers coming in. Um, you grew largely for that reason. Small, um, fewer students graduating then, um, fewer students graduating have entering. That's that big blue bar. Since COVID, your numbers have declined because of retention, losing more students than acquiring in the future, I would anticipate to see a little bit of both of those two patterns. You do have very large, uh, groups that you're graduating.
So that will always contribute to a decline without an increase in new students or larger groups entering a kindergarten, first grade. And I also broke out, um, the two learner groups. So this would be the multilingual and the native English speaking, um, and what that might look like on the total basis. So it does look like just allowing the current patterns to continue as they are overweighting some of the current patterns. The multilingual group would tend to decline by about 1500 students over the next 10 years.
And then the native English speaking group would decline quite a bit, but actually start stabilizing. And one of the reasons that stabilization occurs is you do have a lot of, uh, um, students graduating and eventually the kindergarten in graduating numbers start equalizing. And that's how these numbers start their path down starts slowing, slowing over over time. So that's a bit of a more stabilizing that's occurring with the native English speaking group and the multi equal group.
And I also took a look at, uh, your grade groupings. You would expect to see basically all, um, school groupings or grade groupings to define over time perhaps your high school 10 years out being below about 4,000 students, um, your intermediate schools, middle schools being below 3000 students about 10 years out. And your, um, elementary being full of 6,000 in total about 10 years out. And lastly, I took a look at your attendance areas. Um, both of your attendance areas were about the same size,
uh, in 2020. So right around that COVID period of time we're about the same size. Um, Perry Meridia attendance area would actually anticipate that to decline more than the Southport attendance area. And I know you are on a, a bit of a time schedule, but I do wanna point out there is, um, no right one right number. Uh, I do both a high, a low in the base, uh, where I was last time, I did the forecast two years ago before forecast landed between the base and the low. So it was a bit high on the base
and over forecast just a tad, but was, um, within that low parameter and in a nutshell, I know I went pretty fast on some things. Um, that's what I have for you today. Anybody else have questions Or observations on 23? Um, in year 15, 16, 20 21? Is that, what is that growth? It seems kind of unexpected. Can you gimme the, the numbers again please? And 1516 to 2021 on slide 23. Oh yeah. Yeah.
So, um, I was looking, so that's your past, so that's a five year group pre COVID. So that replacement number that, so that that blue pop, that big blue bar, what that is is more kindergartners coming in than, uh, students graduating from 12th grade. So you were growing because you were bringing in elementary schools and students and you were graduating on average, uh, smaller cohorts, but those, those students were bringing in at that time
as large numbers of elementary school schoolers, eventually after graduate. And so they become the blue bars on the right hand side. I was just wondering if that was kind of artificially inflated due to when the refugees, um mm-hmm. If that population came at that time or was it something else that happened in the area Specifically? Yeah, so when I, it applied my lens to this, I did not have that kind of specific data, so I didn't it, it so very well could be. Um, uh, I'm trying to also, you,
you had quite a bit of new home building, but it might have occurred a little bit before this, but you still, I think had home building in your school district even though a lot of it might have occurred nineties and double os period. So I'm trying to remember if you were completely built out by that time. I don't have it in front of me, but there's definitely a correlation to those years and number of students who came in as uh, and immigrants. All right. Well Susan, thank you very much. This is very useful information. I think we'll be pouring over it, uh, a while longer and we may have some personal questions for you. No problem. Thank you Susan. Appreciate it.
Alright, Well that will adjourn the public work session. We'll get together here in just a few minutes. Thank you.