--------- Welcome everyone to the business portion of our meeting tonight. Uh if you all would rise and join us in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. Before uh actually roll call everyone who's present this evening and before I ask for approval of the agenda
update, I think we're going to we're going to move uh agenda number item number 11 and 13. We're going to flip-flop them to allow the close session to take place first so that the pertinent staff can then leave while we're doing the policy discussion. So
we'll just make that one order change for the evening. So having said that, I'll entertain a motion to accept the agenda as presented. So made by director Bullion. Second second by director France. All in favor signify by saying I. I. Opposed.
That carries 61. Moving down to personnel items. Dr. Thomas. Thank you, Chair White, board of directors. Um tonight we have uh some routine employment u from the summer. Uh that's um within our budget of filling
positions, many of which um were going to be releasing from their other uh districts that they're currently under contract, but didn't want to wait until July so that they could actually effectively start um some of the summer work. So you'll see that on that candidates for employment.
And then we also have um a certified uh position as well. Sorry, one second here. Sorry, lost it here. Sorry about that. There we go. And then we also have a um standard uh
certified um change as well um for um our ECF um summer teacher, parent educator um at Edgewood and uh that is also one that is um before you tonight for approval um for some of our
additional support in ECF. All right, I'll enter a motion to approve the candidates for employment as presented. So made by director France. Second. Second by director Johnson. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor signify by
saying I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. 70. Resignations. Dr. Thomas. Uh thank you, Chair White, board of directors. Uh tonight, uh we have uh executive director Emily Herman, who is in route,
by the way. Um so sorry about the delay. uh but she has tendered her resignation and moving on. Um and her last date of employment with us will be June 30th of 2025. Entertain a motion to accept the
resignation as presented. By director Bullan, second by director Johnson. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor signify by saying I. I. Opposed. Motion carries 70. That concludes the business portion of
the meeting tonight. I will entertain a motion to adjourn the business portion of our meeting. So made by director France, second by Dr. Atinson. All in favor signify by saying I. I. Opposed. That carries 70.
We have no speakers tonight for the public forum. And moving down to the purpose and agenda. Dr. Thomas. Uh thank you chair. Uh tonight we have got a few items. We have our end of the year superintendent um evaluation review. Um
we are going to give a update on some academic uh progress indicators and some updates on some grants and then um the rest will be going into some of the policy discussions. We have a 900 policy as well as some of the board's 200
series policies um for your um first reading this evening. All right. Thank you. Next item on the agenda is the superintendent's uh yearly evaluation public statement.
Uh last Monday night during a close session, the board of education completed its review uh for the 2024-25 school year for Dr. Thomas and I will read the summary as follows. Dear Dr. Thomas, on behalf of the Prior
Lake Savage Area Schools Board of Education, I want to extend our sincere appreciation for your continued leadership throughout the 202425 school year. As part of our annual review process, this letter summarizes key findings from your summitive evaluation
grounded in board member feedback and our district's strategic alignment goals. It is intended to recognize your strengths, acknowledge areas for growth, and offer guidance for continued collaboration. One of the most consistently recognized
strengths of your leadership is the culture of cooperation you are building across the district. Your deep well of patience, steady professionalism, and consistent respect you display for people is creating an environment rooted in trust. Board members noted how well
you treat your team as professionals and work diligently to support a collaborative atmosphere that aligns with our shared mission. There has been meaningful progress in coordinating school improvement strategies and establishing a framework for academic consistency across
buildings. The board recognizes these efforts and encourages continued momentum in this area. We look forward to the implementation of comprehensive school improvement strategies such as district dashboards and goal setting tools to help the board and the broader
community visualize our progress in connection to student outcomes. Your efforts to manage fiscal challenges while encouraging system level financial thinking have been acknowledged. You've shown the ability to make difficult decisions, prioritize spending, and
balance short and long-term needs. The performance measure in this evaluation focuses on your ability to understand, plan, and lead the budget process, an area in which your leadership has been intentional and informed. As the board considers a future levy, we
encourage a thoughtful analysis of past campaigns. This reflection should help ensure that any future efforts more clearly reflect community priorities, build broader public support, and communicate a vision aligned with district goals.
You continue to be highly visible at district and community events, and your approachable, positive demeanor remains a consistent area of strength. The board appreciates your responsiveness and the tone you set in your interactions with stakeholders. Looking ahead, there is
opportunity to extend outreach by fostering new relation new relationships, especially with partners who share our mission but may not yet feel fully connected to the district's direction. Additionally, your active advocacy and partnership with state and
national organizations demonstrates a strong commitment to elevating the district's priorities at broader levels. This work helps reinforce public trust and advance the strategic interests of our schools. This review reflects the collective insight of the board and our ongoing
commitment to shared leadership. While together we have challenges to address, particularly around academic outcomes, financial constraints, and broader community community engagement, there is also strong confidence in your ability to lead through them. We thank you for
your commitment to our dis to our district and look forward to working together during the 202526 school year to build on this year's progress in support of students, staff, and the Pri Savage community. Sincerely, Dan White, chair board of education.
Dr. Thomas. Uh thank you, Chair White. Thank you members of the board um for the opportunity to engage in another year together and uh at the end of the year with this annual review. As I shared during our time last week um and during
the close session, one of the things that's very important to me is the power of evaluation. Um and I pride myself on being a very reflective leader. Um, and uh, and it's not just to be affirmed and where things are going well, but also where we have opportunities to to
continue to grow. So, it's the glow and grow. And that's something that u is important to me because I want to make sure that I'm continuing to be my personal best, you know, for this district and this broader community as well as, you know, serving the will of the board as well. It's something I try
to model for our staff throughout the district um to ensure that they are also looking at that opportunity to seek feedback for continued improvement and growth. Um while at the same time um pausing to give ourselves permission to celebrate as well because there are a lot of great things that continue to
happen in our district. Um I will say that I think you foreshadowed a couple of things in that response and thank you for those words. Um there are opportunities for us collectively um as a board as an administration team to ensure that we are getting the outcomes
that we desire. Um whether it's academic outcomes, graduation outcomes, engagement outcomes, a variety of things. That is something that I think collectively we are we are equally committed to ensuring that that happens. um you noted the notion of uh resources
and I think that's another thing that's a big uh uh conversation on on our horizon and how we will effectively uh uh discuss ways that we can address the the resources so that we are able to have what is necessary to reach the
outcomes that we desire. Um, I also really appreciate uh the notion of having tighter alignment around the the strategic priorities and that's one of our uh first uh engagements as we actually have
just been in the process of um uh hiring that uh new individual and that was actually centered on a lot of conversations and questions that we asked the prospective candidates as well. Um because similar to what we've done with LTFM or or five-year forecast
for budget, um we will be developing a five-year academic framework with goals and metrics and objectives. And we'll speak a little bit to some of that this evening um that we've been working on together um to uh as examples and then getting your perspectives on are these the right look fors um for the high
level high leverage um pieces. And then lastly, read my writing. you mentioned um establishing new partnerships uh with our community particularly those
that are that are with us but maybe not committed or not connected I'm sorry not connected to the current direction and uh that's that's very significant because you know one of our core beliefs in our strategic plan is around um being
unified in in our in our efforts and I know that uh there There is not a single district that will be all to all at all times. Not that naive. But I do understand the importance um of us being a more unified community both within the
district internally as well as our external community as well. Um the world has enough happening um as we all know that keeps us apart and I think the more that we find of our common interest and shared um commitments um the better off
we are and the better off our students will be in in for that as well. So I appreciate that push of that statement um in there as well. So thank you again and I look forward to a fantastic year with the board. Thank you Dr. Thomas.
Okay, moving on to the academic update. Dr. Thomas, want to kick it off? Yes, thank you. Um, so several months ago in in conversations uh with the board, uh there was questions particularly that were stemming around a lot of the math discussions and so that's really what um
prompted a lot of um interest in finding ways that we can um better articulate some of those pathways and we'll be planning for that. But we are also taking this opportunity to share um as I stated some of the um academic metrics that we would like to um engage with you
all on on high leverage uh monitoring uh uh metrics similar to what we've talked about with our financial dashboard. What are some of those high leverage metrics that we believe would be ones that we want to be looking at systemically but also then within uh based upon that
within our schools. Um so we're going to talk about that first. Uh then we're going to engage in some of the conversations around um the the uh math pathways particularly at the secondary which was kind of the impetus for some of this broader discussion and then
close out with giving some updates around some of the changes that are taking place um specifically um around the ANI funding and how some of that's being converted into more direct student support um services um to really bolster the our efforts on trying to um minimize
those achievement gaps. and accelerate some of that uh uh closure as well. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Zumbush to start us off in the conversation. Good evening, Chair White, members of the board, Dr. Thomas. Um here uh
tonight I am going to present some initial thinking and alignment around um strategic metrics. This conversation is going to be a little bit tricky because um the fine details of this have not been entirely worked out and that's part
of the discussion tonight. Um so I think to the extent possible we want to stay at the level of um really looking at the type of framework that we have laid out here um and get some conversation around that um without going down too many
rabbit holes if possible. Um so this is not a fully um you know sometimes we bring things forward and things are very you know formal and data is kind of set. This is very much a working draft of something that we're we're working on. So um just wanted to give you that
context uh from the beginning that this is still a work in progress um and nothing on here has been set in stone. Dr. motion if I may also and I I'm sorry board I forgot to share that we will also be planning for our annual fall deeper dive with you on on very in-depth
metrics um some of those metrics are embargoed uh so we can't publicly discuss them but certainly that will still be part of our um annual discussion that we'll be having with the board um as we typically do. So, we're going to start by talking
about some of the progress indicators we've been working on. Um, currently what we've been working on um in the um data realm is two main types of data displays. And if you look on um lots of
different district websites, this is a very typical um type of display that districts would have. One is kind of a by the numbers display. We do have a version of that on our website currently. Um, but I'm currently working with um a new vendor uh Aubrey to kind
of revamp and rethink some of our by the numbers uh data displays just to show a little bit more description of um who are the students that we serve and and what does our district really look like. Um so there's been some mockups of this. Um again, I just want to reiterate uh
these visuals are not in their final format. Um it's really just intended to show you the types of data displays that we're working on um and where this thinking is going. Um so the um by the numbers mock I'll go through this fairly quickly. Um it
really is a visual look at what our enrollment numbers look like and a snapshot in time. This would be something that um would be uh updated um daily or nightly. Uh this is a snapshot that happened um I believe last week.
Um, also we would look at enrollment by school, looking at key demographic variables. These are all publicly available data sources, so this isn't giving anything new that we wouldn't be able to find. Um, but just kind of reinvisioning how to kind of have a good snapshot view of
the district overall. Um then over time these by the numbers uh v displays would also incorporate uh school level demographics and kind of a snapshot of what each school looks like kind of like a school profile
and just really um visualizing the students that we serve um the different um programs they might be part of in terms of special education or a 504 status uh English learners um that type of Um so all of that is being um kind of
worked on now um so that we can have that um ready for that um external display. Uh the second thing that's in the works is um what would be kind of a scorecard uh section. Uh this is something that um when you adopt a new
strategic plan, you typically rework your indicators to align with that strategic plan. Um and this is uh the work that's being done to kind of identify what are those key indicators um that are aligned to our strategic plan that can kind of roll up as to key
metrics that we would want to report on on a regular basis. Um this is currently what the scorecard draft looks like. Um it's not in a program currently that would be externally facing but it's a working document to really show what could this
look like. Um these are the four pillar pillars of our strategic plan. Um academic excellence, optimized resources, positive learning environments and community partnerships. Um and I will kind of go one by one and talk about some of the metrics that are
being discussed within each of these um categories. Uh academic excellence is obviously the big one and the one that we've talked about a lot. Um so I'll go in a little bit more detail on this one. So academic excellence um when we look at a
scorecard level metric, these are really our highest level metrics that are um an annual measure of um success or change over time. Uh and these would generally generally be our MCA or our summitive
measures. Um and then we also would display career and college readiness indicators such as our ACT composite score. um some of the outcomes that we see in terms of advanced placement courses uh and students getting um those
three or higher on the AP exams that would give them college credit and then some graduation rate data. Um also all of these metrics are designed with the school improvement plans in mind. So this is very in alignment with what the
high school is currently tracking as their key metrics for career and college readiness. Um and as we go through the other ones um other the schools in their process and departments in their improvement processes are talking about all of these metrics. So all of that is
an alignment um from a department and a school level. Um of course the um MCAs are not the only thing we would track. I think like a school improvement plan it gives a very highlevel overview of the types of
things that a school is working on. Um the MCAs are a very summitative measure. We've talked about that. It's kind of the um at the end of the day, what did it look like? Um that doesn't give us those formative measures or how we're tracking progress. So what you see on a
scorecard is not all of the information that we're tracking on a regular basis. So, in the um I'm going to go um okay, that was just there's no slide for that. Um so, basically there's a lot of other formative measures that we
would be tracking on a regular basis and that would be our fastbridge data. um we can look at um you know some specific um look at grades or or other types of other metrics that are um formative
along the way. Also down the line as I mentioned we would be developing school level metrics. I think um I didn't take an actual clip of this because I think we need to talk um as a community first about what it means to report out school
level metrics in this way and you know the um especially at the elementary level that comparison across schools um and what that means and you know just being careful that a scorecard metric doesn't mean um that a school is is good or bad by a single metric. So just
really um that's this is kind of like the next iteration is to start looking more at that school level and within the school improvement plans at the site level. How do we think about looking at metrics at the site level as well? Um I'm also in the process of developing
um what's called a stoplight report. Um really that and a lot of the documents that we work with the data it's important to know what the actual numbers are but it also is important to know change over time. So, how do things look from a visual standpoint? Where are
areas that things are um improving? Where are some areas where things are going um down? Where are things stagnant? So, kind of this is a mockup of an example. And this is not our data, but um a mockup of the type of thing that we could look at in terms of not
just the level of, you know, percentage of students who were at low risk on FastBridge, but what did that look like in terms of comparing to that same period last year? So, are we moving in a positive direction? Are we moving in a negative direction? And then really
disentangling why that might be the case and figuring out that root cause there. Um so in terms of the formative measures um fastbridge data is something we look at at a regular basis. We look at those risk levels um but we also look at um
specific subtests um to see where are specific skill gaps and growth over the course of the year. Um that winter growth data is really important to kind of set the stage for what the spring um learning looks like. uh also tracking,
you know, English learner exit rates. Uh really digging into ACT data, what are the subject area tests look like? Um we have other data in terms of um Apple is our language acquisition data that we look at in terms of our immersion
programming. Um and then in secondary, we look at grades. uh if students are failing courses and then if that's associated with um either high attendance or low attendance that may mean a different type of intervention for students. And then um the disagregation of data is important to
understand whether there is something systematic happening at a site level or a grade level or um within demographic groups. um within our optimized resources section um between the school improvement plans and department plans.
This one has landed um fairly squarely in the human resources and the um finance areas. The school improvement plans this year have really been to um implement the new Danielson framework with fidelity, making sure teachers are getting high quality feedback on their
instruction. um the um the rate this year was was very very high um because of that and you know continuing that metric for making sure that we're getting high quality feedback to teachers. Um some of
these are also example metrics of a three-year rolling average of retention is a researchbased metric that indicates um success in a district. So, um kind of a combination of what our departments are tracking and then what does um the research say in terms of um metrics that
are um predictive of outcomes that we're looking for. Um for um finance, the per pupil spending and then percent for instruction. Um those are metrics that are on the um state report cards. So things that we can pull
in terms of comparisons to state and then look at other districts as well. um for positive learning environments. This really um has three major sections in it. Um one is key stutter survey items. Um recently our schools have
focused on um bus safety and then uh students nice being nice and showing respect to each other. Um we just had a endofear um retreat with our learning leaders and there was some potentially new areas that schools have identified that they'd like to focus on um in terms
of student engagement. Um so these may shift over time depending on what schools identify as kind of those key areas for um student needs in terms of um making sure that they have that positive learning environment. And then
um attendance and behavior are key metrics that we'll want to look at as well. Um attendance really is a metric that we want to look at more at the upper level. Um when you look at attendance at the lower level um elementary that is really more of an
indicator of whether the family is able to get a student there versus an indicator of whether the student over time as the student becomes more independent and has more decision-m and is able to drive that attendance is more of a metric of that student engagement
um more so than something that maybe needs to be addressed at the family level. Um, and then behavior, we want to track. It's it's complicated because behavior is a measure of both what the student does and how adults respond to that behavior. Um, so it's um something
that we want to think through how we can um present some metrics that kind of give us an a snapshot of what that looks like at our at our sites. Um, community partnerships. Um these are also really based on our um community
survey. The first one is um the parent and caregiver survey that we uh disseminate. One of the metrics is to just increase participation over time to make sure that we get as many voices as possible responding to that survey. Um and then a goal in terms of increasing
overall satisfaction um with the district over time. And then in terms of the um the other section is key stutter um items again driven by that uh root cause analysis that schools conduct that needs assessment on what are those
things that really need to be improved in order to improve those partnerships um at the parent caregiver level. Um this this past year and the year before a lot of that has focused on positive messages home and feedback on students learning. Um, schools are in development
of their school improvement plans now. So, we'll see kind of to what extent some of these stay and others are shifted. The other thing we're in the process of developing is a long-term uh curricular adoption cycle calendar. Um, the purpose
of this is that um we have a lot of complicated timelines when it comes to piloting curriculum, adopting them. um knowing that it takes three full years to implement a curricular resource um in order to see those uh measurable
outcomes. Um and on top of that, we have constantly changing standards and constantly changing um MCA tests depending on the subject area. Um so in a development of a comprehensive timeline that shows whi where we are in
the curricular adoption cycle and when we can start to really anticipate those measurable outcomes. Um just to look at um one example we know that we are um
um I should look here because that's can see better. Um we know that um we are in the second this is the second year of our bridges implementation goal. All of the um teacher goals this year were based on um implementation of the
bridges resource. We know that next year we'll be shifting towards that outcome goal because that's year three of our um implementation of bridges. Um the carrot in the school year 2728 indicates that we'll be changing standards. Um, so just
trying to understand how things may change over time depending on state contextual factors and also where we are in our curricular adoption process. Um, and then all of this kind of wraps up into um, given our um, academic
excellence priority and all of the metrics that we're looking at, where does this kind of land for us in terms of what our vision is for academic excellence moving forward? Thank you, Dr. Zush um and I'll just share these are four of our key key draft um goal
areas that we want to focus on. First and foremost in the upper left hand quadrant the strengthening tier one instruction and this is where we want to have you know uh 85% or so of our students having quality experiences at that in that space. When you think of a
traditional MTSS model um you know a good portion of your students need to ensure that we have that. So um key to that is ensuring that we have that evidence-based curriculum across all content areas and as Dr. Zumbush alluded to sometimes that's a moving target
because of some of the state standards change etc. There are publishing companies that try to futureproof a lot of their content but we know that we're always going to be at the whim of any of those changes that may take place and or any state laws um that change through legislative sessions. Um the other area
that we are really wanting to focus in on kind of as some strategies within that goal is to ensure that we have more consistent instructional blocks. Um that's a key area that we've observed uh over this past year. Um particularly as we've been doing some of our um informal
rounds is that um school school schedules particularly I'll just use at the elementary school where we have the vast array of differentiation of of time. We want to make sure that what the research notes in terms of blocks of time um for math, for example, is
actually being delivered. Um because some schools as to how they're structuring their their school day, we might find, you know, 20 minutes here, 20 minutes here, and 20 minutes here. So maybe they're getting the 60 minutes, but it's not coming in a block. And then we're
looking at ways that we can um increase instructional efficiency, but also what's best for students in terms of their learning. Um, and I understand that we need to have release time, you know, learning breaks, etc. But that's one opportunity I think in terms of a strategic or a strategy that we believe
is going to be something that we're definitely going to want to hone in on, you know, across the board. Um, and then if you take a look at that last bullet, just monitoring quality through coaching and classroom walkthroughs. One of the other aspects that we are looking to
revise this or for the upcoming school year, um, it's something that we've been um, doing with Stutter, particularly from the leadership standpoint, but we'll be taking some of those same principles uh, also in partnership with one of our local universities um, to develop instructional rounds. Um so very
similar to what you might see in a hospital um at shift changes um where we are looking at you know how our students are doing or in a medical setting you're looking at how your patients are doing um so that you're handing that off to the next uh groups of individuals who can be there for the next rounds of
support and that's something that we are going to be tightening up on um the district services side of of support to ensure that we are tighter on our instructional rounds to do more progress monitoring um from the central um support uh standpoint in addition to
what's happening already within um each individual school um and within each you know department and grade level. Uh we just need a greater presence in that to ensure that we have that um alignment. Um we talk about uh data being
developmental not judgmental. So whether that's evaluation data or student performance data or whatever that might be, we want to make sure that data is being used to inform practice and uh through structures such as professional learning communities or some of those uh
release days that we've had in the past. We want to make sure the appropriate data is being um harnessed so that teachers have what they need when they need it to make the best uh adjustments to their instruction. Part of our partnership with Aubrey, who is an IT
solutions company who helps do some of this visualization and put it at the fingertips of administrators and staff, um, is that it's more accessible. So, we know that the easier we can have staff access the information that's necessary to shift instructional practice, the more inclined that they will be leaning
into leading more effectively with data. Um, and then to Dr. Dr. Zumbush's point earlier this evening as we set those larger academic um strategic goals then we're back mapping that into each individual school grade level or department to say now what does this
mean for fourth grade for third grade or for the science department etc. um so that we have a better structure of of data usage and data literacy all throughout the district. Um that couples with those instructional walkthroughs that I just mentioned in the um uh uh
strengthening tier one core instructure instruction. U moving over to the upper right quadrant um uh the big goal is to ensure that our teachers are at their best capacity uh to ensure they are delivering the best instruction in our
classrooms. um we have an opportunity to revision how we've been leveraging professional development in our district. Um we also know that we have a lot of changes particularly around literacy that's going to be mandated. So very tight on some of the things and so we're going to really have to um harness
that differently moving forward um uh particularly around the science of reading um and the and that's going now into the secondary for next year. So, that's going to be a a new plan that's going to be realigned um there to ensure that we're delivering on this u
expectations of that new state statute. Um, one of the things that we're really proud of and we've given uh our annual QC comp report to you all and uh this year we really wanted to make sure that uh our we had a high completion rate um
because what we know with the research is that um the best um feedback from an evaluation is that postconferencing feedback and if we're not getting those evaluations completed that postconferencing is not happening with our staff. Um so similar to the debrief
that you all had with me, that's where the learning um comes and that's where the goals and ideations of strategies come from that that process. Um this year I'm proud to say and Emily, uh Director Herman, you can correct me, was it about 98%. Superintendent Thompson, members of the
board, we're now up to 99.48%. 99. So it's gone up a bit. So you know and and this is not just a technical um uh uh check the box that I've done in the evaluation. This is actually deep feedback that we can provide our staff
to ensure that they are mirroring um research as well as observing through data and then that daily pedigogy in the classroom that they can triangulate the best practices for our kids. Um, and then this gives us an opportunity to really revision how professional
learning communities or PLC's are being realized throughout our our district. I think kind of coupled back with some of that common and consistent instructional blocks that allows us to give better structure and support around professional learning communities to versus everybody kind of being all over
the board with regards to calendars and where we can plug in for central support. We lose efficiency when we don't excuse me when we don't have that. And then lastly, we have, as I stated earlier, about um, you know, 80 80% or
so of kids being in tier one instruction. And that's where everyone should experience that core uh, learning. But then we also know that we have a percentage of our students who are going to need tier 2 um, and upwards of tier three going into special ed support as well to kind of round out that final 15%. And one of the things
that we are committed to doing next year is uh really investing in how we can build up with our limited resources, but we need to find a way to build up a more robust uh multi-tered systems of support. So when a student is not performing um uh well at tier one um
through some of this technology of of data literacy that we're partnering with, we can build in automatic flags as well. So we can have tech kind of monitoring for when students in addition to what teachers are seeing daily as well. I don't want to say we're taking that out, but we can autom have
automatic alerts come up. We can when we run reports, we can run reports categorized by how many u students are receiving tier 2. What was the exit and return back to tier one and or are we seeing increases in the amount of referrals for tier 2. Um, and that's something that we want to make sure that
we have a more robust approach and intentionality around because in the absence of that right now, our only other tier quite frankly is special education support. And that's a very costly um both from a time and financial resource um methodology to have that be
your next tier automatically. Um, not to say that some students don't require that, but what we would like to see is a better intervention process to prevent students from going into special ed unnecessarily because that's the only other place that we have some of those alternative supports. Um, and we do and
they do well, but it's a just a very costly way of doing it. So, we'd like to shift some of that and really uh round out more of that tier 2 um aspect. So, just want to share with the board, these are our preliminary um academic excellence uh uh goals that align to the
Strat plan. You'll see some semblance of some of the strategy thinking that we will be spending this summer um based upon once we get u all the updated and cleaned data that's disembarged as well to start then setting some actual measurements around some of this as to
what we can expect. that would then then roll up to that larger um dashboard that we um initially um shared. So with that um initial framing of uh that I'll just pause here while we open up for some discussion as to are is are
there pieces that we're are are missing some things that you would like us to consider um and just open that up chair and then our team stands ready to engage as well. questions, comments. Charles, yes. Um, Dr. Zush, could you
tell me what would go into the school level metrics if we move forward on that? Um, thank you for the question, uh, Director Johnson. I think the answer is
a little bit two parts. One is that um as I mentioned with the school improvement plans, every site needs to go through um a comprehensive needs assessment that really um unpacks what went well and you know areas for improvement within a site and that helps
build their school improvement plan. So part of the metrics are attached to that school improvement plan. Um the other answer to that is that as we solidify the district level metrics um that is something that then can cascade down at
the site level. Um without having those completely solidified I think um the the sketch or the outline of what that those school metrics looks like isn't as clear but I think a lot of the same metric it will be a lot of the same metrics. So
looking at um MCA outcomes, obviously high school, elementary have some inherently different outcome metrics um but also just uh a snapshot of what that building looks like in terms of the students that it serves. And then um any
sort of specialty programming or um like if a program like Lola would have, you know, choose to have a metric in terms of language acquisition. So there could be some specific metrics but overall it would look very aligned to that district
report card um for those high level metrics. And I would just add to so the uh scaled down version of what our district metrics would be would be consistent. And so we would own that real estate at the school level, but
definitely want to work with our principles to give them that autonomy on some other local measures that they also feel are important to their community that we might not track specifically, but it's high leverage for them. So there be that both and approach.
One other question. Um, and you plan on having all this up and running by start of school. Is that correct? Yeah, this our plan is to have this ready to roll out for this fall. Yeah. All right. Thank you. So, oh,
sure. Um, so I have a question. Um, so understand there's a difference between matrix matrixes from grade school, but I think the high school a lot of people look at high schools. Um, so having that dial down on on specific to the high school, I think is really
important. Absolutely. because like I said high schools and then also a lot of this data is online through MDE by school. So I also think that I understand the concern of having it broken out for each elementary school but at the end of the day the data is available if people really want to dive
into you know absolutely yeah I I don't disagree Director Atinson and or I should say we don't disagree. Um so a lot of this all as you say it is very public on MDA's um uh north northern star or northstar online or northern star uh website and uh one of the things
we want to be mindful of is again it's this whole notion of the developmental aspect of how this is being used. Um a lot of this data is also in our school improvement plans and so when our schools are doing their states of the schools in the fall they're sharing this data publicly as well. We just want to
be able to have a more visual way of dashboarding very similar to what we've done with our finance dashboard to bring that same level of awareness and understanding and kind of make it meaningful for our community to understand this amorphous number that gets published in the newspaper or wherever they might find or the test
that their student brings home. Well, now they have some context around what that actually means and can have some better dialogue on understanding the holistic aspect of how a school is doing as well as some deeper conversations or questions to ask when they go in for conferences, etc. So, um, and then the I
just want to be clear, this isn't just for elementary. So, if that if you all thought high school and middle school were exempt, they're not. That that is part of it, too. There are just different sets of metrics that we would be tracking that um compared to elementary. But they're they've always been part of that vision to have this as well. And I think I mean I think once
you take a deeper dive into the elementary schools, there's some really great things to celebrate in our district. So I think it would actually be really great to have that online. Um I have a question about the slide for positive learning environments. Um I understand the data points here look like they're all um student driven. We
talk about staff here where staff are valued. Would it be worth exploring adding some sort of um information about um evaluating our staff? Yes. And I'm not sure what that looks like, but I'm just we do talk about staff there, which is really important for positive learning environments. Yeah. And and in
and if you take if you take Sorry, let me just zoom in on this. Um so one of the things that around positive uh learning environment, this is something that we take from our key stakeholder uh student information. So we would have some of that information that would be metrics that we want to track for that
year. So we might see a pattern established around a particular question set that netted a result that we want to say okay that's going to be one of our our drivers that we want to track and monitor. So absolutely whether it's our students, our staff or our parents as our three primary stakeholders. That's
where a lot of this information could be um pulled in on that first area in addition to some of the schoolbased related stuff around behavior and attendance. And then I just have um two other quick questions. On the very last slide for vision for academic excellent priority
um for the first strengthen tier one instruction under the bullet point moni monitor quality through coaching and classroom walkthroughs. How is that executed or how do you see that coming together? Yeah. So what we envision for that who specifically what we envision for that director Atinson would be
members of our central academic team partnering with members from our school-based building instructional leadership teams. Um so having uh quarterly touch points throughout the year uh where we understand at the very beginning every school and department
does their school improvement or their uh department improvement plan um with their goals and metrics for the year and we now will establish at the central support uh an instructional rounds protocol um that myself uh Dr. Warner,
Dr. Zumbush or others would go out and work with that building principal and members from their um ILT to say okay what are the look fors for us you know when we're going to spend a couple hours in your building today and that would be something that we go through and then we would give that feedback that
observation feedback live right there in the moment to say okay this is what you wanted us to observe this is what we actually saw here are the points of alignment and and to celebrations as we've talked about and here's some opportunities for us to ask them questions of is it just the time of day
that we saw something kind of like going to a classroom for a regular teacher observation you're going to see a snapshot of time. So it's our ability to have a deeper understanding and context on saying okay the this is a sample of what we saw today and here's how we see it you know rolling up to your school
improvement plan. Um and then if there's anything you need from us to do something differently, okay, then that's the ask for them to say, well, we need XYZ resource or this would be an opportunity for us to strengthen um professional development on our next release day. Um if we see that pattern,
for example, across a grade level, so or or a grade band. So that's the protocol. Um we would be using something that one of our local universities uh has partnered with you know across the country with some very similar work that Stutter also has engaged in. Um but it
would be our academic central division um representation partnering with building leadership and teacher leadership to observe for those um uh look for ti tied to their skips. So that would be our formal touch points and then of course there's still going to be those informal popthroughs whether it's
the principal doing that myself other members from the academic team uh namely like Dr. Warner um Dr. Edwards or you know um you know who's in that role and myself that would also have those informal touch points too that wouldn't necessarily be scored and unpacked you
know but it would be more that onetoone coaching with that building principal. Thank you. My last question is um under the M MTSS um supports do how do advanced students fit into that? Um it would be all of that. So if we have
students who need acceleration or students who need some remediation, that's kind of what this whole notion of MTSS is about. And so when we're looking at ways that we can differentiate, you know, our instruction, that's where we need to start finding ways. So, uh, we'll talk a little bit about that in,
um, our next portion of the presentation, particularly around the middle school math. Um, but it's that same concept of when we have a student who's, um, going forward in their educational career, there's going to be opportunities for them to, um, take different, um, ramps for their learning.
Sometimes they might take a ramp that slows things down. Sometimes they might take a ramp that accelerates that. Um, but our ability to to have that tiered system of support um to meet those individual needs, again going back to our core definition of equity to give students and staff what they uniquely
need to be successful, that's where we center a lot of that work. Amy, um, I I just want to say this all is really exciting to be able to look forward to. I I mean having it aligned
to the strategic plan, I think there's a lot of great things in here. One of the thoughts that I had as we're going through all these things and I know that they're not um solidified as of yet. So, but just I just kind of wanted to share
this thought um is that there's a lot of information, a lot of data that um we're looking to collect and to be able to share on the on a future dashboard, which I think is really great. Um but my where my
thoughts went is um this uh administrative tool um how are we ensuring that it is the the support is going to the uh students and the teachers and that it doesn't
feel like a another thing that teachers have to report or does that make sense? Like it does. I mean, there's a lot of things in here and I I think that um teachers often talk about their loads um
admin their reporting loads and all of those things and I'm I'm just mindful like how how are we insuring? I I hear you and and I'm I'm mindful of that as well. And a couple of you who were on the board when I first started here know that that was one of the first changes
that I instituted when I came here because um again this is not to say what was happening in and of itself was bad but there were a lot of metric tracking that became very technical. Um and um the
feedback to me was we have all these joint work groups or whatever they might have been called and they're all responsible for these kind of sub bullets of things to generate reports and numbers and data and um it was
numbers everywhere and so we're not recreating that. Um what you're seeing here is a lot of data and I think twofold. one, we want to make sure this dashboard um really helps our community
first and foremost understand one how we're performing and what all this means. Um whether it's a running glossery um uh uh definitions of what uh I'm sorry, what the a certain assessment
might be used for, etc. So that families understand what does all this data mean? Um so that they understand how to be more of a support. So that's that's one aspect what you're seeing here and and I know for you all what we're trying to do
for you is give you that thermometer approach um of what are the things that you should be taking a temperature on that you should be monitoring and seeing because there's a lot of data here that will never see the light of the board
necessarily. Okay? Because it's it's our formative utilization of coaching development etc. Um, not to say that some of you don't have an interest and we can talk onetoone about that, but it's not going to be those high leverage pieces because we want to make sure that you're gi given the data necessary from
your level of governance to make the best decisions for when we, you know, for example, when we're looking at Redact, um, and the potential new curriculum that will be, uh, coming as a as a means to, um, bolster the literacy. Well, you want to see some of those
highle metrics. You don't need to be all into the weeds of some of the uh semantics of of curriculum, but what does the data suggest that when we look at the market for a resource, a curricular resource, these are the three things, Michael, that we should be
looking for based upon what we are seeing in the data. And as long as that curricular resource meets these three, then the other aspects, the ped the pedigogy, the science, and the research, we leave that to you all to to best vet that as long as it meets these outcomes
that we need to hit. That's, you know, part of that resource. So that's how this would be iterative for all of you. Um, and then in terms of teacher, this isn't something that teachers are going to necessarily be gathering. This is
data that we have access to. And this would be data that would also be um pushed from our own, you know, warehouse system into a better visualization that teachers would have an internal facing dashboard that would look slightly different than the public, but it allows
them to then categorize their kids, see who's there. We can, you know, as a teacher, I could break out, you know, various ways to see how I might do my instructional groups a little bit differently based upon content. And it makes it very user friendly and more intuitive. Um, and again with some of
the AI built into technology, you know, data systems nowadays, we can build in automatic cut flags to say once a student reaches this, then I want to flag for a discussion that I have, you know, with Dan to say, looks like you've done really well well on these formative
assessments, I really want to start pushing you a little bit and and accelerating some things. So, I'm going to give you something different, right? or I might have a cut score to say, you know, Mary, you might need to slow it down a little bit because you're not demonstrating success around the standard. And I just I don't have to be looking for that. It'll just tell me
have a conversation with Mary, have a conversation with Dan. So, we can have some of that intuitive support that's built into some of the dashboards with Aubrey. Um, so I hope that gets to your question that we're not recreating a whole bunch to add to a plate. We're actually trying to streamline and organize the plate differently for for
our teachers. I can see um how this also could do just that and and um my sharing that thought. It it just mainly being mindful that the support we want at the
students and staff. Um I really appreciate how it ties everything to the strategic plan. I feel like the since adopting the strategic plan, the work being done to have that from boardroom to classroom is is very encouraging.
Thank you. I Yeah, one other thought um on the community partnerships um you know I I think the way like I read the strategic plan too is just even outside of like the the parent caregiver. So, is there a
metric or something we could consider that may benefit us to um gather from community outside of this the parent caregivers? So, other stakeholders, city partners, you know, I don't know, I'm just tossing out ideas, but um you know,
getting that feedback incorporated also like are we are we a good partner with you know, whether different organizations and with the cities and with you know, whatever that might be. So, similar to what I submitted during my evaluation in those uh um uh artifact folders that you all had access to,
you'll see that um partnership profile that we've done for all of our schools across the entire system. So, something like that would be a good data point that we could leverage to say, are we growing or expanding partnerships, right? And or for if we want to say, you know, we want to get real specific about
the type of partnership we want to expand in. So, I'll just arbitrarily say if we want to bolster our medical um connections to really help our medical career pathway at Minaps, then we want to say we want to increase that by 3%.
And so, let's find, you know, five more agencies that might be able to give some of those in, you know, the field uh resources and supports and experiences for our kids around medical just arbitrarily. And then I would say lastly, uh, Director Mason, um, I think
within our community education, that's another place where our broader community meets the district, if you will. And so we could also set some metrics around that in terms of class participation rates, um, the drive or
the demand for new courses. So there's some metrics that we can partner with director D and his team to better understand. And and this part of this discussion tonight was to just solicit from all of you. What are some things that are top of mind around some metrics that you think might be worth exploring
um and wanted you to help drive and design that process before coming down with some finals that we would bring to you, you know, first part part of the school year next year as we get ready to launch. And I'll just add we do have a number of community education metrics and early childhood is another area that
is relevant for community partnerships. Um in our coaching with sutor I think their thought was that is maybe a little bit more of that formative or you know behind the scenes or departmental work but um I think anything's on the board for elevate no pun intended elevating
any conversation that is a important metric for the community. Um, so I know director Dah has goals around um increasing the number of classes that are taught by community members um and increased participation in community education. Um so we do have a number of
those metrics getting tracked at the department level. Um but I I also agree that you know a broader um community metric would be helpful and so any um thoughts on what that could look like would be appreciated. Yeah, I mean my
initial thought went to just like even communication like how are we communicating out to our you know not our parents and caregare anyone that's not in the district but also like you know volunteer opportunities or anything around that but I don't know how you could gather that I guess is the
challenge something um yes so first of all thank you very much for this um you know as I look at all this it's It's it's stuff that I've seen under the MTSS umbrella uh for a while. It's more or less
memorialized in the rubric and in the and the matrices. So, I appreciate it kind of coming to life. Um, one of the things that um is is is a little bit more difficult to measure and I know
that we've had conversations about this in the previous years is a the cohort as it goes through the years um and trying to get it not at because nothing could be really measured at a point in time. By the time you realize there's an issue, you're putting in the changes but
the student is moving between grades. uh the group of students are moving between grades and every so often and I've seen this happen kind of in waves where you have a wave of let's say a grade level sometimes go up or down and it can skew if you're looking at it aggregately
let's say by building or something like that. Um so that's my first question. Uh, and I do think that's a it, correct me if I'm wrong, you do the work, that's a little bit easier to do K through eight. Once you get in high school, the
MCA scores are not as reliable. They're not as reliable anywhere, the equivalent of that. Um, simply because students aren't as engaged, especially the juniors. I mean, a lot of them don't even show up, etc. Um so measuring that
as they continue through high school um has always been a a continued challenge. So if you could address the K through eight and that cohort impact and then uh and and I'm not saying that you're supposed to pull a rabbit out of a hat
for high school, but uh any ideas that have been discussed about following this through in the 9 through 12 grades? Yeah, I don't have a clear answer because it is tricky. And I think one of the other things that's happened is the
pandemic has um based very specifically by whatever grade level they more or less missed during the pandemic. And so one cohort may have more um social gaps, another cohort may have more math gaps, others may have
more of the foundational reading gap. Um, I think the nature of education is there's so many factors that go in it's really hard to pinpoint that. But I I hear your um point. The other complexity is that it's really tempting to compare
MCA's year-over-year, like what percentage of students met standards in um third grade versus fourth grade? Um it did it go up or down? um that is not recommended um by our state, you know,
measurement officials. Um it is really a test of very different set of standards. It's a test of um the grade level standards. And while there's clearly a relationship, if you're if you're um doing really well in third grade standards, you're more likely to do well
on fourth grade standards, but that is not necessarily that onetoone correlation. Um but I can think a little bit more and talk to some colleagues and see how to better um understand that cohort effect and um I do think that does help um and I know a lot of the
board conversations have been um related to that idea that you know if a particular outcome looks a certain way does that kind of match what we've seen been seeing from that cohort over time or is that something that maybe is um
something that was unexpected? Um, so I think that is a definitely worthwhile conversation. I'll see what I can do in terms of and I might just add a little bit of uh additional context around for example specifically earlier in this uh slide uh looking at the high school data
set that we would uh intend to include here. And if you recall earlier this year we brought some conversation to the board. My recollection is might have been around October or November study session where we were talking about a focus on uh increasing student
participation in our AP course uh offerings and likewise the assessments um at the high school level to address that concern that you you brought up with juniors not being highly motivated by necessarily all the assessments that we put in front of them. Uh juniors and
seniors or and occas and sophomores as well. uh actually some freshmen too that have exposure to AP uh course offerings take that very uh seriously and that's a great measure. Um so that is one of the reasons why uh because we've been engaged as well with the high school
administrative team also around the ACT test and uh that that in addition to the composite score there's a lot of good data around the other components of the ACT as a measure of of where our progress is and adjustments that can be
made. So I know that Dr. Zumbush has been engaged in conversation with the team around that too. Yeah, I think we can dive deeper over time on um student grades as well. One of the biggest predictors for on-time graduation is whether you um fail a core course that
basically takes you off track. Um the biggest predictor for um postsecary GPA is your high school GPA. Um it's it's a little bit of a complicated metric because it is both um a content measure and an engagement measure. Um and then
there's the added um that each teacher has maybe some different um metrics on how they grade, but in general um core courses um even just courses overall and the grades. So we I think that's a metric that we can explore in terms of
um secondary because that really is predictive of how students do in post-secary environments. Um, in terms of the acquisition, I agree. Um, and MCUs are only one grade level in reading and one grade level in math. So, we don't even have a comprehensive data
set. Um, I think what we, um, implemented this year fast bridge across all nth grade um, in all three quarters. I think that's an important metric to understand whether there's um, foundational gaps in in terms of student skill set in the high school. Um, so I
think looking at fastbridge over time, um, and we're still, um, not clear from the state what the guidance is in terms of secondary screening, but, um, we might end up expanding that out, um, if that's something that is really giving
us better insight into in terms of the reading, um, abilities. But I think there's a lot more we could explore with that and that we and and I agree we we already this isn't teachers are not going to be collecting any additional information. This is all information that I look at it on a regular basis. I
think it is a matter of better organizing it and communicating it and um being clear about what metrics um tell us and what they don't. Um I had one more. Yeah. Um, so to kind of piggyback exactly what you just said on
what um, Director Bullan said, uh, I remember um, and I am very appreciative of what Dr. Thomas did because we tend to we had so many committees and so many initiatives going on at one time. The biggest um complaint we were hearing
from staff and was that they were losing their time to do that crossf functional evaluation particularly in secondary where they may have only seen a student once a day or three times a week for 45 minutes or an hour. Um they wanted that
time to be you know their time to be maximized in front of students and with students. uh and so you know as we're gathering this data I would hope that the data is gathered again in their normal course of their teaching and not
another step forward um because that's going to take away from their time and now that we're even more resource constrained that is a concern agree anyone else
okay moving on to Sure thank you so Um several months ago we were having discussions around math and so I'm going to have the team come back forward and walk us through the conversation with some additional uh context and I think
some visualizations to better understand some of the pathways and uh uh uh opportunities for kids to accelerate math um as well um based upon how they're performing. So I'll turn it over to Dr. Warner to start that conversation. Good evening. First off,
we'll just remind ourselves of where we started with our math vision. And so, this was a really awesome opportunity for our K12 math educators to come and really think about what is the learning experience for students look like, feel like, sound like in our math classrooms. And so, we had our K12 math educators
start with this. You can see those bulleted points were really about that student learning experience. And that vision really guided and supported the next steps that we went through as committees to be able to adopt our resources so that we can bring that vision to life so students really have
that learning experience and then can apply that to their academic learning. Also then just reminding where we were at with our secondary math timeline. We did put in there the piece about uh in 2023 and 2024 our bridges math because
that really started that piece. We talked about our vision. We looked at where elementary was at. So that was that first year of that bridges math implementation and then piloting our CPM in our middle schools and are looking to align that with our bridges and being
able to see how that really folds into those next learning experiences for students again to bring the math vision to life to bring that academic excellence to life also. Um and then May we took action um you took action as the board to adopt our CPM and purchase of
that CPM. next year 2024. So what we just finished um first full year of implementation of our CPM at our middle schools and then exploration of that SAVIS resource in some specific courses at the high school and then the next
steps in that looking for next year our second full year of that implementation at our middle school and then SAVIS implementation for our eighth grade advanced offering of Eldra 1 making sure that we have that alignment with high school. So this really visualizes that
intentionality around how all of those conversations led to the next transitions as students moved from different levels because wanting to make sure that that K12 math learning experience was really connected and then also really vital for them to be um
important learners that they are. And then just reminding you of this, I know this was shared um at the board also a little while ago, but just looking at that academic excellence and math rigor and the visual being able to remind ourselves how that was really
grounded together. How we get to that academic excellence is through that mathematical rigor and that conversation continues. It was stemmed again from the math vision, but also then built upon during professional development opportunities during implementation to
be able to say what is that learning experience that we're truly making sure that students have so that that math rigor is there. And then again, continuing to get to that when students need more of that or maybe need some of that scaffolding to be able to support
so that we're at that math rigor which matches where our state standards are at so that all students are learning to their best level. And I think I'm going to turn it back to Dr. Zambush. Yeah. So for these um slides, we want to
revisit a little bit um what it means to um meet or exceed standards in terms of an MCA. Um each of the grade levels have a lot of standards um and they're categorized by strand and each of the strand by grade level has um really
detailed achievement level descriptors of what it looks like for a student to be in each of the categories of an MCA. um this some of these are not tested directly on the MCA, but regardless of the um whether they end up on an MCA or not, and there's actually achievement
level descriptors for non-ested grades as well for the youngest students, what does it look like for a student to be um in a does not meet partially meets meets and exceeds level in terms of their understanding of standards. And so just a reminder that um this is a progression
from left to right. everything um in the meats category is that student understands everything um from the far left side um up to where they're at in terms of that depth of understanding um that mathematical rigor tool um that
Dr. Warner discussed um that directly maps onto those achievement level descriptors and um what we see on an MCA. So, this table um kind of crosswalks those three legs of the of
the rigger stool to the different MCA levels. Um that horizontal line, the dark gray across the middle, that is what we consider that cut point for proficiency. In some senses, it's an arbitrary cut point. You can cut it at any point. Um it is a continuous data
set. So students land all across the whole continuum of a um measured you know variability of their the extent to which they understand standards. Um that one line is just kind of that cut point for what we classify as proficiency. Um
but here you can see that um if a student has that um procedural fluency that is necessary for a student to be at any level on an MCA. So that means they can calculate um they can understand
um how um you know numbers work in terms of um computation and things like that. The the key here is that the difference between a student that is not meeting standards and a student who is meeting or exceeding standards is that they not
only have the pro procedural fluency but they also have that deep conceptual understanding and application. This is not something that we have decided as a district is important. This is the state and and national guidelines on what rigor looks like in mathematics. Um the
national NCTM um the state this is um how we have defined um mathematical rigor. Um another point is that this is the 2007 standards. We're in the process of updating those standards and the direction that it's going is even more
so in the sense that students really need to understand um not only how to calculate something but how to understand the concept behind that and how to apply it to different scenarios. So in terms of the the direction that we're going it's going to be more so um
we're going to see that um that um focus on the conceptual understanding and the application. So that is students taking a concept that they've learned and applying it into a situation that is new for them. And so that really demonstrates that depth of understanding
of of concepts. So this is um again just a description of um the importance of all three components of rigor in terms of um getting to where we need to go in terms of our outcomes. And then um I know this was a followup
from um a March meeting. Looking at Dan because he always knows um we uh there was a question as we were reviewing um CPM data in terms of um
whether students are like how students are responding to um the the curriculum. So far, um, we did get a very high response rate from students in terms of their, um, CPM class. And I know the question here was, what happens if
students are bored in CPM? Um, in terms of the responses from students, um, of all the middle school students in CPM courses, there 2.4% of students reported um, being bored in class. Um I have both an incoming and outgoing middle schooler
and I can say that that's um a very common response from a middle school age student. So um I think this gives us some indication of kind of where students are at. I think if anything um we have a lot more students that are reported um being engaged or challenged
and actually um kind of going through a process of uh that increasing rigor and having to explain things in a depth that they have not had to do that previously. Um so more so when we're looking at our student data um we're looking at um kind
of some of the challenges of that increased rigor um more so than the other end of the spectrum. Um this isn't to say that there are certain students that um don't need other options. Um and so if a student really is not being
challenged um in a math course um we do have a lot of different options and Dr. Edwards will go through that progression. And before I uh dive into that, I want to back up just a moment in conversation to the previous slide and talk just a little bit about uh as we have wrapped
up now year one of implementation. All of our math teachers came together last all of our middle school math teachers came together in a meeting last week uh wanting to uh reflect on year one and had uh lengthy conversations about their
learnings as a team of teachers. and uh they made some great uh uh recommendations of how to move that work forward into year two and as we've uh shared at the this table on numerous occasions talking about the implementation science Dr. Dr. Zush has
talked about that at length uh in past conversations. We're entering year two uh and uh we definitely want to address uh and in the previous slide that number of students who are experiencing those struggles or are finding um that it's
extremely challenging um the level of rigor that is apparent in that course uh and in the resource that we're using um how to help students better access that. So teachers had a opportunity to come together as a as a 68 group of uh
teachers uh to discuss that. Um and then they that was the morning uh session last week. Then they uh broke apart into grade levels to talk about uh what what adjustments they are going to uh desire to make in year two and make plans for
continued uh conversation in August and and into uh workshop week and the launch of the upcoming school year. So, just wanted to make mention of that uh here that we uh are our staff continue to learn um through the implementation process uh how to better meet the needs
of our students. But now diving into um the secondary math course progression uh topic that we've discussed here at the table uh on a number of occasions as well. And uh when we were looking at our tools and resources, looking at our uh
vision that Dr. Warner talked about earlier here this evening as well as looked at the progression of students coming from uh the bridges uh implementation at the elementary level leading into the middle school and preparing students for high school uh
after they uh leave the middle school. Uh we put together uh this progression that you see here and it was the uh teachers who uh recommended that uh we take this model in the sixth and seventh grade where all students are engaged in
the math uh sixth grade math seventh grade math and the choice begins in eighth grade for the pathway that they uh would journey on. But what a couple things I want to point out here. Uh first of all at all times and we
actually began this last year and continued it uh last at the end of last the 23 24 school year continued it this year to look at the current fifth grade students and uh before they come into middle school to assess uh where their
performance is and consider uh those that would meet criteria for grade acceleration and uh went through that in a uniform uh process in each of the last two brings uh Jen Maloney, our differentiation specialist. Uh this goes back to an earlier question that
director Atkinson asked in the previous uh part of this presentation this evening around identifying uh the differentiation needs of all of our students. So looked at those students who would u be based upon their performance to date uh up through into
fifth grade be looking to be uh needing more uh challenge possibly to uh bypass their grade level peers. uh and identified some students uh and took them through a consistent process uh to have students continue to be uh grade
accelerated. We also on occasion have double grade accelerated students um that would uh bypass not only in the case of a fifth grader um bypass uh sixth grade and go on to seventh grade or bypass sixth and seventh and go on to eighth grade. We have a few of those
students as well um and continue to support that. Uh we also do have our teachers taking a look throughout as they look at all assessment data back to that MTSS matrix that we spoke about in a few slides ago. Um teachers looking at
student performance throughout a school year. So just because a student starts out a year um in uh a particular course specifically in sixth and seventh grade but also in eighth uh grade as well looking at their performance to see if
that is uh showing that they are not being challenged or showing that they are showing evidence of being ready for additional uh material and challenge uh to take their uh application of knowledge and conceptual understanding
to a higher level. But then again at 8th grade uh that choice is uh given with the advisement of staff certainly when when asked for um as students are registering for 8th grade um and likewise as they're registering for 9th
grade. And as you can see in this particular document once again, uh the intent here is to highlight and showcase the levels of on and off ramps that students uh and and and families have as they consider uh their choice
opportunities uh in the upper middle school and and going into high school. and want to make sure that um in this document it's clear that students again have the multiple on-ramps and off-ramps they can uh take as particularly as they
get into the 11th and 12th grade. There are uh multiple courses that students can choose to engage in and enroll in in math. they aren't limited uh to take one math course um because they students have uh a little bit of greater
flexibility in the number of courses that they or the types of courses that they can take uh later in their uh school years uh both in their junior and senior year. Typically uh students I don't think it would be very typical for a 9th or 10th grader to take uh just
because of the other requirements that they have uh for credits. Um but there are greater options for students as they as they progress through our secondary courses. So just wanted to um provide that additional information and uh
prepared to uh uh field questions. Uh Dr. Thomas, would you like to similar to what we did with the first section, now we're moving uh the next section as our ANI conversation here. Questions? Questions?
Uh yes, I have a question. Um thank you Dr. Edwards. um question that I had with this um is there ever looking at you know this big map particularly when students get to you know 10th 11th 12th
grade are there any options here like a child for instance I'm making it up gets to um algebra 2 honors in 10th grade and then has the opportunity to go to pre-calc or AP pre-cal
Is there any world where um similar to like our electives where you need to have you know a certain number of kids be interested in that class for it to happen. Are there any situations here where even in 12th grade looking at there there's six options that there
wouldn't be that option for that child or are these like yes we will have these? Do you know what I'm trying to say? Yep. Yeah. I Yes. I uh I I think I do and I'll I'll take a crack at it and please if I haven't answered the question um uh clarify and we'll we'll
reach it. But uh all of the courses that you see listed on the 11th grade line and the 12th grade line uh due to the size of our system and the number of students those are all courses. Now there might be an exception um where BC
kelk the far right corner AP calc BC might not be offered in a particular year but I do know that there have been numerous occasions where our teachers are willing actually to um combine uh courses and that uh strategy happens
often in the computer science electives that are noted in the bottom row there where uh the teacher of those courses might have students because they're the those courses are sometimes u as they get further along and advanced they they
are self uh paced and so teachers can uh facilitate uh students being at different levels in those courses but the uh below that all the 11th and 12th grade electives I'm quite confident given our size that those opportunities
are there. Thank you Jessica. Yeah, I mean I I have a few questions and comments. Um I think on on the secondary courses, you know, the biggest concern that I've heard is just around the middle school offering and
our students essentially being um a year behind uh a lot of neighboring districts as far as you know not offering an advanced path. I know you say great acceleration, but that's very different and a higher standard I would say than than accelerated courses. Um, you know,
when I just like spot checked several of districts around here, a common acceleration path is to be doing like a pre-alggebra and sixth, algebra in seventh, and then geometry and eighth. Um, you know, and I feel like we are a
year behind most districts. I don't know how are we addressing that and are we setting our students up for success with you know impacting college entrance and and leveling and things like that and being competitive um without having that
advanced pa pathway. I mean, I know we have a different curriculum for kids that have extra needs, but then, you know, how are we addressing that for advanced math? And again, I think acceleration of grades is different. And even as a parent, I I think I would, you
know, never want my student to be a year ahead just maturity level, right? I think there's a lot of reasons not to do that. But, um, I think, you know, fifth through 8th grade is my biggest concern. There's there's just no way to challenge a lot of kids.
And I think that's what our um research would suggest otherwise recent research about no way to challenge. I think that is something that would not align with what we are hearing from our students and from our um staff. Um and I there
might be some parents who would say that but I think that uh deep down I think the challenge we do feel uh our students have been challenged um at least in this first year of implementation. And I think that was the reflection and I think the data um you know that 2% of
students who reported that um boredom uh is a is a data set that I think guides and and what our teachers have reported seeing on a day-to-day basis in the classroom. But I certainly uh certainly understand and and I think that is a
continued conversation that our uh teachers will be um having with regard to meeting the needs of those students. in identifying those students who need that additional opportunity. And I think that's the important thing that we're wanting to bring to the surface here
tonight in this conversation is that there are options for families uh to pursue. Um but we pursue those uh collectively and systematically identifying those students currently. How many students are grade accelerating
right now in middle school? I don't I don't have a specific data on that. Um but I do know that we have students that are um identified for next year, 8th grade students who will be going on to the high school um to take
uh great accelerated uh material and we anticipate that to continue to be uh an experience that our students will uh access. Director Mason, can I ask a question? Just a clarifying uh because I haven't done the looking through that you stated
with the um um looking at neighboring districts and and um seeing a year behind. Uh I'm wondering, you mentioned geometry as kind of like the Yeah. So, when I looked at like
several neighboring districts, I can name them if we need to, but um sixth grade advanced option would be like a pre-alggebra course that they would have. Seventh grade would be algebra and then eighth grade geometry. Like that's pretty typical, I think, in a lot of neighboring districts. And we are, you
know, those students are essentially a year behind unless they were able to grade accelerate. So my question is um if you looked at their like if you looked at the com the cumulative um offerings such as like this diagram
shows Yeah. Would that still um suggest that our students are a year would be a year behind? Be Yeah, because they're entering high school with one less course essentially, right? I mean, well, I don't know that that's
I don't know that that's completely apples to apple. like I hear if if they're offering geometry a a year ahead of what our offerings are. But I guess my question would be
cumulatively in the end could you still say that our district students are one year behind? You know what I mean? I don't think that that's a I think taking that I see what you're saying, but I'm I'm also curious
to get to higher math is a little quicker, right? Because you're a year I mean you again you would enter nth grade one year ahead of the curve and I think you know we I think it was Minetanka who offers like multivariable calculus which is even a next level. So there's, you know, and I think again we're talking
about testing for college entrance exams in 10th, 11th grade before you're at 12th, right? So that that year matters to some kids. Um, again, I was just like comparing other districts to see where they were at. And again, personally looking at options, but I again just
curious why we weren't offering something similar. Um, Director Mason, I'm I think the clarity I think there might be clarity in the fact that when we made this change for pathways, we used to have, if correct me if I'm wrong, algebra 1 in seventh grade and
then algebra 2 in 8th grade. And the reason that I'm aware of this is I've heard from students who took algebra 2 this year in 10th grade said it was an exact same course that they took in 8th grade when they did take algebra 2 back two years ago. No, we I do not recall
that we've ever offered algebra 2 at the eighth grade level. We called it advanced math though. It was called advanced math. No, we've offered algebra 1 and geometry at the eighth grade level and a geometry course has always been deemed a high school course and we've never offered at the seventh grade
level. We've only offered pre-alggebra. Okay. So, when we made this change, just to clarify, what were the advanced options in se sixth and seventh when we made the change? because that might have been where prior to the change. Yeah. Uh we had advanced sixth. It was the same curriculum. We
had pre-alggebra 7 advanced which was the same curriculum. I think if I can just finish my my my thought is I hear the I hear what you're saying and
um is there curric you know the questions that come in my head is is their curriculum the same? I think that looking at the total picture is important. Um, but I I mean I hear what you're saying. Yeah. It's just when I'm
when I'm thinking about it, it's again maybe a snap a a a place and time. I don't know. Comparing district to district is very challenging, Mary. So I I do teach and volunteer at other
districts including Minnotonka and have experience at other districts which I don't think is a apples to apples comparison. Um this is very typical of every single acceleration and uh
pathway. Uh some schools do have the resources as well as kids coming out uh that do qualify for everything from honors algebra 1 uh in sixth grade and are through probably calc BC by the time
they're 10th grade. That is the actual exception path and almost all schools offer those for those kids who are truly double accelerated. But the norm is the same for every school in the South Suburban Conference that I have been in.
This is the typical one. I can also say with absolute confidence that all the advanced programs 6th through 8th were really the exact same one uh more inepth or supposedly more in depth um and but
the exact same curriculum because I did sit in those classrooms quite a bit. And by the way, it's the exact same way. So, when you go to another school, they have an honors sixth grade math, an honors seventh grade math, or an advanced or whatever. It's it's the same one. Um,
right now, um, there's a lot of reasons why this pathway was created the way it was, and that's because the the new math curriculum does have a lot more rigor in it, and it is based upon bridges. And many of the kids coming out of bridges
um or did that did not have bridges are essentially accepting the experiential level of math a little bit differently. But if you look at the the workbooks going through 8th grade, um even the standard pathway, even though it says algebra 1, if you look through volumes
two and three and 8th grade, I believe what I read and the and actually the programs that I went through and and actually tried the word problems, that's almost all algebra, matrices, probability, introduction to statistics, etc. So, um, the CPM math actually
doesn't just focus on algebra 1, but volumes two and three do have it in there, which our previous math curriculum didn't. So, I would encourage parents who are concerned about it to actually meet with the math teachers and go through those books, but having
experience and and actually tutoring, helping and all that kind of stuff and the various programs uh throughout the conference as well as in Burnsville, Richfield, and a few other schools. Uh this is the norm. Um and so I I are
nobody's behind a year. um you know and and uh we we've had very few kids. I think six total in the past couple years that were actually double accelerated is the number that I got. I don't know if that if I remembered that correctly. Yeah, I think it it has been typically
in that range. I think our next year it's it's either four or six. I'm I'm blanking at the moment, but Right. And some of the other districts have had much higher numbers, but also they also adopted a similar bridges curriculum
earlier than we did. Uh and also many of those higher numbers come out of and one of the districts Chinese acceleration and Chinese immersion. Um so it's not a it's nowhere near an applesto apples comparison.
Um so I guess my other comment was really just around the survey results. So you know I guess my concern is what we've you know seen as far as highle bullets in in the meetings. I went in
and read each and every single comment of the student and the parent survey. And I think um you know literally have handwritten notes of positive and negatives and I and I feel like you know overwhelmingly was the experience of the parents
especially um not positive. Um and and I I think in some instances a lot of frustration. Um I appreciate the the student comment in here and I actually you know had to laugh at some of the comments because I do think the students actually really like the social aspect
of the course. Right. Um so that makes sense. But um and then I think you know just to be fair today also was sent by a parent who must have data requested it and I just did a quick AI and PDF and the overall sentiment on and the entire
you know survey was overwhelmingly negative. Um it verbatim says parents highlighting significant challenges expressing concerns about their curriculum's impact on their learning their confidence and enjoyment of the subject. Um, and I think just again
caution on just highlighting things. Um, I'm a person that I I like to dig into details and so like I said, I sat and read everything and then I just kind of sanity checked it with AI because I was curious if I was, you know, trying to being biased or something. But, um, you
know, I think that it's important to highlight the the parent and student feedback is is not positive um, with CPM so far. Hopefully that changes next year over time. Um I'm not sure, but um so again, just expressing concerns with overall the the pathway and and the
feedback that we've gotten so far is is not positive. Um my last question was just around the math vision and I was curious when was that written? Was that before our strategic plan? Yes, it would have been before our
strategic plan. Um Dr. Zumbush, I was hoping you were uh coming to share some additional uh breakdown. I know we highlighted just a couple of data uh points here, but yeah, just to revisit the parent guardian survey, um there was negative responses. um definitely in
that um data set. Just wanted to remind everyone that when I removed all of the empty responses and dduplicated responses um there was uh the total response rate for parent caregivers was 12%. Um so just wanted to make sure we
take that into consideration. It was not a representative sample of um parents at large. Um and um of that there was actually 21 respondents that came from duplicate households. So it represented
um about 10% of our students. So I agree there were negative responses in there. Um but just wanted to also remind um what the response rate looked like for that survey. Yep. Okay. Um yeah, I think that was most of them.
Yes, I think I had this Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, I had the same question of the mash math vision. When was that written? I thought I recall it was like 2018 or 19 from our last discussion. No, it was written in 202122 school year.
So I think part of my concern with that is that since then we have a new strategic plan and I think our goal of what we've heard is that we were going to be relooking at these type of things that we have in our district and how do we realign them to
our strategic plan. Um I'm also you know knowing that we're an east district and math is the M in well engineering and math engineering has a lot of ma mathematics in it of course. Um, is this math vision a applicable to to our
strategic plan or does it align with our strategic plan? Um, I would say unequivocably yes, this does align to our strategic plan. The math vision was not created just in a vacuum. It was created with best practices and research in terms of um mathematical um practices
also where the field is going where um how again how we define proficiency. Um all of these things under here um are directly aligned to our state's um uh framework on math. Um making real world
world connections, having strong number sense, those are not just things that we want to have happen. And those are things that are the definition according to our state assessments that gets our students to that proficiency level. Um and when we're talking about um academic
excellence and getting to that um increased proficiency level, all of these things need to happen. Um, so, uh, I think constantly reooking at things, um, with the new lens, but this is, uh, in clear alignment with our strategic plan and the way to get to that
increased proficiency, um, rate in terms of our, um, academic outcomes are directly tied to um, these components. And I would just say my only challenge upon that is when you look at the one two three four five bullet points there one of them the very first one I would
agree has some academic relevance to it and the rest of it is very social emotionally learning develop for social emotionally learning driven whether it's connections or persisting which feels very social emotional real word connections social emotional um
engagement and sharing and thinking all very social emotional so knowing that our community was very loud and clear that acade academic excellence has to be on the forefront of every decision we make at this board table. I would just challenge does this vision really align
with our strategic plan? I believe that it does. I would just like to say that bullets two through four are not social emotional. Actually, when you're doing math problems, you have to be okay with making a mistake and learning from that mistake.
Otherwise, it's what we call in engineering and math is failing forward. And it's one of the key concepts of the schools that we all like to say that are much better funded and that we would like to be like. So that is part of a
key math uh problem and uh and we are going from solving for for X in any one of these programs or just repeating it to actually determining what calculation and what formula solves a
problem. And if you're not comfortable getting a wrong answer, because we know that the traditional way of learning that I think a lot of us grew up on is doing a math problem, looking in the back to see if we got it right, but not really understanding why the math problem exists.
Industry needs people to do a lot different. And um where the math standards have taken us is basically servicing where we need to have our kids actually graduate and be functional in that. So feeling safe taking risk
meanings I'm okay taking making a wrong answer because now I'm going to go to figure out how to how to do it right. And that's part of learning. That's part of all learning. And and we want them not to just look at the answer key in the back. Um engage and share. So if I
learned something one way and you figured out a problem the different way that is part of your typical use of math in the real world and the rest of these. though trying to tie this to this seal thing. um that is not what that was and
I was personally part of and not one that actually wrote any of them but I was in the room when these math standards were made and the critical thing of why our state math was going backwards was because we didn't have this built into the actual curriculums
and it's critical that we do respectfully there's a couple methods of thinking that way and a lot of studies that show otherwise so that is a opinion agree Um but there are other opinions out there. Yeah. And I would agree too.
So Charles didn't think we might need to be to move on to the next topic. Directors ambush do you have and if you don't I completely understand. Um you mentioned that there was only right basically when you broke it down there's only 10% of parents that responded. Is
that average of what you what we normally get? Is that below average? Could you um I think when you're looking at secondary um responses from parents and caregivers, you tend to um get lower
response rates as students get older. Um so a lower response rate is typical. Um I think that the default as students get older is kind of if things are generally going fine. And and I I say that not out
of my own like personal opinion, but we did have in-depth conversations with teachers as well to try and understand how many parents are reaching out, what does this look like, how often are we having these um conversations um and looking at that from multiple lenses and
um overall the the the numbers of parent and talking to principal Kabushek um the number of parents really reaching out and and asking um or having like more of those in-depth conversations does equate kind of very similar to that 10%. So, um
I think it's it's very common um as students get older um unless someone has a very extreme opinion um the the engagement does drop in in surveys like that. Can I Okay. So, so that 10% is a is a
valid number. That's not extremely low, but it is about average. Is that would you say that's it's not valid in the sense that you can't generalize it to the population at large. So when you look at surveys you want um you know
upwards to that 80 90% to say that I have a solid understanding of what the population at large is feeling or thinking about a certain topic. Um so in that sense it's not valid from a generalizable standpoint. we can't say that that is that the um the the truth
for the population at large. Um but it is a I would say a typical um response rate um for kind of that secondary feedback. So it kind of depends how you talk about validity. Um okay, Mary. Yeah, last one. Have we ever performed a
survey on math before CPM to know if we have a baseline for what that response rate was? No, I would say we we haven't specific um many of these things uh both the adoption of a vision statement as well
as the uh piloting of resources as well as gathering that feedback. Those are all new uh things that we've engaged in in the last four years. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Uh we can move on to Dr. Thomas's
update. Um, and just as an update for the board and anybody here, we are monitoring the weather. We're fine. There's no severity uh uh severe weather alerts, but just know that we are monitoring that as we go. Next 20 minutes will be heavy. Um, but nothing
significant outside of that. No tornado watches. Uh, oh, yes, we are. I mean, yes, we are, but nothing advanced, nothing more than that. Yeah, sorry. Um, just a quick update. Not warning yet. Yeah, just a quick update on some of the ANI. Um, uh, I think to a couple of
points here, um, looking at how we may revision ANI moving forward. Um, we are in the LA, we have, uh, multi-year strategies that were tied to the approved plan, and we're seeing those end metrics out um to to its um, uh, end
for next year. Uh and we'll be planning to do a a different type of engagement as we rewrite this plan that's going to be more linked back to our teaching and learning committee um to have um more uh participate participate participation
there as well as as we look to bringing this forward in our um finance committee. Um, again, I think how we've developed this plan um through um cross-sectional folks of within our community. We have more formalized
structures since this was um convened. And so that will be running forward um throughout this upcoming school year as we make a new three-year revision to uh uh plan. Um I will say that uh with some of the changes uh particularly in the the role of the director, part of the
impetus behind this was around how we can best utilize the resources um in the current plan um uh in its last year to earmark more resources for direct student support. And I just want to be very clear that was the driver in that
decision of mine to find ways that we could bring more resources directly to students to help accelerate the gap closing strategies based upon some of the information that we shared earlier in the presentation. Um that's now tied to the comprehensive achievement and
civic readiness. I think it's the new world's best workforce. Um and and that's where a lot of this lives in terms of um reporting etc. Um so in talking with the state uh we have our
current um goals five and six with our um elementary and secondary students connection to schools um is their is the plug-in for for us to utilize um academic achievement um as a means to increase their connectedness to school.
And so I'll be planning to um reposition that uh administrative role um to now um hiring academic paras. Um, part of what we talked about earlier uh this evening around some of those instructional rounds was also bolstering our central
services around our uh ability to um statistically identify where the gaps exist at the greatest levels and then also find ways that we can identify who are the students who are contributing to that statistical level. Um we know we
have many students we can support in different ways. We also know there are some that will statistically have a greater um impact in terms of overall um u performance of our schools when we can identify those schools or those schools and students who need it most. Um the
plan will be to create um a more robust um intervention cycle that's going to be at the school in developed in partnership with the administration and that uh any classroom teacher who touches that student um in terms of their support in the classroom. That will be a combination of both pushing
and pull out. Um and then we would couple some of that with some of our highdosese tutoring that may happen outside of the school day. Um that would be something that the family could help um get assistance in brokering. Um our intervention cycles would um center
around our own curriculum and finding ways that we can accelerate their learning around that aspect and then through our instructional rounds. This would be one of those data points that we'll be monitoring so that we can regularly progress monitor kit progress monitor our students to ensure they're
making the types of growth and and achievement in those intervention cycles. and then based upon their performance, we would um cycle them in and out of these um supports uh accordingly. But we believe that by bringing more direct student support, we're going to be able to accelerate
some of the achievement of the students who we know um statistically are falling into some of these gaps. And so that will be our plan moving forward. And uh and and again that will be a partnership both between central office supports as
well as our building. And so you'll see just our basic intervention cycle um that we typically use um very similar to that um but again looking at some other statistical measures and demographics that we would progress monitor to ensure that um we can accelerate those closures
of of those gaps. So I want to give you that update in terms of how those resources from that role will be utilized. Um and then that would be one of the metrics that would be onto our um uh reporting our quarterly reporting to the board.
Any questions? How will the um paras be allocated? Are you doing one at like each level or uh we through our gap analysis that Yep. We're going to find um two schools, no more than three schools that we well we know that there are two schools who have the greatest um
statistical gaps and then within that we're going to identify those students who are going to be contributing most and that's where we would deploy um the academic pairs and um and then that would you know be the academic component and then through our liaison and such we would also find any other wraparound
supports that that student or that family might need to better build that network of support around that individual. ual student. Just uh yeah, a couple of questions. Thank you. Um I'm sorry if I missed it. Did
you say Dr. Thomas that we're going to rewrite or just revise? And who is going to do that? So, so this is a this is a realignment of the budget for the um uh administrator role that's no longer uh going to exist. What I was suggesting
that we'll start this upcoming school year is we'll be working through our various committees that we currently have um namely our teaching and learning and then our finance committee um to help develop a new three-year plan that
will start fiscal year 2627 and go for three years. So, we'll completely rewrite the plan um aligned completely to our strategic plan. Right now, this plan has three-year metrics that we've been monitoring and investing in. So, we want to deliver that out for this last
year. But because of the change of that director role, um we we have been supported by MDE to convert that into studentf facing um roles to support kids. So next year is just this modification of
that position. Then also next year to begin the fall of 26, we'll have a whole three-year comprehensive plan that we have to by statute rewrite every 3 years. Correct. But we had a director do that. So, so
that what I'm asking is with the since we don't have that person anymore, we so our we're going to ask our teaching and learning committee and our finance committee that that will be sorry that that work will still be led
centrally here within our academic division. So, so right now uh Dr. Warner and I are named on the actual plan as the ones who will facilitate the conversation around the development of a whole new three-year plan and we are
committing to use some of our internal structures that we've not used in the past to ensure that um we are bringing um data um and what we've been doing around strategy to some committees to ensure that we are getting perspective
from our community on the development of this new three-year cycle plan which is requirement as well and we have an existing structure um uh through teaching and learning that by statute we have opportunities to leverage that committee differently and in some of it
in our reporting that needs to actually be going to that teaching and learning committee as well um that historically we have not done. So that's something that will be a bit of a change there. And then obviously with the budget, this is a three-year, you know, just shy of a million dollars. We want to make sure
that we're vetting how that is going to be spent, bringing that through our finance committee so that we can get some perspective as well. Um, and then there would be, you know, school-based perspective. We're going to engage, you know, principles and things of that nature. But then ultimately when it
comes back before the board um the board um can be assured that we've utilized some of our committee structures that we have in place um in adhering to you know policy as well um that govern this uh governs this 353 I'm sorry 124D that's
kind of also housed in 3535. Um so you can see the structures that we have. We want to make sure that we're adhering to policy. We want to make sure that our teaching and learning committee has a opportunity to to weigh in uh on the perspective of this plan which by
statute we need to utilize. And then three, our finance committee. Um, obviously with any anything that we're doing um with with our budget, that's something that we'd like to bring forward. And something of this magnitude um and the write up of a new three-year plan is something that we would utilize
that structure for so that when it comes to the board, you will know that it's been vetted internally and through our board facing committees um to uh make a recommendation for you all to have discussion and then ultimately take action. And that would be something that
would then begin in the fall of 26. Lisa, um, first of all, I'm really impressed you remembered that statute 124D.862, Dr. Thomas. So, I've been around this for a few years. Anyway, I have it right in front of me. Um my only question is
um with the additional professional development funds that we as a board allocated with our budget taking it out of the um I believe it was restricted funds is there I it looks like we allocate about $90,000 if I read our plan correctly um I pulled it up from
what we had when we submitted it. We allocate about 90,000 for professional development. Is there any opportunity there to reallocate those resources for direct student support? Um are you talking about the 90,000 that was in the
plan itself? Yes. Um the integration plan. So some of that has been shifted to um bringing additional support to the students by way of the tutoring. So some of that money has been shifted proposed proposing to be shifted. Yep. And then
um um and then the other professional development would be utilized to help build the repertoire of our educators who are in the classroom still as well um to ensure that they're getting the instructional strategy support. We might have a presenter come into a school as well. So some of that still needs to be
re uh remained so that we can leverage some of that um you know support through professional development specifically as it aligns to the out uh the um parameters of the grant or of the uh statute. So y so those are the I just
want to clarify. So we get the ANI funds that are restricted. Yes. And it's restricted to the parameters of the of the 124D as well. and you went to the MDA and made sure that we could take the original plan. Okay. So, yeah. So, it's not like we took them out of our general
fund. We had to use them. That's a separate deal. Yeah. This is only Just want to make sure the language was correct. It was a little confusing. Yeah. Okay. So, we'll be adding this to the quarterly rollup um to the board as well to see um and and obviously we won't we
got to be careful because we're talking about small um end sizes. So we want we don't want to be mindful we want to be mindful of not identifying you know identifiable information for our students but know that we will find ways to either code data or something so that we can give more of a regular report as
our quarterlys to the board and where we're at with some of our gap analysis and again we'll be diving deeper into this as we um launch this fall um with all of our disagregated data. Sorry I just have one quick question but you're not rewriting the goals at all. Nope. The goals will stay the same. Additional
resources are relevant because this actually qualifies for um a student's connectedness to their school environment and the more they are finding their success, the more connected that they can be. And so that we'll just leverage that same goal. We don't have to rewrite any any of the plan at this point. And also not disrupt
some of the metrics that we've invested in a three-year cycle on. So we can see the realization of you know that three year that three-ear goal. Okay. Good. All right. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. Uh, at this point, we will skip down uh
to number 13 and I'll entertain a motion to enter into close session for the purposes of discussing uh teacher negotiations by director Bullan. Second by Director Mason. All in favor signify by saying I.
I. Opposed? That carries 70 and we'll take five here quick to let everybody Thank you. do what needs to be done. Part: 2
It's my father's day. I'm so glad I did. I have to help this empty. Father's Day is super fun. How many hours? There's only two. That's good, Martha. All right. All right.
Moving on to the last agenda item. Uh some board policies have come before the board. Um so we'll start with 904. If uh Amy or Charles want to just comment ahead
four. Um well this went in front of the uh policy committee and we went many months it seemed like round and around and even thought about moving it to a completely different policy and
then ended up coming all the way back around. So, this went from policy committee um with an extensive amount of people um and then we looked at it multiple times, sent it to legal I think two or three times um and director
Herman can definitely correct me if I'm wrong on that number. Uh and then we settled on this which I think everyone had extensive language on. Dr. Thomas was fully involved in this as well as a number of
staff members and uh as well as the policy committee and I think we are all extremely grateful for everything that everyone gave input on when it came to this policy itself and we're very happy where it is.
Questions Mary. So basically if it went round and round there's two three additions and then the implementation um you know and I I've got some concerns about it but
if those are the only additions what was the Can I just kind of get like a cliffnotee or a summary of of what and director Herman if you could help out um from what
the cons you know what happened and I can why the round and round tie into this if you don't mind so originally uh when this first came up I think this was February um a new policy was uh presented to the policy
committee uh that got brought up for as far as materials themselves. Okay. So, stop right there. When you say new policy, did that policy come from you, Director Herman? Nope. It came from me. I'm getting there. Okay. Yep.
Yep. So, because of items that were missing from here, because there is guidelines that also go with this.
So that's where I was attempting to fill the gap. So that went to legal. Legal gave their opinion on it. We then brought this after discussion with key staff. Uh and
this is what was presented to the policy committee. Did I answer your question? Hopefully. Uh kind of. But I kind of get the gist of where the where the issues probably were uh given the minimal changes. Um
but okay. Um I do sorry um members of the board, do you mind if I just add something to that a little bit maybe? Um I think the the concerns that came forward um that there there may be some continued
concerns until we can update the the guidelines and procedures around this is the confusion between um all other all other districts that we were comparing to um and MSBA that ours includes the and employees in the title um but there
wasn't specific um guidelines for that. it was just confusing that it had that in there but not other other areas. Um and then there was a common um agreement um from the policy advisory committee and the individuals that were working on this policy that there wasn't there's a
there is a process to present a concern about a material that's out there but there wasn't it wasn't documented in a procedure of how to bring forward that concern. Um so in terms of looking at that original um proposal or the of the policy
dividing it out maybe is a good way of saying it director Johnson between what do we need to put in policy versus what could we um take and build some guidelines or procedures around um so that we weren't being too restrictive in
policy and we were able to still um expand upon in in a procedure. So I think those are the main discussions that we had at the policy advisory committee if I recall accurately. Um and the that's also where legal guidance came into play um to separate out some
of the original proposal but keep in these these other the other additions that you see here. Yes. Thank you for clarifying that. Um I have a few concerns. Um, well, number one, I don't know why we're
looking at this since we just did this a year ago. That's number one. Number two, I wasn't there at the policy advisory committee meeting because I don't do that usually. That's why we have committees and we trust
what happens in those committees. But I received a few questions from a couple of members of the policy advisory committee that said this is not what the majority of the policy advisory committee agreed to what we're looking at right now. So that's concerning to
me. Um that a few people said that. Um again I wasn't in the room. Um but so that is concerning to me. So I'd like to know about that. I also is am under the understanding that this policy was presented to the
policy advisory committee as something the board wanted. And I'm not so sure I agree with that since I never said that I wanted to revisit this and especially since we only revised this a year ago.
Um so there's that. Um, and then I have very strong feelings about some of the language in this policy that was added. Um, I have as a board member, I
have zero interest in being the sign police in our district. Um, policy 209, which we are going to look at today as well. Um, it says it recognizes that my responsibility to see that schools are
properly run, not to run them myself. And that's what I think this policy does. It gives us more power than what we have. And I have zero interest or time quite frankly to be the sign police for our district. Um,
and just one more thought. Um, my my daughter was very concerned about a friend of hers this past school year, a couple of months ago, and she went to a teacher to talk about
this because she said, "Mom, she has signs in her classroom that say she is a safe space. That says she is a safe space. so I can go and talk to her about this. So why why are we doing this? Please, why
are we doing this? Why are we the sign police for our teachers, for our staff? I understand if somebody's offended or burdened which is under this purpose which we don't define and I know that was there before and I voted for it but
reading it again I don't like it because I we can't define what is burdensome or offensive to someone. We say we have our school patrons are a captive audience. Well, that's school. They're a captive audience throughout the day. So, I don't get it.
So, yes, I am fired up about this. I have zero interest in being the sign police when people like my daughter go to people's classrooms because of the signs they have in their classroom that say I am a safe space because she was concerned. So, a I would
like to know how this was presented to the policy advisory committee. I'd like to, you know, when I have a couple of them coming to me and saying, "This isn't what we agreed to forward." I'd like to know more about that.
Can I ask clarifying question to you? Yeah. Um, as far as signed police, can you point that to me? Are you referring to I would assume procedures letter D where it specifically mentions
the board. I'm talking about letter D for letter D. Okay. Um I'm talking about materials displayed in classrooms should enrich students learning experiences by supporting and enhancing our materials. I I don't know I don't even know what
that what that paragraph means. So I actually had this in the margin. What do you mean? Okay. And I'd like some examples. So, letter D specifically um is the exact language in other
policies that we have uh that was brought up by director Dah because he gave us that language. Is that is that correct? Point of clarification. That's number five, the implementation language, not 4D.
Okay. So the the implementation part was directly from there. This was exactly how everything we talk about should be done. If there somebody has a complaint for
any reason, they should bring it up to their teacher. If not, it's just writing out the process. And I don't have a problem with that. I think that should happen. I don't think that is happening to be quite frank.
Multiple other places that hierarchy um as far as how it got there that I'm I'm unaware of. You might be able to talk to that. How made it How did 904 come back?
Um, uh, board of directors, um, it's my recollection that there was a request to review policies that all had to do with posters. Um, that was then brought forward to the policy advisory committee to review. Um, I believe it was a a future agenda topic item that got
brought up. Um, I I do not recall the date of it. 2023. Yeah. And that's why we move removed that's why we reviewed 903 and approved it. So, that issue was done. That was not something that the board brought back up again. But wasn't
there something I remember I was just I was in those some of the policy meetings. I actually enjoy going to them so I can better understand all these the things that we're talking about. And um wasn't there something that you brought up that you brought up part of the policy and it never got reviewed and it
was kind of pending for a while? I'm just I thought I thought that's what maybe you said. I'm not trying to put you on the spot, but I was also trying to wonder why how this got back up, but um yeah, I um comments, but in in um May of 2023, I asked for a
future agenda item, right? Uh regarding signs in in the schools, and it had been, you know, through one-on- ones with Dr. Thomas and understanding that throughout the strategic plan um there
there would be some rebranding done um how 904 came up right now I think it I mean I don't even have a specific answer to it. Yeah, 904. It got brought up in a study session as a thumbs up when we were still doing that. But that was but
that and we had and then we had then reviewed and then the thing was well let's wait till we review 904. Reviewed 904 last year went over it approved it and then nobody on the board voted to bring it back up after we approved it
outside of the cycle. And I would do I would also say that I think we have a policy that says anyone can bring up a policy. So, I mean I I think regardless of how it got brought up, um I would say I went to I I had nothing to do in bringing it back up, but I have Director Olstead in all
fairness, you've seen the emails, you've seen there's different viewpoints in our community regarding posters that create division within our district. Um we have a new strategic plan and um I think the goal is to try to find as much unity around these controversial topics as we
can. Um, also I attended a workshop in January of this year at the MSBA conference put on by Kennedy and Graven and it was about employee political speech and that we as a board do have oversight in the things that are said,
our employees say in the classroom, what they put in our classroom and they gave what they wear in our classroom. And so I think that there's no guidance there. You know, there's there's not a lot of tight guidance around items that have created controversy in the past. We've
seen lawsuits at neighboring districts around these topics. I actually appreciate us working on this and and enhancing it. The only um feedback I had is is under um general statement of policy. I was talking to a teacher actually who lives in our district, does
not teach in our district. um was just kind of asking her what are her thoughts on this policy and her comment was um under general statement of policy under the purple section where it says materials displayed in classrooms should
enrich students learning experiences the idea of adding the word all. So materials displayed in classrooms should enrich all students learning experiences by supporting enhancing Prior Lake Savage School's approved materials serving clear instructional or district
aligned purposes. And I love the word all because at the end of the day that's where we create unity when we have things that um don't offend anyone or you know upset someone for whatever reason. So aligning those adding the
word all to enrich all students learning experience that's at the end of the day that's what we're here for. Mary um Chair White I would say first of all point of order the board voted on this. This was never brought up to be reinitiated brought up again or anything
like that. It's out of order and because the board voted and I believe it was a unanimous vote, um there is there was no method to bring this up for reconsideration whatsoever to the board to have it then resubmitted through the
policy committee which it had already gone through the policy committee. So I would I I that is procedurally in violation of the way we normally do things and of Robert's rules. So, I would ask that this not be a point of
discussion. I I was confused, too. I didn't understand the reasons. Um, Director Bullan did bring it up. Um, we then did discuss 904. It was in the normal cycle. Anyways, it went through policy committee before it was voted on
and I if I looked at my notes, it was a unanimous vote. Okay. So, this does predate me. So, well, in all fairness, can we go back to the fact that we do actually have a policy that says anyone can bring a policy forward? That's not the issue. That's not the issue. Anybody
can do that. But when it's presented to the policy advisory committee as the board wants to bring this forward, that's not true. That's not true. Do we know why that was stated or where this came from? I guess that would be my question. I have no idea. Members of the board, um, I'm
trying to recall in my memory. Um I don't I don't recall that being stated uh previously. I do recall us having multiple conversations at policy advisory committee about
bringing forward policies that relate to posters but I don't recall us what the specific statements were in those meetings that were made. Um and again if I um if I had a misunderstanding and misstep about bringing it forward to the
policy advisory committee I apologize. Um that was uh my understanding of what we were the process that we're going through. Um one of the questions director um
you you had said um The committee member members said that what was brought forward excuse me in our packet is not what was agreed to at the policy advisory committee. Yes. Can you point
out which things? Um they had let's see um under three general statement of policy the second paragraph. Um well actually before I answer your question I think we should actually discuss if we're discussing this
tonight. I understand well and this is a study session so we're not voting so um I mean there was also other viewpoints in that meeting. I attended that the that that
policy meeting but that that's actually the whole discussion whether what happened at the policy committee is really beside the point right before we move forward since this is the first why do we have a committee since this is a first reading before we get too deep into the well here um I think we do need
to get some clarification on um making sure that we we bring this forward properly and and if this is if This is a policy that the board is interested in revisiting that again predates me a little, but I'm
hearing is it was voted on at some point last year. Just last June, yeah, a year ago. Um, and they're three-year cycles. So, so that means that it was never brought up to the board that it needed to be reconsidered. So how it even started on the process in the policy
committee basically you know without the board agreeing to do that that's my that's my first concern and rule I I it shouldn't have happened from any one board member
um at a committee without going through the proper procedure. I mean, if somebody said, "Hey, we need to discuss this again as a future topic," and the board agreed and you put an agenda, then that's fine. Or if the board said, "Okay, fine. There's some concern over this. Let's send it back through." But
we're on a three-year cycle for these policies. And um we voted just last year, and again, it was a unanimous vote. And I'm I guess I'm a little less concerned with it being just the next year as whether or not the board agreed to even bring this forward. And if if we
didn't then where from where I'm sitting the discussion over 904 for tonight should probably cease and we should move on to the 200s and um I I would think someone would have to bring this forward as a as a future
agenda topic for a study session and or a a future agenda topic is um is the way that I think we should probably proceed. I want to make sure we do this the way we're supposed to do it. I have no idea how it ended up
personally. It was just there on on the first one and I'm not blaming you, so please don't take that or you. Um, it was my first one and I just there it is. So, but I know the amount of man-hour that it went to go in there and I think
would be completely disrespectful um to every individual staff member that that put the amount of work into it. Not to not to mention the amount of legal funds that we put into and that's a good point. I I appreciate that. But that does get back to the point. Let's make
sure that the board wants to bring this forward fully on board and bringing it forward. Okay. Can I just make a comment? Sure. One of the reasons why you go through the process to begin with is to avoid the unnecessary expense and time to make
sure that this is something the board wanted to bring through. So, I don't think it's a valid excuse to say, "Well, we've already spent time and money on it if the procedure was not followed appropriately." I that's um it's
something that that if if should have, you know, before this whole thing started, and Director Herman, this is not on you at all. it should have actually been brought back um to to say um that does the board want to bring
this back through again through the through the committee before the work was done. So I I don't want to be held hostage to the fact that work was done. Um obviously if if and I and I have not talked to anybody on the policy committee but if the policy committee
had all this con had all these concern about it and it was already done then it's it's maybe a relief to them that they don't have to go through this um again because I I and again that's all hearsay. I I don't know. I'm just trying to I'm just
trying to recall um from when this came back months ago. Um, Director Johnson, you had brought forth a policy, um, a 904.1.
The the policy advisory committee did not have a chance to see it, correct? And that was our very first one. Yes. In February. So, um, what I'm
trying to recall is how if or how or if 904 was on the policy advisory committee for that first on the agenda for that first
meeting. It wasn't in February. What I'm able to find it was it I see 90 I'm sorry, I don't have I see 9004 showing up. on April 18th is when it first surfaces. Okay. So, it
did this happen because director Johnson's proposed and then um the the policy advisory committee did not see that proposed um
um point of clarification on February 13th agenda. We did have a signage update 904 policy on there and then it's my understanding that newly appointed to the committee uh then director Johnson brought forward to that
meeting 904.1 because we're talking about 904 on February 13th. So I do believe that 904 was on the February 13th agenda. Okay, I see that. And because um the proposed um the newly
proposed policy was given the night before and the policy advisory committee we did not see it. We did not see it. So then it got carried forward and then it's my understanding
um that that's when legal was um and then we had met after legal had been um had weighed in. Uh there was a group of us that met, myself included,
and that's when I asked if Director Johnson was um um okay, you know, like if how committed he was to the proposed policy, if we could just look at, you know, keeping hours and then that's when
you and I had conversations about did were you aware of of um legal being contacted because there was things that were out of step. Um, okay. So, I'm I'm still trying to figure out and I don't have my my notes.
I'm a paper person. I don't have my notes. I have the agenda for the February meeting, but I don't know how or why 904 came up on that agenda. Is could it be that there was anything in statute that changed that it just came
up again? No. Uh, director or sorry, Vice Chair Bullion. Um, again, I don't recall off the top of my head either how it got onto the agenda. I just recall it being a conversation that we wanted to have with policy advisory committee and I
that's where it landed in um our cycle review for this year. Um, how it got on the the checklist. Um, that is something I don't recall off the top of my head. Um, and again, I think if it does want to be brought up um for a vote with the
board um to bring it forward to another future session or not, I think we can maybe start there and then if it if it's a yes to move it forward with the board, then we can bring forward more of the information that we've we've gone through in the process. Okay. So, let me understand this. A policy got put on the
policy committee that's out of sync that we had already approved the year before and it was on a three-year cycle. It was not put on there because of any statutory required change. It was done so outside of the purview of the entire board.
The district extended expenses on it and a brand new policy 904.1 got created outside of the purview of the entire board and the committee met on it and multiple other conversations occurred again outside of the purview of the
entire board for a policy that obviously has huge legal hooks in it. uh because of everything from freedom of speech but also you know because of the extensive conversation that did occur just last year about
um what we should be doing input from staff policy committee already occurring. So you understand where my concern is about how this happened and the board never approved the work, never directed anyone to do this and money was
spent and time on this policy versus other policies and the normal cadence that have to be reviewed uh and and on a certain cycle. And we already know the policy committee can be somewhat overwhelmed even though this year is much lighter than it was last year. Um,
so I'm I'm I'm concerned about the break in protocol, the violation of procedure, and a many many other things that the board as a quorum never gave direction to do.
Director France, I understand your concern, but we have policy 208 who clearly says under item C, policies may be proposed by a schoolboard member, an employee, a student, or a resident of the school district. That is true. So, I like I said, I understand your concern
and I would probably feel this, you know, I feel I've felt the same way you have in the past about things that have happened in the past, but we have a policy in place. The policy came up in front of it went through the policy committee. I heard appe oppos opposing
viewpoints in that committee. I heard supporting viewpoints in that committee by teachers in our district. So that's this pol our policy 208 where it says policy may propose by a school board member, employee, student or resident of the district is not valid. No, that's immaterial to the proper procedure.
What that is the procedure? That that's not a procedure. That's just saying someone can bring it up. That's not approval. That's not approval to go through the process. This certainly is an approval to spend money on legal. It went through the process. So, well, I think uh
if it would be okay with the rest of the board, we should probably get to the bottom of this. I think the tees need to be crossed and eyes need to be dotted. At least we need to make sure that they were. Um again, since this predates me a little bit, I don't have the historical
view that you guys do. Um this is just a first reading. I think that um I will commit to trying to figure out what happened and how we should proceed with this particular policy moving forward if that's okay. That's not like we're taking any action tonight or if if you
give me some time to try to figure out what happened and where we're at. Um this may or may not end up on the agenda on July 14th pending what I find out. So, um, if that's, uh, okay with the rest of the board, I think that's
probably Can I clarify though? Does it really need to go back through the policy committee if if it's I have all kinds of questions. Okay. Okay. Okay. That's fair. And and and everybody every individual board member sitting at this table may have a whole bunch of questions as we are all individual board members. Try to get uh to the bottom of
of of how we got here. Um, and so I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to do that. So then let's move on to 203.7. uh board. So with 203.7
um after getting everyone's input uh over the last month or two since we sent this out last uh we did have multiple members who suggested
that this uh policy should be taken away uh be sunsetted and be moved uh either just go away completely or the procedures as a whole just like we did with the vacancies uh be moved to
the board handbook. Uh we do have a another policy 211 um that's goes into civil criminal actions uh that does vaguely touch on this, but we can lay these the steps out
in the board book pretty well without having a policy that attaches with it. And keeping with the precedent that was set uh for Director Bullion and I uh there is no MSB MSBA model policy. So I think uh not to speak for Director
Bullion, but it would be our suggestion that this does go away. So I did um email uh MSBA. I did get a response from uh Terry Mororrow. Um, I just wanted to get
being that it was the will of the board that we um were using MSBA model policies kind of as our guide as our guide. I just wanted to ask um
his um what did I ask him? I just said being that you do not have a model policy uh for a school board member violation of policy and he responded with it's up to the specific board um
and to make sure that there wasn't any district legal guidance given. Um that was that was his that was his only response. Um, so my question is
just as we sunseted 2011.1, is that right? 2011.1 vacancy policy. The vacancy policy. We we we voted as a board to have to to remove that. My question is
would the is it the will of the board to keep 203.7 as presented? it pretty much follows what the prior like what our original policy was or um go with MSBA
um guidance if I mean it's just I wouldn't say it's guidance because it's up to each individual district but my question is does the policy support the board governing itself?
That was my original question just to clarify 203.7. It does not appear in MSBA. So they don't have a they do not have it and I didn't know correct why I was here. Cut it. I just And so I reached out to to MSBA just to to just
say we are in the process of updating our 200s given the and it was the will of the board early this year to use MSBA as a model or a guide for um redoing our 200s. Um, and I just asked if he had any
direction that he would or advice to give regarding um cuz I I said that I would consider asking the board if they want to keep this policy or sunset it as we did the um board vacancy one because
MSBA doesn't have a model policy for that either. Um here's the thing. So when you do have an issue, the first thing the MSBA is going to ask you, been doing this for nine years, you don't have a policy or procedure, you're on your own, I can't help you, and you don't have a
precedence, and you will run into potential legal issues um particularly for consistency for um um you know, your cadence of acting consistently that can be brought into question. Um
we have had issues where we've had um board member three in my time I believe one in yours if I'm not mistaken Dan before that went down the violation road we Yes. Yes, there was one. Um and after
the second one um then um three members of the board went back and said, "Okay, how can we make this universal?" I mean, we came to a consensus on the on the language um and then used it one more
time to censure a a board member um based upon violation of our original operating norms and ethics. So now operating norms are no longer in existence now for for professional operating norms which is very
concerning. Um um but um without this if you run into a problem and you cannot hide this in a handbook you you that would be a transparency issue. It could be potentially a legal issue just like the vacancy hiding that in a handbook
could be a could be a huge issue. Um, so, um, the the thing was is to keep it and then, um, again, I don't believe anyone voted on gutting our current policies. They voted on, uh, going back
to some of the MSBA. Now, the MSBA has been pretty consistent. They won't tell you how to govern your own board. The the the statute is vacuous at best. um it's up to individual boards and boards do it all different ways and some boards
are are very highly functioning boards and have never touched their 200s and some of them have had ups and down years where they've had to um given that I can tell you from history if you don't have something
we're going to regret it and we're not writing this for today we're writing this for the future. Uh so we lay something down and the goal is is that it's fair. Um it allows for let's say new board members not you know to make a
mistake and just get spoken to by the chair that sort of thing. And it's very generous that way. I think we've only ended up with this in my experience we've only ended up with a censure once. uh the other ones we're just speaking to. Um so um that's what needs to
happen. But without that you can end up and again we're supposed to lead by example here. So we have to do something to enforce um rules, policies and procedures of conduct on ourselves that and again the statute is
vacuous. Um, so I would suggest keeping it and I would also suggest before policies that predate me, most of them that we're dealing with in the 200s were created during your time and various
fluctuations of your time. Um, they come with history out of my memory. I think this one was put in director France. This one was adopted in December of 2024. The last one it was if you the last 200
series I'm sorry I'm sorry 2022 December 2022 violations of policy December 2022. So let's be director I'm not done speaking. Well we have a time. So the 2022 was just because that's the we started changing our policies in 2021
and 2022 to actually start putting last revised date. But if you go back all the way to Yeah. So, but yeah. So, this one has been around for a long time. It's you you know that, Dan. It's been in here for a long time. After me. So, Oh,
no. It couldn't have been because we had this when I started. Guaranteed. Oh, it was developed after I was gone. It's an original in 2006. No, we we started with one in 20 I'm positive of that. So I guess the the question at the
table then is not to interrupt you. I'm sorry. No, no, it's okay. All I'm saying is I would suggest that we keep it in there and because this was reviewed it multiple times. I know Martha that that we didn't start putting the revision dates and all that kind of stuff um on
earlier ones until later. Uh and some of them were totally missed particularly in the 200s because Director Herman was incredibly diligent when we did start doing it and we were not as diligent. I would suggest that um you actually look at what was in there. I didn't agree
with everything that was in the original one and the way it was written, but I do respect the fact that uh Stacy wrote most of this when I was there with the adjustments. I did not do it and she was a former board chair and a 12-year
member of the board. Uh, so I would suggest that people if you're going to take something out that you actually consider or maybe even ask uh the former um uh board member why it was put in there to begin with, which um I did not
do per se, but I know that we talked about this extensively before CO uh during CO and then um and then again uh we the board voted on it in 2022 as if the last date. Can I say
that this policy says that it is to provide a process which is for the board book and the board book already does mention that right here addressing team dysfunction. So it's already got a section in there. Super easy to take the items from here and put it right there.
So team dysfunction I think first of all is a horrible term by the way just so you know. This was to actually um give a a process and a procedure and more or less a graduated process and procedure for the chair in particular to work with
board members who violated boardowned and board implemented policy as well as uh law. And most of the law that we have to deal with only concerns opening and closed meeting uh law um and privacy,
data privacy. So um the chair actually would be the one following this uh with the individual board member um alone. Now I did not use this during my term. I think it was used by others but um
that's something that you need to understand that any one of you could be in that role and you will need some sort of way to go back to something and say you know can I use this what part of it and it was written fairly
it was written fairly fluidly to give the chair a lot of leeway and and and the language and how um depending on the circumstance cuz there's no way any of these can can anticipate circumstance. I circumstances
will be different in all different areas and times and people. Uh so that's why I I would actually ask Dan to review this from his perspective first director and also include the procedure in Can we have other people add perspective to
this who have been personally impacted by it? Um, I've been personally impacted by it, too. So, in all fairness, we have a policy, and so does MSBA called 211. 211 is criminal or civil action against a school district, a
schoolboard member, an employer, or a student. So that policy basically is a um it's a more enforceable policy because it pertains to the law versus just somebody's opinion whether something is a violation
or not. And I would just say um you know our first of all this is a procedure. It's not a policy. Okay. And the reason that it's not a policy, well, it it's a procedure that not one other school district in the state of Minnesota has.
And I and I've searched hard. I've also heard that this and I've seen this policy does not create unity on this board. And we have a new strategic plan where we are to create unity. I think it creates unity. I don't agree with that. Well, and I also say it's illegal
because step number four says censuring a board member. Guess what? It's illegal. If you want to go back and look at case, Ridger Rock School District just got sued because they tried to censor a board member. So, there's a lot of things within this this a procedure
that are not unifying. They are go against the law and not necessary because we have a policy that is 211 which is an MSBA model policy. So in in my opinion, I don't see how this helps to unify our
board because the the the issue with this is truly the fact that it's totally subjectional to somebody's opinion of whether something was a violation. And in all honesty,
we are adults and if something were so serious that it needs to come to the board for full board discussion, which is where it should if if there is an issue, it should come in front of the front of the whole board, then we follow 211 because that's where two at 11 comes
in. So I don't I don't I've talked to many other districts and they are shocked that we have this in our in our policies and they you know and so I don't again we have a new strategic plan. We've been tasked with re relooking at these policies. if we want
to write something in our handbook. Um, but again, if somebody has an issue with somebody, go have a private adult conversation with someone and other than that, it should become before the board for a full conversation. Period. The end
in my in my opinion based on my experience. And we have 211 for those very serious reasons why there would be criminal or civil action against a schoolboard member where they would perhaps need to be voted out of office, which the law does allow, which by the
way, the state of Minnesota is the only state that allows a school board member to be potentially voted out of their elected official responsibilities. So, and that's stated in min uh min state statute 123b.09 09. And I I I would just
say this. Um I mean, I think it's maybe a little bit naive to think that there aren't issues that may not be illegal that boards are going to have to deal with from time to time, more often than not, probably around personality or perceived
behaviors, whatever the case may be. Um so I I think I have a hard time with having nothing. But to your point, um, if we're going to be a self-governing board, let's govern. I scratch letter B on your addressing
violations. And if I come to you, Lisa, and say, "Why did you do that?" And you say, "Cuz I felt like it." And it's and it keeps happening. Let's talk about it. Let's govern. Let's not put the onus on another single person who may have some kind of a, you
know, issue with somebody. Let's let the board hash it out. 100% agree. And and my in my mind I'm thinking um does that do anything to make letter A a lot more effective?
I don't think we need that second step. Personally, that's just me. I do think we need something because again, it doesn't have to be against the law to become an issue among the seven of us. I mean, they're they're I think that's just again I
think that's being a little bit naive and I think we need something, but I I I want to move toward the board handling the board business. Maybe not always just the chair trying to be the the babysitter. Can I ask something?
Well, not that I'm that's why I feel have that authority and unfortunately the chair does facilitate the question that I have and when you said hash it out I know. Okay. So, the public hashing it out. I mean, the whole purpose is to handle
things behind the scenes and focus on board business at the board table. Um, we've not always been successful, but we do try and, um, Director Bully, I think we've had a couple of retreats and a few other things where we've tried to do
that. Um, and I think it's gone fairly well, although not everyone walked away satisfied. Um the point is is that we are leading by example. So um if we're going to govern ourselves, I think the question we
should have for the board as a whole is what does that mean? Um particularly in the public, how do you want I mean granted, you know, everything trickles down from the top.
Um so you know and we have our disagreements, we vote, we don't vote, etc. We follow a procedure. Um, how will that look if you don't have
our own governing policies of what we consider to be professional behavior and we don't enforce that with ourselves and and and that's a I mean, you know, there's a lot of things that aren't against the law, but people have governing procedures. I mean, I walk
into court and sit on the stand and there's certain procedures we have to follow in order to show respect to everyone else even though obviously it's a highly conflict uh you know process. You can behaviors have sanctions but they're not exactly illegal.
So, if I'm hearing right, just to understand all of this, I mean, I'm hearing like this is like a procedural thing, right, that we would put in procedure to address concerns, call them what you want, violations, concerns. Um, I have I had a problem, too, with just
language in here of perceived policy. I have no desire to babysit anyone on this board, and they're all adults. So, um, I would not be in favor of probably ever censoring or removing a board member unless there was a grave criminal act,
which is covered, I believe, by statute. So, I believe that we are elected by the people and we can be adults. So, I think as far as process, it's great to maybe have a process if there are issues, but um I think some of the language in here
is a little bit like me. And I agree like I I appreciate that Dan that you don't want to babysit everyone too, right? I wouldn't want to if I was sitting in that seat. So, um I certainly think I would be um supportive of it
being in process and um having it sounds like 211 and I believe there's statute too covering like criminal civil issues. Can I just make a statement? The perceived was because it's it's one person's perception. So when you say
perceived, it's not right saying yes or no, right? So so that's why that language was put in there purposely put in there to soften it. It was not put in there to you know make a statement that sort of thing. But that section three addressing violations in my opinion is
process that we go too much further. I guess the overarching question is do we want this policy? what it's gonna say is down the road only if you want it. Yeah, I would I would definitely agree that that would be a pressing question and it
yes, we have this is a study session. Everyone should give their thoughts and and that's what this space is for. I pose the question to MSBA. Um, uh, Director Johnson and I have been try
doing our best to do some pre-work. Um, I don't know what what good it really does because we all get need to talk through it in our study sessions anyway, but what I would say is that uh I would
agree that the question for the board to consider and this is not to decide today maybe you know we don't make decisions at the study session but is to do is it the will of the board to sunset this the
um it had been asked prior I don't remember in which sequence of what we have passed but our ethics policy which is also going to be discussed tonight if we get there before midnight um our
ethics policy uh you know the the things stated polic in our policy they they transcend. That's why we um we reference policies you know
attaching we reference policies so that it's supporting you know I think that it becomes confusing when we have multiple policies trying to trying to you know we have a code of ethics we
have um actually help me help me what I'm trying to say but we we have all these policies establishing the board. This one is not um this one is procedural. This is this
is one that MSBA does not have as a model. And I understand every district has the it is the will, you know, that has the ability to create policy and implement it. My question is is is I wanted to ask MSBA
um any direction be I just wanted to do that step before coming tonight and I think that it's just as with 2011.1 the vacancies we we we asked the will of the board do they do we want this policy or or do we not
we have other policies that say what the what board members are agreeing to do how they're agreeing to show up. Um, so do we need a policy? Um, and my personal opinion would be no.
Again, that's not disrespecting the work of previous boards and previous people who wrote this. It's just when I think about I'm a less is more individual and I I'm one of seven. Um,
so that that's all that I have to say. I will go with whatever the will of the board is on do we move forward with having this this policy in place or not. And I'm fine either way. I just gave my my opinion and then I'll set up.
Chair White, Chair White. Um, Director Mason, I do agree that we are elected to put our butts in these seats and make some decisions and um, and for that I am very grateful. Um
I do think um we have spent 6 months on board policies and now we are looking to potentially sunset
a policy that is keeping us accountable. It keeps us accountable. I don't know what anybody's afraid of, but it keeps us accountable. Um, I think it's actually disrespectful to the
people who voted us in these chairs to not hold ourselves accountable. Um, I think we've done enough sun setting for one month. So, I would like to keep it in. So keep
sort of get rid of Yeah, I would get rid of Can I I just add we I mean we have policy 211 to hold us accountable and we also have policy 209 to hold us accountable. So we do have policies that hold us accountable as well. Um so yeah, I would be I agree.
I I am I'm in agreement to um sunset it. I think we need something. So whatever it says, I guess I think we should have something because what what good is the rest of
them if we don't have something that is as I think as director Olstead was very direct on. So if if somebody completely violates whatever code of ethics we end up with we're left without a tool and the board does govern itself. So what tool would
you use? I'm okay with suns setting as long as it's procedural in a in a board book or whatever we're developing, right? Because I do feel like it's covered by code of ethics and the other policy. But I think procedurally if there's a
perceived policy violation or issue, some sort of process I guess to follow and and that would be like in a board handbook, right? Is my opinion. I I do this for a living. I write policies, I have to defend them. And you
you never you don't even pass an audit if you don't have um a policy about violating the policy. So, and if I could say one more thing, I um Mary, I apologize for interrupting.
Um, I don't disagree that we have I I I'm not opposed to keeping the policy. The challenge that I have in my two and
a half years of sitting on this board is that when we are addressing violations, the first thing it says to do is have a private conversation. we as a board have not followed that
personally individually when there's been concerns that have been brought. And so I while I don't disagree that having a policy that lays things out is beneficial, it's only
beneficial if we use it. And so given that again this is my what is my experience we haven't followed this policy that doesn't mean there hasn't been
perceived or actual violations of policy. Um there has been um things brought forward. It's what we're struggling with is how to deal with it as a board. We're struggling with that very first part.
Sometimes we're going straight to the second to letter B. And yes, we are we are taking time. I I don't disagree. Uh Director Olad, six months of of working on the 200s has
been painstaking. painstaking and I I'm not I I it does it's not lost on me what the appearance that is. I think the the thing is is that in the we we had a new board um the
beginning of the year and the will of the board was to go over our 200s and we have tried to do that as efficiently as possible. Director Johnson and I have tr have spent hours, you know, trying to uh
support, you know, bringing what brought is brought forward and yet um we spend so much time and where what to what fruit? What are we really getting out of redoing these policies? because I'm
going to guess that we're going to still continue to find ourselves in the dynamics that we find ourselves because we are the seven of us are here. So, um uh I we had kind of set a goal that all
of these policies would be approved by our June regular meeting and that didn't happen and that hurts me but here we are and we're trying to keep going through. So, I guess um you know, we we either
keep pushing through and take as long as it takes to get through them or we surrender this mission. I don't know. Um again, is this is I don't know. Um this is the this is the issue. We're we we
can we can go over every single policy. We can go down every single rabbit hole, but if we are not following them, you know, and here's the thing, too, and I've had this I've heard this before, and this is something that comes up a
lot in both legal proceedings as well as employee stuff, you name it. Um, and and let me just quote Judge Alip in San Francisco. Hopefully, he's okay with me doing that. You know, I have a I
have a speed limit sign. People speed all the time, but they know it's there. And so therefore, when they get stopped, they can't really argue. The rules are there, right? But you're not going to stop everyone. And it's really going to depend on, you know,
the motivation, how many resources, etc., and where the priorities are at any one time. But you don't throw away the rules because you can't enforce them all the time. We've got a dress code policy in the high school. We can't enforce it all the time. We try. Teachers try, but that doesn't mean you
just throw it out. Um, so, you know, and I've heard this argument before, well, we're not enforcing them. Well, you know, just because you're not there doesn't mean you don't want to put the guidelines in. Um,
and that's that's a concern. So if we if we don't have any um process or procedure for policy violation, why do we have any of these policies to begin with? That's that's I think in all fairness,
we have a we have a policy. It's 211. And petty harassment of board members because someone doesn't like what someone said or someone doesn't like the way they wrote an email or who they wrote an email to isn't isn't giving creating any unity. So, I just think,
you know, um I have seen how since I've been on the board, I've seen how this policy has been used and it's it's a disgrace to be honest with you. So, I fully support getting rid of it. If we want to write something into our handbook that says that one line about if there's an issue, have a private and
professional conversation with another board member. That's what we all should be doing to begin with. If you have an issue with someone, pick up the phone and call them. And then if it becomes a bigger issue, we go to 211 because that's really at the end of the day, a board member is not going to get kicked off because somebody doesn't like what
they said. But that's never happened and it won't happen and we don't allow it to happen. So we have there are laws. So anyway, um that's I think we need to move forward. We've been talking that I the consensus I've heard is to get rid of it. I' I'd like to keep it.
Mary wants to keep it. Jessica wants to keep it. So, unless you're Here's the thing. We should move forward. Here's the thing. I I don't disagree with I say it to Charles all the time. I
don't have a dog in that fight, right? I I would go with the will of the board on whether to keep it or um remove it. And because I don't have a dog, I say I don't have a dog in the
fight because I don't mind the policy being here. What I what I am challenged by is when we h as board members individually aren't following our policy. And that's probably why you have
to as you're reading this, it has to be faceless. You can't be thinking of somebody while you're reading the policy. And that's how I you determine whether or not it's valid or not. I tend to think that again, we have to have something. Well, it's a procedure is what it is. It's a
procedure. And I and and to be fair, um that's that this type of policy to enforce policies is written procedurally. It's universal to be written procedurally. Every company has an acceptable user and ethical code of
conduct. Right. And we have that in It is procedurally put into the violation the policy violation of that it's put into there also. It refers back to a policy and that is standard and I'm telling you you're not going to pass an
audit without it. So they don't say no go to a procedure because the problem is is that if you go to a procedure that then is not approved by executive manager like a policy is then if you do have a serious issue and you want to terminate somebody and that is an
extreme. It's a just an example. It's not like we're going to kick someone off the board. Um it doesn't hold water. And so that that is the problem is that you don't have any tool. you don't even have a tool to start a tool. And and if you
leave yourself vacuous, um it's not this board that may have the issue. It may be the next board, you know, two years, four years from now or whatever that comes back and has something happen. And they've got nothing to rely on. So, we're not doing
it just for us. These policies are not meant to be ripped out and rewritten. They're they're meant to provide a consistency over time. Um, and I think that's kind of gotten lost in our job to make sure that the
district stays sound, that people stay consistent, that processes and policies becoming become uh predictable over time and and you can't, you know, coming in and ripping it out for one year or two years and then coming back and put
something else in. that unpredictability leads to chaos. With the best of intentions, it can lead to chaos. So, just keep that in mind as as you're thinking about this. And I agree with Director Bullan. We haven't enforced a
lot of our policies, especially over in my recent time uh in the past couple of years. Um but that doesn't mean they just need to be ripped out. And so this is what this well this is what we brought forward to the study
session this 203.7. So if anyone I mean if to to ease our or to expedite our um our process so that we don't spend another month going through these. I
mean can we just go through and this is what's brought forward to the board tonight. I I just asked the question to to Terry Mororrow from MSBA only because MSBA didn't have it. And so well and I
think director Bullian what what director Johnson said about they how they do have it in their handbook means when we get to the handbook which is hope sooner than later we can all provide feedback into let's put in step one for this process. Let's put in step
whatever C for this process. And it goes in the handbook. And that's way that's that is the way it's covered. And what's positive is the board handbook says right in there on I think the second page maybe that it should be looked at
every year by the board. Yeah, that's a good point. Which is something different than what this policy would be looked at because once it right, we go we approve every three years. Three years. Yeah, that's a good point. All right. I think that I I don't like the handbook idea for this. I'll just tell you that right
off the bat. That's going to eventually not maybe our board, but a future board that's going to cause a problem with enforcement. Okay. All right. Well, it looks like this is going away if I'm reading the consensus of the board properly. Not today. It's not correct. Because
we're in a study session, right? So, the brought forward to a school board meeting and voted on. Correct. Correct. hopefully with the roll call. All right, let's move on to 204. Um, with 204, this is uh schoolboard
meeting minutes. So, just so everyone is aware, I spoke to Martha about this. Um, she gave a thumbs up. Um, and I I will just read off the MSBA note here. The provisions of this policy are required
by statute. I'm not going to go into anything else unless somebody else has something they would like to add in here. Um, we do we do all of these things. Yep. Everything is covered. We're just ironing it out. Okay. So, here's the thing in here. It
addresses school newspaper. It it addresses newspapers located within district boundaries, all that kind of stuff. The only thing Yeah. The only thing and and because that also has an issue with other stuff that's going on and other policies that we have that are
not in the 200s. They have to do with notice and stuff like that that are in other numbers. The only thing I think we've ever had before is the school board meeting minutes and the and the statute that we have to follow. Um, so I would prefer that we not try to repeat
everything in the template because the template actually has embedded contradictions and overlaying and just say we meeting minutes follow Robert's rules and statute period and none of this other stuff in
here because again there's language in here um that not the closed meeting but the other stuff about publication s and if before August 1st and notwithstanding any law we already cover that in non200 because the district is responsible
for publications and we have another policy that covers that. The other thing is that the policy that covers that also includes all these other notices. So I would prefer to get rid of all of that so we don't have conflicts with other
notifications, notices etc. Robert's rules has the procedure for um how many minutes are recorded based upon major motions who voted etc. That's it. anything that the board took as an action or was on the agenda and then the
notifications and where we put it etc is already covered in another procedure and I don't want to have to go back and visit this one and three other ones that are in non 200 policies if we all of a sudden do get some sort of online or other newspaper and um and
publication rules and statutes with regards to that change. Um, so that would be my goal to keep this simple. I am I understand. Um, I just become wary when it says the
provisions of this policy are required by statute. That's where it gets real hesitant to me. And if to as you know if it is a statute change it just comes out automatically from MSBA and it's one read and one read only and
that's the only thing that changes. No and I'm fine with that. So that's why I wouldn't want to change anything because if we're just going with the model on this and we're not changing anything else, we don't have to touch anything else. We don't have to worry about it. We don't have to do anything else and we already know
we're we're good. That's statute. Yeah. Statute and Robert's rules. The other stuff in here that tries to describe the statute and the conflation with other notification statutes we've already have covered in non 200 policies. And so
that's my concern. Is your I'm sorry. Is your concern to take out the notes of where it says note the provisions of this poly server recovery statute. Note in 2024 the municipal legislator enacted because I don't think you're with four right
number four. It's mostly four four all the way through. Yeah. Four. But the recording of closed meeting is also statutory by the way. Yeah. Um, so and so you you my experience has been when you start to get very verbose in here
and you conflate different things and we all know we go back to statute regardless and we also know that Robert's rules also designates a lot of the stuff about how the meetings are noted. Um, between that and Robert's rules and the fact that we have Martha
and whoever her doppelganger may be at any one time to help us with this, um, you know, we cover it. The more verbose you get in here, the more we risk that overlap and contradiction and um, and we
don't do the minutes anyways. That would be our parliamentarian. So, what are you? So, just so I'm clear, can I just clarify? I'm So, I'm looking at the open and close meeting policy and this policy actually takes a little bit
of a deeper dive into what the law is regarding some of this. So, I actually appreciate having this because it's people will, you know, I've even looked at policy where you don't have to go into deep statute and find out what is the law pertaining to a closed meeting. If you look at our policy regarding open
and closed meetings, it's really only just a couple bullet points about closed meetings. So, this seems to take a deeper dive, which is why more than likely it's recommended by MSBA and it's statutoily driven. So, yes, I I support
it. I mean, anytime that something's written by statute, I 100% support it. Well, you don't have to repeat certain parts of the statute and not the whole statute. And we'd be better off just naming the statute. So when the statute changes, we don't have to go back and repeat. Can you clarify which parts are repeated? I'm having a hard time
understanding that. Closed meeting notes is is closed meeting law, open law, open meeting law, and closed law. And it's not the full statute. It's it's just parts of it. That's the thing that worries me. And if we're going to have this be maintainable
um and but I'm mostly concerned about four um recordings of closed meetings shall be maintained. Is that one publication of official proceedings? Yeah, we have and then we have the process and the procedure for the
regular meeting notes being governed by uh Robert's rules. I just want to make this simple because I don't want to have to go back and revisit this every single time we have a Are you Are you at this number four or this Roman numeral Roman numeral the publication of official
proceedings? So I'm all for um making it as if you if we don't making it as you know Robert rules statute but I think the argument is the proposed um to keep it simple. I'm always for
keeping it simple. Um, less words the better. And I feel like it's you're it's the opposite coin of the argument for, you know, other
things. So, I don't know. I think for me I I get um confused in the direction because I do appreciate your policy experience. Um I do exper I
do I appreciate it on this board and other boards and um when this is the MSBA model and it's all all statute driven I it's hard for me to know
we as a board gave the direction to use MSBA policy. So it's like I hear you. I hear you say let's just keep it simple and not overlap. I hear you and I'll I'll say, "Okay, great." Um, but then I also hear the will of the board was to
use MSBA. So then I say, "Okay, great. It was to use MSBA as a guide, as a guide." And that's not to just cut and paste. Okay. Um, and what I and again MSBA policy, a lot of the stuff that we have tries to spell out, we've already
had a couple where our attorneys have come in and said, "Yeah, they tried to summarize the statute and they could have gotten us into trouble." Um, I just prefer to keep it simple. If we follow Robert's rules and we did the original one that talked about meeting minutes
and because closed meeting is a law and the statute's in here, why are we trying to only recreate part of the statute? That's what worries me. It it just worries me because of the maintenance of it. This is something this is God is
this to make this one of the longer statutes of everything longer policies of everything we're talking about just so we can cut and paste from the statute worries me. Why don't we just put in the statute and say we're going to follow statute we're going to found Robert's rules for the for the meeting notes and
we are going to delegate the role to our designated parliamentarian. Well, and and given we did not even h we we don't have a a school board meeting minutes policy. Well, okay. So, the so
and that's that's a whole another story because a lot of our policy numbers were created before MSBA changed their numbers and vice versa. So, the numbers are different getting in the right duly noted Mary wants to be three sentences. Any other any other suggestions or
questions? I don't disagree with, you know, having it be short and just saying what statute. Um I don't I have no problem with that. But we don't even we didn't have a school board meeting minutes
policy. We we didn't have a separate policy. We just put in there that the closed we would follow the law and that we would follow Robert's rules for the minutes. that was in the original um one and that's one that's already been wiped
out um and and that was I believe in the operating norms or one of the earlier 200s um because that's all we ever needed. This this should not be a we're never going to we can't change anything in here anyways. I mean it's
the statute and Robert's rules. That's it. Well, and I think when you look at like what's the intent of the policy, right? You always have to ask what what is the intent. Um it's the policy of the school board to maintain its records so that they'll be available for inspection by members of the general public
and to provide for the publication of its official proceedings and compliance of the law. And I do recall and I think it's right here under um legal references, there was a law that was passed just last year about this about how the how we publish um the meeting minutes and stuff. So, I think I think
it's great to have a policy surrounding this because it calls it right out and it we're being transparent with our community and they know where to go to find it because there's a policy that actually talks about schoolboard meeting minutes versus being hidden in another policy for wherever it is. So, I like
the way you read section two for general statement of policy because in there we could just mention the statute or refer to it and just say the meeting minutes will follow Robert's rules and that the board delegates the creation of the meeting minutes to our parliamentarian um or whatever we we basically delegated
it before. And that's pretty much all this policy needs to state if you wanted to keep it a separate policy. Well, it does also say all votes taken at a meeting are required to be open to the public pursuant to open meeting law. There's there's a lot in here. So, but that's in the statute. I Yeah, but a lot of people won't go read the statute.
We've been we've kind of gone back and forth on that where So, I will of the board, but I I I personally don't want to have to maintain this thing if I stay on the board like more than another term because that would be a pain in the butt
and we wouldn't be changing anything. If anything, we'd have to maintain it. I I hear that argument about the maintaining. Um I I and I hear the argument about it being short. Um and there's always the
other side. So will of the board. This is what this is what was brought forward because it's MSBA's model. If there's specific changes or you know specific strikeouts so that we can all look at it and be able to vote on it. I think
that's another thing that I've found challenging in this going through all of our 200s is when we come to the study session or we come to the regular meeting, we we are doing all this talking about things and we don't have
what we can vote on or what we can edit and and that for me is challenging um in trying to you know compile thought. Okay, how about how about this then? Uh, would it be okay to scratch Roman
numeral 4 and shorten it by that much? You said that I think you said at least do that. I that Yeah, I think that's the one that would probably have to change the most because does that make sense to everybody or but just keep the statute?
Yeah, we'd have to keep the statical references no matter what. So, so then so that that four is just all about how we publish the me the minutes and it takes up a whole page and a half, but it really is all just the statute 124D. Actually, Robert's rules also determines
um what you actually record. The other statute covered closed laws and the publication. Um Robert's rules actually says you only and your in your meeting notes, you only do the um the motions and all that kind of stuff. So that it
that doesn't statute doesn't go into Robert's rule. Statutes just go into what has to be legally available to the statute. The statute that's added specifically references publication of official meetings. Right. Publication publication. It has nothing to do with
Robert rules. Remember the meeting minutes are if we wanted to strike four, we could because this if we strike four, would everybody be able to live with this thing? Yeah, I'm good. No issues with that. Yep. All right. We're striking four and moving on to
205. Okay. 205 is open and closed meetings. I will begin with reading the note. The provisions of this policy accurately reflect Minnesota's open meeting law uh statutes and are not discretionary in
nature. So the very small um edits that are in here I sent to MSBA to Terry Marorrow. He said they are all good. So the in the definition the email change on there where study session is
added um letter F. MSBA has has cleared all of those. He said we also don't have to add them if we don't want to. Right. I put them in there because that is how our meetings are done. Um, so I just wanted to make sure that everything was referenced as
far as our meetings. So other than that, um, I don't think there's somebody has anything else to add. That is all I have for 205. Questions on 205. Um, no, again, this is one that we don't
have to repeat everything. Um, we never have before that the open and close meeting follow statute. uh and the latest interpretation of the statute. Um what we're missing here is what was in the original operating norms about how
we are going to make sure the and and in the ethics which will be next on how we as a board are going to make sure that we do not g you know give the perception uh of violations and how we're going to handle certain things
about quorum and not quorum. um you know that's really hard to interpret um from the from the repetition of the statute. Um I I I still laugh the fact that we're actually in here as far as the statute
interpretations. So suggestion um again it's it's interpretation of statute. um whenever there's a confusion because of the interpretation of statute um I would prefer if we put in there
that we refer to legal counsel because it's we're not no it's not in here it's just um you use the current statutes and when in question um because it is a very specific um and and
uh statute um And and as you notice, all the case law that has come into there of how the case law is interpreted is not necessarily in here. Uh that when we do have a question about it that we that the board does refer to legal counsel
for their decision. Uh cuz it's it's it's it's kind of a snaky little interpretation over the years of how it's come across. So you're saying if we can add anything that'd be the same with any law though
to be honest with you. I mean we I'm just trying to get be clear on what you what you're what you're asking. Yeah. Because we could add that to every policy. Would you add it at the beginning at the end? I mean, you're saying that any of these I would say I would say under general statement of policy that when there's a question of
whether something is within the bounds of the statute that we do um that the board does contact uh legal counsel for guidance. So like a C legal guidance will be I think that's fair. I think the board
will ask for legal guidance when deemed necessary. I we're we're not lawyers. This is almost all legal speak. There's a matter of fact, federally, it's actually federal law, too. And um and the interpretations of how it's
happened can change on a dime. Uh so I would I think it's safe for us to say that if there's ever a question that we do refer to legal counsel. My only question about that is I don't want to put that in here and
spend money to ask a legal question that like Martha could answer. That's my only question. Common sense. Yeah. So like as needed or like you know what I'm saying like to qualify it I guess is my only and I would say I think we have to have full board approval. We can't just have
board members. That's what I mean. So maybe it's maybe it's legal guidance that a lawyer wouldn't necessarily have to give us per our per our parliamentarian saying legal counsel legal guidance. Yeah. But legal guidance could be Martha or Emily
even too. I mean I'm I'm trying to take the the officially contacting our lawyer. So we don't have to do that. Right. We could get legal guidance from our HR. We could leave guidance from um someone that wasn't our lawyer and charging us $500 a rate. I wouldn't that
I don't interpret that the same thing. I think anything legal guidance or legal legal counsel to me I would assume comes from legal. That's just my that's just my thought. The point
you mentioned you can we soften it Dan? So, because I mean, if Emily's already asked the question or if Martha's already asked the question or Dr. Thomas has already asked the question, we don't have to repeat it. Just maybe administrative or legal guidance, something administration or legal
guidance maybe to soften it. Um, I like that actually. Yeah, you like the gives us the option. Yeah. But it's not us. We are not the authority by any stretch. Administrative or legal counsel or however you want to put it. But how come how come it says
the provisions policy accurately reflect Minnesota open meeting law statutes and are not discretionary in nature? But we might not know we might not have the expertise to as far as the nuances of of what some of these things mean. So it's it doesn't
hurt for us to say if there's any confusion ask somebody. I mean I don't is basically what it's coming down to. Yeah. There's So if we could just add that little Yeah. refer to administration or legal
counsel as deemed necessary or something like that. Um Mary, please state the sentence because I'm not going to make up your sentence. You know what I mean? You want me to repeat it? I can't even remember what I just I think it's I think it could be as
easy as consult administrative or legal counsel as needed or deemed necessary when when when there are questions and when there are interpretive questions when when there are Yes, that's true. The board will consult administration or
legal um counsel or guidance guidance from administration andor legal. How about that? I hate andor but it works here. That work? Got her. I got something. All right. I got something.
Anything else on 05? Okay, let's move on to Okay, it's 10:00. I just have a question. Um, we still have one, two,
Three more. Do you want to go for it or do you want to do this and take it to the next board meeting? Get them done in the next half an hour, 45 minutes. Personally, I would appreciate the sooner we can get the
200s done. It has like at Jessica Olad's point the six months of discussing the 200s it's valid. I'm also thinking of Dr. Thomas and Martha who have I think about them too.
And I let's uh let's see what we can get done in a half hour here. Let's see. I Okay, I have confidence. Okay. So, policy 206, public participation in schoolboard meetings,
complaints. Um, the changes in here, uh, are very minimal. Uh, actually really what was done was, uh, by director Bullion. She just honestly moved some things around so that it fit the other
policies that we had. So that we had open forum going first. If I remember correctly, I'm not looking open forum and then what was the next one? And that's that's all the way down in the procedures area before uh towards towards the end. So we
didn't have this policy before at all. No, we did not have this policy before. Obviously, the changes are great because it's a brand new policy. It is. It is. It's a brand new policy. And just so everyone's aware, um public forum itself is addressed in 207. So when I got
feedback from everyone, everyone kind of did it in both. Um but public forums, the public forum area specifically is addressed in 207 which is public hearings. So um still in here though. It is. Yes. It's just deals with different
items. Um it's a little it's just different. We we changed it more so in 207 than we did in 206. We kept 206 the same. I hope that any feedback was okay with
the changes. I don't even know why we need it. Don't we already have that? We have a public forum and we've got the rules for Oh, yeah. That's right. We ripped out all the rules for people and their behavior. Right. Um, and this is discusses data privacy
which is already discussed in non200s and the public's opportunity to be heard. We've already got an open forum. Um, we already have the procedures in the in the open forum meeting that we specify a period of time, right? We
already have that in our meeting cadence and another 200 policy and and that we recognize 15 minutes. Um and that the schoolboard chair, if you want to add one speaker at a time in the previous
cadence. Um um we already have a discussion of data privacy. So that's already in there. And then the only thing new about this is complaints. Um and we already have that discussed about complaints in another policy of
how it goes through the hierarchy. So I'm a little confused. this policy is being brought forward because it's an MSBA model policy that we did not have. I I understand that but we already discussed almost all of these in different areas including many of the
policies have things that intertwine and interact and that's just I say I like I like this one. And I always thought we should have this one because it gives the public clear direction of where to find if they want to come speak, they know exactly where to go to find this where before it was interwined in our
policies and you couldn't find it. So, but this conflates with data privacy and and it just restates what we already have that we have an open forum and it doesn't say the rules and it doesn't have any rules for open forum. It just says you can come chair will
recognize the speaker. We already have in another meeting another policy that we have 15 minutes. So you have the limit discussion. We don't um have the policy anymore that we disc we actually
took out the fact um a while ago that you have to limit the discussion to something that's only on the agenda. We took that out a while ago. Are we adding that in to prevent people from speaking about things that are not on the agenda? and two
and 62 682 6 oh sorry 682 the board retains the discretion and limit discussion of any agenda item you already have that it's got 15 minutes and you give each person three minutes that's already in the other one
and you talk about any agenda item we actually took that out a while ago so that people could talk about anything we can we can strike out the procedures part. So it's only in one policy that's not and in 207. Yeah. And we already have a
data privacy one. Okay. And we have the rules of the forum saying personal attacks and public hearings. So we're you suggesting we're scratching procedures all of number six. So and why do we have the complaints against an employee relating to child
abuse discrimination in here? We already have that an official legal complaint. This is an MSA an MSBA model policy that I get it. It's they're bringing up and you know yeah there's you guys we got to
we got to be a little discretionary here because we already have this in other policies. I'm aware that we've got a lot of things and a lot of other policies and sometimes we've already come right here. Policies we already approved and policies the data privacy policy
we have a non201 that goes through that. Yes, but we don't have a 2001. That would be my argument. Why do we need a 2001? Why don't we need a 2001? I we're not individually discussing data privacy. Someone could walk up there to the podium and do it for the forum.
Right. And again, like we we could sit and argue every point. I think when it comes for me we we can argue every single point. And there's there's validity to it all. And it for me it goes back to
what the will of the board was early this year. And that's where we're the struggle. That's where the strugg we this is the struggle that we're in as a board. We're taking so much time and so much effort and then
you know so as a as a board we we stated we wanted to use MSP as a guide. Okay. Maybe that was the issue. Maybe that was but that's what it was the will of the board. So that's what we have tried to do and Charles and I have tried to take
what we've had along with MSBA and marry them and come to our study sessions as best we can and we are spending so much time are you know like I don't
know how to move forward. I get it Amy but director bullying sorry want to be respectful. No, you're right. You can here's the thing. The We have talked about this. The MSBA puts a whole bunch of templates out there. I understand. You don't have to
use all of them. You don't need to use a lot of them. And they and a lot of them with the 200s, some of them have been out there for decades. And because boards govern themselves, um you you pick and choose what you
need. You don't take them verbatim like they're like they're like they're gospel so to speak. That's not what they're there for. They've never been there for that. But when when we haven't had a policy like if if there's a policy that has not been a prior lake policy, that's
what we've done is we've just brought forward MSBA policy be because we haven't had it. Now I understand that in our policy we might have had bits and pieces and we've we what we were trying
to do and in my um in my um opinion I guess is that it was to take the guide of MSBA, take what we have had as prior Lake Savage area
schools and try to bring forward to our study sessions where we could say, "Okay, do we want this or not?" And that has become ex it seems to become increasingly challenging meeting after
meeting. We're on the f final um final eight policies or nine policies and I and we have to figure out how are we moving forward with them because because there's there's many policies that have
um parts of the policy are stated in other policy that argument is throughout all you know throughout all the butic what I'm getting at is is that the policy templates open forum were not made to be used verbatim. They were made
as guides so that you could pick and choose what you want. They weren't made to be just taken and just plopped in. That's kind of what I'm getting at. And I understand the confusion, but um you know, it's up to us to use the discretion and how we want this to flow.
Yeah. And and anytime you have policies that overlap and have and have um repetitions, your maintenance actually long-term becomes harder. And this coming year for policy advisory committee with the our the lighter um
this coming year it's even lighter. And so um we we are discussing that we are going to try to create consistencies across policies to bring up um policies that are um all you know talking about
the same thing so that we can right do exactly that. So we can do exactly that. And um as far as our 200s I guess um we just have to figure out how how we are moving forward with these. Well, can I
make a suggestion for tonight? Can we look at quickly look at 207 because they when you look at the purpose again, you have to think about what is the purpose of the policy. Um, they're basically the purpose is very similar. Um, the purpose of 206 is the school board recognizes the value of participation by the public in deliberations and decisions of the
schoolboard matters. At the same time, the schoolboard recognizes the importance of conducting orderly and efficient proceedings with the opportunity for expression of all participants respective views. So, that's really the purpose of the policy. Then when you go to public hearings, it says the school board recognized the importance of obtain. It's basically the
exact almost exact same thing. So I would I would argue why do we need both? And are there is there something like is there something missing in one or the other that would be like we need to have one versus the other? There's a lot of statute listed here too, legal
references. So I believe there is a purpose for them but I'm just trying to understand you know so what would be your from reviewing these and spending hours and hours on them and greatly appreciate you two doing that. I would I would think if we're going to keep something um we should keep 207. I think
director Bullion and I have spent much more time. Um even though there there are some additional notes on 207 that we will need to discuss. Um, I think that
would be the the best move is to in in today's terms, we're going to deuce game 206 and we're going to keep 20 I'm Yeah, we're going to get rid of 206 and we're going to keep 207 if everyone is okay with that.
I'm fine with that because again, what is the purpose? They're very similar purposes and it's 207's actually a little bit cleaner to read. Um, and it doesn't have procedures in there. As long as we're clear that there's a difference between a public hearing and open. That is the other thing. The title
is very confusing. Can we change the title? Public hearing, right? And there is statute for public hearing. So, I understand why they have either like currently we don't have either. So, we did because we don't have a policy about
it. If if somebody calls for it, then we have to have it by law. That's why none of this is is is something that we even have a choice over if it got called. And that's probably why we don't have a policy on it. Just like we don't include the data privacy because we don't
enforce it here except within ourselves and we're already have the oath of office and all that. Um if somebody if a parent came up there and did that for you know in 206 that's kind of their we can't enforce
the law on them. they can do whatever say whatever they want. Uh we can only enforce the norms of that but public hearings that's if if a public hearing is required like truth and taxation um that is a public hearing. We we do
that and um and we and it's mentioned in our current um um what was put in the you know what is it called the agenda thing that when we have that we have to follow public hearing and I think the statute's already in there but so I mean
we can keep this in here but it's I I I guess um so before each meeting where public comment will be heard a request form will be available 10 minutes. That's required by law on the form and a request. So that was for some reason
scratched out um under C1. Um now you're in 207. Yeah. So I mean if you want to keep 207 and get rid of 206, 206 is probably more redundant than anything else. And um but 207 all this I don't think we can cross anything out of
here if it's all just repetition of statute. I mean, like I said, the truth and taxation is the public hearing, the one that I can think of off the top of my head, and we have to allow that. We everything in the statute, we have to allow whether we like it or not.
Why was I'm sorry. And the and the signage is in our boardroom in general. Why scratched and the signage doesn't have anything to do with public hearings, by the way. Uh has to do with our board decorum. We moved uh request forums to address the board will be available 10 minutes prior to this
scheduled meeting start. It's right there. No, she's asking why did you scratch this sentence scratched? Oh, it's just it's extra. We were just trying to make it easier to read. That was the same thing in less words. Yes. Yeah. Well, it public hearings are I
mean just like open and close meeting law. They're pretty specific to statute and they're pretty specific to our normal cadence of some of our agendas and what we do here. So yeah. So and and the other thing the signing has nothing to do with public hearings both. Well,
no, no, the public hearings are statutory. If you want to keep it in here, that's fine. But mention the statute and say the statute will prevail regardless of what we cross out. It's at the bottom of the page, right? And it's at the public hearing in there. But the only thing that isn't statutory in here
is signage that goes to all of our board meetings. No signage is allowed. So why did it end up in public hearings? actually wasn't it wasn't in policy. It wasn't in policy. Well, it doesn't belong here. Where would you And it belongs in 206. No, I I would say it would belong in our
board operating norms and our thing for Yeah, we are. Where do we have the signage rule now? It doesn't exist. So, who do we just enforce? Why is it hard to enforce? Do you mind if I ask?
It's actually in 4, which is what we discussed. 904. No, that's that's not signage in the boardroom. Um, that's displaying material. I mean, it can be read that way. No, these are adults. These aren't students in classrooms and staff and all
that kind of stuff. It's not um that could that should probably be in our board operating norms for our agendas that no signage is allowed and then also added to the rules out there uh when people go to sign up. because this is where people come to look for
if we're going to keep it meeting. I'm sitting here listening and like kind of I don't have a strong difference either way because I hear both sides. But I do kind of like that like we're modeling over MSBA and and it's a direct versus like buried in our process. So if someone from public goes
and looks for a policy on like meetings, they can read it. You know what I mean? Versus like I'm going to go dig into Can I add one other thing? That would be my only comment, but I agree less is more. Jessica Olstead brought up a good point that we have removed language in uh
number letter C. Which one? I'm sorry. Number three, procedures in 207. Uh in 207, yes, public participation letter C. Number two,
wait, can I letter A? Letter 2 A. So it should be time limitation. Uh vulgar language. Yeah. Um can't define. I think those were the exact words that you sent me. Um I agree. We
have taken that direct verbiage out of policy previously and I think that we should take it out again because we cannot define none of us specifically. Have we replaced it with profanity? Do we have profanity?
We can't find that either. I I can't directly find it. However, I did put a question mark if we wanted to move towards that. But then I think that would bring us back to the same scenario of who wants to define what. So I think
the best thing would be to just So can I have a I have a suggest use vulgar language. Um we have rules. How about just disclose personal information about right? I think would probably be the best. Yeah, we have. So, yeah, we have
rules for the open forum. So what if we created a policy out of that that we can also place over there and add in the no signs to that because uh about open forum as well as you know um our control of the boardroom and if
we and put no signs in that and then memorialize that in the policy and make that the the open forum policy. Um it providing that people are okay with the rules there. the rules are a little I I rewrote them to make them shorter um at
one point in time, but um what if we do that? Because public hearings really should stay concise to the statute of public hearings that we're required by law to do no matter what. So, um I just don't want to conflate that with general
meeting, you know, um um you know, people. Um that's the thing that that um would get confusing 207 very specific to public hearings but
then we need to go back and make sure to 20 206 which 206 does cover the public's participation. So if you if you go back and rework 27 and make it very specific to public hearings and statuto statutory for 20 for 207, then just make sure 206
includes all the things for public participation in schoolboard meetings and then you could add in the flags and signs and banners and that one. Absolutely. I mean that way you're not conflating the two. Yep. But there one's public hearings and one is for the public. That's good. So then 206 can be
rewritten to our forum rule. Well, we should then refer also just so you know back to the um agenda with the forums in it just so we people know what the definition is and where it is. And then change the rules and whatever it is on
the top of that thing. Yeah, that thing. Whatever that thing is. That sounds like a good plan. So, are we officially good on those two? Well, we have to rewrite 206 both. Okay. Yes. I think I think out the
sign. Leave that only for the board meetings. Yes. The vulgar language part. Can we if we scratch it on the other one? I agree with that statement. Well, hold on. We as long as we have it on the open form rules right now we give to people
and it also it also states they can't make personal attacks and stuff like that. Yes, I think we cover everything out, but vulgar language was specific specifically addressed and we have brought this up. This board specifically
has brought this up. Not in the forum. We haven't no in policy. We brought it up in people visiting the schools. We actually wiped out all correct behavior which is dangerous for our staff. That
was but okay. I think why what can I just let me bring this up. Why is there a problem with vulgar language? I don't have a problem with vulgar language. No, I meant why would we want to have vulgar language? I mean, if you've seen the city council form
rules across from Edina to Prior Lake to to whatever. I mean, they have that in there. I think anyone should stand up there and say whatever they want to say. Vulgar language or not doesn't bother me. But I I would say having it in the policy if it discourages 90% of it
that's 90% less we have to deal with then who's ever sitting in the chair to have the right to say you you need to leave this is unacceptable to realize that there's kids in the room and that's what they that's what they should be focused on right and that
should be the focus of everything that goes on at the podium right is that it's for our kids that's why we had the no vulgar language in there. So, but ultimately someone's it's not going to stop anyone if they want to do it. Well, no, it gives the chair or whoever
sitting the right to say you violated policy, you cannot speak anymore and remove them from the podium. The only time I feel like it maybe has been taken a little bit too far was I believe I don't remember when this was a while back. I someone was quoting something
out of context. Well, regardless if somebody's quoting something in school materials, then I remember I believe that it is appropriate for them to say at a stand if it's okay. They weren't quoting something materials. Can
we make that clear? It was if that was the case, right? And that would be my only exception. It was the case. I I understand what you're saying. Can I um can I bring up a point that I think was a good point to bring up. Under procedures, I'm back in 206. Um under
procedures under number six under number two under open forum um which policy is this 206 procedures Roman numeral six. Yep. And then um number two I greatly appreciate as a member of not the board
and now the board. I love the fact that our school board does allow people to speak about anything rather than having it limited to the discussion to an engine an agenda item because we don't have that many opportunities for our public to come speak. And I I firmly believe if they have to wait for it to
become an agenda item, it it's just going to boil and cause frustration. So that's why we actually took that out. No, I know I'm saying I appreciate that. So I think that should be changed to what is in our current policy. This is the discretion to limit it. I don't think so. We didn't I think all tool
suggest I read this as it retains the discretion. This doesn't say it's limit. I know it just I it's I I agree with with director Actson on this, but I also agree with 206 should just be the rules of the forum and of our board room. And
we already have a lot of those rules down. So, I think we should just recreate it according to the rules that we have and then come back and review it in in in its entirety uh so that we're seeing how it how it looks and include the signage in there too since that
wasn't um in there. I think that's the easiest way to do it. Um we already have a date of privacy. I don't want to conflate it with that. And do we have any rules in those rules about people speaking at our board meeting that have to have some sort of
um connection to our district like live in the district, have a student in the district? We don't have that rule now. So, we don't have that rule now. No. Oh, did we used to have that rule? No. I felt like you had just to keep outside agitators from coming in and speaking. I mean, I know that's happened in the
past. I've seen the meetings. Um, they have my memory says that at one time you had to be a resident of the school district, but I don't I can't because I I appreciate the sentiment, but I think just as a Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Martha. You wanted to say something.
Yes. So, we used to have that and then MS they also had to state their address, not ask somebody to address because somebody in Rochester then Yeah, that's that's good. So, it's on your honor that live in the district.
Okay. And that's that's fine. Okay. And you're right, public meeting. They should be able to So, are we clear as mud on 206? 207 206 and 207. I haven't taken a note. So, I got it.
You're good. Director, if you want to go and um describe the meeting. So, we're at 1027. Can I get a clarifying? Yes. What did we decide? Are we taking signage out? I
thought we were moving it signage in 206. Okay. Where does signage stop? Is my question. Uh, as far as I'm concerned, uh, no signs in the boardroom. This is not a this is not a
public meeting. It's a meeting in public and we have the right to keep it as keep the quorum as any way we want. So nothing zero. You're going to come and come and speak. God bless you. But no signs in the boardroom. It's fine. I just want to make sure that that's all
everything clear. Yep. And that it doesn't extend out into our parking lot? No. Absolutely not. Okay. Just not in the boardroom. So people can do what they want in the parking lot. 100%. Great. Is that cool with everybody? Yeah. It's not my role. I want to make sure. Yeah,
100%. Um, moving on to code of ethics. Uh, with 209 there were, this is, you know, MSBA's pretty much through and through. Uh, the items that were struck out were
given by uh board members. Uh so with one change to the addition there uh instead of so now we're looking so five was struck six was struck the new item where it starts with support um that
word was suggest suggested to get moved to uphold. So, it would read, "Uphold the majority decision after honoring the right to members uh to express opposing viewpoints and vote their convictions."
That's how that would read. Uh, if everyone is okay with moving on from there, I can go with the other item that was um suggested, which is holy crap. Sorry. I'm going to just so I
can quote everything moving forward. So letter E number six. So this everything would stay the same except for the last word which would change to
concurrently. Oh okay. That was simultaneously. Yep. Okay. So, both changed and then the very last item was struck. Okay. Other than that, um I do not
agree. We're going to be here all night because I'm going to go through each one of our existing code of ethics as well as the other ones that we had to find out why. Now, again, the MSBA will tell you this is a skeletal code. Um, and
there's a lot of things in our original code of ethics that, by the way, the code of ethics has not been changed in a long time. Um, it was, we developed ours, I looked at the history, we developed ours before the MSBA ever had one.
Um, so there's things in the original code of ethics and the language in there that had been approved by an attorney the year last year you were on there actually uh Dan before you came back on the board. Um that include not to use
the public board office for personal publicity or to avoid any conflict. And the only reason um that we had changed anything in policy 209 is because it conflicted or it was an overlap with what was in 203 before. Uh so there was
um language in here that actually enforced our professional behavior um quite um clearly and also in line with almost all other standards. Um, so
if you have suggestions, could we be methodical about that and just raise one and we can say yes or no or go through it quickly? I agree. It's in a very long note a month ago or so. I was just going to say when we reviewed this, Dr. France in September of 2023, we spent a lot of
time in this. I think we spent six months on it. And one of my biggest concerns is that there was so much um confusion between whether it was an ethic or a norm. And so I actually appreciate this and like this because it's very clean. These are MSBA ethics. Um I would also say yes if we're going
through this and you see one thing I mean we were again like director Bullian said we were tasked with using MSBA model policy. So if there is something missing that is a big hot button for you or whatever I think we should start we could focus there but to go through
every single item because that's the way you liked it done in the past or have a preference we're just it's not right. It's not fair. We have seven board members here with seven voices and this was the guidance to use MSBA model policy and that's here where we're at and we had two board members who worked
very hard on this um to get to this point tonight. Okay, they cut and pasted in. I'm going to just acknowledge that. Now, let me just go through that. We did not spend hardly any time at all on 209. We spent 6 months on 204.
We're we're talking about 209. Are there specific changes? Are there specific things? Are there specific things in 209 that you have issues with? Okay. So um what we had taken out of the original 209 and put it in 204 before 204 or 203
I get confused got moved was that um before a board member brings something up especially numbers that they will validate the information that they have when they speak at the public board meeting or at least make an attempt to validate it uh so we're not sitting here
and arguing what number is that on our current policy just so I can follow along. It was on the pol. It was before we removed it in 20 23. It was redone in September of 2023. Yes. So we removed that. I remember the whole
conversation about validate because there was a lot of conversation about how do you validate? Where do you get your source? There's so many different detail on that. He director Atinson said if somebody says I validated it and I found my source and then another board member argues and says well I you didn't
validate it because that's not the source I had. Then again there's this whole bias of information and and so these are our ethics. These are things like we are supposed to attend schoolboard meetings. We are supposed to come to the meetings prepared. These are true ethics not an opinion somebody's
opinion of one board member versus another board member. Okay. said validate when you're going to uh speak about data concerning the district that you needed to take the time to validate it with administration prior to bringing it in. So, we weren't making up data,
financials, etc. And it didn't mean you didn't agree with them, it just meant you had to validate them. Uh we also talked about not to use the board public office for personal gain or publicity and shall avoid any conflict of interest because remember we took all conflicts
of interest out of the previous one. Um we have a conflict of interest policy and then we have um I mean the original one the original code of ethics not only covered the original can you clarify the the one that's online right now? The
current one. Yeah. Okay. Got it. So my question is is why are we changing the current one? Well, I mean I think it was the direction that we gave them to start with the MSBA and then like I said, if you have suggestions of points that we
have in our current policy that you would like to bring back in, that's where we wanted to go. Right. Right. And I and I did I sent an extensive um um list of comments and and questions of
what I thought needed to be put back in. Well, in order to avoid open meeting law, I only sent them to Director Bullan. I think I copied you, Dan. Um um I'm I'm not finding that, Mary, right
at the moment. I know you did send an extensive one and and my response to you was Mary, this is extensive and like they're they're your
um opinions or experience and so to bring it to the board like this, you know, line by line what needs to happen. I did after you sent that um ex that extensive
uh email I did reach out to um Terry Mororrow because one of the things that you were stating was if it's not something about um if uh things were taken out of operating
norms or or I can't remember your exact verbiage. But so I sent an email asking if um if something transcends my specific questions to Mr. Mororrow and again said the same thing. We're in the process of updating our 200s
using MSBA model policies as our base. I received the comments below and was wondering if you could share your thoughts. I wrote being a self-governing board, aren't all policies equally enforceable? Yes. He answered yes they are all equally enforcable. My other
question was does a govern does governing rules policy hold more weight than an ethics policy? I said, for example, does stating in an ethics policy 209, the board operates through the superintendent and not around or over the superintendent, does it lessen
its enforcability because um it's not explicitly stated in the governing rules policy. And he wrote, "Policy 209 sets out explicit commitments that the board members can make. MSBA recommends that the board discuss policy 209 perhaps at
an organizational meeting. um enforcability remains the same whether the specific statement appears in one policy or another. So we purposely and traditionally and whatever ethics is about moral and about
personal decisions about uh which is much more um meant to be much more um uh non uh discreet. So, it's about be a good person, stuff like that, which is very hard to define because as I put in
that email to you, we ripped out everything with our operating norms which were discreet about board members if you're not going to be able to come to a meeting, you need to do you need to contact, you know, so and so, all that kind of stuff within a timely manner.
All that, we took those out. The only thing we had left was the ethics. So, I sent you the questions and my comments about what needed to be moved over and put there. And I reiterated that as long as you need the term ethics up there, ethics by default and definition do not
mean discreet behaviors. They're usually a um and typically the term if you're eth if you're trying to enforce ethical behavior and you're using the broader statements that we had in our current ethical behavior then they're extremely
hard if not impossible to enforce because of the decisions I and because of the definitions are very very nebulous. They're not um and they're meant to be that way. It's about ethics are about be a good person. Please
consider the interests of others. Um you know you will you will uh try to honestly fulfill your board uh responsibilities stuff like that. They're much less discreet. Um I feel like some of that is written in here though like respect the rights of others to have an express opinion. So I guess
I'm trying to understand what what we're missing. Again I think these are actually better. I think they're better than what we had before. like keep an open mind about how I vote on any position until the board has met and fully discuss the issue. Um well that those are hard to pin down. We had norms
that were very discreet and very specific about showing up to meetings about being prepared. I found the email and I mean it's a extensive email. Mhm. And
it wasn't looking at So I appreciate your putting this all in an email and my response to you was how do we incorporate it? How are you
suggesting that we incorporate it? How do we marry it? Because I mean, you're you're giving you're giving examples. You're this is I mean, I don't know what you wanted me to do with this. Well, that that would came after a long
discussion that was one-on-one between you and I when I was mentioning policy stuff that I was that I was concerned were being eliminated. And you said, "Go through each one and let me know which ones you're concerned about." So, I spent the time and I went through each one. I I understand. And I appreciate
that. I appreciate I know it's overwhelming. How do I what was I to do? And that's why I asked you, you have to come. We each of us, each board member comes to the table with the suggestions. We are all working together to make our
200s as the best that we can. That's what we are trying to do since the the was the will of the board early this year. So, while I appreciate this, I don't know what to do with this. I mean,
it wasn't like, okay, and and you know, right here, this is my suggestion and then we can discuss it. Does everyone agree? Yes. No. I I you know, I appreciate I was mistaken. I thought that you would actually include that in your discussion
with Charles and I was very I pulled the number over and the Okay, can we just move forward on this? I just can't I I can't discuss things thoughts that aren't my own. I don't know how to. Well, I was I said it
came from such and such a number and it needs to be put back in. And then I explained why I chose that one and previous, you know, why it was put in there. I even told you the history of some of them because I had been listening to the board meetings for like three years
before I actually ran. So I remember some of them. I appreciate it. But I I didn't know okay how you know like I'm just I think that's beyond my purview as a board member. Okay.
me taking your input and then trying to incorporate it into I mean does that make sense? I just it does. I made the mistake because I thought since you and Charles were working on these that I was giving my feedback and I was trying to copy others because I
mentioned others. So I wanted to be very very considerate when I said when I mentioned so I copied who I could but I was trying not to copy it to more than three people to or more than two board members and then to make sure that I wasn't violating open meeting law by
having this discussion um outside a quorum. I thought we wanted to give feedback. So, I made the mistake of thinking that I was giving input and feedback into the um into these policies. If it was like
um yeah, Mary, I just I didn't I mean, you sent it to Dan, you sent it to myself. I I didn't know how I can't take your thoughts and make it work. when when
Charles and I are are are working together, it's through a Google doc and then we'll sometimes we've met here to, you know, make sure that we're on the same page as far as what we're bringing forward, but um these are these are from
you. So, it's it's hard for me to Okay, I does that make sense? I thought I was providing input. I didn't do it the right way. a lot of input, extensive input, and I asked you to bring it to the board table. Well, I I was thought we were supposed to be sending in our
input so that it could be combined so we talk about it here at concluded everybody's feedback. That's what I thought. And by the way, the reason why I include Dan on it is Dan, I actually mentioned you because you were working on policy. you were fairly specific on
everything from prepositions and god knows what else during your time that I remember sitting it. So I mentioned you in there to say this goes way back and this is the reason why it was put in and I see no reason to remove it. So in all due respect for time, can we please just look at what we have in front of us and
see if there's anything that is a big thing that either needs to be pulled out or specifically added back in. Um because like this is code of ethics. It's pretty boiler point point boiler topic or whatever you call it. I can't speak at 11 o'clock at night. And I
think um I think the two board directors did do a good job of adding in things that they felt that they received feedback on um that were specific. Um so I think that's the only way we're going to move forward. If there's something very specific that you feel is missing,
can we just look at it and see if it's here? And if not, we can discuss as a board to add it or not. Well, because this is not one board member's policy. This is seven board members policy. Well, my input was not able to make it into here and I did have extensive input. Would
you like me to read the email because it will be here till midnight. No, I think I'm going to suggest something. Um, don't kill me. Can we uh
see if we can reach consensus on 12 and 15? 12 and 15. What? 212 policy 212 and 215. Mhm. And [Applause] carry this one over
to July. What would be the intent of carrying it over to have the discussion at an earlier hour? I see I see the last I see the last with this but I would just ask that everyone brings like redlinined add this sentence verbatim very specific so we don't sit
here for an hour thing chair white you did ask us to provide feedback to Amy and Charles which we did. Yes I think that's fair. So, so with with Director Fran's email,
sure, maybe it was long, but we were asked to give electronic feedback. I'm not disputing that. Yeah. And it's just taken away. I know you're not, but I'm saying like we were asked to submit feedback
electronically. So, several or or all I don't know who it was because we weren't on it, but to provide feedback. So, I guess what I'm having trouble with is I mean, you don't have to and you know what? You don't you don't have to take
anybody's feedback if it's sent electronically, but I guess just acknowledge that it was that things were sent and to offer it up and then just to ask to bring red lines is weird to me
just because we've already done that. We've already provided that. Sorry, that that was a breath that didn't go. And we're also taking valuable time away from hard things that we need to do in our district. So why we can't look at this, make our changes and move forward.
I guess like I had sent red lines and I feel like they were incorporated. So I don't know what was sent or wasn't I missed if there are red lines maybe we just need to bring them back. I would be happy to go ahead and make the make the additions directly into
here and send them back for a future one. Um I'm I'm happy to do that. I I could just take that and move it and redline the original one if that helps instead of doing it in a separate document with
number numbered into the formatting numbers. And when I say miss, they're in here. I just forgot to say them out loud. Oh, okay. That's that's it. So which was Jessica Olstead disagreed on removing number five and then
the the addition to be to with the exception of the 200 series policy which directly applied to the board. So no I said them all. Okay. So did not say this. I'm sure is it fair to
say does anybody have is anybody opposed to this policy? I mean, can we move forward that way? So, you you don't want any of my input is what you're saying. I to be blunt. No, we absolutely want your input,
Director France, the when I'm if you pull up your email from your policy 209 input, almost all of them are questions. No, I was questioning why they wouldn't be included or they were removed from our original policies. So, and then I
was explaining why they were in there. I mean, and and how this isn't this isn't a this isn't um because what I'm concerned about is that um you're feeling that your suggestions
weren't incorporated into this. But you're when when you sent the email and we had a conversation afterwards, I said, "This is extensive. It has to come to the table where we all can agree. Is this something to add? Is this something
not? Um, and I and again I repeated the discussion that that the feedback was supposed to go into the two people that were writing the policies that was asked for feedback. I sent it in. They weren't. And by the way, the fact that
you're discontinuing recognize the integrity of my predecessors and associates and appreciate their work was taken out of the ethics. um which actually obviously flies in the face of what I was trying to do to say
this was put in sometimes in year 2000 uh because of AB and C that sort of thing. Um so so that's why I was saying you know the the operating norms and the
ethics were developed over time. Very little changes were made to 209 uh in our the only thing we did was actually eliminate duplication. We didn't add anything to 209 when we last voted on it. Um, and we had gone through
this process and gone through every single line. Um, to go back and just put in the skeletal and then take out some pieces that I don't agree with even in the basic I didn't think was was right. And I don't think it's going to leave
future boards in a good position. Um, just like I don't believe in 212, taking our annual evaluation of ourselves completely out of our thing is a good plan either. Um,
I don't understand why we would do that, but there's um, you know, the only one that I that I think we can go forward is 20. It's 215. Um, oh, I don't know why. And and and I'm fine with 215. And we made little changes to it. Just updated
the legal reference and cross reference. Chair White, you sent an email to the board asking everyone to send the policies directly to Director Bullion and myself. I think it was pretty clear.
Yes. And I everyone did that except for me which I did send to director Bullan and everyone else's changes made it in and then director Bullion asked you to bring other things and I don't know what
happened with that but I think we should move forward on 209. That's just my opinion. And ironically 209 says come to meetings prepared for discussion of the agenda items. So it's right there. So
So is I didn't send it directly to you both either because I didn't want to break open meeting law because if I would have if I would have sent it to both of you and copied Chair White and it came from me, there would have been four of us. So technically I broke a
rule. I guess was instructed in the email. I remember that in the email very specifically. I remember the email. Well, I guess you know what? I've had it. I've had it. I've had it. This is not why I ran for
this office. This is not why I'm sitting here. I'm very proud to be sitting here and I take it very seriously, but I have had it. We have 200 policies and you know what? If we were instructed, if the if if if the
policy committee was instructed to do MSBA guidelines and that's only then I feel I was misled in what I was thought we were doing. Then I feel that that we were misled greatly.
And I know I'm supposed to be doing this. I know I'm supposed to be having these discussions and having and giving feedback and I have and I have reached my point. I have reached my point and I am done talking about these. I'm done. I'm to the point
where I don't even want to vote on them when we have to vote on them because why bother when we don't even have a policy anymore to dictate if somebody violates a policy. What is the point of all of this?
So, I am frustrated. I am done. It's 11:00 at night and we have spent more time again talking about policies that govern ourselves than actual board work, which is why we
are here. I'm done. Well, then it's what is the will of the board as far as 209 goes? We're going to we're going to have to plow through this. I have sent in a couple of random if changes have been sent in and accounted
for. Then what we have before us is what we have before us. Are there any other changes that someone would suggest? I have changes. If they are not going to be considered by the rest of the board, then that is the will of the board. They're they are considered by the will
of the by the board. If you discuss them like do you want I mean I I what I feel like it's 11 o'clock at night. I'm not going to go through that list. No offense. I I'm not it's it's not not worth it. Um again, all on 209 it's
almost all questions. No, they weren't all questions. They were why was this removed? And I and this needs to stay in there. That was the question. I wasn't trying to dictate. I was asking why. But I am actually going to go with Jessica,
Director Olstead, because um again, I was misled. This wasn't supposed to be a cut and paste. They were supposed to be thoughtful. If we're not even going to enforce any of these, then why are we doing it? Honestly, why are we doing it? If we're
not going to actually hold ourselves accountable, we shouldn't. I mean, I I agree with that. I agree. I don't think anyone's saying that we're not going to enforce these. Of course, we're going to enforce them. It's just the process of which that we talked about. Of course, I mean, of course, we would enforce the code of ethics. Um, I I guess I'm trying
to understand how we how we feel misled. Um, I I felt like I was okay with the approach. I And I'm trying to understand what changes you're suggesting. Quite frankly, I I'm a little confused. Well, we did remove the policy, the
enforcement policy. So, can maybe just go through like the first bullet point and I would understand in the email or something. I don't I don't know. I'm just trying to understand why if we had all these suggestions, why weren't they in here? Policy 209. Operating norms are not code of ethics. Period. Operating norms are rules. Ethics are standards
that guide behavior. Period. Can you provide examples of the following? What does it mean to take no private action that will compromise a schoolboard or administration? Does this include miss and disinformation? Does this include social media accounts? Does this include bringing materials to board meetings
that have not been shared to help all board members be prepared? That was number one. So what are the changes that are suggested out of that? Okay. Again, and so that to my defense, right? To my defense. And so what I did is suggest
that we move the thing into the ethics or and change the language of the ethics to be less specific. Actually, there is. But okay. So I can make those. I was trying not to dictate. I was saying what
does this mean and we need to put this back in. And there's several examples in there that I thought needed to be go back in. I I'm just I I agree what director said. If we're not going to enforce if we took out the enforcement policy, then none of these mean anything anyways. And second of all, we are
supposed to be leading by example. And when we take out everything from vulgar language to god knows what else, I I got what are we doing this for? So we can just really we are supposed to be adults here and acting professional. We don't
all agree behind the scenes, but that's fine. But when we come here, the one thing that got left off is the fact that everything we do is supposed to be for the kids. It's not supposed to be our own personal agendas. that was actually in the original one and it was also in
the norms and how that would actually be memorialized and enforced in a very broad way that still allowed individual expression. So all that's gone on here be primarily motive by by desire to provide the best education possible for the students of your school district
number seven. That is not what I was Okay, listen. I I I'm not going to sit there. I'm just trying to be methodical just cuz it's late. So, I'm I'm just Yeah, it's 11:00 and I think this this covers everything that we need to to cover in our board of ethics. So, I'm
not clear on what to do next if you're going to send red line back or revisit this next meeting. Well, I would like to send a red line back if it's possible, but I don't know if that's going to be the will of the board. If there are explicit points that we
would like to add, I I am happy to review those personally. In in in all due respect to our schedule, can we review it at the next meeting when we vote on it so that we are not spending this would drop then to another study session in August because we don't have a study session in July and we're trying
to wrap this up as we originally talked about. So if you send in your specific suggestions, it comes for a vote in July. we talk about it. Of course, we to talk about it at before every vote. There's discussion, then we can discuss it there and move forward would be my
suggestion. Um I agree. You two are the ones that have to take the feedback. I think that um if we're discussing frustrations and challenges, um
given the fact that Director Johnson and I have um we don't We're not creating policy. We're creating discussion point.
I think that is that needs to be I I have zero comfortability um feeling like I have the authority to you know that I didn't put in your points.
That's that's not my job as a individual board member. We we have um yeah so I'm frustrated by that because I have no authority over a singular
board member. We are doing this we're we have been doing this work to bring to the board for discussion but it we are in no way writing policy or stating that that's what has to be.
So this is not personal just so you know I sent in my comments for consideration. I did have actual lining at me. It's not because I did send them to you and copied Dan on it. Um, and also I did that out of respect because I mentioned
you with how some of these got done. Um, but listen, it I put them in there to be considered in the process and I said I don't know how to put in questions and I did reply to that
and I did call you about it. No, there's no specifics, Marian. That was that was our phone conversation. Without specifics that I can put in, okay, to suggestions, I I I'm I'm not you. So to
to ex to ask me to to do that, I just I cannot do it. And there wasn't a followup email. There was no follow. I don't have a no and I would suggest that if it's if it's okay with directors Johnson and Bullan um
to uh accept feedback between now and and the July 14th meeting. We'll have to discuss this and vote on on July 14th. Yes. Super. And you would put them in as like red lines. Absolutely. Can we do that with 212 and 15th just to induce
like follow that as well? Um so that these don't get moved out any farther. You see what I'm saying? Just let us finish our do the same process with 212 and 215 vote on them in the July meeting so that we can move forward and and not spend additional time past our timeline
that we are trying to achieve. Director France, you mentioned something in 212 already. Can you just let me know? Self the board self-evaluation. I didn't I didn't understand why that would ever be taken out. We self-evaluate ourselves every year. Okay. Uh five. All right. I
will make sure that this board this whole section board evaluation. Okay. And we do do that. All right. Yeah. I don't know why it's I don't know why it's two different colors and why it's crossed out honestly. Okay. That whole section needs to Okay.
We can do that. All right. So then we will move ahead to the 14th discuss and vote on these last three. All of them come up, right? But we we'll discuss these last three and then vote on the balance. Okay.
Um the last thing on the uh I'm sorry, we have agenda. Last thing on the on the agenda is then a future agenda topics which I've received one email. Um uh but before we move on to anything else um I'm going to suggest due to the fact
that we have um we're in an unprecedented position of having the entire executive team being replaced um at the same time that uh a retreat would be in order um
in I was thinking either July 28th or August 4th. Those are both Mondays. I'm talking about no more than two hours to uh um recommmit to how we're going to interact with the new team um and with
and with each other and uh kind of level set with all the new uh staff coming on so that we can uh move forward in agreement with how again how we're going to interact with these people as they come on board. It's a great idea. I'm
not going to be there. I'm going to be out of the country again that day. Uh both days the last week of July into the first week of August. So both the 20th and the 4th would be out because that's the whole week. I will send I will validate my calendar and send you so we
can bookend on either side. So if you wouldn't mind sending me I mean if the 28th and the or the 4th are not agreeable because I figure everybody should be there. Um, uh, you know, we can we can move this into whatever it takes. If it has to be a little bit
later in August, that's fine. But I just want to make sure that early on in, uh, the the new people coming on that we have the chance to do this. I I apologize, Dan. I had sent you dates that conflicted with existing stuff on the calendar, but I didn't think of stuff that was outside of the calendar,
but I will do that. So, that's that's my first crack at it. And uh so if those two dates don't work, um I'd like to keep it on Mondays just for the cadence that I want to take a summer Saturday away. Uh that's certainly not my intent. So again, so no more than two hours um a
68 kind of thing on a Monday. Good idea. So um why don't why don't you uh I guess emailing dates in late July to early obviously Mary's out July 28th. I'm out July 28th as well. So then maybe it's uh some August dates that would
work for for everyone. Well, 4th is a Monday and the 11th is a board meeting, right? We'll figure it out. We'll send in dates. Yep. Send me dates. All of August that And director, what was the other future agenda topic that was emailed in? Uh it was from It was from uh ask me what it
is. I didn't email. Oh, a suggestion on SRO report. Um, so I'll consider that moving forward and um we can go from there. Do we have to get full board? Uh, actually not. The
new policy leaves it up to me. In concert with the vice chair and the superintendent. Okay. So, um, if there's something else to come for the board, I'll entertain a motion to adjourn. We're in a study session. Do we need to do that? Oh, you're right. Uh because we
came out of a closed end. Oh okay. Okay. So made second by Amy. Second by Mary. All in favor signify by saying I. I. 70 be there at 9:30.