Good evening, and welcome to the Rochester Community Schools Board of Education work session, called to order at six Please join me 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. This Board of Education work session is a meeting of the Board of Education in public for the purpose of conducting the school district's business and is not a public
community meeting. However, there is time for public participation during the meeting. General public comment will be heard under agenda item four. If you wish to speak tonight and have not already filled out a yellow card, they are located on the table near the entrance to the auditorium. Once you've completed the card, please hand it to a shield officer. Please note that the cards must be completed prior to speaking. I will call the names of those who I have a card for during public comment. I would like to start with a reminder of the norms we all agree to, which include keeping comments germane to the agenda item,
that we don't surprise each other at the board table, that we have one speaker at a time that is recognized by the chair before speaking, to be honest, to refrain from attacking others' motives, to uphold the chain of command, and to truly listen to each other. This is a meeting for the board to conduct business. We remind our community that outbursts or any other behavior that disrupts our meeting will be seen as a breach of the peace, and those individuals will be escorted from the building. On behalf of my colleagues on the board, we are grateful to be able to serve this community and appreciate your support.
For roll call, all board members are present with the exception of President Butel and Secretary Blake, who are absent with notice. Moving on to number three on the agenda, approval of the agenda. Is there a motion to approve the agenda as presented? Madam President? Trustee Annis? I move to make a change to the agenda. Okay. What's your motion Specifically, under item seven, work session 7.2, for caring steps. I move to table this issue until the next meeting. Is there a second? Seconded by Trustee Alsbaugh.
Any discussion? I'll give my rationale. This topic was just brought forward a week ago for public discussion. And the administration didn't have answers readily available for an analysis and a vote in this work session. This is an important issue impacting our district that warrants more time for further deliberation and consideration, and I especially feel so, if it's requiring a vote, that all members should be in attendance for this important decision. Would anyone else like to comment? I just would like to add that I'm supporting this because, I think through some of the discussions we've had,
there's been some questions that have come up, and we'd like to see more of that data. And I do really feel like we need to have everyone here because it's a really important decision. Would anyone else like to speak? Okay. With that, we'll move to voting. All in favor of amending the agenda to postpone the conversation on caring steps, say aye. All opposed, say nay. Madam Clerk, it was, to table. To table, sorry, to table the conversation on Caring Staffs until a later date.
Did you say a specific date? I'm sorry. The next business meeting. The next business meeting. So March 17. Yes. Okay. So the motion on the floor is to amend the agenda to postpone to table the Caring Steps conversation until March 17. Madam President? Vice president would thank you. Or madam well, for today, you're madam president. Okay. For, I I'm just gonna give my comment that I will support this motion too. Typically, we don't vote on items at work sessions anyways, and so it would be appropriate to wait until the next regular meeting to vote on this item.
Thank you. Okay. So with that, we're voting on the motion, which is to table the caring steps conversation until our next business meeting, March 17. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Two, three. Shelley. This is you. Okay. Thank you. Alright. So motion passes. That's a five o vote. Moving on to approve the agenda as amended. Is, there a motion to approve the agenda as amended? A second? Any discussion? So let's move to a vote.
All in favor, say aye. Aye. That passes. Five-zero. Moving on to agenda item four, public comment. This provides the opportunity for board members to hear from community members. If you wish to speak tonight but have not already filled out a yellow card, please fill one out now. The yellow cards are located on the table near the entrance to the Auditorium. Once completed, please hand it to our shield officer. When your name is called, please move to the microphone and address the board. When addressing the board, you will have three minutes to speak.
We will try to let you know when you have thirty seconds remaining. Please be mindful of this time limit. When addressing the board, please state your name and your relationship to the district. To protect student privacy, we do ask that no one identify a specific student without their permission even if the student's name is not used. Any comments that could directly identify an individual student are not appropriate in this forum and will not be tolerated. We will stop the meeting to protect student rights and privacy. Also, we ask that you address your comments to the entire board and not to individual
board members, school district employees, or to members of the audience. The board will not be responding to comments or questions during the meeting. However, someone will follow-up if needed. The board reserves the right to exclude from our meetings an individual who engages in conduct that constitutes a breach of the peace. With that, we'll start our public comment with, Charles Hubert. I apologize in advance if I mispronounce. That'll be followed, by, Jessica Renick. And then next will be Michelle Manhire. So if mister Hubert wants to approach the microphone.
Good evening. My name is Charles Hubert. So I am a, parent of a student in the, district and a former student here, actually, of this this building. But, I've emailed the board regarding, recently why I feel maybe a major failure for the Rochester Community Schools and this Board as they choose not to continue support of Caring Steps staff, families and their growing Rochester community. It is the growth and support of this very community that resulted in the construction of not only Caring Steps, but also to this building that we stand in today.
A community, including myself, which has helped provide funds and resources for the betterment of the children and future students of this district. Personal morals and feelings aside, I want to share some feedback regarding the budget numbers which were presented at the last board meeting on February 24. Given the current capacity, at Caring Steps and the wait list being over, what I was told, 200 plus children, I used the simple numbers which were shared at the last meeting to extrapolate what a full set of classrooms would look like.
And the building capacity, I believe, is over, 200 kids or around 200 as well. But for simplicity, the 2024 model that was shared with the amended revenue of $1,095,000 results in a rough average of $1,200 per month for each of the 75 kids to make up the five current classrooms which are being utilized. Assuming one lead and three assistant teachers per classroom at the wages provided during the meeting last week, this results in a $700,000
a year, cost for teacher expenses. Add the remaining $170,000 for the year for the additional support staff, we have a total of $870,000 for the year. So without increasing tuition and using these numbers for the five remaining open classrooms in the building results in roughly a $760,000 profit. Adjusting for the relatively fixed cost of maintenance and increase in food provided, would leave a total profit of $566,000
It is concerning to me that the business case has not been made by the board to invest more money Thirty seconds. And resources in retaining the current staff and recruiting additional qualified candidates. The GECS third party currently providing the service appears to be a major hindrance in this effort. Simply having Genesee in their name can be misleading to applying candidates. I strongly encourage members of this board to listen to the detailed needs and potential business cases that would help Rochester Community Schools to provide for this great community.
Thank you. Thank you. Jessica Renick. Hi. My name is Jessica Renick. We joined Caring Steps in 2019, '2 months after the center opened. My daughter graduated and is now a kindergartner at Delta Kelly, and my son is currently in the preschool room. The discussion around Caring Steps last week's board meeting was quite concerning. Multiple times, some version of I'm not an expert about daycares, but I'm not sure if we continue with this facility was said by both members and administrators. And less than a week later, we have those non experts bringing forward recommendations.
The lack of input from parents, data from competitive benchmarking, or discussion on the center's unique attributes is extremely apparent. And with the gravity of the decision of the future of this childcare center, please consider hiring an expert consultant in early childhood care to review the current situation and put together a sustainable business growth plan and recommendations. The Caring Steps facility has the bones to be the gold standard for early childhood education in our area. Just a few things that really stand out and make it unique and attractive to
families. One, the physical size of the classrooms and the building, which many times double the size of the competitors. The full kitchen. Three, the gymnasium, which allows for free play in inclement weather. And evening hours when it's dark. No other facility in the area has anything like this space. Outside space, which in addition to the playground, enables nature walks, water days, and outdoor learning opportunities. The cleanliness of the facility and ample room for indoor and outdoor extracurricular activities, which could provide rentals,
the opportunity for rentals to generate revenue for the facility. The facility attracted us to the center, but the staff it's the staff that keeps us there. The teachers work so hard and they want to be there. They're underpaid and underrepresented in the Rochester School District, but still choose to come and help shape our district's youngest learners. The question I also heard several times last week was, how do we benefit as a district from having this? Caring Steps has the Rochester School District name and branding. This attracts families to feel like it will set up our children for success and
be ready for kindergarten within the Rochester Community Schools. By turning families away, you are directing families to private facilities which could lead to the choice in continuing with private education in the future. Wasn't it a concern at previous board meetings about the reduction in district enrollment year over year? Offering for an early childhood facility within the district enables the introduction of the school to even earlier to families and creates a direct feed to all elementary schools. When my daughter graduated,
her class alone distributed to eight of the elementary schools. It's not the location that's a problem. The wait list of over 100 students proves there's a desire to have this type of facility. I'm sorry. That's your time. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Manhire? Good evening. I'm Michelle Manhire. I have, two kids in the district still and one, gonna be graduating next year. Or already graduated last year, excuse me. Good evening. I'm on the Master Property Planning Committee, the MPP, and I had a number of concerns about the manner in which the meetings were conducted as well as the data which was presented.
I'd like to, say that my impression after the first meeting was one of being left kind of wondering how earnest the district was in having an effective outcome from this endeavor of engaging many different kinds of community members together, to have a transparent planning process even happen. Not being able to review the data being presented was a real impediment to effective engagement for me. Not only did we not have the information in front of us, we couldn't even see it up on the screens, like tiny screens far away like that.
This method of presenting does not engage the participants, instead, rather I would say that it's more of a listen to what we want you to know and just trust us that it's all relevant information, you can review it later kind of a thing. Nevertheless, what I did hear and what did raise immediate questions was some of the data presented. So, I asked a question directly to the gentleman presenting from Plante Moran. My concern specifically was about the quantitative data he was using and how the numbers and percentages reached didn't make any sense to me.
They just didn't add up, you could say. Another participant had even asked him about his source for the data presented and why he didn't use a well known and respected, source, the SEMCOG, organization. And his answer was kind of a surely dismissive. Their data is bleak. So, last I checked in my professional experience, one doesn't get to pick and choose what data they, use based upon how cheery or bleak that it is. It's supposed to be representing what reality actually is. You choose data which is factual and informs the situation you are gathering it for.
Without valid data, any further discussions and plans made are made in vain. It only serves to make the remainder of our committee's time together negatively impacted and likely faulty in any conclusions that we come to. Last week then, I personally went on to my school data and the SEMCOG site and, which are both available to the public and found a different story from the data presented that evening. If the goal of the MPP committee is to assist in the district's thoughtful planning for the future,
ought not we have the most clear and accurate data to work from from our paid professional consultants and the most transparent end goals stipulated from our district to do so honestly and most effectively. I encourage Mr. Russo to delve into and to review the data resource or the data sources that I myself looked into and see if we can get I'm sorry, miss Manhire. That's your time. See if we can get the MPP to be more productive and, I thank you for your time and consideration. Okay. Thank you. Moving on to agenda item five.
We have oh, sorry. We've got one more public comment. I apologize. Kelly Helfrich. Hope I got it right. Hi. Good evening. My name is Kelly Helfrich. I am a parent, of one of my daughters who started at Caring Steps in 2019 when it first opened. And then my second daughter is currently there. My older daughter is a student at Baldwin. My experience at Caring Steps has been a wonderful one. We've been so appreciative of that asset that Rochester Schools has in our community.
It has, been a very positive experience for both of my daughters. We, we have enjoyed getting to know the dedicated teachers who work there and have supported, and been amenable to the tuition increases over the years. And wished that more of that, increase would go to increasing the teacher pay, for the staff and teachers at Caring Steps. I can appreciate the, financial situation and am just asking for some more serious diligence and creativity to be
put forth by, the members on stage here and by the members who have, been looking into the numbers to put forth a more, workable plan so that we, as a community, can keep this amazing asset within Rochester schools and allow it to provide a lot of positive experiences for our youngest learners that it has for my children and many others. And, make sure that we don't let go of an asset that is really something that
sets us apart. So I'm just as a parent, I'm asking for more serious diligence and creativity in coming up with a workable plan. Thank you. Thank you. So moving on to agenda item 5.1, this is communications received by the board. At this time, five communications have been received by the board and are included in the packet. Agenda item 5.2, is communications, received by the members of the Board of Education. Has, any board members received communication from the public? Trustee Ospa?
I received a thank you from Jamie Rockcliffe about attending the Founders' Day, which was such an inspiring night where we honored parents, teachers, custodians, and students that have really made this district an amazing place. I also have, communication from Nishat Ka about, attending a Ramadan dinner that I'm going to be going to next week at the local community center. And then Christina from the Heart PTA and I are still planning on having coffee
together sometime. So I really appreciate everyone reaching out. Thank you. Anybody else? All right. Moving on to agenda item six, which is reports. We now, after amending the agenda, we have one report today, starting with the superintendent update. Mr. Russo? Thank you, Vice President Gupta. First, we will start with the superintendent policy committee update. Mr. Murphy? Thank you. Good evening, everyone. Just to update on the Superintendent's Policy and Curriculum Committee, we met on the twenty fifth last week.
Some of the topics discussed were ongoing discussion of the nepotism and conflict of interest, change or draft change through policy. We also discussed the board member's, email to the group, which suggested a different different language. The committee decided that they wanted that email or that suggestion to go to legal counsel and then to bring the issue back at the next month meeting. So that's where we stand with that topic. Further, we discussed the new earned sick time legislation,
minimum wage legislation which, passed in Lansing at the last hour and the impact on the district. It's a minimal impact but we kind of went through some of the details of that legislation and discussed areas that, we would need to address address in Rochester. We addressed purchasing and I put that in your update this week. It'll be a first reading on some added language to the purchasing policy at the March 17 meeting. Updated the committee on the 14 like districts that are included in our salary study
and we discussed a bit further the LOU MOA, topic and I brought a sort of a test case to that group to make sure I was thinking about the issue in alignment with the way the board members on the committee were thinking about that issue as well. Any questions on any of that? I'd be happy to answer. Trustee Lecoy? Oh, the board member's email you mentioned with the conflict of interest, was that the email that I sent? Just clarifying. Yes. That was the one you mentioned at the last board meeting, the one you sent to the group. So we took the entirety of that,
and we were sending it off for advice. And then my intent would be to bring that response back to that group to discuss what they'd like to do with it at that point depending on what that advice is. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. And I have another go ahead. You mentioned that you brought to the group an example about the MOA, MOU topic. I was just curious if you could tell me more about that. Yeah. It's actually it was a it was a minor, switch in a principal contract. Essentially, when the law changed for evaluations,
teacher evaluations, The the measures or the the rankings at the end have to be with the principals as well. We just forgot to do that. So in my mind, in thinking about that issue, the correct path would be to engage with the RAA leadership, which I've done, kind of draft up what we're thinking to correct that, so the the end ratings line up with teachers. And then in my mind, again, that being a fairly minimal issue with no financial impact, the way I was thinking about that topic was it would be an LOU, which would be an agreement between the RAA and the administration and then informed,
to the to the board. And the three subcommittee members, agreed with me on that. So the details haven't been finalized yet, but I would look probably in the next month or so to have a signed, LOU between myself and mister Mooney representing the RAA and basically changing the the rating areas to match up with the teacher end of year rating areas as the law requires. Okay. Alright. Thank you. I have another question. Okay. Trustee Liqui? My other question is when it comes to I I do appreciate now that we're
getting updates about what happens in the business and operations committee and what happens in the well, I guess we haven't had that one yet. But we have gotten a couple updates from the policy and curriculum committee. I'm wondering if we could include a written report in our agenda packets in the future with some of these bullet points, just as a written written record that could be added to the agenda packet. Is anyone else interested in something like that? I mean, I would just say we do get it in the superintendent, cabinet updates each week already.
For these reports though, that way the public could also have access, to the updates from these committees within the board meeting packets. Is anyone else interested in the board? I'm not. And my rationale is we just got a verbal update from Mr. Murphy, and that should be appropriate enough. We have a recording of this meeting. Anyone who's interested can go back and review the recording. Mr. Russo? If it's the will of the board to do so, we can have it done. I tend to agree with, Trustee Annis on it that we have notes being taken, we have this recorded, and, we go through the meetings so that there can be adjustments if it needs to
be through that through that committee about what's presented to the community, how digestible is it, is it not in jargon form. Thank you for whoever's turning that up. So that we can so that it's presentable to all. And so, what comes out of that is then presented here and we have multiple records of that so I tend to agree with Trustee Hannes. But if it's the will of the board to provide a written recording a written, kind of template from it, I would do that. Thank you. So that's, something maybe we could talk about at a later time. Moving on to agenda item 7.1.
Sorry, were you done with? I'm sorry. Jumping the gun here. Thank you, Mr. Murphy. Before we go into, Chief Mitch, just an update on legislative impact, as you know, Governor Whitmer had her state of the state address. She emphasized the importance of expanding universal pre k, maintaining, free school meals, enhancing mental health support, promoting career and tech ed, and increasing access to tuition free community college. She also supported legislation to limit cell phone use in schools. And I think that's what I want to address today most specifically because, while this bill has been introduced by
written and introduced, in Michigan has has kind of gotten legs in other states as well. And I wanted the community to know exactly what that would mean in terms of if it was passed as written. Right now, the bill is written that there would be no cell phones allowed on school grounds for kindergarten through fifth grade. In grades six through eight, there would be no cell phones during use of instructional time, breaks between instructional time, lunch, or recess. And in grades nine through 12, there would be a ban on cell phones on school grounds during instructional time.
So the way that's written says to me that in kindergarten through fifth grade, not on school grounds at all, not in backpacks, etcetera. In grades six through eight, they can have it on them for before and after school, but not anytime during the school day. And in grades nine through 12, the way it is written right now, that it would be, banned during instructional time, which means that anytime a break happens or a lunch, etcetera, a a ninth through twelfth grader could use their cell phone. We are, you know, this is this is written as a bill that would affect all school districts and
and it would mandate the adoption, not give it up to school boards to decide. And so that is not for me to decide or the school board to decide with the community, more so to know where where this sits. And I thought that was a very important part. Miss Trustee Ellis? I I believe we've talked about this before, and it is our own representative, representative Tisdell that brought the original, bill forward. What are we looking at in terms of, an impact in our district if it was mandated as written? And, how can we advocate for the best interest of the students that we serve locally?
Because personally to me that is an overreach that is mandating, local control. Yeah, I think you bring up a couple good questions. One is how would it affect students? I think the I think the impetus and intent of this really was born from something good. I think the overindulgence in screen time is something that's that's important that we recognize, but the restrictions to this would mean sorry. The restrictions to this would mean that, it would be very difficult for us to monitor and police. Right now the bill is written as this should happen happen,
and then the district the board and the district should be should be there to figure the rest of it out, including what the discipline looks like, how do we monitor something like this, if it's hallway usage, if it's lunch usage, what happens if it's on a bus, what happens if they're standing outside on school grounds in their grades six through eight, etcetera. There's a there's a lot of questions that come to mind, and I think that piece of it is kind of making its way back and forth legislatively to discuss. But as it's written right now, it leaves a lot of questions unanswered. I have a really specific question. Is there any exceptions in there?
As the bill is written now, no. My concern would be I know that some people have diabetic monitors And, you know, they need that to go off or they need it to be on them so that it can communicate to a parent. So, you know, I don't expect you to have all the answers, but I I know you're you're gonna be involved in conversations. And I would want some medical exception language in there, because I I've seen this with students. I've seen students at robotics pass out, you know, because they get so stressed, and I I wouldn't want that to be a risk. As a trustee trustee Alspa,
you make a very good point. In the original so when we first talked about this and I had multiple conversations both with, representative or senator Tisdale and, a couple others, Weber, etcetera. We talked about this specifically about a medical, exemption for this, and it right now is not listed. In the first version, I do believe they had something in there about an exception for when teachers say it's okay or the and I think that was, like, the allowable umbrella that would that would say that, okay, the student has a five zero four or a medical action plan, etcetera, that this would work.
But as it's written right now, I don't see it, back on there. But, it says, it does define what school grounds means. It defines what a wireless communication device is. And, you know, it it there's there's other superintendents who have talked about the cost of something like this because if students walk in with a cell phone, does that mean we have to collect them? And then do we have to find some place to put them in and put in a lockbox, etcetera? So there's a lot of questions. I spent some time, in Lansing last week discussing some of this with, k twelve Alliance and with, Weber himself. And and so there's some there there's and and
there's definitely some movement that still has to happen with some realization that this hasn't been thought through completely. One additional follow-up question. Do you know where it's at in the process? Is it in committee? And if so, what committee is it in? Do you know? You know, I I don't Okay. Be quite frank, I don't know, Tristanis. I will say that before the governor's address, it did it did feel like the governor this came out in, like, a three, four day period where it was something that she really believed in Uh-huh. That we hadn't heard was getting any legs prior. Okay. Right now I don't know where it sits. Okay. Thanks. Anything else?
That concludes my report. Thank you. Okay, so, we are moving on to agenda item 7.1, which is our work session topic on achievement. This is informational and not an action item. Again, Mr. Russo. Thank you, Vice President Gupta. So as we, call up some of our, leaders in the in the district, and I turn it over to miss Hampton and mister mister Cuzumato, to please the board, I just wanna remind everybody that we are trying to keep our presentation to about a thirty minute situation, as asked. And so, the premise of this really is to you have a you have a packet that
was given to you, of data. And, instead of this is gonna look a little different because really what we're talking about is practices, not really diving into data specifically. If you have data questions or practice questions or any questions after, we're happy to answer to the board. But I will turn it over to miss Hempton first, to to introduce. Great. Thank you, mister Russo. We appreciate the time this evening to share a bit of a glimpse into just some of the ways that we work to support student learning across Rochester Community Schools. And and as mentioned, given the scope of the presentation this evening, we hope that you will,
take a peek at some of the data illuminated in the trend nature, in your packet this evening. But we'd like to use our time to highlight some of the processes, used across our district to really respond to these datasets, and recognizing that this is a really recursive process. Right? We don't administer assessments to our students for the sake of, but we rather administer, analyze, and then respond in a in a recursive way. It's an important part of how, The common mid year data set, among all kindergarten and eighth grade students that's been illustrated in the trend data in your packet is iReady. And that,
as you know, is administered three times annually in the area of mathematics and reading. It's adaptive, and it weighs student progress against both content standards and is nationally normed. However, in addition to I Ready, our school teams are using, multiple measures within the classroom, whether those are unit assessments, classroom artifacts, etcetera, that come to the table, for educators to utilize and consider the ways that they can advance student learning. And so in in, in the interest of bringing that to light this evening and give a glimpse into
those collaborative tables and how that work unfolds across the elementary arena, I would ask our elementary administrators, please, to introduce themselves and get us started. Hey. Good evening. Hope you can hear me. It's okay. My name is Marnie Barker, and I am proud to be the principal at Hugger Elementary School here in Rochester. I appreciate, Ms. Hampton kind of leading us off with the fact that while we know that we have data that we're collecting, it's really the work around that that we bring to the table with our staff, to best serve our students. So I'm gonna share just a little bit about,
something we call grade level team meetings at elementary school. So these are structured typically monthly, and they're a time when a grade level team comes in working with, the learning consultant and the administrator. And it's just a wonderful collaborative opportunity, to look at data, but more importantly, to have that important conversation about what's happening in that moment in instruction in our classrooms. It's an opportunity for staff to look at what went really well. Or sometimes as, as the ball will happen and you you look back and you think, why maybe that missed the mark today. And what happened in your classroom,
to those colleagues in that grade level? Additionally, sometimes as we're having these meetings, it becomes apparent that we need to do some vertical grade level work as well to think about especially thinking about bridges as one of the, we're in year three of our implementation with the bridges material in elementary. We've had awesome opportunities to talk across grade levels too to understand what's happening maybe in that second grade classroom that we're learning more about as those third grade instructors come together. I wanna make sure that we share too that these meetings, are full of,
really collaboration in the moment that sometimes we have great intention to have, agendas and we find ourselves so embedded in what really is good, strong, instructional practice discussion that leads us kind of to where we're going next. And that includes what we're gonna do, maybe in our staff meetings or in our building level, PD that we have. There'll, come a time when we realize that we really need to bring that to the bigger group for all sixth grade levels, to come together with the learning, sometimes inclusive of our paraeducators as well. And that just our teachers are incredibly intuitive about their students and about instruction and
best practice. And I wouldn't wanna, stop without sharing that the conversations that happen between teachers sometimes in the hallway, sometimes in the lounge, we have the structured time for grade level team meetings, but those are equally important in making sure that, teachers are talking about what's working well and maybe what they need to refine in their instruction. I'm gonna turn it over to Sarah, who I think is gonna take over. Hi. Good evening. Sorry. Good evening. My name is Sarah Crowley. I'm the very proud principal of Brooklyn's Elementary School, and I'm here to talk about systems, MTSS systems, multi tiered systems of support in an elementary setting.
The goal, of us coming together and using this data is really to look at the triangulation of multiple sources of data. It's not one singular data point that leads us in any direction. We have multiple sources of data that we collect from our students. Our teachers are continuously looking at formal and informal data. But really the goal of that is to build that instructional capacity with our teachers, but also to be able to adjust our instruction to meet the varying student needs. When we talk about multi multi tiered systems of support,
it's a diamond model. We look at both extension and intervention for students and meeting the needs for students across that, across that trajectory. So when we look at MTSS systems, it really gives us the opportunity to, again, what Marty was talking about, dig into our instructional practices. But we are so fortunate in Rochester to have such incredible systems within our, curriculum department where we're able to connect with our learning consultants, able to connect with our interventionists, able to connect with our coaches and consultants to help continue to build that instructional
capacity. And using all of those sources of data is a really key part of building those systems of support. So we use also that data to really set the instructional priorities for teachers, for classes, schools. We look at varying levels of data, both classroom, individual, student, and school wide goals. And then we also use this data to progress monitor to really gauge the efficacy of the instructional practices that we have in place. So just a little bit about our systems of, tiered intervention. Hand that over to miss Desi now.
Thank you so much. I really appreciate the way such a complex process really moves from grade levels and vertical conversation to small groups to, individuals. And while it might look like there's a really great divide between the elementary and the middle school in physical space here, from my short time, I I can say that those layered systems of support, really flow from that early on stage all the way through our students who are graduates here in RCS. So I'm going to turn this over to Mr.
Pizzmano to launch the secondary portion of our share. Good evening. Good evening. So not to I don't want to talk a lot because we have these wonderful instructional leaders here that are going to share similar to the elementary principals, the instructional leaders, what they're doing in their buildings to support the data we presented in the fall. We have that data presentation, which the only new data point would be our fall of twenty twenty four, eleventh graders took the PSAT. And in your Board packet, you see that data is in there, included with how they did throughout the SAT suite of assessments.
But before I turn it over, just a few reminders. We're not it would be the same data set we're looking at and really, very proud of this team because after that fall data presentation, it was all hands on deck and we said, what are we doing throughout the district where we can share and we can do things cohesive for kids? And if something is working at Rochester or Stoney or Adams or one of the middle schools, let's share and let's do it for all kids. So I'm very excited for them to talk about their system from sixth grade all the way through twelfth, on what they're doing for SAT prep because the ultimate goal is when they the
suite of assessment, you take it in ninth or eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh and then the final game is the SAT. So it's everyone all hands on deck when they're doing that. But just a reminder, the SAT measures students' academic readiness for college and reading, writing and math, but it also measures career readiness. So it's a little bit different than the I Ready, it's a little bit different than the MEEP, it has a little bit of a different spin on it of what it measures. And obviously, we want our kids to be ready for life after high school,
so it is important. On the next slide is just a reminder of what grades they're taking these assessments in. They all build on each other. Obviously, But what it measures in the scores, the data they're using in their buildings, the data that was brought in your packet is an overall view of the district data, but they're looking at list of kids who are ready, who are not ready at that point, who are partially proficient at that point and they're providing interventions either through courses, through tutoring, through things that they'll share.
They're looking at list of kids of how to get them from not proficient to proficient the next year and by the SAT to really hopefully get everyone to be college and career ready. So, I just wanted to share that and now I want to turn it over to this wonderful team who really came together with the consultants, with the coaches and really said, what how can we amp up what we're already doing? How can we share and make sure all kids get the great things we're doing to prepare them for this suite of assessments? So I'm going to turn it over to you guys.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Cousinmano. My name is Dan Mooney. I'm the proud principal of Van Hoosen Middle School. So good to see everyone this evening. To my right, we've got lots of quick presentations. So we're going to kind of go through this timeline that you see on the board there. I think the piece is the last time when middle school presented, we talked about that transition period and really that fit to six. So it's not visually this big. So it's definitely a piece, just to visually see that right off the bat. But when we talk about transitions from 5% to 6%, we continue in Sixth grade to use that main data point as our I Ready.
But we kinda we take it to the next level a little bit. In partnership with our teachers and our curriculum consultants, especially in math, ELA, we do some reflection with the students. Right? So they're part of that process. They're looking at their own data. They're saying, okay. What can I grow on? What's an area of strength, area that I need to really improve on in that? So that's really a focus for us since sixth grade is just so they're getting familiar to look at their data, and see how they progress throughout the school year, is our main focus besides the amazing instruction we have, but that's that big transition to fifth to sixth.
So I'm going to turn it over to mister Bennion. He's gonna talk a little bit about, in seventh grade as we kinda build on, you'll see, throughout the presentation. Hi. I'm Mike Bennion. I'm an interim principal at, Hart Middle School, and we're just gonna share I just wanna share about our seventh graders. We continue on with seventh grade and our goal setting and progress monitoring, but then we step it up a little bit and get them accustomed to some of the online tools that are utilized on some of the assessments. And it might be new to them and something that they haven't used.
And so that's something that we specifically try to teach them so they are prepared to utilize those tools when they take the M STEP and then the PSAT in eighth grade. And mine was pretty quick, so I'll pass it over to Lisa. All right. Lisa Fosnau, proudly serving as the principal of West Middle School. And Wendy and I are both going to take eighth grade because this is the big year when they start with PSAT. So a lot going on. We continue in eighth grade now taking the I Ready. We're also still taking the M STEP, which is in sixth and seventh, and now we're adding on the PSATs.
There's a lot of heavy lifting going on in your eighth grade year. But with that, we've built that foundation of goal setting. They're understanding their data. They're learning those strategies, those digital tools, which, of course, they're used to with M STEP and then getting accustomed to when they practice for digital readiness with PSAT. In addition to that, we've added some layers in our consultants and our coaches have worked on and I heard it before, and you'll hear it again with this vertical alignment. Because when we're all in step, it really makes a difference for our kids and their growth. So the vertical alignment, in relation to content specific PSAT vocabularies,
that's embedded in the curriculum by their teachers. Also, using those tools specific to the Desmos calculator, which is something unique that students have to use when they take the PSAT. And then training on differential, ways of instructing things. So when you're writing out those essays or you're working on that PSAT content, they're looking for specific things. There are even specific things such as, you know, function notation, which is not part of our curriculum, but is referred to often in PSAT. So those specifics are really important to embed throughout our instruction. And then January comes along, and we start start really talking about that assessment coming up.
We do this with our grade level meetings in conjunction with our, LCs, our learning consultants, and our curriculum consultants, and of course, our grade level teachers. I'll turn to you. Awesome. Wendy, do you I'll turn to you. Awesome. Wendy Darga. I, too, am a very proud principal of Reusser Middle School. It's kind of a little theme coming along the line here. So right now, we are in it to win it with our eighth graders, with PSAT. So kids have created their College Board account, which is a big deal. They've learned about the format of the test, and they've learned what to expect on the day of the test.
This is something that our, learning consultants do, with with our eighth grade students literally by classrooms. They visit classrooms and and have these conversations. They also have to do a digital readiness check, to make sure their device is, up to snuff and compatible with all of the online pieces, like the Desmos calculator and so on. The other piece that we have, done with our students that I believe has had a tremendous impact is, the practice questions across all four core content areas.
So when you look at PSAT, it says reading, writing, math. But when you look at the reading and the writing, the content of those questions is science and social studies. And so our our consultants and our learning our our LCs and our curriculum consultants have developed, in mind from example tests and so forth, questions. And those questions are put in front of our kids as warm up activities in all four of their core areas, content classes throughout the month of March,
which is really, helping them to just get familiar with that format and that vocabulary as well. And now we've added this year, and it's happening on Wednesday, our students are gonna take a full length practice test, on the morning of the half day, that we have for professional development. So we're replicating the process. It used to be inside of the college board there was one practice test, and now there are actually two. And so students are going to take that practice test, get that feedback,
see, you know, how they did, where, you know, where they may have fallen short, and how they can, what they can work on prior to the April test. There's also another practice in their College Board account that they can choose to do on their own. And then finally, in April, on the ninth, right, the ninth, they will actually take that first PSAT, eight nine, and off to the races we get into the ninth grade. Good evening. Welcome. I am, Dale Sullivan, proud principal of Stoney Creek, and we welcome you here today.
So I hope everybody's enjoying their time. When they get to ninth grade, really what we've found is is, unique to us. Lisa has stated all in step. And I can tell you being at, other districts around the state, Rochester really does it right. Not only do we all three of us at the high school level work together, but we connect with the middle school levels to see where it's at. So often, not only the kids think that it's just a practice test that's not gonna count for three more years, I think the general community might not understand exactly what goes on with those with the seventh or sixth, seventh, and eighth grade prep as well. So we appreciate working with them.
When we get them, a big theme as we thought about how we present this is just making awareness to the test and awareness of what the scores are and how they can practice without really practicing. As they also stated, they start in middle school and they work all the way up. It's embedding these different styles into the classroom, whether it's, digital, at the beginning, if you do some kind of bell work, if it's embedded in their lessons. The Desmos is huge. We continue to use it all the way through high school. Exit tickets, the list goes on. Teachers, you give them a a plan or you give them a a strategy here and they come up with some plans to make this work.
So it's really, in the teachers that they do this all year long. Those eighth graders also don't see their scores until they're with us at the high school. So helping them understand what they are. I can remember even, you know, just a handful of years ago, we would just hand the scores back and we'd move on. But breaking it down, spending the time, altering the schedules to sit with these kids and help them understand what those scores mean, make all the difference when they're juniors. Because that's when you used to just that's when you cared about it for scholarships. But if we help them understand it from the eighth to ninth grade transition, that really does help. Of course, as they go through the preps, which Josh will talk a little bit more about,
because we're really hammering the juniors hard with some of these modules that we're gonna talk about. They will take the PSAT as a high schooler in the spring, coming up here in just a handful of weeks. And, again, when we get those scores back, we will we will sit with them. And as I started, just the talking about and making us aware of this is a big help to freshmen and their families. And we take them on to tenth grade. We're sharing here. So Luke Swanson here, the Highlander proud, principal of Rochester Adams High School. So we'll talk for a minute about our tenth grade students. I think it's important you probably hear this theme as we go down the table
that the model the model is growth. Right? It's not where we start, but it's where we end when we get to our eleventh grade year. So everything that we're doing, right, we're embedding this model of growth as we go. So you're gonna hear this a lot as we talk. So this continuation of the work that started in middle school, we take tests in eighth and ninth grade. And then in tenth grade, we really start adding on and contributing to that as well. So there is, as we as we're working through all these things in our core classes, we're spending time also doing SAT and PSAT prep, right,
modeled after, the types of questions that they're gonna see on these assessments. It's really cool to watch our teachers start to do this. There are also, while this is happening, school teams that are reviewing data that is specific to students. It's really incredible to watch our data teams get together and start to look at where are students at, where are some areas of growth for them? Having personalized conversations with kids, about maybe some barriers for them and their growth in these areas. So it's really incredible to watch those teams work. But as we as we kind of get back to our timeline here, in January, students use their college board score reports,
the ones that they take in ninth grade, to engage in some targeted practice. Right? So focus and we ask them to do this, Right? Focus on those areas of growth. Those score reports are incredibly valuable to kids. They're able to see how they score in different areas. And then, in using that, in using Blue Book and Khan Academy, there are some incredible free resources available to students that we walk them through, right, where they can look at areas specific targeted areas of growth. It's really, really incredible to watch the students do that, and they're firmly embedded in that process right now.
In February, the students continue to work, right? So as the year goes on, work in Khan Academy, they use our RCS testing modules, and this all leads up to their test in April. Again, so again, we've got it in eighth, ninth, taking it again in tenth, which is eventually going to lead us on into our eleventh grade year, which is the big high stakes test. But I also want to pause here and talk about the summer, right? This is something that we've included on our timeline that's important. As part of our summer learning program, students have the option to take, college preparation courses in the areas of math, English,
and essay writing. So those are options that are available to our students that we actively talk about. In particular, we recommend it in that ninth, excuse me, that tenth to eleventh grade transition time as an opportunity where that's recommended leading into their ever important eleventh grade year. I'll turn it over to mister Ringle here. Thank you, Mr. Swanson. I am also a very proud principal at Rochester High School, and it's show time. So we are now in our junior year, and, we are putting our students out in front of the real SAT, to see how they perform.
If you look at the screen and you see this timeline, you see a very clear theme. We are building upon, various strategies both inside our organization, from our professionals that we employ, to outside organizations like Khan Khan Academy and Blue Book, for example, that really go a long way to help our students feel prepared by the time they take that big, important test in April. Across the eleventh grade year, we see a doubling down or tripling down, if you will, at the high school level of a lot of those modules,
those online resources and other items. And so to summarize, really, what we're looking at as we approach that final exam, in April, I just have to say for a minute that I'm very proud of this team. We have done a lot this is my eighth year as administrator in Rochester Community Schools, and I've seen a lot of amazing things done in different pockets of our organization. I never really fully understood what our middle schools do for PSAT and SAT prep, and I've never really we've had a lot of opportunities to,
in the last few months or so, to really sit down and hear the great things that Adams and Stony and other schools are doing for SAT prep. So by the time they get to that test in April, '3 things have happened. First, they have had long term prep for this test. I think about my son, in Miss Rauch's second grade class at Longmeadow Elementary School. He gets his math packet on a Friday. He's got tests on Wednesday. She's already teaching him that you can't just study the night before. And we've done the same thing with our students here from sixth grade to eleventh
grade. The second thing, hopefully, that they're feeling by this point is less anxiety. This is a high stakes test. Our kids know that. They know it's tied to scholarships, they know it's tied, to admission into programs or schools. And so the fact that they've seen it since sixth grade, hopefully by the time they get to that April test date, this is old hat for them. And then third, is a motivational component. Motivation on this test for various students is a challenge. But if you're taking it, a practice test in seventh grade, like we are here, or eighth grade, and all of a sudden your score comes back and it looks pretty darn good,
Well, now all of a sudden you want us to get better at this. What does that do over the next few years for a student? That is that's potentially a game changer for that individual. And so, we feel that this systemic approach is really gonna lead to some great things for our students. It's important to note that, we're gonna have to look at this short term and long term. Short term being our test results that we get here in April, for some of the things that we've done collectively to prepare our students. But we're also going to have to look at this from a long term, perspective as well.
Has this long systemic approach since sixth grade paid off for our students when they take that test as juniors. So I think I can speak for my colleagues and just say that we are very excited for what this collective, brain trust of individuals here, but also our amazing staff members behind the scenes in our buildings, we're very excited to see what, what this does for our students across RCS. Awesome. To add on one thing is, while we turned up the dial after our fall data presentation because we're all competitive people, as you can tell. We're all proud and competitive and want the best for our kids.
We dialed it up, but we I challenged we challenge each other to make sure it's a healthy balance. Right? You can turn up the heat, and we wanna make sure our students don't feel that heat too much to be so anxious about an SAT or PSAT when it's one thing. It's It's one test. It's one one measure, when we have the content standards, we're also teaching. We have we have all these other things that we're doing, that it's a healthy balance of we wanna prepare you to do the best you can on this game day, but it's not everything.
Right? It's not the end be all. It doesn't mean you're not gonna be successful if you don't score x x x amount. So I say that because I I do feel this team keeps that at the at the forefront of pushing, but making sure we support in the classrooms, in the buildings with our counselors, with everybody. But really, like Josh, like they all said, it's it's making them more confident. So that way, they have less anxiety when they have to take this high stakes standardized test. So, with that being said, very proud of everybody, this team for coming together and doing things good for kids in all the whole
district, not just in one building. So other than that, we're now open to questions either for us, the elementary, the high school of what we presented. Floor is open for questions. Well, I'll just start by thanking you all for coming and sharing every piece of the timeline with us and giving us a better insight and context on how you all work together all the way across the board from K-twelve. So that's very much appreciated. And with that, we can open it up to questions from the board. Well, first of all, thank you all for sharing about your process and everything.
I I enjoyed here I heard a lot of really good things and a lot of things that I remember even from, you know, when I was growing up or from when I was teaching and stuff. I like, you know, the vertical alignment between the grades and the way that you all collaborate with each other, and your passion for our students really comes through. And I liked, some of the different things I was hearing, like like you mentioned that function notation isn't part of our curriculum. So so you're making sure but it is part of the PSAT. And so we need to make sure that we're supplementing that so that the kids are ready for the test, and that's wonderful. Like, that's exactly what we should be doing.
And they're getting lots of familiarity with the test, with this calculator, with just understanding it through the grade levels. And, of course, yeah, that will reduce anxiety because when you just become familiar with something, that will help. So there's so many great things going on, and I guess I just wanna compliment you about that and about, you know, supplementing where we need and working together. I'm also wondering, are is this is this presentation it looks like what we have in front of us is condensed from what was in our board packet. Will we also get to talk about the data that was in the board packet
that came in the original presentation too? Because I had some questions about that too. Yeah. I think the data questions can be if you have questions specific to data, they can be directed toward cabinet in terms of, the how it was presented to you in the packet. Are we going to be going through that so that we can see on the screen the iReady data, the PSAT? No. Some of those slides would or do we have the ability to project them if I have questions about a particular slide so that people can see what I'm seeing? I don't believe that we set that up that way. The point of today,
again, we were trying to condense to thirty minutes as asked by the board, so we wanted to talk about processes and not not really miring the data. Well, I thought we were talking about the data questions. Most of the board packet was the data. So we're not talking about the data right now? So I think the idea was that we would be provided the data ahead of time. We could ask questions ahead of time via email or other means or after even, but that this particular presentation was to be an overview to not get in the weeds because we had specifically asked for thirty minute presentations.
But I would I would assume that we would be talking about data that we're that we're seeing. And that's what was given to I had no idea that the presentation wasn't going to be about the data. We can talk about the data, but the purpose of the principles up here was to talk about processes and what they're doing in response to data because we're moving, hopefully, toward a collective understanding, as you can see, of student growth. And looking at that is kind of the core of our discussion. It It doesn't mean we can't talk about the data. I just don't think the principals needed to be here for that portion. Should I save those questions for after this portion of the presentation?
I think that's what I'm hearing. Okay. Alright. Another question that I had about, the MTSS process, because I know you mentioned that's a diamond, and we wanna help students what did you say? You said, either intervention or extension. Right? I was curious for students at the top end of the spectrum, what do we do, to identify students that are in those top percentiles that would be, like, in the gifted percentiles? And how do we extend learning for them? And is there a way that we're testing to see who's in that category?
And one of the one of the reasons I'm asking that question is because I know in our I Ready data, it seems to divide it by mid or above grade level, and that's all one big chunk. And so I'm wondering for the above grade level kids, like, do we separate that out? How do we handle that? Sure. I'm happy to address that a little bit. So the teachers have access to exponential, amount of very specific data based on the, the assessments that the students take. It's broken down into the different domains. So when we say math,
it's broken down into different domains. And within each of those domains are very specific instructional priorities for each student individualized because it's, it's an adaptive test. So the teachers have access to resources to both extend and provide intervention for students. Specific, it doesn't lump them the students into one group saying you guys are all mid or above it. It gives individualized specific data for teachers to look at for each student. So they use that data then to set instructional priorities. And there's many resources embedded within the curriculum that we use that teachers are able
to then extend students or or provide those intervention at either end of that diamond that we're looking at. So that's just one of the measures. We don't use I Ready exclusively. There's curriculum based. There's assessments that are, common assessments that our students use based on bridges. They use, like, for example, for math, there's one on one assessments that teachers use with students when they're reading. There's many, many different pieces of data that we use. And so teachers use all of that information to make instructional decisions for students. So it's not lumped as a class. It gives the opportunity to differentiate based on each student individually.
Are there others, like, names of other assessments besides the assessments that come in the curriculum, like Bridges assessments or the I Ready assessment? Like, what other assessments do we use to particular to identify those particular kids? Vice president, I have a question. Trustee Ennis? Thanks. Thank you all, first of all, for for being here. I I do understand and appreciate, the fact that you are each individual teams, but it's great to see you all together, because I do know there's a lot of cross collaboration. And I I appreciate seeing you all here at the same time.
I did have one question for middle school. And, there was discussion about, about, two practice tests which are taken at the middle school level. And I'm just curious, in terms of feedback for students, is that the type of test where they take it and they immediately get the feedback in terms of how they've done? And, you know, there's no delay in that so that you can kind of look at that, assess it, and then build on and jump off from there to continue? Yes. Okay. Alright. As soon as there's yes, but we will also let you know in a few days. Okay. Because this is the first time It's the first time This is the first time
we've ever done Yeah. We call it the practice practice. Okay. The practice practice. Yeah. So so so today, even late last week, a lot of our you know, do we set up the college board accounts. We did, you kind of like how to navigate the system a little bit. It's just really the practice, practice kind of it. So a lot of the feedback we're going to get is on Wednesday from our learning consultants and our students, of course, to find out how they think and where they need to go and how it went. So we're excited for that. Yes. I have one other follow-up question. And that is, we knew at the high school level that the ACT,
the format changed. We saw in the fall, there was some work to be done. But in terms of the transitioning between elementary to middle school, middle school to high school, there's always talk about summer slide for students. And for many kids, that's a real thing. So how do you work together and collaborate, especially for those transitional students from elementary to middle and middle to high school? How do you work together to ensure I think, what we mentioned and what mister Mooney just said,
you know, the fact that they already have a College Board account in in middle school is amazing. There are so many different free external programs out there that provide students just an amazing opportunity to work at their own pace, with their own goals on different things. I think of Khan Academy specifically. In previous years, it tied directly to their PSAT scores. So it would provide them essentially their weaknesses based on their PSAT data. The more modern version of Khan Academy requires them to take some course challenges,
that uses that data to tell where they're at. But what it provides them is is the ability to go through all sorts of different, small modules, larger modules, detailed instruction, on things that they may struggle with. And not only do we see that data for our students, but we also obviously the students are also tracking what they're able to accomplish. So even those those summer months now become great opportunities for our students to continue their growth towards the SAT test. Not to mention the fact that,
you know, again, internally, we're also doing things like the summer learning program, offering SAT and PSAT prep work for students. Yeah. I would say in addition to that with, the math, language, arts, and STEM that we have in the middle school level, innovation lab is what it's called. We also have some other target intervention programs that we've been using this year, bringing on and expanding another Lexia, as well as IXL. And these are used by our interventionists and to really target certain areas for certain students. Those licenses continue to the summertime, so many times they can work on those too. Math Mac Lab.
Math Lab is new this year too. That's a good one. Trustee Osmo? I just want to say that I really appreciate what the middle school is doing with having them do the practice practice because I know that our our students are really smart, and I know you guys are giving them very good instruction. But sometimes just the duration of that test becomes a brain fog and just getting them used to the this is what it's gonna feel like. Because even if they have the learning, if they don't have that duration, it's like, you know, when I was a swimmer, I was never a distant swimmer. You put me in the 500,
I died. So but it's kind of I think of it as that 500 mile you know, 500 meter event for them. So I really appreciate you guys giving them that experience. You know, the the other piece too that that it just dawned on me that we forgot to mention. This is the first time that our students take a timed test. Mhmm. A limited timed test. M STEP is not timed. IReady is not timed. They finish at their own pace. It however long it takes. The SAT is not. It is, you know, pencils down type test.
Well, her legs down. Her legs down. Her legs down. Right? No. Yeah. I'm a little old. Okay. I still did a pencil. No. So this is a big deal, like, for them to learn how do I budget my time. Mhmm. And what does it feel like to budget my time? Great. Anybody else? Okay. I would echo from the from the elementary lens as we begin to start thinking about our third graders and the assessment for that first time, that notion of stamina. And and I'm speaking of our state test on staff at this point.
But that notion that they have some stamina to, plop through what sometimes are are text test text types, brand new to them. I think that the examples that that we heard from our classroom teachers in those vertical conversations all the way through the big day in eleventh grade really reflect the commitment that's being made here to agility for our students, the notion that they are thinking about, material that that may, come in different forms so that they're able to transfer that to a novel situation. We know that all of the measures that that are used,
statewide may regularly be under review. Right? So how do our students hold on to their, ability to to stay agile and competent and confident with the material when they're in that test taking, frame? I think that the notion of motivation, conflict or or tension for learners. We know our families see that at home. Right? They they reference sometimes those those challenges with their young people when they're talking to their teacher at conferences about I I can't get them to fill in the blank. And our educators, face those exact same challenges in in the classroom all day. And so I think that many of the processes that have been highlighted tonight,
that help our students maximize their greatest potential and success are really a true reflection of the fact that this leadership team really puts behind them a whatever it takes mindset and approach, and carries that forward into our buildings each day. And I'm really grateful for that. Trustee Anna? Well, to piggyback on what you said, you mentioned the educators and I think someone said, which I think is really important, is that you give the teachers the content that they need to embed in the classroom, but then they're given the opportunity to strategize and be creative on their own.
And I think that's really an important point to make that because my concern, we're talking about testing, and there's so much more to learning than just being rote and understanding how to take a test and taking a test. There's so much more to that. So giving educators the ability within their classroom that autonomy to strategize on their own and knowing each individual student and what they're capable of, I think, is really key, which circles back to the importance of that emotional and that social connection that students
have with educators in their classroom. I think it's really key. So thank you. I'm very chatty tonight. I guess my question for you all here is, what can the board do to support this work? I know it's a loaded one. Understanding the complexities of teaching and learning, which I think you just gave a nice summation to, it all starts with relationship. It all starts with those connections between teacher and student. When our students know that we care about them, they're open to learning. So it's that's key. Mhmm. It's multifaceted.
And I think too I mean, when you look at our our timeline, these are the events that we've fluffed out to show you the process over time of what it is we do. But the bottom line is is all of that is grounded in just good instruction in classrooms with teachers who have relationships with kids. You know? So we could pull these pieces out, but and show you, like, these are the steps that we've taken. But this wouldn't have any meaning or or depth if it wasn't seeded in that
relationship with good solid instruction. I think, what Wendy said is is spot on. A lot of this is embedded in just good teaching practices, but I think it's also important to to for everybody to understand that, we're talking about a standardized test and progressing towards that reality for our students is that not everybody needs that. Mhmm. And, we have a lot of students. For example, RCS provides the most students to our OTEC program. A lot of those students may not have much care about the SAT,
but rightfully so because they have other opportunities that they've already decided to focus on. Not to say that we're not gonna help them prepare for that test, but I think it's important to to understand as a community that not everybody, needs it for what they want to do with their with their lives. Mhmm. I was gonna add one more. To that same sense, when we look at our communities, what I get a lot of times, I think, for this whole group, we're not gonna put ages on anybody. When we took the ACT back in the day, it was a lot different than the SAT, and even the SAT has changed with digital.
So when you ask what the board can do is have an understanding of what we're also learning because we didn't take this test, but also the autonomy to do what we need to do in our buildings. And that's what our our guys have done. Pascal has been great with leading this charge. And, it's interesting. I still have people that say I wasn't good at math. I don't they don't need this test to exactly what Josh saying. They're just gonna go into the workforce today. But to help them understand how this test will help them, I think, is a big part. So just the the time that to do that. Opportunity to step outside my building with my fifth graders, and we toured the state Capitol and the Michigan Historical Museum.
So thank you for supporting those and continuing to support those parts of school, that don't always happen within our walls of our building. Right? To watch the kids interact today, even from just how they carried themselves to how they interacted with the exhibit to the questions they were asking and kind of that wonderment that they had as they were like, in the in the Capitol Building and really kind of putting it all together. Because, really, it's the application of what they're learning that's important. What can they take away from all the great planning that our DTCs and all the testing, but what can they take and what they're learning and apply it each day.
So thanks for asking. Thanks for continuing to work this evening. Trustee Agnes? Trustee? I don't know if I get to the answer because I'm not that side of the table anymore. But I I wanted to say that just patience, trust that we are looking at the data and constantly looking at, wow. Here's an area we need to improve. Wow. Here's an area we need to celebrate. We're calling. Just, you know, when when these guys like, patience, little bit of trust that we're all in it to do well for kids, I think it's not going to just turn like we did our data presentation in
the fall, we see all of us were concerned about some of the results, right? Like it wasn't just it wasn't a we're all concerned. And this team said, no, we're going to do something about it. We're going to step it up and we're going to do our best to reverse that effect and start seeing some growth, but it's not going to happen overnight. And I think just the patience to get there with the hard work that these guys are putting in. Sure. Yeah. Just one last thing I wanted to add. You know, data is such an important driver for all that we do, but it's the innovation and the brilliance of our teachers and our students and lifting
the engagement of our students and teachers as well. That's equally as important to have students invested in learning. So it's it's a collaborative effort. It's not just one piece. We don't look at one piece of data. We don't look at one facet of education. It's very complex. And and by the day, it's getting more and more complex just with the students that are in front of us. So just being able to have the competency to continue to adapt and change based on the students in front of us. Data's a big part of that, but it's not everything. Thank you. And we're going to go to Trustee Alsbaugh.
So, we have lots of questions today. So I know we haven't talked about our seniors because generally they don't test. But principal Renkel, made me think of something. You said not everyone needs, you know, the SAT and all that because some people, you know and you met when you mentioned OTEC, that's what started kind of sparked this in my head. I had two out of three children go to OTEC. And, you know, I have actually, none of my children need the SAT to get into a class, you know, to further their careers. But when I was a high school teacher, we gave our twelfth graders the ASVAT,
which I'm probably saying that wrong and my husband's probably shaking his head, which is a military exam. So I'm wondering, you know, is there do the seniors take that or is there any opportunity for our students to take it in, our school? Yes. We offer that. There's a couple I think maybe one or two test days throughout the school year where all three high school all four high school students, can I think we all kind of take turns hosting it at times of the year, but we provide that test to our students? Again, an alternative option, if you will. Karen Malsber,
our director of CT, runs that, where she organizes it and she does a sign up for anybody who's wants to take it. We we, put it out there, and families and kids who wanna take it can take it. Wonderful. I really appreciate you guys supporting the alternate you know, other options because I had my plan for my children and they didn't not do it, and they still ended up happy and living in Italy. One thing I can add to that too as well. We talk about our seniors. Right? All all of our students, nine, ten, eleven, are going through these SAT prep stuff. Right? They're they're getting they're getting there.
This is also provide us an opportunity to talk about what we're gonna do for seniors during that time. So what we've done is bolster career and college prep. Right? We've met with groups of students and talked about what they needed and then provided them some resources to do that. So it's, it's provided us an opportunity not just to prepare for tests, but also to talk about what the next step looks like and to get them ready for that huge transition so that they're ready for life after high school. School. Trustee LeCoy? Well, I just want to I appreciate what all of you are saying here, and I appreciate Trustee Annas' question. But just to offer a slightly different perspective,
I think that for the Board, it's really nice to appreciate all the things that you're talking about, but really these are the operational aspects of the district. So I'm not sure it's actually the role of the Board to get involved in these aspects. It's good to understand how it works and what's going on, but that's not really our role. I think for board members, our role is to actually be a little more high level than that. And it's important for us to just understand what are the end results looking like. What is the overall health of the district?
What, you know, what do the test scores look like or or the or discipline going on in the schools or absenteeism or graduation rates or all of these sorts of things are what boards in school districts are supposed to be looking at, and we're supposed to be responsive to the needs of the community and what they're expecting to see too for their children. So, I guess in some ways that's why I'm a little bit surprised that we're not looking at the data specifically right now and having our chance to ask our questions in front of the public who we represent.
So that if we have questions about some of these slides that other parents might share also, we can get answers to those questions. And everyone can see what we're looking at, and we can understand. And then we can get answers from the people who are doing the work and doing the operational aspects, and they can explain those to us. And we can analyze that data and understand it and then feel very comfortable moving forward. It's not so much about trusting that everybody's looking at the data. It's about help us understand the data. Yeah. Maybe we don't understand exactly what we're looking at, but we're counting on on you to help give us some insight about why something
might be happening or or why it's not happening or this or that. So I just wanna offer that as my perspective and why I do still have questions about the data. And if you would prefer that I don't ask these administrators, I'd like to ask you after. I'd like to ask somebody. So I think we did say that you could ask those questions to the table. Okay. So does anyone else have questions for our amazing panel? Okay. Well, I guess you've been really easy. Thank you all.
Thank you all. Thank you. Okay. So I guess we can, go ahead and ask any other additional questions that we have of our administrative team before we move on to the next agenda item. So Trustee Locue? All right. I will bring up my slides here. K. One question I have, and it it has to do with, let's see. What is this? It's on slide four, and it's on slide nine. And it's this gray looking chart, and it's supposed to be a growth chart. And they say, How did students in schools across the district grow from fall to winter?
And I know from previous meetings that each of the little blue dots on here represents a school. And the growth is the median percent typical growth. The median percent typical growth achieved differentiated by fall placement levels. And I guess one thing I'm wondering is how are we measuring growth, and what are we are we taking starting store starting scores into account when we're measuring growth? And how does this account for the ends of the bell curve? Because the only chart I'm seeing where we're talking about this in terms of groups of students,
it's talking about a median student median student performance. And median student performance isn't going to account for low achievers or high achievers. So do we divide this out so that we can look across and see what low achievers, high achievers, and those in the middle are doing? Where where would we find that information? Something? I'm sorry. I'm not sure your mic. I don't think you're on. How about now? Yep. There we go. Excellent. Alright. On slide eight, we're talking about, mathematics achievement. There's a similar graph for reading achievement. And this graph actually is the median percent of all national I Ready users.
So this is not the quadrant of RCS specifically. This is related to when not looking at a standard set, but the national norm reference portion, how do schools individually break down in a quadrant of high performance and high growth? So if we were to look to your question about how might we categorize our students at, fill in the blank, elementary school, our teachers would use a different type of report where they look by domain and or, by placement area to sort of sort students,
for lack of a better term, in terms of areas of need. And so because of that adaptiveness, students may be sorted on or above grade level as you described. We don't get a categorization for the cohort that's more distinct than that. But at the student level, we do. So it really depends on which data set we're thinking about. Sorry, the dogs all over town are running to Stoney Creek right now. But this particular data set, when they mentioned the national median percent in that quadrant, it's I Ready's data report back to us about our schools here in Rochester as
compared to those national medians. So how they do that, I I would need to get back to you. I don't have their their, You I'm not I'm not sure I actually care how they how they do anything. Okay. I wanna does our district use these charts at all? Because I find them in these presentations year after year, and I feel like they're confusing. And I'm not I'm not sure if they've been I'm not sure if they've been used in the past or if we use them now. Do we even use these charts, or are these irrelevant? They have been indicated in past board presentations.
And so knowing that it's a chart you've looked at in the past, it's brought forward as a as a similar data point to to review. In terms of which data are coming before the board with which metrics and assessments would be, a wonderful sort of goal setting conversation in terms of how will we know which measures and in which ways might we would like to look at things, you know, for the best conversation to your point. This particular, chart certainly doesn't help us guide or plan instruction. The I Ready tool specifically, we we don't use necessarily at the school level to look at trend data over
time. We look at M STEP much more closely in that regard because that's giving us a calibration with our curriculum and the way our students are interacting with it. I Ready, we use much more closely in terms of individual or cohort performance so that we can attend to those instructional needs therein. We know that I Ready does give us some cohort year over year data, whether that's a a fall to winter or a winter to winter, and that that also has been provided in the past, within the scope of this, presentation and and the encouragement for a 30 snapshot,
we we just gave the most recent, hey, this is January, and how our students did from fall to January. Sorry. I wanna be clear on the microphone here for the recording. Hello. Hi. I I'm not sure if I've answered it, but that's that's a little, glimpse into why these slides and why not others and and if I can answer your question. As well. Yeah. No. I think that makes a lot of sense. Personally, I would be more interested in seeing the data that you use that drives curriculum and instruction more than, you know, whatever standard I Ready slides they have. Would I think that would be great for the future.
One question I did have about iReady in particular had to do with eighth grade math. And this is because I looked and I found our achievement session from last year, and I shared this with the board and with mister Russo, over the weekend. And we can see the trend, you know, for four years in a row from 2122 school year to 2223, to 2324, to now. And I'm noticing that the mid or above grade level section is, like, it's five or 6% for, like, four years in a row now.
And I'm wondering what happens in eighth grade because it's not like that in seventh grade. There's a big drop in eighth grade each year. And I'm wondering if we've ever looked at that and why something like that might be happening. That's a great question. I would have to go I would have to get with our math coaches, math consultants, because they're the ones who really dig into the data to answer that, like, to the best place. So if if you send an email with a question you want, like, I will I will reach out to them and because they've dug into all this data, and they will be able to explain, that better than I can at this on the spot.
Okay. Does anyone else on the board have any questions? Trustee Ospa? I'm sorry. I'm trying to find the slide that I had a question on. So I wonder if you can give us some context around the slide that says evidence based reading and writing and math. And it says for our fall eleventh graders that 40, 47% were not ready. It's one of the last pages. Page 17. Go For me, it's 19. But Yeah. 18. Yeah. 19. Mhmm. So so that's the one that says evidence based reading writing and math,
twenty twenty six cohort, current eleventh grade. Correct? So that is the data that's comes from, comes from the College Board. When we when I just asked to get this is the reason why this data the reason why I went about this data this way is because we weren't in the fall, we looked at trend data, right? We looked at from 2017 to 2024 and we explained and we tried to explain all those things. So this was just looking at what our buildings are looking at because they look at cohort data. They're looking at our current eleventh graders and they look at how they did an
eighth, ninth, tenth and eleventh. Obviously, you see an eleventh that's concerning, right? And we are adjusting that with our math coaches and math consultants and our English and having 21 that don't meet in don't meet the evidence based reading, writing or the math. Those are all those things that you heard them saying that they're doing. It's all the things we're trying to figure out in our curriculum, in our you know, remember we talked about not having a, what's it called, item analysis? It's very difficult. Right? We used to have an item analysis to show our kids struggled on this concepts.
Now we have just these four areas of algebra, algebraic thinking. Right? And and all those things, it's hard to really pinpoint what is the root cause of why they're not. So we're really working hard to try to figure that out, in our professional development with our math coaches, with our, curriculum consultants. But, that is the data that I was telling you is we're looking at closely. Our buildings are looking at they're looking the the key is they have names of kids who are not ready. Right? They're looking at names. They're looking at, is this are they struggling in their classes?
Is it is it just they're not motivated to to do well on this on this assessment? They're looking at all those factors and having those conversations as well as we're looking in our curriculum of where maybe are we missing something in one of our classes, algebra? Is it geometry? You know, what are our kids are not getting? So that is that and and I provided what it is. There's right. It's not hiding. It doesn't look pretty. And it didn't look pretty in the fall. And and so, it's it's not about hiding anything. This is the data that anybody can go get on on, my school data. It's the data we presented in the fall,
and it's the data we're looking at now to to try to see if we can figure this out if it's something within our control or if it's something that is something that over time, our kids are gonna feel more confident and with these practice tests, with with the teachers knowing more about the assessment, with the skills being taught that maybe are on this test, like, those are the things that we're kind of exploring right now. Does that answer your question? Yeah. And I can understand where, you know, this is the 10,000 foot level, which that iReady chart, I would consider that the 10,000
foot level, which I think is where we, as a board, you know, we need to look at the over All. That's our altitude. And I under and I appreciate you saying, you know, you don't have the ini item analysis. And with the test changes, you know, there's some challenges about addressing it. But I but you do, like you said, have the names, and I'm sure, like you said, you were addressing it. So I just wanted to I appreciate it, but thank you. Trustee McCue? Actually, just right on that same slide on slide 19, I noticed that we've got three different categories here, and I'm trying to understand that because we have the yes ready category.
So if we look at fall eleventh, it says yes ready, 53%. Not ready, 47%. And that adds up to a %. And then there's met no benchmark is 21%. And I'm just wondering what that applies to. To. Yeah. Good question. It does look confusing. It's because these are combined. So this is a total. Right? So, evidence based reading and writing and math together, you have 53, 40 seven, but twenty one percent did not meet either one. Yes. They are on the struggle bus. Yes. The they did not meet either one.
So like, you know, if you like, for example, if you look back the other side math, you have yes, ready, not ready and some partially approaching or partially proficient. And then for the English, the slide before that you have yes, ready, not ready and approaching, partially presented. But when you put them together, it's showing that totally 53% are ready in both, 47% are not ready in both and 21% did not meet either one, English even evidence based reading writing and math.
Does that make sense? I'm okay. I think I I understand it with that one slide because you're saying both of those are together, and it means they didn't meet either one of them. Right. So okay. So the approaching partially proficient category, how does that one work? Like, if we look at Like, math and evidence based reading, right, both sides? Slide 18. There's math. Yes. And only the eighth grade category and the eleventh grade category has that one? Yes. The way they score, the way that they report scoring is only for eighth and eleventh.
Okay. Because those are the ones that they have to take. We we give our ninth and tenth graders as practice. We choose to do that. But for for this for the, the SAT, eighth and eleventh is what's reported. Okay. So that's the only ones that give us that that partially or or, approaching proficient. Okay. So what is the approaching partially proficient one applied to? It's it it means that twenty nine point four percent of kids are on the bubble of approaching readiness. Does that apply to the yes ready category or the not ready category? The not they're they would be in the not ready.
Okay. So the approaching partially proficient apply out of that thirty nine percent, twenty nine point four are approaching. They're close. And they didn't touch on this, but they really focus a lot on the bubble. When we say the bubble students, it's those students are, like, with a little bit of extra they can be proficient. They can be ready. So that's 29.4% of the 39%? Yes. Okay. Yes. That's a good those are good questions because these charges are charged. Right? And those are good questions. I'm sorry. I can't tell this is on. So on that slide,
just to talk about 18 for Matt to now? Yep. On that slide, Trustee LeCulli and anyone else who was asking that question, Mr. Cuzzimano did a great job explaining it. But if we look at eighth and the eighth grade in the fall of eleventh grade and we compare those two, we're the only ones we get information on, right? Because ninth and tenth we choose to do. So if you look at the growth of who is out of the approachingpartially proficient from eighth to eleventh we've reduced by 29% which is I'm sorry, that's 20 because nine is still there.
20%. So if we had the ninth and tenth, that would be really beneficial. We they just don't offer that. It's just nice to look at that jump. It's just unfortunate that's a three year gap there or a two year gap. But unfortunately, it also the yes ready category seems to go down from eighth to eleventh. Sixty one percent down to 55%. Correct. Correct. Okay. So, at this time I have another question about Okay. Last question. Trustee Latue? Last question. Look at that. Okay. For the I Ready, when we're testing kids in fall and in winter and in spring,
what standard are we using? Are we talking about, what the grade level standard is for that year, or is it a different type of standard? Like, what we would expect to see at the end of grade level, or are there different standards for fall and winter and spring that we're measuring them against? So when I when I ready, sets the graph for, a grade level standard, whether that's early on grade level, one grade level below, two grade level below, three grade levels below, or meeting, Those standards are set from the fall assessment where you would see a typical growth
line and then a stretch line for each student. That line does not adjust as the school year goes. So we see the student's progress bar rise. We don't see the target that they're aiming for rise because that's the end of grade for typical growth or for stretch growth. So what students are being compared against is the grade level standard, whereas some assessments may, sort of move the mark as the year goes on, knowing that standards are adjusting. I Ready has the end of grade benchmark, that students can our teachers actually can toggle from their view,
to look at a student's current progress in its current state or against the end of year measure, if that makes sense. Alright. So thank you for all of that wonderful information. We are gonna move on now, to agenda item eight, which is remainder of public comment. I do wanna just say that technically, I'm probably gonna get myself in a little bit of trouble here, but what's new? Technically, our public comment earlier on the agenda, only gets extended to this portion if we go over thirty minutes at that time
of public comment. But I know that we did receive a couple additional cards in the meantime. And so given that this is new ish, to our process, I'm feeling inclined to, make an exception tonight. But in the future, just know that, unless we were to go over thirty minutes in the earlier agenda item, we wouldn't normally go back to public comment at this time. So with that, I have cards from Amanda Johnson, and then, that will be followed by Brendan C. Hi. Sorry.
Hi. My name's Amanda Johnson. I do appreciate you guys still taking the time right now to just for me to kind of express how I'm feeling and everything. But But I do just wanna let you know, myself. So I work at RCS Caring Steps Children's Center. My name is miss Amanda Johnson. I work there as the lead kindergarten prep teacher. I have been there since June 2021, so it's been almost, like, four plus years that I've been there. I do just understand that the place of work, unfortunately, is not making as much money right now as what we would like. I'm aware that we do need to hire more teachers. That way, we can start enrolling as soon as possible since we do have a very long
wait list. Unfortunately, with that too, a lot of centers all over the, honestly, world and state truly have long wait list. And I know it's just kind of the early childhood stage and everything with that point. But I do agree, we do also need a director as well, and I'm aware of the struggle with all childcare care centers in Michigan to keep staff long term. I truly think the main turnover is due to not having a director in charge and what teachers are currently making if they're a full time or part time employee. We all feel that hourly pay just went up a little bit, would honestly tremendously help a lot of the staff that are currently there right now. I've been working in Rochester for over a decade now and truly enjoy it.
Before I did start at Caring Steps, I was a director of another child care center, local private to help educate infants and through kindergarten prep. As I've been the lead teacher at kindergarten prep for over three calendar years, I truly love and adore teaching and my team in my current classroom. I do have a total of 22 children currently in my classroom, and they have amazing families and parents. I truly with all of my background being out of college for over a decade, I've never been at a center before that has truly amazing children and amazing parents. They truly will do anything for us at any time,
which is truly amazing. I was able to attend your board meeting Monday night on 02/24. Myself, coworker, and the young toddler lead teacher all attended so we could hear your thoughts regarding caring stuff. It did seem that more information would help, so this is why I wanted to pass along that information for you guys. I do want to let you know also, I do have my son there who currently is full time in the toddler classroom, and he truly loves it, loves forming those relationships, forming those relationships with the teachers and everything too. I do feel as was we should keep the center going and making a few
changes if you feel that will help the moving forward plan. The team who are currently still working here and continuing to be flexible in keeping the place going. As always, if you have any further questions, feel free to reach out to us at hearing steps. We're always open to discuss any info with you guys. Thank you. Thank you. So next up, Brendan C. Good evening. I wasn't planning on speaking, so thank you for taking the time. So I also wanna talk a little bit about caring steps. You know, back in 2023, we moved our family over here. We had to move for work. We came from Southwest Michigan and we were faced with the daunting task of relocating
our family. Coming from an area in Southwest Michigan with one of the best school districts of the area and three young kids aged three, two, and one, where we were choosing to put our kids was our number one priority in choosing where to to move to. Rochester Community Schools comes up as one of the most the highest reputations in the area. So that was an immediate draw for us. And looking at the area when we found that Caring Steps was a part of the RCS ecosystem, That was an incredible draw for us. So to the fact that we were able you know, we were willing to move our family across the state, choose this place in order to get our kids into the system very quickly.
We did not choose this location based on convenience. It's we're on the other side of Rochester Hills, it's not the closest drive for us. But I think when you look at the other facilities in the area and then you come here, you quickly see, you know, how nice this facility is. And I think one of the other community members stated it well when she said that this facility truly has the opportunity to be one of the gold standards for what, childcare within a school district could look like. Again, right, this building is just under an hour from my work, it's under just under half hour from my wife's work. So again, we're not choosing this facility based on the convenience for us.
This is truly a testament to how great of a facility we actually have here. I think when you look at other day cares in the area and then you come to Caring Staffs, you can see it. It's the size of the rooms, it's the play areas that they've got, it's the incredible staff, and I think if you guys spend a day going there, I think what you'll see is the kids walking in happy, sad, the parents walking in happy, stressed, relieved. But what you find is that the teachers are there every single day and they take the kids, they take the teachers, they take the criticism from the parents, they take the crying kids every morning and then make it a comfortable place for
them to be. I think, you know, one thing that I wanna bring up is that last year, a survey went out to the caring steps parents talking about a couple different options of would you know, in rating them and how would you react to one, an increase in tuition, a removal of food, a reduction of food, a change in hours. That survey went out. We never heard back any of the results. So I would ask that that survey be, you know, considered when you guys are looking at potential changes to the facility. A couple immediate options that, you know, the things that come to mind How many seconds? There are things in the tuition that are very nice for us as parents,
but we're we're not asked for. For example, we get a one week vacation credit if we're if we have our kids out of school. This accumulates to, you know, one week of tuition, which at a $1,200 average tuition with 75 kids is $20,000 that the center is eating at the ask of no parent. So there are many other areas that I think if you guys get into the details of the operations of the facility, you will see there are many other options to to cut costs and get closer to that break even plan. Thank you. Alright. Moving on to agenda item, number nine,
which is additional comments. Agenda item 9.1 is additional comments by members of the Board of Education. Individual board members may use this time to share information about school visits, updates from committees or organizations they are assigned to, or to express their personal opinion. With our updated handbook, please note that each trustee has three minutes. If you run over that time, I am happy to ask the board if they are willing to extend the time. We will start with trustee Lecui. Well, first of all, those of you who came to speak about Caring Steps today,
I wanna thank you for coming. And if you're willing to talk with me afterwards, I know it's it's you might wanna leave. But if you're willing to talk, I'd be happy to talk with you afterwards and hear more about your experiences. But I also feel like it's my duty to explain to you too why I've taken the position that I've taken on caring steps when we've talked about it during these board meetings. So I wrote a post earlier today on my Facebook page. It's called trustee Carol Beth McCooey. It's on Facebook, and I'm gonna read this post because I think it helps explain it. Caring steps is undoubtedly a valuable service for the families who use it.
It's a beautiful facility, and I know we've we've toured it and stuff too. And I have no doubt that the staff are dedicated and very caring. But as a school district, our primary responsibility is to our k through 12 and special education students, and we can't ignore our responsibilities to them. Right now, we're running a deficit of carrying steps between its facilities and ongoing operational deficits. And after six to seven years of financial losses, we aren't even close to breaking even. Some might argue that with additional investments like higher wages and hiring a director and
other adjustments that carrying steps could eventually become sustainable. And perhaps with different leadership, it could. But it's a gamble, and it's not a guarantee. And my question is, what are the odds that it will change this time around? Because that's what we've heard year after year. We've heard years about promises of how it's going to break even, but a flawed business model won't become sustainable just because we want it to be. And the staffing challenges we face won't be easily solved, and attempting another financial overhaul would require significant time and attention from our district's leadership.
That attention really needs to be focused on our k through 12 and special education students. Instead of pouring more resources into caring steps, I believe we should be focusing on pressing challenges like improving our SAT scores and strengthening math and literacy curriculum and addressing our declining enrollment, which is a huge problem. These are issues that impact thousands of students. And I know there are 75 students at Caring Steps, and I'm sure every one of them is amazing and precious and wonderful, but we can't be taking away from all of these other students. Our duty first and foremost is to the students in our k through 12 and
special education system. The money we keep funneling into caring steps along with the distraction that it creates for our administrative staff comes at the direct expense of those students. It's not about being against child care. It's about making responsible financial decisions for the benefit of all RCS families. And I just keep asking myself, at what point do we stop trying to force this to work and refocus on our true mission, which is education? But like I said, I'm happy to talk with you afterwards, but I would like to respond to what you said.
Okay. With that, we'll go to Trustee Lowson. Just wanna say thank you to everybody that came out. Is my mic working? There we go. That came out, to speak tonight and then to all of the community members that have sent emails this past week. I have read each and every one of them with your thoughts, your ideas, and concerns regarding Caring Steps, and I just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to reach out. It's obvious obviously clear that Caring Steps is a very important part of this community and I hope that we can all come to a consensus soon about it. Last week, I did have the opportunity to tour the Schultz campus and I was absolutely amazed
by the facility. The visit was both heartwarming and very encouraging and it's something to be very proud of in this district about this facility and everything that it has to offer for the students and the community. So I just wanted to say that it was awesome to be there. Thank you. Trustee Ilsa. Well, I agree with Trustee Lausanne. And I'd like to just echo that we really appreciate the people that are reaching out to us about carrying steps and telling us, and the public comment tonight brought up some very, very interesting points that I really hadn't thought of. So I appreciate the community reaching out.
I attended Founders Day for the PTA celebrations. And I I'm just so impressed with our community and our parents and our students. And there was even a custodian that they honored for just making lunchtime just a really good experience for the kids. You know, we have great schools, but we have great schools because we have a great community. And the support that we get from our community is just amazing. And it was a wonderful night to, celebrate those people who, you know, volunteer and give out give their time. So that was wonderful.
And I also got to give a shout out to my Cybercats. The Cybercats competed at the Ferndale competition last weekend, and they were finalists and won the sustainability award. So, I can't wait to see what the other teams do. And the Atombots also competed. And I how did they do Jess? Do you remember? They did pretty well. I don't remember the exact details. Well, congratulations to the Anabots too, and good luck with the fest. They were one of the final alliances. Yep. Thanks. Trustee Yanis. Thank you, Madam Vice President. I wasn't going to speak about carrying steps since we've deferred the discussion and tabled
it until March 17, but I do feel the need to make some comments based on some other comments made at this table. Henry Ford once said, Whether you think you can or can't, you are right. Education for a child begins at birth, and if a public school district doesn't have a team that champions the mission of this model of care, it will find itself where we currently are. Truth be told, my biggest concern regarding caring steps when it was initially proposed prior to a global pandemic was its location in the northern part of our district.
Not that it wasn't a smart investment, in my opinion, because nothing you ever do for a child is wasted. The Riggio Emilia approach to learning, after which Caring Steps is modeled, is one that emphasizes children's interests, creativity, and self directed learning. It's based on the idea that children are capable and curious learners who can become critical and creative thinkers, which, given the current proliferation of AI in our society and its increased usage in education, now more than ever, we should be exploring early education paths that foster this independent learning style.
And I believe we have that model here. We just lack, in some cases over these past years, the desire to fulfill that obligation. By now, after years of leadership volatility within our school district and for caring steps, a lack of focus on this program and its educators, and a constant drumbeat of minority members and some citizens who don't agree with this investment, we are at a point where a decision should be made about its future. A public school district doesn't have fixed costs. This model is volatile due to our reliance on the state aid to educate all
our students, pre K through 26. However, I do find it ironic that many place business expectations on public institutions often speak of margins and added value at the expense of what public education is designed to do, prepare children to be happy and productive members of our communities. The initial investment in Caring Steps was designed to do just that. And if it was able to turn a profit, then, well, that would be a tangible return on taxpayer investments. So with all of this said,
I will be presenting to, Superintendent Russo and his administration team a myriad of additional questions that I have, that I felt that this presentation that was scheduled to be reviewed tonight, wasn't sufficient in covering. And I look forward to the discussion, and the decision in the next business board meeting. Thank you. Thank you. And, with that, I will just also echo that I, am, grateful for the the feedback and comments about caring steps. And the messages that we've received, certainly have made me,
think about some things that I hadn't previously thought about and put some, questions on my radar. And I, well, I will be frank in saying that I I I don't feel like I have seen possible. So, I think that's why postponing this work tabling, sorry, this conversation, is important so that we have a chance to get all of our additional questions answered and dig into that a little bit more to make an informed decision. I also would like to congratulate our cyber cats who were finalists yesterday.
That's amazing. Go cyber cats. Over the last week since our last meeting, I also attended the community outlook breakfast hosted by the Rochester Regional Chamber of Commerce. It was great to see community leaders come together to discuss our community's strengths and challenges, focused on some common goals and a lot of levity, including our very own superintendent, mister Russo. I'd like to congratulate, also, there's just been so many amazing things that our students have accomplished lately. I I I don't I don't I'm not gonna go through the whole list,
but I just generally want to congratulate all of our district students who have, achieved major accomplishments, throughout this school year. We are truly privileged to work with such amazing students, staff, and families. With that, I, will move on to agenda item 9.1, which is members of the administration. We have comments by members of the administration, also limited to three minutes. These comments allow members of the administration to share information that they believe is valuable to the board and to our community. These are comments and not discussion items.
Mr. Russo? Thank you, madam vice president. Doctor. Deluca? Thank you, mister Russo. Just wanted to give a shout out to, trust Trustee Blake, for attending the district critical instance team on February 20. We were joined with Trustee Blake in police, fire, and administrators from across the District, to do a tabletop exercise, with our community members, on situational awareness on events that could possibly take place in our schools. The event lasted for three hours and we got really great feedback from the from the Committee as well. Also, because we talked about data here, I wanted to to talk about some data points about SAT.
Being an administrator in Rochester Community Schools for fifteen years, at the high school level, our high schools are outperforming area high schools on the SAT. Are there drops? Sure. They're gonna be dips along the way. Currently, our high schools are sixteenth, forty second, and fifty sixth in the state out of 788 educational entities. Now, could we go down in certain years? Sure. But right now, our students are performing across the state. Is there room to grow? For sure. But I wanna highlight though, for the, you know, for the past since 2015,
since SAT has been and its inception in Rochester and in across the state, our schools have been been doing really a well job, with, performing and then outperforming the the cohorts the year before that. Is there a dip? There has been a dip. But I this team that came in front of us today, they are excited to tackle anything in front of them, and I look forward to seeing the data that comes out this summer. And, usually, for the board to know that the the data usually comes out at the June. So and then it's and it's embargoed, and then we won't be able to release that to the board until probably late fall. Thank you, doctor DeLuca.
Mister Murphy? Miss Gauthier? Mr. Guzmano? Just to say thank you to our building administrators for all the work they did. I would echo that. Thank you so much. Alright. And I will close out with, just a couple items. To go back, trustee Annas asked a question about where the where the cell phone bill is, and it has been, referred to committee on the committee on education and workforce, on the February 26. I would echo the the SAT piece, and I did hear from trustees that from more than one trustee that that around iReady as well that you'd like to see some trend data, so we'll include that in the next,
update. We can put that what we have in a in a superintendent candidate update so you can be aware of that as well. When in terms of SAT, I I also wanna, you know, we have we have a we looked at what the continuum of services are going down from elementary all the way to high school and how they're trying to prepare kids not only for SAT, but for everything else. There's a myriad of assessments that happen. The amount of assessments that kids take is much different than what we took, in in our educational experience. But just to remind everybody that the SAT and what what it holds for some
students, what's something that mister Winkle said. It's not only for those students who might be, taking a different pathway or going to OTEC or decided that SAT might not be where they wanna go because they don't wanna go to a four year college. There are many colleges that aren't using SAT as a criterion anymore. It's optional. And on the college app, you can make that optional. Anecdotally, I can tell you that, I know of many students who have 4.2s, 4.4s, and 3.6s who chose not to use their SAT score on the college app and still got into the college of choice. So there is a motivational piece to talk about what mister Ringle said that we
really have to dive into to say what you know, we we have to push this more than it used to be that SAT was held higher by the college board and by colleges across the country. And I and I just wanted to put that in perspective because there there's there's a little bit of an uphill battle since COVID, since those COVID days about what the SAT holds for kids and families in terms of what what what it manages there to to turn in a score. So I will end with that and say thank you to the board of education, and we'll we'll get back to you on all of your questions regarding caring steps,
for the March 17 meeting. Just a point of note that mister, mister McDaniel will not be present at the seventeenth meeting. He will be, in in Washington DC for, something for for his professional career, but we'll be able to go through the presentation and hopefully have those questions answered, via myself or mister Murphy or doctor DeLuca. Thank you. Moving to agenda item 10, which is announcements. On March 5, we have a half day of school district wide with PD in the afternoon. On March 7,
we have a board of education closed meeting at 5PM here at Stony Creek High School. And then on March 17, following the closed session, we will have a board of education regular meeting at 6PM here in the Audit Auditorium. Without objection, we will adjourn at 08:15PM. Meeting is adjourned.