Welcome to the 12/11/2025 board meeting for the Rutherford County School System. We will be opening the meeting with a brief moment of silence or prayer and a pledge of allegiance to The United States flag. No one is required to participate or be in present for any of these and being in this portion of the meeting is completely voluntary. Miss Darby, you're in charge of this this evening. Dear heavenly father, Lord, we ask that you would be with us tonight. I wanna thank you for this crowd of people here. I am super excited to see all these beautiful faces with us this evening.
I ask that you would give everybody traveling mercies, and please, Lord, be with this board. Help us to make sound decisions. Help us to make decisions based on what is best for our students, our staff, and our community. And I just ask that you would be with us all during this holiday season. Help us to remember the reason for the season. It is in your name I pray. Amen. I have asked some special guests here this evening to lead us in the pledge. And something I'd like to say before I introduce the principal Thurman Francis is just it's so exciting to me when we find teachers who are stepping outside of the
box a little bit and their passion just shines through. And I really just wanted to shine a light on someone that I was introduced to as a teacher this year, who has really made a change in one of my children's lives. And so I just wanted to celebrate something that he's doing getting these kids excited and passionate. And Doctor. Gonyea? Okay. So we're gonna go ahead and have them do the pledge first. You'll notice the way that they're dressed. It'll make sense here in a few minutes. But the thing is it's it's really awesome to you know, in a world where education is constantly getting a bad publicity and stuff, it we have shining lights to
our teachers throughout the school. We know our teachers love students, and we know they love their content. Mister Shelton is the perfect storm. It It is amazing when kids get disappointed that he's not there at school. Most students will go, oh, good. We got a sub. They're like, oh, what do you mean mister Shelton's not here today? But he has taken the passion of science, and not only has he, gotten kids excited about it, he's inspired them to continue learning at higher levels. And you're gonna get to see a little glimpse of how he treats his classroom, and you'll understand the smiles on these kids' faces for their wonderful work that he does with them. I'm a proud principal and proud to have a met Thurman Francis with us.
This is a different standard, so it's different lyrics. Alright. Okay. Ready? Alright. While they're exiting, I'm just gonna share something with y'all. Mister Shelton sang to the students is, if you know the song, you know the science. And so he's trying to help them remember all that stuff by putting it to music. He wrote the lyrics to those two songs, and he's encouraging the kids to wear science merch. I think it's Mondays or like science merch Mondays. And I just think it's really cool that he's he's you can tell. He's got them really hyped up about science, and it's just really cool to see.
So I really love celebrating our amazing teachers. That was awesome. Thank you, miss Darby. And thank you Thurman Francis. That was that was exciting. Next we have the approval of the agenda. So moved. Second. Thank you. Thank you, mister Tibble. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next, we have the approval of the consent agenda. Move to approve. Thank you, mister Bond. Thank you, mister Vaught. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next up, a favorite segment, Rutherford proud.
Alright. Now we're going to move into our recognition section, which is our favorite of the night. First, we have our Rutherford County Schools teach now and grow your own teacher graduates. Rutherford County Schools is proud to celebrate nine paraprofessional apprentices who have earned the opportunity to complete their bachelor's degrees and obtain teacher licensure through partnerships with MTSU and University of Tennessee Southern's grow your own programs. Over the past two years, these dedicated individuals have transitioned from educational assistance to teachers of record, helping RCS meet critical staffing needs in elementary and special education classrooms.
In addition, Rutherford teach now is proud to recognize its fifth graduating cohort of 91 teacher candidates who have successfully completed an eighteen month 141 power program leading to initial licensure and endorsements in math, science, English, social studies, world languages. English is a second language in special education. Through their hard work and perseverance and dedication, students, these educators exemplify the mission of RCS, and we're honored to recognize their achievements before the board of education and district leaders with a token celebration. So two different things.
So, I finally thank you very much for being here. You do a great job, leading our programs, with those who teach now. And I think it's amazing when you see the number of completers that we have in both programs. But we are one of the largest licensing educator licensing programs. So not only are we running a school district, we're also running somewhat of a college of education here. And so kudos to you and your team. So all yours. Well, my name is Janet Flannery, coordinator of new teacher programs and recruitment. Rutherford County Schools is proud to recognize as an exceptional group of educators whose journey
has reflected both their commitment and perseverance. So tonight, we have to celebrate two groups of educators. Our first is, like you mentioned, nine paraprofessional apprentices who have completed their program, either at MTSU or UT Southern to go through Grow Your Own. They have either earned their initial bachelor's degree or a master's degree, and, we would like them to stand right now if you're in the Grow Your Own program and just recognize them. Additionally, we are honored, to recognize our fifth graduating cohort with 91 teacher candidates.
With this graduating cohort, we're up to 512 teachers that we have created or through the teach now pathway. So we're super excited about that. But these programs are more than just preparing our teachers, but creating legacies. And so we'd like to have our, teach now candidates, if you'll stand, if you are a part of the cohort that is graduating this December. So like I mentioned, we are trying to create a legacy with retention. I'm pleased to announce that we have, like, a 96.1%, three year retention rate for our teacher candidates that we produce.
So that's great job to our team. Great job to our mentors, to our administration, to our instructional coaches, and, of course, our EPP specialists that are here with us that help prepare, these candidates. But, again, the legacy, doesn't just stop there. It's for people like Carly Preston, who is our a first generation college graduate. So great job, Carley. Or also some of our former, Rutherford County School students who have actually returned to
serve their community. It's been truly humbling for me to see four more students of my own come now through, TeachNow, and that just kinda ages me a little bit. So I'm not really happy about that. But, we also have several children and spouses from of current teachers who are now giving back to the legacy of service that their family has started. And also, we have even a married couple in our program that has decided to choose this demanding journey together, and they are still happily married. So that is really a great thing. But these educators represent the future of Rutherford County Schools.
And on half behalf of our board, our district, our students, and our teach now faculty, we are, so thankful that they chose a profession with Rutherford County Schools, and we're proud to celebrate them tonight. So thank you guys for allowing us to be here. So thanks, Pete. We're going to take them and and party with them in another room. But And before you leave, I do think it's important. So just doing some quick math. We've got about 3,600 certified teachers in our district and to have 500 or so go through our program. So we're at about 14% of our overall teaching force has gone through this, program
of our own. And so to continue to have the success that we have with non traditional licensed educators goes to our program, the support that our principals or instructional coaches are giving them, because we're achieving the most, success that we have as a district. And so kudos to you all and our entire team. So Thank you guys. Yeah. It's a little loud. Coach, you cleaned up pretty well, buddy. Starts right.
I'm logged. While we're waiting, coach Creasy was named today as the coach of the year for March, a coach of the year for state of Tennessee And if it's better, if he's not coach here for the state of Tennessee for everybody, something's wrong because there's not any any better stuff. Mhmm. Coach Watson is, locally bred too.
He's one of these grow young, so he's one of the best assistant coaches around in a great teacher. So Alright. So it is my honor to congratulate the Open High School Patriots for capturing its ninth state title with a six a championship win over Ravenwood on Saturday, December 6. Patriots have won five state championships in the past six years. My wife's birthday is December 2 and the first Saturday of every December. I always tell her that we have to eat dinner with your family first because
every Saturday that I've been in this role, the first hour, we always spend it together, coach Creasy. And so it's always my my trip down to Chattanooga. But it was an honor to to watch you lead and watch our young men, present themselves and get yet another state championship. And it's always an honor being a Oakland High School graduate, to watch Oakland High School. And so coach Creasy, I'll turn over to you and we're proud of you for the program. If you wanna introduce some of your players and go from there. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Boos is here. That's good.
That's a good story. I do wanna thank the school board for the invite getting us here. I want to, thank our lord and savior for also getting us here. I think they play he played a great role in getting us here. And, we went through some long trials and tribulations, but came out the other side, victorious and we're really grateful for that. We have a lot of our seniors here, but I I do wanna point out two early graduates, before they go to college. Because of our school system allowing for early graduates, they're gonna be enrolled and playing in the SEC.
Once Joelle Wyatt Joelle, raise your hand. He's going to UT and Craig Tutt is, going to Ole Miss also in the SEC. They like to say it. I I'm really, impressed with everything that you've done for this growing county and for our school system and our players. And as a, act of gratitude, I want every one of us, including myself, to come guy and make sure that we shake everyone of your hands and tell you
thank you before we leave. Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations. It's amazing. Yes. It's amazing. And as they're coming up, we did not jinx it because we didn't publish it. Every year, we always do this in January, but our early graduates can never be here. So we may or may not have called last week and said, hey, can you be here on Thursday? But we're not publishing it. But we were confident that they were gonna win anyways. But we already had it lined up.
So glad they didn't make us look bad on that portion. So alright. Now we are going to turn it over to Bridget Vaughn, who we're going to recognize more Oakland, success. Our Oakland FFA national winners. Eight students from Oakland High School placed in the top 10 at the recent national FFA convention were recognized on stage for their accomplishments. Teacher and sponsor, Gina Stewart and was mentioned, miss Vaughn are gonna be sharing more information about our students. Good evening. I just wanted to start by thanking you all for inviting us to come here and celebrate the success of our students. I work alongside with five with four other co teachers, Gina Stewart, Caitlin Laliberte, James
Scott, and Seth Dearden. And we're, honored to recognize several outstanding Oakland FFA members who again, represented us at the national level, which is no easy feat. For these students to get to this point, they completed a research project or an SAE project or supervised agriculture experience that spanned over several years. They completed an application, research papers, and interviews to be selected as the state winners. Their paperwork was then sent on to the national level where they were determined to be national finalist, and they re interviewed to get their final national placings.
So a huge honor for them to make it across that national stage. So we'll start off with I'm just going to announce our national finalists and those that are here with me today. I'll give them an opportunity to explain their projects. Emma Gough was a national winner in social systems division three. Sarah Wheaton, national runner-up, plant systems division five. Christopher Gann, national runner-up, sheep production proficiency. Mary Redmond and Kennedy Lewis, national runner-up, social systems division four. Annabeth Cruz, environmental systems division five, fourth in the nation.
Madison Rich, plant systems division three, fifth in the nation. And Lydia Moore, food products and processing division three, seventh in the nation. I would like to, before I turn it over to my students, I would really like to thank, our principal, mister Marshall, and our entire administrative team at Oakland High School for being so supportive of our program, and really contributing to this overall success of our students. These recognitions reflect months and often years of research, data collection, and personal dedication. And the achievements that these students have won show not only academic excellence, but their
strong commitment to addressing real world problems in the agriculture industry. So without further ado, I'm gonna hand it over to some of our national finalists. My name is Emma Gough, and I won first place in my category, social systems division three, with my project on balancing innovation and regulation. With increasing legislation on alternative proteins, I sought to understand the consumer of opinion on regulating the production, purchasing, consumption, and misleading marketing of alternative proteins. I truly enjoyed participating in the National Agro Science Fair, and I hope to do
it again this year and win multiple opportunities. Hello. I am Sarah Wheaton from Oakland High School. And I got the opportunity to research floral preservative methods. And I tested four different preservative methods on the effects of flower longevity. And I really want to talk about the opportunities that this research project has opened up for me. As a senior in high school, I've started my college applications. And one thing that this has done for me is it really gave me a leg up in applying for honors college scholarships and general scholarship applications.
And I really hope that I have the opportunity to do another research project this year on microbial inoculants, degrading pesticide pollution. And hopefully, I get the same opportunities that I have this year. Good afternoon, and ever everyone. My name is Chris Gann, and I did a 100% placement sheet production proficiency. I started, my proficiency would have been back in third grade. Whenever I lived in the great state of Texas, we started running sheet. And then, we've just been running sheet ever since, I moved back to Tennessee.
And, my advisers came to me, and they gave me the opportunity to be able to, present that, what all we've done on a national level. And I was, competed and I was the national finalist. There's been countless skills I've learned and just overall work ethic, and I would just like to thank my advisors for, helping me be here. Thank you. I'd also like to mention we had several other national competitors that didn't make that top 10, but they were ranked either silver or gold national competitors, and those are
our food science team, our livestock evaluation team, and our prepared public speaker. So Oakland has had more national finalists and national competitors than any other program in the state of Tennessee. Oh. Thank you. And very very quickly because we're used to seeing winners here. Just to point out, there's over 9,000 schools that have FFA programs and over 1,000,000 FFA members. And these kids were in the top 10 or won their division. So it is a really big deal and we're extremely proud of the job that they've done and the time they put in for that.
I'd like to thank John Marshall for the job he's done. You know, he we talked before the meeting. I don't know how smart he is, but he does a good job in hiring coaches and and teachers. So he's doing a good job. So hired John Marshall? No. But we sort of set the stage. You know, we sort of stage. Okay. Yeah. We opened the doors. You know? Yeah. Yes, ma'am. But you know that I know that we have a really packed agenda tonight, but it still just amazes me that we have spent the first half hour recognizing these students on the have achieved on the local, the state, national levels.
And we have so many others that we could recognize. And we had to say that agenda is too packed. We'll do some more of those next month. But just incredible that we were able to do that. I'm happy to end this section of the agenda, celebrating some of our employees. And so, again, I wanna thank our partners at Sonic Drive Ins of Butler County, mister, Chris Spraggins and Alan Squires. Got it. Right? Mister Squeers, finally told me after eighteen months that I've been pronouncing his name wrong for a year and a half. So I'm trying to get it right every time now. It'll get it right so they're getting closer.
Okay. Alright. So our first tonight the way this works is that we take nominations from the public, of course, and from other employees. And then we review those nominations and and pick winners in one of five categories. Our first tonight is for, someone in our maintenance department here at the central office, Mason Lynch. Mister Lynch? And then, what I try to do is then embarrass them with by heaping on the praise from their nomination. So, mister Lynch, I'm gonna read to you your nomination. I've known Mason for several years and he previously worked for me. I still chat with him and can tell he loves his job, the organization, and
the work he does to make each school as best as it can be. He's a dedicated, honest, and hardworking man. He is a Christ follower and shows it with his generosity and helpful attitude. Even guys who drive trucks and fix things need recognition. Thanks. So and we agree. Next up is one of our bus drivers, Ben Hyers. I hope I pronounced your last name correctly. Did I say that right? Oh, it's important. You're Bus186. Right? Alright. Bus186. His nomination says, he has been the most amazing, consistent, and caring bus driver over the past few years. I was so nervous about putting my baby on the bus when we first moved
here five years ago. But from the first time we met mister Ben, we were at ease. He is patient with us and dedicated to his job and we love you, mister Ben. So that's from one of your parents. Next up is Emily. I'm sorry. Next up is miss Emily Crabie, who's a teacher at Blackman High School. Alright. Her nomination says, we are new to Blackman this year. And my daughter was nervous and she was complete but she completely felt welcomed by missus Crabie, first in soccer and then as her biology teacher. She's been amazing and I feel so much more at ease in all of this transition. Thanks to how much, she has thrived at Blackmon due to teachers like miss Crabie.
Congratulations. Alright. Our next is our administration category, mister Eaton from Popper Hill Elementary School. I'm sorry. Say that again. Doctor Eaton. My bad, doctor. Doctor Eaton has worked extremely hard to get Poplar Hill Elementary open and ready for kids this school year. Even after the opening of the school, he has made efforts to be present with issues as they occur. He has been open to suggestions from staff members. He is very supportive of his teachers, and he's really set a great community at Poplar Hill and making it great for all. So congratulations. Then our final one tonight, it's, miss Heather Stanley from Oakland High School, but she
notified me and said she was not gonna be able to make it tonight. But I'm still gonna read her nomination. I'm a first year teacher this year and I was very nervous about becoming a structured settings special education teacher, knowing that I would be working with many EAs who were old enough to be my parents. I was worried about working with these individuals and being able to ask them to do things while maintaining mutual respect. With that being said, miss Stanley has gone above and beyond her job. She is so incredibly helpful and does everything I ask with pride. So congratulations to her. And in case you didn't catch that, an EA who was so supportive of the
first year teacher. The teacher really respects that relationship. So that's a great too to see them mentoring both ways. So congratulations. We're gonna do a quick photo. I know we've got a busy agenda, and then we will move on. Thank you all. And thank you again, Sonny. Okay. Here we go. And we're doing a round up too of all the awards that have been given up this semester that's going on social media and the website this week. So there you go. Thank you all. I'd like to say a special thank you to the Sonic folks for supporting the program, and it's just great to have stakeholders to support everything we're doing.
So thank you all for everything. Next, we have two very special people tonight as our guest speaker. We have mister Wayne Blair and Sheila Bretton, and they're gonna presenting an overview of the Rutherford County Schools Foundation. And as both of them as former board chairs, I think they volunteered to help us with the zoning tonight. They should they should stay all night. We'll move some chairs over there. Yes. Watch us as we leave. Yeah. Good evening, mister director, madam chair, and, school board members. Thank you for this opportunity for former Rutherford County school board chair, Sheila Bratton and
myself, to share the progress that we've made in the formation of the five zero one c three nonprofit Rutherford County Schools Foundation. We would like to thank the Murfreesboro City Schools Foundation for sharing their bylaws. We use them as a template for hours, so it saved us hours of work. We'd also like to recognize and give a shout out to Emile Hassan, whose Nissan Business Education Partnership awarded over $3,000,000 in teacher mini grants from 1989 to 2019.
Our foundation, we we've got some big shoes to fill. To the best of my recollection, our efforts started around the February or maybe the March 1. And, there's been many hours of meetings, conversations, brainstorming thoughts, and a lot of effort in getting this foundation formed. Thanks also to Jeff Reed. It took a minute, a lot of paperwork to form a five zero c three.
I had no idea. So, mister Reed, again, thank you so much for your time and your expertise. My part of the presentation is, to introduce you to our foundation board, and miss Bratton will go over some timelines and procedures. At your seats are a copy of our logo and partner levels that she will address and our mission statement.
We thank Laura Smith who, basically developed the logo, and she did excellent job. And we also, are grateful to mister Evans, for developing the, RCS, Rutherford Schools at a glance, which is, very attractive. We believe this will help us get our foot in the door to a lot of businesses. If you don't mind, miss Bratton has, told me that I need to read the mission statement, and I think she's gonna read it again as well.
But, it's to provide resources and innovative support to Rutherford County Schools securing funding beyond budget to bridge gaps, inspire creativity, and expand learning opportunities for our students and educators. And the bottom line of that is to, like I said, enhance academic opportunities in the classroom, but the opportunity to stay out of our educators' pockets, which is, I think, if you've been an engaged parent, PTO president, or you've served on the school
board, that's been a concern of ours for for quite some time. So if I may, I'll introduce you to our 15 member board. Miss Bratton and I will serve as the chair. Miss Bratton is a former school board member, chair, central office coordinator, instructional coach, and an educator for forty eight years. I'm also a former school board member, chair, and a county commissioner and a small business owner. Current school board chair, Claire Maxwell, board members, Francis Rosales, and board member, Butch Vaughn,
and, board attorney Jeff Reed are also, presently on our foundation. Mister Vaughn, congratulations for being inducted into the Oakland, athletic, hall of fame. Quite the honor. Oakland just rings them out tonight, I guess. So Hello, everyone. Also, Yaz Hassan, son of Emile Hassan, He's the manning direct managing director of the Hassan Odom Group and possesses a wealth of of knowledge in regard to the OBEP.
Gordon Ferguson, longtime president and CEO of Ascension Saint Thomas Rutherford Hospital. He also has a history with the old BEP. Harry Gill, former teacher, coach, principal, former director of Rutherford County Schools, and former town manager for the town of Smyrna. Kelly Goostree, former teacher and RCS principal, twenty eight years in education. Jackie Williams, former teacher, assistant principal, and presently a realtor.
Laura Smith, marketing director for Smyrna Ready Mix. She will be critical in our marketing opportunities with the foundation. And doctor Jason Pollock, OB GYN, president of the Murfreesboro Medical Center. So did I miss two? I sure did. I apologize. Good thing you're up here. Also, Elena Burgess is our secretary and recently retired kindergarten teacher of twenty five years,
and Jenny Williams is our treasurer, and she's a former Town Of Smyrna council member and business owner. So we've got a really good, foundation, group right now and looking forward to hitting the road and, getting some funds so we can we can share with our teachers and our students. Again, thank you for letting us be here, and I'll turn it over to miss Brett. My doctor just told me I'm now four eleven, so I'm lowering the mic.
Thank you to the Rutherford County School Board for allowing us to come before you tonight with this endeavor, which has become so near and dear to the hearts of the foundation board. You have just heard from mister Blair the history of the establishment of this exciting foundation and what we have done to reach our goals up to now. Let's look towards the future. How are we planning to meet these important milestones? First, a brief timeline. December and January 2026, we will announce the establishment of the Rutherford County Schools Foundation
and its mission. We will begin publicity for the foundation in our schools and in our community. Board members will begin asking for donations in January after your approval of our SSO. Each board member has a list of donor prospects to begin the process. This stage will continue throughout the spring as we make sure our teachers know about the grant process. September 2026. Grant applications will be distributed to schools to be given to teachers. These applications are being developed by a small subcommittee within our board.
They will follow the basic template that we have received from the old Nissan Business Education Partnership known as the BEP. They will be due by the October for drug judging. Previously, grants were graded by the central office coordinator. How well I know. However, we're gonna do things a little differently. As before, these grants will be totally anonymous. The committee grading these applications will be comprised of both educators and community members appointed
by the foundation. There will be a rubric to grade them fairly. Again, I stress to you, these applications will be totally anonymous and the graders will be totally unaware of the teacher, the grade level, or the school that is receiving the grant. November 2026, grant recipients will be announced. December 2026, grant recipients will attend a foundation celebration honoring our winners. And in January 2027, fundraising will begin again with grant applications being reissued in September
2027. I would now like to direct your attention to the second handout we gave you. It's the one that's got the pale blue on it. These are levels that we have established for donation recognition. We'll just briefly look at those to establish some background for this. Again, at the top is our mission statement and I would like to repeat it. To provide resources and innovative support to Rutherford County Schools, securing funding beyond budget to bridge gaps, inspire creativity, and expand learning opportunities for students and educators.
Took us a while to come up with these. We wanted to do something that related to education, so we came up with some different levels and some different names for these levels. Any organization giving us $250,000 will be in the chancellor circle. That will be our top tier of donations. The Dean's Society will be any donation, $249.09 $9.09 to 100,000. The principal's guild, 50 to 99999.
An educator's circle, 25 to 49999. The mentors club, 10000 to 24999. Now we all know there's gonna be people who are gonna say, let me give you a $100 Let me give you a thousand dollars Something a little less than that, but we want to honor them also. So we have the honor roll and the Alumni Hall, 5,000 to 10,001 to 4999.
We wanna thank you for your attention tonight. We hope you will be as enthusiastic as we are to provide our amazing teachers the opportunity to receive needed monies for special classroom needs and projects. They certainly deserve all the accolades we can give them in our outstanding level five district. Question? Any questions or comments? Wow. We did a great job. You did. Good. Thank you. Thank you so much. We are very, very excited to have you. Anybody anybody likes to send checks, go ahead and send them in.
We'll find a way to put them in the bank. So Thank you for all your hard work. I will entertain a motion. A motion till after we do public comment. We have It comes back to the board items. I'm sorry. You're right. So sorry. I apologize. I didn't see the motion now. No. We're not. No. I didn't think we needed it. I was so excited and so eager to do that. I'm so sorry. It's not till January. January. What's next? I was like, what motion is it? I jumped to go. Okay. Next, we have public comments. And we have, 10, speakers this evening.
First, we have miss Rebecca Tran. Good evening, and thank you for letting me speak this evening. Over the next three minutes, my goal is to change your view in regard to rezoning from just seats to actual children. We have nine middle schoolers in our neighborhood, Gazebo Park. Gazebo Park is a subdivision that was built in the 1990s located behind McDonald's and Main Event. We are in the county, not the city. We do not have any new construction. Gazebo Park is located three miles from Blackman Middle and High School and 10 miles from the new Popham Hill Middle School.
Developments happening around us have caused us to lose our school choices. My son is a member of the Blackman Castmasters Fishing Club. He loves helping other middle schoolers become confident in their fishing abilities. A mother and a teacher who decided to send her son to Blackman so he would be in a stable school environment for three years. Ashley, who was already spread thin when she had a daughter at Brown's Chapel and a daughter at Blackman Middle gets to experience being spread thin again with this rezoning. Roxanne is concerned about putting her autistic high schooler on the bus since she cannot
get her other child to middle school 10 miles away from our home and get to work on time. Charice who is concerned about her daughter disruptions in education and social relationships that come from starting a new school. I am requesting that the area of Gazebo Park be I'm requesting that the that the area that Gazebo Park is located in be dual zoned or have 10 seats are added to the 10 open seats at black the middle to increase the chance that these nine middle schoolers will be able to remain in their current school. We have 150 homes and 110 signatures validating our children's desire to stay in their
school. If you can make room for the possibility of 400 middle schoolers being grandfathered so they can stay their eighth grade year, I find it hard to believe you can't make room for the possibility of nine more students. Maybe if you would stop looking at us as a seat and instead as children, then maybe being more creative in your zoning approaches could be a possibility. Any other day I would be happy to have my child go to the newest middle school seeing the shocking reaction of the children in my neighborhood after being blindsided by this rezoning is what led me on this path. None of us are blind to the enormous amounts of growth that are going on in Rutherford County.
I asked the board, why aren't you seeing the need to communicate that resuming is crucial to parents? Why aren't you being proactive in your approaches? Parents are the ones that are left with drying the tears of our children when they find out they're being resound. Parents are the ones with transportation disruptions when all along we thought Blackman was our permanent home. I ask that you be productive in these matters and do better when we know that there are more changes to come. Announcing these changes less than thirty days ago and then pushing through a vote after we assumed we were staying at our schools is misleading to all parents of Rutherford County. I ensure you that our fight does not stop here.
Addressing the city regarding developments that is stressing our resources will be our next stop. We ask that you consider these resolutions as they are presented to you as not just seats, but children. Thank you. Next, we have miss Jill Bottoms. Gotta raise this up. Good evening, everybody. Thank you for letting me speak tonight. I am Jill Bottoms. I am the parent of Joshua Ortman. He goes to Rockvale Middle. He's a seventh grader and a rising eighth grader. And I am here on his behalf. He wrote a little note.
I'm gonna read that real quickly. He was too nervous to come tonight, so I am reading this on his behalf. So he said, I wanna stay at Rockvale for my last year. I have made so many friends this year and have done so much that I just wanna stay and finish my last year at Rockvale. If I switch schools, I would not know what to do, and it would seriously damage my mental health to leave Rockvale behind. I have done and accomplished so much, and I feel truly myself when I am at Rockvale. So I really hope I can stay. So I don't wanna get emotional with that, but he had a rough transition going
into sixth grade. Sixth grade was rough coming from elementary school. And he's finally getting in his groove in seventh grade in the fear of ripping him to a brand new school, then to go to high school, which is another big change. So this is my final plea to grandfather the rising eighth graders to stay at their current school with the notion, of course, that parents provide transportation and all of those kind of things. There are so many reasons why, but one is kind of what Joshua mentioned, mental
health, stability, consistency. The it's such a vulnerable age. I was thinking myself, close your eyes. Remember when you were walking down the halls of middle school, you don't know who you are, who your friends are gonna be, where you fit in, And kind of right through the middle of middle school, you start to feel like, okay. You know, I'm joining this club. I'm on this team. And he's on the swim team. He's on the Rockville swim team for the second year varsity, and it's his dream to make regionals this year and to finish at Rockville. Not just to swim for Rockville, but to be part of Rockville.
And from a personal note, we are dealing with stuff at home. My husband is battling cancer right now. My son has ADHD. He has anxiety. So sometimes school is that only stable force where you have friends, you have an outlet, you have sports. So from that standpoint, I am just pleading that we can at least give these rising eighth graders that stability for one year before they transition into high school, which we know is another another big change. And I know you guys have the power to to make that vote tonight, and
I think it would just show compassion, that human side of things. And also, we did it for the high schoolers for, you know, the rezoning. And I think we can do that for these middle schoolers to allow that last year to to be a good one of comfort and not anxiety. So thank you guys tonight. Thank you. Next, we have miss Sierra Gamble. Good evening. My name is Sierra Gamble, and I'm a resident and a parent who lives just over a mile from Stewarts Creek Elementary in Cedar neighborhood. This past May, my husband and I were out for a walk in our neighborhood
with our daughter when we saw cars lining the streets of our neighborhood. It was more cars than I'd ever seen for a typical house party, so I was naturally curious. And we finally came to realize that people were actually parking in our neighborhood and walking to the graduation at Stewart's Creek. And that's how close our neighborhood is to Stewart's Creek Elementary, Middle and High. I understand that the area route around Stewarts Creek is growing. New homes are popping up. The growth is beyond your control. But what is in your control is ensuring that the zoning decisions made tonight are
based on sound logistics and real financial impact. Tonight, I'm asking you to vote no on concept one, because the financial and transportation analysis has not been completed. And the numbers we do have are concerning. I'm asking you to support concept two or go back to the drawing board to reduce overcrowding at Stewart's Creek Elementary. As we all know, funding is not abundant to our school system and as a board, I know you all understand that how every single decision that it must be made in a manner that spends the money that we do have wisely. When I requested the financial comparison between concept one and concept two
I was told that it doesn't exist yet. And this means that the board is being asked to make a vote on a major costly chain costly change affecting elementary age children without the full picture. So let's look at the numbers that we do know. Under concept one, the average student's travel distance jumps from one and a half miles to five and a half miles, which is a 266% increase in transportation costs per student. Under concept two, the average student's travel distance drops from 10 miles to 8.2, an 18% reduction. So concept one increases costs dramatically, while concept two actually reduces them.
The idea of busing our kids out of their community into a different one to go to school and kids further south in Smyrna into our community to go to school simply just doesn't make sense. My family, like many, bought our home in this school zone, with this school zone in mind, but I'm not asking for a decision tonight based on emotion. I'm asking for a decision based on data. Please vote against concept one and ensure we make the best long term decision for our kids, our taxpayers, and for our schools. Thank you all. Thank you. Next, we have miss Lindsay Hebden. Good evening, members of the board.
Thank you for allowing me to speak again tonight. My name is Lindsay Hebden, and I am here in support of concept two for the elementary rezoning. While I truly understand that rezoning is never easy and that the decisions are difficult for all parties involved, we must ensure that taking care of our students is our number one priority. In voting for concept two, you will be providing many benefits to the current students at Stewarts Creek Elementary. First and foremost, you will be protecting and providing stability to current students, some of which were just rezoned this school year by allowing them to stay at Stewarts Creek Elementary.
Providing our students with consistency is critical for their development as it helps build a solid foundation for the rest of their school days. This concept also addresses future concerns and growth as it implements a zoning structure that will send new students to a different school and allow those families to be aware of and plan for this change. I would also like to see further discussion on implementing an enrollment cap as it would help prevent the builders from using our school zone as a selling feature and hopefully slow some of the growth in our area. Second, you will help maintain a positive community environment for those of us located within
such close proximity to the school. We have specifically chosen to live within a mere mile or mile and a half of the school to create our lives in this community. This is a value that is important to all of us as you may have seen via our recent petition. As of earlier today, over 350 people have signed our petition in support of our kids staying at Stewarts Creek Elementary. Not to mention, we also have two current PTO board members that live in our neighborhood and support our school every day. Third, you will help prevent additional travel time and expenses for both students and parents. This includes bus transit times to and from school, facilitating drop off for families who
have students in multiple schools, and also allowing our students to be involved in sports and extracurricular activities. Lastly, you will be protecting investments that families have made to provide their children the ability to attend Stewarts Creek Elementary and create an educational community that we all call home. We have also heard your suggestions over the last weeks about addressing the root cause of this dilemma. I know that myself and many other individuals have already been in contact with our mayor, our town council, and our county commissioner. We are committed to help with addressing the overdevelopment in our committee in our community
in hopes that these situations can improve moving forward. Please help keep our close knit community of Cedar Hills at Stewards Creek Elementary by voting for concept two this evening. Thank you. Next, we have miss Diana Osborne. Good evening members of the board and the school community. As we come to the close of another calendar year, I just wanted to come and join together to take a minute to consider where we are. December brings with it reflection, gratitude, and hope. And in our public schools, these themes are alive and well every day, through the
work of dedicated educators and the students whom they serve. Tonight on behalf of the associate associations educators, I wanna begin with gratitude. I wanna say thank you for the work you do, the dedicated, efforts you give every day to listen and hear and for the steady leadership you provide. For the difficult decisions and for the long hours you spend considering all the things we ask of you. This year has brought challenges that none of us anticipated and yet our schools remain
places of stability and possibility for Rutherford County's children. And that happens specifically because of everyone around this room, board members, administrators, teachers, support staff, families who choose day after day to put students first. And as we look toward the new year, I wanna reaffirm what educators in this district are committed to. Committed to strong relationships with students and families, committed to respect for the expertise of teachers and support professionals, committed to ensuring that classrooms have the resources they need, and
also building the kind of work environment that that retains the excellent staff that our students deserve. We are also not just these are not talking points only. They're the building blocks of the strong schools that our community has come to expect from Rutherford County. These building blocks need to be reinforced especially now. I'm 7% there apparently. Our educators are doing extraordinary work, but they are stretched thin. Many navigating increasing responsibilities with fewer hands to share the load. As you consider the decisions ahead in including budgets, staffing, student supports, instructional priorities, We
ask that you continue to center the voices of the people doing the daily work with students. When educators are supported, students thrive. When educator well-being is prioritized, student success follows. December is also a month of anticipation. Students will soon return, even though they're not gone yet, from winter break with new energy and new needs, and the choices we make now set the tone for the second half of the school year. Let's use this moment to recommit ourselves to partnership, ongoing partnership, and invite educators to the table early, listen to their expertise, collaborate with them on solutions, continue to collaborate
because every lasting improvement in a school begins with the people inside it And as we look ahead to a new year, our shared opportunity is this, to invest in educators, to trust their professional judgment, and to strengthen the foundation that makes learning possible. Together, we ensure that every classroom is a place where students feel valued, supported and challenged and where educators feel the same. From all of those who serve and work in public schools, we wish you a peaceful holiday season and a hopeful start to the year ahead. Thank you. Next, we have miss Sarah Harper.
Hello. My name is Sarah Harper, and I have two children who attend Walter Hill School. I'm not talking about rezoning, just so there's no confusion. My youngest son attends the VPK program with an IEP. My oldest also attended this program with an IEP as well. Since that time, a change has been made. Now students with an IEP are not allowed to attend on Wednesdays. When I inquired about this, I was told that teachers cannot attend meetings and receive trainings when they have children with disabilities in their classrooms.
Which seems odd considering kindergarten and up students with IEPs get to attend on Wednesdays. My son does not understand why he cannot attend on Wednesdays, but he is smart enough to realize he is being left out. He knows his older sister goes to school on Wednesdays and that his typical peers also attend. But, he doesn't know why he is being left out. He becomes very upset about this as he wants to be in school. He is being denied 20% of his education only because he has an IEP with
an identified disability. From my perspective, this seems very unfair to my son and students like him. Having an IEP is supposed to help you receive an education with accommodations or goals for your disability. How is receiving 20% less of an education accomplishing any goal? They are also losing out on what their peers are learning on those Wednesdays. There is no makeup time for that 20% of education that is lost. They just are not taught. I hope you can see from a parent's perspective how frustrating it can be when
your child is not allowed to attend school one day a week, while typical peers are. When I further inquired why it is only IEP students and not typical students as well who do not attend on Wednesdays, I was told that IEP students can ride the bus, as if bus transportation somehow makes up for that 20% loss in education. Not allowing IEP students to attend on Wednesdays is preventing children with disabilities full access to their education. If you as a board did not know this information before, you do now.
And I urge you to please look into this matter and please resolve this issue so all students can attend on Wednesdays. These children deserve to be in school just as much as their typical peers. And since I have a few more seconds, I'd like to say, I'm a widow and single mom to two special needs children. It's a hard job, but it's my job to advocate for them. And when there's something amiss, I need to stand up and say something. This wasn't something that went on before. This is new and it's not right. They should be attending school with their typical peers.
And I'd like to leave this with my contact information with the board so that I can be contacted so we can further discuss this and come up with a solution together. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker is Thomas Atwood. Good evening, members of the board, and thank you for giving me the chance to speak. Tonight, I'm here not to debate maps or projections or long range plans. I'm here to talk about children, our children, and the very real human impact this rezoning decision will have on them. Our seventh graders have finally found their footing in middle school.
They've built friendships, meaningful connections with teachers, and a sense of belonging that does not come easily at this age. Middle school is already in an emotionally challenging and vulnerable stage. These students are navigating who they are and they rely heavily on the stability of the environment they've grown comfortable in. To uproot them now for a single year only to uproot them again when they move on to high school serves no developmental or academic purpose. It does not support their mental well-being, their confidence, or their progress.
In fact, it risk undoing the growth they've worked so hard to achieve. We also want to acknowledge, something important. Some families may prefer to move their children to Popper Hill, and they should absolutely have that choice. But just as their preference deserves respect, our children deserve the option to remain where they built their foundation. A one size fits all solution simply doesn't reflect the diverse needs and circumstances of our community. We recognize the district's logistical challenges. We understand the pressures of planning and capacity, but the needs of a system should
never outweigh the immediate needs of the children within it. And in this moment, these students need stability, not another transition. These students are deeply invested in their sports teams, their clubs, their fine arts programs, and leadership roles. Many have just found their stride, earning spots on teams, discovering passions, connecting with mentors, forcing them into a brand new school with brand new social dynamics and expectations, only to do it again next year in high school was unnecessary and harmful.
Grandfathering this single class of seventh graders is not just reasonable. It's compassionate, responsible, and aligned with child centered decision making. It provides continuity during a critical developmental year and avoids needless disruption. We're not here to oppose Poplar Hill Middle School. It will no doubt become a wonderful community, but new students will have time to prepare for that transition. Our seventh graders do not. Taking away their final year of middle school in the environment where they've worked to succeed feels unfair and avoidable.
So I ask you, please, choose the option that truly puts kids first. Allow our seventh graders to be grandfathered into their existing schools and finish middle school with dignity, stability, and the support systems they've earned. Thank you for your time and for remembering that your decisions echo through the lives of real children who trust us Thank you. And protect their well-being. Thank you. Thank you. Next, we have Courtney Holshue. Hope I pronounced that correctly. Hello. Good evening. My name is Courtney Holshue, and I'm a mom of two girls in the district,
one at Walter Hill Elementary and one at Segal Middle School. I'm here tonight because our neighborhood and both of their schools are included in the rezoning proposal, And I'd like to request that the existing proposal be adjusted to allow current fourth and seventh graders to finish their last year at their schools before the new zoning takes effect. My 10 year old has been at Walter Hill since kindergarten. Next year is supposed to be her big fifth grade year, the year she gets to be the oldest in the school. Instead, she would be moved to Wilson for just that one year, only to move
again the following year to transition to middle school. My older daughter is in seventh grade. Her sixth grade year, her first year of middle school, was very hard on her and on us as her parents. It took that entire year for her to adjust socially and academically. This year has been a million times better, and she's finally settled and thriving. Moving her to Oakland for just one year, especially right before she starts at Segal High, feels like a disruption that could set her back again. I'm not asking the board to undo the whole rezoning plan.
I understand why the district needs to make changes. I'm simply asking that the students who are already at the finish line, the rising fifth and eighth graders, be allowed to finish where they spent their entire school experience or their recent school experience. Grandfathering these two grades is a small change that I expect would make a huge difference for many families. Thank you for listening, and thank you for everything you do for our schools. Thank you. We have Laura Montanez Miller. Good evening, and thank you for listening to me again. My name is Laura Miller, and I wanna speak about the very real impacts that
this rezoning would have on children and families, specifically in the Cedar Hills neighborhood. A forty five plus minute bus ride each way is not a small inconvenience for an elementary child. It affects their sleep, their focus, their behavior, and their ability to learn. Last year, when my kids went to Brown's Chapel Elementary, they woke up before sunrise and came home nearly an hour after dismissal, exhausted before the evening even began. By the time we handled homework, dinner, and bedtime, there was no time left for them to just be kids. Those long rides also take away precious family time.
Time for rest, play, and connecting with the friends in their own neighborhood. It disconnects children from the community that they live in and they did feel disconnected last year. And this impact reaches beyond our homes. Parent involvement is one of the strongest supports that a school can have. In the Cedar Hills alone, three moms are sorry. Two moms currently serve on the Stewart's Creek PTO. They volunteer weekly, support teachers, organize events, and strengthen the culture of the school. If we're rezoned back to Brown's Chapel, that involvement disappears overnight. We simply cannot volunteer twenty minutes away with long bus schedules and younger children at
home. This isn't just shifting boundaries. It's removing active, committed parents from a school that depends on them. Our neighborhood intentionally built our homes near Stewards Creek so that our kids could attend the school closest to where they live. We accepted a very difficult year last year at Brown's Chapel because we were told it was temporary. Our children did their part, and they endured it with the promise of stability this year. And what is especially hard is this, we are already here. Our homes are built. Our children are enrolled. We're already part of this community. Yet, we're being asked to step aside step aside for families whose homes aren't even
built yet. Families who may not may or may not move in for years. While the ones living this reality right now are the ones being displaced. There is also a strategic benefit to keeping zones as they are. If Stewards Creek enrollment is capped with its current neighborhoods, current zoning, and all new construction is directed to Brown's Chapel, builders can no longer advertise their developments as being zoned for Stewarts Creek. That removes a major selling point and could slow down the influx of young families that is contributing to the overcrowding in the first place.
The board gains leverage and protects families that are already here. I'm asking you to please choose the children who have already endured this hardship. Choose the parents who are already volunteering and choose the families who have already lived in the school and in this community. If you must choose tonight, please choose concept two. But I do ask you to reconsider the zoning altogether. Thank you. Thank you. And lastly, we have reverend Joy Warren. Good evening. My name is Reverend Joy Warren. I'm a local pastor and parent of children who graduated from Rutherford County Schools.
I volunteer with a community based organization, Public School Strong. We advocate for honest, equitable, fully funded, and safe public schools. I love community building. And one thing I've learned during my time as a pastor and organizer of people is that it's very important, beautiful, and rich to include the voices of everyone in the community, especially if you're going to be making decisions that impact them. For the past twelve years, I have served on the board of national farmworker ministry.
I visit communities around the country where farm workers are hard at work planting and harvesting the food that we eat. They are often left out of labor protections and other human rights that any of us think we ought to have. And yet, if they do not do their vital work, we would starve. I have listened to their stories and heard about times they had agreements with their employers regarding work conditions that were not upheld. The workers had no recourse and some suffered dire consequences including death.
In other places, the agreements were upheld and all the parties benefited. Sexual abuse was eliminated. Fear of retaliation for reporting violations eliminated. Approvements to processes occurred. In other places, there were no agreements at all. Just the continual using up and dehumanization of workers as parts of a machine that are broken, discarded, and replaced. And then we purchase that food at a discount, ignorant of the human cost. We are blessed with amazing teachers and staff in Rutherford County.
They are busy working and reworking lesson plans and trying to learn new methods and adapt to change at lightning speed. They have creative and wonderful ideas about education and life together in the workplace. Their voices are essential to the district's vision. Collaborative culture, successful students, empowered educators, proactive planning. I hope we will never stop inviting their participation when decisions are made that impact them and their classrooms. Thank you all for all that you do to collaborate with all the stakeholders in
Rutherford County Schools. Thank you. That's the end of public comment and now we move on to board items. Alright. You all heard from the Rutherford County Schools Foundation. So this first item is board recognition of the Rutherford County Schools Foundation as an RCS school support organization. Rutherford County Schools Foundation has been created to provide a charitable foundation to support projects and programs benefiting the Rutherford County School System and its students. Foundation will provide a mechanism to raise significant contributions for projects beyond what's capable of being funded through tax revenues. The foundation will involve the participation of local businesses and business leaders who will seek
charitable contributions. Per RCS board policy 2.404, only a group organization that has cooperative agreement with the board may use the name or logo of the school district to solicit or raise money, materials, property, security services, or other things of value. The Rutherford County Schools Foundation has provided some information requested from the board's written cooperative agreement to be recognized as an RCS SSO. It is noted that this SSO has not received an IRS determination letter to be recognized as a five zero one c three nonprofit entity that's in compliance with the BOE written cooperative agreement.
The IRS letter would allow the SSO to operate out of a checking account that's separate from the Rutherford County Schools district funds. Until the letter of determination received, the SSO will utilize Rutherford County Schools district funds for all of its financial activities and be subject to the BOE financial policies and procedures. Also, approval is contingent upon the organization providing a detailed financial policy, list of officers of titles, training acknowledge it, and annual cooperative agreement, all of which the board attend board attorney has been notified. Recommended motion is to approve. Miss Vasquez? Yes, mister Rosales. I move to approve. Second. Thank you. Thank you, miss Sharp.
It's, this is off to a really good start. These are some really good board members we have on our, in in civic leaders in our community. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next. Alright. Next, we have elementary school rezoning. Recommended motion is to adopt either concept one or concept two excluding the Walter Hill and Wilson areas. Thank you. Motion. Madam chair. Yes. I'd like to make a motion to cap Stewarts Creek Elementary School, effective January 1, and to move to adopt concept two for anyone coming into the district after that
date and exclude the Walter Hill and Wilson areas. Second. We have a motion on the floor. Miss Maxwell? Yes, miss Rosales. Doug Sullivan, if we cap, Sewers Creek Elementary School, it's going to impact the zone that is going to be approved for it to be at Source Creek. Correct? I would need a clarifying comment first from miss Darby. Are you, you talk about January 1 in the motion and concept two after that date. Does that include grandfathering all current students?
Meaning anyone that is currently at the school can stay. Anyone moving into the district after 01/01/2026 would go to brunch. Okay. It would not impact the zone, but the school would probably stay overcrowded. And so I I don't know a solution at that point. Okay. We have a motion and we have a second. Well, I will say to the board that I spoke to the principal and I wanna be fair with families, but she is concerned about the overcrowding. Yeah. Because even last week, they had 10 kids that came and were registered.
So when does the new concept map begin? If we if everyone that's here stays 01/01/2022. Right. So if you move into the Stewarts Creek zone after Jan after 12/31/2025, you would then have to go to Brown's Chapel if you are in the Stewarts Creek zone. So in other words, we don't need to vote for concept map for the org because I'm getting a little confused here. Kindergarten classes, you would have concept two for kindergarten classes because every year your kindergarten
class is gonna move to first grade. So your incoming kindergarteners would be from concept two. I think I'm confused. So if you're in concept one, and you're come and you're moving into the area, and we're capping it, are they going to Seward's Creek? Are they going to Bounce Chapel? My motion doesn't have concept one in it. I mean concept two. If you're Could I ask you both to Could I ask you both to recognize the chair first before you start talking? I apologize. I apologize. I just miss Maxwell. Yes. Miss Rosellas.
I'm just very confused about the capping because here's how I interpret it. The way I interpret it is that if we are capping, if we're voting for concept two and we're capping, that's for kids are coming into the area in concept one. So that means in concept one, they're not going to be going into Sewer's Creek because we we're voting in favor of zoning concept one.
So anyone that moves in that concept will be moved to Brown's Chapel. That's how I interpret it. Mister mister Vaughn, I put has his hand up. Yeah. You know, I'm not gonna support anything. It's not fair to everybody. We let one school do that, then it's not fair to other schools that wanna do the same thing and can't. So, you know, my recommendation is to approve the concept too without all the capping
and just leave it as is. I think that's like I said, I can't be supporting anything. It's not fair to every school. We let some do it and not let others. It's just totally unfair. Mister Arby and then mister Tidwell. He had his hand on the floor. I did so. Yes. So couple of things here is is I understand where if I'm getting the motion correct here, we're gonna abide by concept two for the incoming kindergartners. But everyone else would be capped at enrollment, and that would last for four years.
Basically, fifth year, I guess, it would be each year you have kindergarten class coming in. They'd all fall under concept two. The issue that I have with that is that doesn't solve the issue today. I'd like it. This is the hybrid of what I would like to see as far as capping enrollment. But I would like to fix the problem and then cap enrollment. So I'm a little bit different on the outcome here. I would I would still like to move forward with concept two. I wouldn't like to start the enrollment cap currently because of the numbers of where
we're at. I I think the the policy or the suggestions been put forth by RSP, based on the data. It would give us a little bit more breathing room, and then we can start talking about caps and stuff. I'm clear clearly, I brought it up at the work session. I am for capping some enroll. I'm for the there's a lady who spoke, miss Miller tonight. I am for the ideas of of capping off some of the enrollment when we reach certain levels. I think we have to put pressure on the developments that are happening around the school. All for that. My take on it is a little bit different in this this particular scenario, and
that I think we should address it, give give some, breathing room to Stewarts Creek, and then look at the cap at a later point if we continue to see the trends. Now, miss Darby. I wanna remind everybody that this board told parents they had to go to Brown's Chapel for one year, and then they could come back to the zone. And now you're talking about sending them back again. So you're talking about taking some kids and yanking them back and forth two, three times within three or four years.
That does not provide stability, it is not in the best interest of those students. I think every parent that got up and spoke about the Stewart's Creek area talked about the unfairness of making them move to accommodate room for the new people coming in. I don't know that there is a fix for this. Stewart's Creek has been overcrowded, I think, almost as long as it's been there probably. The elementary school, I think worse than the other two. RSP said we would be back at this table again in two years to rezone
it again. So there is a desperate need for another elementary school in that area. And until we get there, I think the honorable thing to do and the in the best interest of our students, if if the community is okay with the school where it is now capacity wise, let them stay there and let the new people take up the spots at Brown's Chapel. And just to clarify, it's concept two that I was making the motion for not
concept one, and it was anyone moving into the Stewarts Creek zone effective 01/01/2026 would have to go to Brown's Chapel. Incoming kindergarten classes would fall into concept two. Okay. Miss Yes. Doctor Sullivan. Would transportation be provided with the cap? For the current students? For anybody that moves after January 1 when we To Brown's Chapel? Yes. I think we'd have to. I think that's what we did before. It was. That's an unbudgeted expense, so everyone just needs to be aware of that.
We did in the pre in the past, but this was non budgeted expense. Second is siblings. So we're always gonna run across the siblings. What are we gonna do with siblings? I would just need direction. Miss Maxwell? Yes. Can I just say something? I wanna be fair with everyone. But I will tell you what happened the year that we capped Brown's Chapel. My daughter was zoned in Brown's Chapel. And because we took all the kids from Sewers Creek, it was overcrowded. And guess what? As her first year in kindergarten at Brown's Chapel, I didn't get to to her
lunches because they didn't have room for them in the cafeteria. There was a lot of things that I was I did with my other three kids when they're in different grade levels that we weren't able to do at Brown Chapel because it was so overcrowded that all they were doing is just feeding lunches with the cap. So if we're going to do something, I'm not in favor of capping. I'm just gonna be honest with you because of the challenge that I that I struggle with and saw when it moved to, when it moved to Brown's Chapel.
So if we're going to do this, I I I do not like back to back rezoning at all because it's not fair to the families that saw a map thinking this is where they're gonna stay and the school was still, overcrowded. So we're gonna do a rezoning, then I wanted to a a solution and one of the concept maps that will fix it for the four years. So I'm leaning towards moving towards adoption concept two with no cap at Stewards Creek. Mister Vaughn. Can I make a motion on a motion?
No. We have a motion on the floor. We could discuss it. Oh, you could Can I amend it? I'd like to amend it till we just go prove to, go to option concept two without cap it. That's my modification. Okay. That's a change in motion. Whatever it is. Well, let's let's vote on miss Darby's motion first. Okay. And then you're welcome to make another motion. Okay. Yes, miss Sharp. So if we don't cap enrollment at Stewarts Creek, it's just gonna exasperate the overcrowdedness. Right? So I mean because we're we're literally in they just miss Rose Alice just said,
they enrolled 10 people. We're literally still enrolling students up until the last day. I guess it'll be the nineteenth is the last day. We're so today's the eleventh. We got to the nineteenth to enroll more students. Why would we do that? Why would we let them stay when people were already crowded? We we have to cap enrollment. It doesn't make sense to continue to allow the students to come there. Yes, mister Vaughn. Just I want a little clarification. I'm trying to look at the difference between one and two. You've you've worked with Rob a lot closer than I have.
So if if I'm reading Stewarts Creek right, which seems to be the primary focus, I think all of us concur with that statement, that under concept one, you you create more breathing room than you do with concept two, yet you upset more parents. Mhmm. So if we if we go with concept one, you rip the Band Aid off, so to speak, but you're better off five years down the road four years down
the road. If I'm reading that correct, there's about a 50 student difference. Correct. Right? So if you go with concept two, there's 50 less people that are upset, I guess, if I'm reading this correctly. And and you assume I have to assume there's you know, maybe they've got two kids. So I I in my view, concept two is kind of the compromise of really utilizing space and needs right now. Am am I interpreting that correctly? Not wanting to put words in your mouth, but that's how I I'm just a
numbers guy. Right? You're right. And I think that is I just want the board to be aware for for grandfathering. I definitely respect where Starvey is coming from. I'm very concerned we'll be right back here again next year. Our projected with grandfathering next year is at November. And then the next is 12/31, December, 1336. Outside of providing more portables there. Okay. I don't have another option. Yeah. Right. That's I just want I just need guidance. If that's what we wanna do with portables, we're about to list 40, and so I need to move them. Yeah. I just wanna make sure I'm reading the numbers the way everybody else is reading
the numbers, and I've never not lived through a capping before. So anyway, thank you for that. Yes, mister Tidwell. Alright. I'm looking at Concept 2 here. And in Stearts Creek, if we go with Concept 2, it doesn't look like it's gonna be overcrowded, 27, 28. 28, 29, it's it's over capacity by about ten, and then, obviously, it starts moving up from there. But that's 2929, '30 '20 I'm sorry. Excuse me. Twenty twenty nine twenty twenty thirty.
2030, east school year, that particular year, we would hopefully have something on the ground that's, you know, four years out. Obviously, we've had a lot of conversations about middle schools, high schools, and all these different things in the funds in the county, and I understand that. But that would kinda be more idealistic in the way and it relieves it does something now. So that's still where I'm at. Okay. I've got one Yes, mister doctor Sullivan. I think one thing just to keep in mind, this does not include employees on exemption. So the number very well could be just a little bit higher.
We had 20 something we discussed. So be aware of that. We also have more school choice options with our charter schools in the Smyrna area with some more openings. So looking out four to five years, there's there's a couple options out there that I'm just we just don't know yet. Could you read miss Darby's motion? And we're gonna go ahead and vote. Roll call vote on miss Darby's motion. Okay. The motion is to cap Stewarts Creek Elementary School beginning 01/01/2026, adopting concept two to any student moving into the zone after 01/01/2026, to Brown Chapel Elementary.
Correct. Alright. Missus Darby? Yes. Missus Rosales? No. Mister Vaught? No. Mister Vaughn? No. Mister Tidwell? No. Miss Sharp? Yes. Missus Maxwell? No. Motion fails. Now we will entertain a new motion. I'd like to make a new motion. We approve concept two. Second. Thank you, miss Rosales. Thank you, mister Vaughn. Any comments or question? If you'll read the motion. Okay. Motion to approve concept two. Miss Sharp? Yes. Mister Vaught? Yes. Missus Rosales? Yes.
Mister Vaughn? Yes. Mister Tidwell? Yes. Missus Darby? Yes. Missus Maxwell? Yes. Unanimous. Next, we move to middle school rezoning. Wait a minute. Quick question. Point of clarification. That did exempt, Walter Hill. Right? Correct? Yes. Okay. Sorry. Miss Maxwell, have we moved to the middle? Was there was there anything else around capping or anything else with Stewart's Creek currently before we move on? I just wanna make sure. No. I would like that for that to be a discussion at some point so that we can look at the beginning of the year. I'd like to seriously consider that, but I'm not gonna make one at this moment.
Okay. Thank you. Can we clarify with the motion just to make sure it excludes Walter Hill and Wilson? I think that's safe to writing. So is everyone okay with that? I think that's Yes. Yes. Yes. The recommendation that was on there. Perfect. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Alright. Next, we get to middle school rezoning recommended motions to adopt concept two as presented and allow current seventh graders. So next year's eighth graders to be grand grandfathered into their current middle school with parents, guardians providing transportation. To qualify for the grandfather option, parents or guardians must submit the RCS form by
Friday, 01/16/2026. We're meeting tomorrow. We'll have that launch ready to go ASAP. Move to approve. Wait. Miss miss Maxwell. Miss Maxwell, I would like to make a motion to move to approve concept two while grandfathering in current seventh graders, rising eighth graders, within these parameters to qualify for the grandfather option by January 16. Second, miss Maxwell. I would like to make an amendment to the motion. And to the amendment, I wanna include a way for us to also expand on
choice seats for our students that are in that zone, but that will impact all the seats, all of the everyone in the school will have more choice seats. Right now we have 10 choice seats. I would like to add more choice seats into the, car in 10 seats because to be fair, we did these, constant maps to use in advance. A lot of parents were confused about what that meant, that decision two years ago. None of them did not capture and realize that we were going to revisit this
nine months prior to rezoning. And their parents had thought they were gonna be in that zone. And now they were completely zoned out. I have a parent who's taking a kid who his family has been in Blackman Middle School and they got zoned to Eagleville and they're driving 22 miles. So for those reasons, I would like to expand the choice seats. Instead of 10, add either five or 10 more. So it'll be 15 or 20 more choice seats. Doctor Sullivan, how many seats can we add? Doctor Sullivan? Oh, we haven't discussed it, so, we have our choice application going on right now.
I think anything we can do to increase choice would be okay. I would to 15 would be okay total. I wouldn't wanna go much above that because you start working with class size averages. 20 would be, if you get to 20 choice seats at k through three, that's an additional teaching position. If you get to 25, four through six, it's an additional teaching position. So, we try to operate within. So that five additional seats to make it 15 total, at but I wouldn't want to do just one school. It needs to be everybody. Exactly. Every school. Yeah.
Of all the schools. This motion is to open to add five more choice seats to all the schools. But I want to add that to the amended motion that is as part of the the rezoning aspect that we open up choice seats and add five more. Do you guys Yeah. I agree. We're gonna we're gonna vote on the amendment first. Yeah. So do y'all understand the amendment that miss Rosales just spoke having Because 15 choice seats. At five. At five. At five. At five. At five. 15 total. Just 15 total. Just 15 total. 5¢. If we add 20, we have that new teachers and that's not a budgeted item.
I get that so to the conference with 15 seats and that will give more chances for students to get a seat at black black men middle school. So I'd like to add that. Okay. Let's vote on the amendment. Could you Madam chair, we don't have yeah. Do I have a second? Can someone have a second on my amendment? I'll I'll second it. Mister Tidwell, I thought are you seconded? I I didn't have. I just well, I was just gonna do a point of order to make sure we get a second before we move forward. Mister Vaughn, are you seconding? Yes, ma'am. Okay. Could you do a roll call on adding five extra choice seats Hey.
For all the middle schools. Hang on. This seems like a curveball right here. This seems like a huge budgetary item, and I'm a little nervous about it. I'm looking at staff, and I'm looking back and forth. I think I appreciate what miss Rosales is trying to do, but I almost think we're jumping in pretty deep right here pretty quick. Is there any way we could postpone this and and get some feedback data or something? You you know, I I I don't you you do this across the district.
We're talking about five. You're talking about 50 schools. Right? Correct. Five seats in each school. That's that's 250 kids. Correct. Right? Yes. That's a lot of teachers. It appears to me. Yep. We cannot delay, unfortunately. We have to publish open seats for thirty days. Oh, okay. That deadline is that's the delay. Our deadline is January 31, and so we this is our next meeting before that. Do we have to do the same thing at every school? I would recommend it because it's fair. Okay. That that That's the way we evolved. The fairness doctrine. It's the way we've operated. Every school gets seats.
Now not all of our schools utilize all of their seats. And and I appreciate what miss Rosales is doing because I think it's imperative there for the Blackman Middle School to do it. But is it necessary to do it everywhere else? That's the reason I'm kinda questioning this just a little bit, that that it it seems like we're kinda throwing the baby out with the bathwater, if that makes any sense, to try to accomplish this. Right. Okay. I would recommend everybody compared to nobody or just one or two. I I get it.
I got yeah. I can see that. You you're daddy to everybody, so to speak. Yeah. So we'll just wanna make it where this if needed. Is that the way we wanna add that to? It it it are the choice seats always used up? No. So they will not be equally distributed once the applications come in. Not every school, it won't it won't wash out equally. Point of clarification. I'm looking at doctor Sullivan. These would be six, seven, and eight, or just six and seventh? I think it needs to be k through 12, everybody. Oh, you're An additional five seats for every school. So an eighth grader could be grandfathered in somewhere, but go somewhere else.
Yeah. I think it needs to be 15 total seats at all schools. We have 10 total seats at every school right now. It needs to be 15 would be mine. Including Stearse Creek Elementary. Yep. Including Stearse Creek Elementary. Yep. Okay. Doctor Salvo, just just on the timeline portion. Mister McCann doctor McCann and I discussed this just a second ago. The law requires that we so just so you all understand the timeline, we have to advertise the number of open seats for a minimum of two weeks and then take applications for thirty days. So you're looking at forty five days total. So the board would need to take action tonight if they if it wants to
do this, so that we have we can change the advertising tomorrow on our website and things like that, so that they have those fifteen day or fourteen days plus the thirty for application. Correct, doctor McCain? Yep. Because we already have the 10 posted. I just I'm bringing that up because someone mentioned possibly delaying it. Yes. And that that yep. But not not criticizing that. Just wanna make sure you know about the the two weeks. Yep. Miss Sharp I'm sorry. Miss Sharp had her hand up. Thank you madam chair. Arby and then mister Tidwell. And then mister Botte, if you have something to say, you'll be there.
I may have just jumped to ahead of miss Darby, but she's probably gonna say because I think we had asked for some more choice seats for Stewart's Creek because we had some students that wanted to be in the choir and they were being rezoned. So, I'll leave the rest of it out there because you can address it. I understand. Yes. These have to be completely, lottery driven. So they can't be any type we have looked at that for choir and band and those different types of things, but those are completely set. This has to be lottery driven by state law. So we would need to open them up as a fine arts type academy.
Which I would definitely not recommend. Please do not do tonight. Mister Arby and hold that thought, mister Arby. Mister Arby. Doctor Sullivan, I'm gonna ask you about Eagleville. Yes. Our sweet little outlier that's in in its world all by itself, tends to have more seats available than other schools and also is k through 12. Correct. Can we extend the 15 seats to each k through five, six through eight, nine
through 12, each grade band as if it was three separate schools? And the only reason I'm asking that at that school is because they tend to have seats anyhow. And I know when we originally started the choice seats, I did get a couple phone calls and emails about the fact that they only had 10, but they served k through 12. That one, I I'm not against that at all because the more choice that we have, definitely the better. But that one probably will have some teacher positions moved to it because it is so small. Doctor Chastain, is that kinda what you were thinking? We're already meeting next week to look at some middle school scheduling issues because of
enrollment. So, you know, each grade is very different in terms of capacity when you're looking at teaching positions, the way the lottery is run, we're not distinguishing by grade. So it's open to any grade, even if we were to do grade bands. And the the openings just don't exist always where you would like them to in terms of efficiency for positions and class. Ultimately, that's a student driven decision for class size. It just feels like if we're if we're doing it across the board to be fair, it is like three schools in one. So if it's 15 seats per school, for me, it makes sense to give it
15 for the three schools that are within the one building. They may not all get filled. I don't know. But They'll get filled. Mister Tippel. Yes. So I would only support this amendment if we did include all schools. Obviously, we all have been getting emails about different zones, different people saying, why can't you cut out me? Why can't you cut out us? And we have tried to be fair and upfront and transparent through this entire process. And it's just it's just challenging process. So I will support the amendment of five, as long as, you know, we do
it for all the schools. Mhmm. So, I think you raise a great point. If we have the capacity over there, I certainly would support that as well. What are would it be it would only it got it up into five. We're not really talking about teacher teacher placement changes other than maybe adding a position at Eagleville with that's more significant More transfers than anything else. Okay. Okay. So we're not talking about a huge budgetary item. Logistically, parents are providing transportation for it. So that's not an added cost.
Okay. Well, miss mister Vaughn, did you have something you wanted to say a minute ago? I had a couple of thoughts put out. Okay. Yes, mister Vaughn. I just I just like to say that I've opened, middle school, and I can tell you, parents, if if you're involved in these rezoning, it's gonna be a great opportunity for your child to experience something brand new. And every one of these schools are gonna be offering the same things. So don't be concerned if your child is in the choir or the, swim team
or whatever. Every school is gonna all of them are going to go middle schools and everything will have the same thing. And just the opportunity to be involved in something brand new is a great experience for kids. And, I can tell you from experience that, the kids, once they're into it, they really be excited about it. Just need to give them a chance. Thank you. Thank you. I need to Yes, mister doctor I know this is a strange thing, but I try to be aware of all of it. If we're including Eagleville 912, just be aware that those 15 seats very well could
jump them in t double s double a classification. That is a that is a huge deal. Yes. It is. From one a to two a. They don't want to do that. And that is that is not something I would imagine Eagleville would want. No. But it's just just something to consider. It may not that the current cutoffs are for four years. Right now, they are the forty second largest in one a, 338 students. The cutoff for two a is at three fifty four three fifty one. So this would, on the next classification, jump them to two a if everybody else stayed where they were.
With just the five seats that they currently have? Shouldn't. Do they spread them that way? Is it five seats per, like, currently? Mhmm. It's across the school k 12. And so now that just do the lottery for the 10 Across the whole school? Yes, ma'am. Yep. Give me just a second. Let me see where basketball, baseball, and softball is. Sorry. And it's important. Yep. They definitely wouldn't wanna make that change. They'd be okay in the other sports. They're three thirty eight, and the classification for two a in softball baseball is at three eighty three, but football is looks like it would jump.
Okay. That's all the discussion we have. Let's go ahead. Could you read miss Rosales' amendment? Thank you. Yes, mister Tidwell. Alright. Just for clarity, I know you're about to read the amendment. But is Eagleville inside this amendment with 10 for each grade band or are we just doing the Eagleville still at 10? Is that being are you about to clarify that? My understanding is that all schools are 15 total. Is that correct? No matter what? Do we want an exam taken for? I think we need to find out the parents if they wanna be the vision, whatever that is, because they're very particular.
They don't. You don't have. Yeah. So I think we just need to leave it the way it is. What? Ten, fifteen seats. Point four. Doctor Sullivan, you're not saying that the 15 across the k 12 would change? No. Only high school. So if we keep it, it's high school related. 15 across the board for all schools, Yep. We're we're good. We're not even having this secondary conference. They're flirting with it anyways, and it's something they always watch. But it's it's something we watch consistently. Okay. Okay. Thank you. So we wanna exempt them. Is that right? No. We wanna exempt them.
No. That's 15 total for all schools now. All schools. 15 additional. Oh. No. Okay. It's letter reading motion. Yep. Yes. Alright. So the amended motion is to offer five choice seats in addition making it a total of 15 seats for all schools. Yes. Correct. Yep. Mister Vaught? Yes. Mister Vaughn? Yes. Missus Darby? Yes. Miss Sharp? Yes. Mister Tidwell? Yes. Missus Rosales? Yes. Missus Maxwell? Yes. Motion passes. Who's gonna take the heat for this if if you're an Eagle when you have
to go to two a? Now we need to get back to the middle school. Now we need to go back to the middle school, and I believe we had a motion from mister Vaughn. Second. Motion by mister Tidwell. Okay. Second. And thank you. And seconded by miss Rosales. Could you read that motion, please? Yes. This is the one that's on the agenda. Correct? Yes. Okay. Yes. That is correct. So it's the motion to adopt concept two as presented and allow current seventh graders to be grandfathered into their current middle school with parent, parent, or guardian providing transportation.
To qualify for the grandfather option, parents or guardians must submit the RCS form by Friday, 01/16/2026. Okay. Thank you. Do you wanna I don't think we need a roll call for this. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed or abstaining? Motion passes. Miss Maxwell? Yes. Are we moving to number D now? Yes. We are. Can we go ahead and talk about it? Sure. Yes. We are. And, mister Reed, would you mind coming up here, please? I don't speak. I like to have a floor, isn't I didn't know if we could speak or
not. So this is a resolution we just discussed Tuesday night. This is a proposed resolution of proposed of mister Tidwell. It's a proposed resolution recommending to the Tennessee General Assembly to, to repeal the Professional Educators Collaborative Conferencing Act, which otherwise known as HECCA. So that's the resolution you've got before you sign. Okay. Yes, mister Rosales. Thank you. I wanna go ahead and move forward with the board not taking action on this board item.
The reasons are this is something that the state gave to the local boards. Miss JC Bowman spoke and I don't know. He called me and he wrote me a letter and he send it and I asked miss Dawn to make a copy of it and kinda explaining what this is, what PECCA is, and what that is meant, and give him the history and the context of how PECCA even came into fruition and was born. First of all, I just wanna say that as far as NEA teachers union, I
am not for the NEA. I don't agree with the NEA. I don't there's things about the NEA that I'm not in favor of, but this PECCA, was a result of in it's in this letter as well that in 2011, when they the general assembly, that was a republican led. It was initiated by a republican to dissolve the collective bargaining. And so in turn, they created this framework fame framework for, for employees who speak
to the employers. It's a way to give them a voice. It's no different than we work in any other setting or capacity, and they enter into an MOU, and then that MOU is what's drafted within the contract. If we do if we take a motion to dissolve this, we're gonna be sending a message that we are taking our teachers' voices away and not giving them the chance to come to the table and share with us what the working conditions are. If there are issues within the framework of how that was even, be however it
it turned it became, then that should be given to the legislators to go back and fix. But as far as Rutherford County Schools, we haven't had any issues in terms of how that relationship worked, not a single issue. So for us to take a stand on something that has been beneficial to our teachers and by the way, I've actually and I'm gonna bring a little bit of politics. I've had Republican, teachers that have called me and said, don't take away PECCA. That is my my voice and my way to speak to our employers.
And the way it's Frameword's PECA is it involves all teachers. And it doesn't have to be a particular group to, to represent. They can choose within the members who they wanna be represented. And also, the state of Tennessee does not forbids teachers' units to be involved in the state of Tennessee. So this is not a union issue. So therefore, I'm making the case for this board to take no action on this matter. That's my motion. Thank you.
And mister Hello, sir. Seconded. I will let mister Tidwell speak though. Yes. Absolutely. We'll not be voting, in favor of postponing this whatsoever. So let's just give a rundown, which I did this, when the last time stuff came up. But now we got a resolution here. And I brought it here for a reason. So, let's do a quick run on what that looks like. These members, these organizations, which they are unions, they're not unionized, but they just transfer the name to associations. So I'm only interested in what it looks like in practice. When you talk about collaborative conferencing, it sounds really nice, but everyone has our phone
number, our emails. I talk to teachers, librarians, those that agree, that disagree, we are able to still have those conversations. It's not required to have this. But let me tell you what this does. So these organizations, as miss Rosales had just said, that she's not in favor of the NEA. But the NEA doesn't exist without organizations like the TEA, which is Tennessee Education or Educators Association, which doesn't exist without the REA. So the money gets funneled straight up there. So if you are not in favor of these particular organizations, then they're still gonna
be able to exist outside of this, but we don't have to coordinate through this collaborative conferencing. I'm gonna tell and, and that statement was made. Well, this has not changed anything for us or this had no effect on let me just tell you what happened. So in October 15, in this boardroom, we had a policy committee meeting. At that meeting, it's 10/15/2024, REA under an under the MOU, so the actual language, I'm gonna read you the language, adds language to comply with the agreement, the MOU
with REA, which we were told previously that this agreement would have zero effect. Here's what they decided to add. Under the MOU, they suggested to include mental health under excuses for a sick day. Of course, I voted no against that. That is a very vague answer. We have plenty of, options for sick days. It's meant for your sickness. Mental health is very vague. Secondly, and and I like to put some emphasis on this one. The REA wanted to add gender to our discrimination policy. Sex is already included.
So what is gender? So when I asked that question to our lawyer, we didn't get a straightforward answer. Doctor Sullivan stepped in and said, we're gonna go with the state's recommendations on discrimination policy. The REA, the TEA, and the NEA are not only inherently political, that is a core function of what they do. They are lobbyists. That's what they do. So if you agree with them, support them, and they'll lobby for what you agree with. But I am not for, and never will be for, collaborating with a political, strictly
political organization at this boardroom. And I'm not doing it on one side of the aisle or the other side of the aisle. And so for that reason, I would urge the board members here to look at the actual facts. Look at what was brought forth. Not the talks, not the soft words. Look at the action of what was going on, and then make your decision. Because right after, as I would hope that this motion would fail, I will be making a motion to approve the resolution. And I'll add one last little fact in there.
He said, go to the state. We already have state level support on this. So just like what we had, a similar reaction to this in the past of another resolution that I got that got brought forth and then got voted up, then turned around, had a recess and got voted down. It still passed. It's still gonna happen. But I think it's important that this board think through this process, look at the facts. Look, I know JC Bowman. I've talked to him about different things. I don't have the the professional educators, of Tennessee that had it has a place. They're not nearly to the same level as others.
But and irregardless. Anyone, any teacher, any person can contact any of these board members and their voice will be heard. And so that avenue is not closing with a, with a push for this resolution to pass. Miss Maxwell. Yes. Mister Zalba. Before we vote, I have to say something. First of all, when I ran on the seat, I had a different perspective of what education and our teachers did. I was not expecting my job situation to change.
That was not even my peripheral. When I when things change, the very first thing I did the the very first thing that changed was that I was I was brought into the classroom. When I went to the classroom, it opened my eyes to see what the teachers actually do on a day to day basis. And I'm gonna tell you right now, the state laws and the federal laws that we have are setting our teachers to failure. Why? Because when you have a room full of 20 kids and you got one kid
that is yelling like crazy with throwing a fit while you're trying to teach them, and you have two other kids that don't speak the language, and you have all these things trying to keep behavior, it says a lot of what they have to go through day in and day out, and they're showing up to work every single day. They're not giving up on our kids. I went last week, I was this close to saying, I give up. I'm not going, because I had a very hard day.
The teacher took a day off because she needed a mental day off. Thank god she had a day that she could take off because if she didn't take that day off and she came back to that school the next day and she wasn't refreshed, would she take out all her frustrations out on that child? Probably so. And you know what? We will end up in a lawsuit because she did something that was not the right way because she was fed up. That's what our teachers go through. And you're bringing all this stuff about the NEA and the REA and all that.
I'm gonna challenge every single board member to go and step into the classroom and be a teacher for a whole entire day. And then when you come back, you tell me if they're indoctrinating our kids. You tell me if they are even talking about sexuality and you tell me what they're doing. Because you know what I've seen? I've seen teachers pray for our kids in front of them and say, they're having an issue. They come, hey, let me pray for this kid. And you know what? They're putting themselves on the line when they're praying because they're not even supposed to
be doing that, but they do that. Why? Because they see this as a ministry. They see this as something that they can give back to our kids because they they love the profession, and we don't pay them enough to take all the crap that they have to. Kids cussing at them, desk being thrown at them, kids that don't wanna do the work. That's what they have to go through. And we're gonna fight and argue because we gave them a mental health day, so they can come back and snap on our kids because they couldn't take a break. I'm sorry.
And you can run as you want and do direct memos and whatever you wanna do and said that I'm supporting a teacher's unit. But what I do support is our educators, all of our teachers. Thank you. And I will not be voting for something like that. Miss Rosales. Unless we have something that we can give him before he wants to speak. Miss Rosales. Yes. Yeah. I mean, that was a great speech. My thing is it I have the the facts are here. I've told you the dates. Go look up the dates. I'm not asking you to believe me. I'm just telling you to look this up yourself. So everything that I have pointed out is factual. So I'm asking this board not to to talk to worry about, you know, the
perception. Just look at this from a logical standpoint and make your decision from that. That's all I'm asking for. I'm not asking for anything other than that, and I'll leave it at that. Okay. We have a motion on the floor. Miss Rosales's motion was to take no action. Mister Vaughn has seconded it. Roll call, please. Missus Rosales? Yes. Mister Vaughn? Yes. Mister Tidwell? No. Miss Sharp? No. Mister Vaught? Yes. Missus Darby? No. Missus Maxwell? Yes. Four yes passes. We will take no action on this.
Thank you. Next we move actually let's take a five minute break please. We've been here quite a while and I think there's some people that could use a five minute break. Thank you. We'll convene at 07:30 forty. Yeah. Six minutes. Can I get one too? That's alright. Never mind. I'm good. You have a minute and a half. Yeah. Thirty seconds. Although we are missing our esteemed leader. We'll give him thirty seconds to get back in his chair. Agenda item e. So we talked about this some of the at work session on Tuesday.
This is a con we there was this is a potential contract for a property in Smyrna for a transition academy. School system's been looking to potentially add a transition academy on the north end of the county. A house and parcel, which appears to be suitable for this, has been located at 300 Maple Street in Smyrna, and the contract has been negotiated for the purchase of the property of the board. It likes to adopt it. The purchase price is 750,000. The contract has a sixty day inspection period and is contingent on approval of funding by the county commission.
The contract terminates unless the board gives reseller written notice it is electing to proceed with the purchase of the property. The house would need to be inspected to during the inspection period to confirm its suitability for the proposed use. So this property is brought to you because, there were some interest by some board members in potentially buying this for a transition academy. That's why it comes to you, for consideration. So, it is is on the market. It will be sold to us or someone else. We do have it under contract. So we, if we elect to, approve this contract tonight, you will have a, binding
right to purchase this property for a period of sixty days should you elect to do it. So it doesn't obligate you to purchase the property, but it gives you the right to examine it for the next sixty days and determine whether or not you want to purchase it or not. Miss mister Vaughn. And then mister Vaughn. On this house, then it's a two story house, and the kids is gonna be using this house. One concern I have is the 2nd Floor is not accessible to those kids unless
you put an elevator in this house. Mister Lee, I don't know how much his elevator cost, but I'd say we're gonna be close to getting to a million dollars on this property if to get this successful, you know, for suitable for all the kids that are gonna be utilizing it. I just wonder, you know, just, from my own perspective, you know, I just I truly believe we can build something that for the same amount of money to be exactly what, doctor Ross needs for the program there.
And, I don't know. I may be incorrect, but I just, second floor that home would not be couldn't be utilized by the kids unless we put elevator in. Okay. Mister Tibble? Similar line of questioning. Trey, could you go over with us? I know you said you was gonna look into the numbers about what it would cost to buy new I'm sorry, what it cost to build new versus buy this property? As with all property that you purchase, whether you're buying a, if you buy a home that's in a subdivision, you're paying for the local infrastructure and you're also paying
for the lot. So there is some cost in here that we would not have to incur if we built on the properties that we currently own. My expertise is is commercial construction. So I've but I've got a lot of friends that are residential builders, and I've reached out to them in the last couple of days. I've got a couple of framers that work for me, and and we've looked through the numbers. And we're pretty confident that we can build in what doctor Ralston and I have
talked about, and I did go see her. Two years ago. She and I sat down when we had this conversation about the two pieces of property and whether, you know, when we had that conversation with Transition Academy. So I went back to see her again yesterday just to make sure she and I were on the kinda on the same page. And and I felt like we can build something for somewhere between a 100 and $125 a square foot, with what by owning the property. So that's I I think that's where we would be.
I like that a lot better. Doctor Ralston, question for you. I don't know we kinda mentioned this briefly at the the work session, but, in this, I wanna involve you with this too, Trey. Now we had talked about possibly split. There's two properties that we could put it on. I think it was Smyrna and Whitworth. Right? Those are the two. Is there a need to have one at both places? And if there is, what about build instead of building a large for matching what we currently are looking at, which is like 4,000, a little bit over 4,000 square
foot. Instead of having two four thousand square foot buildings, maybe we have sticking with this budget roughly 750,000, we build the largest two homes that we can build for that budget. Would that be more beneficial or would a one particular location be better than the other? The two locations would serve more kids in Rutherford County. Mhmm. Just because having one on the North End and the South End, it is we do transport our students from their school of zone to the transition academy.
So if we are transporting to one location, the students that live the furthest away or attend, like, say, La Verne to then go to the one in Murfreesboro, they're missing out on part of their day and their services through transportation. So we could serve more students if we built the smaller. Smaller. Both sides and trade, does that are we within range? Yes. It we would we would work backwards, as I call it. I back into it. We would take this budget and and then we would take the designs and then
we would back into it to something that functions for both places that stays inside this budget. Yeah. And look, if it's like another $50,000 more, I think we to split them up and get more students involved, I think that would be something maybe this board could be open to, but that's the motion that I would lead with is that we build in each place, so in Smyrna and Whitworth with these numbers currently. Miss Darby? Mister Lee, do you have a rough idea of what additional expenses would have run
if we buy that house? Because I know they there was talk that a ramp would have to be put in and some other things. Just a rough I know it's not exactly just a rough idea. The the the property is it it's a nice property. The the the house itself is not very elevated, so the ramp that would be needed for there would not be, you know, dollars 5,000 to $10,000 I didn't like I said, I didn't get up under it. The home does look structurally sound. It is in good shape. It's a very nice home. There's some elevation difference between the addition that was put on and the main building,
but the, there is fairly level access from the exterior to get to it. You know, I I think the improved that part of it would be minimal. And then after that, it would be whatever is found during the inspection, if there is any. For the neighborhood of seven fifty to 800,000, do you think that would be appropriate to do the two locations? It it's very possible. Yes, ma'am. K. Thank you. Miss Miss Maxwell. Yes. Mister Rosales.
Thank you. I just wanna get clarification because this is the first time I've seen this property for sale. I didn't know we were looking for property for transition academy. Second of all, to my knowledge, the board hasn't gone on a tour to look at it. I could've sworn or or remember recollect or remember that not two meetings ago, there were board members saying they couldn't vote on something unless we have been we have taken a tour of it. We haven't been invited to take a tour of this property.
I don't know what this property looks like. I'm not sure who negotiated this price either, $750,000. I also don't know who brought this property to us, how it came into being, who the owners are. I heard that the owners wanted to give it to the schools, but in but I'm like, well, if they wanna give it, why can't they just donate it? That can save us money. So I have a lot of questions and concerns about this. So I just wanna know more information of how this came into being. Why am I seeing this right now?
Why we haven't been asked to go take a tour of the house if we couldn't vote on five houses for McFadden a few weeks ago? Why are we voting on something we haven't even looked? I have I personally have not been asked to come and tour the school or been invited to tour the school. I mean, to the school. And I didn't even know this school this this I'm sorry. I didn't even know this house was something that the board was even going to entertain to buy. What you take it miss Tara. I was gonna First of all you had Tuesday night to ask to for a
tour. And we've talked recently about we've we've talked for the last five years about finding something for Transition Academy. We'd already voted to build something on the existing land. When this property became available, I called madam chair. She came out and looked at it. She loved it. She called doctor Ralston. She came out and loved it. And then she called Trey Lee. The thing about this property is it really is turnkey because it was a school before. And there's no issue with the elevator, mister Vaughn, because they're gonna use the upstairs
for, if the board approves, they're gonna use the upstairs for administrative offices. So it's gonna give us some more room here in the central office for other people to move in the central office or expand more room. Mr. Reid, from what I understand, is the one that negotiated the contract because it was listed for more. Sometimes property just comes available and they reach out to you. It was my understanding this gentleman, he wanted this property in memory of his wife
to be a school and they reached out to us. And I appreciate going out and looking at it and it is great property obviously. I have been it's something very important to me. I have been on the sport since 2020 talking about we need another location. I'm not exactly sure that when we negotiated the lease at MTSU, that anybody on the board ever went out and looked at that property before they did that. Nobody. So if you don't want to do it, I understand But we need to do something because too many kids every year are being denied this opportunity and our SPED
population is only growing and getting larger. And my enthusiasm in this property was when Miss Ralston and Mr. Lee said, Yeah, this looks like it's in pretty good shape. I knew it could it could work for us very quickly. We could turn, this is almost turnkey. With some minor improvements to it, we could be up and running and have a North End Transition Academy this fall. Any other way we do this, we're not going to be that ready. If we can build two schools, that's great, but I don't know nothing in this
climate having to work with the county commission and what all the asks that we have out there, I don't know if that's realistic. I I prefer this location. It's perfect, This building, but I'll do what the will of the board is. But I I urge you to to take a look at this property and see if we can make this work because I don't know if we'll ever get this opportunity again. Miss Macklin? Yes, mister Boire? Who, who authorized the, contract to be negotiated?
Mister Reid. But I mean, did We we property is brought to us, and we take it to mister Reed. Exactly what we did. Madam chair. Yes, mister But it's my understanding. It needs to be board approval before it's negotiated. Correct? Well, they needed to have a price. And that's why But I mean, the board board didn't approve the negotiations to be done. We did it with the McFadden property. Well, if you don't like this price, we we can always go back. That's that's what he's doing. This is the price that that was given to mister Reed. No. I'm not talking about that.
I'm just talking about who authorized the negotiations of the contract. I did. As chair. I did. Yes, miss Darby. Just a point of clarification. The board voted to allow mister Reed to do negotiations on the McFadden properties, which is where that whole issue went sideways. Second point of clarification, we are not supposed to be taking action unless the board votes on something. So the chair can't take action on their own. It has to be a board vote. Regardless, this was something we talked about with the land.
Mister Lee and I had met a couple years ago and went over all of our properties and what extra land we had and what we could possibly use them for, which is, I believe, how the conversation came about for Smyrna and Wentworth, for the transition academies. We were just waiting. I kept being told we didn't have funding to build them. So if we're saying we now feel it's a good time, which it probably is because I don't know that things are getting any less expensive, I think it's a
it will probably look better to the commission and a better use of our funds to be able to build two of these and eliminate the lease in Murfreesboro because then we'll be saving that money. So with that, I would like to make a motion to approve the $750,000 to begin building both a North and South transition academy on Smyrna and Whitworth. Do I have a second? I would like to second the motion I made earlier. Oh, sorry. That's good. That's good. Yes, miss Sharp. First of all, we if we wanna go back to who's authorized things, madam chair
authorized mister Vaughn here to negotiate the contracts with us with our con bus drivers. She also we the board voted to have mister Reid to negotiate the contracts of the McFadden properties, but mister Vaughn negotiated those. So there's precedent here with with both sides. And we're not gonna be able to find in our build. I don't Mr. Lee, no disrespect to you, but you can't even buy a house these days for what this house is selling for, that's over 4,000 square foot.
It's less than 2,000, excuse me, it's less than $200 a square foot. You can't buy it. You can't buy a house that's already ADA compliant. Go look at Smyrna Middle School where they had to rip the stoves out because they weren't ADA compliant and how much that cost for the architects to draw. Miss Maxwell. Yes. Miss Rosales. I just wanna make a point that this property, the board has not been asked to go look at the property. There were some board members that spoke during the McFadden and said they could not
vote on something if they had not taken a tour. And now, we're to ask to vote on something where the board has not been asked to tour the location of what we're about to say we're gonna enter into contract agreement for, say, around $50,000 Since I've been on the board, the way that we've done this is that we we authorize we as a board, collective board, authorize mister Reed to be our talking person representation to talk to the owner. And then he comes before us and brings us a a contract.
This hasn't happened. The McFadden, conversation that everyone's bringing up, the board already had voted and authorized mister Reid. Mister Reid also has the authority to also make a decision on behalf of the board if he wants to give the work to someone else. He does that all the time when it comes for his cases, when he represent us Madam speaker. For for work. You know what? I know you're gonna do a point of order because you don't want me to give this information to say that we're not we're being hypocritical in doing this type
of transaction of this voting. Knowingly that when we did a McFadden, there were board members that couldn't vote on this. What court? Listen. Doesn't matter. But it's stated and clear. Listen. You can say that all you want to but Stan bought does not work for Jeff Reed. Stan Jeff Reed does have authority to give people in his law firm other cases. He does not have the authority to give it to Stanvault. Stanvault was the one that negotiated that contract at McFadden. I listen, this is ridiculous. I I vote right now just to rescind it, just pull it. We don't deserve a nice piece of property like this.
Can can I just say, we need to not fight amongst ourselves and fight over the way something was done last time or what happened last year. While we sit here and fight over this, we could lose a property or we could build a property that takes care of two times the number of kids we've been able to service. The special needs community seems to always be last. I want to make them first and we need to do something tonight. I pray that we can come to a resolution but let's not fight amongst ourselves.
This isn't about how we did things the best way that we knew and I did things the proper way, I believe. I gave the property information to Mr. Reid. Mr. Reid spoke to the sellers and he negotiated. This is what the price if you don't like it, vote it down. But let's not quabble with squabble with one another. Okay? Because these kids are waiting for an opportunity and we need to find an opportunity for them. That's right. Yes, mister Tibble. Alright. So it seemed like we do have consensus on something, which is that we wanna
do some we wanna do something for the transition academy. The the pathways we have for us are obviously to purchase this home or to possibly look at splitting it up into different areas. But the the goal being the same is we're providing, expansion of this. So I think the least the board's consensus is together on that. Here's here's the reason why I think it's best to split the property split this funding into two properties to serve more students. I have an older home, and I'm having a lot of problems with my older home, and it's a lot more to man to maintain.
Now, if you go build a new property, if I could build a new property for cheaper or the same price of similar square foot size, similar footprint of a house that I could go purchase that's older. The difference is the time frame. Like like miss Maxwell has mentioned, it gets the students in there quicker. I can see that ground. Over the long term, I still think it's gonna be more beneficial to do it our way, if we can do it, since we have the ability to do so.
If we were having to go out and spend a lot more money to make that happen in in a new construction way, that would be different. But to use the land that we have, use use the funds that we are, potentially approving tonight, then I I think the better option is what we have on the table, which is to build a property in Smyrna area on land we already have, and then on the Whitworth area. I I just that makes more sense to me. I would take that option as a homeowner. So that's that's the way I'm looking at it. I'm not against I'm not even against the house per se. I looked at this from an efficiency standpoint the whole time.
So I I didn't feel a need to go check out the house when I know based on the footage, we can do it better our way and split it in two, under the same fund. So that's that's kinda where I'm at. I just wanted to kinda share that. Okay. I agree. Mister Vaughn. Agree. Okay. So yes, mister Vaughn. I'm gonna try to isolate all this or get us maybe focus just a little bit. The the question the biggest question I've got is, what is the potential?
In other words, how many students in an ideal world do you think we could serve? What what what is our population? I know you have been limited, and I know that's what Claire has been concerned about. And I appreciate her passion in all of this. But realistically, in our population of 52,000 kids, how many could we serve? Or do we need to serve? Yes. We need to serve lots. Or could we serve, I guess? Right. Sure. So if we build two properties at roughly about 2,500, is that right?
2,500 square feet, we could serve, 16 to 20 kids at each property. We could go up to, say, 25. We just have to add an extra staff member, to assist with that. At the property that that you guys are looking at at Smyrna, because we would use mostly the bot the 1st Floor, it would be, roughly about that 20 person limit on there. So the the program ideally is is built for 20 to 25 students, no more.
Currently, we have 12 because the property we're renting off MTSU's campus Right. Has very small rooms. Right. And so it's just too much. When you get close to, 15, it becomes just an overcrowded mess. That that's a limitation of that building. Yes, sir. Okay. So if if you were in the wildest dreams here, want to do something that would really function well for the students you're going to serve.
Is that a is that a house structure? Is it laid out like a house, or is it laid out more like a a school? It it or is it a combination? I can remember, when Oakland and Riverdale were built. And actually, when Central was here, my mother was a home economics teacher. And there was a there was a kitchen, you know, and there was a planning area. Mhmm. And, you know, there was a sewing area. And I can remember those distinct, qualities that were built into that program in that
area that helped those teachers be able to function better. And I know this is a very specific Yeah. Student population. So that that's where I'm trying to get my my head around this and see if I can't if we can't come to some kind of compromise. As Claire said, what is the best avenue for it? Does it need to be laid out like a house, or is it or is it a combination of a house and a and a classroom? It's exactly what you're talking about as far as what you experienced with home economics and things like that. It would be a larger kitchen so you could get four to five students and
a teacher in the kitchen to meal prep. It's large spaces for meetings, for classrooms. They do a lot of budgeting, so we need to have places for that, and then large eating areas, where the kids can actually meet together, eat, learn how to sit around a table, and then large space outside in order to pull, our smaller buses and our vans up to where we're not having to park, drop our kids off and park off-site.
We can also park there. So in an ideal world, a new construction would work. I think in I'm gonna go back and say this. I think Claire's passion is is she sees that this is a very underserved, student population, and we could get there pretty fast. Here would be a suggestion, and I think it goes along with yours, Caleb, is that, you you know, let's take a time out for thirty days or something. See if mister Reed could even see if the possibility might be that we could
lease the property for a year. They might not want to. Question I don't I hadn't asked the question. Don't know if he asked the question. But at least the two if they would consider leasing it for a year, you could function two programs, the one here in Murfreesboro, the one in Smyrna, and then at the same time, give mister Lee and his department time to construct, two stand alone buildings at at facilities. I I'm just kind of throwing that out there. Kind of we kind of get on with the program.
And that way, we're not turning our backs on the student population. But yet, we get new construction out of it, as Caleb said, that we don't have a lot of maintenance and upkeep with. That's just a thought. I have two things. Thank you, mister Paul. I have two things and yes I am very passionate about this. But in sitting here and thinking about this, I think that ideally it would be awesome if we could go ahead and purchase this property for the North End and then get out of that lease at MTSU which has gone from 1,500 to what
2,200 now and perhaps build on the Buchanan, Whitworth Buchanan site. That way we own our buildings and we're not leasing from anybody and we're not renting anymore. But I do want you to explain to them because they may not realize this. You all heard that's 12 students. It's a two year program. It's not 12 students per year. I just talked to Dyson, Massengill yesterday. Guess how many kids get to come next year? Five, out of all of our high schools five.
So could you explain how that works to them please? Sure. So right now the transition academy functions as a two year program. Students have to go through a work based learning, class in their high school. They have to complete that successfully for a year, then they can apply for that program. Several of our kids go to transition academy for one year and then will, go to project search, which is our, our program at the embassy. But some kids decide to stay at Transition Academy, just to learn more about the
community, how to function in the community, things like that was open to them there. And going to project search and where the focus is really getting that job is just not for them at this point. And so when we open up spaces at Transition Academy, we do take all the referrals. We will interview everybody, look at everybody's application, and then that certain few are are chosen, for the Transition Academy. And then we have students who are chosen. Project search is a one year program. Thank you. Yeah. Yes, miss Sharp. So a little bit, explanation what's at this property.
There are four big rooms. There are two kitchens. One's in the a commercial kitchen. There's also a room beyond the beyond the commercial kitchen that's probably about the size of a double car garage. It's just a big space. So that could be used for the lunches, that could be used for for the classrooms and everything. Listen, I wasn't looking for this. We were we we've had that on the back burner. But when this came up, it it's it's truly perfect for Transition Academy. And it will allow us to get more students in the program. Okay. Yes, ma'am.
Okay. How many teachers are gonna be down there? At the property and it's Yeah. At this property? Need how many would you need down there? For for twenty ish students, we would need one teacher and three EAs, possibly four if we added, some, you know, students with some higher needs. Would you need that whole 2nd Floor just for administrative offices? That's that's what we talked about using it for because it wouldn't be accessible as far as that classroom goes. I mean, to me, it just seems like it make a lot more sense to
use this money to be able to build to. It has to buy something like this and not be able to use but half of it for the kids. Mhmm. You know? I mean, I don't know how much room. I wouldn't think you'd need a whole 2nd Floor for administrative bosses. Yes, mister Archsal. Just so everyone's aware, we do not have money budgeted for this. So the process and timeline, so everyone knows, regardless if we buy this property or choose to build it ourselves, we would need to do an amendment to take funding
out of and it it can be separate from I believe it's miss Darby's motion. It can be separate, but at some point, we'll need a motion to it'd probably be in January. Motion to put 750,000 or this funding for this property out of unassigned fund balance and put it into fund $1.89 for the purchase because this is not budget. So we would have to take from our board to Health Net to budget to the full commission. So you're looking at February before funding could be approved. Either way. Miss Franklin. Yes. Mister Tittle.
What's the timeline on building? Say, Trey, this board moves forward with building two new buildings. Design, time frame, what are you thinking? Eighteen months, twelve months, or this you know, how does that work? Different it's different obviously than commercial and some of the requirements. It'd be between the 12 and the 18. 18. K. Well, I I thank you. I support the motion. I'm still good with going forward with two buildings separately, giving trade the freedom to start working on those designs under this funding. And, of course, the process has has to happen no matter what the way that
it's designed, but I would support that for these students. Okay. So we have a motion to and then we did did stand did you have a motion as well or did you just second? Oh, okay. Okay. Well, I would say, mister Tidwell made the motion first, which was the same one that missus Darby made. So it was I'll second hers. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Just go ahead and roll call, please. Can we read it again? Please read. Okay. The motion is to build a transition academy on current properties at both is that
Smyrna High? Middle. Smyrna Middle. And Whitworth Buchanan with a budget of $750,000. Okay. Once approved, do you want me to add that? Once approved. Yeah. Once approved. Alright. Missus Darby? Yes. Mister Vaught? Yes. Missus Rosales? Yes. Mister Vaughn? Yes. Mister Tidwell? Yes. Miss Sharp? Yes. Missus Maxwell? Yes. And I pray we can get it approved. Alright. It passes. Alright. Can we go ahead and make that motion to put that money in that account
tonight? I will need a lot of accounting codes before we can do that. Okay. Next, we move on to safety. So the board went to executive session to discuss this the other day. So this is a mapping project to meet the requirements of TCA forty nine six zero eight zero five four. Motion to approve the mapping project request as presented will be finding out safe schools. So moved. Second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next instruction. This is Orton Gillingham training for title one schools for the spring and this motion is to utilize title one funds for Orton Gillingham training in the fall to cost
not to exceed $89,112.50. The cost is inclusive of training materials, on-site, and consultant, and travel costs. So moved. Second. Second. Thank you, mister Vaught. Thank you, miss Darby. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next, we have Novus Smart Academy. This is the Novus Smart Academy k through eight agreement in accordance with board policy 1.902. An agreement has been drafted between Rutherford County Schools and Nova Smart Academy. The agree exhibits of this agreement include the RCS performance framework, preopening checklist, detailing those
schools responsibilities prior to their first year serving students, and a list of approved waivers in the Tennessee Department of Education. And just as note, this charter application is previously approved by the school board will be viewed in its entirety on our website. So we need a motion to We approve their agreement. So moved. Thank you, miss Sharp. Do we have a second? Second. Thank you, miss Darby. Quick question. Dawn, when you sent out the agenda, that was a lot of it, wasn't it? That whole application. Yeah. I I kinda yeah. Put me to sleep one night. But, anyway, those are I mean, there's a ton of information there.
I'd never really studied one. Doctor yeah. You know, I There's a lot to it. Thank you. Okay. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next, we go to legal and just So these are the policy adoption second reading of two readings. So they were already approved on the first reading on November 20. And if it's alright, I'll just read the policy numbers since these have already been written. Yes. Absolutely. Just do the numbers. Alright. A, policy 1.703. B, policy 3.206. C, policy 4.601.
D, policy 4.605. E, policy 6.204. And F, policy 6.701. So moved. Thank you, mister Vaughn. Thank you, mister Darby. All in favor say aye. Aye. I'm sorry. Was it miss Sharp? I'm so sorry. I apologize. Any opposed? Motion passes. I do wanna go out because there's always a lot of chatter on this on b. This does formally require anyone applying for our seats choice seats through application. They have to live in the zones that are primary domicile by the time they apply, not by the start of next school year.
And so that is a change. It's got some social media chatter again today that I saw. And so they have to live here before they apply. Yes. Doctor Sullivan. Yes. Madam chair. Yes. Yes. Miss Darby. Can you speak a little bit, I guess, to what that is? Is it similar to when they register for school that they're having to bring utility bill or so they have to submit that with the application? Yep. Doctor McCann. Okay. Thank you. So, miss Maxwell? Yes, miss Jackson? Just for clarity, and if anybody's watching, if they if you move in after the
choice seats are already been, it they're gone. Yep. It has to be done. They gotta be living in in the zone, the area, before you apply for those, which that is gonna end on, what would you say, the sixteenth or March 3. Sorry. Thank you. Yes. Because we are This is 26. Applying who weren't even living here. And that did infuriate a lot of our citizens and as it Quite so. Rightly so. Next, financial matters. Alright. First, we have fund 141 budget amendment. This amendment is to increase general purpose funds, 141 budgeted expenditures, and decrease fund balance
in the amount of a $175,000 to account for the fiscal year twenty four, twenty five charter schools final true up. This was not a budgeted amount in the fiscal 2425 budget due to not being able to determine the increase in ADMs and actual revenues and expenditures for that fiscal year. We talked about Tuesday, this potentially recurring budget amendment every fiscal year, because it's difficult to determine the actual numbers for every charter school in developing the budget. It is required to be amended from fund balance because this payment to charter schools from previous year student revenue and expenditure is only worked through the comptroller's office to
make sure that these are worded the right way. I'll entertain So moved. Second. Mister Vaughn. Thank you, mister Tipple. Mhmm. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next. Fund 141 budget amendment. This amendment is to increase general purpose fund 141 budgeted expenditures and decrease fund balance in the amount of 65,000 to fund the deposits of earnest money and appraisals of five McFadden properties. This This amendment will transfer money by decreasing fund $1.41 $39.00 $0.00 unassigned fund balance and increasing board of education account 72310715 land of the count in
the amount of 65,000. Thank you, mister Vaughn. And thank you, mister Botts. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next. Next, I don't believe we need so we can mister Reed, what would be the appropriate motion if there's something we don't need on this? Nope. No action. Okay. No action. Next, engineering and construction. Transportation contract termination bus two 20 and one thirty pursuant to section 8.1 of the Rutherford County Board of Education bus contract. Transportation department received an email notification on 12/03/2025 from Brenda Stem, the daughter of James
Stem, for bus routes two 20 and one thirty requesting voluntary termination of the contracts with the board. Based on previous board approval, there would be a return of insurance stipend funding for insurance to RCS for both routes. The board attorney will be requesting to notify the estate of this requirement. So moved. Thank you, mister Vaughn. Second. Thank you, mister Vaughn. But let me I wanna clarify something there. I I'm I know we probably should, but I'm a little reluctant to pile that on that estate. Anytime you go through that, we're we're talking probably less than $4,000 So and and
I probably should have included this in my original motion, so I I hate to put that burden back on the Stem family. I really do. I don't know if that's fair or if that's right. I just feel like, you know, they have he's been a contractor here an extremely long time and, you know, clawing back that money at this time in their life, I don't feel good about it. So I kind of want to amend my motion right now to say that we don't go after the insurance money because we're halfway through, but I'm reluctant because does
that set precedent that everybody else, if you understand what I mean? So it could be the fact that mister Reed, you know, if he negotiates with the estate, if the estate doesn't have the money, then we can't claw it back. So it may be better handled that way as opposed to I'm thinking out loud if y'all are not following me right now. Miss Maxwell. Okay? Miss Maxwell. I I'm I'm trying to get the rest of you engaged here. Just a second. Yes, mister Tidwell. I think this is, obviously, an extremely sad but unique situation.
I don't know if there's a carve out in there for such a circumstance. But certainly, I I understand where mister Vaught's coming from, and I'm in agreeance with the position. We wouldn't want it to set precedent for other situations. But if we're comparing the situation, another situation that we set precedent for is someone passing away during the service. So if that is a parameter or something that we can talk about in this board without violating anything that we have already set up, I'm in agreeance with the
thought here. I think that is not a a good look or good move from the board to to go after someone who has spent so many years of service in our communities. Yes, mister doctor Salton. From an audit standpoint, I just need an official motion from the board to send to the county finance director because that's not something I'm I think they're gonna love. So we'll need it specifically later. Yes, miss Darley. I think mister Lee has the actual amount. $6,043.84. Okay. Yes, miss Darley. I think it's possible to probably put something I know it's in there that they
have to pay it back if they end early, but could we not put the caveat in there unless due to death or extreme sickness. I mean, I'm sure there's a way legally, mister Reed, maybe we could word it that would be appropriate but not set precedence for any and every little scenario. Is the board's right whether or not to collect the money or not? If the board votes to not try to collect the money, then the board does not have to collect the money at that point. Contractually, if we add language to the contract, it has to be amended.
All the contractors have to approve it. It's a big ordeal to amend the contract. So if the board if this if the will of the board is not collected, the board needs to vote to not pursue collection of the prorated insurance in this case. Miss Maxwell. Yes. Mister Tidwell. So for clarity sake, you're saying there's there's not really a route without having precedent for every other contract to Without adjust this particular certain circumstance. If you're on you would have to amend the contract if you're trying to carve
out these exceptions. If you amend the contract, it requires all of us contractors to agree to that, which requires all all these to be re executed again, which is a big deal. Okay. Thank you. I think I wanna rescind my motion and restate it. Who seconded? Butch did. I'd like to restate it by saying this. We accept the termination of those two contracts, but do not, go after the insurance stipend in this particular case. I'll send it to you. Thank you, mister Bond.
Can we legally do that? Yes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Miss Maxwell? Yes. Just based off what you just said, would we in other cases where we are going after the insurance money, are we setting ourselves up for some type of situation? The contract says, if you just if you deem to to not enforce your rights with respect to particular contractor for whatever reason, it does not deem itself to be in a duty of the board to do that in other cases. So, from a fairness standpoint, you will have people say, well, you treated this person
this way. You have to do me the same way about the same situation. So from a legal standpoint, it does not create problems from a fairness standpoint. You could have someone say who's in a similar situation asking for the same benefit that you've afforded this family. Well, I mean That's for a board to determine. Sure. So there's some discretion there. And that's kind of where where we're at now. I just wanted to make sure there would be no legal issues because, obviously, if somebody made the argument separately, I'd be well, this person has passed away. So the argument would be void unless you have a similar circumstance in which the board would probably react the same way. Mhmm.
So I just wanted to clarify that. Thank you. Okay. Madam chair. Yes, mister Sure. Mister Reed, when someone passes away and they owe credit cards that that are just in their name, does that company have the right to come back to the estate or does it die with with the person? They can they can come after the estate. Okay. Yes. So this is a unique circumstance. So we have a motion from mister Vaught, and the changes that we do not pursue or claw back the money.
The exact dollar amount in that motion? Yes, please. $6,043.84. And that is for the total of both routes together. Okay. Okay. Could you read the motion one more time? Yes. Okay. Motion to approve the voluntary contract termination of bus two twenty and one thirty, but do not go after the stipend of $6,043.84 in this particular case. K. Thank you. Yes, mister. Can we say, pursue reimbursement?
Pursue reimbursement. Pursuing. Yeah. Okay. Alright. Okay. I think we can just do a all in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Abstain. Okay. Motion passes. Thank you all. That's 11. It's so like understanding and kindness. You to do. Okay. Alright. We have a central magnet bench request. And so engineering construction has read the request and has no objection to projects being donated by MTSU School Concrete and Construction. Move to approve. Thank you, mister Vaughn. Second. Thank you, miss, mister Vaughn. Miss Darby.
All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Next. We have Rocky Fork Elementary's Gaga ball pit request. Principal Scott Baldwin request to install Gaga ball pit. The cost is $9,513.75 will be at no cost to the board. Move to approve. Thank you, Ms. Darby. Thank you, Ms. Sharp. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. Alright. Next, we have mister Johnson. He'll be part of my director's update. I know his label has several other quick things to go over. We asked mister Johnson to go over the route of warning. Just a quick overview of how that's gonna work. Mister Johnson, he's all yours.
Good evening, everyone. I for the sake of time, I want to, first of all, answer a question that was asked last night. Not last night, but the first night. We're here Tuesday. Question was, how many open routes do we have? Zero. The sped route that had been open since August was picked up, so we have zero open routes. I have all of the documents that I need to receive from those two drivers on the route updates. So that is taken care of as well. So we don't have to worry about closing any, you know, not, providing any checks
to those folks. Wanna state that first of all. Secondly, I've given you all some handouts and so I'm not gonna go through the bubble chart step by step, but I do wanna say this, that the system is designed for three things. Equal opportunity, transparent documentation, consistent decision making. There was perception by many of the drivers and that perception was that we weren't spinning the wheel.
We were deciding who we wanted to give it to. We were kinda throwing mud against the wall. And if it's stuck and someone's name came up, that's who we would award it to. That is not true. Everybody has an opportunity, an equal, fair opportunity to compete for these routes. So without going through the, this is the policy 3.4 in the student transportation management. I put that up on pages three and four, so you might wanna read it. You probably already know it, but I wanna highlight a couple of things. You wanna put it up about this.
When the notification when a route is announced to be open, a notification goes out to the public, all of the dryers, drivers. And those drivers give an intent. They have to submit an application saying, I would like to compete for that particular route. Their name is added to the picker wheel, and then their name is randomly selected. Once their name is selected, they have a choice to make. Do I want to accept the route or do I not want to accept the route? If they decide to not accept the route, their name is removed from the list
and we go back to the wheel again and spin it again. If they decide to accept the route, they must provide us two things within twenty four hours. They must provide us with a VIN number of a bus so that we know that they have a vehicle, and they must have an active driver. They cannot come and say, hey, mister Johnson. I have a driver who's interested, but his background investigation has not been completed. Can you give me time? My answer will always be no. No. I cannot do that. Why? Because we don't know how long a background investigation will last.
And secondly, every day that that route is open is a day that we've got to find ways to make up for and it causes chaos. So we're very, very particular about making sure that they have a van and a driver. How do we make sure of that? We call them first and ask before we even put them on the spin because it doesn't make sense to put them on and they don't have it. And then if they say they do, then we put them on the spin. But once they accept it, we still want them to come in and sign that affidavit saying I have a VIN and I have a driver.
Once that has been done and they've accepted it, they can come in and start to route and activate it. Those are the key elements of that. Any questions, comments, concern? Yes, ma'am. Yes, miss Tidwell. Oh, Miss Descartes. Oh. Miss Descartes. Sorry. Who I don't know who did first. So, thank you, mister Johnson for this. Is there any way that we can notify because before when we operated from a list, they kind of knew that they were gonna come up and might possibly have
an opportunity for another route. Is there a way when they have can we have a list or put out a list that says, here's the people that are gonna be spinning for this will. Yes. Not only that, we once we spin, we can send out a list of saying these are all of the people that were selected for the spin. And then once we finish, we can also send out a list and say that these are the people that were selected for these particular routes. Why that is important? It's important because if they are in a particular geographical area, a location where other
buses are, and those buses know that you've accepted that route and they need help, they know who to call. And one more thing. Because they I had a couple of calls from bus drivers about spinning the wheel and everything when when no one's there. And I understand everybody can't come here to the central office. Is there any way that you could do a Zoom? Yes, ma'am. The way we're gonna do that, for security, again, there was no truck there was distrust in the drivers about spinning the wheel. So what we would do is we have assigned this task to one of our lead routers.
So we will always be in the room with her, whether it would be myself, it might be the super superintendent, and take a picture. Once the wheel stop, a picture is taken of who that driver is. So if anybody wants to know if it was fair, we will send them that picture or send them the video, the video. And they'll be time stamped? Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Time stamped. Thank you so much. And we're logging all of that. Time, place, witnesses, and with the photo. Okay. Thank you. Mister Johnson, I appreciate this. This is very clear straightforward.
I love the flowchart. It's easy for us to send back because we get a lot of questions about that. So I appreciate all this information. I just wanna say that. But also, I've heard that you are out riding, with some of these contractors, on these buses. Is that true? Yes, sir. I, my desire is to build relationships. And by doing that, I go out and ride with at least three to four drivers a week. I try to visit at least three to four principals every week and I try to talk to as many drivers as I can. Why that's important to me is because we hear drivers talking about things going on
and we might assume that they're complaining. But when you actually get on a bus and ride and you see how they have to negotiate these tight streets and some of the location where they're dropping these kids and safety issues they're in. When we are talking about rezoning, I need to be hip to hip with the guy that's creating that so that we can talk to him about the reality of those zones that they're talking about putting in. So, yes, I do. That's awesome. For the next hundred and twenty days, that's my plan, is to visit all principals
and all drivers. Already off to a great start. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Yes. Appreciate it. Any other questions or comments? Any other questions or comments? That was very impressive. If you, you have the design really, if you have any questions, call me, and I will personally come up and sit down and talk about it with you. Thank you. Keep it in mind. Glad you're here, mister Johnson. Thank you. Yeah. Alright. I do have a couple things on be as quick as possible. I did email you all. We do have it's financial season is about to start for us even though it's December. We start our budget season, which is typical for us that we had our school
internal account funds, which that, account so just so I can go over and kind of how our audits work. We have two different audits. We have an audit that is conducted by the comptroller's office. Those are the funds that our board approves. Fund 141, 142, 143, 177. That report is not yet published, but once it is, it should have good news and that's that's all I can say till it's published. We do have our school internal accounts. Those had eight findings last year. It had nine. You never want findings, but we do hired a third party CPA to try and
find anything and everything they can. That that's what their job is. They're auditing our schools, auditing our books to make sure that the things at the school level. So if you look at those documents as published at the comptroller's website, it's things that is not signing and the wrong person signed a packing slip. Alright. But it's, 52 schools, there's there's a wide range of things, but we'll work with our principals on correcting those. Budget season again starts soon. We will meet with our principals at our meeting next Wednesday. Nothing starts the Christmas season like discussing budget season.
And so they will start working on their budget requests next as soon as they get back. But we go over it at our meeting with them next Wednesday. We will more than likely need to operate with less funding and so need to be aware of what our priorities are, the reason we operate with less funding. Couple of reasons. One, we have just a little bit less students. So a 140 ish less students than we have. Less piece of funding. Second, there was a hold harmless last year for economically disadvantaged students. If you'll recall, we talked about there was a huge change with what qualified as
economically disadvantaged with Medicare that went away. The governor held harmless for one year. And so that that's several million dollars. And so we've already started looking at ways to to cut costs, but we will have to do a budget. TSIS should increase a percentage as part of the governor's budget, but we're looking at ways that we can move positions around, as much as possible, but we'll start that. Next thing is health and education. We talked about it Tuesday. Last Tuesday. This coming Tuesday, December 16 at 05:30. It is at the county commission, so the historic courthouse.
We'll have our budget amendment, but then we will have our enrollment analysis and future planning. Meeting with health and ed and budget just to discuss where we're heading. State report card will be released next week. We'll have great news, on that. But the official release will come with TDOE and that should make us eligible for some things like we got last year as well. And then last is, had a really a great week with the community. So we met with Jennings Jones Foundation this week. Courtney Brown and I was our, gifted supervisor and we secured funding for three more
years for our gifted academy. So we appreciate them doing that. Then miss Maxwell and I met with the Christy Houston Foundation and the Scarlet Family Foundation to look at some future funding opportunities for post secondary for our kids. And so that was a good initial meeting yesterday. And then I'm serving on the Williamson Family Farm Education Foundation. So that is a a way along with the commissioner Pettus Reed to try to enhance opportunities for students around agriculture. And so our first meeting was today. Last one is, we always have to be moving forward. So we're gonna talk a lot more about this in the next couple months, really
years. But we know that we have really tried to do a lot with career and technical education. We looked at having CT centers across our county, so we're embarking and have really embarked on a partnership with us, TCAT, Murfreesboro, Smyrna, and also with Motlow. And so we've had some initial meetings with them. It's gonna take some time because it's gonna involve our board, our county commission, Tennessee Board of Regents, to where our conversations have been around land use from Rutherford County,
three different areas. Cedar Grove or Laverne Middle, probably Cedar Grove. We have a lot of land behind it. Kittrell Elementary School potentially, that could serve the Rutherford, but for TCAT and Mottlow, it also helps them serve Canon County. That that's their issue. Kitchell. Cedar Grove, the LaVarn Middle, but Cedar Grove makes more sense. And then also the land we have beside Blackman Elementary for a health sciences type thing. And so it's it's just starting kind of our initial conversations or we have land, but we don't have the ability to build buildings. We don't have that funding capital. TBR has invested a lot in TCAT centers recently.
They did the Smyrna where we had our board retreat. They've also just recently completely redone TCAT Shelbyville. And so there may be some partnerships that we're exploring. I don't wanna go too far down that, but it was an exciting time for us to look to see how can we really enhance some opportunities for our high school students and partner with them. So long process, it's a little bit of a risk, but it it helps us kinda see if there's a partnership way for us with Motlow and TCAT. So I appreciate mister Wei with TCAT, doctor Torrance with Motlow.
And it's been some good meetings to start. We've been trying to get this off the ground for a while, but I'll bring you all the next step because the we have to see what Motlow and their board of regents is interested, and then I'll bring you all more information on it. But exciting. Mister Vaughn, do you have anything legislative wise? Oh, god. Okay. I am. Oh, come on. Texas was an active person here. Okay. Thank you, sir. Now to general discussion. Does anyone have anything? Yes, mister Vaughn. You know, I know it's late, but I just like to you know, this is the end of college football season.
And you you read about it, you see all about TV about coaches getting fired and these coaches getting extended contracts. And, you know, our school system is the best school system in the state of Tennessee. We've had, what, 32 levels of five schools, and, you know, we've got a director of schools that brought has brought everybody together. Every school principal that we've talked to has supported, doctor Southern and says, you know,
they they really appreciate. He said he showed great leadership, for our system and for all the people that work with him. Very few people can do the job, that he's done. Most superintendents don't survive very long, but very few people can do what he's done. You know, if if superintendents don't perform well, they get fired. And, you know, it it, the ones that have low achieving systems and schools, they
don't last very long. They blame the leaders. So to be fair, in my opinion, we need to reward, our coach whenever they receive these higher achievement. And doctor Sullivan's salary is seventh in the state. We're the fourth largest third largest school system in the state. We got the highest performing standard. So I'd like to make a motion that we extend Doc Sutherland's contract one year
and to raise his salary by $10,000 to get him where he is more, reward him for the job that he's done for us. Yeah. Because if things don't go very well, we may be on the other side. Yeah. But I'd like to make that motion. Can I real quick? Yes. I appreciate that, mister Vaughn. But there are certain things that have to follow for any type of contract extension and mister Regan can attest to that as an honor to serve in this district each and every day, but it's not about me.
It's about the people that I get the the vision to and the opportunity to serve with every day. We have a great central office staff, great teachers, and they're the ones that make the impact, but I do appreciate that. But mister mister Reed can can talk more to that some other date. K. Sounds good. Okay. Yes. Mister Tibble. I'd just like to say we are in the season of amazing shake competitions. So I'm sure you guys are probably getting invites too. If you haven't went and been a judge at one of these things, they are awesome. It really just shows, what's going on in in these lessons, that these life lessons
these kids are learning. I will be, I we got a lot of invites to different ones, but I'll be at one of my schools tomorrow, and I encourage a lot of fun. Doctor Sullivan, I think, has done it. I think most of the board members have done it up here anyways. But it's really fun. It's a great time. Encourages your students by showing up and judging if you can. I got a handshake too, but it's it's because of my stomach. My only suggestion is it's also, sickness season, so please wash your hands when you're done. Mister Vaught. One one thing, and I hate to end on this this kind of a sour note. I know for the last three or four weeks, we've been getting emails from one
of the bus contractors about the, power hour deal, and I don't know that anybody's ever addressed it or ever happened. But I'm gonna ask the question here that that and this may take a community effort between Trey and and, mister Reed to answer. Those contracts that were issued back at the beginning of the semester that said it was gonna be for the entire year, and now the board elected to change that, is there any liability on our part for for for that?
I mean, it's kind and I because I know that's you've either drawn for the spring routes or you have or you're right here fixing to. So anyway, if you can kinda highlight that just a minute. Sure. There was no contract that stated a year. There was a request for the contractors to submit their, application. What's been floating around is an application. It's not a contract. And I'm not minimizing this contractor's argument in the least.
I've sent mister Reed a timeline of events. There was a request for application. There was the drawing that you were at. And the next board meeting or work session, there was a lot of conversation about whether we did one or whether we did two. At that point, the contractors had begun to sign their contracts. But they signed them, we did not fill in the end date. We left it blank because the board had taken up the conversation.
At the conclusion of the board's conversations when you all voted to change what was on the application, the following day, that information was included, and the board chairwoman and doctor Sullivan signed those contracts. So we had a open ended, not complete contract until the board voted. Now mister Reed can speak to the legalities.
We did not have a valid contract until after the board took action. And I'll leave it at that. And that was my that that was what I was hoping for. What I was afraid that had happened is that there was an end date that because that was the impression most of them had, I think, the day that I was here and saw the picker wheel. But because of the board the board's inaction, I would state it that way. We had not instructed you or transportation on what to award.
And so until we voted on that to do two drawings, there was it was really not a valid contract then at that point in time. Right? I I did not there there was not a fully executed contract. Right. If that if that makes sense. It was only an application until the school board signed it. Yeah. So they they were really operating without a contract up until that point. Once power out signed it, and we were paying them. Yeah. Yeah. But but we did not have a fully executed I I I just wanna make
sure we weren't fixing the double pay. That's you know, there's a there's there there would be a huge liability on our part if that was the case. It's just we need to outline it better next time if that's what we're gonna do, whichever way we're gonna do. Anyway, I just want to like I said, I hate to end on a sour note, but nobody had responded back to her, and I felt like that needed to be addressed here before too long. Thank you. Is there anything else? If not, miss Darby? Move to adjourn.