e e e e e e call this meeting to order it is 6:30 and calling the regular business meeting of the St Louis Park School Board for February 25
2025 um before we get started I'm going to read the land acknowledgement we are gathered on the land of the Dakota ojibway peoples I ask you to join me in acknow acknowledging the Dakota ojibway Community their elders both past and present as well as future Generations St Louis Park public
schools also acknowledges that it was founded upon exclusions and erasers of many indigenous peoples including those on Whose land the school district is located this acknowledgement demonstrates a commitment to dismantling the ongoing legacies of colonial power and a District's desire to support the
ongoing work of local indigenous communities to thrive in our schools uh the next thing on our agenda is to approve our agenda um which includes public comment um superintendent report um some discussion items 6A which is
design team update Career and Technical education 6B which is a finance advisory committee budget and fiscal recommendations seven which is our consent agenda eight where we have our action items including 8A and American Indian annual compliance agreement 8 B
policy development the second reading and vote on policy 503 B1 excused absences uh second reading and vote of policy this is 8C 506 student discipline 8D which is second reading and vote of policy 524 internet and Technology
responsible use for students and 8 e policy development second reading and vote of policy 621 read act then we have board member updates and an adjournment with that um it is recommended that the school board approved the agenda for February 25th 2025 is presented do I
have a motion to do so so move moved by Taylor do I have a second second second by Ann all those in favor I any oppos pass the 70 okay at this time we have our public comment before we get going with our public comment um let me just
read this description here to support open communication the St Louis Park School District provides an opportunity for the public to address the school board during business meetings if you wish to speak please complete the public comment sign up which was online or there's one in the back of the room with
ch was there any additional signups okay um and uh on our website before the meeting begins anyone indicating a desire to speak during public comment will be acknowledged by the board chair and all lowed three minutes to present their topic tonight we have a special presentation where we're allowing it to go for a little bit longer than that um
that's been pre-arranged during this time the board and administration will listen to comments um but and note that no disrespectful comments are those in a personal nature directed individual either by name or inference will not be permitted so with that I believe that we
have um just one sign up up tonight and we have um miles F and Sarah janii that are leading this and Megan s's her adviser and so I'm going to turn it over to them welcome them to the
table here miles and we'll turn it over to you okay hello St Louis Park School Board and Dr Hines I'm miles food and I'm SAR jaavan and we are speaking in behalf of the St Louis Park Middle School Green Team we would like to talk about the
Middle School cafeteria Waste Systems that that use single use Plastics one way to address these issues is to apply for henpen County Waste reduction Grant um which the green team is already attempted to get approval for in
December 2024 the nutrition services has thus far denied the opportuni stating that the kitchen does not have the capacity to watch silverware even though we use silverware pre pandemic one reason we want the waste Grant is because of our plastic silver
our plastic wear in our lunchroom we use so much plastic in our lunchroom that does not need to be there I'm not just talking about the plastic utensils but also other waste that could potentially be reduced with this grant we can do a lot of things
but one thing that we want to focus on is the plastic utensils we want them out of our lunchroom and in replacement silverware we were told that our lunchroom would convert into compostable utensils by mid January although we have
not seen this toen yet another reason we want the grant is because we want more way sorting vents many students in our school want to be environmentally responsible and put the right items in the correct bins one huge obstacle though is that we don't have enough sorting bins
it it we only have one which is not always in use the bins allow students easily discard their waste properly since they have defined sections for compost recycling and trash our club will also take precautions if we find that the bins are still not being used
how they should be used um did you know that just last year the amount of money spent on Waste Management in St Louis Park was 13 $ 38960 last school year the 2023 through 2024 school year we spent $1,717 on plastic utensils this
consisted of 96 cases of forks and 133 cases of spoons on our presentation we have a table and on this table it shows by month how much money we spend on Waste Management in the entire District since there's zero tax on compost and
recycling Aspen waste costs could to go down drastically we acquired more waste sorting bins and converted to silverware our school is 1/5 of the total waste management cost in our district we would also like to thank Patricia Magnuson who
is a big help collecting this data last Friday apologies are we here we just finished this okay sorry everyone last Friday our club had the opportunity to work with the University of Minnesota menap is a
program that conducted a waste audit on our cafeteria we received a final report from John who's supporting us here tonight but it's easy to see that over 90% of our school trash should really be
composted or recycled this means that our lunchroom should have more compost and recycling bins for students to use this would not just benefit our school but it would also once they learn these skills they can use it in the world around them SLP teachers are always
saying that we create change makers so let's do that we can change people's perspective and how they look at something if we change that making them more open-minded we can fix the problem of kids won't care so they don't
do which if we make them care which we can they will do it it will just take some time and a lot of work this relates to the previous slide because we found a ton of compost and recyclable items in the trash bins again
not having the rip bins for these items will cost more than if we do because we will have extra Tas T tax for trash moreover we were unlucky to have the SL we were lucky to have the SLP
city waste specialist Addison tamson who she informed us that the entire District meaning all of the schools are currently non-compliant with the zero waste package ordinance we will eventually be fine for non-compliance this graphic organizer
shows the cost of each different type of utensil clearly shown reusables are more cost effective saving our saving money for our school and our district these are our sources thank
[Applause] you thank you um thank you for sharing that information tonight we do have sort of like a policy that we don't really comment in uh in direct response but we will take in this information and we can
follow up with you through um your advisor or somehow we can make sure that we connect back with you too but I can say that I think we were all impressed and by how well this was presented by the support that you have here in the room and just really appreciate you taking and being courageous and coming
forward and sharing this in in such a public setting that takes a lot of energy and probably the great support of a lot of people here so thank you so much you're welcome to stick around for the rest of the board meeting but I totally understand if you wanted to a
question if we want if we have followup questions I know that we don't do in so is there anate way to reach out to the group I think it would be through the advis here right we also meet every Wednesday after school so if you wanted
to join us for a meeting we'd love to have you um the kids worked really hard to collect a lot of data and we were super lucky to have people on staff and also people from the U um that are invested
in what their work is so thank you thank you thank you very much you thank you thanks you're welcome to stay for how much but you're welcome to take Cofe or too what's that what is the name of the group Green te Green Team can we get a Cofe of because I don't think this
PowerPoint was in our board materials yes can thank you all right with that brings us up to the superintend I know I don't know if I can follow that
up but you know I will try my best um so thank you so here is my February update um at St Louis Park public schools we see Inspire and Empower each learning to live their Brilliance in an environment that centers student voice and
experience to create racially Equitable learning that energizes and enhances the spirit of our community this month we have some exciting achievements to sh share um we are celebrating I love to read month Black History Month Career
and Technical education month and I would like to highlight student leadership in Civics engagement so we have one of our yda students that applied and was selected to serve on
representative Elon Omar's youth advisory Council and so I am happy to share that OA otoa masaki has been selected to serve on the youth advisory Council this opportunity allows her to contribute to important
decisions on policy and advocacy while representing the voice of young people in our community her involvement reflects the district's emphasis on student empowerment and civic responsibility so when you see her please congratulate her on this
achievement secondly our student organized a holocaust remembrance event honoring Manny g g Gable gaer our students recently led a meaningful Holocaust remembrance event in
recognition of Manny through this initiative students demonstrated a profound commitment to historical awareness and education ensuring that the stories and lessons of the past remain present in our Collective memory
the event showcased student leadership and our District's dedication to fostering a culture of respect learning and social justice these accomplishments exemplify the exemplary Talent compassion and
dedication within our school Community we are immensely proud of our students and staff for their achievements and for upholding the values that Define St Louis Park public schools and that ends my report great thank you Dr Hines that brings us up to
uh 6A for discussion this is a phase one design team update on Career and Technical education we have um Dr Duffy the director of teaching learning and Leadership coming to the table to kick this off for us thank you um chair Cox super tenant
Hines members of the board um it is my pleasure to uh be here to welcome and introduce our career in technical education design team um I'm just still taking in everything that we just heard these students share I'm always AST Ed when I hear our students engage in this
work and just so thankful for the work that our teachers are doing to engage them in this way it's a testament to the work that we're about to hear about and this work that we're about to engage in around Career and Technical education um before I invite the three members of our
design team up I want to share three things that I think kind of lead into this work um I believe a lot of our work that we've done around our reviews and design teams have led to this point around Career and Technical
education um I believe at my core that the primary teacher of each of our children is is their parent their family member and I think about my own two children I'm just going to get personal
here for a moment and I think we differentiate for children in our community and even in our own family just as our teachers do um my both of my children were very different and um tried to do the best I could for both of
them um one my son will um always wanted to be very Hands-On and whether it was creating things with Legos or train tracks um I tried to understand that his sort of will to want to be an engineer
led to me bringing my love of History into road trips and and getting him to um understand that his love of creation was getting instruments in front of him and helping him understand how he could explore those sort of things in
different ways um my daughter Kira 13 years ago I remember um we drove to go to a doughnut shop somewhere in St Louis Park and it was one morning and it was uh I I I
don't know why but we pulled over to um go to the dut shop and I said what do you want to be when you grow up and this 4 and 1/2-year-old girl without hesitation said mayor and I thought to myself I've got a
problem on my hands here and all I knew was that for the rest of my time with her I was just watching trying to think wonder why she said that and I didn't
try to get her into a career in politics but what I did was I noticed that when she was very interested in saying I want to go attend the summit for courageous conversations on race with you dad I want to go see that video of the school board meeting that you presented at I
want to hear about those social justice issues that you're talking about at school I want to go much to my chagrin I want to go go see my uncle at the University of Wisconsin Madison and see what they're doing in those Progressive issues there I would say go take that
on so I think about that because Career and Technical education I think starts before our babies even come to us in the school and then when we come into Elementary School I think about the way that Career and Technical education we think of it
often as a high school opportunity but we in St Louis Park have said that our talent development program is really a primary way after we forged a beautiful relationship in prek we've said that our talent development
program is a place where we are going to have critical thinking exploration and connection and purposeful exploration around science technology education and the Arts and find ways that students can understand
together where they want to go in all of this work and then in IB in middle school and high school understanding whether it be through design classes in the Arts and Science and an anti-racist leadership development where they're going to figure out how they can
navigate a diverse and complex high school so we have a lot of Career and Technical Pathways at the high school but we have been doing this work for decades we have three people that are coming up to talk to us now about the review that they're going to begin
around Career and Technical education but our mission asks us to actually look at how we are developing Career and Technical Pathways for leaders in every location that our students choose and we have been doing that as
long as St Louis Park has been here we have had we have had I've said before Grammy winners Oscar winners Pulitzer Prize winners we've had politicians go through these hallways and we haven't been afraid to say that most recently it is absolutely
essential that they are also racially conscious and that they are globally minded because we know that to do that we are saying that the entire Humanity of each person as well as treating them with dignity is absolutely essential for
the children that come out of our schools so with that said I'm going to turn it over to lenisha Paddock Cara Mueller and Abby Lugo who will tell us about their work on the CTE design team this
[Laughter] really oh okay okay um sorry Dr Duffy do we need to talk about the phas just okay that's what I figured I just wanted
to make sure okay oh there we are all right so I'm Abby Lugo I teach business classes at the high school yay CTE um and so I always say that CTE is a blessing and a curse like I get to spend time with kids who get to shine in a
whole new light and I get to see their Brilliance that they might not Showcase in some of those core classrooms and I love it but at the same time it's a challenge because I instantly have to outdate curriculum like constantly and I mean this year I have eight different classes
that I'm teaching throughout the year so this semester five preps alone but I love it I love my job so I'm super excited to look at this and see how are we working to like bring this full scale and I'll tell you a little bit more about my y later but I'll and this is Karen Mueller and lenisha Paddock are we
doing the Y now we're like I'm sorry I think the W okay okay all right our racial Equity purpose statement the CTE design team is committed to advancing racial Equity by ensuring inclusive accessible and
empowering career Pathways for all students we recognize and work to dismantle systemic barriers that have limited opportunities for historically marginalized students through culturally relevant and responsive instruction Equitable access to resources and a
strong Community Partnership we strive to create programs that reflect and uplift our diverse student body our goal is to ensure each learner can leverage their own passions and strengths while having the opportunity to explore and thrive in Innovative sustainable careers
making racially racial Equity a lived reality in our schools and Beyond okay sorry I jumped to this right off the yes yes that's great uh thank you so we're just going to talk I'm going to
talk about why this work is important to me and why it's important for the district to engage in um a review of this work and I'm just going to kind of combine them um I believe uh at my core that our role as Educators is to create
awareness opportunity and access for a variety of career Pathways and that we ensure that students have the resources and tools that they need to be College and Career ready um I also believe that CTE offers kind of a multi-tiered
approach to Career Development it's really allowing our students to explore um and earn IND industry certifications apprenticeships technical technical degrees um that really meets the demand of an evolving and Ever Changing like
Workforce um from both a personal and a professional I'm the spouse of someone who's in a trade and so I really see firsthand the benefits of what what what careers in like going to a technical school have to offer um and how that can lean into some really re warning and
sustainable career opportunities um we also believe that it's essential to create relevant educational experiences that expose our students um to diverse career opportunities and that aligns with their
goals their strengths their skill sets and that may be or may not be uh a pathway that leads to a four-year uh college degree um I believe that um we should be exposing our students to multiple career
Pathways and Empower them to make informed decisions about what they want to do postsecondary um whether that's a a skills trade Health Care technology or other high demand field um and lastly I believe the work of this design team is
to really create um that vertical articulation prek K12 so that students can imagine themselves in a variety of careers um and it's about communication right it's about providing the resources and tools so students see themselves
being anything that they dream to be and leaning into their interest and strengths to get there and lastly I just have to um this team has been amazing um at the high school I'm really proud of the work that we've already done I feel like we are leading like I get I often
get um I just got one this week emails from other districts and and they want to come and see what we're doing and so I think that the value and and staying the leader and and making sure that we're analyzing the work that we're doing and that we're providing everything that we can for our students
um is just exciting and how we expand and create new opportunities so that's why I decided to join this team um alongside my wonderful team of Educators yeah so I am Cara Mueller I'm the career and college coordinator of the high
school and um I have a deep deep passion for career in Tech ad ever since I was honored with it when I was in high school um students don't know what they don't know and exposure and opportunity I want to broaden all
opportunities regardless of social economics regardless of race regardless of any kind of background and I want students to be able to critically think transition between because careers change quickly so I want them to have
skill we need to break the uh skill Gap we need academics with skill development and so I'm very very passionate about having all these opportunities open to all of our students regardless of where they end up in the end and I also tell
students you don't have to choose your college today you have to have a plan and in that plan how are you going to sustain yourself be happy and make an income to live and so it's about finding themselves giving them skill sets
continually educate but bring it all together yeah and I shared a little bit um prior to because I jumped the gun a little but um also I mean I think my biggest life for why I love to teach and why I continue to choose this job is because I believe that I can diversify
the boardrooms of America and so when that starts with opportunities that kids get in high school or kids get in education so that is like that has become a goal of mine and also trying to close the income gap that we see and encouraging our students to be the
change makers of that and to open up conversations about that and hold companies accountable and so that stems for it and then I just wanted to participate in this because in addition to wearing my teacher hat on the CTE team I'm also wearing a parent hat so my
oldest is in second grade and my youngest is about to join the Early Learning childhood he's probably this is um he also y he also earned the nickname the mayor at about 8 months old so he still lives up to it this to these to
this day so but I think just even as a parent like how are we going to make sure that you see my babies in their Brilliance not only like my babies my students but my babies my biological children and what opportunities they can see themselves in um throughout defining
their next PATH mhm so I think what questions do you have for us you guys are just beginning your journey as what heard so I think we're just like yeah appreciative of that but let's if people have questions or comments or feedback here or insights
they want to share about their experiences or anything I have a question first of all thank you um I know that this is for all those who volunteer for these um groups that and it's work that it's above and beyond what you um know we do and so I
just want to thank you for that I know in this phase one that some of the things that you're thinking about um one of the things on the list anyway is engage in courageous conversations or hear and reflect on student voice and Community input um I don't know a lot about our
Career and Technical education work other than what I hear here which is wonderful but I guess I'm wondering are there things that you have in mind going in that you anticipate we need to take a deeper deeper dive on areas that um
maybe require a little bit more I would say opportunity right like areas that present opportunity for us moving forward um because I know that the work that we do in this area is really great and also I know we have the spirit is across everything we do right I really
feel that um our uh K through High School needs to be seriously considered we're strong at the high school as best as we can be our Middle School needs to be seriously discussed and researched and find ways for our students to understand how they're going to move
along and then in the elementaries it's it's time for them to start being exposed connect their um what Brilliance that the the what Dr Duffy just talked about you T development Talent Development what enough I mean their
talent development would be the best opportunity to say do you know what you could do with this and so our element so it really needs to start earlier and really get some research out there on earlier career and Tech ad opportunities it has a history and its funding has
always been high high school but St Louis Park can mix things up and I'm excited to explore I think we're seeing a lot of districts move towards career pathway programs in which we already have like Cara has built an amazing amount of programs at our high
school but to look at like what would a Next Step Beyond that be and how do we build a c like you know just explore all that so and then make recommendations what we think is best it's very exciting and I would just agree with I mean both of them but what Cara is
saying really like when I say having our students imagine all of their opportunity in front of them that has to start the minute like that doesn't have to start in high school it really needs to start when at in prek right um in
exploring all of the things that you can do um I'm just speaking from personal experience there's so many things that I didn't know was were out there for me to explore and engage in um and so it's really our our responsibility to provide that for our
students and to make sure that they know that they can do anything they want and here's the pathways to get there and expose them to that often and early well I just want to say I'm really excited about that I feel like it's
really critical to um connect all of our students to be able to see Pathways to get to all sorts of things not just the things that are available in their immediate view I I'm a lawyer but I didn't grew up with any lawyers around
me and so I didn't I probably didn't even know what a lawyer did until I was in high school or Beyond um but yesterday so I also have a second grader and he said to me you know he's asking me did I know that kids can be charged or you know
brought to court when they're when they're kids and I said of course because that's what I spend my career working on um and he said well I'm going to change the law and I can't even imagine like even thinking that at that age because I wasn't exposed to it um
and I think he knows that because I talk about it all day so he maybe doesn't connect that he's heard it from me but you know nonetheless I think that opportunity to expose kids to all the things is really important well you know I love this I I
talk about you all the time and I love them so much that I have like pretty much force my child onto you so um which I've enjoyed very much she has Miss lug for three classes this um semester and at least two next semester and I think
um I think just reiterate kids don't know what kids don't know and um I had a set career path for you know sort of decided by my parents um and I didn't know that there were other options out
there and in a short amount of time this team has done a lot I mean Cara I like I just you are an amazing human being and I just really appreciate all the work and Abby getting in there too um I mean just like pulling up the career fair in
like six weeks notice I think right so like that is what we're that is how kids learn what they don't know is that um the Community Partnerships I mean I I don't know if we have I I have no idea
um I teach in a very small District that doesn't have a lot of Industry around it but the career Partnerships that I see in in St Louis Park is just amazing that they're there and they're willing to do so much much in order to partner with our schools um I just I Kudos just hats
off and it is it's a tough job uh my sister is also a business teacher so she also teaches nine different preps in one year so um I know how challenging that can that can be so I just really I look forward to and I agree about the Middle
School um so I'd love to see a career day or career fair going on at the middle school too I think that would be really cool awesome yeah yeah I just want to say thank you first
can you talk a little bit more about Nas and like nontraditional the non-traditional Academy so the non-traditional Academy is a little bit different than um Career Tech Ed that's just kind of a different model of teaching for students
that are seniors so this is kind of separate from that is there something specific you had to ask about MTA I mean yeah in terms of carer like yeah I'm just connecting about the trade you know
so the Career Tech Ed would be more of like uh the career-based like Pathways and NTA for non-traditional Academy is um for students that may be looking for a different approach to teaching and
learning um so there it's there's a lot of student choice that happens with than that our teachers kind of create um educational experiences based on student interest and strengths um in core content in core content so math uh
science Ela and social studies because I've been there a couple times I like it it's a great program our teachers do amazing and our students really thrive in there also I forgot about my product I was going to say there's one
inally need to visit the new stor because this is where you get all of your s l park I just I just want to add one thing like my I have 10 years old he's fourth grade you know I didn't talk about ker but he knows what he's going to do because he came to me the other
day and you know I don't want to go into details but uh he bring me some carrier and he says I will doing these things insulting to you and I I didn't get that time because like and I asked him what he mean about
that so like he was kind of saying understand the idea of making a lot of money because like those carer things there some people who already have money does that make sense I always tell students don't let
the money drive you you won't make it if it's that way let your passions come out make the connection and money will come you'll make a living yeah I mean yes there's things and if not your heart is full yep yep and you have to decide sometimes is it a hobby or is it your
career and sometimes things that you really love to do maybe they should stay your hobby it's going to help you get to the other areas I was going to add that someday I want to hear some kids say that they want to be school board chair oh um we for
mayor I don't I don't mean like you're not going to you're not GNA um train people into being Schoolboard members but obviously some of the skill sets that we talk about and I I was trained as a teacher and I and so I do hold that very passionate thing to me but I'm don't I don't work in there directly but
I'm using what I've learned in that I've learned about how you learn to learn and all of those things and I think we all sort of have experienced that too and bring some of that to the table so it's again some of those skills that just have uses you never you you just can't know what you're going to do with some
of those things and where path is going to take you but that did pivot too and just making that plug in a way another way of saying like I know that you guys are also looking at teacher Pathways yes we have an education yeah because um and it's just it's really exciting because we know that's a challenging a we have a
number of teachers in here right now and we know that we're so appreciative of that but we know that um it's uh it's it's not as compe you know I mean it's it's more competitive we're looking for more people to do that and particularly um uh teachers of color and some we have
black men teach right some things like that you know the grow your own programs and all these things that they talk about so just you know putting in that plug for that too and just appreciate that because we need those teachers too this is a great opportunity I think we have a great school district for people to see good modeling of that and I think we've seen the result of that that a lot
of people kind of exit from here and sort of with that you know because of they've had that good experience too so that's really great uh anything else anybody wanted to offer otherwise we do have a big agenda is tonight so but just really appreciate it you all thank you all
[Applause] Thomas yeah I think they need to get a little buried there all right we're up to 6B our finance advisory committee budget and fiscal recommendations annual thing that we have here and we have Patricia Magnuson our director of
business and services and she's going to kick than off for um this presentation so welcome Patricia yes good evening chair Cox superintendent Dr and members of the board I want to do a shout out for before people
leave it's a nice Career and Technical education area that we really need good smart thinkers in so I would love students to want to go into accounting and I'd love to talk to all of them about it um and we have a couple well I think Charlotte had to leave because she
has a um a swimming meet or practice tonight so we do have Jam here though um I'm not going to talk very long tonight we've got our team here I'm super thankful for this finance committee it's a it's an experienced group and I'm really thankful that they're here to do
some presenting I'm not going to reread the mission um Dr hin read it very well but we start each meeting talking some how about the mission about what they're hearing what does race have to do with the way you're experiencing the group um you what are you hearing in the
community and how does it fit with our core values so we try to connect um every time we meet um and it's a really engaging group I wanted to just quickly show you the budget timeline the star you can see we're more than halfway through the budgeting process for this
year here's a closeup on that we're deeply into budget preparation and we'll be starting with budget approval um next month so I'm going to turn it over to Josiah so if each person just um introduce yourself talk about what your job is too especially for the adults
that are going to present so we can what brings you to the and because we want to hear some career ideas to spread Community go ahead awesome um I am Josiah I'm the assistant uh Director of Business Services um I work with Patricia and Cody in the
business office um overseeing accounting and finance um budget prep Levy Etc so all right the finance advisory um who what's the purpose our purpose is to advise the administration and the school board on economic and School Finance
issues and build Community Trust in The District in District finances um the the main goal is transparency and be able to communicate to the public what we're doing um okay so we started
off by coming up with five recommendations um to present to you today the first recommendation um that we came up as a group was to grow our fund balance above 8% so we're going to prepare a
budget with um where the expenditure is at least 8% and then we want to grow that to somewhere between 12 and 16% that is more in line with some of our comparable districts as well as what we were in the past um second
recommendation was we want to so currently the formula allowance increase is not published yet so we had to determine what that number would be and we came up as a group of 2.53% from last year from current school
year for FY 26 um we had to be mindful of that number um if we go too high I mean every percentage increase is about $315,000 so we want to be very Mindful and conservative with that
number uh Rec recommendation number three was we had to determine what our enrollment would be for next school year we don't have those numbers yet so it's um this is based on the best available information we have at the time uh and we recommending that we're going to
create a budget with enrollment projected at 4,326 students um the fourth fourth recommendation is to maintain student fees and meal prices at the current rate
um and then we also going to add the technology fee increase um as well as increase in Community Education uh Premier space uh rentals um fif fifth recommendation is
for this was mostly for us but we wanted to understand the district cost drivers and focus on Cost Containment um so yeah there they are um so Finance advisory committee members um
anyone can be can join this group uh we're looking for new members all the time but as you can see we are a diverse group of people right we have students um we have community members and each community members bring their own perspective and their own career path
that can and those inputs are very very uh invaluable to us uh we have District staff not only just the business offices but we have um um we have uh members of superintendent cabinet uh we have teachers as well as business staff and
then we also have multiple school school board members that attend regularly so all right um so what are the primary factors that we discuss oh hello Dr hin chairman Cox uh the rest of
the board hello uh most of you I believe know me if not uh I'm Cody Christensen I'm the new senior accountant here I've been here for about 2 months so I oversee payroll and accounting I work under Josiah um and for what it's worth uh I
took in accounting class in high school and now I'm here so you're welcome it does work it does work yeah is that all you needed was just that one accounting yeah and uh I actually my wife is a teacher within the district and towards the end of one of their
school years it's about uh taxes and stuff very briefly obviously because you don't want to scare them away and uh so I come in and talk to them about that too which is very fun it's a great time and they're surprisingly receptive to things that Pleasant and um yeah so the
three main uh factors uh that we took into consideration with the uh when making these recommendations are these right here the state economy the cost structure and the student enrollment so the uh the state economy um currently the economic Outlook in
Minnesota has weakened a little bit um the last uh legislative session uh had quite a bit of uh investment in public education but we're not expecting um any additional funding in the current one if we did happen to get any it should be used purely to balance the budget or
strengthen and maintain the uh General Reserve fund uh and then we have cost structure um which is pretty straightforward hopefully isn't uh news to anyone but a 85% around uh of our District's general fund expenses are
dedicated to humans uh Human Resources so salaries benefits and all that um and then the other large cost drivers include Transportation substitute teacher fees and utilities and all of these continue to rise rapidly uh so
much so that they're growing much faster than the revenues associated with them so it makes it very critical that we FOC focus on efficiency initiatives um and then the third point is student enrollment and while we haven't we haven't returned to
pre-pandemic levels but uh fiscal year 25 marked the first increase in student enrollment in over a decade so there's some positive outlook there um and then yeah on I'll get it and so those factors lead us uh back to our budget
recommendations which are the fund balance minimum uh the per pupil funding form formula uh student enrollment projection uh some information about local fees and then maintaining costs and uh focusing on our largest cost
drivers hey everyone M Meer uh I've got three kids at Aquilla uh I work in IT project management stuff and stuff I would not would not have thought I was going to end up there when I was in school so would had an idea uh I'm going to talk a little bit about fund balance
minimum uh pretty much rinse and repeat from last year when when we recommended stuff to the board uh develop an expenditure budget that ensures the unreserved fund balance of at least 8% this is like our emergency fund um it's to to take care of things that we can't
budget for um and so we don't want to spend into that uh and then create a longterm strategy to gradually increase this is that aspirational goal seems you know daunting um but is what we are recommending this is just kind of the
history of what our fund balance has done over the past 10 years or so um so you can see it's it's been as high as 20% and now we've kind of held steady uh kind of spent into it during the co year uh and continued to to do that and then has have held it steady for for the last
couple years and then this is the one that I'll dwell on for a moment here um and why we had that second part of the recommendation to actually try to at least aspire to building that back um this is you know the orange bars here
are St Louis Park fund fund balance Reserve uh and then the black bars are the Minnesota's average for other districts um and so you can see as we kind of went down and don't get too caught up in the the numbers it's not quite Apples to Apples but the the important thing here is the shape of us
compared to everybody else um and so other districts have found ways to kind of maintain or keep keep it at at kind of that recommended level of you know I think it's like 2 months worth of of expenditures or something is is kind of the rule of thumb um so same
recommendations last year let's keep holding oh actually forgot to mention as well you know on this last one it was no small feat to like keep it steady right like we're proud of that like it's good that we did that and so that's why we're uh recommending the same thing again for
next fiscal year Gober superintendent um Matthew Ernst I've got two Juniors at the high school um I've been in finance and sales and project management for 20 plus years so um now it's the fun part all right it's
the funding formula so this is the part that comes from the state um basically we usually receive anywhere from 2 to 3% supposed to counter for or to counteract the inflation stuff um this year 2.53 is
what we're suggesting right now that is only based on the current Minnesota Department of Education estimate um you can see in the past it's been anywhere from 2 to 4 it could change from the 2.53 we don't know um that will come out
later this year um but that's all we can use for right now and uh like I said at it's what's been stated and I think most other districts are using it as well um we do have an operating referendum from
uh November of 17 that's been maxed out so there's no more funding going to come from that so um those are the two pieces that we have within this portion for superintendent um my name is
Lisa walstrom um I have a preschooler here at Central and then my a second grader at Susan lingren it's my third year on the committee so I'm hitting my term limit last time you'll hear from me um the reason that I joined the committee was last time the um the levy or the referendum was on the on the
ballot I did vote for it um just but I was thinking just out of a general good feeling about education and at the time I thought to myself how would I know if I should vote for this like how the school is spending their money and whether they need more money um so when this opportunity came across I thought it would be a good opportunity to learn
more and I have learned a ton um so I'm going to talk about the student enrollment projection again of course this is really important because when we talk about the per pupil form formula and funding this is the projection for the number of pupils that we would expect um so it's
4326 is what we're projecting um it is a slight drop I believe one of the drivers of this is that we're graduating a larger class then we project to bring in um for kindergarteners um this yeah so this just shows again the graph over time um we already mentioned
there was a slight uptick last year so that was exciting um the model is we're expecting again a slight drop the next year this is just a picture of the model to give you an idea so again it's looking at birth rates to project how many kindergarteners we'll get and then
um the term I've learned from Patricia cohort survival so as how many of those we expect to retain as they go through the grades um one thing to note is that um historically we've always used a seven-year average when we determine the number and um we discussed and decided
this year that we would shorten it just to remove the covid years from the numbers um because that was just such a thing it was a huge thing that happened so this year we're going to use three years of history and then the plan is to continue building so with every
year we would add a year back until we would get back to the seven um this is showing our capture rate so that is of our eligible students what percent of them are choosing St Louis Park schools again you can see that
we've got a downtrend there um so one of our recommendations is also to focus significant effort on recruitment um and we'll um talk a little bit more about the ideas here I guess the one thing that I would note about this um you know we've lots of
thoughts around this one of them of course is persisting in supporting improved academic outcomes um but we also want to talk a lot about the unique strengths of the district and really talking about all the great things that are going on here so I think kick him
out um hi I'm Jaden I'm a senior at the high school um I think you started touching on it a lot um I also I'll be covering the next two slides as well so as usual the intern got dumped with everything joking I actually I love this
um yeah student enrollment has been a topic for the district for some time it's not unique that we as a suburb have declining enrollment a lot of schools are dealing with it um we did hear positive news it's the first year it's gone up in decades um some of the things
that we talked about in regards to encouraging enrollment was making sure we have high academic standards um that's one of the biggest attractions for parents is one of the first things they look at is where the academic s for district and making sure that students are well prepared for future academic
challenges careers um have a substantial impact on enrollment numbers um in addition to reinforcing strong academics uh something that we also discussed was promoting some of the strengths we have as a district um one one of them that sort of caught my eye was our preschool
programs um the fact that we're still sort of able to capture well not capture but grab kids young and and and sort of pipeline them into the district is something that it's a particular strength of ours low Elementary class
sizes engage and connected teachers uh modernized school facilities um all of these are uh strengths that we have as a district um strategically we should intensify our Outreach to families of incoming kindergarteners establishing their connections again this early
ensures that we can keep them in the district for as long as possible hopefully all the way throughout High School um with local Revenue um the finance committee has suggested adding a technology fee in case of breaking or damaging a school provided technology um
you know it's not a luxury anymore a lot of it's needed now in education to have technology um but we also want to keep teach responsibility with it you know I'm sure if you guys have talked to Librarians they will hear stories of pretty insane ways that kids have broken
their computers before um mainly of Rage um increasing our communities education spased rental fees is also another step towards capitalizing on the assets we already have um generating additional funds without impacting our direct educational um offerings allows
us to support various community activities while also benefiting the district financially um we also understand that fees are a big conversation for families we recommend maintaining existing fees for uh student fees and meal prices and
we also uh are asking the board to start thinking about the concept of a district wide booster club um for sports um hopefully with it focusing on Transportation specifically as that's a big cost driver um us as committee also wanted to focus on understanding and addressing
key cost drivers for the district and make sure that these cost drivers are in alignment with historical and Statewide Trends um some of the initial Focus we found were substitute teachers um sub teachers and Pa professionals printing uh transportation
again and additional pay Beyond contracted pay we also wanted to emphasize prioritizing and retaining classroom teachers and direct student facing positions that investments in non-classroom positions such as administrative roles deliver a clear
return on investment is this where we we wanted to give everybody a moment to just say what they what they've experienced on the committee without having I guess you s of talking yeah well I touched on it
already I mean this has been a great experience I've learned so much um School finances are so complex that's one of my main takeaways um and I just want to say thanksa you've done such a great job so invested in bringing us together and really curating really
meaningful conversations and I also I super appreciate the students um contributions as well yeah uh I remember when I was I was recommended this by Dr La I don't know if she's still here um yeah she she mentioned it um in passing conversation
I thought it was interesting um I've I've never even touched Finance as a topic let alone uh a district Finance Finance at all um but it's been it's been really educational to see how things work from the background and and
educate my friends on it sometimes on you know why you know we're building millions of dollars in construction it's not the same thing as you know paying teachers for example that's something that I've been proud to be able to share with my friends they know the difference um and
yeah i' I've been very glad thank you Patricia Josiah thank you um only have three meetings that's why excuse um yeah so thank you yeah I just add uh as as sort of
plug for the plug for the committee if if if people want to join just because it's uh I also like that there's it's like a we asked for this customary three-year commitment first year for me was kind of overwhelming with how complex and learning kind of the Baseline and then this year was a really
I think powerful year because we really dug into uh cost drivers right we had guest speakers about Subs we had guest speakers about uh Transportation uh Community Ed and stuff like that so we really were able to D into some of that
work that we'll continue on next year so I'd continue off Mitch my second year as well um first year was interesting and this year we did get a little bit deeper um adding budget reviews on a monthly basis with the department heads is something that I think is very
beneficial um just to continue that through next year and and possibly more tools that will help those who don't normally look at their budgets or are aware of their budgets to help them understand how these drivers impact everybody that's one of the ideas that
surfaced from this group was let's quit talking about revenue and get ourselves focused on expenses and the board I think knows that we now meet um monthly with every budget manager to give them two hours to just look at their budgets and really understand so um I think we
will make a difference I think it would be difficult to not have made a difference this year spending more time focusing on how we're spending money I think it's been great um I'm a little bit of an outlier case I guess I uh I joined the uh Finance advisory
committee before I worked here and I remember in the very first meeting I said yeah this is complex but tragically I think it's kind of fascinating and then 3 months later I worked here so you know life um but yeah no it's been a very interesting thing and
like you know seeing Jaden and like other like high school students there and like also community members and this and that like it's a very interesting committee and very cool to be a part of it absolutely um I'll just add um I think what I appreciate from this group
is just the broad diverse uh perspective that everyone brought to the table um having three well two no two seniors one Junior as part of the committee was you know interesting you know students are very direct
and and that helped uh facilitate some of the coners some of the tough conversations that we needed to have so thank you guys for that Charlotte was um going to present tonight I think we told you she had to um be at swimming um so that this has
been a really great year we'll be back in next month I'll be back with his team to talk about the budget and how this fits into our budget recommendations so I welcome some School Board member Reflections two or otherwise two people
have have questions yeah questions as well obviously um have a couple questions first of all thank you I this committee is I know a big commitment for folks so thank you all for doing this um I have a question initially about the um
the first recommendation about the second part of it which is the growing the fund balance to 12 to 16% I understand it um I mean especially looking at that chart around what other districts have
done um and I want to say I've had the professional experience of like being responsible for an organization in a budget and the need to maintain a balance right so that should there be an emergency but I also like I'm struck by the other side of this which is that
like the money we have now should be used to provide the resources and opportunities to the students in our buildings right now and and so how did I mean how do you land at 12 to 16% is there some I had you know just
kind of Googled around before the meeting like are is there some um you know recommendation Beyond just you know in Minnesota that folks look at um I mean 12% would be 6 weeks instead of four weeks right like it
feels it feels a little arbitrary from where I sit and so how did you land at that um I guess is my initial question well I know it was a marker that we had can I just invite you to come up just you no no no go right in
stay there the microphone um you can come up we looked at past history and that's basically where we were sitting I don't know probably three four years ago prior to the pandemic and uh we want to get student enrollment back to pre pandemic
and all of our basically all of our markers back to that point um um we didn't take a look directly to say what kind of catastrophe would it take to deplete this completely but um that's basically why we looked at those points
that we had before and we just we know that our minimum is what 6% we can't go below six the bo policy is 6% we did look at um maintaining two months worth of expenditures and that is certainly not 8% that's closer to 12% and there
was a organization and we were just that was in last year's presentation and I'm trying to remember that gave us a um like an industry standard around balances and that gave us a a benchmark as well it's in last year's report I don't know if you remember what that was
the from last but you are absolutely right there there's like an arbitrary element to it um but amidst you know uncertainty on school funding and things like that like that it's a real possibility that we would have something crazy unexpected happen um um and so
history plus just kind of The Benchmark where we sit compared to other districts around us uh is kind of where that came and the rule of sum of like two months right is kind of where that came from that is actually one of my question that connects to Sarah's because on the slide
that says Statewide and this is like maybe a Patricia question so Mitch you just said districts around us but the slide says Statewide unrestricted and the thing is is like what I know to be because I'm a teacher and I work in several districts
is that you know there were districts out there that maintained an unreasonably High fund balance because we didn't get raises for like two years in a work so I didn't like there are districts out there that teachers weren't getting um even
inflationary um increases in their toe contracts and so you know if you look at my district it did it maintained a fund balance of 18 to 22% two rows two years in a row because of Co um but like it
affected our our teacher salary so I'm just wondering if this is painting a really too broad of a picture to understand what all districts are going through because I don't think it is I I mean it makes it look like we're terrible maintaining our fund balance
and you know well I guess I would reframe that though Virginia because like I I mean I guess my push back here is like I like you if the Statewide average in 2023 was 21% like that to me is an unreasonable amount of money to be holding in savings when we have
obligations right to the children and families and like in the adults like all the people who were serving in our district right like that's not a that to me is not good stewardship of our tax dollars at 21% but maybe I'm wrong but I'm just saying but I hear you it makes
us look like an outlier like a really significant outl I'd be curious like how do we compare to some of the districts Hopkins you know like the places that we compare ourselves to for enrollment purposes we will look like an outlier so the the truth is we are an outlier with
a low fund balance right now um it's not a tragic Le little fund balance this is we've been able to maintain it as Mitch said for three years with some hard work the and we aren't um bringing the budget to you right now we're just giving you a recommendation from our research and
when we bring the budget to the board ultimately you can make a decision whether we want to spend further and we didn't willy-nilly spend down this fund balance we've been thoughtfully making a decision to use fund balance for the very reason a fund balance is there to
help us to not have to make budget cuts or cut off teacher contracts you know we've been spending that fund balance very wisely and we're just saying get your brakes on because we cannot continue to maintain um so it's a this is our recommendation and we'll be back
with some final recommendations around the budget for you yeah I I guess I'll say for what it's worth where I mean I would be interested to understand I mean when we talk about the budget we do get a better sense of what that fund balance means in real numbers
but like I'm acutely aware of the environment that we're operating in and the threats to our funding um and also feels like a really hard time where we're where we're going through this budget cut phase to say and
we're going to try and expand this area where we have I recognize how much work y'all have done to maintain like keep us above the 8% I mean I remember last year we're like going line by line like what about this side what about you know and so I think I recognized that I just say
for myself from where I sit I don't know that like this is going to be a year where I'm going to be saying let let's try and build that P balance of the I certainly don't want to go below where we are but I'm just forecasting how I feel a moment I so I was I got to serve
on the fac for the calendar year 2024 and I was involved in some of these conversations and I think it's really important that the wording here is like creating a long-term strategy and my understanding wasn't that like we're not going to build it up overnight and it
and and I think I mean I I can't say what I think what I would expect to see um in in our in our budget when we get it this year is a balanced budget I don't think we're going to see right now anything that's adding to
the fund balance I think the idea was to sort of say hey um ideally we would have a little bit more in fund balance but like undoubtedly right now we're in a position where we where we can add to it is that fair totally yeah primary
recommendation is like leave it where where it's and and and and explore how how what it would look like to to to go further or if there is some windfall or something changes crazy with State funding or something you know don't immediately spend that to start
something new you know think about adding back to the fun balance Cody Cody want to add yeah I was well he started saying exactly more or less what I was going to say right at the same time um but yeah I was just going to say that maybe a better way of uh phrasing it
would be like your main point is maintain the 8% and then like you know underneath it with a bullet you know indented metallics you know smaller font like and make a long-term strategy to
eventually start crawling that back up as I think how framing it should go I had one other question if that's okay um which is just about the student enrollment and um the capture rate
continuing to decrease a bit and I mean again we're talking about you know percent like less than 1% for the most part but I think I'm curious U this has you know been a consistent conversation since I've been
on the board um what we're what we're seeing cuz this year right it did was it this year last year I guess this year our en went our enrollment went up this year right and so trying to start to look at just
continuing to say like looking at what at that capture rate particularly for our little kids right and how can we um how can we build that back up I think Jaden said too it's test scores are a big thing too that's how we
capture the older kids you know that's we put out better products that'll that'll help us gain more I I totally agree and I think we're going to see that a lot of confidence in Dr hin and she has here that's a lot of pressure
you got it you got it full confidence but but I will also say because like the for the little kids that's like my peer parent group and we lose kids I've said this every year we lose kids to other districts because of ersion I just I
know it like I see people who leave this District because they can't get access to emerge in um and other districts just have greater access to that and I'm not saying it's the end all be I'm just saying it's something that I see a lot from my peer parents
I I was going to just add to that I think there's the one recommendation I might have for another review is to look at how other schools are marketing them immersion is one of them other objects but other things that they're saying that because I think that's a little bit of where we probably also lose in our capture rate is that other schools are
marketing to our students as well well too they're saying we have this we have this we have this and that's hard in a increasingly competitive world too they're doing the same strategy that we're doing and I hear what we're saying we want to make sure that we can highlight the good things we're doing but also make sure we're not ignoring what other people are saying about their
districts particularly if we have the same things and we're and we're prepared to say that like we have these things because I think there's a perception that we may be a smaller school or we may be a u more you know limited resources school or whatever it is so that I think people may not understand
and what we do have we have full IB programs you know we have AP programs we have a number of things too that I think are that are just as competitive as some of our other District all right I want to make sure other people have comments too here other any other comments any other Reflections we're just
appreciative of again all the work that you guys put into this I think many of us have been on this Finance advisory committee I think I start on it so again there's a pitch there you know that maybe you could consider career in school boards many and all of you um and consider doing some of that because you've done a lot of the hard work we
know that you guys are digging into numbers we're so appreciative we look at them too but having an extra set of eyes with a totally different perspective than we come with your business experiences your parent experiences your community your skepticism experiences like you know all these things that are
just really hard for us to always bring to the conversation and to bring to whatever that we're doing we we just welcome more people and welcome people from the community to be participants in that too so and youd encourage people to do it too it's it is interest it is you know we do ask for a threeyear
commitment out of people but um I think it's interesting once you get on there so I was going to I mean we have a school board election this year and like school board members how many of you have knew this much about school Finance when you first sat at this board table right so yeah you I I see a bunch
of I see adults and young adults who are all um more highly qualified than we all were um in school Finance so think about it and quickly sorry one of the reasons that we talked about strengths was exactly why you discussed it
like exactly yeah like I'm pretty sure that's why the conversation came up was someone's like we have I I think the original conversation I can't recall was like we have AP and IB programs that's very unique lots of great things yeah
lot I mean lots of great things and then as we were going through the strengths everyone had listed everyone I was like we also just had a massive construction project no one have brought that up yet so I I do think that um like that that mindset is is true there is sort of the
notion that we're not as competitive as other districts when that's just not true as a matter of fact we compete very well against other districts wait till we get the space that we've been needing an Aquila done too so but I think I think what Jaden is pointing out is that there's opportunity
for cross-pollination with Communications and as principal uh p says all the time is when you go to school in a nicer place it feels as though you're going to a nicer place and so um you know that sharing your ideas
for growing enrollment with Communications and partnering with Communications um because for sure there's I mean I guess I'm just feeling it in my district a lot I think every district is going through massive amounts of budget cuts um and the
pressure on Educators in the building is intense as far as um the Reliance of the capture rate being on the quality of the teachers that we have and the relationships that we form with our students so looking for that partnership and that way to tell our narrative and
way to tell that story I think is really important and that's an aspect where if you want to help the district that's that's an area that you could really help us I think there was a nice um two two more things and then I think we can move on unless there's any other things but
the two more things for me one being um the sun sailor had a nice article um talking to representative Yim about some of the stuff that we're that we're facing and it summarized St Louis Park is trying to cut $2 million Hopkins is
trying to cut $7 million by Z is trying to cut $9 million these schools are trying to face enrollment issues too we're not the only ones so we know that so just for people's context too that are also going wait declining enrollment it's a national Trend it's people are
having smaller families where you know things like that that are at play here and some other things so so just we're not the outliers here then the other thing I was going to say to sort of the community I was going to save this for the for the for the school board members updates but um I'm trying to highlight our Communications work here that we
have a nice new newsletter that's going out here um that's going out to the community to talk about what we're doing in our community and I think things like this help reinforce it it's a nice simple message it's a very easy thing to take in and just can reinforce some so I'm hoping that some efforts like this
continue to help so anyways all right thank you we W want to keep you any longer than you need to be so we appreciate you being here and uh thank you again all right this does bring us up to the consent agenda thank [Applause]
you um consent agenda uh uh we have uh a number of regular things on here uh we have our business items that we have toic L we have Personnel we have minutes and we have one thing in here which is the move board meeting from March 12th
to March 11th 2025 that's we when we approved our our calendar we had moved it to March 12th because of Township elections we don't have Township elections here so we are moving it back to that Tuesday night March 11 so these are the items in the consent in agenda
it's recommended that the school board approve the consent agenda the following business and Personnel items for February 25th 2025 School meeting as presented do I have a motion on that so Mo moved by and I'll second it and all those in favor say I I I any opposed
passive 70 thank you that brings us up to action items the American Indian annual compliance agreement and we have uh do we have principal Bailey here yeah I think I S um and it is uh recommended that the school board approve the annual compliance agreement with the American
Indian parent advisory committee has presented so let's just bring this up here while um principal Bailey's coming up but um do I have a motion on this so moved by Sarah do I have a second second second by Taylor okay with that um
welcome principal Bailey and hi good evening chair Cox superintendent Dr uh H board members I know it's a little we've been just trying to get all this together here so my name is Freda Bailey principal on
special assignment and I have have been really privileged to be able to work with our American Indian parent advisory committee our American Indian intertribal youth Council and they have really given me an opportunity to see uh what's going on with our youth and with
our family so I have to say it's been a really I've been honored to be able to do that also the uh member who would always kind of lead this was uh Julia MB Bride bbby and so she would usually be up here to help share some of the great
things that were taking place and so I just want to put that in the space as well uh the purpose of of Us coming and sharing is basically dealing with our American Indian annual uh compliance agreement and with that uh there's a
statute that if you have students that are more if you have 10 or more American Indian students that means that you would have to have an American Indian parent advisor committee I meet with them and get their input on basically how we will be able to move forward with that and I have to say one of the things
that um having the land acknowledgement at the beginning is something that is really I have to say is the dedication with our American Indian parent advisory committee and being able to have those words put into the space at the beginning is an honor for our families
moving forward with that with our membership we have to make sure that the members are American Indian students and as I mentioned before we do have our youth who are part of that conversation with us and we have District staff members who are identified and they
usually attend the meetings as well and with that we have other members in the district who support uh this process so that means that when they do go through voting we meaning myself and some of the other District members we're not voting members we let the chair decides how
they want to move forward and so one of the things that we talk about with this um statute is kind of tied to some of our state and federal components with this and we always have to have different goals and so what I will share is some of the goals that have gone
through uh last year and we have new goals for this year that we're working on and so we're giving you just kind of a a quick overview of some of the things that took place last year based upon our grant with our families and youth and then what we'll be doing moving
forward so with that we have our five goals and just listening to some of the things that have taken place based upon uh when we talk about CTE when we're talking about the financing and then we're talking about with some of the design teams those are
indications of um or indicators that we usually talk about in our committee as well for instance we're talking about post-secondary preparation for American Indian students we're also looking at the achievement so when we're having our data meetings uh that helps us to uh understand what's going on with the
students how do we share that information with the families and then they give us recommendations on what they would like to see based upon the data also we talk about the curriculum that's uh relevant to our American India students not only the curriculum but is it of interest to the students so with
our American Indian youth Tribal Council they will let us know some of the things that are taking place in the classroom and then what they would like to see moving forward and I know uh we'll have um Sammy kind of Shar some other things as well but she provides some of that
ojibway um language and culture to our elementary students and they're able to share a lot of that with her as well and then the other piece is just that Pro that positive relationship that reinforcement of self-image uh when we start working with the students a lot of
the students didn't know oh we still have American Indians uh and then for those that were they didn't want IND uh others to notice because there was the stigma attached to it and I would say in collaboration with our family we've noticed that has dropped tremendously
and then the final one is dealing with that Intercultural awareness among our pupil and students and um students parents and staff so these are just some things that I'm once again uh with our postsecondary we had six American Indian
students who worked closely with uh Miss Julia which they would politely call her and um she would meet with them uh each uh I would say every month and with that she would ensure that uh looking at what
classes they were taking she would look at their G uh their um uh like classes and if they were in advanced placement classes she would also talk about their GPA and if they had enough credits in order to graduate and so she would connect with the
counselors to have those conversations about the students and I'm really excited about this because one of the things that we did have is all of those students were able to graduate even though at the beginning mid year they were like well I'm not sure and so she was like she did one of those let's go
have a conversation with the counselor let's meet with your parents she would do a lot of home visits with the families she would give them a call she created a space for the students to be able to speak to what they needed and then have create a plan in order for that to occur uh it was a beautiful
thing to see and they would support each other as well we're talking about young men so we're talking about six young men who were able to really collaborate with each other talk about what they would like to do what colleges that they would like to attend and they were able to uh
participate in two field trips visiting colleges at that time so this is a quote from uh Julia where she said the most important thing I've heard from them is how they feel like they have found a community and
that's important especially in high school she noticed that the high school students when they would get together they would just go into their own separate ways but she was able to see that they were engaged and they wanted to be there and um she noticed that you
have to have a purpose in order to be in the space and that was something that she created with the students and so these are just some of the young men that I was talking about early uh earlier who were participating in our inter uh American Indian youth Tribal
Council that worked with her um in a very special way the other two areas are academic and we talk about curriculum um that's relevant to the students sort of what I was talking about earlier is when we're
looking at students we tried one of the things we've been looking at is the attendance and how they're doing academically and when we notice that there are some attendance issues I know Julia would give families a call and she would have some really like what's going
on and uh how can I help you be able to move forward and that was something that I noticed with that relationship it was very trusting and I'm sure um we have others who can share some of that information and then also with our curriculum being relevant uh she was
helping us look for various materials that could be used and this is in connection with Jill Merkel who is implementing our social studies one of the things that was recommended was certain uh let's say resources and so
she was able to um connect with not only Julia but with our culturally relevant literacy coaches on various materials that can be utilized for uh different students um classrooms for instance I know high school they have been really diligent about creating different like
plans and units uh based upon certain books textbooks that they're using in the classroom that's connected with our American Indian uh culture this is one example of an Elementary classroom uh just bringing that cultural awareness individuals and
what they bring into the space and this was with Frank bigbear who was an a who is an ajib way artist and the students at the school was uh able to learn about this artist his work and then they created their own art based upon uh
Frank B Big Bear so this is one example of bringing weaving that curriculum and awareness with the culture of individuals that are um working with our our students and this is another example of one of our uh primary year school where they were able to understand the
culture of the a dance U that they uh the students were able to participate in as well here we've had an laughing Fox and his name is um Papi
wagush that means laughing fox in no jibway okay and he was able to thank you he was able to um visit all of our elementary sites and he would share his music and instruments and I'll let uh I
know you know more about um laughing Fox so yeah he's um we grew up he's a little bit older than me he grew up he was um one of my older brothers really good friends um and he's uh tells a lot of
stories with his music um the stories he tells kind of gives um more there's morals to the stories um he talks about there's a figure we call wayu who's half spirit and half man and he he gives
these um stories on how how he approached certain situations and how those situations helped him become a better person in the end um so he incorporates stories like that along with his flutes he gives history about
his flutes um where they came from um how he made them he usually makes them himself some are from wood some are from Bones like wolf he has like a wolf bone flute um so he does different things like that and he's been he's traveled
all over the world actually as Laughing Fox putting on telling stories and playing music so I'm going to apologize I do want you to go ahead and introduce yourself uh my name is Sammy um I'm uh
the oju language culture uh language and culture specialist in St Louis Park I teach fourth and fifth grade I just started at Aquilla today um before I left one of my last classrooms one of the kids were like wow she's way better than the OJ way teacher
last year so that made me feel good but um I this is my passion um this is what I really enjoy doing um I've been part of the APAC committee for I think six years now um so I just love
love what I do yeah and happy to be here thank you thank you and and with that um as I mentioned before we have our um American Indian intertribal youth Council and a matter of fact uh Sammy was the one that just kind of brought that information to us about we should
create a council for our students and youth and that was something that working with Julia they were able ble to create for our high school students um they meet usually monthly and once again this is just creating a space for them to talk about who they are what they would like to see and sometimes they
talk about doing some work outside of the school uh and working with the community um this is once again creating that not only Affinity but a space where they can see their peers and be able to connect in a different way even though most of them are from different tribes
and that's why we have the intertribal youth Council so they can all feel like uh they're working in a collaborative way um and this is just an example of when they have their graduations we usually do a celebration uh with the
students the final goal is working on our parent um an aware awareness for our pup and parents and staff and I would say uh after having the poow which was like really um that was that was an
amazing event uh one of the things we t talked about well how can we continue that moving forward and so the goal was to try to bring in more not only indigenous families but other families so they can understand and appreciate the culture and so what took place was
this was in collaboration with uh director Patrice Howard uh where we created districtwide events where families can come and just be able to gather with each other uh and understand once again the culture and have conversations about that we were able to
have a rounde last year uh at the middle school where there was family and food and um different events for the families and students to participate in and this is just some examples of some of those things that we've done um where they've had indigenous day where kids get to
celebrate who they are with their families and they get to share that with their peers and they cheer each other on uh with that and of course this was led by Julia uh kind of working with the community uh that way uh and then this is just
another example of how the different tribes were able to share their flags and and if you want to share some more information about this saming I know you were in uh connection with the students here yeah I led the assembly um my first
time being an MC so was pretty exciting um we uh represented all the tribal Flags in Minnesota um and all the kids uh tried to connect to that flag from that dribe that they were from so they were really
proud to you know step in front of the whole school um to kind of show that off um cuz some kids are they they knew where they were from but they weren't they weren't real sure what that meant um so we bring that
awareness to them that uh you know where they're from especially me being there in the elementaries it gives them that representation um so I came in with a a handra um we kind of went in a circle um
in our culture circles we always do things in circles you know life always comes in full circles um so we did that um they got to show off themselves um they got to pick you know some sing songs some one talked
about her mom that passed away um and she she was one of them that knew she's her mom was Native American but she never got to learn who she was and where she came from so and she was one of my students at Peter Hobart um the last 10
weeks I was there so she was really intrigued um and got to kind of learn where she came from and who we are as native peoples um so it was really um it was a really special time that they got
to see that and they got to be in front of this whole school to show off who they were so it was really cool thank you for sharing that um these are some other things in collaboration with Community Ed we had um what we call the uh craft circles where families can
come in and participate in various types of crafts uh they also have um had an opportunity to be a part of different celebrations that we had throughout the year and these are once again are just some examples of what was taking place
this was the first American Indian par advisory committee celebration we had over 100 attendees participate and once again this was the food culture and games and we had um families from various races come in and be a part of this cultural event and once again um a
quote from Julia was that we were thrilled to see the incredible turnout um because there was a lot of work behind the scenes where she was bringing in the um not only the food but contacting uh the individuals to be a part of this celebration and she was just saying that events like these are
not only about C celebrating culture but also coming together as a community uh to support and uplift one another and she was really grateful to be able to host that opportunity uh I know that was something that she talked about with the students they would always come in the
uh intertribal youth Council they would work with her on these different event events as well this was another event we had with our families where we had bowling night um and uh we provided food and it was just once again getting parents to know
each other students to know each other and just be in one this is just some pictures from that event and um this is Scott who is the chair and he could not be here today um
and so um I'm so grateful that Sammy was able to come in and uh be a part of this as well so with this uh part of uh the uh Minnesota statute state that we have to have an annual concurrence and so uh
these are the members that are part of the APAC committee this year and I will let you take over from there all right we the American Indian parent advisory committee issue a vote of concurrence we
attest that the school board and or District are compliant with Minnesota statutes and that the school board and their District are meeting the needs of American Indian students and so what that means is the the parents were able to get together on
January 30th and they met and talked about the various um goals and if we had met them and then whether or not they voted for us to be able to move forward um and so in closing I just wanted to
once again bring Julia into the space I know I'm not giving the story the way that it happened last year uh because she was doing it all and those of you that know Julia or knew her um she was everywhere and doing everything and it
was all for the students and for the families and um so the story that I'm telling is not even close to I'm sure the story that occurred but I just wanted everyone to know that um I know our community meaning the American
Indian families myself uh truly are missing that support that she brought the pass that she would bring the light that she would have with the students and the respect that I saw them give her when she entered the space um it's
something that if you were able to witness you get to hold with you always um a lot of the students who thought that they could not go to college she encouraged them to go to college and if not to college you can do something let's talk about it let's let's work it out let's create a plan let's meet with
your parents you what do you need and that was something that I saw every time she met with the students whether it was high school elementary even with the families she was able to bring that into the space so I just want to um once again acknowledge her dedication and
support and love for the community yeah definitely okay I know what you want to um no okay I'm I'm okay okay all right so that's all we have um if there are questions or uh for us
or wonderings I just want to thank you for bringing Julia here I don't some people know that I think one of the first things that Julia did in the school district was to work with the board so um I got to work with her years ago um
and I I just I I know you all are I mean you are going to miss her you already do we do um so I'm just I'm I can't think of better way to honor her than to continue this work um she was yeah she was a force for sure um yeah so thank
you and I guess just the thing I always say when we do this is this is you know we vote on a lot of stuff this is the only time where people have the opportunity to vote on the work that the district is doing rather than the board voting um and so we and we don't take that for granted so thank you for that
support thank you for that vote and thank you for your partnership um Sammy you've been here and and we're yeah thank you thank you comments
yeah I just want to say thank you you know also she was great you know I don't have words to describe and I got to know how when I was running to the school board m and she she introduced me one of the one of
your meanings yeah oh yeah every days learn in Cork for me and my family too and I was at the middle school with my kids that def was great you know oh yeah yeah yeah I'm grateful for you you know I've learned a lot of
stuff as immigrants who came this country 2014 I I knew native hisory I never met them the first time yeah okay thank you so there's another celebration coming so get ready
for more always yeah you're always there always that's true that's true so thank you I love the food too me too yeah I just um want to Triple down on thank you um for the hard work and
the success of the program kids being proud of who they are with in come from their Heritage being proud to stand up in front of a whole school and share those things um and also um to piggy back off with Julia I didn't know Julia as a board member I knew her as a parent
so I met her back when I was at Peter Hobart with my kids and my first meeting with her was her introducing herself and just saying like what are your kids needs what are they doing what is what do you know what is their future look like to them and giving me her information and saying reach out if you need um extra support or you know for
your family so um I wish I would have knew her as a board member too but um just a joy to be around for the the time I didn't know her yeah that was her what you need what do you need yeah so thank you I I I just uh I I love that this is
another moment where we get to elevate and show people and show the students and and the only thing that tops that is when the students are here like when we had when we had that ceremony and we got to see the families the students theard I know we can go where they're at and
that'sa the best thing for us to do that but it's hard for us collectively sometimes to do that and to see that and experience that and maybe for us to acknowledge that so I'd say also I hope that you're passing along our um like appreciation for the committee for the work that you're doing and for the student involvement and the student
commitment to it because as we said you know Julia played an important role you all play an important role but it also takes that engagement of the students and it takes them you know finding that space to be proud and doing some of that stuff and we're we're in some challenging times with some of those things in terms of backgrounds and stuff
too and it's and I just I every moment I see somebody who can Elevate again the kids coming to speak to us the kids that Embrace these things the kids that stand up and say this is who I am all of those things it's just really powerful stuff so just really again this is a joy to uh
to pass this concurrence you know to to accept the concurrence from you and um so um unless there's anything else I just wanted to say two things first yes thank you for the the wisdom that you bring to this I mean I think that's that's invaluable and it's not
measurable so really appreciate um the the APAC committee and the particularly in the students and I also just want to kind of put into the space that as much as I completely agree with um the benefit of being able to be proud of
themselves and stand up but my daughter also benefits from from hearing the perspective and and that although this is statut I would hope that we would do this as a district anyway because for for my
daughter she has gained perspective and she has gained empathy and she has gained critical thinking skills and compassion and so culturally responsive um practices is really good for the students to be able to Showcase who they are but it also helps to
develop that critical Consciousness and so I really really um deeply appreciate that ra my kid and the second thing I just want to put um a little plugin so um the legislature this year is voting on some policy changes for psby for the
teacher um relicensure program and one of the things that they are collecting public comment on until mid April is that um they will put a relicensure requirement for teachers with American Indian education and cultural competency
and I think that is so important in this time period that we get that in there um and so it's a 60-day public comment time period And there are several different um there are four different changes to
to pby that are being pushed um I have forgotten the other other two it's early childhood um and then there's one other one but I just think it's really important for people who work in education who have um really critical
perspectives to to say to the legislature yeah we need teachers need to be this is part of their licensure they need to be educated so thank you again thank you thank you right we let you we have to we have to vote on this
so you don't have to stay here for that part but uh we've had a motion at second any further discussion all those in favor say I I any oppos passes yeah sorry passing 70 thank you now you on with thank you so
much um all right 8D policy development second read vter policy 503 B1 excused absences um so to bring this forward in for discussion it is recommended that the school board approve policy 503 B1 excuse absences as presented so do I
have a motion to bring it forward so moved by Virginia do I have a second second by Celio okay that brings us up to discussion and um is that who's bringing us up on this is there there is
that y yeah so um this is the second reading for 503 um the we had some changes that and they are in blue what you see as far as language changes is more inclusive pronouns um in the language also there
after um engaging our principles in regards to practice of what is currently practiced in in the buildings and what is aligned to our mission vision and core values there has been some language that has been stricken
through um so now the policy better reflects our strategic plan our Mission Vision core values what our current practices especially when it comes to um credit attainment that are as the high
school in particularly is moving toward standards based grading okay do we have comments thoughts I guess I yeah I just wanted to thank the staff and the the principal for taking a closer look at this one and
aligning it to current practice and um I think there's some language in there that needed to be changed uh as well um specifically around you know I think there was some punitive language that was the responsibility of the parents
that then landed on the students so GL we updated that um uh so yeah thank you I will EO I gu also like the observation relegious waiting for the excuse
absent thank you okay any other comments then we've had it brought here and and we've had a motion and we've had that second so all those in favor say I I any opposed passes 70 okay that brings us up to the next
policy which is 503 uh no second reading of policy 506 student discipline um so to bring back forward it's recommended that the school board approve policy 56 student discipline as prend have motion to bring that forward Virginia and then I'll second it
so um this is our next policy Dr hind is this here again yes so um again this is the second read um there have not been any updates since the first reading so the language is the same from the first
reading so do we have any further discussion on this one no discussion then um all those in favor say I I any post pass a 70 all right that brings us up to 8D second
reading and vote of policy 524 internet and Technology responsible use um students is recommended that the school board approve policy 524 internet and techn Technology responsible use as present do you have a motion to bring that forward so move move by Celia do I have a second second second P okay all
right so this um policy is in reflection of the requirement for us to have a cell phone um personal electronic device policy in um policy written um in a approved by the board we have embedded
this within our technology use policy 524 um and there has been some language update um and that is in [Music] blue and some language that has been
stricken through um after um the board had its listening session um got some perspective from community members and parents and policy committee also did another deep dive into um after in the second read and
these are the recommendations that we're bringing forward I I have a question um just as a followup and apologize that we didn't get to talk about this in advance of today but I know when the policy committee had a discussion about this we sent and and I see them reflected in
here but Dr heyens I know it it looked like on the uh um Drive version that on the paragraph C that was stricken that you maybe had some concerns about that being stricken and I just I could be misreading the Google notifications that
I get so I just kind of want to make sure we're all on the same page yes we okay we're moving that absolutely apologies was misreading the any further comments I guess my only
um one of the because again I'm experiencing this if you look at paragraph a these rules and procedures may be designed for specific school buildings grade levels and similar criteria I work in both a middle school and a high school and they're different and there's different
needs um and I'm a classroom teacher I grew up in the military so sometimes I'm a little strict so I don't want to see a cell phone out in my classroom but I understand too that there are circumstances so so um I would just
really encourage the building principles to get student impact or you know student perspective family perspective about um and it's a messy job because we started our work at the high school in mamei in September and we're still
struggling to get to a policy that we all um because policies only work when they're put into practice and they're held accountable otherwi why I have a policy um so I just I hope that you get that student impact um information from
from students and families students particularly not just not just absolutely and I'll just say I mean I think this policy is written very clearly in a way that allows for each School site to have differences and that
we are you know delegating to you all to work with the school sites to figure out what works so yes I think that is very important that this is this is a broad policy and it is up to the building to kind of coales around their building and
sight policy and I think just like to make it abundantly clear that's the blue language that you see at the first sentence in paragraph a of the cell phone and electronic device use which is very clear that we're directing Dr Hines and the administration to do this we are
not um seeking to create policies at this table for each of just clear I also want to add middle school already have a cellone policy yeah our schools I mean in I mean we are like there's a policy that we're
setting here and then there are the practices and the the things that are outlined in the in the handbooks of each of the schools so that's that falls on those schools to be responsible for um informing educating and um
and uh uh did I say enforcing um enforcing those things too so and I think the one thing that we heard a little bit from people too was also if there's an opportunity to also educate about the wise um it seemed like people were interested in that and so I just encourage that I don't think we needed
that appear necessarily in this policy but just as a guidance you know I think there's some things that we've heard about mental health about um just other things that make why so it's not just like you shall not um that there's some reasoning behind it if people understand
that and I think that I think that's in responsible too so and I think just that just to add to that not only just for students health and mental health but also for parents to be aware of like what kind of tools they have as far as when it comes to technology
usage okay any further comments questions okay um all those in favor say I I any post pass is 70 that brings us up to our last policy for tonight I believe which is 8e and this is the second reading in vot of policy on 621 the read act it is recommended that the
board approve policy 621 read Act is presented do have a motion to bring that forward I'll move it thank you Sarah do I have a second second oh Ty goes to C clerk
so Dr Hines I think this is here again yes so again this is um the second read for the read act policy um this is a new policy in reflection of the statute there have not been any updates or changes to the language since the first
read this is all pretty much language from msba it's or whatever it's all like required language that we basically can't really do much with so however I did stomp around the my house for two days over the weekend after reading it because I just want to put this out
there for 30 seconds of buck in 2003 there was another Federal mandate that forced us to do particular curriculums and it was called No Child Left Behind and it damaged it did the exact opposite of what it was aiming to do and I worry
about putting something like this into a policy because although I'm an educator I sit on a board and as a board member I am not an expert in the classroom I might be an expert in the classroom in
my day job but I I don't this makes me uneasy um and I did I stomped around for the weekend and I was like here it is we're legislating curriculum again and it's um and I understand the science of reading and I understand many of the
thing I listen to that podcast and I've seen the damage that it has done but um I also understand I've been a teacher for 28 years and you have to have curriculum that students feel engaged in an engagement means that they are
invested and they're driving a curriculum and so sometimes if it's too policy driven then it's not going to resonate with kids so I will vote for this but I'm just saying I'm Hing 10 years I'm not wishing I
hadn't all right any further comments questions all right then all those in favor say I I any oppos pass 70 okay that brings us up to board member updates what do people have for us tonight anything um I did the msba clerk
training um informal I learned some of the same stuff as I learned last year on as being a Treasurer um but yeah um it was good I learned a few more things that have nothing to do with what we have going on here cuz our board is smaller
but um but it was a nice refresher course to kind of refresh myself from some of the notes I have to take and knowing um stuff like when to motion when not to motion and when we need to vote versus when we don't um I'm responsible for helping with keeping up
with some of our um some of our data and when we get rid of it and like reviewing it and that nature so it was nice other than that I was sick so I came out to do that and now I'm back outside other updates um I think I
mentioned the intermediate District 287 um apprenticeship program they have a bill um they testified in the Senate last week um to continue the funding for that bill what's notable for us here is that the intention of the intermediates is to
include their member districts um staff as being possible candidates for the apprenticeship program um which is funded so that um partially fed but that would be a great opportunity it's it's particularly intended um for um
educational assistance forer professionals to advance um to specializ licensure uh I had a chance to tour uh loox today um and I came away absolutely Blown Away by the amount of programming that we have in that in that building it's
really impressive and um it's really quite a like a community genem that's also celebrating it's like 100th year anniversary this year uh it's really cool got to see the art class in action uh that was awesome I was particularly
excited by The Woodworking room as I look at uh some woodworking projects that I have on my list to do coming up here so uh that was really cool um um really great building uh and then uh I
had on March 7th is the Peter Hobart it's Friday March 7th is the Peter Hobart imagination fair so I'm excited to check that out this time I write it down so uh it's February black history
month so I attended uh a AI African-American parents in C today as a parents in aola as a board member in the high school because I don't have kids in school uh I also uh attended to the I'm part of the
committee for sing Vision 4.0 so I I attended the different happen in lenux two more are coming one in lenux and another one is coming I don't have the date right
now and another one happen in West West usually I attended also site Council uh and so much questions same questions our listening session about the cell phone policy and I think one of you will
summarize hopefully summarize so same questions like why we don't block YouTube all this stuff yeah so it was it was great community events and I like the names and a lot of people show up free Fruit our next one we don't have
one in uh This months because Ramadan is coming so we decided to do after Ramadan I'm excited also Ramadan is coming 28 so the next time we meet that will be fasting uh there is
uh ifar coming up on I will be sending new Communications to students organized are Muslim Association students at high school happening on March 13th uh hopefully you you guys join it's
very first time it's going to be interesting and everybody all are welcome you don't have to be fast or you don't you don't have to be Muslim so everybody's welcome to attend yeah um I also wanted to
acknowledge Ramadan is almost here and um just a few days and so I believe uh Ramadan Mubarak is the appropriate greeting and so want to send that out to everybody um I I look forward to getting more information about the student Le
ifar I haven't seen anything on that yet but certainly do my my best to get there and I know that um mayor Muhammad is also hosting an ikar March I think get West which is free and open so I think you just have to
register um I have just been thinking you know it it's been a difficult I guess challenging uh month plus and um getting questions from folks in the community about what so much
that's happening in the news means for us here and so all I want to say tonight I was looking back at Dr hines's communication back in November and one line from that said our priority remains we are here for the wellbeing and Humanity of each and every
student and so I just want to lift that up and say that again and again and again other updates hard to remember I I write everything down I think I've updated everything
okay the um uh as um as abim had mentioned we did do have a listening session that we had I don't know maybe 15 20 people attend um a lot of it was sort of about people were getting kind of into the practices and enforcement you know side of things but we did hear
some things related to education this is all related to cell phone poliy I think people appreciated the virtual option um that was nicely received because I think it did allow some flexibility for people to participate and for some people to just listen sometimes people just want to hear the conversations too and and if
you don't have to go and listen you know like it they open up some the access so I think I think was pretty good it's just a little hard sometimes with the process in in terms of us um you know in terms of the making sure like we're managing the questions coming in some of
the things we think we learned some stuff through the process of doing that but really appreciative for the parents who participated in that and it is a great opportunity another way for us to continue to hear from the community public comment um the listening sessions and I I'd like some I'd like that we've
been looking at some intentionality about timing about topics about the ways that we do this and so just again some appreciation for some of that um this is you know now that we have legislature in full session uh it is for days at the
capital and um I know that Virginia and I signed up for the amsd which anybody can can attend you and you'll be there as well um and so I just encourage people if you want to do that it's a nice opportunity to hear from people to go around speak to our legislators we
have an easier task we only have three um and but um there's an opportunity just to feel in support and just be a presence there that day and listen in and listen into session and just and T along uh we've had asked to just sit in sometimes we've sat in on uh sessions
with um with other uh political advisory committees that school districts do and and there's just a great opportunity just to see that people bring students you know if there's those opportunities that we can consider to do some things like that so there's amsd coming up on I think March what we say 24th and then I
think msba and Masa are doing March 10 um just you know presence reminders things there's a lot of opportunities H was talking about some other opportunities that we have to connect with legislators I just encourage that um the messages that we Shar they know that we're hurting for money but it's
just good to have those conversations continued to share the things there's a number of policies that aren't even about money that Dr Hines and I were talking about that are also important for us to be you know raising and talking to with people because they do have have impacts on so much of what we do here so just just encourage it I know
that it can feel like uh what what I want to say like uh like you know sopan task right you know we're just always pushing that rock up the hill but um but I think we get the rock further up than we think sometimes and
so I think it's just it's good to do that so it is it is nice to talk to I would just encourage people to go especially the amsd because um you know just in addition to ad Dina and Hopkins Bloomington is cutting 5 million this
year and 4 million next year so you know there's a about a 1 1700 approximately 1,700 Gap per student uh because for two decades we haven't kept with kept up with inflationary costs and that would have covered probably that 2 million we
wouldn't be in the position that we're in and so um you know there's a lot of legislators who are asking we've given you all this money what are you doing with it and so I think that they are out of touch with what is actually happening at the the local level well not our
legislators I think they're very in tuned with what we are experiencing but I think that there are other legislators who don't really understand um local school board budgets I think we could play a Rolling
that again like pairing up and talking with some of these other communities that need that help some districts like Hopkins they have a they have a advisory committee but they have like 17 legislators you know like we can we can be parts of those even if we're just sitting in the room you know I think
there's some things like that sometimes that are um all right but we do have some other business take care of the rest of tonight so if unless there's anything else then I will adjourn this meeting at 8:38