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[Music] [Music] [Music] to you for attending. Uh viewers may watch TCAP's board of education meetings and committee meetings live or on demand
at any time at tcaps.net/board. Please rise and join me in the pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and
justice for all. >> With the review approval portion of the agenda, I did have one uh change if there is an objection to making number seven a discussion item for splits. um
and some funding allocations I believe as you would have been under like some guidance on today if possible. So uh adding that as seven pushing everything back one. Um any objection to that?
>> No. >> And if not can I have a motion to approve as amended? >> I move to approve the agenda as amended. Second. >> Second. Okay. All those in favor say I. >> I. Post say nay. Motion carries.
Uh, moving on to public comment number one. Tammy, I I fed up. I know there is public honor. So, I will say the board is set aside this time and individuals addressing the board shall have one opportunity to speak. It shall be limited to three minutes. Individuals should not make personal attacks
unrelated to actions affecting the school system and we strongly encourage common courtesy and constructive feedback. detailed rules and procedures including a complaint processor outlining board policy 254 >> J Ber >> thank you so much it's really always a
privilege to be in front of the board and I want to start with thank you amazed people volunteer to be in the roles that they are and that the administrators work as hard as they do really great community driven
organization where people are sitting on the right side of the table. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Second thing that I wanted to say is want to make some of you may know
I always just love educators. I have to be a advisor, but my principal my high school was just a year ago English early. So I've always found that we've been involved in safer kids safe schools and
educators just can't get enough of trying to just really impress want to make a comment about the new plan. The five items focus for me is keep the kids safe and
teach them up. You know, if you're a coach, you coach them up. If you're a teacher, you teach them up. And you want to make sure that the bar is high. So that regarding academic standards, I'm not an educator, so I'm just speaking general professionals.
But here's my assumptions and what I've learned from reading um is everyone is agreement that our academic metrics are not that's all we can always say. uh and they've been really pretty stagnant. That's not a travesty issue. That's a
national issue. There's something going on there. And what we do know too is our top kids that you know we take the best of the best and caps they're as good as anybody. You know what we what we do know is we have a big group of kids. That's really
tough to get them engaged and keep them engaged and our teachers need help to do. I don't know what kind of help they need, but not an easy job. >> You know, they know that we've had strategic plans and those numbers haven't changed. So, I think that that
is frustrating, but I also think it's really the fuel you need to do something that that maybe is a little bit different. And really, my thing is you want to have goals that create a sense of urgency. We've got a great sense of urgency on school safety and residency. That's still one of the programs or one of the bullet points in there. But
really these academic academic standards are really really important. And I'll just leave you with one quote. People have been uh wrestling with standards for a long long time. The quote I'm going to give you is 550 years old. It's from Michelangelo and he said um
the greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short but in setting our level. So really keep that in mind please as you think about what the right number and again thank you thank you thank you
>> Mary Vanel [Music] retired after could you Speak a little bit louder. >> Is Is your mic >> Thank you. >> That's better. >> Thank you. >> Just have to kiss this mic.
>> Um, so I've been volunteering at Player and Trevor's Heights for the last three years. And I can tell you that experience makes me feel like I need to bring my pompoms with me and be a cheerleader for really working on
narrowing that achievement gap between our kids that are comfortably economically and those who are challenged. Um, wow, we can do it. And I think Blair Elementary has certainly shown that we
can raise those scores um with good plans and and strong goals. So I looked just yesterday at um the 2024 results in Traverse Heights and of
course I'm looking at math because that's my thing. And our economically disadvantaged kids are at 27 point something proficiency. That means we've got almost 34
of our kids not proficient. So, think about me shaking pompoms for you to really set goals that are bold and all of us in this community are willing
to help. And I know that kids that are a ways from opportunity really benefit from community projects and after school programs and that can be lifech changing for them. So it's not just the academic
piece but together we can do these hard things and I think setting goals much higher than five and 10% is so appropriate. TCAPS does hard things and we do hard things well. So, thank you. I appreciate
all of you and the hard work you're doing. Thanks. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, moving on to the consent uh calendar. Uh, do I have a motion to approve the consent calendar as presented? to approve the agenda as present as
modified. >> We're actually on the consent calendar. >> Oh, sorry. I withdraw that. >> Withdraw that motion. I move to approve the consent calendar as presented. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second.
>> All right. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those post say nay. Motion carries. Uh moving on now to the main study session and deferring to Dr. Pan Wang. >> Okay. So uh tonight we have uh an
outline of our strategic plan, a draft. Um again really want to stress this as a draft with opportunity for ideas and thoughts and and knowing that the there will be things we go back to the well and thoughts and thing on after input.
Um, so what I've asked is that Jesse and Dan are going to take us through each of the goals and the thoughts that we have behind all of it. Um, and and uh be able to hear what all that is. And then I'd like to go back to the first one and
then just dig in from thoughts and ideas that the board has, questions, um, things that are missing, additions, those kind of things so that we can go from there. So, >> and I would just add I don't like to speak for as a collective group, but um
this has been a subject that every board member has reached out to me this week. So, in talking to John, that was kind of my plan as well was to have you guys just run from start to finish. No, we won't do questions in the first run. We'll just get the full presentation. Four members make notes. We'll come back to the beginning and then we'll go
through and do questions. That way, we can avoid the it's coming up, it's coming up uh part as well. if that works for you. >> Let's just double check. >> Okay. Um, thank you so much for all of
uh all of your passion and conversations and questions and engagement. It is it is really clear that this community has seven individuals who really want to serve our kids and um really want to talk about teaching and learning, which is something that Dan and I love dearly and so we appreciate that. So, thank
you. Um, we did bring our entire curriculum and instruction team with us here tonight. So, Dan and I will present through the goals. Uh, Miss Connie Taylor will take number five for us. Um, and then our team will be here to help with any clarifying questions or additional information you might need
to. So, I'll introduce those really quick. Our executive director of special education, Tiffany Palmdale, is over there. Our uh, director of curriculum K12 is Miss Britney K. And then our whole child director is Misty Warner. She's here as well. So, um, we're really
hoping today to get some feedback from you guys about specifically the focus areas and our metrics that we have drafted here. Um, we know the strategies and activities sort of will be developed more as we know what the focus areas and metrics are and we really want to work
hopefully with our staff to help us really dig in and think about what those look like. So obviously we are always open for feedback but we're really hoping to get some feedback specifically around the focus areas and the metrics. Um we also want to just say upfront uh this is hard work. There's a lot of
complexity into teaching and learning. Um we are measuring human growth. We are not measuring how much money can we make and what's our profit margin on this item. That would be maybe a little cleaner and easier. I think we all realize that. But I just want to stress
that humans do not grow in a linear fashion. Um, and measuring what a child knows and is able to do by one single standardized test is never what any educator wants. We focus a lot on the process and engaging kids in the process
um with the hope that the outcomes occur. So, I appreciate um just that context. Uh Dan and I have talked to a lot of our administrators, our building administrators about these goals. they have seen all of these and provided some feedback. We have shared these with some
of our teacher leaders knowing too a lot of our teachers are off for the summer and we really want to protect that time. So not all of our teacher leaders have had a chance to really dig in and give feedback. We're doing that this week with some of our curriculum leaders. Um we've also cross referenced with state and regional data um and then looked at
our our best practices and educational research. Um, one of the questions that we do have for you that we're going to put up front is whether this should be a three-year or five-year plan. Dan and I have have debated and gone back and forth. Um, our kind of our challenge
with a three-year is then is this year one and hey, we've already sort of allocated all resources and set the road map because school starts in like three weeks, right? We onboarded all of our administrators today. Uh, we onboard our our counselors, our our student registration next week. you know, um
it's tough for us to make large pivots at this time with resource allocations and things. Um so something to consider. So goal one um is the most popular goal, academic achievement. Um so a couple things Dan and I looked at just a
mathematics in ELA. We realized there are other academic subjects that we teach. some of our thinking around that to be to give you some background is reading really lays the foundation for all of all of our academic areas. Um we have reliable uh assessments on math and
uh ELA that are given throughout the year. So we have a way to progress monitor. Um we have uh national standards in these two. We have aligned curriculum in these two all the way through K12. Um and the majority of our instructional time K12 is spent in
literacy and mathematics. Uh so we really felt like these two were the areas that we wanted to focus in on. We also heard from the board that we wanted to be mindful about keeping our goals narrow. Um really that saying that when
you focus on everything, you do everything and nothing, right? We've seen strategic plans like that. We've heard from our staff that trying to be narrow and like really targeted will help give them the clarity that they need to do their work. Um and so that's why we went with these two. Obviously,
there's I know there's been some uh requests and discussions around the other areas, too. So, I will let Dan talk a little bit about how he broke down elementary uh targets. That sound good? And then I'll jump in with secondary. >> Yeah. So, looking at measures of
success, um I started with our our two main um achievement standards that we use here in TCAPS, right? We have NWA and we have MSE. So kind of to take you through my thinking a little bit um when we start on our baseline data. So
baseline data let's start here as an example um for math for NWA. So a couple questions that I think we've had and and maybe some notes is what group of grades do we do we use for achievement data. So I started out here with K5, right?
Thinking the larger the cohort, the less influence that individual grades have on our data. This is one of the obviously the biggest one I could get for elementary is a take a K5. We can break this data up quite honestly any way you'd like, right? We can do a K2, we can do a 25, 35. Obviously, there's many
combinations. I was looking for the biggest uh population size I could get. So, those individual cohorts that come through that we see sometimes five to 8% differences based on cohort doesn't influence this big group.
Um secondly for the NWA proficiency uh looking specifically here let's say we have non-economically disadvantaged economically disadvantaged and all um this is for our high and our high average students. So on NWA if we want to do some type of comparison in the
MSTEP when we talk about proficiency we take those students that are on the high and high average some people think that that average contingent of NWA is proficient it is not it's 60% and higher um so when looking at both goals even if
MWA and MSTEP I started with the idea of going back to our March study session uh with economically disadvantaged how we want want to close that achievement gap. Um, and I knew that whatever goal that we set with economically disadvantaged, that idea
that the all student goal would have to be less in order to close that gap. Uh, so when I started out, we did in my mind a 10% overall achievement. So when I say overall, there's been a little bit of question about this. Um, if for instance right there at 2425, we're at 42.8%.
I'm not talking about a 4% gain. I'm talking about 10% overall. So the goal over whatever we decide three to five years would be 52. Okay? And then the idea that that would then change, you're going to get a little bit of bump in all of your kids anyway. We figured out it's
about 3%, right? If you bring up your economically disadvantaged 10, your full group of kids are automatically going to go up three because they're part of that population. So we obviously wanted to show growth there also. And that's why we went with five. So, it's the idea
that if we decide to change and move up to a more rigorous standard, right? Let's say we want overall all of our kids to achieve 10. That means if we want to close that achievement gap, we have to then proportionally increase our economically disadvantaged
and how much we want them to grow. So, we'd have to move them up. If we want 10% overall, we move our economically disadvantages. we're getting close to 15%, you know, as far as proficiency goes. Another thing with um NWA we had, and
again I went with NWA because NWA is that that rubber hits the road assessment we see internally. Um teachers use it on a regular basis throughout the year. Uh drives instruction while that MSTEP is more that outward facing. We use some of that
uh obviously some of that data for MSTEP. make decisions about curriculum. But as far as when that data comes, we all know this, the data has still hasn't been released from the spring. And when we look at that data, we can look at like grade level building trends, but actually making decisions about students. Those students are no longer
in front of teachers. Um, so the really nice thing about um NWA, and I covered a little bit of this when we talked about our board curriculum in July, is that we can take this report, this happens to be a JK2, right? We just talked about how proficiency is that high and high
average band. So you take the blue and the green and you combine it and that's your proficiency. But you can take this report and drill it all the way down to a teacher level. Which means that when we talk about strategic planning, right, we want this to be alive in a building. We want it to be referenced in a building. Then a teacher can actually
take our goal as far as moving students from those lower three bands into the upper bands and do it on a classroom by classroom basis which is you know somewhat powerful. We talked about strategic planning in the past. It's nice to have a goal that's achievable
that you have every classroom you know in elementary buy into and we can talk about as part of their PLC process. So, conversely, not conversely, but the other um baseline data we looked at was MSTEP
um and those MSTEP goals, same idea where we have our economically and our on our all categories and the idea of the economically disadvantaged and bringing them up from 30 to 40% which would then raise overall automatically to 47, but
our goal would be up to 50%. So, just kind of my thinking behind where these numbers came from. My ELA and my math are the same as far as that 10 to5 ratio. Um, the idea of the MSTEP being the more district as far as curriculum team and NWA really getting
into the classrooms so they're aware of the goal and they use it on a on a on a basis that's, you know, fall, winter, and spring. Okay. You want to talk about secondary? >> Sure. >> Great. I do. Uh, so get the baseline.
>> Sure. >> Um, all right. So, we, so for secondary ver, unlike elementary, so this is a little bit different. Instead of combining a whole bunch of grade levels together, we specifically set goals around 8th grade and 11th grade. And here was the thinking behind that. For
secondary, we don't have a consistent assessment that you can combine like NWA that we have at the elementary. Right in our middle school, our state assessment is MSTEP. MSTEP, that's sixth and seventh. And eighth grade, it's PSAT,
which is given now starting this next school year, fall spring. 9th grade is PSAT. 10th grade's PSAT 10, not the same version as the other two. And 11th graders take the National Merit qualifier followed by the SAT. every version of that, depending on the student's grade level, the test gets
longer and the benchmarks change. And so it's really hard to sort of like aggregate it together because it would be like me putting a bunch of data together that doesn't really match, which I could do, but like statistically gives me the heeie-jeebies. So, um, when I talked to the secondary principles about this, they really felt like 8th
grade is that clutch transition year for students and ensuring that's when they start that suite of assessments by College Board. Um, and really this is the one that kids they they they just take more um they take it more seriously. They feel like their skin in the game. They get College Board
accounts. They can see their accounts. They can see what strands they didn't do well in. Teachers have more ability to do to do some instructional planning around it to do goal setting with kids. They really felt like this versus MSTEP because it was only given in the sixth and seventh grade was our one to go with. Um, so we did uh that for the 11th
and the sorry eighth grade and 11th grade years. like Dan, I sort of listened to what you guys were talking about. There's a ton of subgroups we could divide students into, right? You could probably think of lots of subgroups, but we focused on the economically disadvantaged as well. Um,
now, because we're talking about a cohort over time, I said this before, I have a hard time statistically saying it's going to be a 2% increase over time. And I was trying to show you the five-year to kind of get at this idea of there's variability in cohorts over
time. There will be. We're humans. They're not the same. There's no way for me to standardize it. And there's no way for me to say because we went up from spring of 21 to 22 on that eighth grade. Wow, look at that. Did we do something different? I don't know until I see enough of it to say the trend line has
moved up and we've like systematically changed the outcome for kids um because there's variability in cohorts. That's my stats soap box. up. So, um what our goals were then is to kind of follow that fiveyear or three-year trend. Um we
did have a different goal target for ELA and math, both 11th and 8th grade. And that was built off of we looked at a lot of schools that were similar around the state and how they were performing and what we actually felt like was challenging but yet achievable. So for ELA, for eighth grade, we really would
love all students to be performing at 85%. As you can see, the last five years there, we haven't been anywhere close to that, but we think studentmen arranger and I have been talking a lot about how we can be more targeted and engage more kids. Um, and then that economically
disadvantage and non that I added that yesterday in case you're like, what is this slide? I added this to the baseline yesterday uh because you guys asked to see those two. We don't normally group out the non-economically disadvantaged. So, I was like, that's an interesting way for me to pull the data and recode it. Um, but that shows you the gap
there. And so if you look at that for ELA in both 8th and 11th grade, it's not quite as large as it is for math. And I'll talk about that in a second, but we'd like to get that gap less than 10%. In both our eighth grade class and our 11th grade class, um, right now we kind
of hover between low 20s for the eighth grade. I think the 11th grade are pretty close around there, too. Um, and so those are sort of the goals with that. And then for math, um, so 85% for eighth grade and then the
11th grade for ELA was was sorry 85% for middle school and 80% for the high school. Our high school, although the scores are similar with the ELA, they just felt like at that time it was going to be a really big reach to get to 85%. Um, we had a very lively discussion
about how the middle school's goals were higher than the high schools. Um, but they just felt for where kids were at, if we can score consistently 80% of our juniors reaching college ready benchmarks in English, that would be like pretty outstanding for our district when you look across the state and when
you look across the nation. Um, I think 85% is a great reach for middle school. So for math, um, okay, again, math scores traditionally are lower and we always wonder why. It's not because our kids math is a little harder abstractly, but remember the benchmarks are higher.
They're higher for everything in math with SAT. You have to get more questions correct to score at the benchmark than you do in English. Lots of reasons why, but just keep that in mind when you look at the data. Um, we have struggled especially at middle school in math. Um, that 38%
uh is a really big concern. When I saw that, I talked to Dr. Van Wagner right away about it. Um, I double checked it about eight times. Um, we think we know why there was a curricular piece of it. Uh, we really feel like we've already put things in motion. Uh, Britney Kay and I have talked about developing,
we've developed an a tier 2 intervention program for our sixth graders. Uh, we really want to go after that, but we set as our goal of 55%. And I know that number seems not great, but right now we're scoring 36%
or 38%. 36 things. So, we felt like 55% increase would be a really um ambitious target. Yep. Um and then for our juniors, we set 60% as the target. It's interesting at few when I took over at Central. That
was kind of my math department target for those guys. 60%. We never hit it. Um and we always kind of laugh, but I really wanted to be able to say that we know the majority of our kids can reach that college readiness um at high school and math. the span between our economically disadvantaged versus non
for math is bigger. It's bigger. If you look at that gap and it's closer to 30% difference between those years um when math is inaccessible for a child, they just are done. They are done. They struggle to engage. Um it is harder to dial down the math and get the kids
involved in that skill development than it is in an ELA class. you talk to our special ed teachers who co-e, they will tell you when the kid has no skills, they just do not engage at all um in that with reading, they can kind of convince the kid use interest, those types of things. Um so, we're really
going to have to go after how we're going to engage these kids in some pretty rigorous mathematics, which we have some ideas around. Those are my goals for math and English. So just to point out there, right, Jesse and I obviously took a couple of different approaches and obviously
suggestions and feedback about that at the end is if you want to see that percentage growth at the end of five years or do you want to target where Jessemore did that eighth and 11th grade that target percentage we want to reach. There's just a couple of different ways to do it. We decided to do a couple
different ways. So any feedback on that of course is appreciated. So moving on, goal two, um, student well-being and connectiveness. We broke this up into two separate, uh, focus areas. One on culture, one on safety and security. So we decided when we looked
at culture, um, >> one in the back, too. >> I apologize. Um, and the connectedness and and mental health services. So the culture one, we broke up. We included our attendance. We talked in board curriculum about um, chronic
absenteeism. Uh we also looked at LEAP and participation and then our third one there was uh similar connection to LEAP as far as our extracurricular clubs. Um and then we moved on secure uh security and safety. This is one of the
parts in a strategic plan where we talk about a goal of 100% uh report that they feel safe at school. We do a yearly survey with that exact question. Do you feel safe at school? Right now, our baseline 91% um 100% of our schools complete safety
drills and learn to grow practices. I know that Patrick McManis uh runs up heads up our security and heads up our drills at our schools. He's been really creative the last few years, especially with our lockdown drills, creating more of a kind of a culture of learning for
those kids where he brings them together. He talks about why we're doing a drill. It's more than just alarm goes off and everybody hides. uh which has been really beneficial. We got a ton of positive feedback about it. And then lastly is uh mental health professional to student kind of ratio. Um right now
we're looking at maintaining access to mental health experts in schools building. Right now our baseline data um is 272 to one. Um so we're looking to grow that. Obviously the board Dr. Van Wagner, we've had a ton of support. I've talked about it in board curriculum
quite a few times. Um, we have our our counselors at the high school, and our secondary level, and now we have a full-time, at least a full-time social work at all of our elementary schools. >> Yeah. And I'll just touch on a few things from goal two. So, you might be wondering, why is the baseline data
different for this one than it was for student academic achievement? You know, like it or not, one nice thing about having standardized tests is it produces very standardized data for us for lots of years. Um, we developed a student survey, oh gosh, like about five years ago. We developed it at the secondary.
We really looked at national surveys and best practices. It's it's not long. We do it internally. We standardized it uh at West and Central. Then we standardized it at the middle schools and the elementaryaries picked it up. Then it kind of floated off of our existence and we didn't do it consistently. Last year Dan and I made
sure it was administered pretty consistently. We do it twice a year. We have times in the year that uh make sense for kids to give us feedback that we can adjust. It is pretty much the student survey is owned by the building leadership team. They are looking for what are the kids saying about their
school and how can they as the staff there work to improve it. Um so we have only one year's worth of data there for you as the baseline because we don't have consistent five years worth of data on that. thinking if these metrics are something that you think could measure
these focus areas, we would have to make sure that those surveys are given on a regular consistent basis to be able to monitor that and see where we're at. Um the baseline data for the student activities was a little bit of one that we had to be creative about. How do we figure that out? Um I literally had to
do a dump out of Power School, remove duplicate names and try to figure out how many kids are an athlete. It it was it was a lot of data mining to even get to that 61%. Again, if this is a metric that you as a board say this is helpful, we want to know what percentage of our
secondary students are involved in this, then we'll work with our technology department to develop a system to track those kids so that we're able to do that every single year for you and report on that. >> Yeah. And the LEAP number I came up with at 3707 is a combination of our sports
for our elementary and middle school. They there's a lot of different activities that run through LEAP that are included in these overall numbers as far as baseline goes. For instance, there's our uh youth football program. They pay a registration that we register
the youth football program from around the whole area. A lot of those kids may not be TCAPS kids. So, when we focused on that baseline data, you see that the total here is around 6,000. But when I focus as far as where the goal should come in at as far as a uh the increase
of 20% again that would start with the combining these two numbers at around 37. >> We did use as our divisor what our enrollment on count day was but dad and I had to at least like sort of figure out where are we getting some of these from. So just just an FYI. And then the
last thing I want to say is that 272 to one FTE. You might be thinking wow that's what our high school counselors have on their uh case load. No, it's not. Um, what we did was we added up all the FT that we currently have in the buildings that would fall under the umbrella of counselor or social worker
and divided by our entire student enrollment and that's what the ratio is. That does not mean that our counselors have a max case load of 272. There are some of our social workers who don't see as many kids because the behaviors they support are much more
intensive and so they operate with a lower case load. And then we have some counselors who are very much tier one and they have a much higher. So that's just the FTE total and divided by the total enrollment of students >> which is true for social work um in our elementary schools or our title
buildings. Uh Traverse Heights and Blair have Trevor Sites currently next year 1.8 FT um and Blair's at a 2.0. Central Grades at a 1.8. So those title buildings are giving more allocation as far as that mental health support.
Okay, goal three. Uh we talked about uh here uh positive student behavior. So this particular one again coming off fresh from board curriculum. Some of the data that we used uh we kind of broke this up into some of our proactive
approaches we use before date before our behavior happens. Um, and we look at specifically uh some student surveys results as far as feeling respected by their peers, right? Where we look at that bullying idea or that idea that they get along with their peers and and form those make
those important friendships. Um, and the next one that their uh peers treat teachers with respect. Another uh point there right now baseline data 65% for the second one and then 74% as far as um feeling respected by their peers. Uh a
lot of strategies here obviously go into our tier one social emotional instruction tier one support curriculum. The second one is more addresses what happens after the behavior occurs as far as data around our suspensions that we presented at board curriculum and how
we'd like to get those that number of 85% of student suspensions occur one time with a student baseline is right now 72. So, we understand that if we have a student being suspended time and time and time again, obviously that's not an appropriate intervention, uh, and we should be using other interventions,
mental health support, uh, trauma-informed practices to help that student with that behavior. >> Yeah, this one Dan and I really we we struggled and we challenged each other on what are the metrics, right? We don't want to do like the number of suspensions because that could change depending on our enrollment. We didn't
want to do the length. And so we really we we thought that that representative of like what what are the percentage of students who have been suspended that only that happens one time and that incident which involves the restorative which involves a re-entry change the behavior for that
student moving forward. That's what we're always hoping for. So we thought that was a good data point for that. Um the other piece is like when you look at the restoratives and you're like gosh 85% why not 100%. Not every situation will call for a restorative um
reaction meeting, right? It just won't. Like there might be a situation in which um a student vandalizes something or damages property and it I mean that typically you don't do a restorative meeting with that. So like not every time in which we have um a discipline does that does restorative make the most
sense, but we do think we can um increase that practice there. And then the other thing about the positive behaviors, we really we really thought hard about how would we measure this? Um how would we measure that our students are treating each other and treating community members with more respect. Our
student survey has three questions that addresses this. It asks one about how do peers treat you. It asks one about how do you see peers treat teachers and then it asks one about how do you see teachers treat students? And I'll tell you what, our kids say that our teachers treat our students very very well. they
actually say so and so is too patient with kids. Um, and but we have especially at the secondary struggled more with how they see their peers treating our staff and how they see their peers treating other peers. So, we felt like those would make better um
benchmarks and and data to go after. This is the best presentation to just keep rolling. >> I know. I know. >> Okay. Goal four. Um, postsecary readiness. All right. So I worked uh with Mr. Esper and Mr. Burgerer on this and then obviously Mr. Gwinny kind of
weighed in at the last uh hour on this. So we broke this into two thinkings here. We really thought about graduation. So what are we doing in school to support our students to be successful? So like how about that on time graduation rate? That's something we have a lot of hard data around and
some baseline data really looking at um increasing that. So we would love to see 90% of our students graduate on time. Right. Again, looking at that 5-year trend of where we are. Um, and then right now we're sitting at 67% of our economically disadvantaged students. So,
again, we broke that into a subop and we would really like to see 80% of our economically disadvantaged students graduate on time. I will tell you, we got really exciting news this uh weekend. I don't remember when I texted you. Yeah, Friday. Um, I was on vacation but reading all my memos from the state.
Um, uh, we got flagged from the state because we had a graduation, uh, data point they want us to look at. It was for Trevor City High School and it was because their graduation rate went up by so much. They were over 40% this year at Trevor City High School and that is a testament to Miss Choic and her staff and how hard they're working. But like
that's what we want to see and we want to see those strides. Um, so it was a good flag in that way. Um, the other piece that uh, we've seen a lot of high schools around the state track this is this idea of graduation plus. That's the second bullet point under that first
focus area. So, graduation plus means in a kind of a nutshell, it means the student graduated on time and had some type of post-secary experience during their high school career. Um, Joe Esper and I back when I was the central principal talked a lot about this and how would we measure this and what would
that look like? Because we thought that was really important that not only our kids reach their graduation diploma but also engage in some type of post-secary experience. Typically, that's just defined as AP course work. So, some type of course in that dual enrollment, not necessarily passing AP, but just having
that full exposure, dual enrollment, a CTE certification. So, all of our students who go over to the career tech center, all those programs, almost all of them have some type of certification that they can transfer right to a job, work experience, or career internship during their high school year. So, this
last year, I only grabbed one batch of uh transcripts. Again, that 62% was kind of labor intensive to get. Don't ask the details. Um, is where we were with this last class. I could go farther back and see kind of more data if you wanted us to if we like this as a as a metric for
this, but we would love to see threequarters of our students graduate on time with a post-secary experience. Um, I I could see us increasing that metric, too. Of course, my friend Mr. Burgerer wants it to be 125%. So, um, and then the second one really is, so
now they've graduated, they've had that experience, hopefully they they've had that post-secary, but do they have a plan? And do they feel ready for life after high school? So, all of our students are required by the state to to create what's called an EDP, which is educational plan starts in middle
school. Um, we kind of look through those, uh, myself and the secondary principles, and about 88% of them were current and accurate. We think we can do a better job of that. You see, we put a 100% for that one. Um, I think I've got some new uh lead counselors that are
really geeked up about this post-secary readiness and they've got a lot of great ideas. Um, and then that other 82% baseline came from again, we asked on our our graduating seniors, do you have a plan for life after high school? Um, and right now we have about 82% of those last classes saying yes, I feel ready
for that next step. And we would like that to be 95%. Okay, Tonnie. All right. So, in terms of staffing, high quality staffing, we focused on three areas. The recruit, retain, and to grow and develop. So, under the first area of
recruitment really focusing in on what's the new hire experience. How was their application process? What do they think about the interview process, the onboarding process, and looking at ways that we can improve in all of those areas? Um then looking at where is our
hiring managers, where is their satisfaction in terms of not only the quality of the applicant pool but the smoothness of the process. We've already made some pivots from based on the last strategic plan goal and we intend to continue doing that as well. And then
lastly, sourcing. We do a general posting which through the um the software that we use launches it out to not only our website but school websites uh LinkedIn all the major hiring components but those are general and so
one of the areas that we want to improve is to expand by 10% where we're putting out these job postings tends to be a little bit problematic because advertising is extraordinarily expensive um but looking at places like if job specific so if I have an halfspeed
position that's for mechanics reaching out to those types of organizations that you know produce and generate um and focus on the trades areas for example. So really trying to be more focused not just in general terms but broader terms
to reach out and be more specific in terms of where do where we're doing our marketing and advertising initiatives. Um so what again we're working on increasing our student teaching pipeline. We tend to hire almost all of our student teachers. So, the more
teachers that we can get to host and and um serve as teacher mentors for our student teachers, the better applicant pool we have and it's on the job training. We can see how they're doing in the classroom. We have an experience with them. They're a known entity. So, again, they probably served as our
largest target area when we're doing hires every year. Again, I already mentioned the the strategic advertising and marketing and candidate experience and supervisor experience. We have not collected data on that previously. Anecdotally, we meet we go out um we do
touch bases with all of our folks, which I'll get more into when we talk about retention, but we're not doing a survey. So, what someone might be willing to disclose in a survey setting that's anonymous versus what people will say when we're meeting with them, could be entirely different. So following this hiring season, start of next school
year, we'll be launching a survey to our hiring managers and our new hires just to see how their their process went. Moving on to the focus area and retention. Um we're looking at new hire turnover rates. We have fantastic
well we have really fantastic non turnover rates as it relates to our teaching staff. Um it's about 2.4% 4% which is significantly less than the state average. Where we're really struggling is in our support groups. So
between TC CAPSA, ASME, TC um AA and our non-affiliated child care, um we see somewhere anywhere between 30 and 36% turnover after the first year. So much of that is based on, you know, wages and the competitive market, but we
want to make sure that we're getting out there and getting a sense for why they why they might be leaving. So if there's things that are really within our control, but that, you know, as a public institution with limited dollars, it's really hard for us to compete with the private sector. So if that's why they're
leaving, we'll always continue to look at our salary structures and way we can entice folks um financially to stay with the district. But if there are other reasons, if they feel they're disconnected, so on and so forth, those are definitely things that we're going to be able to target. Um, and as I said,
the baseline, the average for the support groups is 32%. Um, again, we've got some climate survey, so we're looking at like what people who feel like they are have a sense of belonging in their school. Um, they feel that they collaborate effectively and that they're getting
really in real time constructive feedback on their work. And so some of the areas that we're looking at as strategies is expanding our stay interviews for our new hires right now we really focused in on teachers and when they come we meet with them you
know through touch points throughout the school year. You know how are things going? What do you now know that you wish you'd known when you were hired at the end of the school year? Is there ways that we can improve the new hire process for people? Um we're not currently doing that much engagement
with our support staff. So that's definitely an area where we can do that. My team touches base with them, you know, at 45 days and at the conclusion of a probationary period. Um, but beyond that, we're not doing the extensive stay interviews with that group. So that's one of the areas that we're going to
look at. Also starting to look at and encourage more participation in our exit interviews. Right now they're, you know, we send those out. Not all staff, in fact, fairly low percentage of people will actually complete them. And those tend to be people who had either a
really great experience or a really bad experience. What we really want to hear is from that middle group like you're leaving. Why is that the case? Um we're doing looking at a 360°ree feedback on our managerial support. Are they feeling supported and growing? And then
continuing with our recognitions and incentives. So the longevity bonuses, the sign on bonuses, all of those sorts of things. And then lastly, um focus area of grow and develop. We have been working on some career pathways that we
want to roll out to staff. We have our tuition reimbursement um for multiple groups to allow them to see this is what it would take to move from for example an aid position into a teaching role. This is what would be required of you and what does that look like? Um and then trying to develop those in all of
our areas. So if someone is starting at um say for a custodial position but they have aspirations to go into the skilled trades, how might we support that and help to align that pathway for them? And even outside of their own groups. So you know I may have a bus driver who says
I'd love to be a teaching assistant. What does that look like? Or a bus driver who says, "Hey, I'm now being around kids. I want to be a teacher. What does that look like?" And also succession planning for our leadership roles. I think this is one of the areas that we've done a really great job at. If you look at the hires for our recent
leadership positions, they've all been internal and it's intentional that we have everyone go through the interview process so that we are clear that our internals are in fact stronger than the external candidate pool and that has really been the case. Um so this isn't
just an automatic we place our internal staff into the leadership roles but we want to more like develop a succinct and defined succession planning. um so that folks understand what they would need to do to grow into one of those roles. Um
again the value added evaluation uh I think Jesse you were sharing with me some data that talked about the more folks are observed and the more feedback they get the closer connection they have with the administration and the more supported they feel by the organization.
And so one would think that that would be quite the contrary like you know but for the most part so long as we're providing that constructive and ongoing in real time feedback. Um I think that we need to make sure that that's happening across all of our units. And then supervisor mentorship and coaching
programs. Again we do have a mentorship program but making that more refined using technology and digital learning. Understanding that it's really difficult sometimes for folks to go into in-person training opportunities. So what might we make available from their own home at
the comfort of your couch uh in the evening that staff can go and do and grow um not only from a mandatory training component but also voluntary training component again personalized learning pathways and peer-to-peer learning mentorships to help individuals
grow. >> Okay. So that that completes the presentation portion. So I think and I definitely would take any any guidance if anyone feels we're going off track but what the reason I wanted to do that was to a
allow everyone to line up their thoughts but then b is to pick out first the overarching questions about the strategic plan in general rather than the specifics. I believe the main one in there was the length of the plan
which again doesn't have anything to do with what's in the plan just the length of the plan. We have typically operated typically operated on a three-year cycle. Um I think that was based off what other districts have done and we didn't have a plan at all and we it's
what we needed to get the the round done. I do agree that when we're doing this planning, we're pretty much locked for this year. So, we're talking about a two-year plan of which one year we're going to be talking about the new plan. So, we're talking about one and a half year plan. I think the downside to a
fiveyear plan is one board member one and a half maybe. I don't know how we count you, but um we board turnover is actually pretty low for on in our district. But yet, we've only still got one board member, one or two board members who have been with us for five years. So, I want to I don't
want to put in ever put in a plan that is going to get dramatically ripped apart in a couple years um because that's not good for anyone. So, I don't know what other board members feel. >> Well, I would just add too that um whatever we choose three years or five
years, I would advocate that that >> or >> four that might be the sweet spot in the middle, right? Um that the measures for success um line up with the plan. So you know it's not three with five year goals or you know
>> difficult to get separate. >> Yeah. Um but the other thing I want to point out is in addition to none of us well one one of the seven of us has been here for five years. Two more have been here for four and a half. Three have been added recently. Um and Beth is
somewhere in the middle. But >> there have been the the you know the circumstances of COVID and you know like I don't think anybody predicts another pandemic but you just never know. And then we did put a ton into mental health and we puted a ton
into safety and security and our circumstances as a district have changed dramatically just in the three years of the the plan we just completed. So, I just feel like five years is a long stretch of time um you know to recheck
our priorities. >> I I do agree that five any what what's other people's tools? >> Yeah, I mean I think overall I mean I'm excited about this draft plan. I think it aligns with our mission, our vision, our values, including our commitment to equitable access and success for all.
Um, I also think it reflects with our board of education standards of practice, though we've all committed to the moral and ethical imperative to serve all kids. I like that it builds upon the previous plan, um, including the portrait of a graduate, which didn't get brought up, but I think it does align with that. And it didn't it did
include the 2024 educational equity uh, listening tour data, which was also great. And, uh, of course, I really value that uh, for the first time that I'm aware of that we're actually setting targets for economically disadvantaged kids. So, I very, very much appreciate that. Again, nearly 40% or nearly 3,400
of our kids come from low-income families. So, I do appreciate that. I I do support a five-year plan. I think um uh I love the five-year trends and I would support a five-year goal. I also appreciate going from 12 focus areas uh
to five focus areas. Uh but I will point out that now we have 34 separate goals uh and measures of success. So I would um challenge us to try to get that under 10 with one to two goals per focus area. Um so that Jesse said we can have more
clarity and focus around um those goals. >> And that was actually what I was going to move to next was level of goals. But just figuring out the time frame first. Any thoughts on >> I could just real quick chime in a little on NWA just logistically they're
resetting norms. So our right now all of our data has been based on a 2020 norms. They're going to move to 2025 in the fall. So I wouldn't necessarily be using our spring data from 2024, sorry, from 2025 in this plan. It would be best to
use spring data from 2026 because that could be a significant difference. It has nothing to do with strategies or students. It's just merely reorming the data. So every five years NWA reorms the data. Um, I honestly think it's going to be in our advantage
or our data is going to automatically go out, but I wouldn't want it to be just because of the test. So, something to keep in mind. We're talking three to five using our spring 2025 for NWA is probably not best practice. >> I don't have a particular preference whether it's three or five years when
the sun sets. What I do think is critical is that we have annual evaluations of those goals and have some means of knowing whether we're making progress towards that final three-year plan, that five-year plan. So, I'm less concerned about when it sunsets and much
more concerned about having more frequent data to know that we're on track and it it almost becomes like a dashboard concept so that we we're held accountable almost on a monthly basis, an annual basis. I I don't care how we
do it. I just need shorter intervals to know whether we're progressing the way we're supposed to. So, three years, five years, I I can live with either one to sunset it. I just need to know annually whether we're making progress. >> I mean, I know you guys are looking for
us for some guidance here, but I would just turn it back around. Like, you're the ones that know the data and how to measure the data and have proposed the goals on the data. What in your opinion is a threeyear or a fiveyear? Well, my first thought is just going by
what I just mentioned about NWA, that zaps a year right off the get-go. Uh, and then the reooking at what the next um strategic plan, right? We start that a year in advance. So, that's why when we made our goals, we made it as a fiveyear maybe because we've been part of the system for so long, right? These
years seem to fly by and a fiveyear seem doable. And just speaking what Scott said, you know, the idea of building a dashboard, just hats off to Sophie and our and our tech department because that's what we're having her do, right? So every goal that we have, she's starting to build in our our power school system or student management the
idea that we can easily pull this data on a regular basis. Right? If we do the NWA goal, you know, teachers are pulling that three times a year. But as far as big data goes, it can be a to-do as Jesse has mentioned bringing in spreadsheets and pivot tables and all those types of things. With her building
that dashboard, we can report out on a board curriculum as regularly as as the data is available. Yeah, I I guess my my hesitation with the three-year plan is is a little bit what I already stated, like things are already kind of in motion as far as we
set the stage for the school year. Um, now I do think that a plan like this provides clarity, which we all know when we have clarity, we tend to do a better job at reaching a target. I'm not sure if just the clarity in this first year is is going to be enough. I I foresee if
we really are going to be as ambitious as we are with student achievement. um that Dan and I are going to come to Dr. Van Wagner and say, "Hey, we need like a consistent regular tier 2 math support across every of our 11 elementary
school." We don't have that right now. That takes funding and people, right? And like we can't change that at this moment for the next three weeks, but we can figure out what it is it would look like and start thinking about what that system so we have a better idea as to what that ask is potentially. Um,
so I guess that's sort of my thought about I I really love these like this idea of doing student achievement and measuring it over the long haul. But I agree, Scott, like then we got to make sure we have checkpoints along the way that we all hold ourselves accountable and we hold that mirror up and say we committed to this. Where are we at in
this six months? Where are we at after a year? Where are we at? You know, like coming back to that would be really important. I mean, I'll just add that I'm I don't know how to break the cycle of we do a plan in the last six months of the plan
is the wind down like the overlap >> and we have the wind up which we can't do anything that I almost think it's a fiveyear cycle with a four-year plan. Um, and then there's there is a dedicated planning process in between the two because we've been doing this for several months and no one's paying
attention to the old plan and we don't have a new plan. I mean, that's really in practice what we're doing. is is my line of thought. But again, I'm one that's kind of why I thrive the four year. So, >> well, if we can set some academic goals and we hit those on a regular basis,
>> I don't care if we ever do another teaching. >> That's the other part. You you modify. >> That's part of the inherent risk in public education in general is there's always some new curriculum, there's some new way of teaching, and so we throw everything out, we start over again.
We're not afforded the luxury of starting over. We better have the target and make sure that we have the tools in place. And Jesse, you're absolutely right. If we're going to ask and demand for excellence, then you have to tell us what you need in order to reach that
goal. And that may be economic. It may be it got it could be any number of things. But I, as I said, I don't care if it's well, I I care if it's three or five years. I'd rather it be 10 years because I'd rather we're on to something that's working.
>> I I agree with you on that. I really do because I think consistency following it over time it also allows you to look at the curriculum and you could say well here this curriculum doesn't seem to be working and this is where we prepare for
the next and you can begin to see where your inputs begin to impact consistently going over the one area in the econom in goal number one that I kind of would like to see us figure out
how to address and that is failure. You know, when do we begin to recognize where tier two should come in and where tier three comes in and how do we catch the kids that are constantly moving over the proficiency line? They may be
proficient one test cycle and unproficient the next. How do we begin to identify some of that and pull it in for some of these guys? I don't just see it as economic. I see it actually as engagement and what's going on with the
kid. >> And I think we should come back to I think part of the challenge is >> so just to finish that off. I mean it looks like there's a general feel like there's a general of making it longer.
>> So is that what the board wants to do now? How do you It would be really good to lay it out so everyone knows what they're getting into as well. So, is it a fiveyear plan that we review every three? So, it's basically tweaking the existing plan or looking at it, making adjustments and extending it like what
how I don't really mind. I just would like uh >> us as a board to to decide at least what we think is going to happen. This could change, >> right? >> What are we saying that we are doing? Well, I think that's that's the risk with a longer time frame plan is that
we're we're locking into these measures now. And they may be too high, they may be too low, and having those quarterly or semianual check-ins, monitoring progress is helpful. You know, keeping us and the public informed of progress, but what if we are way off target? What
if we, you know, we've been too ambitious or not ambitious enough? That's what I worry about with something longer than three years. tonight. Um, you know, if I'm in the minority here, so so be it. But, um, I don't think that this is the year one that we're entering
right now is a total waste. It's definitely not to our advantage that we don't have a budget yet, and we all know that. That's the elephant in the room, right? >> But, I mean, there are some good signs at least about the federal title one funding coming through. Um, and I I
think that a lot of these strategies and activities here, they're not new. They're continuing what the district has been doing for some time. And so I'd hate to just discount this year one is, you know, we're just planning um and really it's year two that's going to be implementation. We're going to hit the
ground running with implementation here. I have that confidence in our administrators and teachers. Um it's I think more of a me a question of if administration feels like, you know, we need we do need more and we need to come back to the board and ask for a policy
change or do we dip into our long-term savings? Um or is there a a shuffling of resources that the board would approve, you know, and that that can happen at any moment and it just doesn't dissuade me from going for a threeyear.
I I have concerns about the five year but I was that thing for you is does have fundamental problems. One of the things that we haven't talked about is staff and I would think that teachers and again I'm going to speak as somebody who's
never been a teacher would like something like the time to have this unfold and like consistency and continuity and if it's producing results and we're seeing that I don't see them wanting the board necessarily than to try and reinvent the
wheel again in three years. Uh, but Jose, you're right. We We could be off track and and I think it's kind we need to depend on YouTube to tell us that something's not working. Does that involve a whole new strategic plan or
does it involve a reassessment of particular curriculum? I I I don't know. But that's the early warning system I'm going to depend on. I see. >> So working off of a fiveyear plan with maybe a threeyear automatic like board question in three years time to sit there and say we have >> I wouldn't do it every I do it every
single year. >> I think you I think the board commit to a strategic plan of review of metrics within the strategic plan >> and then whether whatever you do three four five like yeah every year you're going to re-evaluate if it's meeting the mark and if an adjustment needs to be made every year the board sets aside a
study session to identify and make sure that the the metrics and those things are correct. What if the state changes the test? >> What if they no longer pay for NWA? >> We could be facing that in two months, >> right? >> They pay the entire bill for all of our assessments
>> or title one or state funding. >> So I I really think you don't have a choice but to look at it every year to be honest. And so I think that the board just commits whatever time you want to go that each year there'll be a study session to evaluate the components and if there's any adjustments needed in the
metrics. again, hopefully not, but I think it's important that you identify that. Scott, just quickly to your second question though about how do we avoid this um goofy period where the you know previous
>> probably restart the news plan sooner than you know >> I think with the way John laid it out it almost >> and the annual >> the annual a more detailed dedicated meeting to study session to to >> you're going to want to align resources I think after you get your budget you're
you know you try and hopefully it's sooner in the future and sit you know each you know early on probably just as you're adapting budget kind of looked go >> are are there shifts in that are there you know does this priority is this are these uh you know resources working you
know that align to it did the state change the test did they you know all those things you may have to grapple with >> okay so general consensus fiveyear plan one year study session every year to review where we are >> confirm we're on track >> confirm on track make any tweaks as
needed or adjust to any >> conditions that have changed. >> All right, that was a big one. I know it took a little bit, but I think that's fundamental as we go now through the rest of the questions because it really affects everything we talk about. So, I don't think there was any other overarching unless you guys can think of
any. I think that was the main one. So, with that, let's go back to uh go one and open it up to board and let's let's uh start there. Who who would like to kick us off with any questions on
go number one? I my concern which I was already put in the wrong place apparently uh is looking at the tears and when we begin to address when kids begin to have a problem because I think if we wait too
long we're behind the kids and we want to try and stay a little bit in front you know I think proactive >> I know and just to give you some background as far as elementary when we start to look at that tier and Tiffany can speak to this a little bit. We talk
about LRE we have another acronym of course in education least restrictive environment. So when we when we look at least restrictive environment right especially when we're looking at K1 and we're looking at you know the the discrepancy between boys and girls and how they grow and academically where
they catch up. We want to make sure that we're giving them every opportunity to grow before we start accommodating their learning. Right? if we want to make sure that they need that accommodation. So, generally speaking, what I've seen when I was in elementary as an administrator,
we would see that that task, we call it um teachers addressing student concerns, it's a task group. When a teacher would have a concern about a child for various reasons, but if we started about academics, you know, really start to kick in end of first grade, beginning of second, and that's where we'd see there
there's tier two taking place, especially in reading before that. But that that's where we want to try to get most of our our tier 2 started is in that second grade to make sure we give that child every opportunity to make sure developmentally they're where they need to be so we're not accommodating
when they don't need it. >> Okay. I just get concerned that some kids hit the wall and then if if they hit the wall right by this the end of the school year >> and there's no summer school, there's
nothing and then they come even a little bit further behind when they start the next grade. Those kids are really hard to to make feel good about what the material is and catch them up.
catch them up and keep them where they need to be at grade level at the same time. >> And a lot of this we're not going to have answers to. I think a lot of this is the feedback portion so we can go through and then >> just have a quick comment that I fully support focusing on literacy and math and and I will challenge us
administration um to have one ambitious goal for each instead of four. That might be hard. Um and I also believe the targets are too low. I think over five years collectively us together um can can aim higher. So depending on whatever that's
that goal is that we focus on um I think I think with the right tools, community partnerships, family partnerships, we can we can aim higher. >> So when you talk about like one ambitious goal for are you talking K12 or >> you're talking about one literacy goal that you I would prefer one instead of
four literacy. I would prefer one math goal instead of four and I will defer to you on what you think that goal is most meaningful. Um, but four to me I don't I don't know. I just it's rough for me to to have four literacy goals.
>> I know it's much that large of a >> Yeah, like different. >> I I think I I generally do support your point and less goals, but I feel like there has to be an elementary and a secondary on this. >> Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, and maybe it has to be, but again, there's no science or social study goals, even though those are very, very important, right? So,
just because they're not in the plan, >> um, doesn't mean that. So, I guess I would prefer one literacy goal um in the game to get all of these goals under 10 because again 34
is too many in my in my opinion. >> I I would lean for elementary. Again, it's tough as far as because if you want to take baseline data and find a measure, right, that's consistent. We don't have a consistent obviously a K12 measure. My another issue right then you create a goal and then you have all
these sub goals in order to keep measurement of it. I like the idea of going to one as far I would much rather have NWA as a goal than MSTEP just because it's a it's a living document right that's I have MSTEP in there because like you said you know in previous board meetings that's the
measure that gets you know record eagle and people recognize and but NWA's as I've gone back and forth and said that that's rubber hits the road right and I can take that goal and put it in front of every teacher so if we go one way or the other that's the direction I >> support that especially if we have a dashboard being built up that we can put at the top of our website and people can
click on man just like they can with with state assessments. So, >> um I've got one really fast one then over like when we're talking about the cohort, I love the having the K through five >> as or at least a wider group because as you said like it takes away that
individual class that skew the numbers. I feel like we should leave out potentially K because the influence that we can have that's almost the baseline of what we can what we received versus what we can do. So
that would be my only thing is but I as part of a cohort it's okay it's it should would show growth. That was my only point. >> Yeah. I wanted to ask Tai a quick clarifying question but he's out of the room. So Sarah did you want to say something? I I would actually change if
we were to take K out because Jesse and I talked about this a little bit today. We've talked about this several times is I'd almost go two five because NWA is a K1 test and then there's a 25 test and then there's a 68 test. So if we're talking about cut scores and like data
like a score in second grade is actually the same um cut score as a goal as a score in fifth grade. But a score in first grade is not the same as second because the test is is read to them K1. they have to read the test. So I guess if I were to redo it, I would think I'd do a 25 NWA for for
>> and again this this is just a thought. >> I I like the idea because right now it's it's a challenge in our system. I we can work through it by double pulling and taking kids out of spreadsheets, but our JK register as K kids. So getting that JK the junior kindergarten and the
kindergarten separated that that's about five extra steps. I mean we can do it but if we do a 25 that would make it as far as dashboard wise a lot more usable. >> Yeah it's a lot more object like the less data you have to adjust also to me makes the data stronger because it's
just >> you have some mechanism for early childhood on how to evaluate whether or not kids are coming in prepared any better than they were the previous year. >> Not great. I mean, there's some different ones out there, but you know,
the the the issue you generally often have is that you have kids that have not had a preschool experience that walk in. And so, here they are, registration day, and parents get to choose what they want. So, we do try and do some evaluation that first weeks with kids and we do have conversation with parents
if we think, you know, there's there, but there's not solid. I mean, there are different things out there. Gance Ka I mean they're different things but one that I think has just been everybody's believed in strong >> yeah by I like Tai the idea of just less
goals of a big fan of like let's do the really important stuff right and and stay narrow I just I don't know I I have to think about how to make it meaningful for all of our people. What I really like about having the eighth grade, that's a huge transition year we all
know into high school and having that I can rally and we can rally all of our secondary staff around an eighth grade goal and 11th grade goal. I mean, everybody in those buildings has those kids and can own that and can
feel like they can do work to impact that. I just I don't know what a K12 literacy goal would look like that would be meaningful to the people doing the work. Do you know what I mean? Like I I I just need a little more thought on that.
>> That's why we're hashing it out and >> Okay. I thought maybe you had an idea. I was like, "Oh, let's tell me what your idea is." >> Jersey, when you were out of when you left Jersey, I guess one of the questions was a clarifying question to you Jersey. >> Yeah. When you say one literacy goal, one math goal, did you mean one for all
grade levels? So, >> not necessarily. I just think something by 2030 that as a district we can set a goal around literacy and get pumped that we've achieved this ambitious goal. And again, I'll defer to our academic officers. Um,
but I would prefer less less goals that we dream big on and and allocate resources accordingly in the tools and provide support. That's just again that's just me providing feedback tonight. I mean, uh, I could vote yes on four literacy goals. I'm not sure.
>> Or or three. >> I I will just say for my part, I liked that you had elementary school, middle school, and high school goals. I really did. I thought that was very meaningful to have K through five and eighth grade and 11th grade. Of course, my first, you know, me, my first reaction was, wait,
what about grades six, seven, nine, >> and they feed all into it. >> Right. Exactly. And if as long as, you know, you you believe and you're, you know, you train and develop the everybody to have that joint responsibility. I think that's
everything. Um but but I I would be afraid to just pick say third grade reading which is a very popular thing right now nationally and there's the Mississippi story because it really could come at the expense of math or you
know high school middle school. So I like the spread that you have come up with. Um I I my and I just want to back up for a minute and just say very high level, you know, this was an incredible amount of work that you all have done in
less than two months since our last strategic planning session. And um there's a lot of good goal setting and ideas in here and you had to do this um you know when there aren't a lot of staff around to consult and you're competing with the sunshine. So, I just
want to give you a lot of kudos for this uh plan that you've developed for goal one. I do feel like these middle school and high school targets are reasonable. They are meaningful and achievable, but I am concerned about the K through
five goals being too modest. um that 5% growth target for all over five years, that equates to an average of 1% per year. And to me, I mean, I think you're just automatically
going to get more than that. Um I would like to see something more like 3% per year. I I know that sounds more much more ambitious, but I just I really believe it is achievable, you guys. this last year in particular, but even going
back, you know, since 2022, the the end of COVID, um, this district has put so much into investing in new curricula, the CKLA for elementary school, the middle school math. Um, you know, the instructional
rounds, the behavioral coaches, the social worker in every building. I mean, there have there has just been so much effort that I know is going to pay off and we're going to start seeing those results year one, year two. And I think
we just by not setting that goal a little bit more ambitious, I think we might be sending the wrong message to staff and the community that we don't have the confidence in all the good work that you're doing. Um I believe in the administrative
the administration both at the building level and the central office and I believe in our teachers to carry it out. Um, so I just really want to encourage, you know, more ambitious but achievable goals for that K through five >> and I think growth
>> if you don't mind that will be the kickoff to the next >> I think it's critical to get through the number of goals like because we've got a few different ways >> to go and then I think that ties into it as well because we may be talking about something that we're going to cut back
anyway. So, I don't see I've talked to Tai and I'm actually a big uh I think a lot of us want to see less goals or at least ones that really make a difference and stand out like a dashboard as well. So, but I don't see I mean how does everyone
feel on goal one? I don't we've got uh elementary, secondary uh schools. We've got two or three sets of data here. middle and high school, English, math,
disadvantaged, not disadvantaged so far, which if you actually break that down, it's probably going to be two three four five six seven depending on how you do economically disadvantaged, that could be anywhere
from 10 to 12 goals. Um, how in one section, how what do we feel like that? How do you how do you want that to be? I mean, is there any better way? I don't know if there is. >> I mean, I would just I I like the
separation of the the the high school, middle school. I do like that separation. I think it's going to make a lot more sense as we um drill down to those goals. And I understand why u just looking at economically disadvantaged, not
economically disadvantaged. I mean, it's a way to look at where our resources will go um when we're really trying to drill down and target. So, um you know, and in my opinion, I I don't I don't mind the the way I mean, I'd like less
schools are are better, right? Because you do target, but I also understand um >> sure I'm helping. >> I I don't know if there's a good answer. I think I think generally speaking, we all agree the same thing. I'm just trying to merge the what we think we want with try and bring a little and
just questioning like what Dan had thought about. So let's see if we can get at this. So the thoughts of 25 versus K5 >> thoughts on that. >> It's K5 now. I mean and I I assume that's why >> Dan talked about I think maybe while you
were in the restroom we talked about 25 because K1's different and the set the the cut scores and everything of NW than second grade. Second feeds third and up. So we had the conversation about going 25 okay with 255. >> I would be okay with 25. And one of the
things Ty that you missed was K. One of the tests is literally pretty >> they have to read it to the kids. It's what you it's what you received into the system. It's not what you've achieved. So it kind of distorts what we're achieving. Um, >> so I I like the two
>> and and and I guess let me caveat this with >> I think but to Tai's point earlier, I think we take this and it comes back to the board again. >> Yeah, exactly. I don't think we need to be voting or deciding right now, but I encourage feedback and then bring it back in two weeks. >> So this is kind of what Dan had. So I
kind of want feedback on each of these pieces and kind of see where the the board's at. So I think that the 25 >> and then just as far as feedback as far as you know I mentioned at the beginning Jesse and I as far as the achievement do you want just an achievement final measure? So for instance if you're
look at the baseline right and I would change if we're looking for more rigorous goals and we're specifically going to use NWA instead of talking about 10% 5% do we just want to do um all students at 65 and economically disadvantaged at 50. You see what I'm
saying? Where we actually have a a spot we want to hit as far as percent proficiency rather than talking about they're going to grow a certain percentage over time in a fiveyear cycle. >> Does that kind of styy us though if they
change NWA and the cut scores? >> Good point. >> Well, that again I would go back to we really got to look at what first of all we're going to see in the fall. So if they're really impactful then we'll know going forward. Again I think and we're talking about spring to spring data, right? All the data that we pull for NWA
like this is these are all spring scores. Um spring scores we also talked about at board curriculum as far as fall winter spring NWA. If we were to look to trim assessments, you know, it' be more of a winter. We're going to talk more at board curriculum about that this coming month, but spring would never be
touched. People teachers have come back. We've surveyed teachers. They like the spring measure. So that's a good spot for us. So I think as far as to to look at rigor, right, increasing the rigor, but also to look at instead of putting a percent on it, that can be confusing, you know, just as far as us thinking
together here, moving to an an actual proficiency score or proficiency percentage would make more sense in a percent. >> I I agree. Measure it on an annual basis though. Can we measure progress towards that goal? >> We could break it down into five years for every year. The reason I like the
percentages is because basically you have an annual goal that you're trying to hit. >> Yeah. And theoretically, think of it this way. Finding the sky. You meet 12% one year. Great. We only got to meet 8% this year, >> right? >> You know what? You know, why not? Let's
hit let's aim for the goal here and show progress and and it may be not as much we want. What's the extra scoops of ice cream we got to put on this thing or >> while we're really doing well on this? And so kudos, you know. And I think the annual becomes with a we got to at least go out to as far as trend goes, right?
To get all other variables like you know Jesse started by saying education is not you know supply demand where we can put numbers on anything. It's about 15,000 variables that go into a kid learning how to read including everything that they bring into the classroom. So if we
want to actually look at trend if we go just yeartoear every variable feeds into that. We want an upward trend right? That's a goal of everybody. So, how do we get to our final goal looking at an upward trend over five years? That's another advantage of five is that you can just see by our data here, right? It's our
it's where we're at here. We go 53, we go down 2%, we go down 2%, we go up 7%. What did we do between 2223 and 23 24? Can anyone count and look at what what are the variables we put in place to suddenly go up uh 7%.
>> That's the challenge with I don't know what it was >> with the large cohort, right? Yeah, I mean it's hard to know with that large core. >> It'd be harder even with a smaller core because these numbers would be all over the place. >> That's why you need to to look at it. That's why I like the 5year also because you actually can show a trend and it's not like look what we did this year.
>> I don't want to get at the end of five years and settling say wait a minute we're now we're close to where we're supposed to be and how did we miss this before. >> And that's where we talked about study session every year, >> right? It'd be nice too to do study session if we don't include MSTEP. We can do the study session in the spring
because we have most of our data. >> We do. And then we could even say maybe we need some more resources in these areas because we're not making the growth that we would want or that we were hoping we would make, right? And and if we had that and we get our PSAT
results that last week in June, we would be able to in July say here's where we are. MSTEP's a little different because you guys have the scores, but we cannot talk about those in this meeting. You can't share those. We can't put them on a graph. We can't make any type of We can make changes, but we have to be
secretive about it. >> Same bucket as the budget. >> To your point about spring updates, right? Right before budget time, we can help have that informed decision of that. And that's why I prefer like again, that's why I like NWA. And I
think if we communicate the 60% equals proficiency, then I can do a better job of explaining actually I know you're reading MSTEP scores in the paper. here's how that our internal assessments align with that. >> So >> Christine, >> yeah, I just wanted to make one comment. Um, we're focused on teaching and
learning and I understand that you can get data and Sophie can create ways to get data. I want to make sure the focus isn't time and energy on getting data that it's actually time and energy on teaching and learning and strategies. So I mean, I've just seen how much work you've put it in just to get this to create something. So just make sure
you're thinking about what are the goals and how can we get the data easily not spending you know two weeks on getting data for an update that we do on an annual basis that isn't going to improve teaching and learning. So, I'd be cautious of that. >> And that's why that state who does MSTED
for us, we don't have to create any graphs and Dan creates beautiful graphs. Don't get me wrong. >> Dan does not. >> I did some color stuff here. >> I can't even believe you said that. >> But I mean, once a year, you know, Dan's graph time. >> Thank you.
>> There was some graph time. I I 100% agree with Christine that I I know how much time and energy and and again you're talking to an entire well mine is Sarah of non teachers right and so we have to rely on on you and what is
measurable in your eyes and so um sometimes I sit here quietly because I'm I'm really um trusting that your process of how we're going to do this is is what we're going to do. So, and I think what's nice
about if we use NWA and PSAT SAT is we get a fall read on it, right? Like when we got back that data with eighth grade math and I mean I wasn't joking. I texted Dr. Wayne Wagner and then I was on the phone with Kristen and Ryan, our two middle school principles thinking about, okay, it's it's June. We got to
think about how we're going to redo things differently. We got to run some of those class sizes smaller. We got to think about what our coats are. I've got a high school math teacher who's exceptional who's going to go in and coach some of those. I mean like we already were because we had the data then saying we got to set the stage
differently because we can't we can't have kids go to school every day and learn math for an hour and only one third of that state efficiency. Right? So >> that's why I get nervous about this blending of the cohort groups. I mean one of the things that's valuable is to
have something to pinpoint to see where the problem areas are. And the more data you get, the easier it is to hone in on that. And it may be a classroom teacher. It could be a curricular problem. But the more we blend it, the harder it is then to pinpoint that.
>> Not really though. I think the overall goal, I think, you know, teachers and principles, you know, classroom to classroom, we'll look at those things and those elements for us to be able to see that. Again, going back to TA statement, just because it's not there as a goal doesn't mean we're not doing
that. And I think that's the process of us reporting that out in curriculum committee of as we have these either two or three depending on what grade it is and WA assessment or SAT. We have a we have a measuring stick grade by grade
and class by class. And so I can tell you our teachers and our principles they sit and look at that have that look at the RIT scores and have that element for a third grade grade class at Central Grade Elementary with this teacher. drill it all the way down to the students and who and how and
>> I think I I I mean just basic statistics is would suggest that if the if you just take one of the population you better take you have to take a number of the population the n has to be high enough otherwise the confidence is just is going to go way down >> that's what Dan was saying yesterday is the n score yeah
>> you know that >> is my favorite uh you know I'll put that aside for right now but statistically I think you should have the largest And I do like the two5 because it's measurable. >> And and Scott, I just wanted to also add
that over I mean over the last four and a half years since I've been on the board, the administration would present the NWA scores bianually, fall and spring, and it' be sometimes it would be like, you know, by grade, not only grade
level, but by building level. >> Oh yeah. So we would see what all 12 or 11 elementary school you know and that was super helpful and I think that's important going forward not only for the administration but for us and the community to just see you know what are the strengths in the areas for
improvement. Um we you know obviously have a lot of volunteers in the community who are helping Blair and Traverse Heights but there might be a Silver Lake or another building emerge that need extra help. And I'll just comment uh Josie, we've really we do that behind the scenes. We have been
really reluctant to do that because certain buildings feel that they are um it becomes a comparison especially in a especially in a district that has two high schools and two middle schools. It becomes a why did they score higher than us type of a thing. So Dan and I do that
when we pull this data. We pull it here and we show you guys everybody and then we pull it for our principles and we look at buildings and then we pull and look at teachers and then that secondaries we pull and look at courses what courses where are our kids who have the greatest needs and are we ensuring that we have the right supports there what are the hours we actually pull like
first hour algebra 1 versus sixth hour algebra 1. Um so I just I I would need directive as to what you guys want. We just want to be mindful of pitting ourselves against ourselves. >> Yeah. And it might open the door to
parents wanting to open enroll in buildings that you know aren't outperforming other buildings or whatever and >> appear to be. >> Yeah. Appear to be. Exactly. I think I would Yeah. >> And I think we're already we've already established as a board we're uncomfortable with how many goals we're probably going to have especially in
this goal one anyway. So >> I think when we get to the review the breakdown of why this happened. >> Okay. >> So I think we'll take that 25 concept with the proficiency. Well, let's let's take that back for that. Now, let's talk middle school. I know I heard Jesse say
8th grade PSAT. Was there something else there? >> No. My only question was if again if you do we're we're identifying are we comfortable with the fact that we are going to see variation based off of the
the grading themselves? >> I think because at least we have two metrics of that eighth grade. Correct. SAT. >> We have a fall and a spring. Yes. >> We have two two elements with that. And then the SAT stays consistent now all
the way through. Like we've got a consistent measure. It builds it. The college it's all a college board product all the way through as well as AP is college board. Like you've got a lot of consistency there that we've never really had. I mean it's finally gotten to this point like you know wasn't that
long ago we just took the ACT. It was not that >> they changed and now they've gone down and down and down and it feeds and builds and gives predictability towards that SAT score and you've got the the the portal that's built. You've got Khan Academy resources that are built to all
of that for kids and parent resources. There's a lot there that's to like about the SAT that you really don't have with an NWA or whatever at that point once you get, you know, to the the that eighth grade and a transition measure.
That's awfully nice. We're finally kind of getting there to have that that predictability. >> I fully support the SAT portion. I think my question was like obviously not every group of kids is made equal every year. So you're going to see natural up and downs. So is there any way to smooth
that out? Like in the elementary we've done a cohort. So there's there's you you can only get so far from black I that's my only is >> if you can't >> I mean my feedback is I I'm fine with PSAT and eighth grade for math and I
think you know why. So if we were going to go to one goal for math it would be PSAT 8th grade >> and we've thought we've had that conversation. >> Yeah, we have. I mean, for sure, our our class, and I've said this before, that we watch really hard is our algebra one class as a ninth grader. A student who
fails that is very unlikely to graduate on time. Um, it's not any shocker. It's, you know, it's different than a lot of our schools. That's why we already when we saw this last, see, you look at the last three years in this eighth grade, it wasn't just this last year that like made the middle school principles and I
very anxious. It was like one, two, three years in a row and us going, "Okay, hold on. Time out. We got to we got to fix this." and really make figure out how to put some more resources into this. Um, eighth grade's that big transition year. So, I I I like the
English as well because our other teachers, you know, at East and West Middle School, your social studies teachers, your science teachers, your English, you can get all of those guys on board about literacy and literacy instruction at how to support kids who are below grade level. And so I I think
there's more buy in from the staff if we include both math and ELA. >> Support. >> So >> I just feel bad that we're on a downward trajectory. >> Yeah, me too. >> You don't want to know how bad I feel. I feel really bad about it, too.
>> I' I'd like to catch it before it keeps going down too far. >> And I think that's what we're doing right now. >> I hope so. >> Yeah. and to and I hope that we all provide the resources for this consistent tier 2 support across the elementaryaries and maybe that ties into our next conversation.
>> Okay, then so same thing with 11th right there. >> So, so I think we're done with one at least giving you guys enough feedback. The only question I don't think we covered with just to close it out was the economically disadvantaged versus
not how we want that as a goal. Um I think we want to see that gap closing. I don't know. I I think we want that I I'm okay to say that we do want that to be part of the goal and leave it to you to kind of >> Yeah. >> come back. >> Um
>> I agree. There's four four bullets here. Eight measures of success. overall growth and the economically disadvantaged. And I think that's perfect. I just like I would like to have more of a discussion of the K through five target growth. Are folks
comfortable with 5% overall over five years or is that something that we feel like we could be more ambitious about? >> I think we took that away with didn't we to the proficiency goal? >> So it could be grade two to five instead of K5 for NWA and then the MSTEP is
grades three to five. Right now, those are both target growth of 5% total over five years with the economically disadvantaged group being double that. >> And my feedback would just be that I mean Jesse and Dan sat with their team and their leaders and they developed
these plans and how to measure those achievable goals. And so I mean I'm just I'm comfortable with where our goals are at. And I think again in one year when we sit and go through a review if we've you know we can always
adjust um if we want to make you know see the growth and we want to see more growth you know achievement then I think I think we can adjust. >> I don't think we're saying we're going to be stuck with this 5%.
>> I I I don't think 5% over five years is aggressive enough. It's but again I'm not about here to sit here and go to a dart board and tell you what that number ought to be but it it's got to be more aggressive than 1%. I think I think just
based on what we discussed before, let me pull the because this is K5. So once I pull 25 data, we can find a I think I can find a proficiency point that makes sense between all students and economically disadvantaged that does two things, right? That we see more than the
5% growth, but then we also see that achievement gap closed. That that'll be my goal, right? More than 5% for everybody, but an achievement gap that's under 20%. Does your gut tell you that the grade two to five grouping would would lend
itself to that? >> No, I I don't think it lent itself more than the K5, but it like like I discussed earlier, just having the the same standards for each I I think the the data will actually look pretty similar as far as you're still going to have a an achievement gap that's over
20% that we've seen throughout all of our data. So, the goal is to get under 20% and everybody progressing more than 5% in five years. I'm just going to look for a round number to hit. Like right here, if I were to do this right here, maybe we hit an achievement goal over five years of
60% for all students and 50% for um economically disadvantaged 17 and 11. >> It's going to be tough for me to vote yes on 20% gap, but I'm just >> It' be less. My my goal is because right now we don't have a data point that's that's under 20,
>> which is I'm just going to stay and I'm just one of seven. No, but I I always go back to my favorite slide from the equity study session where our leadership team talks about they have two jobs. One job is to improve outcomes significantly. And to Scott's point, I don't think 1% is significant. And I think together, and I'm looking at
ourselves to hold ourselves accountable with the things that we control, including the budget and how we appropriate dollars to the classroom, you know, I think that's a way to do that. and their second job is to, you know, decrease, you know, achievement gaps, you know, while managing everything else there is to take care of
at the building. So, I'd like us to stand with them with those two jobs. Um, I'd love to see 10% um in five years. Um, >> as far as the achieving gap, >> overall growth you're talking. >> Yeah. I mean, yeah, I mean, it depends on what you come back with the with the
whatever makes sense with the proficiency >> uh with a gap a lot less than 20% >> annually. Right. So, >> right, >> doubled it, but we're only at 2% and we've got a ways to go, certainly in math. >> I'm just saying if you go ahead and double your percentage for all students
and your economically disadvantage is going to have to be that and some. So, if we're talking about a an achievement gap that's less than 20%. Right? That's a substantial growth over five years of of our econom economically disadvantaged students. I just want to know if we come back a second time
because we don't want to come back a third time and figure out what that the as far as achievement gap goes. What number is the board comfortable with? I was thinking under 20. >> Yeah, I I personally I I don't think any number I have is going to match what Tai
has, but I also understand that that we have to be aggressive in that number as well. So >> yeah, >> I don't know what that number is, but >> research will show you that math it tends to be larger, which is sort of what we saw here. That's why we said, let's see if we can get to 15%. In
reading, you there isn't as much of a gap, right? So >> it just seems to me it's incremental though. If you're an achievement gap at a younger age is going to be different
than if that achievement never moves. You know that that gap they they never learn to read and by the time you hit 11th grade you can't read nothing across anything.
You know, how do you ever catch that kid up if you've waited five or six years? You know, we can't let some of these kids get that far behind because we'll have a
an impossible task of bringing them up. You know what I'm saying? And then the kid goes home or says to their friend, "Well, I'm just stupid. I'm just stupid and I I don't even need to try and I kind of would prefer not to get there.
>> Well, and to Beth's point, I do fully understand that it's going to be easier to close the achievement gap in the earlier grades >> than the later grades because like you haven't had the years of working with it. And so when we have Yale kids that walk in, you know, in the ninth grade,
that's a tough challenge that >> there were a lot of conversations about about what tier 2 and tier three supports do we need for that, but valid point. >> Yeah. >> So Dan, I just to clarify your NWA and MSTEP, you know, K through five are now
two grades two through five. Your formula here seem to be like 5% overall and double that increase of 10% for economically disadvantaged students. So if we raised the overall growth target to 10% overall over 5 years,
are you saying like I mean it doesn't necessarily have to be double that for economically disadvantage. I mean it could be 15% that would still help narrow. I would personally love to still double >> sure >> the economically disadvantage but I'm going to defer to you guys if you look
at the data and you come back to us and tell us next time you know if that's feasible or not. >> I think he wants to take that correct me if I'm wrong. I think he wants to take that and compare it to the proficiency mark and bring that back and show you where he thinks that >> for 25 NWA only. As far as it seems like
the vibe I've gotten from the board is we're we're removing MSTEP. >> Yeah, I think I I think in general the boards you got enough that I think you know that those numbers are going to be the probably the most subject of >> debate amongst the board when you come back either way. >> We knew that coming in to be honest.
>> You know that's why we just kind of wanted a little bit of narrowing of thought, you know. That's why I think when we get rid of all the rest of the noise learn like of of two through five and we know what we're doing. We're just focusing on a couple of numbers here and there, it's going to be a lot easier to >> we're negotiating at this point.
>> Yeah. >> Card. >> So, anything else on goal number one? >> One thing I will make a comment on and I'm speaking now as a board representative who is public and in theory was elected at some point here. Um, if we all of a sudden decide not to
use MSTEP scores, those are the only ones that the public knows about because they get publicized every year, we're going to have to do some kind of a campaign to say one, why we're not using MSTEP and two, why we are using NWA and it's got to be fairly pronounced. That's
not your problem. That's probably more of a >> institutional problem. >> Yeah. The nice thing about NWA, S could probably talk to this as a teacher. you know, NWA is is by law, I believe it's part of the law, sent home within 30 days of when it's taken at every testing
cycle. So, >> just fall and spring, >> just as far as fall and spring go. So, our fall cycle, they take the NWA, uh, those are given out at parent teacher conference or mailed home. So, that they're aware like parents might be more aware because they get that communication two to three times a year
for every grade their kids in school for the last since we started it. I understand the record eagle part, right? where or that's where it's our MSEP scores are are put on the front page, but parents are aware. They know what NWA is. I think because the teacher takes that out at a >> there's a larger group in the community
that don't have kids in school don't know. >> I'd agree with that. >> Our MSTEP scores will get distributed to sites. This is the funny part. And kids are all at different sites, right? If you move fifth to sixth, we have to resort them and send them to the right middle school. And then we send them
home. And we always get the question of like what is this? And that happens in October just so we're all clear and the kids took the assessment and right >> and and I will tell you that um >> some interesting things happening with assessment at the state level that the
federal government released an innovative waiver for assessment um that I think we could see movement towards an M NWA like concept for our elementary testing. We'll see where that goes, but I think that there's a horizon. New
state superintendent candidates will be announced tomorrow and so we'll have a sense of what start getting a sense of their thoughts and that waiver is now real um at the federal level to consider. So >> Scott, I I agree with you though. It could be more hurtful than helpful to
remove the MSTEP metric, right? I mean, if we if the administration has to do extra work now, creating a communications plan for the public, >> we're gonna we're gonna have to do it anyway. And it's it's going to be there. It's a it's an assessment. We'll still
present to the board, still present to curriculum committee, >> and like again, Kai's point is do you want another one, you know, based on the idea of trying to narrow down? No. But if we're not narrowing down, then it's in there. So, >> but on the other hand, think of it this
way. NWA is going up, God willing. So is MSTEP. >> Predictability wise, you're right. You have to test. >> So you could just say the number is slightly different, but notice the trend. >> True. >> I'll also add with regards to NWA, that
is what we utilize as our initial assessment for our read by third grade law, which is now our K12 literacy law. So, a part of that law ensures that we are actively communicating to um parents and families when students have been identified as at risk and what we're doing as a school system to not only
provide those supports, but then what they can be doing a part of the family engagement component. So, it really adds that additional layer of how we're utilizing and communicating student progress with NWPA. >> All right. Um I do and if there is anything critical please add it but I do
want to try and move on because otherwise we will run out of time for >> Is there halftime? >> We're past halftime and that's why we need to get get on. Um so moving on to goal number two. Um any questions from board members? >> I don't have any questions but just real
quick uh comment that I I love this this new goal. This is the only one of the five that is new from the from the previous uh plan around health wellbeing and school connectedness. Um, you know, it builds on Misti's work with the whole child systems. It builds on the the health and well-being systems change
work that was funded by Rotary. Uh, I do appreciate including our afterchool and uh summer enrichment programs. Um, I think that's great. It is the only uh major goal here that hasn't been discussed at committee level or had a
study session and I would recommend um scheduling one. I appreciate all the the data dive into the 23 24 numbers. Um I think registration numbers if if I'm if I heard you right
Dan or registration numbers aren't enough. We need data around unique students served. Uh we also need a demographic breakdown of these uh unique students. If if you go to the the table, they did have the percent free and reduced lunch as it relates to
registrations. And I'm all for counting our community partnerships like those count. Um but if we are going to count them, I'd like to know the the percent breakdown with those demographics. How many% are are economically disadvantaged
um kids uh especially if they're offsite programs um because as we know transportation can be a barrier for our kids further from opportunity. So I I would like to see some equity metrics built into this this go around after school and summer. um program.
Personally, I've said this before, I'd love to see the ALP restored in LEAP for learning. I think uh we should strive to include that safety. Just to hit on safety and I didn't know what we had a private internal student survey, so I thought
this number came from the perception survey with students. So, I'm not now it makes sense because they didn't drive. Um and I guess my my only maybe feedback is that if we are talking about school connectus like Jay talks about the sense of belonging um that we did in our
students perception survey have a percent of kids who did feel like they belonged at their school was 71%. Um but overall I'm I'm pumped that we have this goal. If we can have fewer goals I'd even be more pumped. So ju just wondering about that when you
talk do you want us to do like do a leap board curriculum to address the equity part or do you actually want because you've said few or more goals so if we have fewer do you want but do you do want an equity piece in this one? >> I do I I personally wanted equity to make sure because we've talked we've heard it last board meeting that that
potentially this new facility could help with equity. It could also in my mind make the equity worse. Um so and that's something that we've never discussed. I've never heard us talk about on a committee level or board about our after school and summer programs. Um but I'm happy to have this as a baseline. I and
I know we're only have a few weeks left, but um if we are going to include LEAP in this strategic plan, I I don't think we've done enough and I don't want to spend all night talking about it right now, but I I don't I think a study session would serve us well.
I mean, I don't know if we're going to have ability to have a study session before we have a strategic plan, but it could be one that we take a best stab at and do that review in the first year as well and have another study session in. Um,
other than I don't disagree with any of your comments. I think it's it is good to know. I I also will say that there's no way if we set our we set the goals with achievable ambition that we cannot do that without focusing
on getting as many people involved as we can. So there is a little bit of a self-fulfilling nature to it but um I'm okay with however we want to do that. But I do like having the goal we are showing that connective connected to school is great. Um, I will say that when you have 100%
targets on anything, >> right? >> Uh, I there's there's two ways to look at it. I mean, it has to be obtainable like a smart goal and it's not. I don't care. You can have one kid have a bad day and then you fail. Um, and guarantee
you that someone is um the only way to get around that is if you do have it is to turn the turn the focus a little bit and say, "Okay, if they don't say that, why not?" And then you focus on eliminating those >> barriers >> barriers. So the focus doesn't
necessarily become we're going to hit 100%. It's the focus on why they're not on achieving it. Um that's the only way I ever support 100%. It's it's not achievable. >> Can can I make one more comment about data collection? So LEAP concerns me
because of data collection. They don't enroll through powers school which is we where we house demographic information. So for students, so I would just be interested in Dan and um his team coming up what with the data we collect, what can we get and if you want to collect
other data, might we have to consider other systems when we have might not get us what we need. That's I just have a concern about that. >> Yeah, at the secondaries we do collect those and powers
and that's what we Sophie and I pulled out of to get those numbers. Um, so might be doable, but if we're going to add a a sub population to look at that, I got to think about how how we're going to pull that in a way that makes sense because right now >> or or it doesn't make sense. That would
be one goal that might come off of this, I guess, if we're not ready to approve it. It would be my, you know, because then because again, there's six there's six measures of success under this second focus area. So, um, again, I'd like it to see down to one or two.
I just have um I just have a a question regarding um the surveys uh because we don't uh explain what percent of kids finish these surveys and I remember a few years ago in curriculum we talked about the surveys were um some of the
questions were hard for they just were very generic type questions and I'm I just am curious if we're we have revised those surveys and then what kind of pool of kids are finishing those surveys. >> Yeah. So, I just pulled up uh one of our
high schools uh 92 kids at Central completed the survey last year. They think it was just over a thousand at West. So, they did it they do it during the school day now and they had make a point to actually come on the announcement and they and they've educated because this teacher leadership
team kind of takes ownership in the CR like and the results like the the leadership teams at both sites do. They really want kids to give their opinion and be able to to give that. And it really is not I I am more than happy to send you guys a copy so you guys can see what it looks like. It's pretty we
intentionally designed it to be short. Um and it has a fourpoint strongly disagree to strongly agree scale. Didn't do a fivepoint system. A lot of reasons why. Um and we've kept it pretty consistent throughout the year. So we've been able to kind of hear where questions against questions.
>> I think that's great. I think those changes then have been implemented since we talked about surveys like a while ago because they were >> missing we just emailed and depended on them to do it and now I think we have a a time now >> dedicated that would matter here right
with school so yeah I think that that's great um yeah and obviously towards mental health um yeah safety so yeah it's great >> now I will probably point out that that study probably does skew kids are in
school probably more well. So we are biasing it a little bit against economically disadvantaged I'm guessing. I'm not saying that confidently but I'm well I am pretty confident I >> sorry >> and the other thing I was going to say you know for us to always say that
transportation is an issue for low uh economic people is wrong. Any single parent that is trying to do activity transportation for a kid, it doesn't matter what your
income is, it's an issue. So for you to think that you have to not have finances not to participate in these and transportation is the key thing. It's not true.
>> I don't know if it's a key thing, but it's certainly a thing. So, I'm I'm I'm just going to throw that out. >> I'd love to see data on that, Beth. I'd love to see >> Well, I'm a single I'm a single parent. >> Okay. I'm just saying broadly as a district, what percent of our kids furthest from opportunity are participating and you can go to Traverse
Heights and Blair and it's clear who is traveling to off-site programs and who isn't. So, before we say throwing it is a problem or isn't a problem, I'd like to see the data and that's all I'm asking for is is some demographics on unique students who are participating. But I just want to make sure that you
understand that you don't want to unfairly mischaracterize it. And I kind of think there's a a move in that direction. >> I just think about, you know, a two parent dual income household that's
affluent that has, you know, at least two cars and multiple drivers, maybe even a stay-at-home parent versus a low income house where there's one car and it might be in disrepair. you know, that's just what I've seen in my lifetime. So, and then the single
parent, too. That's not necessarily low income, but I think there are transportation discrepancies between sub subops. I think that's where folks are coming from. >> I would >> and I'd also just like to share that all of our voices matter at this table. So, I think to just be respectful of one
another and difference of opinion, I think goes a long way. >> Yeah, I think >> good point. >> We uh do have >> Yeah, >> this is the point of today is to get all those opinions. Hey, I just want Oh, Scott, go ahead. >> No, I was to say you were almost making progress here, but go ahead.
>> Um, I just wanted to say with this goal, too, I wanted to lift up that, you know, all of these five goals are interrelated and this one is the heart of it all and the like literally the heart because as kids feel more connected
and a sense of belonging, they will want to come to school. And if they come to school, there's no greater predictor of their success and their graduation. So, it should result in fewer behavioral problems, drive academic achievement up,
and create a a positive culture in our our district, which will help retain staff. So, I just really see this one as pivotal. This goal, too, the student well-being, right? It's going to help
retain staff as well. And I mean, but that that reduction of those kids who are chronically absent, the last two years we've had 21 or 23%. I don't know about prior to that. Um, it might have been worse. I know statewide it's a huge problem. It's up at like 30%. So again,
I would just like to be a little more ambitious with that target for reducing our chronically absent goal to I mean, right now you're trying to bring it down to 18. I would say how about 15%. um and really try to engage parents with that education of why it's so important
for kids to have that seat time. So um that's one thing and I know Dr. Van Wagner is going to touch down with the shining star in the state zoo to learn from them and what they've done to bring down their climate caps. So that that's one thing that really stands out to me.
Um, I regarding the fundraising for LEAP programming, we've talked about it a little bit, but I wanted clarity about whether that's really for all kids or is it for the kids who, you know, h qualify for reduced or no cost. >> That's a question we have for you guys.
>> Right. Right. I mean, I personally I fundraising dollars are precious and you know, we have a very generous community, but I wouldn't feel right about asking folks to donate for a privileged family who can afford the LEAP registration.
I'd really like us to focus our efforts on the kids who are low income so we can secure those dollars for the kids who really need the help. And then, you know, if there's extra fundraising for other efforts like mentoring and family nights at buildings and um maybe middle
school clubs that could run before after school, pay our teachers a stipen for that because they are paid at the high school level, but we have very few middle school level clubs. So, that's just, you know, we're chasing limited dollars always and that would be my preference.
>> Can I not saying I disagree? Let me play devil's advocate on that though. Um, you take for instance Traverse Heights, they a year ago their PTO said, "We're going to cover every kid." And I think more kids came out of the woodwork to know that just because every kid could, it
wasn't a stigma. It wasn't so like what are you going to qualify with a kid? Is it that they have a free and reduced lunch form in? is that you know just that we're going to that you have to volunteer and parents say it some will not you know and now because a kids parent was just wouldn't say it you know
especially if we do get universal lunch back like in that element like that's a little bit of that barrier that you know if we if we say you know that and there was a day in the district where it was well I think so I'm speaking out of turn
a little bit I don't know that you I know that when middle school and leap was created it was cut, you know, budget budget things. But like that's that's a little bit of the hard thing that I, you know, as we've talked debated in that, but I you're right, there is a limited
dollar and we've got a new office in that element. But philosophically, I think we wanted some guidance from the board on that thought. >> I'd say hence a hence the study session. >> It's going to be a long night. I mean, there's that drop down menu, right, when
you go to register a kid for LEAP, full full tuition or free or reduced, and the price goes down. And you're doubling down on your efforts this year to get those forms turned in. Um, so I mean, I would just, you know, pounce on on that
opportunity, but I just wouldn't personally as a parent feel right getting a handout like that. So, I always like the do you have the do you feel you have the ability to pay? >> Yeah, some people are going to take advantage of the system. Some people aren't going to win the handout. But
that is at least worded in a way that it's not uh judgmental. Um >> you can even follow it up with do you do you feel you want to sponsor someone else and then have that option. Um but I I don't know about free and reduced lunch. It's going to be hard. We've got
to obviously it really does does depend on what happens. Um and yeah that the staff are going to have to come back to Tai's point. Maybe this is part of it, maybe it's not. What I think that the point of this goal though is connectivity to school and
that's one of the biggest measures we have. >> That's right. >> Under safety. Um the goal two, the second goal here under goal two, I just wanted to add for strategies and activities. This isn't a performance measure, but just to stay a breast of best practices in school safety and
security and pursue operational and infrastructure impro improvements as warranted. That's what you've been doing for several years. I just that's an acknowledgement that that's an ongoing thing. And then under the third one about mental health supports, um just building on what Eric was talking about
earlier too, I think just better promotion of the Tac Health Center for behavioral and physical health services. I just would love to see that better homes. So that's been I think a great addition in our district for the last two one and a half years. But
>> well, we maybe even have enough for that. So we'll talk about later. >> Um so anything else on two? Was there any comments? Um then moving on to goal number three. uh
to Tai's point if we're looking to reduce two or three they're semi they're closer related than maybe some of the other ones but um if we were looking to eliminate or condense but um any questions on or comments on
the three >> just uh one and that's in the measures for success and uh I call them A and B. So A is the positive student behaviors. Um
that they were saying that uh 90% of the students report they feel respected by their peers. I'd like it to also ask um do they respect as well as are respected? You know, it's a two-way street. And the
same thing with the teachers. Um, do you feel that their peers treat teachers with respect and are respected by their teachers? And it sounds like that would be a positive,
but to understand civility is a two-way street. >> Yeah, I think the survey, didn't you say Jesse asked that question? >> Students treat me with respect. Students treat staff with respect. Staff treat students with respect. So, that one's asked. That one's there. >> It's not one that we set a goal around
because it's actually the the students score that quite high that they think the staff does. >> Uh I know how to communicate with me. So there there's not one about I what you said respect. I respect my other students.
>> I feel like you're just going to buy it. No. >> A lot of kids say yes. >> Maybe not. >> I'll write it down. >> Well, are are you respected and do you respect Do you respect the other guy? Do you feel that the other guy respects
you? Um, I would love to hear from Trusty Bearis about this idea of but under the second piece of positive response to student behaviors. What I hear about from my
teacher friends is the mental health of the staff and I'm wondering if we could add something under strategies and activities about mental health supports or referrals for staff. Um maybe even professional development
for self-care. I don't know what I'd defer to you, but I do, you know, I mean, the last five years have been very challenging for our teachers and other staff, and I just want to support them as well. I know we've put a lot into stu supporting students, but we got to take
care of our people, too. Um, and then for a measure of success, I'm not necessarily advocating for this. Again, I will defer to you, but if there's anything in our annual employee surveys or recent surveys about, you know, how does staff feel mentally, you know, their mental health well-being, we'd
have some baseline data and if you want to establish a growth target there, you know, that that's a possibility >> another goal >> under goal three, positive student behaviors. >> Do you think that would go under goal five, Josie? like because this is more like
>> it could I thought there were more measures under goal five um but that that would be for retention of staff. I mean it could go either way wherever you think it best fits. >> And I I do think that there are
opportunities for our staff that the ESP um is available. I think a lot of the schools have gone to a health and wellness committee. Uh I do feel like that has been a focus. Is it perfect?
No, it's not. There the job is increasingly more demanding and but I do think the district is trying to support that the best they the best they can.
Um, other question comments on goal three. >> I do think though your your comments about, you know, maybe tying it into um >> No. Well, part of it could go there, but then part of it could also go into gold
>> to wellbeing. >> Like if we're talking about >> adding a few things here, we could talk about merging those two as well. um eliminating a couple. Again, >> what do you what do you think about and I just thought of this. What do we think about on that positive student
behaviors? What if we got rid of that restorative practice? It's really hard because it's not necessarily applicable all the time, but what if we made a sub goal for that second one about suspensions? Just thinking about this economically disadvantaged. We've never really pulled apart the data that way.
Again, Christine, I'd have to work with them to make sure we could tag those fields appropriately. I actually think we will can on this this >> phenomenal but she's >> I know um right our spreadsheet I I wonder about looking at the percentage of students who have been suspended only
once and then maybe there's a sub goal with economically disadvantaged all students I don't know I just wonder about how is our system working for behavior supports for some of those kids any interest >> yes if if it's okay with Sophie >> I and I can do a little digging and find
I don't think it's even worth the goal to I just as I hear about that and I've heard you guys talk about potentially that on two we don't really have a sub population I'll see how easy it is that makes sense just speaking Jesse was talking about
going back can I go back to two just to clarify um do you want us to just keep the the chronic absentism under that and then that's the only goal as far this measure goes. Do you want still the idea of
school activities included in there or not? >> Yeah, I think that's important to our connection. >> I like that connection. >> Yeah. >> Yeah, I do I do understand Tai's point on the numbers may not be totally easy to place as some of the other ones, but
I think we just have to be I think that >> at the very least we can work on trying to create that that data system metric to collect at very least. >> Yeah. And and again it might not be particip I mean you know leap it could be like a a card club or in the library
you know it doesn't have to necessarily be like Josie was saying you you know you include kids there's a sense of belonging your want and need to come to school and so yeah I think leap could have a lot of opportunities um to show growth >> yeah I I feel like I do have questions
on the student suspensions because obviously we've seen in when we look at the correlation to success of a student. >> Yeah. And it was a hard one because I was like we can't really measure counts of suspensions because like like that's super dependent. But I do like the idea
that the percentage of kids who have been suspended once and then it doesn't become a pattern, right? It's almost like Beth's idea of like that student received an intervention, had some behavior support, and then was able to rejoin the peers and move forward.
>> But I can look and see if we can do that. I like the idea of maybe looking at subop on that one. >> No other questions on three. We'll move to four. Um, >> yeah, four questions on four.
Got a few big highlighting numbers here. Graduation rates. >> I'm I'm excited for these. I'm excited for this, too. The graduation um goals, targets. I I mean, I get the 100% as perfection could be a waste, but um I do
know we have some administration at some of our high schools that have talked about 100% uh graduation rate. So, if I I'd like to find a happy meeting with 95%. Um, you know, of course, high graduation rates start in kindergarten and all these things come together. Um,
so I I'd like to see a slightly higher graduation rate. I like that we're tying in again the equity for our kids furthest from opportunity. I'd like the same metric uh for advanced coursework uh with AP and dual enrollment because we know there's a gap there. Um, so I I
would like to see an equity measure built into that goal as well. We want a sub population potentially on that one too, >> right? Because we know there's like if you go on the state assessment, you can see that the gap between kids enrolled in AP and kids enrolled in dual enrollment. >> I think the one thing we need to
consider about our graduation rates is some of our students are not on the diploma track. >> So they do take longer to graduate and get a certificate of completion. So that would just be something we need to be cognizant of when we're thinking about those percentages. >> Does that count as on time graduation?
It does not >> serve. >> So is 95% reasonable or not? >> It's high. >> But before we would do that, like just to back off like the 100, I'm glad you have had that compromise of that of 195.
But when I was thinking of like it is not in the best interests of every student to to graduate on time. >> That's correct. Um we have people who receive supports from the district who if they technically graduate uh which
they are unable to do and uh if they theoretically somehow did um they would lose a lot of support and be in a really bad position. So like >> even if we could say let's graduate 100% of our kids I would say we're doing a disservice to a lot of people. I I I
have struggled since the beginning of when I worked at MDE that we discount the alternative ed programs that graduate kids in five and six years. >> There are many kids that that for a lot of reasons end up, >> you know, and and when we So, I'll just
tell you that most districts around the state have cut the kind of alternative ed program we have. >> TC highs do not exist much all over the entire state. They they are just 100% virtual models and that's it. And I think that we have all those
options and all that. Honoring that we get kids fit five and six years out to graduate and we have that program. I I appreciate the goal but I I also want to honor that element too. >> We go to five, six years and strike on time graduation. Can we get to 100%.
>> No. >> No. Just because this what Tiffany talked about our our MYAI program that we host that the ISD doesn't >> for our special ed kids >> are are they are you know they're kids that generally end up with certificates >> go to six years can we get to 95%. >> And I would say they have a right to an
education till the age of 26. >> Yeah. >> The minute you give a student with a disability a diploma um they no longer would get any services. So if they needed um after school programming after they reach 19 or 20, they wouldn't be
able to go on to our life skills center or our transition center. >> So this goal says on time graduation rates goal of 90%. That's then yeah >> it's four years and and part of the reason why is because when a student doesn't get the fouryear we know and that's we have a waiver at TCI we
actually can enroll kids two years after what they can be enrolled in our two large secondaries. I think it was 22. We can um can't have been 22 on September. But um we know then okay, who's out there? Who didn't hit that on time? And now what's our plan? Who's chasing them?
Who's connecting to them? Who's reaching out? If they're not special >> teams have 100% graduation goals, >> do what? >> Are building teams, schools not on their improvement plans 100%. >> No, because those kids are housed in their buildings.
Central's not a center based program in our building >> and we and that's important because we want them to be our kids. >> As long as we think 6% over 5 years growth is is we're going to be going with this like let's talk about what's realistic with a fiveyear goal and I think five is probably the most
realistic number because it's easier for us to measure. I don't want to wait six years to see. But if you had that fivey year goal and then maybe push it up a little bit and you guys can come back and >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Absolutely. >> Think about that. >> Think about it. Like again like I just want to at least acknowledge that it's not in the best interest of
>> and early college can go against this too. >> Early college does go against >> significant >> student population that does early college and dual enrollment >> and we've got thought of increasing you know especially if the state can come up with a funding model that works. >> But again that is not on time because
you really don't get your diploma until the fifth year when you get your associates degree. So yeah, like again that's another >> making sure >> but we'll take that back give some thoughts and bring that thought back. >> Yep. >> But I do like
a little bit and increasing >> but just wanted to understand all those metrics and >> I understand them. I'm just wondering if it's bold enough 6% over five years is my question. Like I think that's lending to Tiffany's point of all that data, all all of those different programs and
maybe that reads out that 9% then >> we'll look and see. >> Okay. >> Okay. others on for personally I would just in the spirit of cutting goals not because I don't think it's important I I saw less uh fundamental shift in value
to the uh EDP and the plan for life the last two um >> postsecary yeah with EDP >> yeah having an EDP and and the 100% EDP and 95 have a plan and goal
for life I I thought there were less like going to drive change within us. But if everyone else thinks otherwise that's fine and that was just in the spirit I didn't dislike the goals. It was just in the spirit of trying to cut number goals. >> Any thoughts on that? So if we were to take that one would anybody be grossly
we're mandated to do it. Is there any real strong feeling to have to keep that as a goal >> or goals? >> Yeah. Would everybody be okay with that? Which one are you talking about? >> I was This was in the spirit of the
board. Every board member said they want more focus goals. I feel like they're not that we have to do it anyway. >> Mandated, >> but we are currently at 88% compliance then, >> right? So there is room for improvement or maybe or is that >> there there are some
>> pre-mandate, >> but there are some opt outs. There are some different things that are there. I think you know >> there's some that we didn't really count either as we were looking at. Yeah, not that one. So, yeah, I'm I'm fine. I that would narrow that down to, you know, some nice metrics and we could do some
uh you know, sub population groups on those top two. Um, and then there's a little student, you know, perception there, but I don't think it's bad how many kids of ours say that they graduate with secondary plans. >> And you'll remember for those a part of our student our boards superintendent
advisory council, this is one they brought up. postsecary >> the life plan the life plan and and actually I have >> just just postsecary planning >> is that a district template then that second bullet here the 95% one that that
is that based on a TCAPS template >> that's based on our student survey we give one of the questions that we ask all of our high school students is uh I have future plans and or a goal for my life after high school Again,
I'm okay to leave it in. It's not like I disagree with having >> But you're just trying to narrow down. >> I'm just trying to narrow it down. >> If you had to pick one to narrow down, that would probably be it. But I didn't dislike it in the first. And actually, I would expand it, of course, you know,
because I'd like to, and I've talked to John about this, if we had email, a current email address to do a graduation followup, you know, and basically, do you feel that you were adequately prepared? And are you where you thought
you would be? >> I would love to do that, but I haven't found anybody that's been able to pull it off yet. somehow, you know, the kids just they vacate and take that and we just don't get they change them, go to college, that element. But we strategize
with even some of our vendors like if there's a way to be able to do that for transcript request like could parchment do that. We're exploring some things, you know, so like when a kid requests their transcript, they maybe have to answer a few questions, but that's something we'd have to get the vendor to
do. So, we got thoughts, but we're not there anywhere close to it to where I'd feel comfortable with it anyway. >> Because I' I'd like to have the kid >> 100% agree >> comment on whether or not >> we would love to have did they did they graduate, you know, college? Did they go right into the workforce? Did they, you
know, go on and, you know, lots of different things. We'd love to get some of that post-graduate data. >> Just nobody's figured that unlocked that yet. >> Classmates.com, >> the alumni. >> Yeah. with with generally 50 and 60 year
olds who will do that more than 20. >> It was an ugly path. >> Um okay. So any comments on four or any other changes?
Okay, moving on to five. Um all right, so moving on to five. So one question I had is you allow is there any I think exit interviews are critical and obviously that as you said is people self- select for good and bad uh reasons
um is there any ability to limit like in the public world which I'm not saying this is right or wrong I'm just saying in the public world oftent times if you don't complete your exit interview you're not eligible to get a referral positive or negative
like anything like that. That's extreme. But like it's a >> we have I mean there's some components where we have some mandated things that we have to give to an employer >> like you can't withhold a final paycheck. And usually by then I mean
they've already received their referral bonuses. They've long since been paid out. They've been paid out longevity bonuses. They've been paid out you know um sign on bonuses. Those are all so we don't really have any incentives when people leave that they get you know what
I mean um >> use that as a recommendation >> and and their records are public and be foyed as well for that. I just don't see how that I mean you could go yeah and they go okay we'll just throw out my stuff and send it >> I didn't think this one work I was just saying this necessarily do there's a
varied ways >> because in the in the private sector like exit interview are pretty >> other than employment verification I I can I don't think we get a lot of this of actual referrals for the next job >> like referral typically
>> like I said I don't we don't get much of the majority of our teaching staff, you know, our instructional staff, which make up the largest share of our, you know, staffing population, they, you know, most of them leave for retirement purposes. So, they're not leaving for other opportunities. They're leaving
because they just put in their time and they're saying, "I'm out, you know, so there's not a lot. So, they don't feel the need to complete those." Um, and resignations. So often what we see again in in the teaching world is people resign because they are leaving to move
away from Traverse City like a a spouse has moved or they're deciding to no longer live here. So it's not like they're going to one of our we rarely lose people to a surrounding district. We do lose them to Northwest Ed um in the special ed world unfortunately um
because there's so few of them the market for them is highly competitive and so we tend to lose out on that and so much of it is contractual so negotiated so we can't negotiate even with our support unit groups we can't negotiate with individuals to get them
to stay so we you have the pay structure the benefit structure all of that we do like in meet confers and union negotiations and what it said set said set said set said set said set said set said set said set said set said set said said set said set said set said set said set said would it an unfair labor practice for me to reach out and say how about if I paid you give you two more steps on the salary schedule if you don't leave we're not able to do that so
I mean there are some challenges we do reach out and ask you know individuals that to give them the opportunity to meet with us in person for an exit interview and if they didn't want to do that then they could always do the online option and still the utilization is really really small. So, you know, we're going to seek ways to try to
improve that participation um and more actively utilize the data that we're collecting from that to see if we're seeing any sort of trends. Right now, we're sharing it with the member of cabinet who oversees that department when we get those um good and bad, but right now we're like we need to start
tracking trends in different departments. What's the key reason people are leaving? >> Um and I'm good. I didn't have any Okay. Um, any questions on number five? I think obviously the first one needs some sort
of baseline or measurable. They're a little bit more. >> Yeah, we and we have not collected that data previously in our perception surveys. Um, so it's one of the things that we're going to roll out right after the first year. Can >> you talk about the ca candidate experience feedback? The first bullet
satisfaction. >> How Yeah, I was curious. How often do you plan to do that new hire check-in? Just once or like dur for we check in with them um multiple times during >> Okay. It's just in that that survey that
formal >> yeah we're not necessarily getting those answers. We we reach out to them in person and sometimes they share and sometimes they don't. So, we're trying to develop surveys so that people might feel more comfortable answering a survey than they would when they're meeting with us when we're calling or stopping
by their classrooms just to see how things are going. >> I don't have any questions, but not to sound like a broken record, but and I understand why this goal is in here. Um, but uh I would recommend there's 12 measures of success if it's possible to
get these down to one or two. Um much like we moved uh Christine's work with finance and facilities to values. I think there's a way to you know this important work that's basically Conniey's and her team's job that often is mandated that I don't necessarily think we need uh strategic plan goals
for Conniey's uh job description. So that's um that again not that it doesn't matter but we haven't even looked at our revised values but I think there's a way to incorporate HR and legal into our values. Well, I'm I'm going to make a comment.
I've made this before. I think this goal is as important as the performance goals because there's two people in the classroom. There's a student and there's a teacher. And we need to figure out some way. I know nobody likes the word merit in here, so I'll quit talking about it, but we need some way to
incentivize good performance. And this goal is maybe one way to do it. I don't know how we do that. I don't know how county does that given the union negotiations but we're going to ask teachers to stretch. We need to incentivize those who made
it. >> And that's why I think this is as important as performance goals. >> There used to be um in the last 1250 of the rice school code that we had to have some element of merit as as part of pay.
So most districts looked at it and said for a long time $100 at it because I mean they didn't have the dollars to do a substantial merit increase and then they were finding that they weren't enforcing it at all. Most districts didn't have anything along those lines.
So most districts vacated the idea and for once I think the legislature put they they heard what we were saying and they eliminated that requirement from section 1250 of the school code. not saying that, but now it would be a negotiated item. And the with the
changes in the evaluation system, we we eliminated the highly effective, the changes to 1248 of the school code this year. They've eliminated the highly effective. So the majority, the vast majority, if not 98% of our teachers are going to score in that effective range.
So it's hard to distinguish good from great anymore given the changes to the evaluation system. and that was mandated by statute this year. >> I agree with Scott. This goal is really
important um because if we can't retain our staff, we're not going to succeed. And it's a business's biggest, you know, expense is having to retrain people, rehire. I mean, if we could bring, you know, the the support staff turnover,
new employee turnover rate down, cut it in half, that would be even better. I'm going to defer to you on that um for that retention goal. But um I was going to say for grow and develop I I'm a big believer in professional development and we had a good learning series at
curriculum a couple of months ago with our union reps who, you know, have partnered with Dan and Jesse to think through what they what the teachers and other staff really need this next year. But I still wonder if we need more
specialized training opportunities for subject matter experts and teacher leaders and administrators and support staff. So under that grow and develop focus area, just trying to add something about identifying those opportunities
um at least as a strategy and activity. I'll leave it to you if you want to have a measure of success target, but at least acknowledging that opportunity. Um, and you know, if again that if that's something that you all need to come back to the board and ask for the resources because there are budget
implications, so be it. But I I just really want to develop and grow our staff. I I'll just comment, it's not um reflected here, but it is our practice. So, we have those teacher leaders or folks who want to go back for tuition reimbursement and some of the critical
shortage areas. Um, they can go to their supervisor who will look and and evaluate the training and is there value added for the district as well for those persons to attend and they do have a professional development budget that they can send folks to additional training on top of for those
specialized. And I'll also make just a comment for the board's knowledge. We're really trying to build a lot of that professional development into our early release days and those so that you know people have lives too. So as much as we want our folks to be trained as much as possible when their only opportunities
are outside of the workday sometimes family circumstances are not conducive even for people who really want to participate just their stage in life prevents that. So with the virtual opportunities and then trying to build it into the workday. I would say that Misty and I are uh doing some trainings
with the TC CAPSA folks uh on how to deescalate. Uh I'm working with the special ed assistants. We've started some PD there. So I do think there is some things that are written under goal number three um that address those PD
elements or PL uh elements for some of our non-certified staff. And we have asked those groups to survey their membership on what are some of the things that we can provide you know because like on for an early release day our TC CAPSA that's a budgeted workday for them. So can we make that more
meaningful based on some of the trainings that they want to see >> and can I just add on the sport side because I have quite a few of them on specifically the transportation side. A lot of it is related to behavior but also don't forget that some of that
retention is is led by us. So I wouldn't want to be have a target of less retention when some of it is us helping people find better positions that meet their their um skill set >> next week.
Um and I I do think new high turnover is important but to that point yeah sometimes it is needed. Um, I do think there's too many goals and I I would like to get back to like the what are we keyly what are we trying to measure here and that is obviously
probably staff engagement um staff support >> you need the recruitment portion >> we're going to do that regardless >> we're going to do all of this regardless but it just >> that's what I thought >> yeah but there's certain parts like we've improved the even for all like
we've improved the process with the videos >> like so the speed and the ability to respond like is is a very big >> sparks. Yeah. >> So that was part yeah obviously this was a goal that's carried over. So spark hires were one of the initiatives that we implemented since the last strategic
plan and it has really streamlined the hiring process because people look one way on paper and then we pulled them a lot of them from out of downstate or what have you up for an interview only to discover that had we known a little bit more about the candidate we may not have wasted their time or the time of
the hiring manager. So this helps us really get down to the people we we really want to invest our time in to meet. >> Yeah. So I think I do think that that probably need to be narrowed a little bit of of and more tied to like what are we trying
to achieve here with like again what and love the board feedback on this one but again are they supported >> and I'm more than happy to go back and narrow these down. One of the reasons there's so many touch points is you're talking about different things are
effective for different play groups and and changing or modifying one of the areas. Will that really move the needle sufficiently? You know what I mean? I for us a lot of us throwing all that we can at the retention, you know, the recruitment, the retention and the
training. Um, but I'm happy to try to narrow those down and maybe put them all in few of them under one umbrella. >> I don't dislike any of them. I'm just trying to figure out how to >> I totally get it. >> How to get >> and whether it's something we're working on or something we're already doing
consistently. >> Yeah. Is it going to move the needle is the point? Well, and I think even hearing Connie talk about the support groups, not necessarily the teachers, but the support groups and why are we losing them to other positions and then to look
at, you know, and and like you said, um, you know, that just identifying that and um, yeah, and I I also wrote down exit interviews with all those support groups and how do we understand >> the big picture like do they have retirement? Do they have the other
things at other jobs? Are they just hourly and they're making more money elsewhere? You know, just those kind of things I think would help, you know, with >> changes to our retirement system have not helped us because we always used to be able to say we have a pension program which was unheard of and now with the
options that are available, they're portable so people can take them. They're not, you know, they don't have to wait 10 years to vest. They can take their with them which is which is a which is a challenge and the market just is super competitive. >> Yeah. Yeah.
I think about technology people where they could go and how much money they could make and you know flexible schedules, work from home, you know, all those options which is just not unfortunately an option for us based on our needs. But they they have lots of options out there. But that doesn't mean
we stop trying to keep them. >> That's right. >> We have awesome kids. >> We do. That's right. >> That matters. Hi everyone. >> That matters. >> Superintendent we all love. Well, clarify. >> And I would I would still put our benefits up against anybody's. Our
benefits are really good. >> Yep. >> 100%. >> Um, okay. Any other questions on five? Any comments or questions on five? >> All right. Any comments or questions overall? >> So, we'll come back in.
>> So, the thought that come back at the regular board meeting. >> Okay. I was going to say that I don't know. That's a question. That would be ideal for timing, but I I know I don't know how much work we just created or if we simplify >> August 25th
doable. Not >> 6:00 or 5:00. >> How about this? We say so, but if I run into where we're like in the element, >> yeah, >> may have to have the I'll let Scott know and we'll have to rethink it if so, but we'll give it our best shot right now. >> We'll get in tomorrow, see where we're
at. And are we the agenda has been posted. I don't know if we had a discussion item on it. Are we good as I modified at that point? >> We could or we I believe we could probably modify it at this with approve
with I don't think I need a vote at least permission. Right. >> There's no there's no real protocol. >> No, there is no protocol. >> You know, it's really at it's the discretion really of the board president really on that element. >> That's why I feel like I've got everyone here. Has anyone does anyone object to
me adding that to the agenda for this commission? >> I think we're rushing it with August 25th. >> I think we need staff back so these guys can query staff about some of the things we're asking for. >> But it could be as simple as we've
worked on these items. Let's clarify these. We don't have the rest of it. So I feel like there's some work. >> So not necessarily >> mean that we're adapting, >> right? >> Just kind of a round two of where we're at. Yeah. going to clarify anything if there's nothing to clarify. How does that feel to you guys that
>> I think that the gold areas and the metrics I feel like I can come back to you guys by the 25th and say we have a method to pull these that we can do regularly, right? And here's what we set based on your feedback and conversation today. The strategies and activities I don't know if I ever want those like
stationary >> we did it last time. You might remember I always kept saying it's a living document. So there's options there opportunities where let's see where our budget comes in funding wise. There might be a categorical that addresses one of them. Who knows? Like, you know, we're always like like if to give me an example where that happened in our last
one, the Teach for America opportunity came in, right? So, that's something that we just boom put in as a a resource and a and a strategy that was there. So, I would kind of hope the board would give us that carb ability to have those. >> I don't even need to see that the strategies. The how I leave to the
staff. So, I don't it doesn't bother me. I think making sure we're clear about what we're expecting and that and and the outcomes over the next in 2030 is more our perview. >> Yeah. And I don't I don't expect a vote on it at the 25th meeting regardless personally because I feel like we need to hear.
>> At what point do we give them the opportunity though to say if we're going to accomplish this we need additional resources and they are x that's I mean all of this is in a vacuum right now >> until October 1st at 12.
Well, it depends if the legislature moves the clock backwards an hour or if they, you know, do it at pull the draw bridges up at 1:00 a.m. But >> I >> I'm not saying we have the resources. I'm saying you're going to have to tell us what you need in order to accomplish
the goals we've just >> But I think that's going to come. >> We don't know what we have >> that's going to come. >> That's an every year discuss. >> There's going to be a conversation on budget at anyway when we see where things are at that we're going to need to have. So, I would say, you know, as
soon as we can, I mean, February is when we generally do a budget amendment, right, Christine? I'd say probably, you know, with that, but it could be sooner with some things such as at risk, you know, we just have no idea where some of those are going to land.
>> No. >> And again, we we don't have to I think we we're adding it to the agenda. We can see how it goes. We definitely have something to review and then we'll get as far as we can and then see where we stand.
>> But if we could also have the new version released farther in advance of the meeting and not on a weekend where their website's down, that would be great. >> Yeah, that would have worked. >> So I mean that might be a reason why two weeks from now it's just too soon. >> I don't want to put any additional
pressure on anybody. >> If it is, then we starting >> right around the corner. >> Yeah. Let me get with the team and I'll let the board know kind of where the consensus feels and if we'll be honest and if it is we'll just the board will know and that's where we go. >> And I'm not pushing it like if if if we
need to push it back. Can we push it back? If there's a couple of clarifying questions and we can clarify those. >> Okay. Um moving on from the study session. Uh we did add uh seven which is funding allocation specifically to
splits. Um there's an email out to finish by >> so I've updated the board but you know where we were a couple weeks ago we really are not very different um from that aspect where we are we've had a few more but per the formula we're right on
you know where we we thought we would be um but you know I we've always had conversations late and the board's wanted to be very cognizant to not have those you know to not get in a situ situation where this is being brought to
the board just before back to school. I think Dan's brought a lot of insight as you know um as of late of of his work at Westwoods as well as Jesse just of trying to come up with more of a hard line and essentially we're within a week
pretty much of that day unless something really strange happens 14 kids walk into Central like but for the most part we think we we want to put in a pen that's a little bit erasable but not really staffing for this point.
So, you know, from a a financial standpoint, um you all, you know, know we've had conversations of of we don't exactly know our budget, so it's a little bit of roll the dice. If the board wanted to do some more with staffing at this point, um you know, we
know that we had our auditors in last week and gave you some numbers on that of where we were from last year. um that I think you know turned out more positive but remember there is still a million carryover that's sitting with some of our secondary buildings of
potential things that they could use for in the next year but I guess my question is just what's your level of want if of doing something at this point I've asked Dan to kind of put some thoughts together if you did want more staffing because I think there was some
conversation amongst the board to Scott uh with that Um, I I just kind of want some direction at this point. If you want to hear from Dan kind of where he thinks that that lands with that, if the board wanted to do something or if the board's comfortable
at a status quo, you know, I kind of want to bring some clarity a little bit to our conversations about splits that um, you know, there's there we I can point to great data of teachers that have splits and do great work with it. I can point to some teachers that and and
Sarah can give input on this too that just do not like teaching them. Um you know it it is an element of numbers and trying to be financially fiscally responsible um when you do it versus multiple smaller classes. Um, you know,
we traditionally a part of our process we've, um, allocated one additional FTE at Blair and one additional at Traverse Heights. Um, that, you know, we we just we've done as far as a practice from an trying to meet that equity standpoint
within those buildings, but they also still are kind of in this mix with splits as well at both of those buildings. Um, so just want to put it all out there and see do you want to hear Dan's thoughts on where that kind of is where where do you want to go with it? So this is just the last
opportunity. Teacher candidates are few. You know, we we did do some interviews today. We've got some more because we think we might have a couple of openings from some possible shifts in staffing that could happen still um need. So we just wanted
to have to know what's left there from that standpoint. Um, so I just kind of >> I would love to hear I would love to hear the numbers. I mean, you're you're exactly right on some teachers can do great with splits, others don't. Um, but I also think there's grades in there,
too, that can be splits that can be more challenging to others. Um, and so, um, you know, just having gone through our strategic plan, I I know it's not right now here today, but of course achievement. And so I I would like to >> Yeah. Before he provides that, can I
just make one? We did a couple of things for via letter of agreement last year so we could start the school year to help with supporting splits. Um, in the past, we've given an opportunity for an aid or compensation for teachers who do overload. That did not extend to
teachers who taught splits, but recognizing that, you know, overloads and splits are difficult. One could argue one more than the other, but you know, I'm not a teacher. I don't know how to say that. So we are going to be offering the same um choice of compensation or an aid um that will be
at the discretion of the administrator with in consultation with the teachers for anyone who is teaching a split. So having that extra set of hands in the classroom or additional compensation to recognize the additional work and he referenced it but you know we have um we
had five interviews today we have a few more on Friday. we are running out of certified and qualified teaching staff. Um, and some of the ones that we interviewed today that would not move forward, you know, with the principles. So, just whatever decisions you make, know that we'll continue to work to try
to fill, but it it it's going to be a challenge. >> And I think universally we all agree that we should not hire people who aren't going to do a good job. So, and I'm just going to be honest, we made some very last minute right before Labor
Day hires a few years right when I got here and none of those individuals were still with the organization. >> They were let go during the probationary period. >> Yeah, >> we still want to hear from Dan. could be meaningful.
>> Dan, can you give it to >> Okay, currently um nine splits are in the are slated for the district. Um of those nine, two of those were made by schools, uh Blair and Court specifically
for classroom composition. So sometimes you can get rid of a split by creating an overload that's manageable. they could do that at those schools, but because they're smaller schools, right? They're under 200 kids, uh, they only have one section of second grade like
Corte does. So, Corte, you know, talking to Andy wants to do a one two split. um knowing that it gives them another option for a section and then if we have behavioral concerns, we have there's an option and which is it's happened there
before that we've been stuck with um separation agreements or things like that and we can't keep the kids apart because they're in the same >> right now we're looking specifically so I would narrow that down to seven that we're specifically looking at. So as I went through Dr. Van Wagner mentioned
that part of the missionbased budget process was we go through formula. So we take a5 number. This is for5 only. We don't split K1. Uh and we take that divide by 27.8 that gives us a number. So let's say it comes out to 10.2 teachers. We always round that up. So
then they automatically get 11 teachers for instance. So that's the first one that helps compensate a little bit. That gets us that we're making sure that we're under that 27.8 because everybody gets rounded up. So in addition to that, the first step after that is at Blair and heights do get an additional FTE to
further take care of any splits and to get our classroom numbers lower. So since then we looked at missionbased budget in certain schools Corteade, Silverlake, Long Lake, um also got an additional FTE like Blair and Traverse
Heights did because they had so many splits um that it doesn't make any sense because once you split one class, if if you've ever looked at the mission based budget and some of you sat on it, it creates a waterfall effect where then you're splitting one, two, two, three, three, four, four, five and you have
five of them. So as far as equity looking at splits, um there are other schools that got an additional FTE above formula. Okay. So looking So then I thought, well, if we're looking at equity and if we were to prioritize, I started with title schools that haven't
received any quote unquote extra FTE. So I'd start with Central grade. Central grade right now is just operating within normal formula of the 27.8 and round it up. They are the school that have the most um free and reduced kids. Uh they're not the highest percentage. Some
of that might be because they house, you know, 100 tag students. Uh but right now they have more. I believe these numbers are from last year. So central grade sits at 250 to 252 free and reduced. Our next closest number to that uh Trevor
sites at 216. So if I were to prioritize a split or alleviating one that would be I think top of my list. So next one with that title school cherry null. Cherry null is a partial title school. They haven't received any additional FTE uh
outside of U formula. So as far as me putting any type of priority I would start with those two. After that, the next five uh would be, I think, at discretion as far as if if the board actually wants to dictate who gets
a split or who doesn't or if it's a dollar amount that we continue to look at numbers and find best fit. Also, incorporating um Erica, what you said about grade level, right? That two three split can be a challenge. Specifically, I know that see I think any split when incorporating a new curriculum is a
challenge, but even more than that is the mathematics. uh with math and a 23 there's no way unlike a 3 four or four five you can combine those classes and and still be able to teach the concepts for a 23 you have to do two separate math lessons so obviously the the
three-hour split support helps with that this year those there's a the split support that's not FTE that's an aid they can't deliver that instruction but they can definitely monitor another grade level while the other grade level gets the instruction >> which can you identify which ones would be a two
>> yeah so current two threes that we have uh so Long Lake has a 23, but they're going to so it's don't write that one down because they're allevi they're trying to alleviate that with a with an overload at second grade. Silver Lake does have a 23. Um
Eastern does have a 23. Blair has a 23. And then Westwoods and Willow Hill are right now have alleviated that two three with an overload. But Westwoods has two third grades at 32 is overload. So they're literally and they prefer that,
right? I worked with Toby. We talked to teachers classroom composition. Every school's a little unique. Every classroom is unique. Uh I think you're getting to a tipping point there. We're like literally like I check 64 third graders every day at Westwoods, right? looking at that number because I think
like 65 and you're like but then if we hit 65 right we create a split. So that's why it's kind of a as far as looking at priorities aboard I would lean more I could give some input towards a dollar amount that we that we allocate rather than saying this one
this one and this one. Um so I went with after those two the next five um you're looking at like I said there's a split at Blair there's two splits at Traverse Heights. Um there's a split at Silver Lake, a split at Eastern.
So I think discussion with board as I thought about this over the last couple weeks is, you know, you look at free and reduced numbers. uh you look at buildings that maybe have not gotten any additional FTE versus a have and when do you add to buildings, you know, do you
add do you get rid of both height splits and now you're three FTE over at about $325,000 before you add anything to Eastern. Uh so those are, you know, thoughts that I've had about how the board wants to
move forward about alleviating splits. I mean, isn't it a little bit irrelevant because even if we told you right now we wanted to eliminate all the splits, we >> we can't >> we can't >> Olivy right now to get rid of seven splits. I mean, this is such a round number. It's like around 875,000.
>> But even if we had the money, we don't have necessarily the staffing. >> Most likely we don't. >> We'd have to prioritize. I think, you know, there were a couple candidates today that they that the principles felt comfortable with moving forward with and we'll see what happens on Friday. And we
have a open elementary posting that we're constantly monitoring um applicants, but we're not getting certified teachers. >> So, realistically, we have two to three maybe options >> potentially. I think two for certain and we'll see how Friday goes. I'd love to
think that all three of them would be great, but um most of them coming in with no experience at all. So, we'd have to assess that. >> Yeah, I know Connie spoke to this about the but as an elementary principal, which I was for a few years, and if you
have the wrong person in that classroom, those kids have that person all day all year. um it's just such a huge impact and it's a really hard thing for those kids um for that year. So I I would really say prioritizing this and then
being honest about our candidate pool is really the best way to deal with this. So I appreciate you sharing all the numbers and the logic behind how you're making those decisions. I think you know
because we get we'll get a lot of emails as we go get into the start of the school year and how when that all rolls out. Um and so yeah, I mean my opinion would be yeah just we trust your decision making process and if there is money and the decisions made to not have
a split I think >> I think we have to say that there is money that's >> well I can't say that that's why I'm bringing it to you like we don't have a budget >> you know it it very well could be a fun equity spend I don't know like >> the last three years
>> and like there's another well we've at least kind of knew that, you know, we had our budget and we knew what the revenue was for the most part. Now we're even another step down, but >> you know, so that's that's where I couldn't do anything without board. I mean, you you know that that it's a roll
of dice. The budget could come back great and you're there in different ways. There could be, you know, different categorical that somehow could work, you know, but I have no idea. It's a blindfold guess right now and that's where you guys come in. So my my assumptions are
again crossing fingers that we will be at least roughly okay with the budget is my hope. I think we talked I was really uncomfortable with the dollar amount that we approved last year and the fund
balance going down that much but I did I thought it was the best thing to do. thankfully through um other positives that we didn't end up needing that money. So, I'm okay to do that again knowing that it was the right thing then and it's probably the right
thing now. >> Um >> if you needed all amounts, >> I So, on our original budget, we adopted a $2 million deficit. So, it we have permission for that depending on how the funding comes in and the priority list.
I think what I'm hearing you say is there's permission to abide by the budget we already adopted and make the decisions that are needed. So I I don't think it is like a formal vote if there's a general comfortability with the thought process. We adopted a budget
with the shortfall because we have no idea um especially with the volatility at the federal level. But as long as when we get our budget it's not worse than that. I feel like we do have the discretion to make those decisions. >> We do. I think yeah I think and that's definitely
>> I think we're okay with that. >> Obviously you are going to be in a position where you're going to have to make this decision this week >> compared to us in a month and say well now we're >> which you may have to anyway because we have it won't be even a month a month and a half.
>> Any input on Dan's rationale? >> I like material and essential grade >> first. Yeah, >> those two. >> Okay, that's that's helpful. That's what we're trying to >> especially if we're about to approve goals around equity. >> Yeah,
>> which I believe we are. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I mean, for sure central grade and cherry all that makes a ton of sense and and then looking at that 23 and you know where that could impact um I think is probably pretty crucial for the teachers. I mean, right, having to teach
two math curriculums. I just don't know we're going to get that far. But >> into new language arts curriculum >> into new language arts curriculum many of them. >> Right. Right. Right. Right. >> So that may be something that >> I don't think we >> versus who has not.
>> One of the splits is assigned to a teacher that was piloting the CLA. >> I'm just thinking >> curriculum wise. >> Right. And this is great. Time is of the essence. We had two vetted candidates ready to in the hopper ready to go and we reached out to them and they've
gotten other jobs. >> They It's like they go like that. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> I appreciate that thought. That helps. And uh go through process this week and we'll let you know kind. But we're ready to kind of lock in here
by end of the week. And like I say, strange things could happen. you know, three three related families move in and 12 kids, you know, like, okay, >> there's a lot of building being finished right now. A lot of people move. >> Yeah. But you also can have the inverse
happen. So, you know, we we'll see. >> Yeah. >> We know ominous that you say that and then the >> uh Okay. So, any other questions? Moving on. Public comment number two.
Okay. Um I I read you the uh again the board has set aside this time for public comment and you should have three minutes to speak and do not make personal tax unrelated to actions affecting the school system. We strongly encourage common courtesy and constructive feedback, detailed rules
and procedures including complaint process outlined in board policy 254. >> Thanks. >> Thank you very much. My name is Mike. >> Yeah. >> So, um first of all, you guys are doing some incredible work here. This is not an
easy job. um you do have a number of things that are in place um having been put in place over the past couple of years and those things should generate results here this coming year as you move to full implementation.
So um 1% increase per year I believe is within the margin of error. That means if you get 1% you won't know whether what you did was what made a difference nor that
it actually is a true 1%. Okay. So I think you can set much more ambitious goals. Okay. And empower your staff to make a difference. Okay. uh 3% per year
is reasonable for uh overall and probably twice that for economically disadvantaged. Those two populations are subsets of each other, so they're both going to go up if either one of them goes up. Okay.
Um the the strategic plan is always the work of the administration. Okay. I I kind of went through all of the um things you're going to implement and just said admin uh staff
um specialists and I would say probably threearters of it is about admin but you do have to get staff buying okay because if it doesn't happen at the at the
teachers level in the classroom it doesn't happen at the principal level in controlling culture in the building if it doesn't happen with parent engagement it's going to be hard to do
anything differently okay so um you know I think setting uh ambitious goals is motivating to people you're saying to them I believe in you okay uh I believe in the parents parents. I believe in the
students. I believe in my teachers. Okay. Um remember those numbers, 1% translates into kids. There's a Michael there, there's a
Sarah, there's somebody that's moving to reading and math competency. So, um empower your teachers. Okay, thank you. >> Thank you. Um,
President Pleas, just a reminder, the MASB conference in October is in Travis City. We have an unusually large amount of legal changes and uh, OMA follow-ups and things changing that we should be
aware of. So, it's a communion that is in our backyard and hopefully that in October. Um, with that, do I have a motion to adjurnn the meeting? >> I move to the meeting. >> Second. >> I second that. >> All right. All those in favor say I.
>> I. All those post say nay. Meeting adjourned.