Welcome, Whitefield. It is 06:00, Board of Education meeting, Thursday, December 18 at 1820 Main Street, Colorado Springs, Colorado 06:00. Before I get going, I know that this is out of not how it's usually conducted, but what I'd like to do is because this is the first time we're seeing new faces, I'd like to introduce everybody. Okay? So to my far left, I have mister William Gwen Dolphin, and he has been in the community for over ten years. He is the,
what I would consider already, the heart of our board and our resident researcher. So we want to thank you so much for just being a beautiful human being that you are. And welcome, and we congratulate you. Second oh, secondly thank you. Secondly, we have mister Luis Ibarra, and he is, actually, he's a Whitefield kid, but he's a little bit of a local celebrity. He did make he is a boxer, and he's currently training our Whitefield kids to be boxers. But he did make the Olympic trials back in the day,
and so that's pretty awesome built in bodyguard. We have we have missus Tina West, and she joins me and continues on from where we were two years ago. And we've made some great progress, and we've I think we've become pretty good friends. And I'd like for you to tell everybody all three schools that you attended while you're here at Whitefield. So I've been here for very long Since I was six months old, and I went to Talbot. I went to Watson, and I graduated from Waterville High School. So and my kids went to Tracer Ridge.
They went to, Watson, and they went to Webster. So been here for ever. And, this is my this is my love, my love. This is Absolutely. My my turf. Thank you. Thank you, missus West. To my left, we have miss Michelle Hubbard, and she's also a Whitefield girl. What what schools did you did you attend? I went to King Genital, and I graduated from Whitefield. Awesome. She also has been very, very active in the community, especially supporting a lot of activities and sports,
through her tenure and all of her children going through Mesa Ridge. So I'm Carrie Kuchar, and I educated actually her children and her children. But I was at Mesa Ridge, so I didn't get an opportunity to to educate you. But we're gonna we're gonna be good pals. And you're just an incredible man, and thank you so much for being part of this. He's he's already he's seen everywhere, and that's what I really wanted was to have a very, very involved board that is seen and is heard and that sees and hears you
as the community. So with that, I would like to call to order. Okay. Mrs. Kutcher? Here. Mr. Dolphin? Here. Miss Hubbard? Here. Missus West? Here. Mister Ybarra? Here. Okay. With that, I would like us to please stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Right I do wanna mention that we do say the pledge in our schools.
I know that some of our community talks about we need to bring the pledge back, but it never left. It never left. Okay. So, we have our consent agenda to begin with. So I need a motion, a second, for our consent agenda. I'll second that. Oh, and we need a first and a second. Oh. I'll motion to approve the agenda. Thank you. I'll be your second. Thank you. Do we have any do we have any discussion pertaining to the consent agenda from anybody?
Questions? Discussions? No. Okay. Thank you. Tammy, roll call. Missus Kutcher? Aye. Mister Dolphin? Aye. Miss Hubbard? Aye. Mrs. West? Aye. Mr. Ybarra? Aye. Mr. Hoffman, have we received and acted on all correspondence? Yes, ma'am. You sure have. Okay. For the superintendent's report, we have the incomparable, Mrs. Briggs. Thank you. Thank you. And good evening, board. I just have a couple holiday highlights to share this evening. The district toy drive wrapped up this week. We had Santa and his elves on Tuesday go to every single school,
the Fountain Valley Senior Center, Whitefield Parks and Recreation, the Security Public Library, collect all the toys that were, donated by our generous community, taken to a security fire department, who then distributed to those families. This year, we were able to help a 135 families in our community. So a huge thank you to the positive action team who really started this venture back in 2014. So, this has been going on a long time in our district, and it's just a really great tradition. Also wanna recognize, a couple of more community partners, the VFW and the Rotary Club for hosting their annual holiday parties for our special
education students. They provide lunch, gifts, and a special visit from Santa each year. The District Attorney's Office, the fourth Judicial District Attorney's Office, they host an annual Christmas for kids at Panello Elementary. It's a partnership they've been doing since 2013 and they come in and buy gifts, for some of the selected families there today. And then the student ambassadors at Panello then give them a tour of the school. They stop by the Makerspace Room, and it's really hard to get them to leave. So they had a really good time today, visiting Panello. And then last,
I just wanted to share, a really heartwarming story that we we have done for a few years with the Ronald McDonald House. Our elementary STEM students created three d toys to donate. And so this afternoon, those toys were taken over to the Ronald McDonald House and donated. And these toys were incredible. I where three d has gone is just, is is amazing. You'll see it on Instagram and Facebook tomorrow, and also on our website. So really excited about that partnership. And that's all the holiday fun I got. Thank you. Wonderful. Thank you. Merry Christmas. Tom, for you.
Okay. We have our board reports, and not all of us attended a meeting for our committees, and so we do have two that did. So I think we'll have mister Dolphin first talk about our amazing Whitefield Parks and Recreation. And I'll keep this brief because we're gonna have a big parks and rec presentation here later. Oops, sorry. Had this pulled up. The twentieth holiday tree lighting event was our biggest one yet. The reindeer were a huge success. The parks and rec staff did an amazing job of lighting the trees and the
the activities were, well attended. It was it was really exciting to see the community come out and support. It was a great time. The food drive raised over $6,000. Students participate in elementary mentor programs at Webster Elementary, and they have their Christmas play and Winterfest coming up. I'm sorry. These were Whitefield High School students. And lastly, I want to mention that Parks and Rec will be open during the break. They do have some limited hours, so check their schedule. So they are closed on Christmas day, and they are closing early on Christmas Eve, but you can still use the Parks and Rec over winter break.
Thank you. Thank you, mister Dolphin. I love your energy. Okay. We also have mister Ibarra who has a report on our facilities or our capital outlay. Yes. Thank you. So mine's pretty brief. Met with mister Gish. We went over long term and short term planning. One of the things was Lauriston Ranch still has about a thousand houses to be built, and, he showed me where approximately where future schools are gonna be built, elementaries and middle schools. Let's see what else. We talked a little bit about, what's gonna get started next year, next school year,
as far as projects, that are, for the bond. Let's see. A lot of so there's gonna be a lot of projects getting started, this 2026 school year. So a lot of people are gonna start seeing a lot of those improvements start taking place and start shaping up. But that's all I really have. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for that. Miss Kucher? Yes. One of your guys' next meetings for for your for your groups? Mine, I don't have it set yet, but it should I should have it here Thank you. Ours will be Thursday, January 8 at 6PM. Thank you. Thank you. And actually, I forgot to mention one thing, while I have the floor. I just want to wish a happy Hanukkah to everybody who celebrates,
with and wanna wish you all, joy and light on this holiday. Thank you. Okay. We do not have yeah. I'm sorry. I don't mean to interrupt. I just wanted to remind anyone about the DAC meeting time. Oh, yes. Please do. Okay. So, yes. So, we did not have a a meeting for the DAC this month, but, we will have one next month, January 8, 6PM at King in the Cafeteria. Wonderful. And then, the library didn't meet this month, but, the next meeting is January 8 at 06:30 in the library. And if you know miss Garrett, just wanna remind you that she is retiring, so make sure you stop by and see her.
Absolutely. Thank you guys for doing all of that. Okay. Next would be public comment, but we don't seem to have any today. So we're gonna be moving on to our agenda with the director of Whitefield Parks and Recreation with his annual report. May I introduce mister Tucci? Alright. Thank you, everybody. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to present to you all tonight to brag on our department a little bit and to kinda spread some information on what Whitefield Park and Rec does. At the end,
you'll have the opportunity to ask any questions you might have of me, but I do strongly recommend for any board members or anybody, if you ever have questions about what Whitefield Park and Rec does, facility tours, ground tours, any of that, just sit down and talk, ask questions. I'm very available for that at any time. But if you have any big questions tonight, we can answer some of those as well. So as I start this, just a reminder, this is an annual report reporting on last school year. So twenty twenty four, twenty twenty five school year, kinda going over finances,
staffing, all of it from the previous school year. So the theme for the 2425 school year was unified approach to support innovation and opportunities. These are kind of some of the things that they had outlined as priorities for them at that time. After being open for a year, making sure they weren't satisfied with the status quo, looking at growth areas, and how to strengthen weaker areas, promoting collaboration, capital improvement projects at the pool. I'll talk about that a little bit more later, to be more specific about that, and the five to seven year plan to fund the aquatic center.
Alright. So big thank you first and foremost to our staff, the advisory board. So Kelly just talked about how great it is to have a supportive and present board. So So we've got the vast majority of our advisory board here tonight, so I'm very definitely very appreciative of that. You can see the names of all of our advisory board members on there. Again, this is twenty four twenty five, so Kelly was our representative on that last year. Gwen is joining that group this year, so definitely appreciative of that. For all of our staff members, you can see on there,
we have 25. As of last year, 25 full time employees. At this time, it's 26. Over 200 part time employees at any given time, that'll fluctuate depending on the time of year and then we couldn't do what we do without all of our volunteers certainly. Youth sports have the vast majority of that with over five thousand hours of volunteer time, but we also have numerous volunteers for special events, ground support and some other things, and our advisory board members with over seventy two hours of volunteer work on their end. Part of that with the volunteer I'm sorry,
with the employees as well with the opening of the rec center, the staff has grown certainly within the last couple of years, so I did want to point that part out as well. Alright. So guest services led by Doris Schomer. She was highlighted, by HR this week, so that was pretty cool to see. They do an amazing job greeting patrons when they enter the rec center and experts in the memberships and serving any needs that our guests might have. We get lots of compliments on the friendliness of our staff upfront. Here's some admission and membership numbers for you all. So big thing,
we had over a 124,000. You can see in that second grouping there, a 124,000 visits to the to the rec center as opposed to the 92 from the year before. Day passes on the far left, that's a little bit higher that second year than it was the first. I could tell you right now as of this year, month to month, that number is significantly higher than it was last year, and then total visits being at that a 137,000. So day to day, when we look at advisory board, we look at every month, financially and just numbers of of visitors that is going up significantly every month at
this point in time. Grounds. Our grounds department is led by Wayne Frazier. Facilities lead is Curtis Leadham. So a couple a few big things that they had accomplished in the twenty four, twenty five year, some pool upgrades, specifically the floor, anybody that's been in the pool. The flooring was updated. Not very safe prior to that, so that was a big one. New equipment to include tractor, a new tractor and scissors lift. I guess I have the pool on there twice. But the plumbing as well, that was part of it. Had to dig up part of the old pipes. Field 2 renovations, so that's,
Whitefield High School softball field. The the lowest field we have there had some renovation done and some improvements to the blue blue field, which is Whitefield's baseball field. Some light lighting upgrades across campus. Wayne, in particular, took a lot of pride in assisting Watson, empowering students to be able to do landscaping out in front of Watson. That was something that he was very proud of and supporting arborists and tree trimming and planting new trees across all of our properties to make sure we have good trees for years to come. Aquatics. So they're led by Brigham Mills,
our rec associate over in the aquatic center. Again, big numbers, over 25,000 visits across the pool between all the day passes, memberships, swim lessons, all the different programming things we have at night. You can see our list of programs that we have up there. The new one that we had included that year was mermaid mania. I know a lot of, a lot of kids really like to swim like a mermaid, so that was a that was a new one for them. Couple of big accomplishments they had. We are very proud of the fact that our aquatics are open throughout the entire
summer. When you talk about Memorial Day through Labor Day because lifeguard shortages are a real thing across the whole country, and that's something that we have not had to shut down for. Occasionally, a a mechanical issue or something, but we've never had to shut down for lifeguard shortages. So we are very proud of that. I will say a big part of that has to do with the Whitefield High School class that we have. Whitefield students come over to train to be a lifeguard, so we're able to train them according to our standards. We provide them jobs afterwards, So that's a a great partnership right there. And just overall, the guard the culture that the guards have,
just goes to show we don't have a lot of turnover, and we are able to maintain stay open throughout all that. And like I already mentioned, upgrades at the pool with the flooring. The pool is not the newest building that we have, so being able to do some of those upgrades that we can in the meantime is pretty big deal. Alright. So we have arts and cultural, so that's it's led by Lane Renick. She oversees arts and cultural programs, special events, and bear trap. That is a special event, but I'll highlight that one in particular. So on the left there, you can see our list of programs that we have within the arts and cultural
space. A new one I'll highlight again later is sewing is coming back for 2026. That one, we we couldn't find an instructor for quite a while. So we have an instructor for that. Back by popular demand, we'll be sewing. Some of the special events you can see listed in the middle column there, the big one, certainly, that I'll highlight, though, is the holiday tree lighting. That's that's Lane's biggest event of the year. It takes the entire staff is there. We had over 4,000, folks there this year. Definitely the biggest one that we've had, the reindeer. Like Gwen said, we're a big highlight people.
I don't know how many people I talked to that were excited to be there just to see the reindeer. Mhmm. So that was that was pretty cool. And then bear trap. So so anybody that's been part of the community for a long time knows that bear trap is a staple. Used to be fifth every fifth grader would go, then every sixth grader for a little while. Once that became not feasible for everybody to go, Blackfoot Park and Rec took that on. So we're trying to make sure that we're we're really pumping that up and getting as many kids as we can to go to that, because it is an opportunity. It's shocking how many how many kids in this area don't have the opportunity to
be in the mountains and do some of those things, do the rappelling and and the hiking and all of that. So the fact that we're able to still offer that is is really cool, I think. And you can see our sponsorship total, being at over $6,800. That's that's what keeps a lot of our special events running is sponsorships from especially local businesses. Alright. Licensed programs are led by Andrew Osich. So preschool along with Whitefield, the school district's preschool, obviously, park and rec preschool is a staple for the community. We offer the classes for three year olds with 45 students.
Last year, it was 45 students, and four year olds was at 68. UPK has definitely changed that landscape for us, so that's been a pretty big deal. Summer camp, first through fifth graders, that year was 252. Campers, that's one of our one of our most popular programs too. I think that sells out just like swimming lessons. The day that registration opens, there's there's a waiting list pretty fast. And child watch also falls under that umbrella. A lot of folks aren't aware of how good of it, how good of a value that really is we have 435 child watch memberships so
it's only $5 a month so for your whole family your kids are watched while you you can go work out and somebody's watching your kids in the preschool classrooms for only $5 a month That's great. It's a it's a great value. It's a deal. That's a deal. Wish I had Alright. So youth sports, Sam Lowe is our rec specialist that oversees youth sports. Overall participation increased last year with the additions you can see there in orange. So summer basketball, spring volleyball, and what was my other one? Basketball camps are down there as well.
So you can see our list of youth sports seasons there. I know it may be kinda small, but the new ones, again, are in orange. We have over 4,000 participants in our youth sports programs, and I know anybody in the community knows that seeing our youth sports pro our our youth sports shirts throughout the community is a pretty big deal too, kind of a kind of a badge of honor. Especially when you see it in other parts of the city, it's pretty cool to get that marketing out there as well. Some other notable highlights from youth sports. So like I said, over 4,000 registrations,
so that's a decade high. Sam's very proud of the million coaches challenge grant that he had gotten, from the positive coaching allow alliance. So allowing coaches kind of a PD opportunity to, learn some positive coaching strategies and then facilitating, the district's elementary track meet is something fairly new for us as well. Adult sports. So Joshua Duke oversees adult sports along with Sam. So you can see our leagues there, cornhole, softball, volleyball, kickball, pickleball. In the so the top right picture there, that's a highlight, I'll say,
the new hats for the league winners. Those have been a major hit too. People are pretty excited about their hats. We have over 81 teams, 820 adult sports participants, and it was a 16.3% increase from the year prior. So fitness, Jason Dandino is our rec specialist that oversees Fitness. Definitely our most consistently growing department now that the facility has been open at this point in time for its entire second year. Consistently adding new classes. Highlight right now, Pilates has been one people have been asking about for a long time,
and we finally found a Pilates instructor. So if you're on that list, I think in January, Wednesday mornings at 6AM, you can sign up for that. Otherwise, you can see some of our examples of classes right there. 95,000 over 95,000 aquatics fitness check-in. So that's just for the aerobics, the the various aerobics classes that occur in the pool, and then 18,000 almost 19,000 fitness class check ins. And when people when we talk about our pricing and the value that our pricing brings, it's not just the fitness area.
When you talk about the basketball courts, the fact that includes an aquatic center and all of these classes, all within that membership, when you compare us to any gym in the area, it's not even a little bit close. So we take a lot of pride in that. When you look at the average fitness area daily users being around that 300 mark, and then we're also proud when you look at SilverSneakers, Renew Active, for seniors that they're when it says increased health pass revenue by 24¢ percent, that includes anybody that if your insurance pays for your day passes,
those are the numbers that that have increased by 24%. And that number for the senior memberships for the free senior memberships is over 700. There's a lot of gyms as prices have increased that are not able to offer that anymore. So the fact that we are, we're we're definitely very proud of that. Alright. Being the only parks and rec department in the entire state and only one of a few in the whole country provides us some very unique opportunities. I think it provides our community and the school district some very unique opportunities to give back. So here's some examples. I won't go through all of these because you can read them some of the
the ways that we give to the students, specifically through the school district. Some that I'll highlight, funding partially funding elementary, intramurals, and robotics programs, doing donations for that is is something that's happened for, I think, a couple decades now and that we will continue to do. But overall, you can see over $200,000 of the resources donated annually to schools, whether through, resources donated annually to schools, whether through, facilities usage, space, the monetary donations. So, yeah, that's that's a pretty big one. Another one I'll highlight that a lot of people don't know, again, that I know Wayne is very proud of, that our grounds crew does mow French Talbot and Whitefield Elementary.
That's one that I've learned a lot of people didn't know. I didn't know until, I started this job. So, yeah. And that gets us into finances. One thing that I will say before I go too far into this that a lot of people are not aware of, so zero school district dollars, 0 go towards Whitefield Parks and Recreation. A lot of people think when you talk about salaries, the rec center, you know, looking at Facebook, they I I've seen comments about, well, the school district is is funding this rec center. So anybody that lives in the Whitefield community, Whitefield Parks and Recreation is its own tax line item.
So I do wanna make sure that that folks are well aware of that as well. So for the last five years, our income has increased about $3,000,000 for a number of reasons, the biggest one being property values. As we all know, property values going up has increased our property tax bills. We've also seen that equal increase in expenses, providing high quality programming activities and facilities. Obviously, our expenses have gone up pretty significantly as well. With with the expenses, I will say like most organizations, retaining high quality staff is our biggest expense significantly,
whether you're talking the salary or the benefits. Over $1,000,000 goes to the part time staff in and of itself when I brought up that we have over 200 part time staff. Over 1,000,000 goes to them, which are community members of all ages, whether you're talking about a high schooler. I'm I think this is awesome. I'm really proud of this. How many high schoolers are getting their first jobs, you know, talking to them, sitting down with a high schooler and talking about it's okay that you don't have anything on your resume. Right now, we can we can help with that whether you're talking, facilities, maintenance, grounds, mowing, aquatics, being a lifeguard, child locks, providing those first jobs for a lot of folks,
or you're talking about somebody that's retired that, you know, a lot of our guest services staff are retired folks that are able to provide back give back to the community as well. So and everybody in between. That's that's something that we're definitely very proud of, and I think it reflects our our our staff reflects our community very well. Okay. So this is our income slide by year. You can kinda see how that's changed year to year. The rise in income this past year reflects a significant increase in the programming and membership area,
certainly. Again, this is one this current year has gone up quite drastically. Like I talked to the advisory board a board about every month, it's almost $10,000 10,000 to $20,000 increase per month based on the prior year's month. UPK decreased a little bit. So, you know, in talking to Terry, the revenue per pupil has not increased for UPK. So it just depends if students are added or dropped because that kinda fluctuates throughout the year, what makes a difference in that. So for this 2425 school year,
the tax assessment actually went down. So that's why when you look at the taxes that you'll see that that one had gone down this year, had gone significantly back up. So this next year, you'll see that that number is a little bit higher. Specific ownership tax, that's one thing. I guess I did put it on there before it had said SOT, so that's another tax that we benefit from. And this is just a program income by department. I won't get too far into the weeds, but you can kinda just look at each department and and you all will have a a copy of this as well to look look at it in more depth
if you would like. One thing that I will talk about was license programs gone going down because of UPK. Like I said, not I'm sorry. Not because of UPK. UPK has an increase per pupil, but with the fluctuation, that's why that one would be a little bit lower. And we did see increases, though, in youth sports memberships and facility usage. Facility usage refers to rentals, whether you're talking parks, our meeting rooms are a huge one, fields, gym space, all of that. Alright. Expenses. So expenses, they also went down for from the 2324 school year.
Salaries and benefits consistently increased along with services, but supplies and property expenses were down for the 2425 school year. Again, I don't wanna go too far into the weeds with with all the details of that, but you can kinda compare it by department or by expense year to year. So the lottery money is one that a lot of folks aren't aware of as well. You might hear that lottery money goes a number of places, but park and rec districts across the state do benefit from that. So you can see the revenue interest and expense differences there.
Some of those are so small that they ended up not showing up on the graph. Some examples of what this money is used for though, in the past so the tree, the arborist company that we utilized, that was one that lottery money went towards. HVAC units on the aquatic aquatic center replaced, converted the when we converted the grass, but over by Wittek into the turf soccer field, that was what that money was used for as well. That's where those funds came from. And last year's prod projects included the trees, like I mentioned, some park projects, and parks and grounds projects.
This year, we will we're going to upgrade, resurface, excuse me, the tennis courts over by the library there to include one of it won't be four tennis courts anymore. It'll be three, and one will be turned into four pickleball courts because that's what that's what people are pretty excited about. So what's next? Here's some things that are not from '24, '25, but that we've been working on currently. Like I mentioned, the new pickleball oh, I'm sorry. This is different. New pickleball nets at Windmill Mesa. I know that made a lot of folks really happy over there. Replacing tennis courts on the main campus like I mentioned.
2026, we'll have an adult women's volleyball league. The sewing classes are whether you're talking about kids, adults, sewing classes for all ages there with teddy bears, t shirt blankets, pillowcases. The trunk or treat that we had, that was the first time we ran a trunk or treat at Paiute Park. That was a major success, by far our busiest. Moving in the park afterwards as well. That was really cool. And Lane has an Easter extravaganza planned for spring twenty twenty six as well. So that's what I had for you all today. Tina, do you have a question?
Will the Easter Bunny be there? I hope so, but I don't know. I don't wanna get your hopes up. So I'm not I don't wanna say yes. I had questions. Yeah. Yeah. That was that was. Yeah. Absolutely. So like I said, I I wanna answer any questions you might have right now, but I do wanna say, if you wanna come sit down and meet with me, I would love that. I love the opportunity to Good. Talk I mean, a lot Some of it's learning for me as well, at this point in time. But I'd love the opportunity to sit down and talk to any of you as well and walk through whatever you wanna see. So what questions do y'all have right now? I I have I have a couple.
So, well, first of all, I thank you for that because I I mean, that's been a staple in this community forever. Mhmm. And, I appreciate that you guys are expanding and doing so many more things. But, I wanted to, I remember going to Bear Trap and it's, upsetting that kids aren't just automatically doing that. How how does that actually work? Do they do they have to apply for that? How does that work for kids? So it's an overnight camp. So it's about, I think, thirty hours total. So it's only one overnight, whereas I believe before, some people were here were were there three three days or three nights,
I think. I think it was two nights and three days when I was a kid. Yeah. So so now it's I I believe the registration is a $150 for that thirty six hours. And it's just a like, an overnight camp. We meet at the rec center, drive up there. Some former some former staff members are are help out with that. So it is something that they can just sign up for. Numbers had declined a little bit for the last couple years, so that's personally something for me. I I've only heard all these amazing stories from staff members, from parents that went there as kids.
So I went this year for the first time, and I was blown away at how just how great of an experience it was for me. My own daughter went, and and again, these kids that haven't been in the mountains before and haven't had these opportunities, it's a personal mission for me to better connect to the junior highs in particular to make sure that those the kids have those opportunities. Do they have scholarships or anything that they can get? Get? Because that can be a cost thing for most a lot of kids in this. We do. So in general, I actually don't have it on here, the Aaron Gutierrez, memorial scholarship. So that's something that people can look into for any any of our programming.
Whether you're talking about memberships, sports, a lot of people associate programming in particular, but that's an opportunity that anybody can can look into. And I had one more, well, actually a couple more questions. Is the community community garden is no longer a thing? Correct. But but were there was some talk about offering a space other elsewhere. Is that something that you're still talking about? Or So there was are you talking about the planters? Or are you talking about the potential of the I had a plot there over at Talbot. Yeah. And, since it's no longer going to be a thing, is there an alternative place that you would be offering,
or how would you be So there's kinda two parts to it. So Lane had talked about, the mill is actually making planters. Yeah. If anybody wants the planter, as far as the future site, that's something that we're evaluating where that might be in the future. Yeah. Because, I mean, this past couple couple years, the interest had waned. I know that this last year, I wasn't able to get over, but I kept the plot Yeah. Because I had anticipated going back. But yeah. And and part of it with the community garden, anybody that lives over by Talbot, that one's incredibly challenging, space to maintain because you're right. Interest is waning, and,
we can't spray in there because if you spray the wrong thing Mhmm. That causes problems. And you can't let you Correct. And if you spray too close to anything and and people pay for their plot and part of that is you're supposed to weed your area as well, and then people would pay for it and not go. So it was an eyesore. Interest is going down. So it was just one of those things that we had to make a tough decision on. Okay. And then and then I know that a few of us have have talked about, possibly, creating some sort of, like, board member, sessions to connect with the public. And is that something that you would be interested in hearing about from from board
members? Yeah. Is that something we could entertain? Mhmm. Okay. Great. So I will I will call you. Alright. Sounds good. Anybody else have a question? No. I just wanna oh, I just wanna say you're you're kicking ass. Good job. I'm sorry. Excuse my language. You're kicking butt. Yes. Good job. I just wanted to say that, my daughter attends Bear Camp every year and it's the highlight of the summer, and it's one of the few places that you can still see deputy Don. So I wanna give a shout out to deputy Don, because I know yeah. He he had a Amazing. Well, I went as a as a sixth grader and then I was also a,
a counselor. So That was exhausting. He ran the Dearbrook. Oh, mister Grant, did you have your hand up? Okay. I have a question for a lot of a lot of the kids in the area. Since we have live reindeer in the tree land, this year, next year, will we be able to get a root off? I asked the same question, but I did not get a straight answer. I will say the the the guy who owned the reindeer, so he is somewhere in North Central Colorado, so he was a Whitefield Elementary Student. We didn't know that until he got here, so he said that he would be every year because it was, homecoming.
He gave us his I mean, not Rudolph, but he said he gave us his two best reindeer, the most docile, calm ones. So that was that was kind of a cool connection to make as well. Well, thank thank you so much, mister Tucci. That's amazing information. Next on our agenda, we have doctor Houchins, and we are going to receive four items this evening. Good evening. I have four, high school course proposals for you. We updated policy IKF three years ago now, and part of that update was to expand for English and social studies,
to put opportunities in place for teachers to create electives in those areas. So I have two classes tonight that are electives and two classes that will fulfill what we call core requirements in each of those areas. The first one is honor speech, and this proposal was, initially developed and brought forth through Stephanie Owen, and she went through. And the really, unique, part of honor speech is that it will count as dual credit through the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. And so she has already been approved as a guest lecturer through the UCCS,
and so students will be able to take the course from her here on our campuses, and they will be able to then pay for, the dual credit option and have a transcript from UCCS for, I think UCCS calls it public speaking. We're calling it honors speech because it does articulate with the university, and so the coursework will be, at a college level in order to maintain, that partnership with UCCS. She had to submit a course syllabus and have that syllabus approved by the English
professors at UCCS. And so, honor speech would count as an English core graduation requirement. And it really and I don't know how much, especially some of the new board members. Stephanie Owen and Brett Elhofer have worked really hard to build a speech pretty phenomenal speech and debate and forensics program that is combined between Whitefield High School and Mesa Ridge. And so this helps to support, that program and recruitment for that program. And so the full outline for the course is included. All of these items,
you guys will have thirty days to review. And if you have any questions, I'm happy to answer those. If I don't know the answer, I will find that for you. The next course is an elective course offered through social studies. Social studies, teachers were very excited. This course comes to us from Mesa Ridge High School. It is a street law, I believe, is the next one. And, the full outline is included in the, proposal, and the resources are all free offered through a nonprofit. So street law is a course that is offered at high schools,
across the city and also across the country. It's intriguing for kids. It helps them develop a deeper understanding of our legal system and how it works. And it it's just interesting. Everybody is a wants to look at a good case study of how laws come to be, how laws are interpreted interpreted, and how case law impacts that interpretation. The next one is also an elective brought to us from teachers at Mesa Ridge High School, American Popular Culture. This is another common course that is offered around the city and around the country. They've put together a course outline.
It's really looking at history through the lens of what goes on in pop in pop culture over time. So what's happening out in society that's popular and how how do those different trends, impact, history. And so that's an interesting and exciting course for kids to take. It's a different way to look at history, and it allows them most of the timeline you'll see is in, really bizarre to say, the mid to late nineteen hundreds and into 2000. So it's a lot more recent than most of the history that students are studying.
And the final one is, advanced placement world history. I've waited a long time for us to have interest and teachers to come forward and say, yes. We wanna change honors world history to AP. The reason that it it is beneficial for us to make that change is AP is something that is recognized not just, in The United States, but around the world. So our students that are coming to us through our Department of Defense schools that are military students that have transferred, moniker on the course, it it is identifying no matter where that student goes, they know what the the rigor and course content is.
Whereas, when you put an honors title on that course, honors then is usually branded by that individual school district and their interpretation of what that is. So it helps with transfer of credits and understanding of the content that skills have. It also gives students the access to the AP World History exam, which if they pass the AP World History exam with a three, four, or five, then that could translate to either college credit or the waiving of required college courses. So it opens up some doors for our students to earn college credit while they
are attending classes on our campuses. We do for, new board members, we do subsidize our AP exams for students. So I believe we charge $20, instead of the I don't know. I think it's 89 or $99 a test. Our students will pay 20, and if their family qualifies for free or reduced lunch, that cost is reduced to 10. And there are always provisions for students to come and talk with the principals at the high schools if the 10 is too much for them or if the 20 is too much for them and they don't qualify, and we work with them to support them.
The through honor speech and street law and the history of pop culture, the resources are all free and can be, covered within building for AP World History. That does require us to select a textbook book from college board's recommended list of textbooks. So you will see us if this is approved next month, you will see us then come back in the, probably the end of the school year to with a textbook proposal for that course. And those texts are college texts.
They're not cheap. They're about a 150 to $200 a piece. So we will, if it is approved, then we will proceed down that route. Does anybody have any questions? Mhmm. Am I Alright. But these are yours to review for a month. Please reach out if you have any questions you think of, during that time. Thanks. Thank you, doctor Houchins. Well Of course. Community, friends, and family, that concludes this evening. Absolutely does. We wanna thank you for being here. We'd like to increase our in personal enrollment, so we're gonna come up with some thoughts on how to do that.
And hello to everybody that's we're streaming live, so we wanna make sure that we acknowledge all of them as well. So future meetings, lunch meeting will be January 13 at 12:00, and the regular board meeting will be 01/15/2026 at 06:00. All meetings will be held at 1820 Main Street, Colorado Springs, Colorado. It is 06:45, and the meeting is adjourned. We need a motion. Oh, we need a motion. I make a motion to end the meeting. I will second that.
Okay. We have a first and a second to adjourn this evening. Do we have discussion? No? Okay. Everybody's ready to go. Christmas. Happy holidays. Merry Christmas. Thank you. We got the vote. Leave it down. Now we vote. Now we vote. Mrs. Kutcher? Aye. Mister Dolphin? Aye. Miss Hubbard? Aye. Mrs. West? Aye. Mr. Jbara? Aye. Okay. We'll get it. Now we're gonna Now you can get the gal. Okay. Thank you.