##VIDEO ID:gButEhEEEEs## e e e well good evening today is Thursday November 7th 2024 and the time is 6:30 p.m. I will now call the regular meeting of the ISD 191 Board of Education to order welcome to those you are in the audience this evening here and and those watching at home alone online sorry might not be alone dror Mera will you please lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge 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 thank you is there a motion to approve tonight's agenda it's all moved moved by director go second seconded by director C is there any discussion all those in favor indicate by saying I oppose n the motion carries unanimously all right we'll move into the information portion of our agenda and the first item on the agenda is to receive a report on employee indicators and orgam metrics from superintendent Dr battle and Mr Joe joeir Vice President of Operations for Infinity systems welcome thank you chair Miller and directors of the board and welcome to Joe bird from Infinity systems we are partnering with infinity systems this year here to help us better understand how we are doing in two major areas our alignment to our mission and vision and also our work to be an equitable school system in both cases we're asking for employee feedback through an online survey and tonight we'll be presenting the results of the alignment survey or what Infinity systems calls orgam metrics we'll conduct and report on eam metrics in the spring Mr bird will guide us through the results and how the survey Works to measure alignment but first I want to share some thoughts and provide a lital context first and foremost I want to thank all of our employees who took the time to participate I've always shared how important it is for me to hear from others in our community especially staff members and of course inclusive partnership is one of our core values we will use these results and the feed back we hear in other forums to understand what we are doing well and where we need to focus our efforts to improve so we can deliver on our mission and vision second it is important to keep in mind that this survey is primarily about alignment within our district are we all pulling in the same direction toward our vision the orgam metrics portion of this is not a satisfaction survey and while we did add in some of the same questions that we've asked in District surveys in the past the scale is a little different so it's not really comparing Apples to Apples you will see as we go through that we can compare ourselves to other K12 organizations and Mr bird will share uh those States um that we are being compared to organizations in other states and we can also compare our results from 2016 which is the last time we worked with infinity systems lastly please note that um my staff and I only F first saw these results last Friday um while I'd like to share specific ways that uh we will respond to the data the first thing we need to do is really to gather more feedback and to dive deeper and so that we can really understand the feedback employees gave us what their expectations are as well as how we can learn internally what's working and what can be improved uh with that I'll turn it over to Mr bird well thank you Dr battle uh thank you to uh the board and of course to all the folks listening out in the community um first things first as Dr battle mentioned the uh the measure of alignment um on our survey um we use this illustration just to make sure that uh we're we're clear with that so thinking about this this this race or you've got your boat at the the top um leadership is is clear message is clear everyone's getting it um our ores are in perfect sequence and of course we're going right along and and we're winning uh the boat in the middle um the message is now slightly off right so now you've got a few folks that are um you know a little bit off Cadence not terrible right we're not you know going out you know wildly off course we're not running into each other but um we could be going faster could be going further uh our boat at the bottom right now we've got a meter that is further off message from uh you know from the center um you've got a couple folks that are slightly off you've got one person that's still far off now they're actually getting in the way of one of their teammates uh they're going they're now going to be off as well so um we've got chaos down there so what what we remind everyone though is that um everyone in all of these boats is working very hard right they're they're engaged they're they're showing up every day they they're doing their best to bring as much energy to to it as possible um but it's it's quite possible just as in these boats that we're out of sequence Ian we're thinking about the wrong things working on the wrong things um so alignment is really adding that purpose to that engagement right everyone's working hard in the district they really want to make sure they're doing their best um we want to make sure that um everyone's doing that on mission on plan and um you know really doing that on a day-to-day basis so that's what we're really trying to measure um and we we're going to show scores in these particular areas so you see the nine components um but our first uh piece of data is actually our response rate so 72 and a half% uh response rate um we you know obviously want to get as close to a census as we can we'd rather not be you know measuring just a small group and then trying to extrapolate that out across the whole District or project um so in this case you know again 72% of folks wanted to respond um I say that's the First Data data point because what that shows us is we've got a good um amount of feedback we've got a good amount of trust we've got a lot of good ideas um as you'll see as Dr battle mentioned you know Gathering more feedback um spending more time with the results even um just making sure that we really understand what people were saying because there's a lot of a lot of participation uh and a lot of real desire to to make sure things are uh are going the the way that we all want them to go um so the structure of the survey um we did measure um 20 uh excuse me 23 items so we have 19 of our core items are going to be in these nine areas that you see on the screen um we also measure um two areas of just alignment resources and rewards and recognition um and then there were a couple um added in the uh District climate feedback Focus area which would have been some of the um questions at asked in the past um that way we can compare some of those things and just see how people are responding to those as well so that's what we measured um here's how we measured it so when we talk about our scores um we're really talking about our nines and tens are the folks that strongly agree um as you look at the scale um I'm sure a lot are thinking wow this is a really uh really difficult scale it's it's quite rigid um there's a reason for that as well um so when you think about um the net promoter score model um model used in you know marketing and and Communications really trying to get messages outward um your nines and tens are your um promoters your sevens and eights are actually passive or neutral um and six all the way down to one um those are actually going to be your detractors and so um while seven and eight is not certainly not a bad score we want people to be agreeing that's that's definitely a good thing um but it's really hard if you think about our boat analogy it's really hard to um interpret a message from a coach that's you know slightly off on the strategy and then somehow be in sequence and be in Cadence right as as things go outward in the district um the message is going to tend to get a little bit less clear um and you're going to see more variation of it so we really want to make sure that people are in that nine and 10 really strongly agree and when we see the items themselves um I think you know as a as a leader I think everyone would agree that when you see those items you'd really want someone in your in your team in your organization um to have no question that yes we're doing that on a regular basis so without further Ado here's our overall score um 32.5 and so again what that's showing us is that 32.5% of the responses across the whole survey all items all responses um all Focus areas um were in that nine and 10 or strongly agree we've got our if we move to the middle here if you've got our our three boxes here um as you can see we're we're kind of in that that red box at the bottom um the next box up so from 35 to 65 um is kind of like that goal I would say over the next um you know next 9 to 12 months we'd like to see um you know based on the feedback based on the responses um it's definitely um doable to get up into that 35 to 65 range um which is you know really a good place to be um ideal um and at full disclosure not not yet attained by a K12 district is above that 65 Mark um where if you think about you know what would it look like if uh two-thirds of responses on these items were yes I strongly agree we're doing that on a regular basis there's no question about it um and as you can see all the way over to the right um our normative comparison to other K12 districts um we're clearly above that so good participation um you know good score as compared to the norm uh and that's comparing to uh districts in uh Minnesota Wisconsin uh Iowa Texas Georgia um um Colorado California Arizona Ohio Michigan and North Carolina and Illinois sorry I always I always miss one um so definitely uh you know definitely on track good to see where those numbers are um where the numbers start to make more sense are going to be now when we look at our our specific Focus areas so 32.5 was acoss the whole survey as you can see some of those areas were higher some of those areas were lower um accountability being our top scoring Focus area at 54 down to creativity at 1649 and you can see our alignment measurements and our district climate feedback measurements down at the bottom as well those are not part those two are not part of the overall score just the accountability through creativity then on this slide we wanted to show you the distribution of responses as well so again our overall score being 32.5 that's going to be our nines and tens are strongly agrees the sevens and eights are the folks that are agreeing um 2839 um and then six down to one are neutrals down to disagree um 39.9% of those responses so um in a nutshell what we're what we're really trying to do is move those folks that are in that agree category if we can move those over to the strongly agree if we can move a good portion of the folks that are neutral down a disagree up to the agree level um we'd like to see again the green green and yellow go up and the red go down ideally and the um the wheel so zero being uh the middle here um the further out those points go uh the stronger the score or the stronger the level of agreement this really starts to make sense with you know with more data to compare so year-over-year as you see the wheel hopefully it's going outward um as you can see though accountability um is is you know a strength mission and vision also being a strength um ideally uh we'll move everything outward um but um it's not common it's not uncommon to see um the strengths Remain the strengths uh and the the numbers that are um relatively lower they can still go up but may still not be the strengths of of the um of your district and this is a look at adding the sevens and eights so again really T really rigid scale so our you know just looking at our nines and tens those are our scores on the left hand column still um but now what we've done is added the sevens and eights to that number so as you can see um nearly 80% um are in that strongly agree or excuse me agree up to up to 7 to 10 um so accountability mission and vision and teamwork um as you can see are looking quite a bit stronger and so um this is another bit of good news because what happens in a lot of organizations that we've seen and we work with uh I mentioned the K12 districts in those different states we also work with law enforcement we work with government and we work with a lot of corporate uh entities and in a lot of those cases what we can see is when we add these seven Ates the numb is not going up quite as much and what that's showing us is that there's a there's a real polarization so there's folks that strongly agree and there's folks that disagree um and so in your case seeing that number go up um significantly right we've almost got as many in that 780 as we have in the N9 and 10 overall um and so that shows us that there's a lot of folks that are in that seven you know they're they're agreeing they're on the right side of the scale um the question is what would it take to or two questions one what would it take to get those folks from yeah I'm kind of seeing it to yes definitely I'm seeing it um and then the other question would be what would things look like around the district if everyone was seeing and hearing and and and you know really understanding the mission and vision and seeing that applied on a day-to-day basis and the next slide is going to be normative comparison so I know there's quite a bit to look at all at once here so I would actually started at the top with the um the response distribution so looking at um you know your survey that we' that we've just closed on the left um the same numbers there 32 28 and 39 as far as um green yellow red um compared to uh other K12 districts as you can see we're um slightly higher on the strongly agree and the agree and then obviously lower on the neutral a disgree as well and you can see how the focus areas compare um and as you can see the um Center chart as well shows you that again that mission and vision significantly higher accountability but what's also interesting is that you can see that K12 definitely has a pattern or a shape um emission division is generally High although yours is higher even than the than the norm um same with accountability and then Dr battle mentioned the 2016 scores so you can see how those compare so we definitely now have more folks in and that strongly agree looks like there was a few more folks kind of in that tentative agreement back then versus now and a pretty similar number in our 1 to six what I find interesting here so a couple things one the mission Invision jumps out first really clear picture there's more people that are saying yes I'm understanding the mission and vision um empowerment right people feeling that they've got the autonomy they've got the um support to bring their best um to the district every day um and then I think it's noteworthy that communication is is higher as well because there you know these other things aren't um aren't grown and and supported without um strong communication to be able to show people what what we're here to do and what often gets missed um is letting people know when we're doing it well so that they can understand that right we are making progress and these things are are bringing us forward so if we go down another layer into the the survey you can see so those Focus areas um are going to be a combination of of multiple items together um if we go down all the way to the individual item itself in this case we've got our top four and our bottom for um and so what this is showing us is that within the accountability item excuse me within the account accountability Focus area um the very highest scoring item on the whole survey was feeling people feeling a strong sense of responsibility to meet um performance goals and objectives um on its face when you read that hopefully right hopefully everyone in the district is saying yes I do feel a responsibility to meet my my goals and objectives um we need that to be high the fact that it's the the highest um is definitely a good thing it's a great Foundation to have if people are uh connected to that mission and and really um feeling responsible for their goals um obviously they're going to going to be able to do the the best work um teamwork is another important aspect so having a um sense that we're working well together as a team um great Foundation to have we got people that are holding themselves accountable if we're working well as a team we're better able to hold each other accountable um so definitely a good sense there and then um mission and vision um actually seeing both of these items up here is is really important um one because if we don't know the mission and vision it's really hard to um carry it out um but two um in a lot of especially in in K12 districts what we've seen is that first one is high people say yes I understand the mission and vision um but in a lot of cases you'll find people that you know I'm I'm not understanding how my day-to-day work is actually supporting the mission and vision right I'm I'm here I'm busy I'm doing things but I'm not sure exactly what's um supporting supportive so um that is a really important factor to have those so close together um which again speaks to the to to good communication and and and I was not just good communication but clear communication about the mission and vision and the importance of of what we're doing and then our bottom four so we're fli if we flip the scale over and now um look at the items that had the highest percentage in that uh neutral downed disagree um communication uh is one of them um and uh disclaimer that is always in at least the bottom four if not number one so um and that's why I mentioned that the shape of the wheel often stays the same because even as we improve communication and that score goes up it's also pushing everything else up so communication is probably an area where people are always going to say you know what we should communicate more differently I've got a suggestion for what we should communicate differently um so that's not a bad thing um but it is just it's a baseline so we look at that and say okay what would we do um to make these things um you know stronger uh creativity um employees ideas being uh valued and and suggestions being valued um that is also often um toward the bottom and what we end up finding with that is that um it's not necessarily you know we don't encourage creativity um it's that we don't have good mechanisms in place to really show people um where ideas are coming from and and what's happening with ideas when they're brought so um it really just comes down to to fostering that culture of you know looking for for new ways to do things um but what often gets missed even if we're you know being resourceful and finding new ways to do things um that doesn't often get communicated formally right there may be Pockets that are happening around the district uh and then you know when you start to look in you know site data um demographic data you may you may clearly see that um there are things happening in um certain classrooms or certain buildings certain departments that are working really really well um but how do we get some of those best practices um to be a little bit more Global a little bit more um standard so that we're all doing the things that are working the best um which ties perfectly into best practices looking outside the organization to see best ways to do our work um in K12 the the most common situation here is that um as we're as we're in the center of the district you know we're bringing in those best practices we're having those conversations we're going to you know conferences and and seeing the kind of the leading um process and and things we need to do um as that gets implemented though um as it goes further out in the district um it's it's you know harder and harder for people to realize where that came from so it it by the time it comes to you know come get to the classroom for example um it's just what we're doing right it's not you know really communicated clearly about why we're doing it what are all the benefits how this is going to make you a better teacher how it's going to support your students um and then again that I think also ties to uh the next one which is going to be development and so um again just the the formal aspect the the really clear communication around um you know how I can bring my best self to work um within the mission and you know continue to grow that um not just in this role but um you know in career overall as well then our district climate feedback items there's a little bit more to take in on this one so but in this section we asked about recommending the district as a place to work being proud to work in 191 feeling that work is valued by school leadership feedback being encouraged and valued having a clear understanding of the district's Mission feeling that my work aligns with the district's Mission resources and need to talk to families who are talk to families about who we are as a district promoting promoting its successes as a district and feeling positive about the direction of the district and so in each of the focus areas um of course there is the the numerical response that we've shared um there's also a comment section so uh lots of employees uh had lots of different things to lots of different things to say um each of those um sections um with throughout all those comments we were able to P to pull together kind of uh clusters so as particular topics were mentioned more um we can see that um kind of forming and then you know for example the communication issues um most of that um topic when that was mentioned um there was conversation around feedback around followup and around know consistency of communication um workload and support leadership and management professional development and growth and then morale and retention so some of these are are you know directly related to some of the items that we um surveyed on um others are going to be more um results of what happens when we you know take those actions um so like morale and retention for example as we see that stronger communication as we see that better understanding of the mission and vision um as we see that strength and development that creativity um that should be you know better for morale and retention and then the um sentiment we were able to to see which things were positive which things were more negative um and another disclaimer as far as the comments go we do just by Nature um tend to see more uh comments leaning more onto the negative side just because even if someone's just saying I have a suggestion about something right it may not be saying something negative but you are saying something could be improved so there's going to be kind of a negative um uh you know sentiment to that so of course we did see some negative sent we also saw some positive sentiment there's lots of um focus on there you know people mention specific supervisors that are doing good things so those would be examples of some of those best practices that we want to dig into um Team camaraderie which you know speaks to that high teamwork score a sense of pride in working in the district was mentioned quite often often but of course concerns and and feedback on on what we think we can do better was was mentioned a lot so you know which which again from our team perspective we see that as a good thing if if if folks are not wanting to share right if you have a really low particip participation rate and you're not seeing comments um you know in a sense that can be worse because people have decided that they don't either they don't think they're going to be heard or they don't care enough to to share that feedback back so um we want to keep getting that feedback so we can make improvements and the way that um Dr battle and team are are working on that um we've talked about um really leveraging strengths so again that that accountability um is going to be huge to build on right you've got a lot of folks that know that this is their their calling this is their mission this is what they want to be doing and so if they can really have a clear picture of what that is what that means um they're going to continue to to thrive in that and one of the things that as we tie accountability and mission and vision together one of the things that really works well especially in K12 is really making sure the the clearer that we are mission focused when um introducing new ideas when evaluating things the more tied to that mission is um the the better we can hold each other accountable because if you know if I introduce a new you know a new initiative um and you ask me um you know what parts of the Strategic plan does that really support right what part of the mission does that really um further um right if it doesn't right it's not going to be a strong a strong thing but also I know that okay you showed me objectively where that fits and where it doesn't it's not a matter of did you like my idea or not or do you like me or not um and so that that you know really Mission driven Mission Focus conversation is going to be going to be key to that um teamwork again you've got that camaraderie already you've got a lot of folks that are feeling that that bond that connection um so if they're clear on how to hold each other accountable we know exactly what the mission is and how we to to meet it um you know that team team focus is going to be a real a real strength in that and then of course empowerment so you know folks that feel that they've got the um you know the autonomy to take that initiative and really run with the the mission and vision it's theirs they to take an ownership of it um if we can get more and more folks to to feel like that um then we're just going to have more people doing their best work and and obviously that's better for all the kids and and the community as a whole um a couple things that we um often see working together would be links so um accountability and empowerment are often closely tied together so um in organizations where accountability is really high but empowerment is really low um you end up with a a sense of well I've got to be here I'm going to show up I'm accountable to show up every day um but I don't feel like I have the autonomy or the the license to do my best work or bring even my full self to work so I just I'm just here um so we definitely don't want to see that um the fact that you have an empowerment score that's High um especially relative to your accountability score is a real strength um that is a really good thing um mission and vision is going to work really through everything right it's it's why we're here right it's it's the purpose and so the more we uh can include that in any conversation possible um the better um any reward any recognition um if we can show where that connected back to um you know the the you know the mission or the pillar the core value um the better um and of course that's only going to Foster um accountability um leadership right as our leaders go so go so goes the district right if we can make sure that um the clear the messages going outward um understand what's happening as the message comes back to you so you can see what you know what was what was uh caught what was missed um what can we do differently when we communicate differently next time um and then of course back best practices and creativity overall just making sure that um you know I know that we're always looking for best ways to do our work sometimes that just doesn't always get um as clearly um shared as well so making sure that people know where that's coming from um and then there was a couple interesting um focus area gaps and and it's not uncommon to see these but so teamwork for example um one of the items is working well together as a team uh one of the other items is um teams working well together um between teams so we don't expect that to be 100% even um in any type of organization but especially in in K12 I mean there's people are working in completely different buildings not necessarily interacting or collaborating with each other um but if there are ways to um you know help certain teams under understand how they connect to others um how their work is supporting theirs how the other you know group's work is supporting them um can be you know a big a big um Big Boost um similar with accountability so personal accountability and um group accountability it's much easier to hold yourself accountable because you know all the goals and you can look in the mirror and say well this is me and I know what my goals are um but holding each other accountable can sometimes be more challenging and so that gets back to um again the understanding of mission driven Mission focused conversation uh we can hold each other accountable to that mission and we we must um and then empowerment is an interesting uh Gap as well because people don't feel that they're um and you have a high score in empowerment so people don't feel like there's a supervisor over their shoulder you know bugging them about every you know every little detail they're not being micromanaged um but the other item talking about more systemwide um there's a feeling that um something is holding me back something is holding us back and so um a lot of times with with strong communication um you know with with good leadership um we can help folks see um a there's a lot of things in place yes we need systems in place we need those things um but a lot of times we don't understand why those are there we don't understand how those are helping us we don't understand how they're helping the students um we don't understand why this system versus that system so being able to to Really share what those um advantages are um but also um um just helping uh you know we call it small L leadership right the um leaders in the organization the folks that have been here the longest they've in some cases figured out some of their own systems they've got different resourceful levels of resourcefulness and they're doing a lot of good things they're they're teaching you know new staff members they're teaching folks that um you know what to do sometimes what not to do um so the empowerment levels and finding good ways to get you know for example uh principles to you know find who's you know who's doing an interesting Innovative thing in a classroom and what did they learn from some of the folks that don't necessarily have a leadership title but they're experienced and they're doing a lot of good things they care about the mission and vision um and they are you know learning and doing good things and so how do we get those get have people empowered to really find those ideas and really share those and and keep things moving outward so that we're all doing um our best work so again um finding out more about what's happening um we say kind of for better for worse this this brings out more questions than answers um but those questions that you're asking each other that you're asking yourselves um that you're asking staff members um they're going to lead to good things because we know we know how much people care and we know that they're going to be able to to do their best work if we you know continue to harness that so um zooming out to look at at what's happening districtwide um but also looking specifically at some of the um some of the pockets um of the district with some of that demographic data um the comments are a good way to really get a deeper understanding there's more context there we see the numbers but um people are sharing very specific things so um those could be you know immediately actionable um and of course the areas of strength I I think it's really important not to just say you know here are the things that are negative um there are a lot of things that were strong um we'll that both in the numbers as you saw the higher ranking Focus areas but also even in the comments as you look at some of that positive sentiment um we want to make sure that those things are are continued um obviously you know feedback and discussions and um overall again we just if we continue to ask those questions we can continue to you know get more answers and and hopefully make more progress so with that I will turn it back over to Dr battle so thank you Mr bird so my goal goal is to have a strongly aligned uh District uh where my employees will score nine or 10 um so I had to reflect on when I was a teacher um and my students if 10% of them fail the quiz or an assessment I had to take a look of how to personalize or differentiate to meet those students needs um if a quarter of my students failed on an assessment then I had to look at my teaching um I needed to reteach in different ways so seeing that uh not a green at 39% is something I would never accept as a teacher and so I'm not going to accept it as uh the leader in this District so a little bit more about next steps even though I'm not going to have a detailed specif uh um specificity um as Mr bird said we need to dive deeper into the data um look at uh building school um it's interesting we do get information about generational there's kind of no difference so I'm a boomer um so the Millennials we're not seeing that but it's interesting Mr bird will tell you in other organizations there are wide differences not in education but wide so I found that very interesting so we're going to do a little deeper Dive In disaggregation um we will absolutely look at the comments that staff shared uh continue with discussions possibly focus groups um really curious about the strengths so what made you uh indicate a nine or 10 what did it look like um in those areas and of course um how people are experiencing where they did not agree um this is the first of two surveys again equim metrics will be in the spring um it is not um it wasn't planned that later this evening you're going to have a request from our band and Orchestra teachers for a trip uh band trip but I will talk to them about how they get that alignment if you think of an orchestra with all those different instruments and all those different students when they play that piece it is all along and it's a beautiful thing so with that I want to thank Jo and in Infinity systems um and again for staff for participating I'll turn it over to you chair thank you Dr battle and Mr BD board members any comments or questions this evening I have a question um so this is employee District districtwide so um I'm just curious about in the survey is there distinction between like what departments um employees are in like so we're able to distinguish between like these groups of people are saying more dissatisfaction as opposed to these people like are we focused more on teachers are you know who's more dissatisfied than others yep there's data by site there's data by uh position um you know the type of site that they're in um Generation Um years of service so how long someone's been in the district um gender race ethnicity um I feel like I'm missing one but um there's quite quite a few different areas that we're looking at yes we can look at it in lots of different very detailed yeah okay all right thank you other questions or comments okay I'll go first um I was pleased by the response rate I think that was pretty extraordinary was it 700 and something people like a 70% response race or something 72% 72 that's incred I've never it's incredible I I do surveys at my day job and we never get even remotely close to that so um obviously there's a lot of good feedback Dr battle I appreciate your comments about um needing to dive a little bit deeper before really knowing what what the next steps may be um I guess my question I don't know if you even really have an answer but are there things that you have observed from doing this work the districts maybe have implemented that have made an impact on some of these scores there there definitely is um some of those we've you know we've shared in the um with our with our comments we've got actionable suggestions that come back with that so in the reports um and yeah we do have some recommendations specific to um you know the accountability area the empowerment area the teamwork area um and I would say communication and Leadership would probably jump up to the top as like things that we can really think about on just again trying to communicate the mission and vision as specifically as possible as we can um but um Dr battle is is on it in terms of focus area focus groups I should say um just getting feedback from folks about what they were saying when they responded what they're saying now um using the I would say one bit of advice would be to uh recommendation would be to use some of the language that comes out of the survey so there people did mention specific areas that they thought were most concerning or most you know they most wanted to share about so getting that you know weaved into the conversation as specifically as possible um is going to be important just so folks can and know that they were heard um 72% of people shared again good thing um now bringing that back and showing them that not only did you hear them but we're going to take action on those things um is going to um not just you know have participation stay high but um you know obviously help make some progress on those things so right um I guess the short answer is there's like a really really long list of things that that you can and should do um but I would say the easiest thing to do as far as recommendations go is to to break it down into into sections and just grab you know one of those Focus areas at a time um and just you know think about what we can do within that area and um I think talking to some of the staff about it is the best way because they're the ones that are they're the ones that are going to be doing it sure thank you and that brings me to my final comment which is probably more for Dr battle um if I can remember what I was goingon to say [Music] um oh organizational change takes a long time as I know you know um so if there are things that can kind of the proverbial lwh hanging fruit I'm a fan of low hanging fruit when trying to make changes and at least you know what are the easy wins the things that can have an impact in the short term while we continue to make plans to address things in the long term as well so that's my unsolicited advice for you thank you the author of uh director members of the board author of um good to Great talks about those small winds first and that'll build the trust that grad school maybe that's why forgetting his name Joe I can't remember his name auth good degree it's okay that's all I had thank you chair Miller um yeah I would first like to thank the folks that participated um in the survey um because as as leaders in the in the district of of course we're here to support our students and it's also equally important to support our staff and make sure that we're helping Dr battle and her team you know with with their work to make connections and I I found it interesting um one comment and a question um it seems like the the theme coming out of this is personally people are really set with their responsibility and ownership of um their role within the district and as a system we need to do a better job of making connections um between teams you had mentioned right um breaking down silos that might exist um Communications making sure that our Communications are really um Landing where they need to and in the way that we intend so that you know you just got me thinking about um your when you commented about how change is implemented and by the time it it reaches the school building people might not know why and that it actually started with a colleague and that was you know that was just I like oh yep you need we absolutely need to make sure that that that's happening um director Hume you um made a comment about change being slow that was something I was thinking about and I guess my question was at the beginning of the presentation did I understand you correctly to have an expectation and that between now and spring change would happen um yes well not now and spring I would say now and next fall when we when we survey again okay um yeah because the spring will be different survey it's it's measuring different things um so no I wouldn't we wouldn't do the same survey again in the spring um but yes I mean as as you know you know you you can have some of these conversations yesterday and so just making sure that um people start to to see that and start to understand that there there can be really slight changes that that have a really big impact so awesome and appreciating to Dr battle that you're thinking about focus groups and you know kind of gathering more information to inform what it is that that you and your team need to need to do to leverage those strengths I appreciate that um kind of following up with that so hearing that there'll be another survey again in the fall is the frequency of doing the survey annual because we were seeing 2016 so it's like oh we it's been a while um and so it was just kind of curious in terms of the frequ you know because it you know change is slow so if you're going to plan for change to see the impact in a survey in the future you're going to of course space out the survey but I didn't know if there was kind of a a standard like is it annual is it every other year is it you know most most districts do it annually um some we have some that do it every other year just depends on on preference and great well I have a few questions and comments um again I Echo the everybody else's commentary about um the response in general thank you to there Community for doing so um so the uh the 21 items you call them uh the um I I assume that um they you probably have some sort of leadin description on the question when you get to that point um do you find that you know when you engage a district like essentially you're engaging us new again basically um and you start working with them the the around the district um there is some change in the way the score the scores change some as they come to understand those items a little bit better I mean a first pass with with a surveys is often a little challenging to to get this deep into it um so when they start talking about accountability or start talking group sessions or about uh empowerment and what it really means in terms of the survey do you find the results change a little bit after that um yes and no so when when we do that when we're more deliberate about the mission and vision and more deliberate about the things that you're seeing in those items um it's it's hard to say if people are reading that and answering differently because they're seeing it actually we've we've tend to tended to see the opposite where now that you've brought that to my attention I'm thinking about how we're communicating the mission division I'm thinking about you know how our teams are working together and you actually said you were going to do something about that this year and you know what I'm not I don't know that I'm seeing that right now so we actually do often see a either a plateau or a score go down before it goes back up again um because you're increasing the awareness right you're you're saying hey everybody this is what we're working on and you know it's like anything where when you set that goal publicly um everyone's going to say okay now I'm going to hold you accountable to that um so that does you know we found we found leadership teams feel that there's kind of a a kick initially to say okay good that now that we've put this out there we better actually take action and and and keep moving on these things um but yeah I would say that you know as people read the item um they're going to they're going to respond based on what they're what they're seeing okay um it was mentioned earlier that and we talked a little bit about some of the segmentation you have uh maybe this is question for Dr battle what when will we see some of the segmentation out the report itself is not attached to the the board book so how will we see some at least higher level segmentation um are you referring to uh race and E ethnicity to generational could be but I I My First Leap would be I'd love to see a difference between say the um K through our elementary schools or secondary schools uh are are I assume the this is not just teachers I assume uh the department everybody yeah everybody the administration the umans clerks service Food Service yeah so I would love to see some segmentation by those different areas because I'm guessing that interpretation of um I'm just making an assumption that some of interpretation some of our values and things might be very different for someone who's working in the administration even at the high school versus buried in an elementary on a daily you know sort of level so um so there is there a followup for that or is that more breakdown of the data sometimes when we get surveys we get a lot of tables maybe too many all the different slides ex you know with data you can go deep so it's helpful for me to hear what else you're looking for um the flip side of that is if you know you get down to a level like of a building and then you and your staff come in and start talking about well we um you know we hear that this building scored low on employee ideas and suggestions are valued um do you find that that causes some issues in it of itself because I mean that's basically pointing at the principle of the building right I mean it without saying it so I mean does does that become challenging when if you if there's too much segmentation um so what we usually recommend when when sharing the data outward would be to kind of just like the message goes outward we we'd want to move that data outward as well so for example bringing all the building leaders together and not necessarily publicly showing each individual ual scores but just giving them an understanding of of you know here's our overall score um here are some of the specific things that people have asked about we do want to segment obviously we don't want to publicly shame someone whose score was lower um but we do that segmentation also allows us to see who's who's doing really well right so if you see a particular building that has a really high communication score they're really sharing employee ideas and getting those employee ideas we want to know you know how are you going about doing that so that we can you know do some kind of peer-to-peer support and make sure that everybody's doing that so um the the short answer is really um you know we we we do want to look at those because if there is a low score somewhere we want to be able to remedy that um but we also want to make sure we're going about that um tactfully right so we're you know we're going to that building leader um and we can say hey it looks like like your score is higher looks like your score is lower um why do you think that is but now that we've got the numbers and and the information here we're not just subjectively asking this person if they think they could do better on something we're saying people have said this and if we you know we have to be able to take constructive feedback we have to be able to think thinking about growth and and Improvement um and so being able to share that with them hopefully can can go that route and if we've got some of the um positives on the other side of that so if we we've talked to the folks that are doing really well first um we can bring some of those ideas to the folks that are struggling a little bit because they might know they're struggling with it and not know what to do or how to make it better um and so if we can share that with them then we're helping them with that development um and they know that then they're they better helping their staff as well may I ask a clarifying question on um so just to clarify um so that that deep dive it is work that you do with this within the school district in the appropriate setting regardless of whether it's a principal or a department head yeah so we you know we share the information we're happy to we're happy to come back to meet with other groups and then have conversations at different levels with with different groups of folks um as far as the the you know the work that's being done that that's going to be um the team uh and so you know Finding ways to kind of bring people together and have those conversations um it can really look a number of different ways gotcha um and I guess just to um just to pin in the comment is this data seems like it could be really helpful in terms of those conversations with the building leaders the depart departmental leaders um that are doing well and or struggling uh the back to the 21 items these are Universal across your your process with all the places you work at so do you um find that any of them um dimatic uh conflict with each other so if you have someone saying you know they don't feel valued but they somewhere else they maybe indicate the opposite does that occur at all in your data set at all it it doesn't no so our our items are specifically grouped together in within each of those Focus areas and we've done uh like factor analysis to make sure that those are indeed holding together and have a high reliability um and the fact that the relability is so high is what gives us the ability to look at those the gaps so if we see big differences in those numbers because the reliability is so high they those numbers really should be closer together therefore if they you know accountability for example if that's drifting further apart on you know a particular survey um it's something of note right so we need to we need to take note of that and and see that's why it's kind of one of those one of those observations but no everything is um separate in each area so that we're not not duplicating anything or certainly contradicting anything okay well thank you again for your time this evening thank you for everybody that participated in this survey Dr battle I think that you've been handed a great set of management tools to work with so we look forward to the outcome thank you thank you thanks everybody okay next we will receive a read act update report from Amina aadel director of instruction and assessment welcome director R good evening chair Miller superintendent battle members of the board uh thank you for letting me take some time this evening to uh give you an update on the um implementation of the read act uh for context the re Act is uh a groundbreaking piece of legislation that uh directed uh school districts across the state of Minnesota out of the 2023 legislature in 2024 in the spring there were some updates that were made to that and all school districts across the state are in the process of up of uh implementing the re act which directs us on um these three particular areas uh related to literacy and reading instruction the first is screening and assessment instructional curriculum is second and then third is professional development uh just as an update for our screening process we do use one of the uh mde approved screeners fastbridge for our students uh the fall screening this year we used the fastbridge assessments for uh grades K through n this year nine was a new addition and it's part of the um n9th grade academy uh implementation is to uh gather early information about students in order to provide uh early uh intervention we did screen 4,9 959 students this fall in reading and literacy um overall all of all of the students uh we had a 51 uh% of students meeting fall grade level benchmarks um our next screening uh window as mandated by the read act uh will be in January and uh we will again do a midyear screening for reading and Literacy for students in grades K through 9 uh there are some updates from the Minnesota Department of Education that came out this fall which were some clarifications um they have added two additional subtest to grades 2 and three screening these subtests must be administered individually and so uh the teachers will now meet with each student individually to uh um uh to uh provide this additional subt test um it is part of the dyslexia screening guidelines and so the subtest that's being added is nonsense words I know that sounds a little counterintuitive but uh it's to focus on uh how students are decoding and identify characteristics that may indicate dyslexia and uh so the two additional subtest will uh become part of that screening we are still waiting for guidance from the Department of Education on screening tools specifically for grades 4 through 12 until that guidance comes forward we'll continue on with our own District um designed screening with fastbridge this is just a quick glance at that fall screening data by grade level um the number that you're seeing there for uh in the graph is the percentage of students who were screened who met the fall Benchmark and then uh aggregate it was 51% the second component of the read Act is instructional curriculum as uh I have shared with the board before um we are in the process of our implementation our multi-year implementation of foundational literacy curriculum uh this year uh our uh prek uh VPK classrooms are preschool classrooms are all implementing uh the Hagerty foundational um curriculum and on phic awareness and oral language development uh I think the really positive uh data that came out of the Fall screening for our VPK students and the positive impact it's having on our students uh in order to meet those kindergarten readiness score uh benchmarks um really uh again strengthen our uh resolve to provide them with the most foundational uh um uh curriculum that we possibly can that implementation is going well um we have uh done the initial training for all uh sites and they uh began actual implementation of the full curriculum this October after the mea break uh grades three four and five have finished their initial training and have uh begun uh since the end of September in the implementation of grade three Hagerty bridge to reading and grades four and five foundational phonics and morphology uh grades K1 and two are continuing on with their second year we did begin in October our first round of literacy coaching for those in which our literacy coaches our teachers on special assignment are um are um going into classrooms and are meeting with uh collaborative teams during their collaborative team time to review their formative assessment data and uh uh supporting teachers in using data walls and uh adjusting instruction based on student formative assessment professional development I'm sure uh is uh uh something that's uh been a heavy lift for all of our staff this year um the carry all training is a total of 67 contact hours um each one of the eight modules is five hours of asynchronous work and then an additional two hours live session with a facilitator from the University of Minnesota we have are scheduled to complete module two on Monday we are super excited to uh have made our way through that initial kind of awkwardness of module one we're starting to find a really strong rhythm of uh scheduled work time during the work days our administrators and uh special education supervisors are working really hard to provide the support for teachers so that they have that set aside time for the asynchronous work during their uh scheduled contact hours um the live session the first one went fairly well um we learned a lot about how to organize that and make that the best learning environment as possible for our staff and so um staff will join that Zoom uh from their own workspace in their sites across the district um after the two hours are up we have two um literacy coaches in each uh site to provide support for folks as they to work together to complete their post um module assessment and begin work on the next module um we do have 326 currently Educators uh who are participating in that carry all training letters for Early Childhood is a 35 hour um training and we have a preschool and early childhood special education teachers who are working on that it is five hours a synchronous per module and um there are 12 hours of live synchronous time and and they will complete their second module on November 11th as well and so we're really super excited to watch them move through that particular process as they are also doing that implementation of the foundational literacy so we have 28 Educators um and so we are able to host our own session with just our staff um with the vendor for the uh um for letters and uh that seems to be working out really well for our staff so really a lot of uh credit goes to the facilitators in early childhood uh Kim wle and uh Christy wac and uh Caitlyn uh cantola who are um just doing an amazing job of supporting those uh Early Childhood Educators in uh completing uh the uh letters for Early Childhood so I really appreciate their work there that's the latest update thank you all right do board members have any comments or questions yes just curious uh with 51% meeting the benchmarker for fall was there a goal or is that just new and that we just kind of setting up it's not necessarily a goal it's just a piece of information as we are moving into our uh mtss our multi-tiered systems of support um looking at that data and we're disaggregate that data using a variety of uh context to kind of identify root cause where do we see strengths where do we see challenges and where do we need to shore up our curriculum and instruction okay cool and then uh appreciate the testing about dyslexia being dyslexic myself so I appreciate that we do that screening also understanding though that there are other forms of learning disability and so wondering if that is something that also gets um noticed or assessed so the screening uh is really for screenings of characteristics of Dyslexia we do not identify dyslexia as U that's not within our purview um but what we do identify are uh characteristics in which we do have specific interventions which can support uh Learners who might be uh um displaying those um we don't uh necessarily screen specifically for other disabilities we leave that to the um evaluation process for with special education thanks I can add to that um director Chester members of the board I have begun meeting with my uh leadership teams at each building so as at Burnsville High school and a teacher in the nth grade academy as well as the administrator signs that they're really uh looking at the data and they're seeing um some needs of the special ed students so they're actually meeting with the team that's where they're seeing they need to differentiate a little bit more so as uh director off theal said they're just digging into the data and I I'm sure when I go to the other sites they'll share a little bit about what they're seeing and then their followup and I think it's important to make a distinction this report's about our response to the state mandated read act um requirements I am certain that we are doing extensively more uh intervention and uh assessment in the district yeah the comments director Mero yeah uh I just have a clarifying question um thank you Amina for this update on um the slide that talks about the additional subsets with the winter assessment window um coming up in January MH is the fast bridge and the subsets supposed to happen both in January for the k23 yes and the additional subtests are part of the fastbridge assessment okay and so all of it is uh um is set up it's all part of an Administration um within that and so all the data is housed together with for the students thank you um yep thank you for the update um I just have some questions on the professional development the um the car all and the letters for Early Childhood the hours that it's um requiring is that something that's just a one-time thing um or is this something that's going to require like annual training I mean does it specify it in the the read act it does uh it's very clear that uh it is a one-time certification that we want to make sure that all teachers have this foundational um base of knowledge and then it is up to the school district to continue to provide uh continuing professional development around this topic but this intensive piece is a one-time uh investment for us okay so as far as the ongoing is that something that's just up to the district then to decide what that will look like yes uh as a district we'll decide based on our uh mtss process where do we see the strengths uh in our staff it may be around uh literac uh our literacy implementation it may be around assessment may be around interventions it may it just has to do with whatever part of our program needs the most uh attention Okay thank you thanks ja I have a follow-up question to what she just asked so you said it's a one-time training for staff a year from now two years from now is it is it still required for newly hired staff right so this is the the react really has a three-year implementation for the professional development and school districts are responsible for providing this professional development over the next 3 years for all staff so any new staff that will be coming in we have a process for staff next year which which will include new staff as well as our phase two staff and then we have a third year in which we as a district are responsible for that after that uh it we should be receiving teachers coming to us from uh the their teacher preparation programs with that background and knowledge uh embedded because that was also part of the react if they got went to school in Minnesota we that is correct and so um we'll continue to we'll continue to monitor those particular pieces um but the the other component of the read Act is the um the establishment of the regional literacy networks and so that is a a regional Resource Network and so for example training for non-licensed staff will come from the regional network not from school districts and so um the the responsibility of providing and administering the training will go will then shift from school districts to the regional literacy networks got it thank you m additional questions or comments I had just one what oh I have something going back to the Chart uh what is it slide four um the benchmarking uh three data points is I hesitate to call a pattern but I do notice that the K through 2 is 10 points lower than the average um do you have any would it be purely subjective for me to ask you uh your thoughts on that um I have I I think for kindergarten it's really clear that uh these are students who come to us from a lot of different places and so um it may or may not be that uh they're been part of our system and so that's why when we looked at the world's best Workforce data I tried to draw the distinction between the students who had been part of our own VPK process versus students who came to us from somewhere else um the other uh piece of data that I really want to draw your attention to is the big jump for grade three and what that means is that students who may come to us not prepared to read um by the time we get them to grade three we've made significant progress um and uh I would think that uh the more intensive development of our foundational literacy programs we should be able to see more of a jump between that K and two as well but or between the first and second grade uh as well well one thing I I mean again would assume that a benchmark they've taken into account some of the factors such as you know kindergarteners may or may not read at a certain level but maybe not maybe they haven't done it adequately uh are you telling me that the the group The cohort group at currently grade three were they significantly lower at grade two last year and theyve made that jump or oh really okay so that's a yeah when you see that Benchmark is kind of a standard pattern that we're seeing and then we see just like this really big pickup by grade three and four you wouldn't then expect the grade two to continue at that level next the current cohort grade two to I I would be optimistic and say I would like to see those scores closer to um okay to to see those higher especially with the amount of work that we're doing with kindergarten in first grade speculative but I would have thought maybe this is a CO Shadow hanging over the the data set too a little bit these are kids that you know some of the very informative pre preschool time were at a very different world than other kids have grown up in so but I don't know we'll see I guess as the data plays out oh does that does this um structure of the data match other like the state average or other stuff you know because uh this is the first year that uh school districts have all been using the same screener there really isn't any comparative data for local districts um we will all report our data now using the same screeners um this spring through the new read Act local literacy plan and so I would expect the data to come from the state with more U kind of some aggregate kind of response so that would that would be beneficial for all of us okay thank you for your report um let's see next we're going to receive a report from Mariam Brandi a student board representative welcome thank you um so we have a lot of exciting things to report for November I'm going to start off with one of our Affinity groups the agents new Association is beginning to plan out and prep for their bigger events events to look forward to this year will be the Lunar New Year TLC New Year and the aapi show they also H held a group discussion on the 6th about the Asian-American identity in politics this week moving on to Brunsville strong they just began committee meetings and are prepping for second quarter they're setting up mental health help posters in the bathroom and are putting resources together for a schoolwide advisory slideshow and then for theater it's opening night for Burnsville High schol School's First show this season mean girls will be playing at 7 tonight Friday and Saturday and then we'll resume again next Thursday Friday and Saturday and Saturday we'll have a matina at 2 and another show later at 7 for Houston government about 25 students attended launch which is a training event for Minnesota delegations to come together and prepare for the Youth and government conference in January some exciting news with that is that three of our Burnsville High School students kayle krampton Anais Calvin novaro and McKinley Shannon taught their own respective classes at this event moving on to Athletics for girls basketball there was a big congrats to senior Messiah Bettis who's been selected as one of five finalist for the 2024 Miss Batten award also fun news is for the blaze cross country in late October burnsville's Karly lamote and Liam Merill both play SE second in the section tournament and then later had a chance to compete at State last weekend as for other things going on at HS we had a schoolwide mock election this past Monday for students to have the opportunity to vote for you United States President Minnesota Senate and the House of Representatives for district 2 of Minnesota this event was basically designed as a learning opportunity for students to understand politics and the importance of voting and then separately this was a really exciting thing that I myself got to participate in is that the CIS government class students had the opportunity to help with the actual election brunville High School CIS government classes worked with the city of Burnsville to give students the opportunity to election judge on November 6th advisers from the city came in last month to give student volunteers training on how to be an election judge some of our duties as election judges included handing out and explaining ballots sorting out voter receipts and handing out I voted stickers which was my favorite part of that and then moving on to my personal favorite part of this report and the picture that you see on the screen is the msba student School Board event two weeks ago Dr battle and myself and my fell fellow student Representatives attended the third annual Minnesota School Board Association student board event at Chaka high school here we were able to connect with students of similar positions to our own who are from across all of Minnesota to brainstorm and collaborate on ways to improve our home District student representative system we have some exciting ideas in the works including a guide book and workshops for future Representatives having future alternates start start out as Juniors to give them more time to prep for the role having a second seat on the dis for student representatives and incorporating a more interactive ways of engaging with a student body as a whole and then here you can see a picture of myself Dr battle McKinley and chinos and this concludes my report thank you well I appreciate that very much uh the next item on the agenda is to receive a report from Dr battle super thank you chair Miller and members of the board first I would like to take this moment to celebrate and thank our community members for overwhelmingly supporting our technology Levy renewal the referendum pass with 66% with about 66% supports which means we will continue to have the funding we need to support technology including devices programming support and systems for another other 10 years we are incredibly fortunate to have such strong support from our community it is definitely one of the things that makes me and one District uh 191 very proud and makes our district special I want to thank our staff members throughout the district for sharing information with families and neighbors sometimes I think we take for granted that everyone knows how important technology is to our work but it's worth being clear that it's not just putting a device in a Student's Hand it's about providing access tools and information that students families and staff need and doing it so safely and securely so congratulations to everyone and again thank you I want to share some praise for our students in election years high school students are given the opportunity to serve as election judges and several as Mariam told you chose to do so this year on election night when our own Sarah olssen Dicken was helping City officials manage the process they shared nothing but positive feedback about the work our students provided so in Minnesota and in our district we can be really proud of how smoothly and securely our elections are and I'm especially proud of our students who help make this happen right here in District 191 November is American heritage month and I invite our entire Community to join us in recognizing the history culture achievements and contributions of indigenous people during the month we'll share a variety of resources and information through our social feeds um one event I want to mention in particular is the American Indian cultural showcase which will take place on November 21st starting with a mail at 5:30 pm at Burnsville High School this is a tremendous opportunity to learn about an experience some of the richness of indigenous culture including food music and dance and featuring our students so thank you that concludes my report thank you now we'll receive a board member reports do board members have any reports they wish to share and just a reminder that our committee and school reports are scheduled at our next board meeting I know has not it's not quite a committee report but I wanted to share that on October 31st so Halloween uh Dr battle and I attended the 9917 uh school a membered school board and superintendent Retreat um it was about a half a day long and we um convened and with our other member districts uh superintendent as well as um school board members and um learned more about the partnership um between 9917 and the Humanities Center because it was posted at the Humanities Center and the um some of the service is um benefits of that partnership and the um some of the programming that they do that that uh we have participated in and some of our our team I think um they went to the Civil Rights the Civil Rights yes and then also um because 9917 is uh housed um mostly in um Dakota County Technical College we also had um them come out and talk and share that there is a I don't know is it public uh a merger between Inver Hills and Dakota County Tech so they have to get legislative approval yeah they'll have to get legislative approval but we heard about kind of how everything is like really synced and how they're going to continue to you know how they're partnering together right now in that and then also um had a nice presentation from mentor Minnesota realizing that it's a relation you know if any student has a relationship with any One Mentor they find much more school Success as well as um thinking even longer career-wise and so um that was a a great report and also had opportunity to then have small group table discussions so okay any other reports okay then we will now move to the business portion of our meeting beginning with our consent agenda although board action is required is generally unnecessary to hold discussion on these items in the event a board member wishes to discuss an item that item will be moved for separate consideration at this time do any board members wish to remove any items from the consent agenda seeing none I will ask for a motion to appr approve the consent agenda so moved moved by director word second second by direct alt uh all those in favor say I I I those would indicate n the motion carries unanimously we'll now move into new business first item for tonight is there were being asked to approve an application for preliminary approval of an extended field trip to Malta for the Burnsville High School band and music department presenting tonight's recommendation will be Dr Chris Belmont assistant superintendent Keith French and Nick Armstrong both BHS band teachers welcome to all of you all right thank you chair Miller um superintendent battle members of the board we um as is uh customary and aligned to our policy and regulations around field trips um we have two of our fine Educators presenting about a fascinating and exciting field trip um currently earmarked for February 20126 yep hello everyone um I'm here to uh just present what our plan is if approved to uh do the next music trip the band travel club uh with the band Orchestra and choir next year uh 2026 in February uh the plan is to go to Malta um okay so you're asking yourself why Malta how did that happen and uh so what we do every year when we are start to decide the trip we um work with our travel company to present five six um cons con affordable options that our kids can go on that will be safe and a great experience for them to learn about new cultures and to get to perform for people so um after they voted we we had five destinations we had Norway and Italy and Ireland and New Orleans we always include a a domestic uh location and Malta and the vote came down to Malta so that's how we ended up there I've actually been learning about Malta it's fascinating place and so I'm excited yeah any questions back to you chair for questions considering the recommendation any uh well first is there a motion to approve the recommendation to Grant plinary approval of for this extended field trip so moved moved by director whom second second by director alt now is there any discussion on the matter questions yes director thank you yeah very interesting location um I actually I needed to look at a map because I wasn't entirely sure where it was so thank you for getting me to do that um just a couple questions um which volunteer opportunities do not require the students uh parent to be present are there opport opportunities like that sure um so for fundraising you're talking for fundraising so um we've done four do you want to talk about yeah we've had um two fund we we've done two fundraisers so far this year um that have not just required the students to work on their own so first we did a fundrais genius fundraiser um and fundrais genius is a company that works um just with music groups and um basically it's a GoFundMe type fundraiser where students built um they just created a login and um uploaded a profile picture and then we as directors provided them with um pictures of our students performing and things like that and they build a nice web page and students enter emails of potential donors and then those emails go go out when we hit the go button on the fundraiser and then people can either donate or not donate so it's just a chance for um people to provide cash donations um and students take home 85% of the profits which um is much higher than most brick and mortar fundraisers where you're selling items um but that being said we did also do a droy moose fundraiser that just wrapped up last week and um that brought in a good amount of money as well for students that they can use towards um the trip and then we will be starting a pamper Chef fundraiser that was approved um towards the end of this month that one is completely online um which is really nice because students can forward to people who are interested in purchasing um and then all the goods will be delivered directly to the um the the their customers houses um just by mail so um it doesn't require students to do a tongue other than to just share it with people who might be interested um and then we're also going to sell bugger braids delicious bugger braids um towards the end of January February so they just come as raw dough and bake them and they are delicious so those four fundraisers are fundraisers we're doing this year um and then we'll likely run a lot of those same fundraisers next year as well um all of those proceeds can go towards this trip um if the students so choose right and I think you're kind of alluding to we also do one other we give the students the opportunity um this place called achieving dreams where they work uh concessions at local sporting events at the big stadiums and stuff and that's a very that's a really lucrative one but it doesn't they do have to have a parent present to work on that one but um we want to give them as many opportunities as possible to that's awesome whatever they're whenever their best cases and appreciate the addition of the go GoFundMe site yeah fundraise genius just you know just nice for families to be able to make that donation rather than to feel like they have to purchase something that whether they want it or not just give them money cuz that's really what the kids's looking for um and then just a question on the logistics of the travel It's seems kind of unusual to have them fly out of Minneapolis and then land in Chicago when they come back and have a coat tried home can you elaborate on how that happened um the is far as I understand it it's just that that's where the plane goes on that day the closest one is Chicago oh to get us home so um it will in the kids did know that when they voted on it so this isn't a surprise going to be a big surprise to them but um so yeah so we'll be flying back into Chicago and then busing home oh glad they knew about that that's that's awesome thank you yep it was yeah he was talked a lot about that any other questions or comments yes um I appreciate the detail for this trip it was very detailed so I I appreciate that and then um oh's my other question oh so the fundraisers that you mentioned they're like group fundraisers so you would just split the money and then they also have fundraisers that they do individually so our fundraisers um for all of our students we always the the fundra the money that goes in goes into our ban Student Activities account um and then we have start we've been tracking it with a system previously called charms but charms has now changed to cut time um so we're using a a management tracker to track the funds that each student earns so when I got the detailed report of fundraiser genius we got one kind of blanket check for the music program but then we went into fundrais genius and added that to each student's individual student accounts so yeah so when uh when we do a fundraiser the money goes directly back to the students to use for their whatever they would like to use that for and they don't have to use it for a trip they could also use it for their a marching band fee or something so or to buy reads or whatever they need so so it's so while a lot of students do use their money for their trip some students use that money for a winter drum line fee or uh they're going to buy their reads with that or so okay thank you any any questions or comments um this sounds like a great trip um because I think it's every two years the band goes right and CU so they the frequency is a little infrequent and there's been a little confusion in the past I think the point about the fundraising we want to make sure and this isn't just for you guys it's in general statement this board is adamant of in the support of these kind of trips we believe they're highly educational and know a excellent experience for the students but it is an underlining requirement for this to continue in the future that every student when we do this every student has the opportunity to fundraise their way onto the trip and that they're not they don't need to come out of pocket that makes sure that no matter what background they come from they're able to go on this trip with with their fellow classmates so I just want to be very clear about that that's our we trust you guys know and understand that and we'll we'll we'll drive towards that purpose so and we love that we are um we're always working towards that and we do have several students that will fund raise their way onto the trip good excellent well thank you very much oh we have to take the vote don't we um having had that discussion all those in favor for the motion in front of us indicate so by saying I I oose nay the motion carries unanimously thank you very much thank you all right next we remain asked to adopt a resolution to accept donations presenting this resolution will be superintendent Dr battle thank you chair Miller members of the board I want to first to say thank you to the many Community organizations and partners that support education and ISD 19 191 I am so grateful for their support and generosity included in this quarter's donation report you will find many ways Our Community Partners support us donation of fresh produ produce from Cub Foods school supplies from Prince of Peace church nearly 1,000 backpacks and school supplies from Costco and Toyota Kids in Need Foundation school supplies from the Lions Club Burnsville women of today dig key and community members donations to food and nutrition services from former students and staff it is my recommendation that the Board of Education adopt the resolution to approve and accept these donations to our district in accordance with our school board policy and Minnesota statutes and to permit their use as designated by the donors is there a motion to adopt the resolution to accept donations as presented so moved was that director and second uh any discussion on the matter second by director Chester sorry you didn't hear me any discussion on the matter just had a question yes um so at the bottom it says total donations $254 55 but looking above that it obviously is more more than that so that's just the cash donations so we're not we don't include a monetary value for the 400 backpacks or the $500 Costco gift card or yeah just that's just the cash so we can probably put that at Cash total donations yeah okay any other well again um you know on behalf of the board thank you to our entire Community for the support it provides this continuously um having been moved in second and this resolution will require a roll call vote so in just a second I will ask Sarah to call the role and when she calls your name please respond with either an i a i if they are in favor or a if you're opposed Sarah will you please make the Roll Call director Hume I director Chester I director Connor I chair Miller I director BB I director Marcel I and director Al I this resolution was declared duly passed and adopted next we're going to be asked to approve the Minnesota State High School league Foundation Grant a the recommendation will be presented by Dr Chris Belmont assistant superintendent thank you chair Miller um in uh partnership and with the guidance of athletic director um Kleiner uh presenting to you this um Foundation Grant a application for the Minnesota State High School league this is um something that we typically do present to the board annually um it seeks to provide uh the opportunity for more students in the Minesota State High School league and in our school district to be able to participate through this grant um these grants are an excellent way to recognize I the value of student participation and um how its extracurricular activities are connected to thriving academics um so my recommendation is that the Board of Education approve the ISD 191 application to the Minnesota State High School league Foundation Grant a to offset Student Activity fees is there a motion to approve the Minnesota State High School league Foundation Grant so moved moved by director WB second second by director Connor is there any discussion all those in favor say I I oppos nay the motion carries unanimously thank you next up on the agenda we are been asked to approve on a first reading basis changes to policies 516 student medication 521 student disability non-discrimination 535 service animals in school and 608 instructional Services special education presenting this recommendation will be Amy patoski director of student Support Services welcome thank you good evening chair Miller Dr battle and members of the board I am here to bring up or to bring forward to the first reading basis changes to policies 516 which adds new statutory provisions and rearranges sections for clarity policy 521 that updates the statutory um definition of the Disability Policy 535 service animals in the school it adds protections to persons with disabilities and policy 608 instructional services for special education this adds um child with disability provisions and also some evaluation standards that were completed by the legislation um these policies were reviewed by the policy Review Committee on October 22nd 2024 is there a motion to approve these policies so moved by director hum second second by director Chester is there any discussion all those in favor say I I oos n the motion carries unanimously thank you in our final item under new business we are being asked to approve on a first reading basis changes to policy 532 use of peace officers and crisis teams to remove students with IEPs from school grounds assistant superintendent Dr Belmont will be presenting this recommendation welcome back Dr Belmont thank you chair um policy 532 use of peace officers and crisis teams to remove students with IEPs from school grounds um this is a change to policy that is in response we've had several changes to policy in response to the 2023 legislative session um with specific language around uh school resource officers um this policy was reviewed and um recommended in partnership with uh director petski as well as our um School staff and then presented to the policy Review Committee um meeting on October 22nd it yes sending it back to you is there a motion to approve changes to policy 532 so moved moved by director Connor second second by director WB is there any discussion on the matter I'll just acknowledge this is the end of a long Road appreciate to be there thank you all those in favor say I I oppose nay the motion carries unanimously thank you this concludes the business portion of our meeting tonight up next on our agenda is couple work sessions to discuss long range facility planning and the audit report before starting this work session I move we take a brief recess and return to the dayis at 8:20 to begin our work session is there a second second moved by myself and second I'm sorry was that all yes sir all those in favor say I I oppose nay the motion carries unanimously please return to the DAT at 8:20 think that whole table e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e back everyone the final item on our agenda is to hold a work session to discuss long range facility planning and one on audit on the audit report I will now turn it over to superintendent battle to start things off thank you chair Miller so tonight I'd like to First ground Us in why this discussion now um so recently we had a closed session on Safety and Security a work session to discuss the use of open facility sales proceeds um just refresh everyone's memory about the dec Outlaw outlot sold on September 30th metf middle and Su Trail Elementary schools are anticipated closing July 2025 um we really need to take a planful comprehensive approach to addressing these and other facilities needs um going back to oh 201920 we had set our purpose and commitment for open facilities and so the next two slides are really just a repeat of that commitment so wanting uh uh feedback from the board is is still our purpose and our commitment um identify and prioritize needs for today that will provide flexibility for the future leverage and maximize our uses of funding to uh address the use and efficacy of our 191 facilities and then the commitments on the next slide are ones that we have had throughout the open facilities process um the next slide safety and facility updates so Dave Lake primarily has been hearing from staff um and we've also heard from parents of um a initial list of identified safety and facility updates some of them are structural uh to the front entrances to make them more welcoming um and secure um we still have open concept buildings so improvements um Dave will tell you um as you have seen we have some redesign of parking lot and parking especially at Burnsville High School that was done last year in parent pickup zones we like to continue that at other sites um Early Childhood um dedicated spaces for instruction secure entrances and the Enterprise infrastructure on the next uh Pages I'll give you a little bit more detail about the uh list um so the structural changes um as I mentioned to be welcoming to look at traffic flow uh regulate the environment um have multiple layers for security our vision throughout our uh buildings communication and then efficiency reduce the need for multiple dedicated Personnel there's some ways technology can really help us with that um efficiency um the next one is um open concept buildings so we really need to evaluate for a return on investment I theyve may uh it might have been the 50s when that was the big school architecture um it was open buildings um but we have so many different needs and changes um so we have some buildings with three4 walls so install Florida ceiling walls uh adding classroom doors um in buildings uh the next slide is a little bit more about um is that a cop same one oh the pickup zones I'm sorry the site student pickup zones were never designed for the level of traffic that we are experiencing some of you who have been in those lines understand um so safety this is why Safety and Security the separation zones improve Vision uh clear permanent markings and signage and reduce the need for multiple dedicated Personnel to direct traffic and set up um Enterprise was the last um one on the list um the secure entrances for Early Childhood Aid buildings uh so excuse me I'm sorry before the uh Enterprise is the Early Childhood so voluntary prek and project kids programs are available at all all elementary buildings our program hours do not align with the K5 progr programming um and we need to provide appropriate instructional spaces including primary age bathrooms for these programs with dedicated secure entrances and the last one is Enterprise um security cameras communication and Next Generation flexibility um other needs we have received um some of which you've had presentations from parent groups or booster groups about um one we're hearing is marage Center upgrades um so our theater as well as our band and Orchestra teachers have uh identified some areas for upgrades the athletic field upgrades most notably are baseball and softball fields you heard was it is it two years now since we heard from the boosters um and then the pathway programming at Burnsville High School uh future enrollment and instructional capacity and there's dated infrastructure and inefficiencies um so Dave lake is going to share how we um do projects now and then I'd like your feedback on some uh my proposal for next steps to go forward um and then Dave is here to answer any specific questions you have about all that he's been getting from staff and about several of these facilities so Dave good evening board chair Miller directors and superintendent battle so I want to answer the question how do we do projects now the majority of projects are planned up to 10 years in advance which is long-term facilities maintenance mde allows several uses for long-term facilities maintenance first deferred Capital expenditures and maintenance projects necessary to prevent further erosion to facilities second increasing accessibility of school facilities third health and safety capital projects or fourth by board resolution to transfer money from the general fund reserve for long-term facility maintenance to the debt redemp Redemption fund to pay the amounts needed to meet debt on General bonds as you are well aware some projects are unexpected um those could be due to enrollment shifts enrollment shifts typically entail classroom and space updates special needs uh our job is to serve the everchanging needs of our students ADA compliance or restroom accessibility for students with the disabilities are two common examples breakdowns and malfunctions mechanical repairs are ongoing with over 2 million square feet of properties in the district examples would include HVAC Plumbing Roofing mechanical boilers water heaters and I could go on all night listing more um another example would be changing programming pressures student programming does shift at the elementary and secondary levels from time to time our board members and District leadership are proactive in addressing the needs of our students when applicable we do utilize ltfm funds for these changes some major projects are outside the scope of long-term facilities maintenance such as significant structural changes which take additional steps in development there are several allowable sources of funding at play here we pay for the different projects through long-term facility maintenance which we just discussed I I consider that a semiflexible 10-year adjustable plan to replace and repair structural and some Capital expenses Capital expenses Divine defined in this conversation reported projects that exceed $10,000 these items may also include new roofs boilers flooring HVAC Plumbing mechanical another option is the annual operations Department budget this includes but is not limited to maintenance repairs General supplies equipment cleaning supplies and smaller sight improvements like painting roller Shades new marker boards things of that nature we can also fund some projects through safe schools safe schools is in place to equip school facilities for improvements related to violence prevention and facility security for qualifying school buildings security cameras would be an appropriate use of this fund special education primarily focuses on classrooms programming and accessibility for students with specific needs next reassigned unassigned funds as Dr battle mentioned with recent board sessions on Safety and Security along with discussions on how to use the sale proceeds from Diamond Head metf middle and Su tril Elementary reassigning unassigned funds provides an opportunity to address some of our pressing facilities needs lastly Bond referendums Bond referendums are one of several financing options for school construction projects school districts with voter approval May issue General obligation funds to finance School construction projects this includes new schools School additions Renovations related equipment and software technology infrastructure energy improvements and staff planning and development in many instances Bond referendums and unassigned funds provide the largest opportunity for longrange facilities planning to meet student needs programming Safety and Security in an efficient welcoming manner that provides future flexibility thank you and so I am recommending that in the next three to four months that I gather more more information so a much a thorough vetting process uh so for example you had one group for athletic fields to present their proposal I think we need to look at the other needs athletic as well as in these other areas to get more information from the parents of early learning um do a deeper dive um and then based on that information then uh develop the guiding change to identify the essential questions and then a process to a explore the priorities the options desire desired outcomes and then bring back to the board my recommendations for the priority projects um it may be a 3 to five year um some suggestions of where would seem most likely we should fund things for example security cameras probably should come from safe schools um but really for the board then to give us direction of how uh you want to prioritize um into funding options okay thank you right uh it's a workshop so we'll let our hair down a little bit here in a minute but um I suggest given there isn't like a burning question in front of us tonight I suggest kind of three parts one any questions we have about U you know facility planning since we have S Lake who's tolerated their whole entire evening to sit here for us so let's take advantage of it um and um I then suggest that we weigh in a little bit on the um proposed uh process that Dr battle has brought forward uh and then finally just I guess any um thoughts initially on but I mean I think that might be the last part might be a little bit premature at this moment simply because we need her to bring forward or you need her to bring forward information in the coming months for you so so but that's just my suggestion how we handle tonight's conversation but so I open it up to that I think that's a great way to structure the conversation okay I agree well then let's go questions how do we feel about Dr battle's proposed process I think it sounds like a good strategy moving forward I appreciate I mean obviously there were a lot of things listed as things that could be included so I appreciate the process that you've outlined and obviously it will be a pretty big project to determine what are the most pressing needs and when can we when can and should we do them and how are we going to pay for them so it seems like the process you've outlined will get us to a point where you will have a recommendation that you can bring to us and we can discuss at some future date probably not too far in the future but um yeah so I I think you're on the right track and the three to four months is aligned to the budget process and as you know your next um uh presentation is the uh audit of last year and so that aligns to the process the really prep us to have this same conversation as you're finding what the government legislature will do and right you'll know where we are with the audit and um I just when I saw this on the um on the agenda I started thinking about you know okay we're looking forward we also have to know where we've been and um I went back back to the baker Tilly report um that was uh commissioned by uh then superintendent amaroso and then Dr battle you moved that forward and I also remembered um Scott in a previous conversation you had mentioned you know making sure that we're judicious about where we invest our money um in terms of student need SL demand and so kind of taking a step back I think part of this process needs to start with a holistic view of enrollment um to kind of take a temperature of the water in terms of um space usage class sizes um given that the audit is going to tell us that leadership acknowledges that we should expect enrollment to continue to decline for the foreseeable future I would feel a whole lot better if we get a read by building and I I'm not going to bore everybody I have of course a list of questions um I'm not going to bore everybody with those right now but um basically confirming that um you know that our investment will not end up with a building in a building that eventually is going to close um the last thing that our community and taxpayers want to see is to have that happen um so I think you know it's it it has to do with not just enrollment as I said but also and and Baker Tilly kind of gives us the bakertilly report gives us kind of a general space in which to evaluate you know square footage by student for one right and as I said Dr battle I will I will share out my questions but um that needs to be the start so that we really know yep we are really On Solid ground with the elementaries in particular because obviously the middle schools and the high schools are not going to go anywhere um but particularly in the elementaries um that we're going to be so you know good going forward thank you for that and as you know the legislature gave us additional VPK M seats so as we're moving more of them into the building media that looking at the space and what the projected enrollment is for VPK um yeah that will give us kind of future Trends but as you know dist uh all the districts in Minnesota are expecting a de pretty much because they're just aren't enough placement burs it's Nationwide yeah it's Nationwide it's Nation yes okay I was thinking the same thing that you just brought up that I mean if we lose the equivalent of half an elementary school in terms of our enrollment numbers every one to two years you know it's been almost five years since we last had that conversation so at some point we may need to revisit that conversation and maybe we decide we're good and we don't want to make any changes but I think we probably need to consider that conversation as part of of this because you're right I wouldn't want to spend a million dollars on a building and then close it two or 3 years later and it makes your job a little more challenging over time right because we need to be Equitable with our investments in the schools right um and whatever it is that we're doing cameras as an example right to put them make sure within a certain time frame our schools are going to get those um so my question though for that particular thought is Is it feasible to be able to predict what particular building might we would have to look at closing and say we're not going to put dollars into that particular school I don't think that's possible and it might be a chicken and egg conversation it it's you're right we can't say no we're not going to invest in this particular school but if we see that one school is as with last con conversation of open facilities if there're you know if we TR if we're at a truly underutilized building um status that might shift the conversation a little bit I don't know I mean we need to the point is the data is going to is going to hopefully tell us that yeah we're good to go right right it's it's not a binary it's it's nuanced I mean cameras can be moved right right money spent on rebuilding a whole new gymnasium would be you know probably not a wise choice cling or turning 3/4 walls into whole walls or whatever but um you you you did have a slide here on other needs which highlight a few things that have bubbled up from the community without implying that this is now an please tell us what we how we want to all the things we want to do um how can the in order to engage the community uh how can the community reach out to you there's things not on this list not on this list that you're currently not aware that there are people that are actively interested in the future I think we're thinking I think we were quite successful when we had our parent and Community meetings at the three middle school so I'm thinking that's a similar process where we open it up to the community and have focused groups um so I just I think there was a question about what other projects are we it was a question I think from about prioritizing how do we know to do first what are we putting aside first how do you get to that what comes first so then I would I would so yeah I look at that invite the community because as you know the community use a lot of spaces through our facilities rental they may have some ideas that we may not get from our staff who's there in the day there may be some things that people at night are seeing since is going to come in the shadow of an influx of cash um I would suggest that those um those sessions be phrased as we're not looking to go how we can spend all this money next year you know um but rather this is part of an ongoing circular process of development in the community and what what is it that you know we can what what is it they would like to see added to the to the our facilities planning so I think that's a um great idea um to the focus groups cuz that can uh serve as uh informative too for people that may feel like um some buildings get more um improvements done than the others and stuff like that to kind of maybe tell them the why and um the needs uh for some of the projects of the past just to be transparent too so um I do have a question about like things that we already have that we are slated to be paying for to fix or update that are already allocated from whatever you know long-term facilities money we have to separate and say well we're already allocating this money we don't need to put the this you know we we don't need to put it towards like the money that we're trying to choose what to do with right now you know what I mean Y and that's and that's a great question and I appreciate the the the thoughts here because I I think we're all on the same page here we don't want to put money into a building that maybe down the road ends up getting closed and and I will say that um you know I see the same enrollment numbers that you see and and I factor that in as as I adjust the long-term facility maintenance dollars um you know most recently we two years ago we replaced the boilers at William Burn William Burn that was a building that I'm well aware that we added on to it's got I don't know the exact numbers but 550 for students something in that range um and then we have other buildings that that maybe have couple hundred students less so would I would I look at that a little different I certainly wouldn't hesitate to do something that the building needs but I may ask you know our executive team like okay we're we're getting close to having this need for this building how do we proceed or or or do we need to involve the board in into that conversation so I I I would agree wholeheartedly on on the the line of thought there I'd also caution it though U because I think anything that's like oh we're going to earmark maybe that school to close could send Community Panic oh absolutely too and and it's like oh so you don't want to invest in my school you know what's wrong with this school you know so it's I I wouldn't want to make an assumption that any particular school is being eyeballed to consider that you know and being very careful about that um because declining enrollment isn't just one particular building it's across the district and so just because you know so it's really kind of like going through the the process the last time it's really a a puzzle to make that determination and also variances and and open and you know open enrolled in right that's so we've got our we've got our enrollment and the the space usage how are we doing with managing our variances and our open enrollment so that building you know building use is optimized right that could be another thing that could help yeah okay any additional thoughts you have looks like some affirmation to your plans okay okay thanks thank you hanging around with us Dave absolutely all the requests we now pivot to the second half of our um work session tonight around the audit report um have introductions on my here yeah Nancy Tyler Dean and Nancy Tyler I recognize n Nancy sorry um with Bergen kdb welcome good evening chair Miller Dr battle members of the board first I want to thank Nancy the and the Bergen kdv team as well as our finance team for another successful audit um and then second or with that I'll just let Nancy go through the presentation all right thanks Tyler good evening members of the board and administration I'm happy to be able to present these results to you this evening so I want to start out the discussion tonight talking about the communications that we issue as part of the audit um and first and foremost and most importantly is the independent Auditor's report and if you would like to read this in its entirety it is in the front of the financial statement document but in summary um what we're issuing is an unmodified opinion which is the best that we can offer indicates that based on our audit the financial statements are fairly presented in all material respects so that letter does talk about responsibilities and other levels of assurances provided but that is the key that it is an unmodified opinion and then in addition to that we have some compliance reports that we issue and the first one relates to government auditing standards and those are the standards that we're required to follow because you're a school district in the state of Minnesota so they require us as Auditors to look closer at internal control and also compliance with laws regulations contracts grants other matters and based on that um we had no internal control findings and we did not note any non-compliance so really unusual situation we usually have at least lack of segregation of accounting duties but your finance department has done a really good job of segregating where they can and adding mitigating controls when there is some overlap so congratulations on that and then we had um our report on compliance in accordance with uniform guidance so this relates to the federal program money that you receive and we did test your education stabilization fund and also your federal special education funds this year we do that on a rotating basis for the larger programs that you participating you know that you participate in and they are required to be tested once every three years so that's how we landed on the two that we tested this year and based on that we're issuing an unmodified opinion on compliance and also um no internal control findings as it relates to that compliance and then finally the last official letter is our report on Minnesota legal compliance and this comes to us directly from the office of the auditor they're very specific as far as the statutes that they ask us to test as they relate to accounting matters and there as well we did not have any findings so no non-compliance noted so all clean reports when it comes to compliance and internal control and those are all housed in that separate document that you received the third of the three and then we have the communication letter which is a document in itself and in there we have several pages that are titled required communication so those are all all the things that our standards say that we need to present to you as the governing board for the district and um would be our tool if there was anything significant that we uncovered if we had any disagreements with management any difficulties encountered happy to report that none of it Strays from our standard language so clean bill of health if you will then we have financial analysis which I will cover tonight and then in the back of that document there's a little light reading um some legislative updates from the last session and then also the most exciting part new gasby standards so the government Accounting Standards Board is always busy and so there are three new standards that will be implemented in the next several years that you'll find a summary of in the back of that document any questions on those Communications all right then moving to the financial information general education a is still your largest funding source for your general fund so we take a look at the components of the calculation of that general education agid starting with the basic formula allowance so what we're presenting here is a 10-year history and then looking forward to 2025 I think the Highlight on this chart is the 4% increase that you did receive for 2024 so nice to see that number a little bit higher than it had been in the past and um going back down to 2% for 2025 and then the other part of the calculation has everything to do with your students so we have a lot of charts and graphs to take a look at those numbers then give you a fiveyear historical perspective so starting with your residents is what we see on this chart and overall like you discussed earlier declining enrollment declining population um in in both ways so when we look at this you can see that in 2024 versus 2023 you're down about 48 students so not a significant change in those two years about um less than 1% but if we look back five years you're down about 365 students or 3.5% and this graph is the same information in graphical form we all see things a little bit differently so nice to present it in two ways and this does segregate by level so you can see on the top there we have your secondary um pretty significant decline there that's probably the biggest area of decline in the middle your Elementary very stable when you look at 4620 and 2024 versus 4625 back in 2020 and then on the bottom you have your kindergarten and other also very stable over the five years just to clarify as you're flying the these numbers are um residential numbers not attending numbers right so those are the students that live within your boundaries that are not that are attending a public school may or may not be attending our school right but a public school so the non-public students are not included in those numers all right so then to actually calculate general education Aid we take those residents weight them by grade level which is what the top portion of this chart is showing you and then factor in that open enrollment and that's where the biggest changes that you're seeing are coming in so the top line of the chart are your residence so you can see that overall Decline and then we have pupil unit gains and pupil unit losses the good news is that your gain has been increasing but unfortunately the loss has also been increasing at at a higher rate so the net loss in 2023 was 2766 and that increased to 2948 in 2024 so that does drive a lower number and a bigger decrease so about 3.2% since 2023 and 10.8% in the 5 years that you're looking at and then similar information again in a graphical format showing that overall um decline in students served moving then to some actual dollar amounts um starting with your general fund sources of revenue so revenues were up in 2024 um about 16.4% or 23.3 million so a sizable increase there and I can think you can see a little bit easier in the graph um showing that large jump up so on the top in that brown is your other category that is federal and local sources so you can see back in 2020 before s funds before those education stabilization and the covid money that number was much smaller so what you're seeing in um 2022 and 20 through 2024 most substantially are those um covid covid monies in the middle there is the state sources um that makes up almost 65% of the total revenues and that's where you saw the largest increase so that number was up over 15 million for 2024 a couple of things contributing most significantly to that are the um special education cross subsidy increase that you saw which is a nice um a nice change for 2024 and then also the increase in the compensatory funds with your general education a so those two pieces along with some other miscellaneous new revenues um contributed to that increase and then on the bottom is uh the local property tax category and that did increase this year about 7.9 million uh with the increase in the Le in the general fund for 2024 which is the pay 23 lby all right then taking a look at budget to actual um so when we look at original budget you had anticipated $2.8 million increase in your fund balance you did modify that um increasing that expected positive variance um to 6.6 million and you ended the year increasing your fund balance by 16.3 million and when we look at the reasons for that you can see them in the far right category far right column um revenues were over budget by 3.4% so not really a sizable variance when you're looking at $160 million in um a budget two categories that had some variances first of all your local and County revenues um biggest driver in that variance is your investment earnings so last year there were some um unrecognized losses this year the market conditions were better at June 30th so you had some increases in and some unexpected money there it's really hard to predict what we're going to see in the market so conservative budgeting is a safe way to go and then the other category is your state sources um budgeting conservatively for that special education category which did exceed anticipated amounts and then if we look at your expenditures those were under budget so also positive variance there but that was 2.8% so again a very small variance when you're looking at that size of budget and really only two categories that show show some sizable differences first of all your regular instruction under um budget about 4.5 million related to primarily open positions and just some um conservative budgeting and then um the people support services that actually was over budget by about a million related to increased Transportation costs all right then moving to some um pie charts to take a look at where you're spending your money in the general fund so we have two um pie charts and you can see that the picture of them looks virtually the same so your spending categories were very consistent um from year to year and the amount spent on Direct instruction around 62% for each of those years so consistent there as well overall expenditures were up about 11.9 million so a little less than the revenues um that's about an 88.7% and most of that came in the way of salaries and benefits that is your largest expenditure category so it would make sense that that's what's driving the increase in expenditure all right next several charts and graphs take a look at your revenues and expenditures per student and then we also have some comparatives to the Statewide averages so what you see on this slide includes all of the funds uh and when you look at 2023 which is the last year we have comparatives you can see that Burnsville is over um Statewide averages which is consistently what you've been seeing um if we look at 2024 those numbers were up with the increase in the expenditures along with the decrease in the student serve so kind of a double effect on that change and this chart is a graph that just shows the general fund and then Compares it to the state average and here again you can see that you've been consistently above so you're moving at the same in the same direction that the state is moving at just a higher level um and the big jump up in 2024 we have been seeing those significant increases across the board so I anticipate that that average will also be going up and then expenditures a very similar picture you're not going to spend what you don't receive so um again above State averages and an increase for 2024 and then with the same information in the graphical format all right next slide uh we take a look high level at the general fund financial position so charting your cash and Investments and your total fund balance I think what's good about this one is that you've been experiencing challenges with enrollment but you've still been able to steadily and slowly increase that fund balance which is on the bottom there so going from 20.3 million um in 2020 up to 53.7 in 2024 cash is above that uh and the variance between your cash and fund balances are going to be those receivables and payables that happen at year end me pull all that information together to give you a chart that takes a look at the general fund operations um we talked about the increase in revenues and expenditures and that increase in fund balance and I think the positive to take away from the top portion of this chart is that overall excess revenues each year allowing you to build on the fund balance which is on the bottom so we have segregated all of the restricted categories as mandated by the state um there is a committed amount that you have set aside and then your unassigned number um increased about 14 million for this year and is about 24.6% of your expenditures at year end moving then to the Food Service fund this fund had a really good year uh so the state of Minnesota implemented free meals for all the students so you had a 20 almost 22% increase in your revenues costs were up about 18% so that allowed you to increase the fund balance in this fund as well so you were sitting at the end of the year at just under 4.2 million so something to continue to look at and um see how we can improve those those programs um with some Capital items or however you uh want to spend that money I think the the state of Minnesota took away their letters that they would send when your fund balance was getting a little high in this this fund but I think they're bringing those back next year they have increased um to six six months is what they were looking at uh we'll have to see what that recommendation is going forward that's something to keep an eye on and then finally your community service fund um revenues up about 6.3% expenditures up about 3.8% so um healthy increase in your fund balance here as well increase programming was the biggest driver in the changes here when we look at all of the categories of your fund balance those are all positive as well and that is not always what we see some districts have um struggles in maintaining those as a positive in um each of the categories especially when we look at ECF School Readiness and those programs and that is everything I have um happy to take any questions that you might have thank you um before we do questions I just I had a thought as we were looking at this we have uh two new board members will join in January let's can we make sure Sarah gets copies of these for them and then probably if they they can figure it out think it' be sorry I'm going to do this Tyler it' be good to meet him and go through the information in this presentation I'm sure they'll have their very comp Minnesota Finance go big for a little while but you can walk slowly through it there's some great stuff in here about pupils account and expenditures and stuff it's all wrapped up in one report so be a great starting point for them phase one and two questions for our auditor Tyler yep go ahead well it was towards the end but the Food Service fund balance is not something we talk about very often I'd like to better understand like what is that typically used for and having a $4 million fund balance seems like a lot to me for that yeah so I think if you look back to 2020 that million dollars that you had in your fund balance is more typical with what we've seen in history covid and the increase rates from the federal government increased the fund balances for 2021 2022 2023 was more of a typical year and then now this year with the state funding uh that increased went up again those funds are very restricted as far as what you can use them for there was a little bit of um expansion that recently on um some things so cafeteria tables those types of things but otherwise really just operating the Food Service program um is what you can spend that money on so new kitchen appliances those types of things um but not your not your cafeteras typically so that's new that you can use it for cafeteria tables and and some other things so I don't know Tyler you probably have more to say on that yeah so it used to be um you can only have three months of operating expenses um covid they changed that to six months we're right around that six months after 20124 so we're looking at different ways to spend that um most notably some Capital Improvements to some equipment the the kitchen equipment I mean that's about the the quickest and easiest way to spend that um I know like Julie has a lot of troubles feeling positions you know that's another um area where we come in a little bit under budget because um positions positions don't get filled um so Staffing is another area that you know if you could fill those some positions that would be helpful um but some kitchen you know the cafeteria tables would be an upgrade um and that's a new expense that I think just started for fiscal year 201 that districts can use um so that that would be a nice upgrade for you know um it would it would look good for the you know community and the um students to use and that was not typically allowed um so that's a new way we can use that um but it's it's going to be kitchen equipment is is going to have to be kind of what we look at so that money is not used for actual food supplies or meals oh yeah the operating operating Food Service yeah it's it's food food um preparation of the food um Staffing the food depart food service department all of that yeah and when you refer to restrictions such who is setting that is a state restrictions on that money it's I mean it's mostly a federal program so it is it's a it's um it's restricted that way so like we can't we can't spend money on um utilities um we can't pay for operations staff to clean kitens or clean the cafeterias because that's a general fund expense so it's restricted in that way um it has to be for really meal prep food supplies that kind of thing right and this year is so different I mean you had increased food costs obviously with inflation those increased food costs but the increase in the amount of money that came from the state of Minnesota was higher um so it covered all of that and more I've been meaning to ask about that so the increase the money that came from the getting off tangent a little bit came from State actually was an increase over what we would have received had we been charging for meals is that what I'm hearing I mean that's what we're seeing from an audit perspective but I haven't looked into the details Y and then you still probably are having all a cart um that students are paying for yep all the car is still an option yeah yeah I had a question um about the communication letter um looking back at FY 23 the audit included um first uh three significant risks oh and this year's audit added uh looks like one or two more yeah um can you elaborate on that I can so when we sit down and plan and audit we need to address risk and we need to determine where risk could be so we have two things that are always required to be considered management override of controls and revenue recognition so in each and every audit that we do for whatever type of entity those two things are always considered um misappropriation of assets just by nature is included in most of them so two years ago we were required to start putting in the communication letter and the communication to you as the board and administration what those risks are so it's not new that we've been doing that those are not not new they've always been there and then in the last year we had a new audit standard that said if you have significant estimates those equate to significant risks so that's why you're seeing additional amounts this year so your OPB your pension um you know leases those types of things are significant estimates so then by Nature they are significant risks so that's why it went up okay um and also uh Tyler um thank you to you and your team um this is just a glowing audit report and um your attention to detail and diligence um just it comes out loud and clear in this report so thank you thank you other questions or comments or thoughts no being a it's always awesome yeah glad there was no findings and you answered the question I was going to ask about the food service for Pacific pupils so all right thank you thank you for uh all your hard work the hard work and and hanging around for the remainder this evening appreciate that thank you very much sure and thank you for giving me some time to go over this and before I leave I want to thank Tyler and the team I think it's really a credit that here we are at the beginning of November everything is done and you prepare the um annual comprehensive financial report that's a big ask um and a lot of extra information a lot of extra work so appreciate all that you do thanks all right well that uh having achieved our tonight's um agreed upon items and having no further items to cover I now call this meeting adjourned for the Board of Education thank you