##VIDEO ID:ijxfRaHltts## oh they aren't physically turned powered right okay okay all right so um first up for the study session tonight is a review of new course proposals changes and deletions superintendent law Madam chair members of the board uh on an annual basis our teaching and learning department on the direction of uh director of curriculum instruction Steve oransky Works to review our course offerings to make sure they're aligned to current standards they made our students interests they reflect industry input and each year even though it isn't on our board goals that we're focusing on every course we make adjustments and sometimes those adjustments are enough to a new course Edition or course deletion typically in November ahead of our registration timeline we present to the board these new courses the public has a chance to hear about them tonight certainly live streamed and then they're formally approved later so they can be included in our Skipper log book and eventually registered for tonight we'll hear a few of those courses Mr oransky thank you superintendent law Madam chair members of the board we're pleased to be before you tonight and as uh superintendent law mentioned this really is a process that begins um at least a year before um for a number of reasons one many of our new courses are proposed as part of um new course requirements for advanced placement or International Borat there can be program adjustments and there can also be some administrative recommendations so uh they tend to span and some years we have more than others and this year we have fewer than we've had in the past few years I should mention that we also have had some new legislation uh over the past um several months last spring where as part of that the Department of Education is also creating some framework for some new courses to be offered in the future so we'll be coming before you as we look at adjustments to that as well but the courses before uh you this evening uh have been through uh a comprehensive process um we've had administrative review as well as Department chairs student teaching and learning advisory our parent teaching and learning advisory and of course we're bringing this to you and I should mention that as we brought this to our students uh as well as parents they provided a number of insights questions and uh I think the ratio between our student group and parent group was probably about 5 to one for the number of questions and comments from students so again as you just heard in the last presentation we really have engaged creative thinkers uh in minetonka and we always remind them this really is all about their experience in menaka so we're pleased uh to share these new courses as well as a vantage pathway and a few adjustments and I'm going to uh let Emily rosengren assistant principal uh from minaka high school uh share the details of the courses and she really facilitates this process with our department chairs as well as our uh different uh program leaders so Emily I'll let you sh sure good evening hi everyone um I uh know that you have materials in front of you uh that outline the three brand new courses that we're proposing for next year um each of them is meant to fulfill a need that's uh either not currently met or refine a need that is currently met so uh the first course that you have in front of you is AP business management principles um as you know we have really uh um robust programming for students who pursue Vantage and who want to pursue business this course would be an an AP course offering in business at the high school so it would uh meet the needs of students that either are unable to accommodate Vantage into their schedule or who want to just sort of pursue a one-off rigorous Business course um there is a really strong need for that at the high school uh we have so many things that kids can choose from which is wonderful uh and kids often want to try and do it all which we talk to them about um but the idea that there are students at school who really want something more than just an introductory class um but are unable for whatever reason um to fully uh fit Vantage and accommodate that into their schedule so um that's the first of our three new course proposals um the second one is band uh it's a little uh bit of a revision and a kind of change in approach from the way that our current ninth grade band runs uh we have enough students that come into n9th grade band that we have two sections of band so basically kids go into I don't know our one an hour or to um within that group of kids though there's a variety of um of students who want to maybe pursue music more seriously and students who want to just be able to play for one more year they want to get their art credit um and they are happy to be in band but they might not consider themselves like lifelong musicians so um what our band director is proposing is that instead when students come into nth grade band they can choose a ninth grade band option or they could choose nth grade band honors which would allow kids to kind of pick a more precise path for themselves but also allow the teacher to provide music for kids that's more accessible to them and more fun for them um so that the students who are in band because they like to play uh are able to play music that makes them want to keep coming back to Band and the students who do think of themselves as musicians for life are presented with more challenging material and have a better experience too so that the experience is better suited to the students that are in it um but honors band would be an audition only band which is new for nth grade um but there is plenty of space for everybody in band so there's going to be room for everyone in either one or the other uh the last new course is uh professional communication this is a course that uh that uh is is kind of meant to fill a need within the English Department particularly for upper classmen um this would be a a a 12th grade English course and it's meant to do a couple of things um it's meant to line up with uh our emphasis on uh the importance of the trades and the ways that students will need to communicate in uh in th those fields which include you know technical communication skills but also um presentation skills public speaking listening the kinds of things that are necessary for success in the world of work and and the world of postsecondary life um this is also an interesting option because it's different than some of the other English elective requirements it's not heavy into literature um it's not necessarily you know heavy into um deep reading and Analysis uh which is great it fills a need for kids who are not that kind of English kid but who want to take an English elective and do something that still involves those skills but not so much the reading of the great works not that those aren't in fact great any questions so far yeah Chris um again in our our student section we listening session we had um quite a few students that were in momentum and uh we talked about and always think about that um you know a lot more people are going into the trades and and we're going to need that in the Next Generation and really talking about this business class and maybe the need and I don't know if this could have apply to that but you know they're going to go out and um be a mechanic or a carpenter and a lot of those people are independent contractors and run their own businesses and and I know we' just added a um I forget the name of the course a a finance course maybe last year or two years ago like kind of personal finance and is this a course that could be applied there or or maybe looking at other things or I don't have the skipper log memorized and maybe maybe that's something that's that's already in there but it just seems like there's probably going to be a need coming through and love this and understand it's more for the global business side but um it sounds like like the skills you're talking about are the skills of Entrepreneurship and finance yeah um personal finance is definitely something that's coming it's a course that exists already at the high school um I don't have the skipper log mized either but I know that's true um and uh and I think that you're right I think as we think about the kids moving through that program becoming independent individuals right those skills of personal finance and skills of uh business finance are going to be really important do you want to add to that no I would just say that um more specifically the AP business management principles course uh you may have noticed that this is a pilot for um uh across the country uh so we're really um feeling privileged to be uh part of that and it will be it will not be implemented for next year fully but we will begin uh with some of that uh the piloting context so there's a lot of opportunities to really see what this looks like within our own programs yeah um the other thing that's just beneath your table of new courses is a reference to a new Vantage strand for fashion design this is a strand that's combining two courses that already exist which is why it's not totally a new course proposal um but it's going to blend um uh our fashion design course fashion design one um along with our uh social studies senior elective Global Studies and economics those two things coming together to give students who are interested and have pursued fashion design already opportunities to do more advanced technique some Fiber and textile exploration merchandising extended use of Adobe Illustrator so to take um that subset of students and give them um some additional work the advantage and then as a result of all those new courses we have a few title changes to respond to some of the music changes as well as really more accurately reflecting the courses uh and then each year uh this is part of a process at the high school where uh courses that have not run for at least three years are just Revisited to uh see if they still fit into that larger uh course uh pathway for students and uh you can see there are three courses that be removed um one of them being webpage design but the Tonka online version of that will so with that uh those are the new courses and revisions that uh we have for you this evening and um with your uh support we'll we'll be back to within a couple of weeks for final approval um one other thing I just wanted to share at teaching and learning they they shared that um Orchestra is already operating in this way that they're proposing for band so there already is an honors orchestra that has a audition process and that it's really worked well for orchestra and was one of the reasons that they wanted to do the same for band so any other questions comments discussion thank you both thank you um next up tonight we have a review of the audit superintendent law Adam chair members of the board I've had the privilege to go through this audit review I was it was previewed with our finance advisory committee earlier this week every Public School District in the state works with a third party to review uh internal controls and ensuring that we're meeting all compliance requirements regarding finances in the district so tonight we'll get a preview with Executive Director of Finance and operations Mr Bersa and our outside auditor of what they found and Ju Just as a little teaser not much which is great [Laughter] news all right thank you superintendent law uh chair members of the board for accounting people like us this is It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year um actually so uh yes we've had uh finish the audit uh the I have to first before I turn over to Troy and Grace I just have to recognize uh Jess hulet our coordinator of accounting and audit extraordinaire does a great job and we have a team that she supervises uh that is equally talented and and do a great job making sure everything is in just the right account in the right amount at the right time in the right place so um just want to recognize their work so with that I'll turn over to uh Troy and Grace to introduce themselves and and you have the con you go thanks so much Paul I'll get out of the way oh that works as well thank you for the int introduction uh so my name is Troy gabler I'm the manager uh for the audit this year um I've worked with the district in the past excited to work with the again this here um and then Grace is really the project manager on the audit um our agenda for you this evening is I'll go over some of the oh yeah is this better I'm usually so loud that's why I was sitting kind of far um and uh so I'll go over some of the audit results uh she'll certainly go over some of the trends and numbers and what those are telling us and then I'll kind of end it going over some updates for governmental Accounting Standards um maybe to start I'd actually like to um second what Paul had said about Jess and the team this is one of the easier districts for us to work with from a kind of a process standpoint uh we do have good planning processes with the district where we talk about processes controls procedures for upand cominging kind of standards that are getting implemented uh and then they put controls in place and then by the time we get around to the audit things go quite smoothly um and that is really what is going to play into a lot of the posit POS results that um we've alluded to so uh maybe to start we do have a you got the left hand yes okay um so for audit results uh we do take a risk based audit approach we do try to focus on the areas that do have risk um we look at common areas that there's fraud in the industry we look at where we're seeing it at different districts uh we take that approach throughout the entire audit process including any of the single federal audits that we do um and we certainly meet with members of the board management each year to get your thoughts and incorporate that into the plan as well as a result of that process um our audit opinion we issued is clean or unmodified that's the best type of opinion you can issue on a financial report it doesn't sound that great but that is the best um you wouldn't want a modified or an adverse opinion uh this essentially means we're able to support everything we tested we didn't run into anything where we couldn't get a reasonable mod of support to say yes this number is correct um the accounting for this was done properly yellow book compliance this is just the result of you being a government we have to look for if you violated any laws regulations for contracts or grants that would have a significant impact we didn't note any of those and then internal controls uh we don't have any internal control issues that would rise to the level of a material weakness which means a number was materially incorrect or a significant deficiency would which would be think like an internal control item that if it doesn't go well or continues the way it is potentially could lead to a material issue um it's quite rare for us not to have either of those or one or a couple of those for a district the size um so I would say that that is commendable and really reflective of the proactive approach to controls that the district appears to take right and then for the single audit we do not have any recommendations or findings here either um we take an approach using uh the compliance supplement gives us a kind of a nice list of things that we need to be looking at uh from allowability to um reporting procurement and for every single thing we test we have to make sure controls are documented over that we didn't find any issues with that um that is also quite uncommon usually there are procurement issues and time and effort issues that we see at Minnesota school districts and then Yellowbook compliance findings this is really getting at U Minnesota legal compliance uh this is a bunch of guides we have to go through to test say um specific laws that the state requires for all audits um often times you'll see you know prompt payment of bills pop up here um or other things with like bids and quotes we didn't run into any issues this year any questions on audit results all right um the general fund balance activity uh this graph uh certainly important when you're looking at kind of running the budget and management of a district um fun balance is essentially what you have left at the end of the year um or maybe kind of your contingency plan if you have unexpected expenditures uh or anything like that so unassigned fund balance you can see at the end of 2024 ended at 10 uh 27% of the annual expenditures and total fund balance for the general fund was at just under 133% so about six weeks of operations um obviously you guys have budgeted spend Downs of those from year to year something to watch as you get close to that 10% range um which I'm sure you're factoring into budgets and whatnot going forward and then uh we also have the change in enrollment from 2015 to 2024 uh you can see that this is a very strong um enrollment for a district that is as mature as minetonka due to kind of the improvements of the buildings and the increased capacity that you've been able to create uh that's not something you often see with um districts that are a little bit more mature a lot of times you see stagnant or decreasing enrollment which certainly you could face in coming years um but obviously it helps with from a budgeting and growth standpoint to not have to deal with that all right I will turn it over to Grace to go over some of the financial numbers and graphs um and then I'll come back and help you with the standards uh this is a summary of the general fund expenditures by object code we have presented here the final budget for each of those object codes that we then compare to the actual expenditures for 24 for those object codes I want to highlight first that the district does an extremely great job at allocating the budget according to each of the nature of the underlying costs as you can see for obviously those two larger object codes salaries and employee benefits being very very close to the budgeted amounts that they have here with that being said total expenditures of the general fund were only 7% over the budgeted amount you can see here that the object code that was the most over budget was purchase services this was due to increased in transportation costs increase in repairs and maintenance throughout the year and increase in student field trips up next we have the operating results for the Food Service fund it shows the revenues and expenditures for the past five fiscal years uh to start two for the Food Service fund the free meals bill was in effect for fiscal year 2024 which made all lunches and breakfasts free for all students historically minona has not operated a breakfast program so as a result of this bill revenues and expenditures increased with that being said though the district runs its food service fund extremely well as you can see with expenditures being very close to in line with revenues a lot of the times you'll see at a district in the state of Minnesota they have a transfer from the general fund to cover deficits in the Food Service fund if this District were to spend more expenditures than revenues which minetonka does not have that so just another great way to say that you know it's operating its food service program extremely well um obviously this is positive as if there were ever any emergency purchases or capital projects that needed to take place the district would be able to do so with ease here's a a graph summarizing the total meals served to students for the past five fiscal years based on category so you have the reduced meals free meals and full priced meals as I said in the previous slide with the free meals Bill there were no full priced meals in fiscal year 24 the only sales revenue that you'll see in the Food Service fund relate to all the cart sales and adult meals so going forward there won't be anything presented in in that full priced meals similar to what we saw during the covid-19 pandemic when all meals were also free continuing with operating results we have the community service fund again showing the trends and revenues and expenditures for the past five fiscal years every year the district has continued to see an increase in traction in participation in its community service fund with more enrollment and classes being offered as a result you can see revenues are increasing every year and with that increase in revenues you're seeing expenditures increasing in line with that in order to keep up with the enrollment and the number of programs that the district's operating we did want to highlight that fund balance the past three fiscal years in the community service fund has continued to increase and that's just in relation to the increase in participation in the students um enrolling in those up next we have the balance sheet for the governmental funds for the district which you all should have copies of we've touched a little bit already on the general food service and community service fund but also wanted to highlight a few things related to capital projects and Debt Service mainly related to the district's fund balance here you can see all of the fund balances listed out for all of the district's funds uh like I said we just want to highlight the capital projects and Debt Service fund on this slide you can see for both of those funds that the fund balance is restricted which means it's restricted for a specific purpose or use so in the capital projects fund you can see that it's restricted for projects that are already set by the district as well as long-term facilities maintenance and then in The Debt Service fund you can see that the total fund balance is restricted for Debt Service so that would be related to Debt Service payments up next this is the statement of revenues expenditures and changes in fund balance for the district's governmental funds the previous slides showed the trends in the general food service and community service fund but again we just wanted to highlight uh in comments about the capital projects and Debt Service fund for expenditures you can see capital projects has a large capital outlay expenditure that relates to repairs and maintenance that needed to take place on the district's facilities throughout the year as well as AC related to the Vantage momentum building which was completed in March of 24 so that's relates to the capital projects fund and then in The Debt Service fund for expenditures relates to principal interest and fiscal charges which correlates directly to the bond documents for the district's outstanding debt this is a continuation of the statement from the previous slide it's just another section for the district's other financing sources what we wanted to comment on here is the capital projects fund there was debt that was issued during fiscal year 24 there was the issuance of go facilities maintenance bonds the series 2023b of 10,785 th000 as well as the certificates of participation series 2024a of 1,764 n98 so just wanted to highlight that activity in the capital projects fund as well this is the statement of net position for the district's internal service funds so that's related to the self-insurance accounts which provides health and dental benefits as well as the OPB revocable trust fund you can see that the statement of net position has consistent activity related to the prior year however there was a decrease in net position which I'll cover in the next slide this is a statement of revenues expenses and changes in net position again related to these two um funds in the Self Insurance account that relates again to the health and dental benefits um that had a decrease in net position this year due to increase in health costs related to inflation as well as a higher than normal incidences of serious illness claims so that's what related to the decrease in that fund and then in the oped revocable trust fund that also saw a decrease in net position related to normal withdrawal for benefit payments as well as a decrease in investment earnings from the prior year which you can see presented in that comparative column between 2024 and 23 here we have some comparative data from the Minnesota Department of Education for um expenditures of benefits for pre-elementary through secondary um education the 2024 data is not available yet but we have here presented the 23 data as you can see in total minona spends less than all those Statewide averages which is the column for all districts seven County Metro area and an enrollment greater than 4,000 students um I wanted to highlight that the district does spend a little more on regular instruction than the rest of the Statewide averages however they do spend less on maintenance transportation and other Administration costs so still Below in total the Statewide average and obviously we'll come Circle back to this in 2024 and compare that but historically that has always been the Trend with Minot tanka and that just goes you know to highlight the budgeting and spending that the district does and oh did you want I was just going to comment especially with the changes that have happened you know post pandemic um and just uh inflation that we've seen in the last few years it's nice to be able to see if you're able to kind of keep these in control and stay uh still below the averages so pass it back over to Troy to talk about exciting gasby standards all right uh first up I'll actually touch on the one that we implemented this year uh you may closer um you you may see there's a little bit more uh in terms of additions and depreciation uh related to grouped assets uh so if you did notice that in the fixed asset footnote uh that's really related to things like maybe laptops uh Information Technology um things like that you could maybe have some more furniture um it's essentially a groups of smaller assets that in the past wouldn't have met your capitalization threshold uh gasby changed one word in implementation guidance from 2015 um basically from could to should and now you have to do that going forward if it meets your capitalization policy so um it works just like any other fixed asset it's essentially just trying to capture some of that on the government-wide financial statements uh upcoming in 2025 you'll have gasby 101 which is for compensated absences this will have the effect of increasing the district's compensated absences liability uh potentially significantly now given that's only on the government-wide statements um and what it's having the district do is create an estimate um for think of like um safe and sick time or sick leave uh currently you'd only ACR the portion that would be paid out upon somebody leaving or um getting terminated potentially and you basically book that Severance portion that you'd actually pay them on that date and now they're going to say well let's look at the rest of that and come up with how much we think they're likely to use before they retire or leave and that will now also get booked and You' basically base that on historical Trends with retirees um or maybe people switching positions or leaving the district so will be a little bit more work increase the liability um but you're not paying any more than you've been paying in the past uh gasby 100 two certain risk disclosures this won't have a very large um change for the district uh you don't have a ton of risks that would have to be disclosed this way uh if you started investing all your money in one particular investment or something uh we'd have a few extra sentences and some of your footnotes and then come going forward to 2026 they are changing a few things for the financial statement um model uh so it'll change some of the mdna language that you see at the beginning of the report and it will also make it a little bit more um clear where we should put budgetary schedules so we move some of those this year and in anticipation of that um but currently there's options as to where to put those and that's just going to streamline where they show up for all organizations so but the information that you'd have available now will still be available then it'll just be on a different page any questions on those all right um and lastly we just want to thank um everybody for having us out to present these results results um as Paul said that this is this is kind of the time where we get to actually say hey here's the results of our testing get to share that with the boards communities um and so we always appreciate the opportunity to do that and we are also open to any questions you might have at this time I'd just like to make a comment uh related to the audit and just to remind you especially for the new board members your first time through um the Auditors don't work for super tendent law and the administration they work for you and the community so um their report is directly to you on how we're doing and the thing I I want just want to mention is that you are well served by Clifton Larson Allen they've been the district's Auditors for a number of years and they continually to send us very qualified account uh CPAs uh to audit our books uh they even though they found nothing doesn't mean they didn't put us through the ringer um you know so they really look at everything in depth and do a really good job in that regard so you're I just want to say you're being well served by this team but also Clifton Lars now over the years thank you I just going to say one highlight um of that is part of the reason we don't have the significant findings to report to at a meeting like this is each year we go through kind of an internal control assessment and we give best practice recommendations for areas that fraud is up and coming areas that we've had problems at other clients and the district is respons to that and always implements that stuff and that's really what leads to us not having significant control problems and I and this year EXA actually we implemented um a uh a new auditing standard the last couple years where we took a little bit deeper dive into your it um and you guys also didn't have any significant issues with your it either so thank you um I had one question so I noticed that there were reduced meals for 2024 what is a reduced meal in this um situation where we have free breakfast and lunch so A reduced meal so what that is is you have two programs going on you have the federal program you've always had and then you have the state program that is now on top of that and so you still have students that qualify for free and you still have students that qualify for reduced Federal meals now in this case when you have a reduced Federal meal the state is coming in and paying that difference and they're still going to give you the funding that you get for the meals same thing if you have a free meal whether it's free federally or free through the state still getting reinfored for that so um and potentially we could also update that to just essentially show the number of meals if they're all going to be free going forward um as as far as like overall compensation to the district it's not thank you Dan um just more of a comment than a question but thank you folks for this report and Paul thank you and your entire team for the work that put us in this position like I think uh I don't know much about auditing but it sounds like a cleaner unmodified opinion is pretty great and I think that um the folks in the community the folks who help fund our district should have a lot of faith in our finance department and when we're presenting numbers when we're receiving numbers at the board be they positive be they negative or posing challenges to us I think we can all comfortably um be be comfortable relying on the fact that they're accurate that they're free from error and that uh our folks in the district are are doing a great job with the Public's funds I would Echo that especially that slide that showed what we spend on like administrative compared to everybody else and then to the direct instruction in the classroom compared to everybody else like that's a very powerful um set of data there so Patrick uh similar comment to what you've heard again thanks to everyone for your efforts I think just to bring it up a level of a abstract you know in our private lives we hear the word audit we all kind of panic like oh no I'm in a lot of trouble um I what I what I take from this presentation over the years however is that uh these clean or un modified audits are a way of Clift and Larsson Allen saying we've looked at the finances we've looked at how you keep your books as a district and essentially those books are an accurate depiction of the finances of the district is that fair yes that is correct because I I just want I want our community to know we have some challenges coming up but at least from the perspective of of your audit we should be comfortable relying on the numbers are accurately showing us uh in the books are showing us what's really true about our finances yes I would I would certainly agree with that um and then maybe one more time emphasize it's you know an unmodified or clean opinion is not so rare as having no internal control findings that rise to the level of material weaknesses or single audit findings um and maybe just in terms of the federal funding recommendations when you do have one of those um for the next two years it actually doubles the amount that we're required to audit so it saves the district money to have good controls because we're required to test less um and look at less um and so they just have what you call a lowrisk and a high-risk audit from a federal um kind of expenditure standpoint and minona has been a lowrisk a of for quite some years thanks all right thank you again we really appreciate it thank you thank you so much for having us um next up we have an mtss update superintendent law Madam chair members of the board multi-tiered systems of support is actually one of our Schoolboard goals and the strategy we use to meet the unique needs of every learner our district has been implementing mtss as best practice recommended by the state and common across the country uh we have a a report tonight from associate superintendent Dr Amo us executive director of student services Dr Christine Breen and director of no I'm just she's just helping us text support tonight I had she fooled me just Dr Leo and Dr Breen we'll be providing an update on how we are moving our mtss initiative forward uh from the building level out to the uh District level out to the buildings and into the classroom Dr Leo to spell for 2 that's a Windows there we [Music] go superintendent law Madame chair members of the board thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight and provide you with an update and highlights uh from Priority areas for our mtss year three action plan as you all know we've been at this a long long time starting in the 20189 school year many of you um were with us when we did that the mental health evaluation with Dr William all the way to today um implementing year three of our mtss action plan in Partnership um with Carrie we remain steadfast in our support for ensuring all students get what they need in our system every single day again this is a familiar image um it illustrates our mtss framework and it really also uh shows that layering and the importance of that solid tier one for all students and when students need more time more support or more Challenge and stretch we're always layering that on but that that most important element of mtss is ensuring that robust tier one or core as we we uh go through our year three plan there are four core areas for our goals um you'll see here some of the highlights infrastructure and support assessment and decision making and multi-level instruction and we'll be speaking to the updates um in each of those areas of our action plan so the first area is the uh teams section uh We've continuously provided you with updates on this but as you know a multi-tiered system of support framework has four levels of team that District level team that oversees the entire process and provides Guidance the work at the buildings the teacher teams individual teachers and SST so we'll provide a brief update on each of those oh before we do that though um we do want to just remind you of how those teams work together with the framework and that the data and information about students and their learning is really at the core of all of the work of this system and how we're working as Christine mentioned to ensure that the system is meeting the needs of each of our students um in those core areas so as we look at our district leadership team one of our core areas of focus this year is Fidelity of implementation this is again making sure that we're implementing um evidence-based practices at the classroom level that building teams are looking at the right data and looking at it in the right ways and that the district leadership team has measures of fidelity to make sure that the system is working um additionally we have evaluation of our implementation on our goals this year a self assessment was conducted by our district leadership team in August and as we go throughout the year we're working with the carry team to determine what are the most important areas for us to Monitor and what other measures or information do we need to ensure that we are fully implementing the system the way it's intended um additionally we are looking at system data and reviewing our progress analyzing that really looking at first and foremost the effectiveness of our tier one you know do we have 80% of our students demonstrating that they're learning at or above grade level and of those students that start the year on track are they showing the appropriate amount of growth and ending the year on track Having learned what they needed to in our system and then finally ensuring that we're providing the guidance and support that buildings need to successfully implement this work the building leadership teams um really have become more focused and more confident in the work that they're doing um we have our building uh agendas that we have provided for them that really follow the Cadence of the work throughout the year what we're assessing when how that should be looked at and what else they should be monit monitoring at their building um with that we have that schedule for that work to happen and we're providing supports uh for those teams so that we're ensuring each team at a common level is looking at data in a similar way as we mentioned at The Retreat on Monday this is a work in progress but we feel really good that we've taken a good step forward in this area especially with access to more data consistently um consistently in an easy accessible format we've had the data we've been using it but it's the access to it through the new educ climber system and then it's monitoring the building progress how are students at that building doing how are they doing at various grade levels in programs across student demographic needs or demographic groups and what are the needs of students and then making sure that at the building level they're allocating their resources where they're GR needs are whether that's additional intervention support needing more tools or needing more professional learning um the plc's then are those grade level and course teams that are working collaboratively really to implement our teaching and learning model um with this at the elementary level we're focused in the area of literacy as our core Area Teachers of course are also work working on math and social and emotional learning um in our content areas our plc's really have been working on refining and deepening the work of applying a true PLC process where we're looking at what do we want all students to know what are our essential learnings how are we evaluating those and how are we adjusting instruction to be responsive to those individual student needs and then that last team uh SST we continue to partner with Dr Alina Jong um from kry she's she's no longer at Kerry but we we are not letting her go we continue to contract with her um she has created Five training modules and what's amazing this year is these teams are watching them at SST and in November at SST we would have typically had a backlog of students that we would have been talking about but because of the structures we have been able to put in place they're talking about these kiddos at PLC at their Department meetings and so there's time at SST to do learning work to really engage in the learning work that Dr Jang is putting together and this learning work is really ensuring that we are implementing a systematic tier one and early tier two um and utilizing um and making database decisions using our data warehouse edge of climber and our early warning system prior to engaging in in review at SST our second area of need is professional learning and this has been an important element since we began this work um this fall one of our emphasis was on deepening uh the shared understanding of tier one and what that meant and what individuals teachers roles is in that instructional level um this fall we had an opportunity during our opening to talk about tier one with all teachers again and to help continue to connect those dots we also Then followed up with our elementary teachers through the K5 uh grade level meeting that we held during Workshop week um and really had an opportunity to just deepen that understanding and make sure that all teachers understand their role not only in that core instruction but that intervention and extension as prevention from students needing more support after the end of the unit or after after the learning is finished additionally our content Area Teachers so 612 teachers who do not teach reading and our elementary Specialists have been really doubling down to deepen their understanding of those PLC practices that directly impact their classroom instruction daytoday and their responsiveness to their students you're looking at a picture of our MHS teachers collaborating during the learning on November 1st um on both professional learning days teams of teachers developed meaningful assessment practices that were focused on Building Hope efficacy and achievement and they had the opportunity to work with Nicole diage um both of those days so that they could do some learning work with that learning and then come back and deepen that learning um we're fortunate to have her local and that she's always willing to be a support to our motanka staff um additionally uh they continued work with uh expanding their tier one instructional practices so we had a variety of sessions some were in common for all teachers some were teacher Choice depending on the level um but the goal was really uh focusing on how are they differentiating instruction how are they engaging students how are we deepening learning in every classroom additionally in the area of professional development uh our director of teacher learning Sarah white every fall works with uh the launch of plc's at the buildings each year we update what we call our One-Stop shop this is where teachers are housing their goals their notes from their team the assessment plans they're putting in place and it's a way for teachers to both interact with uh the teacher instructional coaches but also their uh principles on what is the work of their PLC and what progress are they making this year in order to help really support and deepen the mtss work we've created a link in there that gets them to all of these resources on the screen so that um it's both front of mind and makes the work easier as they're trying to coordinate and connect the dots across the areas and then lastly in the area of professional development is our work around literacy all of our teachers of reading from Early Childhood to grade 12 and sale um who teach reading have continued that professional learning um we've completed day three and day four of the five days to meet the state requirement so far this year we've really we're working on Multi cabic words and spelling and fluency which are great indicators of comprehension and really important to that transition from learning to read or decode to really understanding and being able to use reading uh to learn um additionally on that fourth day we focused on vocabulary and syntax at the word level so how they're putting words together and really some of that knowledge of of grammar that sometimes we don't haven't associated in the past with an important skill within reading um and both of those days in addition to content really focus on making connections to their curriculum because again all the learning is um independent of a curricular resource it's about best practice in structured literacy and then thinking about what are those applications they can carry back to the classroom and then finally we have worked with teachers on understanding the differentiation framework that I'll talk about in a few minutes as we move into our core area to assessment and decision making our first area need is tier one assessment and on Monday we had a great opportunity at the board retreat to talk more deeply and share information about the implementation both of educ climber as well as how we're advancing ing data literacy with our teachers um as we support them in accessing uh assessment data understanding it and then using it to make those instructional decisions and we're able to update you that nearly all of our staff has had some basic navigation training and then that we've done targeted training or customized training with targeted groups depending on their role and um if they're serving as a teacher leader as we continue with this area of need we also are working on tier 2 and tier three assessment and decision making and this year one of the areas that we've um been able to focus on is elementary math um and standardizing both our screening and progress monitoring in grades 2 through five um we have all of our schools using the same screening tools uh this year and so that's a good step forward all students took nwaa math assessments as they have for years this year though we also added our fastbridge automaticity assessment and automaticity is done in a whole group setting so it's not labor intensive it takes about 10 minutes to do that as a whole class and similar to fastbridge reading fluency automatis reflects the level of proficiency that a student has by measuring their rate and accuracy as they work to solve math problems students who were below grade level on the NWA also completed assessment called a maath which is in the fastbridge suite and this allows us to see students uh strengths and their needs by math topic and helps us guide um instructional decis decision making with that we also then worked with our director of advanced learning on this area and much like we look at students who need more challenge um and more uh push in the area of math we looked at how can we evaluate where students are with risk so that we're serving like students regardless of the building that they're in so it's not left up to are there more or less students at a single site but what's the criteria area and this chart really identifies levels of risk and how we're using or triangulating results to say how are students um doing with their math and then allowing us to determine what's the appropriate response based on their overall picture in addition to looking at risk levels we also know that sometimes students are on the bubble and so a file review process was put in place to be able to really look at the assessments and the work that they're doing day-to-day in the classroom as their learning State Standards finally once the needs were all evaluated our math interventionists worked with principles this year to identify which students should receive some additional Services outside of the classroom for tier 2 and tier three and the great thing about um fastbridge when we have that automaticity data and that aath data it helps really Target and align evidence-based interventions which is one of the areas that we've been working on as a part of our mtss plan um and so we also then can provide that intervention and progress monitor students uh to make sure they're making the expected progress as we move forward more of this work will shift to our grade level plc's um and we're continuing to uh identify research-based resources that we um can and should use to meet a variety of needs we also will look to expand this both into our early primary math as well as our middle school as we move forward but grades two through five were a great um starting point in the area of reading we talked extensively also about our elementary literacy screen reading um on Monday at your retreat uh this slide really depicts the work we're doing with our early reading assessments again using the fastbridge suite with our kindergarten and first grade Learners and how we're leveraging then that data as leading data to guide instructional decisions or where we may need to gather more information and do diagnostic work regarding um individual students and in grades 2 through five we're also using our fastbridge fluency data we're looking at needs um of students based on that data to identify students who may need again um support in the area of could be phonics and word recognition it could be fluency it could be comprehension and our students who need us to challenge and stretch them because they're at or above grade level already to ensure that again we're meeting those IND individual needs in the classroom um and teacher teams leverage their plc's to do this work uh in both in literacy at all levels and then our last area is multi-level instruction and the first area of need or the first goal was the district developing and implementing our district literacy plan um as you know this was developed last spring was posted on our website in the summer uh to align with MD's template for district literacy plans in support of that literacy plan though we also developed a literacy instructional model and this model is really meant to provide guidance and support to our teachers it aligns our curriculum to instructional um structures of whole group and small group and collaborative and independent time it also guides resources for the various uh areas and the five pillars of literacy and supports teachers in making differentiated instructions within small group and independent times helps put all of it together in a usable way for teachers and then finally this is the differentiation framework that was developed more as a flowchart uh really to create clarity about roles and the process you know from when teachers screen students to how they look at that data using the tools that we were just looking at to when and how to engage our reading Specialists um and when students aren't making progress how and when we move them through that SST process to determine do they need more intensive support or is a special education evaluation appropriate to best uh determine how to meet their needs and so now I will turn it over to Dr Breen to talk about the are this area of need as it relates to Social and emotional learning may you can take a breath now that was a lot of information um so a really large area of focus um in year three has been around seal um in in our year three of our action plan at the elementary level um a lot of the work has been focused on looking at our curricular resources what are we utilizing it um what are we um looking at in terms of understanding the implementation Fidelity across our systems our six elementaries um learning what gaps exist in student need what the curriculum is actually accessing needing um and um discussing what the best Service delivery vehicle is forcl minaton utili utilizes responsive classroom as a frame in oure in our elementary schools some of our sorry should a Little Closer um some of our elementaries Implement um responsive classroom more wholly than others um additionally social thinking is embedded within every Elementary School it is a foundation in our tier one we utilize that vocabulary at every Elementary School um and ovas is additionally utilized in our belonging efforts around the bullying prevention uhcl has historically been delivered in part through our health curriculum at the elementary um that said health is only delivered once every six day cycle at the elementary which makes it challenging to deliver a systematic tier one and so in connecting with Elementary Teachers Health chairs they've really been kind of voicing a need for um a more robust tier one and so that really led to kind of the next part of what I'd like to share with you today that we've been working on I've also been partnering I should should state with um Steve oransky around um the National Health standards so Steve has been working with the health chairs um because seal has been paired so closely with health Steve and I have been connecting around um that Service delivery um and there are National Health standards that he's working through with uh the health chairs to write new curriculum the Minnesota Department of Education Just Dropped a Bomb on them that um they will be coming out with new health standards here in the state of Minnesota by the end of the year so we'll see if that happens um but he and his team are going to continue to align with the National Health standards assuming Minnesota will align closely with those as well so St and I are working in conjunction together to move the tier one forward previously Health standards were a local decision and they encouraged us to lean into the national standards so that will be a change in Minnesota so this led to some Exploration with with needing to look at some potential other tier one opportunities so um as Amy and I have shared a systematic and healthy tier one is imperative um for an entire mtss system to function effectively Tier 1 is no different um another intended outcome of this this work is a standard treatment protocol so a standard treatment protocol um is a protocol utilized at SST to assign interventions in a uniform and systematic way to similarly situated students uing utilizing databased decision-making um middle and high school Seal Service Providers did this work I've shared this kind of screenshot the middle screen we did this work this summer and I'll share a little bit about that um in a couple of subsequent slides and finally another intended outcome as Amy has talked about Fidelity we are working with Carrie this year on Fidelity of mtss across all of our systems so that's no different for oural work as well my page at this time following the initial work led by Annie lumbar Benson and her small group team last year as well as Dr Ellen Swanson from kry as well as all the service providers and assistant principles from the elementary um this fall we have selected three curriculum resources to trial these are the schools partnered on the screen um and they are well underway in their planning and training of staff so we have created data assessments to be completed by staff before and after um as a means of determining the efficacy of the tier one we can also utilize fall winter and spring Sabers but we wanted more granular data at the class classroom level um we want teacher feedback we need to understand the ease of use with tier one tier one needs to be plug andplay so we need to understand the efficacy of tier one and the ease of use for our teachers it has to be able to fit into existing routines and structures and it really can't be an add-on we don't want our teachers to feel like it's something in addition to what they're doing we do have to consider our immersion our immersion is partnering with us in these Pilots we do have Chinese Teachers volun ering we have Spanish teachers and some of these curriculum resources are translated and some of the materials are in Spanish some are in Chinese so those will be decision points for us as well at the secondary tier one um in the Middle School specifically they continue to implement their priority lessons um using be good people through core content rotations and through advisory um be good people is an evidence-based curriculum and while they've been utilizing it for a couple years I know the middle school counselors are really interested in looking at another opportunity um Dr Leo had an opportunity to hear about another opportunity or option for a potential tier one at a conference she was at and so um it's with Dr Clay cook he created character strong which you just saw in a different slide um so maybe some additional opportunities for Middle School folks as they're looking to uh maybe re Revitalize their tier one um they also utilize tier one or Implement tier one through the health curriculum at middle school as well um I was just going oh as we potentially shift into the middle school model in 2526 if that moves forward um tier one could be implemented through seminar so that would give a really nice Avenue for tier Oneal to be delivered and then at the high school um Jeff and his team have built a a very robust All Aboard which he is very proud of he implements his tier Oneal through that um he also does it through morning announcements it also is through their embedded Health which happens once every three weeks depending on the grade level um additionally grade level counselor meetings one-on-one individual meetings and then his building wide culture you all follow him on Instagram he does a lot of social building social emotional things for for his high school staff okay all right core area three um continuing with this um you all had the opportunity to hear from Dr Ria and and Amy on um on Monday and I I genuinely cannot share how excited we are with this work I was saying to Amy I was typing up my notes for today and just um the excitement we have is maybe a little bit nerdy or just we're just very excited about the work that has happened it's been a labor of love from so many stakeholders and it is just so exciting to see it come to um so we shared about the early warning system what this means is that our counselors at our middle and high school receive emails every Monday morning at 6:00 a.m. I know they set their alarms every Monday they are so excited to get up and read the emails so they get four separate emails one for attendance one for discipline referrals one for failing grades and then one for Sabers around Sabers testing time so Sally at the board retreat you asked the question um how do we know who's using Edge of climber how do we know utilization um and it kind of it made me smile because it made me think of as I've been leading these groups and I'm sitting in front of counselors and I've been meeting with them very frequently because this is all new learning for them and I'd be asking questions okay did you get your email did you open your email what' the email say how' you use it silence right silence is not a great thing um so I just I would walk away and think they're not using it and then all of a sudden I went back one day and it totally changed they were asking questions what does this mean I actually can't get in I forgot my password can I reset it um this took me here this took me here what do this what does this all mean and then it was I don't want it on a Friday morning they used to be getting it on a Friday morning they wanted it on Monday and so in that moment I knew they were using it they were using it for something meaningful so that was an exciting moment so they are using it are we where we want to be no have we made great progress yes go to the next slide so this is a screenshot of what the counselors see so they get those emails which really then sends them in into edimer they have to actively go into Ed Climer this is an example of a data wall for an eighth grade counselor at mme this is what this counselor sees this is his roster half of it you can see um right here is the student this is the Myer over here is the teacher you can see they're very different rating right they rated very differently that's not atypical and then you can see this student this student has multiple tesion [Music] attend so that is what they see that's how they're reading it and then they have to dig in further just reading that doesn't tell them what to do they need to dig further so a kiddo May flag for significant attendance but they might have been on vacation then they're also going to flag for fails because they missed two tests while on vacation so just because of kiddo Flags doesn't mean we automatically need to put them in a tier 2 group for additional support so these counselors now have the resources those thresholds are set we've identified what those thresholds are and by we I mean principles assistant principles Dr Ria Emy and I participated in conversations with counselors around when do we want to be notified when do we need to be concerned about a student with regards to attendance discipline um and grades and then sabes we set those thresholds go to the next slide so we set some decision-making rules sometimes our counselors just want to be told what to do okay so I see this now what so we gave them some kind of guidelines so if a student has three or more minor Flags so a minor concern in any one of those four areas they may require a tier 2 intervention if they have two or more significant Flags they may require a tier two intervention I can continue to say may because it's not an absolute it's not automatic those counselors know those kiddos might call a family say what's going on they might be going through a divorce they flagged because of that um so these are some decision-making rules that help our counselors at their PLC have the conversation these conversations are not yet happening at SST you can go to the next slide so again this is the standard treatment protocol all of our counselors are utilizing to make decisions on students when they get those thresholds they're digging into the data they're having robust conversations at PLC they're utilizing the standard treatment protocol to make decisions on students they're placing them in the appropriate tier 2 intervention tracking data on how the intervention is working coming back at PLC reviewing that data and if that intervention is not working coming to SST to then discuss now what might we change interventionist might we change intervention might we move to tier three or might we move to a special education referral the next slide this is just an example this is Empower you this is one of our tier 2 opportunities that we can choose from based on Sabers it will tell you which of the four um tier 2 interventions you might choose for that student so are they struggling in the area of friendship you're going to put them in a tier 2 friendship group are they struggling with building confidence that's the you would choose for that student are they struggling with emotional regulation or habits for lasting change think of habits for lasting change as executive functioning we just don't use executive functioning middle school kids doesn't really resonate with them um yeah um but then if you if I were to give you the high school example it doesn't say friendship 10th grade boys don't want to work on friendship so it says like peer relations or um like sustainabil like um relationship sustainability something like that so it is age appropriate so the subscales within Sabers identify and support what tier two you choose and you can go to the next slide and this is the work that the middle school has done they have built out the entire year of groups and interventions and they call them waves when to start when to end based on reporting periods grades um Sabers times so the amount of work that has been done by our counselors our school pyes our social workers has been immense I'm super proud of them and this was just an example of the work and the foundation that has been laid and then them implementing it so I just wanted an opportunity to share how this work looks in the area ofal as we think about our board goals um today so as we think about going forward forward you can tell we continue to be very enthusiastic about not just the work that we're doing but the progress that we're making and Echo Christine's Point obviously there are a lot of a lot of people at all levels of the organization involved but we feel like we've moved to the teacher and counselor level and we're at the point where we're able to both provide supports and that they understand where we're headed why we're headed there and how it helps not only the work they're doing in their classroom but ultimately positively impacts their students and so as we go through this year um we'll obviously continue our implementation of our action plan we'll continue to refine our action steps um we continue to work with the district leadership team and with the team at carrye Dr Kim Gibbons and Dr Ellen Swanson as a support our professional learning with our principles in December will be around Fidelity of implementation at the regular principle meeting um we'll continue to look at what are our measures to say that we're making progress and that it's having impact on our system and on our students and then uh Christine and I already will begin uh that first week of December working with them to look forward to say as we complete this action plan this year what are the next steps that will ensure that the work continues to be uh continues to go deeper but really becomes institutionalized that we're moving in that direction that you know all teachers understand their role and are implementing the practices and the processes consistently so that all kids are having their needs met in like ways when they have like needs and so um it's good to be at this point we finally feel like maybe the snowball is starting to roll down the hill and we've caught some momentum and we know there's still a lot of work to do and we've asked a lot of our staff it's you know it's a heavy lift but people are leaning in and we're excited about it so happy to take questions or additional comments thank you questions comments Chris more just a comment U thank you for the great report and um you know when we started this work so long ago um you we could tell the excitement and it it really is uh you know part of the Future Foundation of Education what we're put putting in here and all the supports and it's really I mean you took all my analogies away uh but it really does feel like we're we're we've climbed this hill and and now we can start um you know all schoolb goals all goals should you do the work and then it gets to be operational and and it just kind of is part of what we do um and I know we're not there yet and we have tons of work uh left but it's starting to feel that way and it's it's it's really exciting and even though things have improved and we're seeing results already imagine when it's you the Fidelity is all all across everything and um you know and you have kids that spend 13 years in the district and and have all of this from start to finish and it's just really exciting and thank you uh to to you both for your leadership in this and I you can't you pretty much have to thank everybody in the district um you know it's it's a big lift so thank you don't be too surprised but I have two questions um my first question was so I'm not expecting numbers here but do you have a gut instinct about whether we are now catching kids that maybe historically we would have missed or that would have kind of fallen through the cracks like does it feel like we're catching kids sooner so that they can get intervention and be back on track sooner or do we not have enough information yet for that I think you know not having data in front of us I would say as we're working with teachers and counselors at the initial phases of intervening sooner and using data and knowing more about um what intervention will be most successful and that shared ownership of students not who can we send them to or what intervention can we put them in but what can we do instructionally to be more preventative or to respond more quickly I feel like we've made movement in that area I don't know you know I I think we're definitely identifying more students sooner I would say that academically and I would say that socially emotionally as well yeah I would also say the research around quiet undiagnosed femal um who don't flag anywhere else my Sabers has been a great way to identify or catch them earlier so that counselors can dig in a little bit deeper and maybe have conversations with parents um whether they need a tier 2 intervention or whether it's just a conversation with parents of have you considered um because it might just spark conversations the research is very strong that we often miss quiet um girls who often get later identified in life um with ADHD or Autism so catching those kiddos that was a really good segue to my second question which was um how is some of this communicated to families so you I mean we've talked a lot about how the teachers use it counselors um but how are parents informed or how is it communicated to parents when their student either needs um tier 2 intervention or if they've flagged or just can you talk a little bit about that sure at the academic level um teachers through conferences are sharing data and results and when we're having them you know work with an interventionist we're communicating with parents and those interventionists are then in communication with those families as well but I also think teachers are more equipped to talk about what they're doing in the classroom and although we're in the early stages of of that with our literacy work or in that shift with our literacy work I think that will just become stronger and stronger um as we move forward and then at the secondary level if we have identified them for a tier 2 intervention um counselors are sending parent notification home outlining um you know your student has been identified through saber screening additional data points um whether it's grades attendance referral really spelling it out um and we'd like to place them in a in a tier 2 intervention we outline what the tier two intervention is and then both um empoweru and character strong have parent information letters so we send the parent information letter home it then is an opt out process for parents so they're opted in unless the parent says no thank you um so we are informing the parents giving them information um at the high school for example we identified 60 students for the first wave of interventions for tier 2 um and I think we had about 42 come the first day but only two families opted out that just means the nth and tth graders didn't find their way to the intervention so the next week then I think the last eight of them did did come so we don't have many families opting out the ones that they just had more questions so making sure we're informing them in a timely manner that's really helpful um that was one of my wonderings was when it had suggestions for the teachers to use like for the tier one interventions I kind of wondered if there was any um information presented to families so that they can work on it at home as well you know for some of those things like the parents might want to spend 5 minutes at night reinforcing or whatnot so yeah thank you any other questions comments Dan just thank you both um I I like having not been in this chair very long I feel like I've already seen an evolution in how Edge climber has been being presented to us and the sort of data and things that you're able to pull in so I I just think it's it's very cool to see that Evolution see the potential that's there and I'm glad it's finding increased utilization thank you thank you both so much thank you um and that is all for tonight thanks everybody so so the