##VIDEO ID:SAKmXQ2Fw8Q## e e e e e I mean not many but like a I love you have 50 million people the study session of the Independent School District 535 School board is called to order at 5:31 p.m. on Tuesday January 14th 2025 in room 137 of the Edison building the board acknowledges this site and all RPS sites are situated on the ancestral land of the Dakota people and we honor the Dakota Nations and the sacred land of all indigenous peoples present at this meeting are school board members superintendent Kent pel a non-voting ex officio member and assistant school board clerk Miss Anne Kramer Miss Kramer would you please call the role here here here at this time we offer the opportunity to S the Pledge of Allegiance i al to flag the United States America the stands na indivisible andice item 2.1 is approval of the agenda are there any changes to the agenda second has been moved and seconded to approve the agenda all those in favor say I I any opposed the agenda has been approved the agenda and documents for this meeting are available online at Rochester schools.org assembly item 3.1 is a focused topic School continuous Improvement plans process 2.0 superintendent thank you chair Nathan um I am going to be very brief um and then I'm going to turn it over to Dr Peter Ruck uh who you all know as our director of research uh and Improvement and Gretchen acasio who is our coordinator of project management as uh Peter and Gretchen have taken the lead in doing an analysis of our current skip process or School continuous improvement process as you can see on the title slide there we're talking about the future of that process in two phases first what we're calling 2.0 beta which will be the process that we put in place for the upcoming school year the 25 26 school year and then the full 2.0 version of the process and the reason for those two phases is that this is going to be a major shift for our schools in a really fundamental way from the process that we've been operating on for the last several years which I will call 1.0 um we have I think effectively uh built the core infrastructure for continuous Improvement planning but to date it has largely been using initiatives and priorities that we have set from the central office level and the big shift which is very much in concert with the shift in our budget model that you approved last week is to be providing our sites with more support and more guidance in setting their priorities based on uh rigorous needs assessment that we will be uh working very hard to provide them with as part of the new process so if we can go to the next slide this slide is the only slide you're going to hear from me on uh this evening but it's the one that I think um I tried to put into a single visual the core components of the process as we're going to be moving it Forward at the top will be a limited number of performance measures that will be unique to each level of our system specifically elementary middle and high school and those will be performance measures that I'll be asking you to approve as the board and we will be bringing a draft of them to you in the coming months and they'll be common because those are the aspirations and objectives that we have for all kids in our system and so that'll be a very important board level um decision they will certainly be indicators of student outcomes but they'll also be indicators of school environments and staff uh well-being and efficacy so that's the top of the system the place where School discretion takes a heightened role in our 2.0 beta and 2.0 skip processes compared to the current one is at that next level right now we have uh set Improvement goals at the system level of statistical significance uh across the board and we have large grally determined the Improvement initiatives like implementing multi-tiered systems of support in literacy or deeper learning or mental health at the system level in this new system the sites will set their Improvement goal which is to say how much over a threeyear period do they believe they can and should improve on those performance measures those success measures that uh I'll be asking you as a board to Grapple with and ultimately approve then sites will also be setting what we're calling their Improvement initiatives the priorities curricularly instructionally in terms of student behavior and supports that they believe will take them toward achieving that goal now they'll have a lot of support in doing that and in some of the discussions I've had uh especially since the balanced budget model discussion began one of the messages I got from some of our most thoughtful principle was yes we need the flexibility to meet needs of kids in our schools but we want coherence across the system and we don't want to reinvent the wheel school to school to school so in that Improvement initiative bucket the skip teams in our buildings will will determine those initiatives but they'll have a lot of District support there will certainly be some that are district-wide initiatives where we'll say this is going to be something that we're all undertaking as a system based on data or based on priorities that the board will set and then frankly if we have a school that is struggling that either has got AOW low outcomes on those performance measures or declining outcomes or both there are situations there where we also will step in and be more directive in the Improvement initiatives that they will need to adopt and then of course you go down to the action step level that's right now where our schools have discretion in skip 1.0 is determining the action steps everything above that is largely what we have determined for them in our current system the virtue of that has been it has gotten us underway it has got gotten us out of the habit of a school Improvement plan being something that uh somebody sends in in October and nobody ever looks at I think skips are very much living documents in Rochester Public Schools right now and the skip teams are not everywhere equally but are increasingly uh centers of gravity for improvement issues in our schools but this is the work that lies ahead of us it's the next step and then at the final point is a progress indicator that is a measure that can help the school figure out how well it's progressing toward uh those performance measures so to tie the bottom of the graphic to the Top If the performance measure is ontime high school graduation in four years a very valuable progress indicator is the percentage of kids in ninth grade who fail to earn a credit in a course because we know that when a new high school student misses a credit it can have catastrophic imp implications for their progress through school and that intervening early with those students can make a huge difference over time in the graduation rate so that's an example of a performance indicator that would be tied to that big picture goal four years later of ontime graduation so that's a a glimpse of where we're headed and as you can see at the bottom of the slide kind of buried there because I couldn't manage to fit it in graphically it notes that the balanced budget model uh that you approved last week will be particularly focused on resourcing the Improvement goals and the Improvement initiatives and the action steps that's the budget piece of this puzzle and so uh John and Andy and the finance team uh will be working a lot with the uh Improvement team to make that connection an explicit one as we build out this new system so with that I want to turn it over uh to Peter and Gretchen to um share what they learned as they engaged in a pretty rigorous uh self assessment of our 1.0 School improvement process um um and thanks for all that work absolutely good evening so uh this evening we'll run through some uh details of the feedback that we got from principles uh during the interviews that we did in two different waves uh and we'll run through some of the basics of the proposed new structure that we are refining so the evaluation of our current skip 1.0 uh process started with uh staff feedback uh and principal feedback that Gretchen carefully constructed this fall turn over to you to describe sure um so the the um interview process for the site leaders really focused in on the principles and those principles being essentially the chair of the skip team at each of those sites uh the the sessions were oneon-one um intentionally so that we could have detailed and candid conversations about uh what was working what wasn't working and any ideas for improvement um with what they've experienced either at their site or their previous sites in the skip process within our district um we wanted to focus on also challenges and opportunities for uh the future so that um we could make sure we were addressing some of the common issues or challenges that we were seeing across sites but also making sure that we were aware of what was working and preserving those elements of the process and building upon them so not not losing or throwing throwing everything out with a brand new process um the scope of that was across all of the buildings so we wave one we had approximately 31 interviews with uh the principles and the aps um we had a second wave um that Peter orchestrated um in the last six or six or so weeks and then um those conversations lasted anywhere from 45 minutes to full a full hour and it really did allow us to get into the specifics of the site's experience with the skip process what their needs were um and and what we could do to support them through this new process architecture so summary of that Wave 1 feedback which was the the site leaders that I conducted um last summer into the fall it really emerged as five different common themes um the first one being that some of our um complexities within our district uh both in the central office and how we're we're architected through to the sites um was posing as challenge for the sites to really Propel their sites forward on progress to their goals um the second being um unclear progress tracking and definition of success so while the the goals and the initiatives and the action steps were quite thoughtful um there's opportunity there to really connect them to um a way to to see that there's Pro progress happening and really tying um those those actions and mechanisms through to um something that can be assessed on its level of success the third was inflexibility hindering the progress um and so this kind of touches on the the balance budget model it touches somewhat on um how we were defining our goals from a central standpoint and having um the sites actually just comply with that and attach their own action steps um that was creating difficulty in being able to Pivot or being able to adjust the plan to the uniqueness of their sites um so that was a common theme that we found um liit limited data literacy and the maturity of our data or the Mastery of our data tools um it was very clear across the district that there is an embracing of evidence-based decision making and looking at data to really inform um the instructional practices inform the improvement process um but there was more opportunity for supports in in understanding how to evaluate the data and really mastering the tools um for data evaluation we saw a similar thing too in school's use of uh Uh current research a real desire to do so but not always the best sense of where to start or how to how to conduct that search um the fifth theme that that emerged um across the sites was the challenges in our schedules um both including how we how we orchestrate things across staff and and teams but also even with our district calendar in being able to find time to focus on Skip and some of the deep work that has to happen in that planning uh to really be able to propel the sites forward and embed that practice into um the school year as opposed to just focusing on the planning and then sometimes having that be a little bit stagnant throughout the year um so those those were the things that we were really paying attention to as we were looking to rearchitecturing into detail on these so um this if you're interested in reading this does uh dive into each one of those themes a little bit more constructively um and and tactically to to highlight some of the things that um we identified as opportunities or areas that we could focus um to empower our sites a little bit more so I'll I'll skip through these so during this process while we're Gathering all this feedback we were also doing a fair amount of research on current best practices process efficiency type of stuff that uh exists outside of public education that could inform some of our work uh and drawing that into the process alongside getting this this feedback and some consistent themes for areas of improvement emerged uh yes and to build on what Peter just noted um we did take take a look at a number of different um Frameworks that were were successfully used in the United States we also looked at some of our neighboring districts um lake lake uh Lakeville was one example uh that used the mtss process as their framework for continuous Improvement so we we looked at how they they implemented that they looked we looked at their indicators um what their Cadence was and and we wanted to be very intentional in how we selected it and how we matched our our district size um and our needs with some of those tools and Frameworks that were already out there um what we determined through this process is that our benef our district could benefit mostly from uh streamlined communication and collaboration um and this is interdepartmental within Central as well as collaboration between our Central supporting departments and each of the sites um increased autonomy at the sites and that's really to um expand it beyond the action steps and uh allow the sites to tailor their initiatives to really focus in on the uniqueness of their site and the challenges that they are seeing as it relates to the overall goals that that central office is um guiding them in and at the same time sites were very specific that they really actually appreciated some of the structure in the existing skip 1.0 process they liked having goals focused for them they like having some of the initiatives identified even if there was some autonomy in choosing which initiatives to undertake uh so that it wasn't so wild Westy and they still could come to uh you know get expert support from all of us when necessary we really didn't find that there were any schools in particular that wanted to like have complete autonomy on the process yeah and there's there's a fine balance um some sites were much more advanced in their processes and their ability to execute on their goals and their initiatives and and for that they were actually looking for more autonomy to be able to do stretch goals or to be able to configure their resources a little bit more for what they were seeing and then there are some sites that um were maybe not so far along on on that Spectrum or that trajectory where they they did appreciate the extra guidance and the extra expertise on initiatives or um resources available for them to reach some of those goals so we we did see kind of a spectrum of um of sites and and where they were as far as like process maturity and so we we wanted to make sure that what we introduced would work for all of those different um types um better alignment of goals uh this has kind of multiple meanings here one is um some cohesiveness across the district because sites indicated that they wanted to be able to work with other sites who may be facing some of the ilar challenges and to be able to implement best practices or adopt um initiatives that other sites have seen as successful basically they were wondering you know what's the rollup how do I look at what other places are doing that I could then build off of or make phone calls or whatever it is in that and then the other the other layer of the alignment with goals is very much uh the the balanced budget model and being able to align their goals to the resources and uh being able to make decisions on some of their program planning um with the ability to influence some of the budgetary decisions or the resource allocation to help them get there um as the the process 1.0 currently stands um the skip process um was happening very much uh after the budgeting process was happening um in the the school year and the fiscal year and so blending in those two things together and aligning them a little bit better to have some of those um decision points um and levers at their at their availability um was one of the other opportun opportunities that we found um and then finally more effective engagement um and and this is strategies to maintain the staff enthusiasm Beyond just the planning sessions um there's there's particip participation in the the skip planning Retreats um that is met with a lot of enthusiasm by the staff that are participating but then once the school year starts we want to maintain that momentum and enthusiasm um closing the loop on um feedback channels making sure that we're incorporating what we're learning along the way throughout the year in in our plans and being um more responsive than just an annual look at what's happening and what the outcomes are um and so those those were the things that we wanted to focus on as we built up this process for 2.0 some standout observations that are quotes from our leaders if you're interested in Reading um some of some of the takeaways here was that um everybody for the most part thought that what we were doing currently um was making some very positive impacts but there was definitely opportunity to streamline opportunity to build upon um and to formalize and so um that that was one of the the unique things that we came away with is that we didn't have to start over which was good news um so in in summary of this this process evaluation um we did Come Away with um kind of our charge to improve the framework um to um Implement some additional supports and tools um from where we are now and instead of starting over we are able to build on what is currently there and um and implement it with much more intention and um migrate the the process to be one that uh allows us to have rollups to be much more data Centric and to embed um the skip process throughout the school year slow on the clicker um one other side note I wanted to point out here um as we went through this process is it became clear that our district is on um in a transformation process and it's I looking at other Industries I I equate it to a digital transformation um this is not a graphic that I created this is Harvard Business um it's the cycle of digital transformation but based on these interviews based on the analysis that we did and the evaluation of other districts and tools we determined that we're somewhere between number two which is data and number three which is insights and through this skip 2.0 we really do want to transition our district through all the way to number five so that we've make that entire digital transformation and embedded that in our three-year cycle of our skip goal planning and our annual and minic cycle of um adjusting and being informed by the data so I just wanted to highlight that in in a formal digital transformation diagram so as we look uh at the process improvements um we want to focus on a few areas uh to really build in process um Central to that is directing our goals centrally but um providing the school sites um the ability to develop their initiatives action steps and timelines um as I mentioned uh to much more um match their their culture their uniqueness um the the challenges that they're seeing um whether it's um with their systems or with outcomes um through that we are proposing to embed um data practices um and this is really looking at the seasonality of some of the data that comes to us the the screening Windows uh the the surveys that we get from staff the surveys that we get from families uh from students looking when those results come in and building our skip process throughout the year to allow us to use that data um near real time when those results come in to inform um either a pivot to our goal or have it um have it uh validate the direction that we're moving and so looking at that much much more frequently and with a seasonality of the data that's available and in some cases it's the other way around like we will probably move when we do our major survey from October until after the holidays with this new process um as it'll better align with the process itself and that's not a calendar we're locked into it's one we can Define our um additionally we're looking to streamline um our operational calendar and our hierarchy into a Cadence and a structure that better aligns with the the budgeting model so that um the site leaders have those levers of adjusting resources or identifying resources that can help support their goals and their their uh momentum towards those goals um but also working in concert with with the timing of um like our surveys and then also um looking at our title application process there's some economies and some efficiencies that we can gain by adjusting the timing and the Cadence um and the calendar of those two separate processes to to work together in that our our title schools will be able to Leverage The skip Improvement goals um to fuel those programs to um to attach the programming and the title requirements to those dollars and so it's aligning those as well it's also designed to be a little bit of two birds of this process can meet both the title need and the skip need simultaneously without doing two different processes at the same time um skipping the opportunity to adjust resources because we we talked about that but um the platform for skip flexibility throughout the year um the three-year goal is is one that allows sites to focus for a longer term on meeting certain um objectives or metrics um there is a need to still have small Cycles within there so that we're not tied to a single goal three years from now and suddenly our um environment has changed perhaps our challenges that we experience in a specific side have changed our outcome data is coming in and being different than we expected we want to have the opportunity to adjust and have small Cycles to evaluate that and um either replan or refine those goals and initiatives on a a much more smaller scale um so introducing much more frequent check-ins as it relates to um the the targets and then um finally um formalizing and further embedding data and our resource commitments um um and and making sure that we have more than one one opportunity a year to make adjustments based on that as well so if we need to adjust resources mid year we don't have to wait an entire year for a budget cycle we may have some levers and some opportunities to to change some some of our programming to have bigger impacts um earlier than our annual um goal and outcomes review so um those are the things that we're really focusing on introducing or building upon as we move towards skip 2.0 um and so all of our our tools our processes and our communication streams that we're looking to implement are really going to um solve for these things and introduce these in a in a larger capacity it's the graphic that's small and hard to read but it looks good so um I'll just briefly touch on this um and there may be questions that come up but um this graphic was introduced in the balance budget model and I've I've adjusted it a bit but if just to explain how to read it the rainbow dial in the middle is our calendar an annual calendar um you can read it clockwise um previous version was counterclockwise which I realized made my head explode I'm the only one who thinks of it that way so it is now clockwise um so we're looking at the calendar the Inner Circle which is the gray scale is our our budget calendar and the seasons of that uh the red um Center or the red Outer Circle is our title application process and programming and then the very Outer Circle which is blue is the proposed skip alignment to all of those things so programmatically moving the dial so that these things align because historically they have not aligned and so we've been out of sync with when we can make decisions and when we can make adjustments um and then you'll see the little Triangles around the outside those are some key data Seasons uh for our district and so um we want to use those as our guide to try to structure some of our skip check-ins some of our progress monitoring and our opportunities to Pivot on a goal or um resource planning around those times so that they're um evidence-based and their um data informed this is just a slide of that unrolled for those of you who like to view things a little more linear linearly um but you'll see they all they all kind of converge um at that middle line which is our fiscal year change um so the planning is really happening uh January through June and is in concert with each other selection of the sources that we drew upon um we did highlight uh a few uh one is the nine characteristics of of a successful school um this was a model or a framework that um got a lot of um attention it came out of Washington state um and it I know that it's also in MD's repository of some of the Frameworks that they that they point out five Essentials uh is another one that comes out of um Chicago public schools and then um Illinois actually adopted that across um all of the schools in Illinois it is another framework for evaluating the climate of change and what's going to make the the school Improvement successful so we really studied that pretty extensively as it related to um what we were looking for and then um just looking at some other General process Improvement um references that that I thought were particularly interesting as they related to um P through2 education um and then of course my own personal experience being in process in Corporate America for a good 25 years so that concludes our brief quote unquote summary well board members this is a study session where we get to ask questions make comments honder does anybody want to start Dr Cook in the um either circular or linear um overview of all these timelines and how they relate to each other why why are there two different prep and plan um periods for the skip planning that's probably something fundamental that I missed but oh sure that's because there are two different skip planning days that the schools uh right now they have two days that they dedicate to this one in June and one in late summer so what this is is it's noting that those dates will now occur one in February and one in May is so it's it's prepping for the skip planning is the skip meeting and then holding the um the intention behind that is to have preliminary planning when some of the preliminary budgeting um allocations come out and and what site budgets could be as well as uh when some of the key needs assessment data becomes available um from surveys assessments Etc so that would kind of prime the initial planning and then that plan would be Revisited after the budgets settle um for the next fiscal year um after some of the the final um data and assessment information becomes available the sites would get back together with their skip teams review that that available information and then solidify their plans um and and have a much more targeted conversation about action steps and implementation one of the common items of feedback that we got is that uh having the first initial skip day and planning Retreat or whatever you want to call it in February so it supports the Staffing uh and and finance component was great but that a later date was still going to be necessary because a lot happens between February and June and so they were going to want to have the additional day later to still be able to refine revisit make sure it all makes sense by then the budget's set that I two separate days can I I think what you're asking though actually is if you look if you look in January and February there's skip prep that hovers over January and then skip planning that hovers over February thank you for that clarification is that is that and then it's the same thing in April and May YES Prep and planning is that what you're asking for like why is there prep and plan together and then prep and plan like what's the difference it is and I I sounds like we're kind of getting at it but um yeah that that's that was what I was wondering about two skipp or tree days yep yeah two skipp or tree days there's really two two um phases the skip prep which is happening before the skip planning is the district's opportunity to do some of the needs assessment work and preliminary data collection um with the intent to Pro provide the sites each with like a data packet um so what are the survey results that we're seeing coming in um what are the assessment results coming in getting that information together to really inform the planning that the sites do when they get their skip teams together so that would happen in January as a prep and then again towards the end of the year in prep for those um site sessions so it's the district is prepping first so that the sites can do their planning second yes yes thank you m okay thank you does that answer your question director c yeah thank you wow this presentation is really valuable and um really impressive uh five of us were at a school last week for a skip visit and full disclosure it was last Thursday I didn't read this before I went but the principal there was saying just this that the skip structure is really useful because it gives us that structure that we needed and she said the the one thing that they were challenged with is that sometimes their staff was ready to move faster sometimes they needed more time and so that that probably varied from school to school and I am so impressed that rather than just showing up and saying you know what we got it done and if schools aren't keeping up they better just do the same thing but do it harder uh but the way you listen to the staff and adjusted and are allowing and supporting that kind of autonomy I find incredibly impressive really hopeful and my question is you spent a lot of time Gathering data and listening to schools are you going to be able to keep that up it's an involved process um we are in to build capacity in the schools to be able to um think in these in these ways to be able to self-report um so that we are able to do rollups and we're not having to um have such intensive um schedules to to keep up on that one other thing that we're looking to do um currently our skip plans are in like a Google a Google Document we are looking to um use those and migrate them to more of a spreadsheet format or or something similar ilar so that um as we're collecting the inputs on those we're able to do rollups we're able to do much more with that uh to to streamline the process of reporting and monitoring as well so that there isn't quite that intensive one-on-one um need to get the information that we're will'll be able to be a little more facilitated through some of our tools and I think too the longer we get into the process the easier the sort of two-way communication becomes um you know initially it'll feel like the holder of the process is coming to deliver knowledge on the process and that's not the point right it's to have a partnership through it and so as people get more and more comfortable with what it looks like and how it kind of plays out they'll be more and more willing to engage in by directional feedback that might not be as easy to get at first but I think it gets easier the water we go absolutely thank you so I I have a question this directly related to the abbreviated schedule but my question is if we need more Title One administrative staff in year 2026 where would that be in the budget maybe you're not the right person to ask for that I mean is it how much flexibility do we have in the budget and how much more additional staff might might we need that we have to look forward to you know take some from here and put it over there it would be outside my area of expertise I would like to defer a an expert on that um and Andy can jump in it it is more tied to the uh balanced budget model than directly this although title requires a lot of this stuff they require our needs toess they require your goals so we're merging that into our skip process which will be a Time Savings but we're also based on your decision last week expanding the number of schools that get title funding so there will be an aggregate increase of about it it really is to FTE that we're looking at and a reorganization of an existing FTE and that will come from largely title funding with a couple other sources we're going to bring back some coordination of volunteer efforts in the district which has had nobody uh doing it that will share some of that responsibility with the title um analysis because right now there's nobody centrally who is trying to do what used to be called Volunteers in education to be a conduit for people who want to volunteer so that's why I say part of an that won't be directly on this but it it will fit nicely with that so we're actually moving that uh process forward in the very near future within within title you have to do like a schoolwide plan and when it's not aligned like this you end up having to do a side Improvement plan and a schoolwide title plan and they're separate and as a principle I've had to do two and it's silly because there like the same and you're jumping through hoops and then you have to do this needs assessment for title and then you have to do A needs assessment for your and the timing is all different so like aligning all of this it really does save time and with the expansion of title to more schools the timing is like it's it's perfect like it's going to make so much more sense quick follow yeah quick followup so um on the the um unrolled cycle timeline you have Prep Plus CNA so I'd like to know what CNA is I'm assuming it's not certified nursing assistant uh I adopted the the acronym that's used in title which is a comprehensive needs assessment we're using it a little bit more Loosely in makes more sense I made that mistake at first too to work one all right uh I have three questions and it could just because I'm late to the party um and I'll just ask all three questions and then you can do what you will with them so my first question is around uh we're on the five components of digital transformation and we put us there between the two and the three so my first question is what's the hesitancy with applying the data because I know collecting data is not new so I would think that there's something else that's missing there if we have data and we haven't been applying it um I don't I'm I'm a little bit confused as to why we've been collecting data for a long time and we are only there um my other question is excuse me y'all I haven't had enough Coke today um I I read through the comments that were written uh from the different uh administrators or whoever you interviewed my question regarding their comments would be we have made much mention to the fact that there are some schools that have implemented this skip process extremely well and we have other schools that have been struggling with the skip process for me to objectively see the comments I would personally like to know are the comments coming from the schools that were struggling um in implementing the Skip and what their feedback was versus the schools that were thriving um and that brings me to my my big question because if we have schools that are thriving with the skip process not and we aware it's not perfect will need to continue to be improved upon but I would wonder what are the commonalities of the schools that are thriving and I'm not big on Reinventing the will so if we have schools thriving with the skip process is it a class size is it a location is there PTSA involvement like what are the commonalities of the schools that are seeing successful outcomes from the 1.0 vers version of this and when we discover those is there any plan to do anything structural so if if we see that as we've implemented this that CL schools with smaller class sizes or schools with x amount of Administrators or whatever are thriving in this process and the schools without them are not is there any plan to say okay well structurally it doesn't matter if we go to 7.0 skip without the structural changes we're not going to see uh the Improvement so have do we have any data related to that was my question the very first I can certainly answer about um data I think it's not so your point is very well taken I think it's not so much that we haven't been using data it's that the data that is available to us and its quality and what we have changes over time so for example with our fastbridge data the district only really got into full implementation of that about two years ago and so for a lot of our folks it's learning how to use the effective data resources that they may have only really started grappling with in the last couple years and when it comes to uh mtss and diagnosing those types of needs there's a steep learning curve in applying like this item of data to this particular instructional practice and I think a lot of that is where learning is occurring and it's not just RPS that's true everywhere um so it's not so much that we we have not been using and and interpreting the um it's that those items and how they're used in terms of best practice changes over time and we get better at it as we go so I I think that's how I would probably answer that question if if that helps yeah and I can add to that just a little bit the reason why we're not fully into number three insights is that we are still building our capacity and our comfort level in being able to interpret the data triangulate that data uh to have the right data inform the decisions that need to be made and and that's a learning it's a learning process I think for building leaders in all our and sometimes it's it is literally data overwhelm where we collect so much information that people aren't even necessarily sure which item to choose to that's when they contact folks like us and we talk through help with that and part of the process that mean that part of our strategic plan that we're working on now is putting systems in place so that we're working with the data not just at the individual student level but also at a classroom level at a building level and then looking at it at a as a whole District level and those systems weren't necessarily in place so it's building that and that that does take time and you're right data Rich information poor is like that's a real thing like you can have all kinds of things and just not not know what to do with it and I think they're we are building their data literacy across the board with the teachers and um administrators and believe it or not I've now been here for three years and in the three years that I've been here I've seen a big change in Improvement for the better across the board so your second question is it relates to um the successful schools and and sites um with their skip process and what are they doing specifically or you know is is there characteristic um I think um from what I gathered and and I can't speak to the details of like in the classroom and student outcomes but um as we look at skip 1.0 um many of the things that are being implemented for the initiatives are are really um putting in Frameworks um starting some of the processes um starting to look at different systems and and tools and practices and so the success of schools that are implementing right now um are very much yes we're doing the mtss practice in this way yes we are uh effectively running professional learning communities yes we're doing this and this and this and not necessarily tied to um the much more data Rich outcomes or or the evidence that we're looking to expand upon um in 2.0 where we're looking at our goals um actually moving the needle on certain things um right now our success for skip is getting these practices in place um and we're seeing that as success and then kind of our next piece is going to be um seeing how they're embedded and seeing what those outcomes are looking at I think the strongest correlation so far um and you kind of hit on it that we've seen is schools uh that have set up their skip so it's a very distributed leadership type of model tend to have been able to make more progress um and schools that haven't necessarily made as big a shift that way um maybe not as much but that's really just sort of an observ ation about whether teams have been empowered to go do more stuff besides just the skip team and how the school is organized it um and that can vary on a lot of factors how the principal and the team based on culture and everything else I think as far as characteristics of um a school that um or the commonalities of schools that are are successful currently it's hard to pinpoint that because some of them are large some of them are small some of them have multiple administrators some of them are Singletons um and it really is dependent upon how they're able to orchestrate with the resources and the time constraints that they have and so in skip 2.0 we're we're looking to provide some supports and some tools and some adjustments on those fronts so that um regardless of the size regardless of how many principles are in a site or the the resources that they have at their disposal that they'll be set up for more success the reality is continuous Improvement involves continuous learning on part of all the else so this will continue to be a process that we just get sure I'll I'll um just director white horn briefly addressed the issue of structural change fundamental structural change I think that was your third Point um I think as Mona just said I think we've laid the infrastructure we were not using we were not a data inform system three years ago full stop we didn't have a research director you know we didn't have any we've laid a lot of ground that is I think bringing us to exactly the moment your question says is okay now are you going to just uh Tinker around the edges or are you going to look at fundamental structural change I'm uh uh getting out to a lot of our to all our schools to talk about this and I will tell you this morning at John Marshall last Friday at uh Century also at Washington at John Adams um every one of these sites is beginning to think about fundamental changes of the structure of their schedules the structure of their programming um for example at centry they were talking about you know the needing to shift to a block schedule to um address uh struggling students who need intervention now there's a ton of homework and there's people in that school who would feel differently about it but they're having that discussion at John Marshall this morning we talked about the desire to have an area Learning Center an Alternative Learning Center in their building so that they don't have to have kids waiting to get into the Standalone ALC that has a 70 to 100 kid waiting list and um at Washington they were talking about fundamental questions of the effectiveness of core knowledge as a curriculum for them right now so I think the next strategic plan is all about empowering thoughtful changes in those structure those core structures and I think we're in a much better place to do that now because of these processes to help us make data informed decisions than we would have been if we just said just change it um so I think that's coming and it's going to be a really important uh decision for this board to think about how what structural changes need to be systemwide and what structural changes need to be site specific one other example that came up is right now in middle school there really is no credit requirement to progress from grade to grade to grade and then go on to high school this is a huge issue if a kid is struggling and doesn't actually get credit they show up in ninth grade and suddenly we expect them to get serious and that's a gigantic shift so how we also know that grade simp simplistic grade retention doesn't work can't just hold especially for older adolescents we it doesn't work for little kids but it really doesn't work for eighth graders so how could we add a structure that does require middle school students to earn credit to progress through middle school and onto high school that's a huge structural issue because we don't want to punish the kid but we're not doing them a service by letting them essentially slide through a subset of our kids uh and then show up in high school and realize that they uh don't have the knowledge and skills they need to do high school level work so those are some of the issues that are coming up and I think it's that's really the next work of the next strategic plan and I think it comes into the the structural changes at the building level come in when you look at that needs assessment because the push is going to be we're not going to do our staffing the way we've done it just on a different spreadsheet right it's you're doing your you're doing your um your needs assessment and you're looking at the actual kids in front of you and what do they need and what is your what plans are you putting forward in your site Improvement plan what programming do you need to provide for the actual kids in front of you what changes need to happen in your building and how are you going to provide that within your Staffing model within the flexibility that you have to help your kids grow and that's ultimately where where we should see success it's so there needs to be some level of flexibility and I agree with some level of like foundational like we know we know class sizes until you get below 15 class sizes don't matter so reducing a class size from 26 to 22 you're better off saving your FTE and using it somewhere else you're not going to see changes there so like we know some things like that don't make a difference um so but but that's where the real work is going to be and it's all intertwined right into this process those were really good questions and thank you um I just wanted you to know that where I was coming from thought process wise was that you know we're grouping all of the concerns together which you know it's the easier thing to do I know I was focusing on the topheavy but also concerned about the schools that are not thriving right so the schools that are not thriving may have more complex concerns that I just wanted to make sure that we are able to differentiate you know between that so it sounds like with the needs assessment some of that will get done um but my concern is that we do 2.0 and the schools that are thriving do even better right and we still have the struggling School who didn't get 1.0 now trying to catch up to 2.0 so that's where my uh my question is coming in thank you uh I've had opportunity to rethink my original questions uh based on input that's been provided uh I am curious though in terms of U data resources uh Dr Rock you referenced fast Bridge uh do you think or believe that uh uh the district has the requisite uh U software resources to uh adequately uh engage in uh meaningful the the the meaningful assessments yes can occur uh and uh presently yes districtwide yep and so this will not fall to individual sites to uh fund through their budgets no those performance measures are items that we already collect at a central level and that we're very confident of yeah absolutely okay thank you um so I I from this discussion it sounds like aligning the the timing of the skip 2.0 planning and um uh and implementation process with the title process makes a lot of sense given what the board has already decided in terms of uh its uh allocation of title dollars and so forth I'm I'm wondering a little bit though about the opportunities for family and Community engagement in this skip 2.0 process especially given that it's going to be happening earlier in the year um as a even a very involved parent at at several schools um it's hard for me to think about the next school year in January Ary of the current school year um and and I'm just wondering what if anything and maybe this came out of some of the um input that you already received from staff um could be done to facilitate the robust type of community engagement family involvement that we'd really like to see as part of this process um any initial thoughts on that I know that part of the needs assessment contains a family component about how families or will like the need assessment will contain items on family engagement how families are drawn into uh decision- making processes and that type of feedback um that type of feedback generally won't change a whole lot depending on the time of the year because it's not really about a specific thing it's just more about am I involved can I be involved are mechanisms for that and then each school now and it varies we talked about this has different different levels of not even levels approaches to engaging parents in their in their planning activities and it's a lot of that is dependent upon the culture the school has who the parents are where and how it all and so that can vary from school to school and we didn't want to step on those toes because if their engagement is working that's fantastic um so that wasn't prescriptive intentionally but as a part of the needs assessment and as one of the many different initiatives that I could see could envision taking place yes absolutely you could I could even Envision a family engagement initiative pretty easily under some of these things yeah and the family engagement is it it really is a vehicle um to help achieve certain outcomes um and so uh independently it's it's not going to be just some side um thing that gets implemented as a skip process it we are looking at integrating um that as a mechanism to achieve goal um in in concert with other aspects of improvement um essentially and and across the district uh we're going to continue the family engagement survey process and be intentional with the types of questions that we're asking and being able to directly tie some of those um those um inputs from the families to actionable steps um at each site level it it is going to vary and um how that gets incorporated into the school's skip um team and process specifically um I I think is going to be less um less prescribed by essential but um perhaps you want to note on that um yeah I I'm uh yes in the needs assessment and and and and will and I have talked about this a lot I'm not satisfied with our measures of family engagement um either the survey we give or or other measures like how many people go to step into learning how many people go go to conferences we need some better measures um um but for sure it needs to be in the needs assessment two other issues uh are the school Improvement teams and I know I got an email I haven't even had a chance to respond to it yet from Joan bkm who uh is our president of our uh area PTA really arguing for parent involvement on the skip teams and when we come back to you that will be the composition of those teams will be one of the things that will be uh bringing to you as we build out this process um I my personal orientation would be I would strongly encourage sites to have parents on their skip team requiring it really can also be challenging because as you said these are not people who are Educators who work on our schedules and uh who think about school Improvement in February when they're worried about focused on their kids and so uh requiring parent involvement on that can mean can you find someone who has the time and commitment and are they truly representative of the incredible diversity of parents um but it's a it's an option and there are places around the country that have said you must have parents on your uh site team your school Improvement team so that's one of the things that we'll bring you right now we've said it must include both general education and special education staff and then staff who provide student services like a counselor things um we could go beyond that and certainly the email that Joan sent uh I think is a important it it crystallizes some of these issues that we'll be thinking about thanks I would just add also that those are some of the more formal ways for getting some of the input from families but we also have monthly family engagement meetings that occur all year long so that it's not dependent on whatever is happening at that time we have different topics for every month where the families can receive information from the district but they can also give their insights to what's going on and that happens all year long what I think we can do better at is broadcasting that so we get more families involved in that in that routine of showing up monthly so we're not waiting until the end of the year to do the survey to get that information we're Gathering that information all year long and adjusting as the school year is going on so [Laughter] watching that's very funny I have a follow up on U Mr R's comment are those just for people who are listening are those meetings you're talking about are they each site having them monthly or is it District wide month District wide okay so each month there is one in the different locations amongst the district got it absolutely thank you um I'll take a chance to ask some questions um so if when I look at the cycle and I look at it starting in January and I I've heard a lot of the talk about Skip 2.0 I know that there's also a skip 2.0 beta that is kicking off even as we speak as I look at everybody in this room so how will what's going to be concentrated in the next few months to get us to a budget decision in June going to be different parts of the all of this um in the main difference between beta and 2.0 is time we right now if we tried to launch the kind of rigorous data driven decision-making that is going to be required to fully realize the promise of this new process the there there simply are not hours in the day that are available this year in planning for next year and so it is going to be a lighter touch needs assessment and planning process next year we will dedicate at the curriculum and adjustment days on the calendar the professional development days on the calendar to building out this process we will we will make space for it right now the primary focus at the elementary level is our curriculum adoption and win wisdom if we told them that they needed to engage in this now when they're overwhelmed with that similarly there are uh similar um priorities that are occupying the bandwidth for our middle schools and high schools and so um we're going to move this forward this spring uh but it's going to be a less uh intensive and rigorous one because we have to make space for it we're also going to have time to build out new tools we're going to integrate this the Alo software with our school Improvement planning process in a way that I think is going to be very important for especially School principles and that's going to take some time we're going to continue to work with Afton Partners as our technical assistance provider on that so I think the short answer chair Nathan is time and tools uh are the things and that we will make a good start this spring but that next year we really will have that uh very rigorous process align process and then we're fully in it for the 27 26 27 school year so whatever skip plan um is developed in relationship to this year's budget it'll start all over again with a three-year cycle for skip 2.0 well I'm not sure about that that actually we've we we haven't landed on a solution to that how do we um would hope start all over again is not what happens I would hope that they have identified their uh targeted areas for improvement many of which our sites are already aware of and have begun to develop their Improvement initiatives that then can be greatly enhanced uh through the new process so that we're not kicking the hand down the road an entire uh different year and we're also not restarting everything but yeah this is the quintessential Reinventing the airplane while you're flying it um kind of an issue because nobody's is going to get to stop serving kids and running schools to take a year to just plan that'd be great but that's not reality so we're going to have to we're going to have to make this transition as we go so for this the development of the budget for 25 26 year is the board going to take action to define the performance measures that would be my hope the degree to which we would ask schools to fully align their plans around them is the question for sure by 2.0 but what we don't want to do is I think I mean probably in not just in schools in Corporate America too you adopt goals that are um good goals but you don't have the time or resource to develop serious strategies to align them then the goals themselves become farsal you know you actually then just sort of we we look at them and admire the vision but we don't have serious strategies to get there and that's obviously not what we're aiming for so the the degree to which we will this spring ask our schools to focus their Improvement initiatives on those performance measures that we'll be bringing to you this spring is a question that I'm thinking we're actually going to dedicate our entire districtwide leadership meeting later um this month to getting feedback not just from our school principls but also from our central office staff on that precise question and I know that in that um cycle of work um there were uh points of action for the board regarding the budget so um we just talked about an additional one which is the approval of performance measures I think in your memo on the balance budget memo um you mentioned that we would also be approving criteria for your review of the skip plans is that something to happen this spring as well I would hope so yeah I would hope so that we would basically be having you set the standards for how we work with sites both to build their capacity and frankly to approve and I think to director white Horn's point if you have a school where things are not going well we don't just stand by and watch it flounder you know how do we provide that direction that intensive support um so that's the kind of thing when I talk about board approved criteria it's us saying yep we want you to take these steps when these situations are uh observed and I know that in the past we've sort of evolved um how much the board gets informed about individual schools geted we used to have the presentations at the board this year we're going and making the site visits to see them in action um and then this year we're having I think maybe one or two agenda items where you've given us a summary of what the individual schools have um done with their skip plans is that going to be a component of um the process before we review the budgets just to understand what the priorities are that the schools are setting so that when we get the actual budget numbers have an understanding of why they look that way I I would say chair Nathan for sure when we get to 2.0 this spring there's so much basic work design work to do on the budget and on this process that that might be premature for this year but eventually the other thing is the way I've thought of organizing that is actually by success measure so as opposed to by school we're going to look at everything Willow Creek is aiming to do that's one way to do it the other way to do it is to look across cross the system at graduation rates or literacy or attendance or staff satisfaction so we're looking at those what are the goals that all of our sites are setting tied to those success measures the logic of that would be then we're having a deeper conversation about what it takes to deal for instance with ninth graders who don't earn a credit and therefore struggle to graduate on time rather than everything Century High School has on its priority list so that's kind of an early way I've been thinking about it because I know sometimes I mentioned I've been having these these conversations in our schools and they're by Design very fluid and unstructured which every time reminds me of both the importance but also the complexity of our work because we literally go from Reading to behavior to staff morale to uh postsecondary Readiness and it's all our work and it gets kind of whiplash as you go but that's the purpose of those conversations I don't think we want that to be the characteristic of the board's review of our Improvement strategy so I have a think that those conversations would also surface um we look if we were looking at the strategies for a specific performance measure and we hear from multiple schools we all wanted to do this but we don't have the resources to do it or the people don't exist that we're looking for to do it or we can't implement the strategy because it's beyond you know our capacity it would allow us to yep one of the things that we haven't uh talked a lot about um even at the staff level much less with the board is as we get this skip process in place at the site level how do our processes and structures change centrally to support that new process how do we organize the central office around this structure to support and inform it I mean it it's on my mind uh all the time but it's something that um is uh is something that a lot of school districts don't do very well you know it's the what was the famous line I'm from the government I'm here to help it's kind of like I'm from the central office I'm here to help whereas I at John Marshall today they are preparing tomorrow for a meeting of their English Department with uh look the talking about the fastbridge data and literacy and they were telling me that Justine Trueblood who is now working in Mona's Department department on multitud system support and literacy prepped and set up the whole presentation and discussion for the school leadership team with the English Department and that took that that not only took something off the plates of people who are very very busy it leveraged Justine's expertise in the area so they they didn't have to become experts in mtss at the high school level and she's provided now they're still going to have that discussion at JM it's theirs to have but the central office came in and for what I heard this morning provided very actionable Hands-On support for an issue that they know they need to Grapple with because uh we know we got kids that are can't access the curriculum because they're not reading at the high school and I just it's a comment more so than a question uh but to uh director Cook's point on the family engagement um you know we do have that monthly meeting uh it's at a very peculiar time at 10:00 a.m. um I have attended some in the past haven't attended any recently um but as a parent um I see your point of saying that you know you may not be thinking there but as a district I feel that if we did require par parent involvement as part of our setup you know that would then require for the you know it would it would propel parent involvement right so these 10 a.m. meetings are not going to work so that's going to mean that people our district is going to have to get more creative with reaching out to parents so I actually see the bonus side of saying well if we are requiring a parent involvement piece of this you know yeah we all got to cop out we too busy we're this we're that you know but I think that that would help Propel us more towards getting community and parent involvement I think we're straying away from it maybe for incorrect reason if we're just assuming that all the parents are not thinking that far away um a lot of people have more than one child so you have kids older or younger so you may already have ideas about eighth or nth grade because you've already had a eighth or ninth grader so I don't think we should be just so quick to just assume that it's going to be too complex because I feel like this is something we keep coming back to is how are we involved in the community and how are we involving parents and then we have the opportunity to make it a requirement to involve parents we say no we're not going to do it um so I think if we start to add those um components into our structure instead of just saying well if parents come they come if they don't they don't maybe that will help to get what we're looking for cuz right now you know we're we're people and we have ease um but I think if we create that into our actual structure it will force some of these conversations on how we're going to get our community involved right now it's very abstract there's no reason for us to actively reach out to parents because they're not part of the plan but I think that us removing them from the plan might not be the better of ideas if we really want to move towards a more Community involved School based system any other comments board members comments thank you for all of this work thank you thank you and the forward our next Focus topic is 3.2 fiveyear general fund Financial forecast superintendent pel um thank you chair Nathan one thing I uh want to say in brief before turning it over to Andy crockstead who's our Director of Finance and I'm sure John Carlson uh our chief ministrative officer will jump in um the uh discussion of deficits is unavoidably a part of the forecast that we're going to look at right now and I want to be really clear that um in making the commitments that we made to the community about the referendum we absolutely considered the likelihood of what you're going to hear about right now which is uh a deficit in the out years that I'm confident we can address but the commitment that we made in the referendum is we are not closing schools we are not uh raising class size we're not making major cuts to District systems and programs at least for the uh First Years of the referendum 10-year period I am confident that we can meet those commitments um we have uh uh done that since I've been here and I'm confident that we can do that again and as you will see in the parameters that we recommend you give us for the budget we would be charged with developing a long-term Financial stability strategy there is no question that the deficits that uh are there in some of the out years would be catastrophically worse if the referendum had not passed we would be looking at what many school districts are looking at which is a financial freef fall um we are not but we have some issues that uh Andy will touch on now but I wanted to start out with that note of Hope and commitment to the Investments that our community made uh even though obviously we need to provide the board with the information that Andy's going to go through now great thank you Dr pel board happy to be back here again uh Dr Marvin I don't think you're going to be as excited as about my presentation as you were my my colleagues before me but perhaps I'll pretend okay I I would appreciate that thank you um I want to first before we get started just just tell you what the forecast is and what it is not it's very important to understand it is not the budget we're using this year's budget as a baseline to look at the future years but the future years do not represent the budget what do they represent and this is what it is it represents our our best estimate of our revenues and expenditures in each of those years and how that difference between those two whether it's a gain or a loss affects our fund bals so that's really what the forecast is I just want to make sure that everyone understands that and that you're not looking at this from the lens of oh the the budget oh wow you know there's there's x million uh deficit because we haven't prepared the budget for each of those out Years yet obviously so why do we do these and there's a there's there's four key reasons um and I won't read these but it's really the a couple of them that I really want to focus on is resource allocations which has really been something that the the committee uh internal group along with Afton Partners is really obviously focused on a lot in the last um in the last year and then obviously transparency I'm very very big proponent of transparency both obviously at the board level but more importantly at the community level so as we look to prepare these forecasts we're not necessarily looking at them from a conservative and I don't mean that politically but conservative budgeting perspective or forecasting perspective we're trying to really be as as honest and transparent as we can be with the information that we know at the time that we're preparing it so a little bit different this year than I've done in well I've only done this one other time last year but I wanted to focus a little bit on really a key metric and and as you look at uh the the both the memo and and the the slides there's not as much information on the expense side right because in some cases those are controllable but I wanted to really focus your attention on our enrollment and what does the enrollment mean for our forecast it is absolutely critical I I we can't emphasize that enough because our enrollment drives our our two largest uh Revenue sources which would be our state aid and our local levies so as we prepared our enrollment projection this year we used the previously uh discussed Cooperative strategies forecast or enrollment projection that was done three years ago and we also used a tool from our data Analysis company forecast 5 which helps me produce the reports that you see each month on our budget to actual and fund balance projections Etc so those are two very independent sources and when we pulled them together um the projections were 15 students different between the two so we felt fairly confident that our enrollment numbers that we're putting in this forecast and the enrollment number that we're using for FY 26 budget is is fairly close um there's always is going to be some variances and we're going to continue to monitor that as we move into the budget cycle it's also important to understand this we talk often about October 1 October 1 October one numbers what are our what are our numbers on October 1 because mde uses that as a as a as a reporting timeline for for many for many reasons but as we look at our membership on October 1 and then as we project what our membership looks like at the end of the year there is a loss of that uh historically over and I we went we've gone back several years but I asked our team to look at the Last 5 Years historically uh and 98% of those members on October 1 become a full 1.0 ADM at the end of the year in the K12 uh category 57% in their Early Childhood so what does that mean that means 2% of our K through 12 students are not generating a 1.0 average daily membership at the end of the year so over the course of the year they have not been in school long enough to generate a 1.0 ADM it may maybe they moved between October 1st and the end of the year perhaps they open and rolled somewhere else out of the district decided to go to a private school there's a number of reasons why but it's important to understand so when we give you an October one number we're fairly confident that's going to be lower the following year at the end of the year which is what our actual revenues are going to be based on when we uh when the state um finalizes its revenue for us and also with our levies we provide a levy amount but that is adjusted up or down based on what our actual enrollment ends up being that comes in outer uh future years so again we need those a adms to drive what then is what we call our adjusted pupil units adjusted pupil units are a measurement that the state uses then to calculate the revenue an adjusted pupil unit is um that factor that is then uh used both in the levy and for the General Ed uh General Aid formula a k through six student is a 1.0 Apu so our $7,200 some odd dollars which is the General Ed formula amount time $1 or time one that's what that student generates secondary though 7th through 12th it's 1.2 or 20% on on top of that so that 1.0 ADM is multiplied by 20% multiplied by the 7,200 and something dollars right that becomes that student's revenue for us for that particular year so a couple of different acronyms and and um enrollment characteristics or enrollment descriptions I wanted to provide to just for clarity because again we talk about enrollment a lot and these are things I've learned obviously over the two years because I was not in school Finance Prior to to here but recognizing the importance of enrollment finally I did did want to mention that we are uh going to be going into a new independent or or undertaking a new independent enrollment study this spring Hazel Reinhardt who I believe was the former demographer for the state of Minnesota now um does this for school districts around the state and uh we will begin that process we are beginning that process we've been in contact with her and our team will be working closely with her to build out then new projections uh for the for the uh coming years anecdotally I've heard she's very accurate so uh we've had a we've had uh other colleagues tell us that so we'll we'll be doing that so those again I like the concept of two different independent approaches though so I may ask ask that we continue to do that from our team so that we really then say boy I think we're pretty close we're we're right on okay enough about enrollment in terms of the process where are we so um you can see those numbers this particular school year you can see the ADM that we had on October uh 1st and then what we're projecting it to be at the year end that's taking into consideration um those particular losses or declines in ADM from day one through the end of the school year so we take that same formula and we apply it next year um our enrollment projection indicates that we have 16,924 ADM or we can call it students in this instance but uh ADM on day one or October 1st it's it's basically the same uh the same thing we give a few days for things to come together and then MD says what's your numbers on October what are your numbers on October 1st if we apply those same loss ratios uh percentages we know that by the end of the 25 26 school year our enrollment our our ADM rather is adjusted down to 16,634 students which is really what we should be using then to calculate our Revenue because that's what our actual revenue is going to be based on is what do we actually generate in ADM so you can see the two different numbers there's a starting year number then there's some loss throughout the year and then the projection that was done becomes the starting point for the next year so that's what the 16,924 represents director do I I know we're I don't want to mess up your flow but since it's a study session I the the way that I've always conceptualized the average daily membership is that it's the the consequence of 10 to 15% of your student population enrolling and then unenrolling at some point in the year because the the actual average daily membership is like a weighted average based on the actual number of days that each student is enrolled in the district whereas the October one number is the snapshot in time actual number of students enrolled at that time and I the the way that this information is presented here and in the memo it seems like throughout the year we're having some attrition overall of students that start and then and then by the time we get to the end of the calendar year we have less students than what we started with and that might actually be the case but I know we're also continuously enrolling new students throughout the year from people that are moving to the district and so forth and there's this churn those newly enrolled students that don't join until January or something are also not getting a full ADM wait so I I just I'm trying to I'm trying to separate those two narratives between like the 10% of students that have some churn and changes in enrollment status throughout the year versus an overall decline of students that are leaving the district for other um educational opportunities so that we start with a much higher number of actual number of students enrolled at the beginning of the year compared to the end of the year um can you just clarify which one it is that we're talking about so the way that I learned this and and and John can correct me if I if I say something incorrect please but we shouldn't think of ADM necessarily is headcount because you could have multiple students creating a 1.0 ADM so they're aggregated so as a district we are generating 16,634 1.0 adms at the end of the school year that doesn't mean we have 16,634 students we could have more than that but when we look at the funding percentage correct John so as we look at the funding though the funding is based on the 1.0 ADM so sometimes there's the confusion between actually what's the enrollment and perhaps enrollment might be we believe that on on day one we're going to have 16,924 1.0 adms which means we have that many students in the building on that day and they're going to generate a 1.0 through the end of the year just for planning purposes that's what that that's what what that number says but between that day and the end of the year we know the children that you mentioned some come in but they don't generate a 1.0 some leave but they've generated some portion of an ADM that's aggregated together to generate the 16, 635 by the end of the year we could have more actual enrollment at the end of the year bodies in seats at the end of the year than 16635 but some of those are not generating the full ADM so therefore we're not going to get the full benefit of their General Ed formula or the levy that a 1.0 would get so there is a there's a there is a slight distinction between bodies or head count and ADM and we're using one for all the way through 12 because you said 7 through 12 it was 1.2 but we're using one all the way through for this projection that is the that's a great question just to clarify that is the average daily membership so that's the difference between the average daily membership and the adjusted pupil unit the state recognizes it it costs us more for the to provide the courses and and the the the teachers at the secondary level so they give us 20% more per student for 7th through 12th grade so that's that's the adjusted portion so that's the adjusted pupil unit so is that calculated though into this no this is what becomes the adjusted so for for just for argument sake 16,634 at the end of the year 10,000 of that is perhaps that's too high I'm just going to use rough numbers 10,000 of it is secondary we would actually have 1.2 times 10,000 is how we would be how we would be paid the other 6,635 would be paid at the 1.0 formula so I didn't put those formulas in there because I didn't necessarily think we would get to this point I do think we perhaps we could come back at another time and actually go through some of the formulas or we could meet one-onone and do some of that but I think if we could if if I had put those formulas in here you would see how that calculates the 1.0 ADM becomes an adjusted pupil unit which equates to actual dollars then Justin I think maybe have fill in the Gap that that there is a real projected loss of head count from October 1 202 24 17323 down to 16974 so we are saying through this projection we will be 349 students less next year as a school district than this school year on that one day you know that we compare to year over year year over year probably if we were digging the numbers more deeply we'll see that our 12th grade class going out is bigger than our kindergarten class coming in with some small churn in other grades where we have a known pattern of maybe losing a percent or two from a grade um but the biggest difference is 12th grade versus kindergarten is just it's that's where the biggest change is going be okay thanks and October 2nd might be different than the head count on October 1st but we use the October 1st number because I remember there was some noise about you know keep your kids home on October on October 1st so that we can make sure there's less money coming into the district sure and that's that really doesn't matter factor in correct right right because it's an enrollment number not an attendance on that day so whether they showed up or didn't show up are they enrolled or not uh but then as Andy's been explaining it really is you have to look at the whole year the whole calculation deter what we get paid on sorry to Sidetrack you but I appreciate the clarifications thanks moving forward so then as we take a look at those obviously those that enrollment then obviously generates our Revenue that becomes the factor used for our Revenue um Dr pel mentioned this already obviously those those items that were part of the or EXC excuse me the approval of the uh referendum Revenue that's included in here as are when we get to the expenses those particular um commitments to fund uh that Revenue the new Revenue as part of the referendum that was passed last year and the 2024 extension of the 2015 referendum so if you recall you extended the 2015 revenue or referendum rather last year for another 10 years uh those dollars are both uh both of those referendum are combined and in here as Revenue they include both of them a 2 and a half% inflation Factor that is great but we have to point out that that inflation is part on both of those referendum are partially offset by the loss of enrollment because if you remember the number of students uh is used to calculate what those levies actually generate and so an inflation is great otherwise you'd be going the opposite direction but at least we're making up we're we're we're we're making more in terms of the revenue than we're losing um but I I'll have a statistic for you here in just a moment that I can share uh also in terms of our Revenue projections as we look forward obviously we're retaining all of those other board approved levies those that don't require voter approval um safe schools is an example of one of those uh and then mail clinics onetime donation I just wanted to mention all of that all of those dollars are in this year's budget so they're no longer available after fiscal year 25 so Andy just to clarify on the referendum amount in all of our Communications on both of the referendums we kept referring to in the last case it was $1,133 per pupil that was the that was the uh the question the question was not $19.4 million that's correct so the inflation of 2% is applied to that 1133 correct and then the calculation is that 1133 inflated times these enrollment numbers that's absolutely correct okay the that's absolutely correct I couldn't say it any better um so I'll move on just want make sure you're absolutely right um on the state revenue similarly um the same calculations are made what your enroll what is the enrollment times the general education formula uh for that particular year obviously then generates um the bulk of our the largest share of our state aid we have several other categorical but that's the largest I did also want to mention there is some increased special education funding uh student support Aid student support Aid right now is being used for chemical health counselors uh in our high schools so um we're expecting an increase in that as well so I I believe that program perhaps may be uh slightly expanded I'm not sure what the you know the use is yet for that but but just understand that there are some increases and then really in terms of federal funding federal revenue essentially flat at at this particular Point since all of the co era money uh is now used up so as we then look at where we are Revenue assumptions um for the next uh five years uh again I'm not going to not going to go into read all of these for you but I just wanted to make sure that this to highlight this chart where we are this year and then obviously where we uh where we project next year and as I mentioned you know earlier uh the further out we get or I didn't say this but I should the further out we get obviously the less unknowns that exist we also should take into consideration this year is a state budget year so anything anything is on the table you know we are projecting to still have the cost of living inflator in the General Ed formula moving forward you know that's at we're at the whim of the legislature so who knows I mean we're we're projecting that so again that's why we're saying a lot of these things are unknown and we really don't know until we get closer expenditures and I didn't get into as much detail here because I really think we need to focus on the revenue and in enrollment because these things in many instances we have uh the ability to manage these a little bit more closely don't so much on the revenue side we don't have opportunities to really generate our own revenues unlike um you know the private sector or or just raise levies at will um like our counterparts so we are factoring a 3% increase each year in salaries and wages um whether that's enough or not I'm not sure um I will tell you that a couple of contracts I saw on the city council's website um be approved uh last week had 4% increases in there so um but some of the significant increases we've seen which were necessary and important and worthwhile over the last two years may not just frankly aren't probably sustainable into the future um as we look at how much revenue we have to gener or have to pay um and to cover all of those pensions um TR uh in legislation last year also oh I think it was two years ago actually increased um from 8 8.75% to 9 and a half% so that's a 3/4% increase on the employer uh side um and so that obviously is an increase moving forward health insurance we're produc we're projecting n well we we do have a 9% increase this year that was established um obviously that will be half of fiscal year 20 uh six as well and then we've projected a 7% increase in the Years moving beyond that um based on some uh information uh we talked about with our Consultants when we established a 9% increase we think it's possible again unless there's catastrophic U economic challenges again which we can't predict that we may even be able to see that se that that 7% number may be more realistic and so that's why I'm trying to be in this case um as perhaps as um as thoughtful but ensuring that we're not necessarily going lower than I than than we should purchase services and supplies and materials um those are going to be those are going to be um a little bit more difficult to maintain uh at the 2% increase so especially with purchase Services those are our contracts and we have some um we have some Rising contracts especially in the transportation area which I know John has brought to the board previously um we're going to have to really seriously dig through all of our purchase services and and begin to think about um what is absolutely critically critically important and necessary perhaps from a software subscription is one of those what areas of consultation uh do we have as a district what Consultants do we have and and are there areas we can pull back um because as we think about um software subscriptions and I'll speak to that specifically it's not the largest share but it's a big portion of this those those costs are going up double digits every year in terms of percentage the vendors are are charging significant increases and so um many of those are absolutely necessary Google Microsoft um educ clim or many of these other platforms forms we've talked about uh to operate so if if they're necessary we have to make some adjustments somewhere else and I think that's something we have to think about and again here I just sort of laid it out Year bye in the major categories finally um all of this all of this boils down to how does it affect our fund balance and the board as you as you may uh as you all well know has an 8% unassigned fund balance and we we believe that if we made no course Corrections we could still continue to achieve that through fiscal year 27 then beyond that however we would we would drop below the 8% um and obviously would become negative in terms of our unassigned fund balance um by fiscal year 29 I can't reiterate enough those projections and those out years are are just assuming there's no change to either our revenue or our expenses moving forward so we know we have opportunities to make adjustments based on what we know we end up receiving in Revenue so but to Dr pel's Point those numbers would have been increased exponentially had we not had the referendum uh investment so that is really the the presentation I I plan to share with you I did have some charts and graphs because I always like those um and I'm certainly uh happy to answer questions specific to those I didn't include them in the presentation however board members okay well then I'll start with some questions I want to get back to enrollment but I I I want to talk hypothetically about some of the um expenditures so if we were able to find some additional Revenue in fiscal year 26 or fiscal year 27 would those projections in the out years look better well if we found additional revenues yes as long as we didn't use those revenues as long we didn't use them we didn't exp right so if we for example uh found a way to maintain those uh 33980 M and because as I calculated it based on the um state general formula Revenue that's about $3 million so if we were able to keep those or or bring those students in the district that could be additional Revenue that we we could maintain over time proportion of it would be maintained because I'm I'm sure we'd have to add some additional teaching staff possibly depending on where our numbers are at and when we talk revenues we I think we always have to talk about our cost subsidies um so um what is our current special education and English learner cross subsid I can tell you what you told me in the email the other day do a quick Google search on what I told you a month or so yes so um our special education cross subsidy is $1.9 million and our English learner cross subsidy is 3.8 so if for some reason the state was able to cover more of that cross subsidy in the next few years that would also make our projections look better in later years and I do believe I have to go back and look at legislation I do believe there's an adjustment actually I know there's an increase into the the English learner cross subsidy um Aid does increase I believe in fiscal year 26 but that would have been fact they're not yet at 100% no no no no no okay um and then as far as some of our expenditure areas um with the health insurance costs um we chose to share the cost of the premiums with our employees so that reflects that increase of the 2.2 million as the portion of the premiums increase what other control do we have over our premium costs well we've done a lot of work in that area frankly I I think um one of the things that we did this year we implemented a a new tier with a direct contract with hestad medical center and that actually for those that choose to use that and that this will be really important and I think it may take a year or two to kind of bring that momentum um they're providing better better rates to us than we can receive just through our standard uh agreement with health easy who has the network that we participate in uh and so for those that choose that they both they pay less for that service and and we pay less for our portion of it so it's a shared savings so those are the kinds of strategic decisions we're trying to make um and and really it's about building it's about it's about bringing up the membership within the health plan the the group coverage as well um especially with a lot of our younger employees trying to get them entice them with the the plan itself to bring them into the plan because they tend to be healthy they don't have the number of uh of obviously expend that that someone who's been in the district for several years or as they've gotten older such as myself would have um but they're contributing through their portion of the premium for example so those are the kinds of things we're trying to do in that area but this year OMC and that agreement was one of the the key metrics that we believe is going to begin and we have seen actually this year or I should say last year calendar year 204 we we did have a slight decrease in our overall expenditure uh related to healthcare and then I want to ask one question about enrollment so uh superintendent you've talked in the past about um wanting to be the provider of choice in Rochester and during the referendum we talked about uh enrolling 76.8% of the kids in our district who could potentially be in the schools when we do this updated enrollment um projections in the spring with the demographer how will that relate to to what you've talked about which is the strategy of making sure we're doing everything we can to attract all the students that we can and retain them in the district are those two separate pieces essentially they're two separate pieces the the enrollment study uh is just to make sure we're getting the numbers right and that's the quintessential like diagnosing the patient doesn't cure the patient um and so the enrollment strategy really I think needs to be a foundation aspect of the next strategic plan it is why we are undertaking the vision mission values and branding work that Amy and momu updated the board on at the last meeting um we have a good story we have a great educational product but we don't uh necessarily Market uh as effectively as we need to and we need to shift the product and we need to make the kinds of uh changes that are there I will also say and we'll update the board this summer when we do our overview of our work on attendance and our data we can do an increasingly uh effective job of keeping the kids we have um which is a critical priority it's Priority First for them because we want to make sure that they are progressing toward graduation and post secondary education or some kind of career but it has those uh benefits for us as well so that slide that uh Andy has talked about is not um uh Destiny and there are things that I think we can do um in the early work that Angie McAndrews has been doing as our director of student engagement um we are finding that we have kids who get dropped because they don't come to school for the required 15 days and I think to director white Horn's uh comment about family engagement um we are frequently able to reach them and find out what's going on with the kid and get them re-enrolled and we up to now have not had a robust system of doing that I think Angie told me in one day she set the she she identified 18 kids who had um dropped because of the 15-day drop which is the law we have to do that um I think we have to do a lot to prevent it but once it happens it happens and was able to reach in one day 16 of the 18 um get some of them re-enrolled or identify the reason that they were not enrolled well Grandma's sick in Mexico and so they went down to Mexico and they're going to be there for two months well are they coming back to Russ Rochester yeah we think they're coming back to Rochester but they're down there and so we can't maintain them on their enrollment unless we could get them in the online school which is an interesting point so I think that that's another piece of it that we want to do it first for educational and I would even say moral reasons but also for financial ones as well so that's going to be a big piece of that enrollment strategy board members then you have director white horn okay I don't I don't speak um budget I don't think um or maybe I just can't read I I'm not sure but so I see on the revenue assumptions page I see numbers and then on the expenditure exumpan balance of something am I the only person that sees that so it it looks like there's enough money but then when I flipped the page over there wasn't enough money and I don't I don't know where the money went and then my other question is with the Family Medical Leave Act that is going to be coming into place has that also been taken into accountability when we're looking at the health insurance portion because I as a small business owner I know that that impacts a lot of businesses and I'm assuming it will affect the school district as well as there will be an additional cost to all employers that will be mandated by the state um that will be have that will need to be paid out so I don't know if that um was calculated when we were looking at uh 26 and Beyond but I don't really understand how we got these numbers from the other numbers I'll just talk about this graph and that's a great question um so so think of our fund balance as our savings account just like you have at home and if you look at this then the the second the second row is our Revenue so that will align to that first chart you see that's the revenue year by year so that's the money that comes in right okay that's added to the fund balance so you're adding to your savings account M then the second table that you see are the expenditures M that then comes out of the savings account arriving at what your ending number is so that's really what those first four rows represent for each particular year where did we start how much did we make how much did we spend and where Did We End and I'm happy to meet separately with you on this as well if that would help but but but what we there's the revenue that I just broke out and the revenue assumptions ultimately those carry down into this table and then the expenditures are deducted from the revenue that we bring in and then anything that's left or if we happen to have spent more than we bring in that affects the fund balance so the fund balance is is really what we want to maintain a strong healthy fund balance and the board has indicated that the unassigned fund balance so what is the unassigned fund balance it's the percentage of money that we unassigned means we have the board has full control over those dollars there's no restrictions on how those dollars are spent okay so unassigned is really what we want to make sure that we are maintaining that at a level that allows us to pay all of uh our expenditures and so it's important to maintain that unassigned fund balance to pay those expenditures and the board has set a policy of 8% that 8% means in any given year we're going to have enough money in the bank at any given time 8% to pay what we expect our expenses to be so in this particular instance again if I would just look at FY 25 that unassigned fund balance divided into the expenditures is is the 15.3% we want that 15.3% to get no lower than 8% okay or we may not have enough money to pay several months I believe 8% is going to be about three one one month one month or so okay one month of expenditures yeah I I just was trying to figure out where the other money was coming from but so um and then did you answer the question about the health Insurance did we take that into accommodation that those numbers will be changing because I think it I just looked it up I think it's uh January 1st 26 is when all businesses will be required to start offering that so and I'm I only ask that as looking at a projection because won't that change things a little bit I'm not sure what the percentages are yeah it's it's 35% I was reminded of that today actually as a matter of fact okay and so uh half of that obviously will be part of this next budget because it doesn't start until 2026 because we're on a fiscal year um so we will have to cover half of that within um the budget that would come out of our our general fund as a as a payroll tax so it's going to be a payroll tax like um um like Social Security or Medicare taxes that's what we pred uh expected to be that in this case goes to the state of Minnesota instead um we do not yet have that factored into fiscal year 26 budget or going forward um that was uh something that was frankly just missed and so we're going to have to make some adjustments based on that dollar amount knowing that in FY 26 though one of the areas I will think I will tell you is that we're projecting um a we're continuing to project a contingency account of about one 1% meaning we we retain 1% in the budget to cover unknowns and unforeseen um that that number actually has I believe is is going to be able to be reduced potentially offsetting some of these these that dollar amount that you mentioned that we don't have in here so I think there's still room in the budget or the projection rather in FY 26 to cover it um with some with some movement and that would be under the salaries and the wages then that's the category that that percent would under believe the employee benefits that's going to be on the employee benefits row oh okay right oh Dr um well uh thank you for the information it's it's helpful to have a a clear projection of kind of how things are trending um my my my comments I guess are about the expenditure assumptions um assuming 3% growth in salary and wages and 2% in contracted Serv Services I think that those assumptions reflect uh targets that are appropriate given uh what we should reasonably expect in terms of revenue from the state of Minnesota in the next several years and the commitments that this board has made to the community to maintain um high quality programming and um not increased class sizes and so forth I am concerned that it might not be realistic um and I guess my my comment um to my fellow board members is that in order for us to uphold the commitments that um the community made and investing in the school district um I think each of us really needs to be cleare eyed about not growing our Ambitions for what the school district could do beyond what is financially prudent and um being really disciplined when contract renewals come up and when approvals for expenses come up because um you know last last year we had a 30% growth in our transportation budget um we we there is not room for that kind of um thing anytime real soon if we want to maintain our commitment to academics so um thanks for the information and uh um it's helpful so thanks uh two points for the viewing public who may be wondering well I thought the board just passed a Balan budget model uh that was um in theory designed to um my words offset if you will um some of the realities we're currently looking at and then in addition to passing the balanced budget model the community uh uh uh voted for the ignite student learning referendum uh approved it soundly and to it seems like all that did potentially for some who may be thinking along these lines it's bought us three years okay and and then we find ourselves in I won't see it the same situation but uh in a situation and and so what can we uh begin to do thank you Andy wonderful information uh what can we do though to whether it's addressing the uh uh uh fund balance uh whether it's addressing the uh projected expenditures uh what what things do we have control over or not and in terms of being uh forthright uh uh to our community uh I wouldn't want anyone to think that we somehow didn't that we HIIT or withheld and and that this was there all the time maybe no one in the community commun thinks that but but I I just sitting here um thought it necessary to just raise it as a point of discussion and how we might um get ahead of it and uh ensure that the community continues to feel confidence uh in what we're doing and the direction we're headed in is there anything you can perhaps offer um I I can Dr car that that precisely the point you've made is why I'm recommending that in the budget parameters we're going to turn to in the next item you direct us to bring a long-term plan to address uh those deficits with the budget proposal for next year so as you said well in advance of the emergence of those deficits and so we we did that three years ago I think to good effect and essentially I'm suggesting that you should direct and hold me and us accountable for bringing a serious strategy to deal with that I think that um the balanced budget model will help us find efficiencies at both the school and system level that we previously haven't found and so I think there are some uh efficiencies that's part of the strategy I think director Cook's point about our uh labor contracts and purchase Services is uh well taken especially because if I understood the implications of what you're saying uh fully Dr Cook we may have to not do some stuff in order to uh preserve the core academic Mission um and so those are some of the tradeoffs that we would bring you in the strategy that I'm hoping you will authorize us to do so um I I I'm confident that we can develop that strategy um and thanks to the referendum we have some time to do it I'm just really quick I guess uh and I'm not sure if this was kind of what director Barlo was saying but do we have specific things um chair Nathan had brought up some items that could potentially be funded by the state that maybe we should be keeping our eye on or you know um petitioning our local government about are there other ideas that we have within this space um of what to increase funding um if we do have this projection that we'll be losing money I guess I've heard a lot of the problems but do we have any solutions on how um if things remain as projected where we going to come up with this additional uh funding maybe inhouse or are we just kind of at the whim of the state or do we have other ideas um we always have and we will continue to Advocate at the state level and as the legislative committee is going to update us on in a moment funding is certainly a predominant theme in this proposal for this year I will say I was up in the cities on Friday because I'm on the executive committee of the board of the association of metropolitan school districts and they had legislators senior committee leaders of both parties and they both said there is no new money coming they were unequivocal um and so I think we need to be quite conservative in what we assume the state would do that said you know things change elections happen priorities change so I think that's no reason for us to be passive I think your point is very well taken um we we also need to be able to work with our Rochester delegation um on those issues um so I think it's a really critical issue in terms also of the longer term Financial strategy one thing that I uh I I know we we've learned um is that when we do talk about the um the changes we might make to address this issue it's very important to have done our homework first and so I won't go further into the kinds of shifts and changes we might we might make now but certainly the strategy that I'm suggesting you direct us to bring you by June would have enough specifics for the board to understand the heart of the strategy um so we will use the next six months to dig into uh this reality that Andy has outlined for us tonight and and bring you some um options not for Action uh all at once because of course we build these budgets year by year by year but I think we've seen the merits of a long-term Financial strategy over the last three years I mean we really stuck to it we stuck to the strategy that the board approved in the fall of 2021 and um I think we need and can develop a similar strategy that addresses the um the gaps that Andy has um outlined for us here which again compared to what a lot of school districts are facing are not cataclysmic I don't mean to be dismissive but they are not um certainly what we might have seen had we not had the authority to renew the 2015 referendum and pass the 2024 referendum uh that would be very hard to see us maintaining the academic agenda that dror cook just spoke about if we had to make those cuts next agenda is action parameters for development of the 2025 26 budget and we are scheduled to take action on this at the January 21st regular meeting thank you we do not have a a presentation for you on this because the six points that I'm recommending are uh outlined in the memo that you have uh that was written to the board um they are first of all to build the balance budget model model into the comprehensive proposal that we will bring you for Action in June second to build the capacity of our School principles to uh utilize that model in particular The increased flexibility they will have with one of the four components of the model third as we talked about tonight to really link our budget model with our school improvement process for reasons that um our chief academic officer I think described really well um a few moments ago fourth to maintain the commitment of the ignite student learning referendum as we articulated them including in board action when you voted for the referendum um and thereby avoid uh increasing class size or closing schools as we also discussed in the referendum and then finally uh to the point touched off by Dr Bar's uh last comment to direct us to bring a long-term Financial strategy to address the gaps that Andy has just outlined that we would present to you concurrent with the budget proposal for next year when we do not face a deficit but that we uh certainly need to begin taking action because the longer you defer um developing a strategy the harder it gets Dr Cook um I I like all of these priorities I think um it's uh makes a lot of sense to me my main question is whether in this upcoming budget cycle there are any urgent facilities need needs that ought to be part of our next year's budget planning I know many of us have uh heard about um well a a whole constellation of of needs that um depending on which site you are at the district uh will be um relatively urgent in some cases so um is that is that something that is going to be part of the long-term facility maintenance plan or is there any aspect of our facilities needs that makes sense to incorporate into the next year's budget well a couple things um first we do have time scheduled with you on June 10th in a study session to actually go through a laundry list of facilities um issues and uh potentially bring a recommendation forward on to act I don't see them necessarily being implicated here in the general fund um budget that we're talking about um but secondly as part of just a normal ongoing how we pay for long-term facilities maintenance we will be bringing to you approximately on March 18th um information on the next round of issuing um uh bonds to pay for those projects that are in CU um and so you'll get an update on our long-term facilities work at that one too briefly okay that's upful thanks for item four um the parameter of integrating all the Investments and positions and program that were included in the 2024 ignite student learning referendum I know that during the referendum we also talked about a dashboard that would somehow show exactly where we were spending the money on those is that going to come out after the budget is approved we would uh chair Nathan uh prefer to do that after because then it's actually based on what you actually approved um but um I would imagine shortly thereafter but when we are approving the budget will we see where the ignite student learning Investments are sort of located yes okay Dr White I have a lot of questions I'm sorry um so I I do think that great ideas but what I I don't particularly know and maybe somebody else does know is what can be included in you know as we have all these buckets there's a lot of them uh what can this small general fund Surplus be spent on because I'm sure that they are parameters so I guess I really can't attest to whether or not these are the best ideas if I don't know what exactly can be included in that money right um yes and thank you d w this establishing parameters for the budget is something that I suggested we begin doing when I got here in 2021 and so these are essentially our marching orders from you and then we will bring you a very specific proposal that outlines um the recommend Commendation for expenditures across all of those categories including what we might recommend doing with that modest Surplus that you mentioned so you will get uh starting in May and then ultimately leading up to your vote in June all of the specifics and we will track our budget proposal back to these parameters and show you how I believe the budget meets these parameters so we'll we would definitely get there we would we haven't uh developed it at this point point because we really start our process with these parameters that you set as our governing board so right now there aren't so we we've had this money but the we're trying to create what this money could be used for is that where we are with this is that well some of the funds we have and they're continuing but most of this is dollars we will get over the course of the next school year and you're going to approve the budget for how we can spend them okay so they're not existing parameters right there's always some carryover uh that's not significant but most of this is budgeting the dollars that we're going to receive through the process Andy outlined where it's the average daily membership drives the revenue and you are then telling us uh how we can expend those dollars okay maybe I okay so when okay give me a minute child so I know that we have separate buckets right so there's certain things that get spent out of one bucket for whatever Transportation St so is this are these supposed to be for items that are not already in a bucket or these are supposed to be for items that we think need more money does anybody understand where I'm headed with this or say yeah think I'm understanding you're so like in the budget we already have like the balance like we have you know things in each bucket right these buckets so what I'm saying is this particular money is this money that can overlap with money that's in other buckets already is this for um things that need more money that aren't already you know don't already have an allocation of where the money is going just talking about the Surplus dollars right so this money is this just however are we just whatever this is everything this is all of the resources in the district and we'll bring you a comprehensive proposal for some funds we have discretion over and flexibility over that we can uh allocate and you that's what you'll vote for some things are uh ESS required expenditures like for certain special education services and so this is giving us the broad as I said marching orders for essentially all of the funds that are in the school district and so it will include um any new Investments we might want to make it'll also have you authorize the continuing Investments that we make every year and so it's probably the best way I can uh describe unless new Bud year and the goal I think is I I tried and maybe didn't do a good enough job in that is that we we bring in we are projecting a certain amount of Revenue and in in a perfect world we would spend no more than that and if that happened year after year after year our fund balance or quote unquote our savings account that I've discussed as well would not change but in those years maybe where we've spent less than we brought in then our savings account goes up and we can decide how do we want to use those dollars sometime in the future they're not part of the budget per se though those are dollars that were part of a previous budget that were either saved or used so when we start talking about putting the budget together for next year it's our new new money and our new expenses and if there happens to be anything left at the end of the year between those two amounts then that would become be added to our our fund balance which then becomes something that we can you as a board can make future determinations about how to spend those dollars for example we had money saved over several years in the fund balance and we used $6.7 million of that this year year to pay for some added the added healthare uh Health Care contributions that the that the board chose to um chose to enact and so therefore that we we are projecting to spend $6.7 million more and the board has agreed to use fund bounds or savings account money essentially to pay for that so I don't know if that helped at all I think I got it y'all Y gota you got to give me a minute been losing sleep I have a lot of new small children um at my home that I'm fostering but I was just trying to get so these are the parameters for the entire budget and how we move forward I just think my brain was getting stuck somewhere but I'm catching up just talk to me nice I'm getting there good questions all right any other comments board members on this agenda item we will be talking about it a lot going forward oh yeah our next item prep for Action as priorities for the 2025 legislative session which are we are also scheduled to take action at the January 21st meeting um when someone from the legislative committee like to take the lead on this um I think you can take the lead on it but I would ask uh director Workman to jump in because I might need some help um given that how we put this together this year um and what you have before you is a document that basically director Workman and I put together to um summarize information that we had from various sources some of them were the delegate assembly that she and I attended in December some of these come from the msba legislative priorities some of them which is the Minnesota state um School Board Association some come from amsd which is somebody might need to help me with here the association of Metro school districts and some come from the superintendent Association that you're going to have to help me with that when it's late um so director Workman and I looked at all of these different legislative priorities and put our thoughts together as to how to P how to present these here to determine what would be most impactful for rochest public schools and our priorities uh to discuss with our local legislators uh for this current legislative session and one of the thoughts we put together is that we broke these into categories this year that I think I borrowed this from the msba um legislative priorities that there are some that refer to governance which is basically the work of the board and how we operate the next is based on funding which is kind of self-explanatory and then student centered learning are things that relate to our students and and how we approach um policies that directly impact our students and then there's a fourth category of kind of a mish mash of different things that we also glean from these different organizations um but I would director merkman corre me from wrong but I think that we looked at the governance the funding and the student centered learning as probably our stronger priorities some of these have been either carried over or considered in PRI years but the additional priorities are things that we also wanted the board to be aware of so that if there's things from that list that you really want us to prioritize prioritize with our discussions with our legislators that we could do that as well I also want to talk a little bit about process that once the board takes action on uh final list of these priorities at on the January 21st meeting the next step then would be for the legislative committee and and director cook I would definitely plan include you on this as well is as a new member of the committee to set up a schedule to discuss these priorities with our local legislators we've done that um by Zoom most recently but it might make sense actually this year perhaps to consider an inperson meeting the challenge with that is that a lot of them are obviously extremely busy during session and getting them all together in one room might be a challenge so that's one of the reasons we've looked at electronic um ways to to do that as well or some combination of the two um so I guess uh I haven't really thought too much about how to go through this list other than you know just kind of bullet point by bullet point I would remind um the board that the data request uh the first one under governance is something that um director Workman and I actually worked with at some other districts to present at the delegate assembly um we worked the language a little bit to combine some Concepts that came through from that process but the general concept of modifying the government data Practices Act was something that the delegate assembly which is a group of uh Schoolboard members that come to that body in December to help the msba develop their legislative committee this is very well received by the delegate assembly and U past un unanimously and also is something that has um been mentioned in all of these different organizations um legislative priorities in you know somewhat different forms but kind of the main concept to amend that data Practices Act um we've also gotten input that um some other local government units might want to uh do the same so it seems like that's a something that's kind of bubbled up to be a priority in terms of the legislature I'll sure we go I remember um your admition that when everything is a priority nothing is a priority so in previous and I Bor that from Dr pel that wasn't me that was him yeah that's right I him doesn't make it any um so what we've done in previous years have have come to with a specific recommendation of three or four priorities that we've already worked out and they we' improved it obviously we can't approve all of this because then nothing is a priority um so I'd like to you know just let you know that the process this year in terms involving the entire board and members of the cabinet in deciding you know what is it we really need to push forward um the board did approve on September 24th 2024 that the first thing on the data requests um and the language from the beginning of that up until uh b letter B is the exact same language that you approved back in September and then as Karen mentioned with um these additional uh Concepts here so I personally I think this is one that um since um our other professional organizations have in their legislative uh platform and in as much as the the delegate assembly did unanimously approve this which was a little bit of a surprise I'm not sure what I was expecting but it wasn't that um that I feel pretty strongly that we need to have this as one of our priorities however of course the rest of the board may agree or not um to this and I would add to that too that I think it's come up in a lot of different contexts and also um I think this is something that our legislative body might need some education about why it's so important you know they may look at this is all this is just some boring thing but the financial impact that it has not only on our district but the district Statewide is is pretty impactful um and growing um until we have that discussion I'm not sure that people would have this on their radar um as I was thinking about how to present this in general going back to director workman's comments if we had more time I think we could do those um sheets with the dots but we don't have that available to us tonight because um of how we uh brought this to the board um that might have been a good way to do this but um if you want to weigh in on things um as we go along that uh either questions or um expression of your interest in these priorities I think that would be helpful um the other thing I did want to point out is on this two-page list um director Workman had the good idea to indicate with stars or asterisk the things that we can do that don't require the additional funds um going back to uh Dr bael's discussion about the amsd presentation last week that I um did attend remotely um that the lack of new money and also thinking U listening to the news a little bit today about how our legislative session has launched today um is probably not super a a really good day to be to having this discussion but here we are um the so the other piece of the governance is uh over periods of time there are a lot of unfund mandates the legislature passes and U doesn't attach funds to them but that is essentially probably what a lot of leads us to the budget discussions we were having today as well um in terms of funding um I believe that the first bullet point the increase in the general education formula by 3% for fiscal year 26 and 27 to cover the inflationary shortfalls this seems to be something that we've carried over from year to year but it continues to be on the radar of uh this is one way to and Mr Carlson jump in if you want to reasonably increase our Revenue in a way that uh would make sense from the legislative level if if we're going to look at increasing funding needs this is the way to do it um so that's that's why that continues to be on our radar and our priorities um director Workman do you want to talk about the increase local optional Revenue I don't yes I don't quite have a handle on that I would be I would be happy to talk uh about that so the local option revenue and I did see a chart somewhere in all of this material that showed where we were um back in 2014 where the um it was at $424 back in 2014 or 2015 but actually a year or two before that it was at 2 212 for Rochester and the rest of outstate Minnesota and 424 for um the metro area yep and so at that particular delegate assembly meeting I did bring up this inequity and then the state said okay everybody gets 424 but that's kind of been uh where we stuck we stuck for a couple years then it was increased to 724 and then with the inflationary um aspect uh since then um it would be at 974 to have to to keep up with inflation I figured for our district that would generate uh roughly $4.3 million 4 million somewhere in there um which would help and this is a uh item that the school board votes on we can either choose to do it or choose not to do it I think this is one thing that um is good for districts to be able to have that local control over how much um they can actually Levy additional to you know things like referenda um so I'm in favor of doing that no let me back up and clarify that I think that it would be great if the legislature would vote to do this and then we as a board at some point would decide whether or not it was appropriate for us to increase that particular um funding from 724 where it is now to uh 974 which would obviously be an increase in tax which might not be the wisest thing to do after we've just passed a rather large referendum but certainly for future years did that help I I think it does and I think that that providing some context to that it requires legislative action of the state yes but it's not State money it would give us the authority authority to Levy it at even you know now or sometime in the future to access this additional local Rue to assist with the budget discussions we were having tonight does that make sense um and then we've talked we've talked about reducing or eliminating the cross subsidies for English learner programming and special ed and this has been on the list forever and ever and ever and I think that things even when the legislature says no more money we still need to keep this on their radar so that they don't come back and say well you didn't say this year that you needed more fun funding to uh help cover or completely cover the cross Subs so it's one of these the gift that keeps on giving gu and I think the the one change that I saw in the discussions in the various documents this year is that sometimes it just says eliminate I like the idea of adding the reduce or to kind of chip away at this um over time again keeping it on the radar like we like the legislature did for last year and then next year in the last legislative session um there were bills in both Chambers to completely eliminate the special educ cross subsidy and then eventually that resulted in reducing or increasing cross subsidy Aid which reduces the cross subsidy from 6.43% of a District's cross subsidy to 44% and then eventually in 2027 to bring it to 50% um I I mean I I I totally agree that this doesn't seem like the year where it's likely to happen but um it's sort of a a long-term campaign where you build this support year to year to year um I I think we should push hard as hard as we think we can for eliminating the special education cross subsidy that is the single biggest thing for our district and probably every District in the state if I had to guess on enabling school districts to meet the needs of every single student in their District both those that are served by APS and those that are not um for our district even at the 44% level it's still million that we are um allocating from the general fund to fund necessary and required special education services we could make very good use of that $18 million um to provide enriching services for all of our students I I think that should be a really high priority and we should push hard and the same thing for the English language Learners which is about 3.8 million according to what you said earlier that sounds about right yeah okay any more board discussion or ideas on uh the cross subsidies for English learner programming and special head Madam chair if I may uh so I'm not chair but that's fine well actually I speak you were looking at me director Barlo so um so thank you director Workman so if we do have additional questions uh we can perhaps forward them to you versus trying to to take action till next right right and that cross my mind as I was sitting here as well in terms of um we have the ability to ask questions about the board agenda maybe that's the place to yeah to put to put that into your questions into assembly like we do for other agenda items QA y right the Q&A document Q&A comes out tomorrow for the uh January 21st meeting so there will be Place yeah I'm on say un necessarily well giving consideration for tonight's meeting yep um the next bullet point is about um basically the modifications to the compensatory funding formula now that we um have the um the free meals for students the free and reduced lunch forms aren't as prolific as they used to be so really rethinking that whole funding formula and how to um have some different type of criteria for better identifying student needs for services um until we can come up with that the idea would be to if I understand things right use the current formula and tell there's a better system is that at least not negatively impact our right the whole harmless but I think the general idea is what I keep coming back to and thinking about this topic is we need a better be better better system at some point we just need to develop that with the assistance of the legislation um the next three topics actually are things we had not been considering on prior years's legislative priorities but one of the reasons I included them is I do think that RPS is looking at U reconsidering how we're using uh our funds for Career and Technical funding and um education for for students and it it seemed like a good topic to include um to talk to our legislators about so that they can think about how we are um looking at those areas of our programming and wanting to increase the funding if they're able to assist us with that um the next topic the sparity transportation funding increase is something that director rman and I learned about at the delegate assembly that it wasn't even something that I had even heard about before so it was very educational to learn about that and then um dialogue with u Mr Carlson about this but basically the idea is that because we are a big Geographic District we do receive some funding to assist us with our transportation costs the idea is that we currently get um in you committee explain how the formula works but we get 35% of uh reimbursement in doubling that to 70% would assist RPS in offsetting those Transportation costs because of the size of the district do you want to talk a little bit about how Works within the general education formula they assume about 4.66% of what you're getting paid on general education Aid should be covering your transportation and we run above that our transportation spending on regular education transport general transportation is running slightly ahead of that and so they um they acknowledge that some of the districts like us Forest Lake amidi are really large and geographic area and so they're trying to pay us back a little bit more um for that and right they're paying 35% of what that excess cost is us is just proposing doubling that payment and when you talk about general education that's for our general routes not like the special our special ed routes are in reimbursed right now about 80% of what they cost to cross there's there's a gap there but if that gets addressed through special ed cross just a little and then finally I added the final bullet point the fund Early Childhood Transportation costs because I think it's a conversation to start with legislators I don't see that at all happening this year but I think it's something that really impedes our budget to a great extent about being able to serve those youngest Learners and I want to start that discussion of if there's ways to assist us with that at the legislative level this may be one thing to consider um moving on to the student centered learning uh there has been discussion about um I got a quick I just I'm sorry the um and I'm just so I'm clear with the uh free and reduced lunch issue is it just because we don't have students completing the form anymore because we have free and reduced lunch is that a concern right so the idea is to stop using that form and shifting it to a different model to create the formula for that um that us used to be that if they wanted assistance with lunch or breakfast or whatever they had to fill out a form yes but now they don't have to fill out the form because the state has picked up the entire cost of it you know no I'm aware of that but what I'm saying is that if I mean the the form would the information that we need to collect would be the same and I'm sorry maybe I maybe overly simplistic but what I would saying is is this not a simple fix like we just are changing the name of the form because the what what I understand as a parent the reasoning behind it would be for you know special activities Sports plays this type of thing it also identifies so that children can have a reduction on those other things and if parents are not completing it because it says free and reduced lunch is this just not a simple fix of just either adding to the existing title so that parents know why they need to complete it um you know and I'm just trying to think of of things we can do now um to kind of um show since we we do need those forms I just don't know um I see I get what you're saying system wise if that's possible because we we need to collect the same information and I think as as I'm aware since the state is picking it up parents are getting the form and saying well I don't need to complete this because you already are paying for lunch so there's a misunderstanding yeah of why they need to complete it you can do some parent education around it being it's really about educational benefits but I think there's still a lot of those educational benefits parents are more more likely to complet it when kids are older than when kids are younger because we don't have like extracurricular activities as much mean you do I think maybe with the community ad it's just having been in the in the younger buildings um without having it tied to lunch and breakfast you lose a lot of it um it there's just a lot more leg work that has to be done parents will fill it out you can you can track them down and get them to fill it out but it's just a lot more leg work that has to happen on the schools and so if there's another way to get the information or get access like just so that the schools aren't held um so that it l funding I think that's right I think we get that packet in the beginning right like if it I think that's the that's the stop right is because it says free and reduce lunch that's why I don't know if if it's just the Simplicity of even in the titling of the form you know because parents just fill out what you tell them to fill out so if you know I mean I know myself as a parent I just filled it out because I had kids I don't I mean there many years I didn't even qualify but you get the packet oh maybe they'll qualify so maybe it's just a matter of cuz I think we talk parent education now gam talking about Community engagement and all these other things which is fine but I'm just thinking can we simplify the process even more than that and just either add to the title of that form so that may and and I mean it may work it may not but I'm just thinking if we already have the form we already have that system and I know we need to change it until we get to that point is there something more simplistic that we can do to continue collecting the data as we always have well as I understand it and clarify for me too it's not our form it's a it's a Federal Form oh okay and the state uses the form to do the calculation for the compensatory money so even if we were to come up with our own form for the educational benefits that we might give as a district decrease on Sports fees or um subsidies for Community Education the state and the FEDS are still using their form to calculate our compensatory money no no but I'm just saying the the concern is the parents not filling it out right so my thought is do we just it's not really that I don't think I think concern it's more about replacing that form with a different process so asking the legislature to say don't use that form anymore to determine the compensatory Aid create a whole new system but until we do that we're going to rely on the old system but not require people to do the forms but I've also learned through the process there's other ways to identify that population some of them are through it's called like direct certif certified that accessing different um perhaps Community benefits that people are getting light Public Assistance accessing that information so they don't have to do the form there's a different way to get the same information the other piece though is that there's better ways to identify what students need those Services what students and families need those Services we need a better way to cre we need to create a better system to capture who those people are and I agree I was just saying I just know that takes time I was just trying to think of what can we do to utilize what we currently have even though it may not be the best system so that we're still getting that data and we you know as the system changes I guess my concern is that Gap right because we have an old form that we're all saying is not very effective right now because it's not being utilized we know we need a new system but if this takes two years what what's happening in the interim right because even if you know even with when things pass and I could be wrong it doesn't go into effect immediately right there's still even if the legislation says yes we agree and we're going to change this it could still be implemented in 2028 so what happens in that time so I was just I agree that's the purpose of way this is worded is don't let those B Financial benefits don't let the district lose out on those benefits during this transition time okay I'm just trying to understand thank you yeah but good questions um so in terms of the student centered the uh looking at ways to um assess our students I think we've had earlier discussions in other meetings about the value of the MCA exams and transitioning that instead to the ACT um to better align with career and college readiness is a concept that I think that was the first time I did hear that was at the msba delegate assembly uh this is kind of percolating up to something that might get the legislator's um attention particularly um in I guess there is a little bit of a question of whether there would be Financial impact of this or not the the other thing I think about and superintendent I'll invite you to jump in on the that the um act actually lines up better with what our um outcomes that we are supposed to have um from the state as opposed to the MCA which don't seem to be quite as well aligned and so you're not really getting as clearer picture from the MCAS as you are from the act and I believe we pay for all of our students to take the ACT now is that correct if they if they take it if they take it if they take it it's not required so I think with you that pointed out though we the issue of science that that act doesn't doesn't assess science so we'd have to figure out a different way to do that no there is a science there is a Science assessment but it um often is not included in the states that have adopted act or sat they usually just tie their accountability system to reading and math oh um but it could you know I think this is a great idea and I I hope the legislature um pays attention to it I the big argument against it is going to be that the ACT is not designed to measure Minnesota's standards specific um in my view there's enough overlap between Minnesota's standards and what the ACT uh is built to Merit this change so I hope it gets some uh attention I know there'll be opposition from within mde to it um but I think it's a great idea so and I mean there is a potential cost savings maybe to the state because the MCAS aren't free to administer right or to develop potentially the MCA test development happens only every year when you do which is just about now you do new test development and then you kind of just run them and actually the MCAS are a relatively cheap test which is part of the problem for as standardized tests go okay um so I would I think this is an educational argument as opposed to fin fin one um there might be some savings to it but um I actually did come up with my own question as I was thinking about putting this on this document um if I understand things right the MCAS are tested periodically through a students time in RPS but Act is just 11th grade so how does how do those match up yeah we would only give one high school test if this was adopted presumably which do use other assessments for other purposes we would still give Fast bridge for but that's a local determination um act used to have this really great aligned Suite of Assessments that were predictive of the act the explore tested the plan test in eth grade and 10th grade and they moved away from it but um the you those that was really a a powerful but very expensive system and you had to buy it from Act of course um but now it's just that it's the the summi of test is what they have built now their whole system but they have tons of resources for curriculum and instruction tied to the exam so I think it's a great idea I think the thing that you just brought up um in terms of the MCA being multiple times in high school and the ACT being one is that um that time away from um instruction um to um a the multiple times we give the MCAS and frankly the value of the timing of taking the MCAS versus when students receive the results that aren't tied to course selection or college or career planning where the act the suite of resources absolutely feeds into all of our College Planning effs the other thing from the students perspective is I think they would are more likely to take the ACT test more seriously than they do the MCAS and I kind of looked this to in a bigger picture of avoiding the criticism of teaching to the test that we can teach for assessment and helping our students rather than a standardized test that has to be done on a regular basis well and I just want to say the mca's in high school the reading is done in 10th Grade and the math is done in 11th they don't take like the same test multiple times in high school so I guess my question surrounding that is so I've take I'm from the East Coast I took the SATs that's what's popular there when I moved here I took the acts I will say out of both school systems I had to do additional studying and went through additional preps so how would that change our current curriculum um that we have set up and I'm just ain't been a student high school student a little while um but would that how would that impact the the curriculum because even my kids who took acts recently you know there's a whole separate prep process for that um that includes you know the the studying that they're doing so if we would be testing the students are we going to be adjusting the curriculum so that they're able to pass it because depending the AC as I'm assuming most people have taken it um it's a little different than just what you just you know than than the MCA so are how would that uh I see the value right but then how does that affect the high school curriculum because we don't want to set kids up for failure right so if we if our curriculum is set to to get them prepared for the MCAS does this mean that we'll also have to make a structural change so that the children are prepared to take the act or we going to be adding um an additional ACT prep course and and I could be wrong in this but I mean I did it with all my kids I did it myself we all did the ACT prep course um my kids who were very bright and my kids who were struggling I mean one and the same just because that test is set up a little differently so I just don't know if that adds additional things to our yeah it's a it's a great point the in statute and just in theory it shouldn't be the test that drives the curriculum it should be the standards right so Minnesota has in theory but oftentimes people pay attention to the test so the test should measure the standards and the curriculum should teach the standards and that's where as I mentioned I think the biggest push back to this is going to come from people who say the MCAS are designed to measure Minnesota's standards which means that the test is aligned with what people are expected to teach with curriculum and then some will say Act is designed on the Knowledge and Skills that you need to succeed in first year coursework at a four-year College University that's what the ACT is designed so then there's a separate question about kids who don't want to go to fouryear college um and so that will be the biggest counter argument to this because you're right we would need to account for what kids are being tested on and if there was big discrepancies between what the ACT measures and our state standards that's where the problem would lie I think that this will push that useful discussion um at the state level um because there's nothing magic about Minnesota's standards you could you could re revise the standards right now the standards are in law and they're revised about every 10 years and that's what we're expected to teach and this could create uh a tension between some of those standards it's not gigantic they're broadly aligned and they've done this in multi in in eight states already where they have part of the process is that they do a mapping of the AC content to the state standards and they have shown that without changing the act that it does cover the state standards in every state that they've done and we are there are already two districts that have also done that mapping in Minnesota to start the mapping to the state standards and they're already showing that it does cover the majority of the state standards so it's not that it's such a tool that's as you said it's so out of compliance with the standards that the curriculum would have to change I just ask because like I said a lot of people do that prep course and I mean it wasn't super intense but there were things that I mean myself my kids we all had to re-review in order to prepare for that test um and a lot of it was just because it wasn't fresh information there there are areas in the act that you know you may have dat in maybe eightth grade you just had to kind of brush up on some things so that's why I ask will they if we switch to it what will be the plan to Preparing kids I don't think that it's not you know just like with any test if you test any of us right now on act we might not do that good um without the prep course so I'm just saying how would we prepare so that we don't set our system up for failure right because if we're not preparing our kids to take that particular test how it's formulated there may be what ofation do you we we we don't so right now we we certainly urge our schools to uh be paying attention to what the MCAS measure but we don't do test prep um for the MCAS um we uh the idea of creating a test prep for the ACT uh because it does matter to kids who want to go into college um is maybe something we should consider separate from this right now it's usually fee based people pay for their own we don't offer it directly so that's an interesting idea and um we would be getting into the test prep business if we did that because right now it's not something that we do um and if this change happened that would be an interesting possibility to have to think about it would be interesting what resources we could get the state to provide too for that well yeah which they don't provide much for the MCA so it would be a but that's not true there are some things that they provide well as she said the MCA is a different sit different animal though right because you're taking the English in one year you're taking the math in another year um and it's it's still not the same setup as you know the ACT where you're sitting there for two and a half hours going through every thing you've learned I mean I I think there's just there's some some things I think need to be really thought through and considered because I think it's a great idea to do but we don't want to see our numbers plummet either right we don't want to go from you know because we're trying to get rid of these achievement gaps so where we now create a new Gap because we have uh a whole different testing structure that our students are not prepared to do I I can just in a in a foreshadowing of um what we talked about at the beginning of this meeting when we were all young long ago um uh the I will be recommending to you that RPS make the ACT um for sure in reading and math and well it's reading in English and math that we make it our success measure at the high school level locally so I know I'll recommend that to you as opposed to the MCA we would still have to give the MCA unless this proposal happens but I think it is a much uh more useful goal for us to focus on the ACT at the high school level so that'll be coming this spring when we bring you that recommendation I'll tease her there oh yeah reason to stay tuned y um any other questions about that one otherwise I'll move on to the next one the broadening the definition of instructional hours to allow students to earn credit for learning wherever it occurs the basic idea about this is that if students are doing um unique programs where they might get mentoring or other types of instruction to be able to allow them to use that as credit um so that they can progress in their studies whether they're sitting in seats or not is kind of the idea um so the next section is the additional priorities for consideration um director M do you want to talk about the first I did not understand the school calendar part I think that allow School boards to establish the school calendar right now we are legally required to start after Labor Day unless we have $400,000 or more of construction projects for the summer in did I get that right and any anywhere for anytime we have 400 Grand of construction going on right it it allows us to set the calendar um I don't want to say this too loud but that $400,000 amount has been in place for a very long time we'd like to leave it there um there's been some discussion you know um from some communities there some districts that if we're allowed to set our own calendar it's going to really mess with tourism and other things where they rely on maybe teens to you know come in and help with that or if school starts too early then that's whopping off a couple of weeks in the summer when people would be traveling you know doing some of these these touristy kinds of things so there are um you know pros and cons to that at this point it doesn't affect us because we do have $400,000 worth of construction happening and I guess I the way I look at the the first three of these additional priorities is I look at kind of things to modernize the process that this isn't a consideration for us and I would expect a lot of districts because they probably are in the same situation as us as having that additional um the $400,000 in construction the next one eliminating All State requirements related to notice of remote Schoolboard meeting participation I think this is just recognizing that people's lives may require remote attendance on occasion and the Hoops that people have to jump through to accomplish that seems really outdated um I think you know the experience that we had with virtual meetings during Co has really really changed that a lot in that um we we know how to do virtual meetings and you know if I'm if I get sick on Sunday and I'm think I shouldn't be at the school board meeting on Tuesday but I'd still like to participate um I can't because I haven't given the three days notice of um you know where else I might be to participate in the school and some of it was too like you had to Kathy I know you're pretty familiar with this because you've you've traveled a lot but you are required to say exactly where you are you have to give a public address so that if people you know if I'm in uh California somewhere so that people who are in California if they want to see that I'm attending this meeting they need to know exactly where I am um which seems to me to not make a whole lot of sense but these rules were from an earlier time and some of the other organizations had different aspects of these either re eliminating the three-day notice or eliminating the address loc I just added eliminate all those requirements they're outdated um and similar to the next one the this again doesn't necessarily impact RPS but allowing school districts to publish their official proceedings on a district website rather than a newspaper some of the communities are losing their newspapers so they're having to publish in larger Publications that are more expensive and not as related to their communities so it seems like website again with u modern technology is perhaps the best way to publish their official proceedings um the next three or four here are about changes the legislature has made that impact our bottom line so things like the unemployment insurance and paid leave programs the state passed those uh changes to law but did not provide funding to them if they provide funding it would allow us to do that with um in more cost- effective way um providing additional training for the react implementation to train uh uh training and curriculum for the S successful implementation um drel do you want to talk about that locally I I how that impacts us I don't know if it's an RPS or it's a bigger State issue um just like we've we have prioritized the literacy strategy and so we reserved uh a large share of the last part of our covid funding for it and then we have um maximized uh District dollars and so unlike some districts we're we're covering the cost at present but we know it's actually a multi-year strategy and this there's no new state money forthcoming and so we have have been able to Resource this transition in the first phase but uh continued State funding would be very beneficial if there it was forthcoming again as we keep saying the prospect of that is not high given the state budget but if you don't ask uh that also sends a message right but also related to our earlier budget discussion we used our funds to fund this rather than other prior that's perhaps know why we're having some of the discussions we are tonight um the next item is strengthening the program known as grow grow your own and teacher apprenticeship programs to recruit and train teachers of color and teachers in shortage areas I I definitely agree that this is something to keep on the radar the question is should it be a priority for this year um and then finally repeal the requirements to negotiate e-learning days student testing and student to staff ratios um director Berman I think you might know more about this one the night I was going to say don't count on it I mean we we don't have e-learning days correct where where like if there's a snow day it's a snow day we don't require students to um virtually be in school that day for any number of logistical reasons such as do they have the materials at home that they would need to do that we we don't but by because a state statute we had to talk about it in negotiate negotiations and we agreed with our Union locally not to do we agreed on uh the state t student testing you know issue as well but it was required to be in negotiations um the student to staff ratio piece is obviously a more complex and difficult one that we don't consider a subject of negotiation but we had to talk about it uh because of this legislation uh our perspective really was that's an inherent managerial right not something that's contractual but uh the legislation is awkward in that it doesn't Force us to agree but you have to negotiate it you have to include it in the negotiation so I think we have a really good relationship with the Rochester Education Association so it it didn't divert us from reaching a good settlement in places where that's not the case you can have uh these become roadblocks to getting a deal done because they're saying wait we're supposed to agree to this well no you're just supposed to make sure it is comes up in negotiation I did understand that distinction so that's super helpful um so unless there are other questions I think the process we talked about earlier about asking questions through the Q&A for next week's meeting and we can we have more discussion next week great so under other business our annual Board calendar draft update are there any items of board member i' like to bring forward for consideration on a future support meeting agenda hearing none our upcoming board meeting dates are January 21st at 5:30 a regular meeting February 18th at 5:30 a special session on field trip fees within a regular board meeting immediately following March 4th 5:30 regular board meeting and March 18 5:30 a regular board meeting and hearing no other business this meeting is adjourned at 8:35 p.m. e