##VIDEO ID:CDVyYnzObWc## e e e e e e e e e e e [Music] oh [Music] 2020 yeah good evening it is Thursday September 12 2024 at 6 p.m we are at the district service center in Cottage Grove of Minnesota we would like to acknowledge that the land on which We Gather is the land of the Mid wakon Dakota people mid awakon means dwellers of the Spirit Lake our first item on the agenda is 1.0 roll call Dana Brian Clark here Sharon vaner here Eric Tesmer here Pat Driscoll here Melinda does here Sim p here KD Schwarz here 2.0 for you please rise for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands one nation indivisible withy andice for all okay 3.0 is approval of the agenda can I get a motion to approve motion by Melinda seconded by Sharon all those in favor I any oppose motion passes on to our 4.0 which is our Workshop items 4.1 is our Community Education update presented by Jake Winchell director of Community Education thank you good evening board um thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight uh to give you an update on some of the wonderful programs we had going on here in South Washington County Schools over the course of the summer um in this presentation today you'll hear me talk about Early Childhood kids club enrichment and Recreation adult programs targeted Services extended school year and Credit Recovery I'll start here with our early childhood um starting with uh ECFE which stands for Early Childhood family education um as you know it's often times a a family's first interaction with the school district is through ECFE um ECF is uh designed for families of students ages birth through age five um and E was really busy over the course of the summer uh they they were at 16 events across South Washington County Schools Community with uh schoie on two occasions they held events at the Washington County Library story time and they served over 73 families with infants over the course of the summer another Early Childhood Program that may you may be familiar about is Early Childhood screening which um is require is a requirement of families before children enter kindergarten um Early Childhood screening is is um a program that community educ ation runs we try to screen as many children at at an early age as possible for a variety of reasons but as you may know um identifying students at an earlier age connecting them with resources is only going to benefit that student um as they as they grow so um in in addition to that there was there is a reimbursement from the state for screening and that reimbursement level is a little bit higher at the earlier age so we try to screen at age three as much as we can um in age four and age five as well so but it is a requirement before entering kindergarten this summer we screen through 36 students at age three 25 at age 4 35 year- olds and there were two six-year-olds who were screen over the course of the summer a total of 93 screenings conducted over the course of the summer moving on uh kids club which is our school a Child Care Program um you're probably aware um that uh School a childcare often drives a community education budget so the health year the the school a Child Care Program that Community Education budget is probably going to be a little bit healthier as well um during the school year um kids club operates out of every single Elementary School providing before and after school care in the summer we consolidate down to four sites we operate out of this summer we operated out of Bailey College Grove Middleton and Valley Crossing Elementary Schools we're open from June 13th to August 22nd and they run from 6:30 a. to 6 p.m daily and obviously that's a changed from the school year because the kids aren't going to school during that day so there's a lot of contact hours with those kids um and kids club does a wonderful job of providing engaging opportunities for the kids all summer long you can see here are some historical data dating back to Summer of 2019 um we see a high of 12 thou or 1,200 enrollments and kids club which I would guess is probably pretty close to an all-time high for kids club it would be if I was to venture to guess the summer of 2020 we ran into covid and that year there was no child care in schools um and we were providing essential care for tier one and tier 2 workers and you can see there in 2021 that it really devastated schoolly childcare and that's not unique to South Washington County schools that was Statewide um we' slowly worked our our way back to this year we set a post post pandemic high of 93 enrollments um and our staff would consider ourselves to be at capacity just based on our structure and the number of sites that we're operating out of um as I mentioned we're open from 6:30 to 6 p.m daily and with that with those hours and those number of enrollments and daily participation we saw over 650,000 contact hours with kids this summer kids club couldn't do it on our own we have lots of um Support over the course of over the course of the summer and we wanted to recognize is some of those groups nursing for example support a student needs all summer long for us couldn't do it without them nutrition services provided healthy meals including a catered breakfast lunch and the snack program you know that's a long summer and I mentioned they find the really good things for kids to do all summer long and that includes a weekly field trip at each site um so we can't do that without bus drivers to get our children to these field trips so we appreciate them and our custodians in addition to supporting the needs all summer long you know they work around us right we're our we're in elementary schools when they have their duties to to clean that building to get the previous school year cleaned up and then get ready ramped up for the upcoming school year so they do a wonderful job of working around us and we do our best to work together to move out of certain areas um so they can get in there and clean and prepare for the next school year as I mentioned uh as I mentioned lots of fun activities for for students to do over the course of the summer um they have a literacy Focus all summer long um which includes tracking reading minuts much like you see a lot of times in in during the school year um we had lots of guest readers including Dr Brooke as you can see there in one of those pictures and uh represent representatives from the College Grove Police Department came and we guest readers as well they committed to providing 60 Minutes of movement per day has done through a variety of means uh to meet the needs and ability levels of all children here's an example uh kids um participating in a color run then there's a service aspect to Kids Club in the summer uh all students participated in a school supply and book drive which uh supported South Washington County cares so was Co cares foundation and all Sites hosted a wheels go round day where children were able to bring um bikes from home and ride bikes at school so lots of fun activities for kids um and then the summer wrapped up with our Carnival where all four sites Consolidated into one um where we provided games they had a barbecue there's lots of dancing and fun activities for kids to do it was a really fun activity um kids were really having a good time was it was great to see staff across Community Education stepped up here we had office staff who were popping popcorn and and helping out with this event too so it was a event to wrap up the summer moving on to our next uh Department here schoolie schoolie was busy you probably saw schoolie out and about the summer schoie had 48 School visits over the course of the summer participated in four parades was in 15 special events and in these events and schoolie visits um served over 3,780 meals and there are 32 Community Partners help make schoolie a possibility moving into more Community Education uh some youth enrichment courses uh we offered 181 courses which led to 2,826 Total enrollments this summer so kids had lots of opportunities um en camps clinics gymnastics and Aquatics which is a huge part of our summer you see here over 800 different courses and over 5,000 enrollments here there's a change here if you saw some historical data and the total number of enrollments here you'd probably see that this number was a little bit lower um than previous years those numbers reflect a change in the way that we operate our some of our vendors um they're now independent contractors instead of operating the school of District employees and that was a change that we look to make so even though their enrollments look would look like they're lower those independent contractors are paying rent on the facility and and it's really a wash in the end so we have adult programs um this is overseen by Susie Evans and her team um in the adult programs we had running this summer we had Adult Enrichment adult basic education and our senior programs you see in these pictures here there's a group that took a trip to um there's trips and tours that we offer as you can see in the picture there Generations Cafe and the senior center and GED programs we had over a 100 students participating in adult basic education over the course of the summer um the senior center operated out of Armstrong Elementary due to construction um it did lead to an extra week of shutdown for the senior center um but everybody took it in stride and they're back up and running in the DPC now moving on I'll talk about targeted service summer school um targeted Services summer school ran July 8th through August 1st 4 days a week um they ran for 5 hours per day elementary students ran from 8:00 a.m. to 2 p.m they operated out of great cloud in NOA front Terrace Elementary Schools the middle school students again ran for 5 hours from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. they were at cotage Gro middle school and this is for students entering grades 1 through 8 you see some numbers here uh you see a nice increase in 2020 4 from 2023 967 students were enrolled and targeted service of summer school um a good jump in both Elementary School and Middle School the bigger jump was in Middle School um part of this part of this increase was the goal of the targeted Services team was to send out 1500 invitations for targeted Services um with 800 to a th000 students enrolled over the course of the summer and uh you can see there was 967 enrollments they they were on the high end of what their goal was so I think they're very happy with that um and one other change they're able to send those extra invitations out this year because the criteria to be to qualify for targeted Services changed from meeting two criteria um from three so more students were eligible for targeted Services which led to a bigger um overall enrollment too some of the day-to-day aspects of targeted Services um they saw an updated curriculum this year um their theme for the summer at the elementary level was to be kind be strong and be well they had a literacy Math and Science aspect to their day and and they served breakfast and lunch as well as they're transported the middle school program again benefited from an updated structure and curriculum their theme was to engage achieve belong and celebrate they had a three-day period with a home base and a lunch as well they had math Ela and an elective uh they had Project based learning stem challenges and they were served breakfast as lunch as well as provided with Transportation targeted Services looking ahead to 2025 again they'll they'll offer four weeks of programming uh they're El eligibility for criteria may be adjusted again based on capacity um they'll look to increase that enrollment and they'll continue focus on high highly engaging activity based curriculum and positive relationships our next program uh extended school year also known as esy that operated um July 8th through the 25th there are 460 students served from Early Childhood to age 22 uh to make this happen takes a lot of staff there are 60 licensed staff plus related service providers working the summer in addition to approximately 100 Pair of professionals and other support staff they operated out of Liberty Ridge site 2 great Cloud Elementary Cottage Grove Elementary Cottage Grove Middle Eastridge High School pathway school and Community Based and work-based learning experiences as well um 460 students this year and two 2023 they sered 373 students so an increase there as well lastly I'll talk about credit recovery this is overseen by Ashley Ruka and South Washington South Washington Alternative High School um over the course of the summer over 400 credits were earned um amongst the various high schools Park High School students earned 99 of those credits Woodbury High School earned 190 of those credits EAS idge High School 86 credits the Alternative High School students earn 26 and a half credits and online students earned five credits over the course of the summer that concludes my report and I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have um I had some question questions thank you so much um one of the questions I had was with the credit recovery at the high schools can you tell me what drove Woodbury High School to have twice as many credits recovered as any of the other schools that's a great question I thought I may you get that question so I did check with Ashley Ruka um she did say Woodbury had more students enrolled in Credit Recovery over the course of the summer she also said it's hard to measure um just due to the nature of credit recovery and where students are at in their credit recovery Pro um um progress I suppose some students have worked harder up to that point so some of it's just a timing thing but there certainly were more students from Woodbury High School as well okay um and then with the um can you tell tell us the difference between like an extended school year who would go to extended school year versus targeted Services yeah right in the way I understand extended school year is somebody who receives IEP Services um and then extended uh targeted Services could be a variety of criteria that they meet I mentioned that in the previous years they have to meet three this year was two it could be um progress in school it could be chronic absenteeism it could be a variety of reasons but students who aren't necessarily on an IEP okay do we know what drives like you said you gave out 1500 invitations to get 800 or to a th000 is that like a typical um net response yeah great question I don't I don't know that but I'd be happy to ask that question and I can follow up with you do we know what drives people not to accept targeted services in the summer I don't know great question y oh vacation oh I think some of it has to do with the timing of when we offer targeted services and if families are around and I think we actually appreciate that if we know families or students are going to miss a week and a half of time it's really difficult to kind of slide them in in the middle of something and so that really is a good turnout though to have over 800 students the only thing I'd add to is that for Middle School we did a lot different this year is that our teachers had the um information at conferences and we invited every kid to summer school and then we worked with them in their programming to see where we could qualify them there were very few students who didn't qualify under the new criteria um and so instead of saying here's an opportunity targeted for you it was like hey do you want to sign your kid up for summer school so it was a different approach at middle level this year so that's why you saw a bigger increase for Middle School in particular so literally like 1300 students times four middle schools were all invited yes and that is that's exclusive of the cards and everything and all of all reach that targeted Services Department did so yeah so as far as the extended school year um I know I'm in the the seek committee and I know I've heard parents talk about like not as many people qualify as they used to like you have to have more severe type of diagnosis or whatever is that is that because we have more special ed kids than we used to so less qualify or how does that work eron do you want to take that one do you have a mic great question it's very hard to generalize any patterns because our students change from year to year seniors or 22 plus move on our Kinders come in I would say I could certainly compile some data but it's always individually determined so the criteria that's set forth by the federal and state regulations has not changed at all um it's IEP teams that determine a student's need to to receive those extended service Services through the summer so increases could reflect um the trending that we're seeing with incoming kindergarteners an earlier identification of eligibility for sure and then also we have the opportunity to serve our oldest students for an additional year so that's a whole kind of cluster of students we could potenti any other questions yeah I do have a question actually um Jake but the uh kidss Club is that that's not state funded is it correct that is not state funded that is a fee based program so just I mean can you tell me about the fees how much are they that kind of thing right um great question I don't know off the top of my head the what the exact fee is but it is um you typically it is um County assistants eligible um so so if a family can't afford that fee they if they qualify for child care assistance they'd be through the county they'd be willing they'd be able to attend our program P pay per day then essentially per day y okay yeah it's [Laughter] expensive it's quality um actually that brings up another point so what you said that we're at 900 post pandemic what is the um so our sites are capacity constrained are there is it like a staffing issue that prevents us from opening additional spaces or is have we found that like this is the right amount yeah I think I think um kids club staff would say for our current setup would say that that's just the right amount staffing has been an issue certainly in the last handful of years um but I do think that there's a magic number as far as we want to see this many kids on a waiting list before we added an additional staff some students also require maybe some additional services or maybe a one-on-one staff as well um so even though we might um have a waiting list we might be waiting for a staff who can just serve one student or to help get one student enrolled in the program MH any other questions okay thank you okay on to 4.2 and that is our strategic plan priorities for 20242 that will be presented by Julie neelson superintendent great thank you Katie um while the slide deck is coming up um as we begin year two um it's hard to believe I don't know if it's just the age but as we look back and we think about all the timing it feels like we've been working on our strategic plan a long time in terms of community involvement bringing information back to the board going back to the community but we are actually on year two of our strategic plan and this evening we'd like to share the big work um in our areas of focus and priority as we go into this school year and along with that taking a look and being more descript around um what those results and how we'll measure those um so this evening I'm going to go ahead and start out in terms of outcomes um examining the components of our strategic road map again just solidifying when we use different terms what does that mean sharing the 24 25 big work of the district reviewing with board members and any community members watching the desired daily experiences as I've shared with board members those ddes as we call them um really reflect are reflected in our vision card and what we're measuring and then um talking about what instruments or tools we're going to use um to measure those results so first off our strategic road map and what you see here is um in working with Teamworks is is what they would summarize as our strategic road map um the core components of Mission Vision our core values and then uh we all use a little bit different terminology but I call them the buckets of work and underneath there are the five buckets of work from student experience Mastery of learning and expectations really gets at the academics our student Pathways and supports operations Staffing and finance and then of course engagements and engagement excuse me and Partnerships so here we have the mission of South was South was County Schools is to educate students for success and in talking with uh staff and having them in one big arena we talked about what does educating students for Success uh look like what does that mean and uh while obviously there's always that academic success which is definitely a strength there were a lot of other things in the way of problem solving Independence teamwork collaboration that really comes up um when we think about making sure the education is well-rounded obviously with a focus on the academics but when we talk with staff uh there are definitely other words that come into play when we talk about that educating students for Success our vision statement this is one honestly uh while we haven't been super focused on we look at it occasionally but that is the way off um in the future leading by example working with our student staff and families and Community to support each student and I think every day in our daily work we look to make that happen to act with integrity and to work with others around us and then the core values people love that I have a little two eyes two EAS and a c and as we um ground ourselves in these core values and we look for opportunities and stories throughout our district just remembering what those core values are and that they're grounding so connections Integrity Equity excellence and um Innovation um just so you know on the Innovation we've taken off the E uh so um that one's an that's the I otherwise it would be three e and two i's just so you know that's what made sense in my head Ryan two eyes two EAS and a c I don't know there was a little rhythm to that two eyes two EAS and a c and it's important because people will talk about our work and what core value does that work align to and then just to point out again uh uh making it a little bit larger is just those buckets of work and these buckets of work were determined by our strategic planning group when we looked at everything that was happening in the district these are the highlevel um areas and then underneath there what you're going to see this evening are the uh various um uh specific areas that we're going to be addressing that fit into those buckets so what's our big work of the district and it's important to know when we talk about strategic planning everything becomes a priority and so our question is always how do we prioritize the priorities to make sure that in our large system we're not overloading our teachers we're not overloading our bus drivers with a new ID uh with a new driving system whatever that is to make sure that everything makes sense and is seamless not that every department is doing their own individual work without consideration for the whole and so we're going to go through the five areas or the five big buckets and uh executive cabinet members are going to help do the presentation um as they oversee much of the work within the buckets so if we can go ahead to the next slide and I believe it is Kelly kicking us off and then we'll just roll right through so Kelly go ahead so the first bucket is student experience and two of the projects we want to highlight tonight um are program evaluations and District supports for new to Country students and families um this isn't an exhaustive list of everything we're doing within student experience and I think you'll also find as the three the in particular the first three buckets of work probably could overlap each other in terms of what goes in in each one um but with program evaluations our goal is that we would have a procedure a program evaluation Library an inventory of District programs and a schedule to learn about District programs that we will be heading into program evaluation cycle and a big part of program evaluation cycle is student voice how is the program affecting students and is it giving us what we hoped it would when we created this program um we don't want program evaluation to be something scary that we're going to evaluate you because we may be cutting you type of conversations this is really for improvement and to understand what the impact is having on our kids and their student experience the other one is District supports for new to Country students and families as you know our enrollment of of these students has increased greatly and so we want to make sure that we have an onboarding orientation for our families that supports them understanding our system and helping them navigate that um we kicked it off actually last week we had our first Spanish-speaking Parent Portal session and we had over 40 families in learning how to be in the parent portal and understanding what information they could access about their student in the parent portal so that was pretty cool um the other piece of that is making sure our schools are ready to receive these families so that accountability checklist um is just kind of those things that every school should be thinking about when they have a new to Country family um enroll in their school so those are two of the areas that we're highlighting for student experience the next strategic direction that we will uh update you on this master of learning and expectations as St as superintendent Nelson said this is the academic uh piece that all that gets a lot of the attention and rightfully so and so we are uh in alignment with the read act and with the training that is taking place Statewide I would say South Washington County uh schools is leading out uh what I mean by that is we are making sure that our staff are trained in year one whereas other school districts kind of phasing it out uh but South Washington county is leading out and we are uh emphasizing and and having all of our licensed uh Educators go through training and that training has commenced with literacy training for uh our Elementary uh licensed staff and also our secondary licensed staff the elementary licensed staff are going through kry I all training and our secondary staff are going through core literacy training uh they began that training doing Workshop week uh with synchronous sessions and also some asynchronous work uh leading up to that synchronous session and then on a monthly basis that training will continue uh and prepare our staff to not only have the confidence and competence as it uh pertains to literacy but it will position us to have common language and common expectations K uh K12 uh as it pertains to literacy in addition to that the elementary literacy screener is also being put in place this school year uh that uh staff have been trained uh and now the uh the screening are actually uh taking place uh this week and next week at the at all Elementary uh sites and through this process we will be able to identif ify specific opportunities uh for increased I would say instruction uh very purposeful instruction for our elementary students that way uh we can help move the needle a little bit faster uh with uh as it pertains to literacy and specific reading needs for our elementary students can you give back to the program evaluations can you give me some examples of the program so we can get an idea of what those are Elementary here yep so um one that we just completed was Spanish Immersion um we have program evaluation currently going on with our AVID program um we have an El program evaluation that is is been ongoing and um continuing um other programs we may consider probably eventually would be mtss I would say also eventually would be our impact of literacy training on our staff and like our literacy program um um so I think those are some that come to mind I'm kind of looking around Ain I know Aaron is really into program evaluation so I know there's many within our student support services that that Aaron will be part of as well you speak to yeah it the multi-tiered system of support sorry those acronyms um in which we make sure we have tier one or core instruction and we're we're reaching at least 80% of our kids in that tier instru uh tier one core instruction and then we have an intervention so core and more in tier two um and then we have some intensive intervention for students who are well below grade level that would be tier three that would be tier three um Kelly when you're talking about the program evaluation so this year is just developing developing the evaluation and developing um like a evaluation cycle correct correct because evaluation been happening in in um for the last couple years Dr M Jacobson malel Jacobson has been working working on it what we're hoping to do here is make sure people understand when they're part of a cycle and then who is going to decide when we when we are going to look at doing program evaluations particularly because people see the benefit of it and then they come to Dr malel Jacobson and say I really would like to do a program evaluation and so we want to have a process where we will consider programs for evaluation and have a cycle typically when you're doing these evaluations are there do you have like similar questions or rubrics across all programs or is each program really highly individualized I would say that it's highly individualized but there's a national standard for the program somewhere so for example in the Spanish Immersion and I know I won't remember the program but she used a national standard for immersion programs as the rubric in which she measured our programming against so obviously we can't use that one for every program so there's usually a National Standard that we measure against okay and so how does for Spanish Immersion then how and I'm just picking on this because it's a example but how does a program evaluation differ from like the school a school evaluation or is yeah I guess since they're co- terminous right our programs are always in continuous Improvement to your point right we're always wondering how we can do better um this is a very intense process where it is focus groups it is surveys um it is a deep data dive it's a historical data dive um and so I would say that it's much more rigorous than what school Improvement planning is a couple questions Tyrone um with this with the literacy screening you mentioned three times a year 2425 is that more than in the past that's been increased yes it uh yes it will be this is our first uh year going with the uh screen at the elementary level okay on a comprehensive scale okay and then uh KY question for you too in regards to um so like students and families are new to the country is there an additional cost associated with um students that meet that criteria and if so who absorbs that is that is that a local taxpayer thing or is there Federal funding for that or state funding uh both so these students will qualify for El services and so we receive federal funding and state funding form but as you know in our last couple legislative platforms we have a cross subsidy and El services and I'm looking for Chris um not nearly what we have for special education services but I think it's been around three million around our cross subsid for um El services so they're not fully funded is what I would offer any any student who receives El Services is not fully funded um because of that cross subsidy that we have do you I mean do you have an estimate it's probably maybe you can't even quantify it but do you have an estimate on what you believe the cost might be per year it's funded 3 million but is it you said it's more than that or no I think 3 million is our additional cost oh that's okay that's yeah yeah I would say that our cross subsidy on that so get kind of similar to special services right that cross subsidy pieces that were unfunded um and then the general fund kind of absorbs that's about 3 million so the state aid for El they have created a cross subsidy Aid now as we look to fy2 7 I believe that one comes into effect as well and so that will help offset some of that um and they did change some funding as well with that so we're hoping to see you know some gains anyway towards reducing that subsidy in the next couple years any idea what the the trend is on that I'm assuming it's increasing do we know by how much or for the aid itself I guess for the cost for the cost or um I can certainly provide that a because that would be something I could pull up pretty easily because we do have a specific how we code it in our system and then I guess also just like the num you know the numbers of of students enrolled in in the E program yeah and I think um I think that was probably in Nikki and Den's presentation um couple months ago I believe they came and so we certainly can get that data for you as well what's the apologize for the questions what's the um the deficit I guess on the on the funding versus the cost do do we have any idea and that's the cross subsidy that we're talking about it's about million so we'll get that's a deficit is 3 million correct no plans from the state or anything on closing that or and that's where I think the El that cross subsid a that they made some progress for that'll come they have to collect data first so fy2 24 will be the first year they start collecting data on that okay um and then 25 and then we'll actually get the funds in 27 so they need some time to collect some data to make sure that there's consistency across districts and how we're reporting that information as well um so that will help we're just um I think it'll continue to be a challenge that we Face legislatively a question what about the federal cross subsidy well how much is that so that would be included in that um we don't get a significant amount of title three funding which is the El piece um I want to say I'll get that number for you for sure um in my head I have 100 less than 100 thousand but then I'm been looking at a lot of numbers as we've been doing preliminary Levy and working towards audit so I'll certainly provide that information but that would be included in when we talk about that ELC cross subsidy often we assume that includes the federal um AIDS in there as well but I'll make sure to get that information do you have to apply for that or is that so title three is similar to Title One title two and title three in that um certainly we have to submit an application each year um the processes changed slightly there used to be um it still is the initial applications is due by the end of um August I think it's actually September 1st we always just shoot for end of August um and that initial application is due by then it's based on our enrollment numbers though and so um as those increase we might see some slight increase but it's still spread across the whole nation on the title of funding because it's a federal fund source and so some of that is gets challenging too because it's like oh well our numbers went up we should go up but it doesn't always um exactly equate to that thanks only thing I'd add to that Eric is it's not a competitive Grant though so it's not something that if our application's wrong or that we wouldn't receive those funds it's the state works with us if our answers need adjusting or so it's our money is our money we have to submit the grant for it but it's not a competitive Grant yeah it's considered a formula grant and so they have a formula for how they distribute those funds instead sure and and then but and the rest of the the costs then are just absorbed by local taxpayers that's included in our so when we talk about um just our budget in general right in the um kind of what the general fund picks up so whether it's local taxpayers or the state just the general per pupil formula amount that we'll get to talk about this evening too correct and I think the key thing is that both special education and elel services are mandated services so by law if students qualify we have to provide them and so that is why administratively we continue to Advocate on the legislative platform to fully fund those areas great I could share just a little bit of data to Circle back to one of your questions so as of like last December we were just just over 1,400 students that qualified for El services are eligibility uh and just to compare to the state we sit just under 7% across our district we have es and flows we have schools as low as three schools as high as 20% representation the state sits it about 10 10 is the average y about 10% okay did you say Chris that um the deficit from El as far as what the state and federal pays versus what the school eats is higher than the deficit for special ed no okay that's what I was like confused by that I just meant it was similar in that so and I said similar more as far as that we have that cross subsidy that unfunded piece right it's a significantly less dollars compared to that um cross subsidy um Tyrone I did have one question for you so for the carry all versus the core literacy training what's the difference between the two and why do we have one with primary and one with secondary that's a great question I'm GNA let kayy Johnson uh who's uh heads up that no who heads up at is that because you didn't pass that class that car all they actually we should say when we talk about the red training uh many leaders have been through the training so I I'm looking around the table but I know Kelly Christine and Tyrone Aon um they've all done parts of the training and they successfully completed it not at 100% though not 100% okay with that I am okay with that um so MD put forward three trainings uh two were through the University of Minnesota letters and carry all um letters we automatically ruled out because it was 150 hours and um then carry all and then core online language and literacy Academy soola were between 45 and 54 hours both of them um when our directors of teaching and learning looked at the content we really liked what core and ola did with relating it to classroom teachers in the secondary and so we put our secondary teachers into the olaart and the University of Minnesota some of many of our teachers have done letters already and so we wanted that natural fit with carry off for elementary teachers so both of them are approved by the Department of Education as approved training programs okay and then you said all licensed staff will be going through so that includes like counselors and um so how do they how do they fit in with how the training works so I we would offer to that we have another training for um that's that is through core but it is um completely synchronous so it's with a trainer and our um counseling our elective type courses are going through that one because they aren't they weren't in that list from MD in particular um but I would offer that all of our teachers have an impact on Literacy for our kids and all of our families and all of our businesses and all of our community can impact Literacy for kids and so we really wanted to send that message that you can impact the literacy of a kid and it really expands it Beyond reading for children and so I think myself going through it I told Julie like I feel like I can teach a kid to read now even though I know I can't but it was it was just really good to understand how kids brains work when they're trying to learn how to read so is this in alignment with that Arc reading curriculum that we have or can they be used in the carry all training be used as they're teaching with The Arc curriculum absolutely so the training is about the science of reading and and the how to teach reading and the arc is the resources used to do that we lose track of where we're at now but good questions board members this is a great opportunity this is our big work so thank you um I think now we're moving on to Erin and Christine student Pathways and supports all right so when we look at student Pathways we're looking at what are the pathways and supports we have for our students so and as Julie mentioned earlier a lot of these overlap or are involved with the other pieces so mtss as Kelly already very nicely described is a framework for our schools to PR to look at data and provide interventions for our students and so by the end of the year we hope to have that K12 framework for all of our schools and we hope to also have leadership teams formed and working on the framework not just to create it but implement it in all of our schools since we are in progress with that oh next is Ain do you want to just jump down sure so I have the third one toolkit to support cultur affirming learning and events and that is through our Dei Department they're creating um a toolkit and some resources for schools if they would like to if and when they provide um programming for families so like for example in um October we have our Hispanic Heritage Month and they're a big part of resources and supporting those events that our schools would like to put on throughout the school year for questions okay all right so circling back to special education we are working across services and levels to just really look closely at the Continuum of services and supports that we we provide through special education so to kind of circle back to the comparison we serve about 4,000 students in special education um as of just last week about 800 of those are our youngest Learners 0o to five um and so we just want to pause and take a look at all the good things that are happening in our system and really intentionally look at how to grow that so that we can leverage and support better outcomes for more students and so that process will of course be grounded in our commitment to make sure that the work that we're doing at the district office and at the district level is translating into support and responsiveness to our teachers and our service providers that are working with our kids every day that has to be what we stay grounded in um we are obligated by the law and by a commitment to best practice that what we're using and doing is grounded in research and evidence of some sort um so that we can predict reasonably that it'll be good for kids and good for teachers in special education we often talk and we're going to talk more about this idea of high leverage practices so what are the instructional strategies approaches and resources that leverage and increase the progress and success of our students and so that'll be language that we Circle back to um as we begin to kind of articulate what we want to do and move forward um our Focus will also be on how we collaborate effectively within our buildings and across disability areas and Specialties um and again just really getting grounded in what are the core strategies and supports that work well for kids and how do we support our teachers and doing work with that um extending from kind of that process of looking at the overall experience specific to special ed we want to take from that what we can glean to assess how our support services are working for kids and for staff and for families like social work the mental health supports that we provide in our schools and in our partners with our in agency um Partnerships throughout the community um and then we're partnering with Handover research to do a survey across our state at how public school districts big medium and small figure out the best approach to case loads so case loads refers to the number of students that are served by one special education teacher or case manager and there's lots of factors that go into that the number of service minutes the impact of disability the level of services being provided and it hasn't really been something we've looked closely at in my five years here um and that's not uncommon or unique to us and I think the time is really Prime for us with the talent in our system the lead leadership in this space uh to look a little bit more intentionally at how we make decisions in terms of our allocations again staying grounded in what's best for kids and so we're going to partner with Handover to look at what's happening across our state and see what's working well for other districts that might work well for us as well um the next piece in terms of a focus area for this year is our multilingual uh enrollment processes so our partners uh Nikki and danillo who you've met and all heard from even or about tonight um have worked really hard to improve the very first experience that we have with our families um who are new to Country new to us learning English as a second language or perhaps third fourth English as not a native language uh so starting with a flowchart that just really outlines and articulates the responsibilities and roles of every person from that very first interaction when a family and roles with us to when we hand out a schedule and welcome them into our school buildings and that's already up and going additionally we're required to have a language instructional education plan one more acronym L I uh and that is drafted and in process and our expectation is that would be living out fully implemented by the end of the year we've always had it we've always been required to we're just working on making it um better in terms of our family or user experience and how those supports are implemented um and then we have a newcomer toolkit that the US Department of Education has provided to public school districts that's amazing and it's like 57 pages long so the good news is we already have something to start from and then our Focus this year will be having that be a standard resource in all of our schools and understood how to um pull from and use it to support our families who are considered newcomers so just for a reference or reminder a newcomer would be a family that um is in K12 public education who has been in our country for three years or less and is learning English so our next bucket of work that we'll speak about this evening is operations Staffing and finance um so one of the first big projects again it's not a comprehensive list but this is some of our big work is the implementation of Frontline in our professional um Development Department um Frontline is a platform that we currently use for recruit and hire for absence management and for Teacher evaluations in an effort to streamline all the platforms that we use um we are now going to be be pulling the tracking of cus and professional development into this Frontline platform um we will also be updating classroom teacher rubrics in Frontline on the evaluation side and then we also will be utilizing the learning management software to do our Assurance of compliance training and so that'll give us a really nice much more streamlined approach rather than having four different systems for four different things another big project that we're working on is true time right now and what this means is that our hourly employees who are still being paid on contract pay will be moved to a system in which they clock in and out so we have some hourly employees which is an Antiquated system to pay them on contract pay um so what that means is it's even pay spread across the year and then if there's any overtime they would voucher for that at that point um and so we are working on implementing this this year um for a variety of reasons but really so employees can understand how and why they're paid the way that they are um also for compliance reasons to be compliant with federal and state laws um so that's a big project that we're working on this year and then also working on updated um evaluations and processes for non-licensed staff evaluations and working with pilot groups this year on those new evaluations and that will also be run through front line how you like a pause for a moment um I have the next slide then so continuing with operations Staffing and finance um we we are also implementing Edge climber which is a software it'll be configured for sash schools and training will start for core district and school administrators this year so right now this year is kind of that um I'll say onboarding for staff and then as we roll out to next year for that um transportation of RFID badges otherwise known as the rider IDs so that we have a secure accurate reliable way to track bus riders um student their status to make sure that we know where all students are um who are riding the bus and increasing that student safety component again the final one on this slide is a new work order system and through the facilities they worked um to really look and assess what the needs were and um this will complete the background documentation auditing of all building assets and then we're creating a system with transparency and accountability so we can ensure that uh when there are things that need to get fixed that there is just a nice fluid process for that instead and I'll wrap us up with the uh engagement and Partnerships um bucket um really where first big work and um we've been working on this all year and and last year too but is uh focusing on improving some of our translations and interpretations um so we'll be continuing to improve some of the platforms we use to communicate and engage with our multilingual families um some of the little things that we've been doing so far is to be able to get some different translations into campus and so um people aren't having to sort of have that just memory of what I click on and where I go and they can actually read it and understand what they're they're um working through um we also have been working on um G getting our data in a better place to identify which language um families prefer so that is probably the biggest work that we're working on right now that's going to impact a lot of what we do um and so what we're finding is that um we're asking some teachers we're asking schools to just help us identify who needs um different types of translations and interpretations so that then as we provide those Services we know we're um giving it to the families who need it um and then really we're working to create and begin to offer plain language training for all staff and so what I mean by plain language training is that it's we want to there there's a lot of Edy speak in in in what we use and so I've been in Communications for over 10 years for schools and I still don't understand some of the things that come across my desk and so I have to ask a lot of questions right to what do you mean by this and so um we want our families to be able to understand what we're sharing with them and then that when you're when you're writing in a plain language like that it also makes things easier to translate and so um everybody's getting that same language um and that same message um but it makes it easier to translate and then it makes it so everybody can understand what we're saying and so my team works really hard to to to write like that right now and we're trying to roll that out to our schools as well um one of the next things that we're working on and we're close to Rolling Out is our new newsletter platform and I know that I've spoken about this before um we're kind of in that final phases of um the data integration of it so um there's a lot of pieces that kind of come together here to make sure that we have all of the the lists and things like that we need and we didn't want to hand our schools um a platform that isn't ready to roll and so um by the end of what this looks like is we'll have a consistency across our schools so that people know where to find this information how to get it um the translations will be much improved um over that once we get to to that point and then our school letters will have that consistent look and feel from elementary to Middle to high school and so um it it you know sometimes I think there's a lot of difference between what those look like and so at least families will know what to look for in those newsletter platforms as they as they come through um and finally um the food rescue program um and this is nutrition services and we'll be offering a food rescue program in all 23 cafeterias um this will be rolling out kind of a slow roll out I think and the partnership is with basic needs food bank um and this will allow low um lower amounts of food going into landfills and um help diminish some of the in food insecurity um with the community members in our community as well and with that I think I'm G to click next I think it's you Julie right yep and so as we think about this big work if we just took any one of those small components whether we're talking about RFID badges or implementation of LY number one we know that Communications is always involved like there's always some type of communication to parents or schools so um I think it's important to know that our directors and the leaders around this table we have spent time doing what we call Project planning and that really is to help Pace us and guide us in our work so that we don't overload the system what we saw happening is at the beginning of the school year there were all all of these expectations and all of this work now it's natural right it's the beginning of a school year but as Leaders we need to not start everything in August as we enter September so how can we Pace that out and it's really our job as Leaders strategically to think about when when what other time could we start this work um because otherwise we overwhelm the system and by the end of September everyone is tired and exhausted so as we look forward I just want to bring to the board's attention and community's attention and I know this is not new for you but as part of our strategic planning process the desired daily experiences um and there were groups of staff there were groups of students and there were groups of uh parents and family members who talked about what they wanted for their children out of South Washington County schools and these are those desired daily experiences and why this is important is because this actually will lead us to what we call our vision card um but as we go to the next slide just to help the board um see and make sense it's really like a sandwich so at the beginning of our process we had the desired daily experience of staff students and families as we wrap up we're going to be measured with those desired daily experiences and in between is that strategic ro road map and those strategic priorities or those buckets of work and then as we look at the next slide it really shows out of that what happens so when we think about the Strategic priorities and the buckets of work out of that comes perhaps procedures policies we create handbooks um we have implementation maps of the timing so that's what comes out of the big work and then as you look at the bottom the desired daily experiences of staff students and family we create our district vision card or the metrics under which we're going to be measuring our desired daily experiences and I know board members had the opportunity to take a look at um a draft vision card so if we can go ahead Sean um just to share again when we think about what instruments are we going to use for the most part it's going to be student academic data the Minnesota student survey uh it actually I learned we do it right now 5ifth 8th 9th and 11th it can be done at every grade level and I believe Kelly every year right now we do it every three years so that'll be a conversation as we move forward um of course the board members we had what we call the community survey um that Community survey was done in 2022 and at that time what the board committed to um similar to something we talked about before is we don't want to just go survey the community when we're cutting budget or when we need a referendum we want this to be ongoing and it provides us with great information so in 2025 I believe it'll be November December of 2025 we will go back and conduct that same survey to see how do those percentages look and compare to three years ago and then of course there are some of the desired daily experiences that don't align to some of these instruments that we already do that we will need to conduct our own District surveys um so what will our vision card include I'll actually Sean have you hop into it because we'll show it right there so what I wanted to share with board members are the tools that we're going to be using so an example underneath student achievement data we would make sure that under that Mastery of learning and expectations and I think it was Dr brookens Who shared that this is that heavy area when it comes to data this is just one snippet of what we would be measuring we would be taking a look at our MCA results in math and in Reading um while that's a very high level we would also have the ability to break it down by student groups so just an example of how we would use um our academic our student achievement data and the academic data and then next as it relates to the Minnesota student survey the Minnesota student survey is packed with information and the questions they ask so just to point out here while our bucket of work is the student experience the description is actually one of the desired daily experiences I feel welcomed cared for heard respected accepted for who I am so how are we going to measure that um there are four questions that are asked on the Minnesota student survey that we would grab that data and have that be part of our vision card so we would take a look at questions like adults at my school listen to me uh at at my school teachers care about me they're interested in me as a person and I feel safe at school and then the community survey or as I think I labeled up there the ml community surve survey the Morris Leatherman Community survey um you will see the measure there how would you rate the financial management of South Washington County schools and then um another question is our community receives a good value from its investment in our local public schools that really gets at that academic um academic data does our community feel like they're getting a good value from the investment and so you can see again that alignment of questions that are asked in that Community survey that we would then be measuring and sharing back with the board and finally um when we talk about a district survey of course our schools uh they all have their school Improvement plans and so they're out surveying parents and families and staff too we want something that's more comprehensive so uh individuals don't get survey overload um our survey fatigue and so we would work together with our schools and in this particular measure nowhere else is this question asked and this is um one of the desired daily experience of staff and that is overall I am s satisfied with my job in South Washington County schools and so that particular um metric on the vision card we would need to conduct a District staff survey so just to share a little bit about um what the metrics are as we move forward so in terms of strategic planning Next Step steps continue to work with our district directors and guiding the big work in the school district um review District data to determine the effectiveness of training and what is being implemented one of the things when we talk about the big work big work does not come to our table unless we have the data that shows that it needs to be big work um which means that we're not chasing shiny objects that we really want to be intentional about the work that we're aligning and why we're implementing something to finalize our district vision card um and then to share a finalized District vision card in March with the board and then finally to make sure that our strategic planning information is updated on our website and so with that I know we kind of paused in between with any questions but if there are any questions for the group any questions okay thank you Julie and everyone else uh we will move on to 5.0 information items 5.1 is intradistrict transfer and open enrollment presented by Tyrone brookens assistant superintendent all right so I will be representing my colleagues uh the other two assistant superintendents but I will be the voice if you think back to last year Kelly Jansen was the voice because Christine and I were uh actually supervising a football game so no supervision of football games this evening so it's we're up all right so we uh the agenda topics that we would cover are the timelines for the intradistrict transfers which we refer to as IDT we love our acronyms and education and then we'll also talk about policy 509 which is open enrollment timelines for applications and then identifying schools that are uh closed for opening room this presentation will cover cover the Strategic directions of operations Staffing and finance also engagement in Partnerships and it touches on the core values of connections Integrity equity and Excellence so we haven't been Innovative with this but it's just a a standard process that we go through all right so our rdts uh they provide families with an opportunity uh living within our School boundaries uh to request their child to attend a school outside of their assigned boundaries and we actually get uh a ific number of requests every year uh those requests are considered around these following parameters uh the space and the staff that uh have been allocated to uh that particular site uh we do prioritize applications based upon siblings of currently enrolled students applications related to uh approved achievement integration and also children of uh School District staff members who work at that particular site that uh that family member wants that child to attend uh if there are number of intradistrict transfers exceeds uh the available space then we uh Institute a lottery process and it is actually a lottery process with the actual balls and and the and and the spinning and and it pushes it out a number and then they're assigned a number it it's I kind of laugh at I'm like wow this is a real thing but it it's actually a real thing that takes place uh families are responsible for providing their own transportation uh when they request and the AIT is approved and then the eligibility for for athletic participation related uh to a transfer would fall under the uh parameters and guidelines set forth by the Minnesota State High School league so we're not creating any uh advantages for one school over next vice versa uh we have three time periods that we meet and uh make decisions for uh the interdistrict transfers on the screen you see uh those dates uh secondary starts a little earlier because we need to know uh student enroll and and and students need to be able to choose the uh courses that they want to take so um that uh date is December 15th uh Elementary is March and then you see the uh once the date uh the deadline is set we meet as a team the three assistant soups plus the representatives from student information uh we approve or or disapprove and then uh student information communicates with families via uh letters and phone calls and you see the uh dates that correspond with that and then we do it March December and then we come back in May and then we do it again at the beginning of August and then if we have any families that move into the district after that August State then we will consider uh those requests at that time the next part of the presentation is related to our policy of 509 which is open enrollment and this policy uh is connected to Minnesota's uh uh statute language 124 d03 and it provides a nonresident family the opportunity to attend South Washington County schools and because it's connect connected to legislation uh we follow the parameters of 1% of our uh students enrolled at that grade level or or in the district or the number of District residents who choose another school district other than South Washington County and we choose the lesser of the two but it is a state mandate and we uh make sure that we are following uh that state requirement um when we look at the definition of open enrollment it's requested it can be requested uh at grade level and we look at schools that are under 95% capacity and I will be bringing forth a resolution at the uh next meeting uh for board approval uh for this uh we also have to make sure that space is available for the applicant under the enrollment cap standards uh we have a booming uh I would say enrollment uh right now in our district and a lot of interest from open enrollment um but we have to make sure that we stay Within These parameters and make sure that we're not putting any schools or grade levels to at a disadvantage and the number of available spaces for open enrollment like I said earlier in the previous slide it is uh the lesser of the 1% of the total enrollment for that grade level or the number of school district uh resident students who open and roll out of our district the following is our timeline we accept applications beginning December 1st all the way through uh January 15th and then any applications received after that day they uh are placed on a waiting list and then uh we meet and then we make decisions and then we communicate with uh to families by February 15th the next slide identifies the schools that are currently closed for open enrollment you see the elementary schools of Bailey gray cloud Pine Hill and Red Rock Elementary and those schools are closed because they're uh at 100% capacity or over 100% capacity and then our middle schools remain closed College Grove Lake openland and Woodberry and our three comprehensive high schools are also closed so opening up any questions um Tyrone just to clarify when you enroll say you're a kindergartener coming to Woodbury L um you get to stay in the district till you graduate correct that is correct and you can continue to follow like since if you go to Woodbury L you're likely to go to Woodbury middle and Woodbury High School so even though those two schools are closed for open enrollment because you follow your pathway you would be able or do you follow you do follow your pathway correct you do follow your pathway uh we we can't guarantee it but it is strongly considered and we have not had the uh situation where we've had to you know change that up um but for the most part once they open and row they become our student and we want to you know treat them as our student any other questions uh for our online school do we have open enrollment for that as well and how does that work uh we do have uh open enrollment for our our online school and it follows the same uh process and procedures as a student in a traditional setting is there a limit with on how many students can enroll it's it's dictated by space and I know the online could get interesting because you think you can load up uh the number of students in an online environment but we have some parameters around class size even in an online environment where do you find the data that shows what's open and what isn't on online we uh we communicate with the office coordinator and the principal uh from our online uh school and they provide uh information around available cour available seats within courses I think one thing to point out about Open Enrollment is when families make application they make application to open roll into the school district at that point they're accepted under open enrollment but may not be assigned to school because the school assignment is based on space available and so at that point we get determined where it's available um we always do our idts in front of the OES why is that because ID students are our resident students and we want to make sure that the benefit goes to our resident students over open enrolled students so just kind of understanding that process Tyrone how much do we look into excuse me like the perspective um kids that are going to be coming from like new housing developments and stuff compared to how much space we think we have do we go back and you know look at those percentage and those numbers that we expect to get kids before accepting kids from out of District if I understand your question correctly um you're looking at projections and we're looking at projections uh I would say in real time when I say real time we're talking about this current school year and the upcoming school year we're not like forecasting out three two years and beyond that but more so the immediate uh incoming enrollment okay so basically three years the year before and then the preceding year of that year you kind of looking atent yeah and then one in the next and I think the thinking has been that once the student is accepted whether it's IDT or OE then that cohort moves together so then we've planned for them um I think it's important to note that the Staffing process actually happens in March and so when we talk about new homes kids moving in we have uh some buffer built in in our secondaries because they don't tend to get staff added whereas when kids move into our elementary school depending upon which school and which grade level we need to keep it at that 95 so if a student moves in we still have a slot for an attendance boundary student Julie one question is um when kids do apply for open enrollment do they or families apply for open enrollment do they get to Priority say like you know because we have 10 elementary schools that are open for enrollment right can they say well my first choice is you know Armstrong my second choice is Hillside my okay that is accurate they they can on their application put their choice of school um and then student information just tends to respond about if there are openings at those schools and it may not be until a third school or maybe it won't be any one of the three many times um individuals don't even go on the website to see which schools are closed and it may be those three schools and so then um what student information would do is put out what schools we have openings at okay thank you um we are on to 5.2 Transportation update presented by Abby Baker Executive Director of Human Resources and oper good evening um tonight before we start the transportation update I want to recognize a couple different groups um as you saw in this strategic planning presentation um RFID cards are one of our big work and that has been a lift for our bus drivers and for our transportation team and our bus drivers were in this summer learning our new system um we've had some bus drivers helping out office staff and so we greatly appreciate especially you three awesome bus drivers in the audience tonight we appreciate we appre appreciate your flexibility and your professionalism um as we move the system forward also when you're routing 14,000 students there's a lot of details that going to all that especially in a year in which we have a newly implemented system so um special shout out to our office staff who have been working around the clock to get all those students routed um and so their work is greatly appreciated as you are aware we have a transportation steering committee and this was really a result of looking at Staffing and shortages um with the attempt to not cancel routes whenever possible and so we really wanted to look at creating efficient and sustainable um transportation for our families not just in the current year but in the future as well one of the other goals is to reduce the number of bus routes needed um increase the accuracy of ridership um we've been exploring the radius method for measuring Transportation distances and then clearly defining what what a hazard is and then identifying hazardous areas so some of the implemented changes from this school year um that we discussed at the steering committee was we went we went into the Ser with the second year of required opin for transportation for all of our families um we moved the Hazardous area north of Bailey Road for EAS Ridge High School students we changed the start time for Red Rock Elementary so they were a tier one school this year they're a tier three starttime school and that helps balance Transportation throughout the tiers and then we reduce the number of routes for Pine Harbor Christian Academy students so when you look at this three-year snapshot of routes by year um in the three years we have saved 32 routes um right now we're at 80 morning routes and 87 afternoon routes we know this will change in the upcoming weeks as we look at load counts and capacities and um look at what our current picture is there um but I think this goes to show that some of the efforts made by the steering committee we have reached our goal in reducing some of those routes um to make sure that they are properly staffed this data also shows us that there's more need for afternoon transportation for our families so new this year um is the new routing software with the navigation for and bus rider information so all general education students get a bus rer ID and they look similar to this so students will swipe in and swipe out when they get on and off the bus um if they belong on that route there will be a ding if they don't belong on that route there's a different sounding alert so drivers are able to quickly identify if they don't belong on that route each driver on the bus has a tablet and so there are turn-by-turn directions it's a very similar to Maps um that you may be familiar with and then as you approach the stop um it populates pictures and names of students are at that stop so it's really some increased um measures for students safety and accountability one of the major wins we had this year is that in that first week of school we did not have any missing or unac accounted for students and so when I was speaking with Carrie olssen our director of Transportation um this is the first year that she remembers in her 20 years of working here that we did not have a missing student especially a kindergartener because we know that happens in the first few days of school so that tells us that um the hard work of our bus drivers listening for those dings that we are really making sure that we prioritize student safety along with that we're also going to be able to better view Trends and more efficiently allocate resources so we will be able to get a live look at Road at load counts and capacities and then make adjustments to routing from there so another big win right now is that all routes are currently staffed with bus drivers as you may remember in the last couple years it's been a regular occurrence for office staff and our bus mechanics to be covering going into this school year all routes are staffed with bus drivers which is great news however we are still going to monitor Staffing and continue to hire bus drivers um since early August we've had four retirements or resignations and we know that that happens at this time of year um we also have to plan for a leave of absence especially those unforeseen leave of absence um to make sure that we have the Staffing to back fill those needs um additionally as we are working on implementing a new system system and routing students we have two positions in our office open um so we have a payroll position and a routing position so if you know anyone send them our way so looking ahead in the next few weeks our M our main priority is to get um students that still need to get on buses um on buses and routed and so as of August 26 so that was a week before school started we had 1,00 requests for transportation and or changes to trans Transportation so those are a lot of requests to process um for each of those students we are averaging about 50 new requests a day as of yesterday we were down to 200 so we hope that in the next week or so we can get that leveled out um traditionally it does level out as you get through September and then things stabilize by the end of September that way so that is our main priority right now is getting students um routed on buses after that we will be working through timing issues with some of our current routes in particular middle school routes um we will be using that new software to monitor load Cs and make adjustments to routing as needed we know our buses are more full this year than they ever have been our drivers can attest to that and so we'll be looking at those capacities and um looking at seeing if adding routes are possible at that time um like I stated we will continue to monitor Staffing and continue to hire bus drivers and hopefully get those two office staff positions filled um very soon and then in October we'll be reconvening the steering committee um to review the changes that we put in place for this school year and we will already begin looking ate um at next school year and looking at our staffing looking at our routing and seeing what changes we may need to implement for next year any questions yeah Abby yeah so if a student gets on the wrong bus and the little ding-ding goes off then how are they redirected who read to to the correct um bus I mean how how do you who does yep so if it was a afternoon route if it's a pickup at school um they would work to get the student on the right bus if it is in the morning we don't leave students at the bus stop so the student will get on the bus and then we'll figure it out from there same with ID cards I know that question has come up if a student doesn't have an ID card we are not turning students away from rides um they are still allowed to ride the bus I have a question about the um the bus routes I've heard from some parents that their bus routes are lengthier this here so I'm just wondering like how we're addressing those longer bus rides yeah so once we get students on bus that's what we're going to take a look at it's mainly at the middle schools right now and then even from there um it's really isolated to the Spanish Immersion at the middle school level so that's where we'll first start taking a look which makes sense because then we're busing from all areas of the district um but we want to get those bus those times on buses as close to that 1 hour max as possible um and then uh how do we how is the card system working I mean we've been in school now for two weeks it's only two weeks right and I have a child in the district you think I would know um but uh yeah so how how is it like are the kids catching on is it causing any delays for drivers how is it working yeah it's good um and so I think the the win like I said before is that we did we had all students accounted for and safe that first week of school um I was out watching it it it's really interesting to see I think sometimes our kids are better with change than we are um some especially some of the littles loved swiping they were excited about their badges so that was really fun to watch um and it's changed right it's getting used to that it took them a little bit longer probably in the first few days of school to load and unload and as they get used to swiping and doing the turn and what direction that the scanner is on that that'll get quicker too are the littles tending to have wear them around their necks or they have them attached to their backpacks or what seems to be yep so they're attached to the backpacks um so during open house at some sites um they helped with those getting them on the backpacks but then also on the first day of school teachers helped with that I have a question when you're looking at routes for like high schools we wouldn't start cutting routes because kids aren't because I know like Athletics my son hasn't rolled the bus all year because he he's in athletics um so we're not going to look at just because they haven't ridden yet this year they're not going to be like no if you've opted in you will still have the ability to ride the bus what we' look at is different types of routing like could we add more students onto that route could we combine routes um based on what those load counts are looking um but students will still be able to have a spot on the bus yep any other questions okay thank you thank thank you okay we will move on to 5.3 Financial update presented by Chris Blackburn Director of Business services so I'll tell you my exciting part of this last week so we got to go out to schools as the start of school and I was at nois and the power went out and I went I was in the office CU I was just starting to head out and I said so do you want me like is there anything I can do or do you just want me out of your hair because I know sometimes when I don't know what I'm doing that may be more problematic and so they're like here have a walkie-talkie and go make sure there no kids are lost in the hallways I said on it so that was kind of fun because in the finance world we don't often get to walk around with walkie-talkies in our schools so I know I came back I was like this is the most fun I've had um Financial update then preliminary Levy so um tonight we're my financial update really is regarding the preliminary Levy for uh property taxes payable in 2025 so as we note here the Department of Education we must they must provide us preliminary reports to school district by September 8th um so that did come out um if you want to look I have some here I was furiously taking notes um during the levy presentation on Monday um property tax levies are made with voter approval or at the discretion of local Schoolboard local levies um for our district are about 20% of our general fund revenues and I'll just remind people when we talk about payable 25 Levy again that's the actual taxpayers will make those payments in 2025 we call it 2425 2425 24 payable 25 Levy often because we're implementing it in 24 making the decision then again taxpayers will pay those funds in 25 and we'll actually collect the revenue or it'll become revenue for the district reported as in 2026 fiscal year lots of numbers to keep track of no wonder why I can't always tell what year I'm in the state of Minnesota then um does set formulas as we talked many times during our presentations that formulas that determine our revenue and most of that revenue is based on specific amounts per pupil the state also sets tax policy for local schools um in addition they set a maximum authorized property tax levy and so the reason we point that out as well is at the next meeting we'll ask for um board to approve the preliminary tax levy and typically we ask for them to approve it the board to approve the maximum we know that that doesn't um we don't final approve the levy until December and so that allows some adjustment opportunity if um the state would make any changes districts we can Levy for less money but we cannot uh cannot go over that amount authorized by the state Unless somehow if we would have a November election I left that information in there from last U presentation last year we did have very two successful operating and capital projects levies so the state authorizes us to seek those referendums and again last year we did so this year we don't have anything on the ballot for that um again we're very thankful for our the support of our communities but as a result of all the items noted Above This funding is highly regulated in the state of Minnesota we frequently talk about the basic general education formula and it laging inflation since 2002 and three the state general education Revenue formula allowance has not kept paced with inflation for fisc year 25 an increase um as noted in our budget that we approved in June was 2% which is $142 over the previous year that was legislative approved fiscal year 25 the legislature also the amount specifically isn't set however they did um put a formula in place that the increase is now tied to inflation so there is a floor in a ceiling so the minimum is 2% and the maximum is 3% currently again if they always can take legislative action to change that but that's currently what we'll anticipate being in that 2 to three for 25 26 being conservative I likely will assume 2% um unless we hear otherwise before then the per P formula allowance for fiscal 25 of 7,281 would need to increase by another 13,064 or 18.7% to have kept pace with inflation since 20023 resulting that allowance then would have been 8645 and so again that that legan formula so Eric to your comment earlier on El and things these are sometimes those challenges in that face not only do we have cross subsidies then that can um diminish maybe what we have full access to this lean um as a result of just not keeping up pace with inflation really impacts us as well the next slide is really just a vis visualization if I can speak that tonight um of that general education formula allowance from 2003 to 2025 and just shows that Gap and how that's widened over the course of the years so there's not necessarily information there just to see it a little visually sometimes helps one of the items that we frequently talk about is the underfunding of special education both from the federal level and the state level according to the min Department of Education in fy22 the costs of providing programs Statewide were underfunded by $713 million even with the recent improvements in funding so again we talked about the um increase in Cross subsidy Aid that's again will increased once again in FY 27 despite that in fy2 they're predicted to be underfunded by 435 million yet so that change in that cross subsidy um Aid was the result of why that number went down but it still is significantly underfunded the primary options of the district we have to bridge that funding Gap are to cut regular program budgets or to increase referendum Revenue which again our taxpayers were supportive of last fall and most districts have done both of those what is our current special ed cross subsidy so it's roughly $24 million in is our cross subsidy um they call the net um and that's just a sign you even 330 M 300 million that's a significant number School District property taxes again we each School District in the state of Minnesota can Levy taxes in more than 40 different categories the maximum Levy amounts are calculated by mde for each category and those maximum Levy amounts are set either by state law or by voter approval so the different categories um I realized I didn't quite have that on that slide but some various categories are that uh again the local um locally approved operating referendum Capital project levies that we've approved we also Levy for qm long-term facility maintenance we also Levy for community service programming um and Debt Service programming as well are just some areas along with lease Levy as well for educational instructional purposes only a change in tax levy does not determine uh a change in budget the tax levy is based on many state determined formulas plus the voter approved referendums some increases in tax levies are Revenue neutral because they are of offset by reductions in state aid so if we Levy sometimes the state will reduce our Aid expenditure budget is limited by state set Revenue formulas voter approved levies and our fund balance so again we can only spend what we have and what we get an increase in school taxes does not always correlate to an increase in budget by the equal amount little difference in Levy Cycles so I know is a school district sometimes we um like I said even with those numbers of 24 pay 25 Revenue in 2 six but as a school district our budget year begins on July 1st um compared to the city or county which begin on January 1st so sometimes that calendar year versus fiscal year sometimes can cause confusion the 25 taxes again will Pro provide the revenue for us in 26 whereas for the cities and counties that 25 taxes will be revenue for them in 2025 and as a reminder we adopted our budget for 20 um 425 in June of 202 four and then our 26 budget will adopt next June so there's always that we're adopting budgets before we've had levies set and so that poses some challenges and some assumptions that we have to make some background in property tax background every owner of taxable property in the county um pays property taxes to in the state pays property taxes to various taxing jur jurisdictions so not only the school district but they also would pay County City Township sometimes there are special districts um such as Watershed districts in which the properties located so um growing up I now own a little bit of land up in monoman county and so me and my siblings own a quarter of three acres and so um we'll pay property taxes up there as well similarly in my property that I own personally too so same in our residents um here in our community they will also pay not only and they sometimes will pay different districts depending where they live Washington County stretches from nearly to Forest Lake all the way down you know to here and so that's the South Washington County when I tell people where where we're located um and so it can get kind of confusing on property tax statements sometimes because those jurisdictions can look differently even the city of Woodburry you may be in Stillwater School District or you may be in South Washington County School District each taxing jurisdiction sets their own tax levy and again often based on those limits set by state law the county um serves as the collection agent for all property taxes and then they distribute the funds back to the taxing jurisdictions so what's happening with each slice we often get asked well geez if mine went up everybody's must have gone up and that doesn't always the higher market value just increases there's the same amount of Levy dollars it's just how it's spread across taxes so I said um the pie is still kind of because it's that this is we can only Encompass the P that's our Levy itself and then if you're higher market value if you have an increase you get a little bigger slice of that pie if your value if your lower have a if your home has a lower market value you get a smaller uh and if it would increase it's a smaller slice so it just changes that amount of um property taxes but again each owner pays a portion of that pie the impact on property valuations again which is not um the district has no control over property valuations but if we have an example of two properties in the district and both houses are valued at 100,000 in the levy of $500 in the equal value would be $250 each however if the orange house increases by 10% in a year and the blue house increases by 25% we still only receive the $500 in Levy same amount even though the values themselves increased but the orange house will pay a little bit less and the blue house will pay a little bit more so getting back to that pie they'll just get a little bigger slice of the pie or a little smaller slice of that pie of the levy they're paying next steps so again we did just receive the preliminary Levy reports this week um we did have the tax levy work shop on Monday and so I was about two hours of just um actually about 4 hours of sitting through I think it's 39 pages of numbers um we always audit every Levy and make sure that we are receiving the aid and the levy of dollars that we're supposed to the board approves the 24 pay 25 preliminary Levy at its next meeting so again we'll have a request for that approval at the maximum and then we'll approve the final levies in December along holding the truth and Taxation hearing at that time as well with that any questions any questions okay thank you thank you are you feeling okay tonight years ago okay on to 6.0 reports and comments and our first one will be superintendent Julie I think I just wanted a slice of that pie and I one of the one that was just a little more um I always say it's truly the most wonderful time of the year uh there is an excitement um and joy in our schools that really is only meant for kids and the adults that live in those spaces um I always know why I don't like the end of the year because it's always sad things come off the walls and there's a quietness and so when you enter our schools it truly is the most wonderful time of the year um to share with the board in the community right now um actually as of this morning we were at over 19,000 students which we are very pleased with that enrollment um we hope that Trend continues that was all of our withdraws as well as our new students into our system so that's great news and since our last board meeting of course we welcome back our sixth and ninth graders um they have a great day that first day is so valued and as I was out in the school it's understanding the school layout uh for middle schoolers it's getting your locker open getting to meet staff finding a friend knowing where the cafeteria is you know we have uh schools that have multiple levels and just understanding and figuring out the space and we take for granted that they're Sixth and nth graders but in these big large Schools they're very small bodies and so it just sets a really nice tone and the staff is surrounding the kids and making sure that that first day for those Sixth and nth graders goes great and then of course September 4th we welcome all others um one of my Joys is always to be out of school and watch our kindergarten teachers who at some points deserve more pay than other teachers just for keeping our littlest Learners and of course our early learning um but our kindergarten students coming in with their families in that first day and those parents saying goodbye to their kids now having been through um two and having college graduation and all of the other phases in between I'm like this isn't quite as big a deal but in that moment it is the biggest deal to have parents walk away and every year you can guarantee there's one student that's going to cry as a parent has to walk away and that is a really really tough feeling but just really a great opening and I think despite some of the HC they're very normal lunches got delayed a little the bus routes were a little bit late or a little bit early and so we continue to work through all of those things um thank you to our executive cabinet members um our district office staff everybody is out in schools and so while Chris had a walkie-talkie someone else was walking uh a student who came off the bus and was crying and saying my mom didn't tell me which hallway to walk down um so lots of things happening but thank you to our leaders in the district um also thank you to our bus drivers uh we know that the weight of this new Rider ID system is not just that our bus drivers but that our teachers um our parents everyone has lots of questions and we're working through that but thank you to our bus drivers because we know that's a whole new system um we do hope that our bus drivers take the opportunity I know the bus drivers we have here tonight um probably know student names but what a great way when students scan on to also get to know students and call them by name and then finally you heard tonight um Dr brookens talked about that redac training and I just want to share with the board that the staff we heard from was extremely grateful to have that time built into the school calendar um that didn't happen everywhere and so to make that a priority so that our staff could really focus on the training um was wonderful and then finally uh we're already hearing about spring break 2026 and so yesterday um yesterday we met um our calendar committee met for the first time we H to have our draft uh 2526 school year calendar um to the board for a first reading in early November with a final read of that calendar on November 21st and that's just pending if there are any any other bumps that we might run into but we're hoping by the end of November that that 25 26 Calendar is approved so we can get that out online and families can continue to make plans um but with this just thank you again to our leaders uh to board members it was a great opening thank you Julie um any board members have any events or upcoming events to share uh one thing is that if if for any of the board members if you have not rsvpd for the City of Woodbury development tour um that's coming up on Monday so if you haven't you should probably do that tomorrow since tomorrow is Friday that's it what time is that uh it's at 5 to7 in at City Hall thank you s okay we will move on to 7.0 future meeting date September 26 2024 School Board business meeting here at the district service center at 6 p.m. then October 10th 2024 Schoolboard Workshop meeting also here at the district service center at 6 p.m. um and then 8.0 is a closed session pursuant to Minnesota 13 d05 subdivision 3A for the superintendent evaluation um motion to approve moving to close session so uh so moved motion by Simi seconded by Ryan all those in favor I any opposed motion carries uh just a reminder for our four people in the audience and anybody watching at home that following this closed session there will be no action items the board will return to open session only to adjourn thank you e e