[16:25] Welcome everyone to our meeting. Thanks for being here. It is Thursday the 17th

[16:31] of September 2026 and 5:30 and we are meeting in the boardroom on Legacy

[16:38] Campus. Uh we'll begin with roll call starting with Scott.

[16:44] » Scott Riby, business administrator. >> Jeff Nielsson, board member.

[16:48] » Alan Grunig, board member. >> Kathy Christensen, board member.

[16:51] » Terry Rhodess, board member. >> Roger Pulse for board member.

[16:54] » Todd McKe, superintendent. >> Brian Chambers, board member. Randall

[16:58] Bagley, board member. >> Thank you all. Thanks, Randall. Um, we

[17:04] have a two special guests this evening that will lead us in our pledge of

[17:09] allegiance. Um, we have uh Emory Tortell and Timothy Heaps from

[17:17] um Birch Creek >> Birch Creek Elementary here and we

[17:21] welcome them. And you c can you come up front and and lead us in the pledge,

[17:26] please

[17:46] to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it

[17:52] stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice

[17:58] for all.

[18:03] » Thank you, Emory and Timothy. We appreciate you being here. Well done.

[18:09] And our superintendent, Dr. Todd McKe, will give us our mission statement.

[18:14] » Our mission is to educate students for success in a changing world.

[18:18] » Thank you, Dr. McKe. Uh uh first up our next on our agenda we have a recognition

[18:24] section and tonight we get to recognize teacher of the year for the district and

[18:32] our teacher of the year is Darren Lentz who is from who teaches at South Cash

[18:39] Middle School and this award will be presented by principal Doug Snow.

[18:56] So, uh, good evening. It's a >> It may be easier. Can I just take this?

[19:02] » Yeah, take right here.

[19:06] » So, it's a pleasure to do this. I've known Darren for a long time. I worked

[19:09] with him at South Cash seven years ago. Uh, Darren actually taught my oldest

[19:15] daughter microphone on. >> There we go.

[19:20] Darren actually taught my oldest daughter who is a math teacher at Green

[19:23] Canyon, uh, Kaye. She's, uh, 69 years old. And so Darren's very And [laughter]

[19:31] so, uh, Darren is a fantastic teacher. Let Let me tell you why I think he is

[19:37] the teacher of the year. So Darren, you go into his classroom and

[19:43] you see someone who has built great relationships with kids and engages

[19:50] every kid. And he's done that for years. And I think uh that is the key to

[19:55] success is great relationships and engagement. And those kids know they

[20:01] come away knowing that they can do math. They might not even like math, but they

[20:06] don't mind it when the time they leave that classroom because they've been

[20:09] cared for. And what they discover is Mr. Lance is great at relationships. He

[20:14] really doesn't know anything about math. It's just really great relationships and

[20:18] and uh engagement. So, uh, as I said, he taught my daughter. So, I've had the

[20:24] chance to get to know him from two perspective as a parent, going to parent

[20:29] teacher conference and working with him that way. and then again as his

[20:33] principal now uh two different times. And so it's been a pleasure and and for

[20:38] him to go down to the state and make the top five in the state of Utah. Uh so he

[20:43] was honored um in what they refer to as the Fab Five, the top five teachers in

[20:48] the entire state of Utah. Uh what a great honor for him and his family and

[20:52] for our district and for South Cash. So uh it's a pleasure to work with him

[20:57] every day. He's a sounding board for me. When I have good ideas or what I think

[21:02] are good ideas I want to try in the school, there's always four or five

[21:06] teachers I run them by first and he's one of them and then they can tell me

[21:10] I'm nuts and then I the idea goes away real fast. And so he's been a great

[21:14] sound sounding board, a professional and he cares about kids. So again, thank you

[21:21] [applause]

[21:27] a picture

[21:31] » and he's the only guy I've worn a tie for twice in one month.

[21:38] » Get your pictures first. Which way you got to get your pictures first?

[21:43] Go ahead. [laughter]

[21:54] Okay, >> hang on one minute.

[21:55] » Oh, yeah. You're not done yet. All >> righty.

[21:58] » So, can I borrow that for a minute? Thank you. So, my name is Curtis Kums

[22:02] and I am from the Murdoch Auto Group and we are so grateful for our relationship

[22:09] with the Cash County School District and we are so grateful for teachers. I I you

[22:14] know, I was talking to my wife. We have had teachers who have changed the

[22:18] trajectory of our kids. So, we are grateful for teachers and the fact that

[22:22] you have been recognized. I know the Fab Five is a big deal. And so, the fact

[22:27] that you were there is incredible. So, in recognition of your teacher of the

[22:30] year, we're going to give you a plaque as well. Not as cool as Cathy's, but

[22:34] we're going to give you a plaque as well. And plus, we're going to award you

[22:37] the use of a car for a year. >> That is awesome.

[22:40] » That is awesome. No charge to you. So, we'll that's something that you and I

[22:44] will talk about, but congratulations and thank you for being a teacher. We are so

[22:49] appreciative of that. >> All righty.

[22:53] [applause]

[23:02] » Get used to

[23:09] patience. Can >> I take a second?

[23:13] » Yes. Use the >> I just want to shake the

[23:16] » Thank you. >> Congratulations.

[23:19] » Thank you. >> Congratulations again.

[23:21] » Congratulations.

[23:25] » Congratulations. >> Great job. Thanks.

[23:30] » Congratulations, Mr. Lent. Thank you for all the great work you do for our

[23:34] students. Can we have all those who are here with

[23:38] Mr. Lent, please stand.

[23:43] [applause]

[23:49] We all up here know that it takes a village to raise a teacher of the year

[23:54] and to give them the time they need to be that. So, thank you so much for your

[24:00] sacrifices.

[24:05] All right. So, if you're here for recognitions only and you want to

[24:10] escape, this is the time to do it. We're moving into the business part of our

[24:16] meeting.

[24:26] And we're super excited because we get to return to our um tradition of having

[24:34] a school report each month during our business meeting. And tonight, our

[24:38] school report will be presented by principal Trudy Wilson, who is principal

[24:43] at Birch Creek Elementary in Smithfield. Take it away, Trudy.

[24:47] » All right. I told um Terry and Kathy this privately, but I might as well just

[24:53] put it out there. when Superintendent McKe first came to Cash County. Um,

[25:01] » Gary Thomas, >> I wasn't going to mention names, but all

[25:04] right. Gary Thomas said, "Superintendent would like these presentations,

[25:10] and since you're the most seasoned principal, we'll let you go first, and

[25:13] you'll only have to do it once." Here I am again. So, um, thank you for this

[25:20] opportunity to share the wonderful things that are

[25:23] happening at Birch Creek Elementary. It's kind of tricky for the fact that we

[25:28] have only been in school 17 days and so we have a lot of plans for this year,

[25:33] but we haven't implemented a lot of them yet.

[25:38] Um you can see with a water bottle sticker that we have a new mascot and

[25:44] the communications department helped with this. We started um when we opened

[25:50] the school in 2010 with a lovely clip art bulldog that we proudly had on

[25:56] everything for x number of years. And so this is our new u mascot that we've just

[26:03] introduced in the last couple of weeks. our mission statement. You can read that

[26:07] as well. One thing about that, when the school opened, we spent a full year

[26:13] establishing that mission statement. And I know when you as a board came up with

[26:18] the mission statement for the district, it was a long process. We are going to

[26:24] reinvent that again this year with new uh dynamics, a smaller school, different

[26:30] teachers. We thought it was time to revisit that as well

[26:35] with our demographics. Last year, we ended the school year at

[26:40] nearly 800 students, including preschoolers. And so, as you can see,

[26:45] we've dropped almost 300 students. That's still 60 more than what they

[26:50] projected. And superintendent knows that knows this, but most of them are

[26:55] kindergarteners. So, um, we have a small minority population at Birch Creek. Our

[27:02] ELELLL population has grown in the last two years. And we're fortunate that we

[27:07] do have a full-time ELELLL teacher to help meet the needs of those students

[27:12] who are mainly native Spanish speakers. We do have Somalia students as well.

[27:18] » Trudy. >> Yes. Can I ask a question before you can

[27:20] move? >> Yes. Um, do you have So you reduced by

[27:25] 300 students. Do you have any students in portables?

[27:29] » No. >> Okay, good. Thanks.

[27:32] » We have empty rooms even. Well, I've I've filled them, but they're not uh

[27:38] full classrooms. Let's put it that way. >> Thank you. Yeah. [clears throat]

[27:42] um with our rise data. If you look at the trends, um we really last time I

[27:49] presented I talked about since CO we had really bounced back. Um we have some

[27:55] different areas where we've dropped a little that you can see and some other

[27:59] areas that we've gained. I've worked with Jeremy um our assessment director.

[28:05] He's been meeting with our PLC teams to help find specific areas that we can

[28:11] improve and we're looking forward to that.

[28:15] With our Acadians reading, the same thing they this just looks like DNA

[28:20] strands to me. But the one thing I like to look at with Aadian reading is

[28:26] following the trajectory of kids. If you look on the 23 year column with

[28:33] kindergarten, they started out at 60% at or above benchmark. First grade they

[28:40] were at almost 64, second grade 71, third grade 72. And so that trend is

[28:47] going up with the groups of students, which is what we like to see.

[28:53] our math acadians. Um we did really well with our um first through third grade

[29:00] students. Kindergarten dropped a little bit, but if you noticed, we had a huge

[29:05] jump um between 2000 or 24 to 25 and that's when we implemented full day

[29:11] kindergarten at Birch Creek. Um some of the some of our scores dropping, we

[29:17] don't know if it student numbers. As you know, we were at capacity. We had more

[29:22] FTEES than we had classrooms for. And so, um, not an excuse, just a just a

[29:29] wonder. So, we're excited >> to see what this new year brings.

[29:33] » I was just wondering on your 2026, is that just the beginning of the year?

[29:38] » End of last year. This is all end of last year data.

[29:42] » Thank you. >> So, again, it's tricky because our

[29:44] demographics, our populations really changed. So, we'll see what happens for

[29:50] this next year with our I Ready math diagnostic. Um, if

[29:56] you look at the top kind of middle section, it shows you the students that

[30:01] were moved in each of those areas from students that were above benchmark,

[30:07] unben or on benchmark, a year below, and so on. And it has the specific number of

[30:14] students there. I feel really good that we moved from 73% of our students being

[30:20] below grade level to 32. And even if you look um at it, we'll just compare the

[30:28] red and yellow bars. That just shows you the growth with our students over the

[30:32] year last year. Some different opportunities that I

[30:37] wanted to talk about [clears throat] are listed there. our academics, our PBIS

[30:42] program, character strong and professional development.

[30:47] With our academics, we have really strong tier one instruct

[30:52] instruction happening. Our PLC's are effective. Teachers are working together

[30:57] to develop strong teaching practices and that was really helpful last year

[31:05] when we started the new um language arts curriculum. And this year we've

[31:10] implemented a new math curriculum. So the teachers are just building those

[31:16] building capacity together. Our tier 2 groups are strong both in reading and

[31:21] math. We have something unique in our kindergarten. We do a program called

[31:26] Letterland that just is more visual for the students than a typical direct

[31:30] instruction program. And we have a grant from the STEM action center that

[31:35] provides three math mentors. So those three teachers are able to get into the

[31:41] grade levels every day and do small groupoup instruction.

[31:45] Our SSL is phenomenal. She runs data dive meetings monthly where we look at

[31:53] reading and math groups. Are kids placed appropriately? Do we need to switch kids

[31:57] up? Are kids being remediated and enriched to meet their needs?

[32:04] Um it'll be interesting this year with the new legislation where we're doing

[32:08] IRPS, individualized reading plans. Um we haven't tackled that yet. We just had

[32:14] our Acadian day yesterday. So we'll look at that data and figure out what we need

[32:20] to do for next steps. This is the third year we've run the

[32:25] Bulldog way program and it gives students a consistent set of rules,

[32:33] expectations to follow in all the different areas of the school. So we

[32:37] have posters in classrooms, in the hallways, going out to recess, walking

[32:42] into restrooms just to keep those consistent expectations. Our team has

[32:47] taken it a step further for a monthly focus to practice and students get

[32:51] bulldog tokens which are like wooden nickels. Um if they follow like this

[32:56] month's character trait is respect they'll get bulldog tokens. If we fill a

[33:01] jar then we have some type of celebration for that. We do monthly

[33:06] celebration or sorry monthly assemblies also that focus on the character traits

[33:13] and a system that we started using. We're either on year two or three um is

[33:19] called Panorama. It's a platform that really pulls all of the different

[33:23] components together um visually, but it helps us identify students who need a

[33:30] little bit extra just kind of on one screen. It pulls things from powers

[33:34] school, from the rise testing, from our attendance records, from office visits.

[33:41] So all of those things are in one place. The new component that the dis one of

[33:47] the new components the district has added this year is character strong.

[33:52] If you'll just go to the Thanks, Kevin. Um with Character Strong, the teachers

[33:57] in every grade teach a weekly lesson. So, it's a character skill. Um, we

[34:04] started the year with a week of kindness and then we've moved into respect. Every

[34:09] grade level follows the same format as far as respect week one. This

[34:16] is what you're supposed to be doing. Week 2, three, and four. But it's all um

[34:21] established. Kindergarten is going to be different

[34:24] than fifth grade, even though it's the same topic. We are just in the process

[34:29] of starting tier 2 groups for that. So just like if we have students that need

[34:34] help in reading, we offer them help in reading. If we have students that need

[34:38] behavior help, we're starting to implement those small groups. So that's

[34:43] something we're excited about. Um oh the teach well the teachers

[34:50] Allison will laugh because I've always hated daily announcements just my

[34:55] personality. And so this year I said we're going to do daily announcements

[34:59] and Kevin this is not a spam email from me. So um that's been fun because it's

[35:05] outlined just going over the character traits. Um there's monthly certificates

[35:09] and awards that we offer the kids as well.

[35:13] All right. For professional development last year, um the teachers participated

[35:19] in professional development monthly over the big five. Um maximizing structure,

[35:26] clarifying expectations, re reinforcing appropriate behavior, responding to

[35:31] disruptions, engaging students, and we became a big five certified school with

[35:36] that. Teachers are still using those strategies. Um they're just good solid

[35:43] teaching strategies. This year we're working on I Ready Math, the new

[35:48] curriculum. And we have two training sessions set up with the company itself.

[35:53] They'll be coming to our school and then we've partnered with North Park and Bev

[35:58] Sanders is going to be leading some professional development. So we'll do

[36:02] that four different times. So we have six sessions set up.

[36:07] Some challenges. I decided to break this up just into three different areas. Um,

[36:13] school challenges, socioeconomics has really shifted um, just since I've been

[36:18] back at Birch Creek. We used to be a title one school and we're we're no

[36:22] longer we don't qualify for that anymore. However, we do have a lot of

[36:27] really young families that are working really hard to make ends meet. Um, I did

[36:33] mention our ELLL population. Um, with that communication can be tricky, but we

[36:39] do have great supports from the district, our um, liaison that reach out

[36:44] to parents. All the technology we have to let parents translate things into

[36:50] their language has been really helpful. And I am super excited about the

[36:57] boundary changes because it has really um made the school feel more

[37:05] um calm. That's the best word for it. With 300 less students, it's calmer in

[37:11] there. And the teachers notice there's room in the halls to walk. We get

[37:16] through lunch in an hour instead of two hours. So, it's made a big difference.

[37:20] However, our kindergarten is the largest in the district and I have a feeling we

[37:24] will be filling up grade by grade again. Um, if you've been out to the school and

[37:30] seen all of the growth there north of the school around the temple, um, when

[37:34] Bruce Parker was here, he always said, "If you build it, they will come." And

[37:38] and they're coming. Um for teachers, I feel some of the challenges that they've

[37:44] shared with me are

[37:48] um just a lot of change at once. And we knew this was a year of change with the

[37:53] boundaries, but we have they have new curriculum, the math um the character

[37:58] strong curriculum to put in there. And then we've just had a lot of system

[38:02] changes. Um the communication platform's different, the substitute platform's

[38:08] different, how we reimburse legislative money is different. Um new legislation

[38:14] with food dyes and less computer time, things like that. I I know we'll figure

[38:21] it out and work it out, but just being, you know, a couple weeks into the school

[38:25] year, the teachers plates are pretty full right now. students. Um we have

[38:31] fantastic students at Birch Creek. My biggest challenge I think would just be

[38:37] um for some of our students, not our two that were here tonight, for for some of

[38:43] them just that grit. Um trying to convince kids that they can do hard

[38:47] things and to persevere and not give up and that productive struggle. I I feel

[38:54] like sometimes kids don't know how to do that anymore and it's challenging for

[38:59] the teachers if they don't get things right away or they don't understand,

[39:03] they don't know how to handle that productive struggle. Um,

[39:08] of course, just meeting the unique needs of students is challenging. And then in

[39:13] our lower grades, we do have some larger class sizes that teachers are dealing

[39:18] with. But points of pride, this is the most

[39:22] exciting thing. When I go into classrooms, and I've already been in a

[39:26] lot already, which is just exciting. Students are engaged and they're

[39:30] learning and they're having fun. We talked about that in our opening faculty

[39:34] meeting that that kids want to come to school if it's fun. We have a really

[39:39] strong culture. Um, our entire staff I feel works well together, not only as

[39:46] grade level teams, but with our classified parents or sorry, classified

[39:52] personnel coming in. Um, anyone's willing to help out however is needed.

[39:58] Our parents mentioned that when they come into the school, they feel

[40:01] appreciated and they're excited to partner with us. I did mention our

[40:06] strong PLC's and again our parents are the best. We

[40:11] nearly have 100% participation in parent teacher conferences every time. And we

[40:17] like to celebrate. We have the monthly assemblies, bulldog token rewards. Um

[40:23] Allison's going to be talking to you about our reading quest challenge that

[40:26] we just started this year. We have a lot of celebrations. the PTO

[40:32] um sponsors everything from a Halloween carnival to a mother son bingo bulldog

[40:38] mile and the things that they're going to do to help our reading program. So it

[40:44] is a great day to be a Birch Creek Bulldog.

[40:48] Thank you for all your support. It it's felled at the schools and I know you

[40:53] have a really hard job and we appreciate what you do. Do you have any questions

[40:57] for me? Thank you for your presentation.

[41:02] » Thank you >> for all you do.

[41:03] » Thanks. >> Thanks, Trudy.

[41:06] » That was awesome. >> All right. Thanks, Terry.

[41:11] [applause]

[41:17] » It says Trudy Wilson, but I'm actually Allison Fontacco. I teach third grade at

[41:21] Birch Creek. And um when we met last year at the end of the year, we were

[41:28] struggling with some of the reading programs that we had available to us. Um

[41:33] we had gone through and we've done the testing like the AR that I grew up with

[41:37] and the cost just got so high we couldn't do that anymore. And then we've

[41:41] had some great businesses that have done great donations to help do great things

[41:46] in our classes, but we were finding that in our younger grades, they were

[41:51] unengaged because they were unable to do it by themselves. And then in our older

[41:56] grades, they just weren't getting rewards as often as they needed to in

[42:01] order to stay engaged. And so we had a big meeting about what it would look

[42:05] like and Trudy was like, "Run with it, Allison." And I was like, "Let's do it.

[42:11] So, I came up with the Bulldog Book Quest. And will you go forward just one

[42:18] more for me? Um, you had to change your mind about reading. Readers are going to

[42:22] read. So, um, we didn't want to do a minutesbased one because your kids that

[42:27] are going to read three hours a day are still going to read three hours a day,

[42:30] but we wanted everybody reading because you can't raise reading scores without

[42:35] practice. And so, we started with a letter out to parents. So, if you'll

[42:40] click that and it just explained the difference. We wanted consistency over

[42:46] quantity. And of course, we still want quantity, but we're going to start with

[42:50] consistency. And so, we told them, we explained to them like this is how it's

[42:54] different and this is how it works. And a lot of our rewards uh are free or very

[43:01] cheap. You know, lollipops for 10 days worth of reading or wear a hat day to

[43:06] school. Um, Trudy was great in with our cute new logo. We've got water bottle

[43:11] stickers that kids get to earn. And then the other thing that we've done is we've

[43:15] reached out to local businesses and they have been amazing to donate gifts and

[43:21] things like that. She talked about our awesome parents. They've also done this.

[43:25] And so we came up with an Amazon wish list and I think it's at level fiveish

[43:31] somewhere in there. they can get a ticket and then at the end of the year

[43:35] they can spend a ticket for a chance to win those prizes that we've had donated.

[43:39] And so overall, it's been a cheaper way to do this, but it's giving kids the

[43:43] ability to do it. Um I had my first bookmarks turned in today and I've got

[43:47] kids who are like, "Oh, I'm just a day away." And they're so excited. And the

[43:52] reason that it works is it's simple and easy for parents and kids. For teachers,

[43:57] it's really easy because we they give us a bookmark and sometime throughout that

[44:02] day, we just say, "Here you go. Here's all your stuff." We organized it well

[44:06] and we made it very user friendly for all the teachers. So, literally, they

[44:09] were given something and it was all done. They had to cut out some

[44:12] bookmarks, but other than that, it was pretty easy. Um, I think this is kind of

[44:17] what our bookmarks look like. So, it just gives simple directions on the

[44:21] front. It has the prize on there and then parents just initial. They can only

[44:26] initial one book per day. And so they do the date and the initials. And then when

[44:31] they come back, I have just like a vase and I'm putting all the bottom parts in

[44:36] so we can see how many we earn over the year. I think it'll be really fun. And

[44:40] then those are just kind of some examples of the first six of them. We

[44:44] have 13 levels overall. And then we're also doing a school tracking system. Um,

[44:49] everybody, every teacher had to come up with something that they put on our

[44:54] library wall and we have percentages across that. And every month, basically

[45:00] what we want is we want every child to earn 13 bookmarks by the end. So that's

[45:05] your classroom goal. Everybody's goal is a little bit different depending upon

[45:08] their class size. And every month, teachers go in and they put how many

[45:13] bookmarks they've had turned in in their class. And then our awesome librarian,

[45:17] um, Mari Balls, is moving all of our things across so the kids have a good

[45:21] way to be able to see it throughout the year. And if we start falling behind, I

[45:25] can be like, "Guys, you got to get those bookmarks in. I don't want to lose to

[45:29] whatever teacher I'm competing with that month." [laughter]

[45:32] Um, and then we also were able to get donations. Like I said, we went to

[45:37] businesses and we went to our PTO. We've asked every teacher to just get one

[45:41] donation, which is lots of prizes for us. And then we've also asked the PTO to

[45:46] help us. And then I've already reached out to some companies and they've been

[45:50] great. Costco was great. They already gave us $100 and so we're going to use

[45:53] that to get our drinks this year. So that should be good. And overall I think

[45:58] it's been really awesome. And then I think that's it. Thank you.

[46:04] » Thank you. [applause]

[46:09] » Thanks Allison. I want to be in your class next time I'm in third grade.

[46:12] Okay, come on over anytime. >> You need to come in a few weeks and look

[46:17] at the library. Just all of the teachers have created their AI racers. And so

[46:24] » Mr. Rigs is riding a mosquito and we have some on dinosaurs, of course, some

[46:31] in fancy race cars. They're cute. >> So, how many weeks do we need to give

[46:36] you before we show in? pro

[46:41] I don't know >> pro probably a month or two at least.

[46:44] » Okay. [laughter] All right. We'll show up sometime in November.

[46:48] » We just barely started in September because we were waiting till

[46:51] kindergarten started and then we gave them a week to, you know, settle in and

[46:55] we started it right after uh Labor Day. >> Great. That's super exciting. Thank you

[47:00] both for being here. We appreciate it. >> Okay. Uh,

[47:08] next up is public input. We have no public input this evening and so we'll

[47:14] move on to our consent agenda and I will take a motion to either approve or amend

[47:20] our consent agenda. >> I move that we approve the consent

[47:23] agenda. >> Second.

[47:25] » It's been moved and seconded that we approve the consent agenda as printed.

[47:30] Any discussion to that motion? All right, we will vote electronically.

[47:37] » We are going to try it. Second and

[47:42] let me know if you have that pop up. >> Worked.

[47:49] » Amazing. >> That is amazing.

[47:52] » Mine didn't pop up.

[47:58] » Yeah. >> Okay.

[47:59] » I approve. >> Okay. Um, all of the votes are in and

[48:02] they are unanimous. >> Thank you, Scott. Uh, moving on, we are

[48:06] to our action agenda and we have four policies that we have already heard

[48:14] information about. Um, most of them two weeks ago in our board uh study session.

[48:21] So, these are up for action tonight. And superintendent, do you want

[48:27] to speak to any of these first or do you want us to just

[48:30] » Yes. Yes, please. Let me just speak to them maybe collectively.

[48:33] » Okay. >> And then if there are questions, I'm

[48:35] happy to respond. Uh before you this evening, uh board are are four policies

[48:40] that really try to capture what has been in practice in the district. Um but to

[48:46] uh put it into board policy so that we have clear parameters around um

[48:51] expenditures when it comes to um employee cell phones when it's

[48:55] appropriate uh for for district purposes, employee meals and recognition

[49:01] uh clothing and any u employee travel. Uh this is intended again just to give

[49:08] good guidance and parameters to ensure that all dollars being spent by the

[49:12] district are going directly to um furthering the mission of the district

[49:17] and its objectives and goals. >> All right. So first up we have the

[49:24] employee travel policy. I'll take a motion to approve or amend this policy.

[49:32] » I move to um Approve.

[49:35] » Approve. My gosh. Uh to approve the employee travel policy.

[49:40] » I second. >> Good.

[49:41] » It's been moved and seconded that we approve the employee travel policy as

[49:45] printed. Any discussion to this motion? >> All right. We'll vote electronically.

[49:54] » Came up this time. [clears throat] >> It worked. The vote motion carries

[49:59] unanimously. >> Thank you, Scott. Next we have uh meals

[50:06] in within the district, not travel meals. Uh those are accounted for

[50:11] differently, but meals within the district and employee recognition

[50:15] policy. Uh this is a new policy and I will take a motion to approve or amend

[50:21] this policy.

[50:24] » I move to approve the meals other than travel and employee recognition policy.

[50:31] I second. >> It's been moved and seconded that we

[50:34] approve the meals and employee recognition policy

[50:39] uh as printed. Any discussion to this motion?

[50:43] All right, we'll vote electronically. >> Motion carries unanimously.

[50:50] » Thank you, Scott. Uh the next the third

[50:56] policy is clothing and uniform allowance policy. This is also a new policy and

[51:02] I'll take a motion to approve or amend this policy.

[51:09] » I move that we accept the what is it? The clothing and

[51:13] » uniform >> uniform uh policy.

[51:18] » Second. >> It's been moved and seconded that we

[51:21] approve the clothing and uniform allowance policy as printed. Any

[51:25] discussion to that motion? Seeing none, we'll vote electronically.

[51:36] » All votes are in and the motion carries unanimously.

[51:38] » Thank you, Scott. Uh, last policy in our action agenda is

[51:44] the wireless communication policy. This is also a new policy and includes some

[51:49] procedures. I'll take a motion to amend or approve this policy as printed. I

[51:56] make a motion to approve the wireless communications policy.

[52:00] » I second. >> It's been moved and seconded that we

[52:03] approve the wireless communication policy as printed. Any discussion to

[52:07] that motion? >> Seeing none, we'll vote electronically.

[52:16] » All votes are in and motion carries unanimously.

[52:19] » Great. Thank you all. That gets us through our action agenda for this

[52:23] evening. And next up is our reports agenda. First on that agenda is uh Scott

[52:29] Riby with our monthly financial report. >> Thank you, President Rhodess. Um just a

[52:34] few things that uh wanted to go over with you. I know that you have the

[52:37] appropriations and all of the reports that uh I have sent to the board. I hope

[52:43] you've had a chance to preview and to look at those. Just a few points that

[52:47] I'd like to make as far as ongoing audits. uh had a chance to talk to Cindy

[52:52] Parkinson, our CTE director, and she said that the state review is finished,

[52:57] but they are doing a federal audit, a federal programs for CTE, and Cindy is

[53:03] waiting for the state and waiting for audit instructions that will be coming

[53:08] uh shortly for that. >> What What CTE programs are federally

[53:15] funded? >> I believe it is it Perkins

[53:16] » Perkins funds. >> Yes.

[53:18] » And what do those fund? So CTE is funded both federally and by the state.

[53:24] » Okay. >> And those dollars go into overall CTE.

[53:28] So it's not that they specifically fund a a program over another. It's CT in

[53:33] general. >> So what does Perkins mean?

[53:35] » Perkins is the name of the the federal statute that that granted those federal

[53:40] funds and that was implemented oh decades ago.

[53:43] » All right. I didn't realize those were just CTE funds.

[53:47] » Yes. All right. Thank you. Carry on, Scott.

[53:50] » Okay. Thank you. No, no, no worries. >> Um, just also want to uh talk about our

[53:56] external uh auditors. We are finishing up with our external auditors uh Richie

[54:01] May who are our auditors. They were on site for two weeks and this last week we

[54:07] have been following up with them uh trying to to finish up the requests that

[54:12] they have they have asked for. Um and so we we we have a few items left that uh

[54:19] fixed assets and school fees that we are continuing to to finish up for them. Um

[54:24] and and just have to give a shout out to our business office. They have been

[54:27] absolutely fantastic. Um I wish you could be there while we uh watch the

[54:33] audit, but it's a constant stream of our auditors going in and out of offices and

[54:38] uh some days that can get very tedious with all of the other uh things that we

[54:42] have to do. But it's it's it's a great opportunity. Um when the uh auditors are

[54:48] finished up, we will report to the board and they will have recommendations and

[54:53] we'll be able to have that report. I believe it's in uh October, November

[54:58] time frame. >> Um also wanted to report that we have

[55:02] been doing some middle school and high school fraud training. Cody Leman, our

[55:07] new financial director, who has been fantastic, and I have been working to

[55:11] train the high school and the middle school principles and their secretaries

[55:16] in fraud prevention and training. The last few weeks, a few weeks ago, we did

[55:20] the secondary principles, the high school principles. Uh just this past

[55:26] week, we did the middle school principles. Um and the training took an

[55:30] hour. We took a training that was uh taken from the USB office on fraud

[55:36] prevention and modified that for our school district so that we can make them

[55:40] aware and understand the things that they need to be aware of to be aware of

[55:46] fraud and to take the necessary steps to avoid that. This training was completed

[55:51] over the past couple weeks. We will also be vis visiting schools onsite over the

[55:56] next several months to assist and to address any concerns or issues that they

[56:00] may have and also follow up with the fraud training to make sure that the

[56:05] things that we have talked about are being implemented.

[56:08] That is the report that I've got. Does anyone have any questions or concerns

[56:12] they would like to bring up? >> Thank you.

[56:16] » You're welcome. Any questions? >> Have we heard anything about our truth

[56:19] and taxation? So yes, um I have visited the uh Utah

[56:26] state tax compliance website and it shows that our uh truth and taxation has

[56:33] been approved uh from the the website. We haven't received an official letter

[56:38] from the tax commission and so I'm waiting for that to to come.

[56:42] » All right. >> Thanks for checking on that, Scott. We

[56:45] appreciate that. Uh, next we have uh board member

[56:50] reports. Anyone who has something they want to report on.

[56:54] » I have one question about the new elementary school. Derek, are we still

[56:58] on for tomorrow and getting things moved in?

[57:01] » Yes, they've actually been working on it um throughout the week. Um, and tomorrow

[57:08] they're just doing kind of their final move from the host schools. Um, but it's

[57:14] looking the the rooms are looking pretty good. Kevin's team's done amazing the

[57:19] last few days. Um, especially just the big push to get all the technology up

[57:24] and going. So, they're following the contractors and checking. So, it's

[57:29] looking good. >> Okay. Is there a time when I could come

[57:32] and help? >> Um,

[57:38] yeah. tomorrow. Um, anytime after 4, uh, they will be done with their they're

[57:46] doing some trainings from about 2:30 to 4 and then anytime after that, um,

[57:53] they've got some district teams coming to help. Um, so yeah, any anytime after

[57:58] that, we've been there. We've had district teams there helping this week

[58:02] and um most of the teachers are pretty set, but if you would like

[58:06] » any any chance before four because that's the time I have to not be there.

[58:10] » Um yeah. Um Amy McNeill is planning on being there most of the day just

[58:16] answering questions. So [clears throat] like I showed up today before the

[58:20] teachers got there and she had me go um unpack some boxes. So um I can I can let

[58:26] her know that you'll stop by. >> Okay.

[58:28] » So she'll be there. Thank you. >> All right. Thanks, Alan. Anyone else?

[58:34] » Yeah. >> Awesome.

[58:35] » Uh it was a really neat opportunity to go to Nibbi Elementary two weeks ago. Uh

[58:41] the Garf Foundation uh uh attended and celebrated Nibbi Elementary in

[58:49] preparation for this new program that they'll be launching across the state.

[58:53] Um we're a pilot district. I was so impressed with the um the organization

[59:01] of it. Um cameras everywhere, drones flying above. It was it was awesome.

[59:09] » Can you explain the program to us, the pilot program?

[59:12] » So, the Gar Foundation I there are so many nice people in the state of Utah

[59:18] and Superintendent McKe might >> go ahead please. Yeah, you'll do a

[59:22] better job. So um [clears throat] two thing is it's it's we were fortunate

[59:27] in that um with the Olympics plan for 2034 the GH

[59:33] foundation is taken on a particular aspect of trying to support the Olympics

[59:38] there that aspect is through education um with the the initiative across the

[59:44] state for early literacy uh they determined that that was the area that

[59:48] they wanted to help the most and so they've identified seven um early

[59:53] adopters um or pilot districts. We're one of those seven that have been

[59:58] selected. Uh their intention is to try to support every way they can uh two

[1:00:03] aspects early literacy. So how do we incentivize students um to read and then

[1:00:10] how do we support teachers as they're they're instructing in literacy and then

[1:00:15] the second the second um effort of the foundation is around improving

[1:00:19] attendance. And so they've put together this campaign with incentives. Um they

[1:00:25] have an app for students to track their their reading minutes. They're providing

[1:00:30] uh dollars to schools to support them. Um all is in in terms of a leadup and as

[1:00:36] pilot districts, we're full participants at this point. Their intention is as we

[1:00:41] get closer to the Olympics that this will go statewide to every district in

[1:00:44] the state. So, we're we're kind of at the table helping them work out some of

[1:00:49] the kinks and some of the unforeseen um pitfalls with with their plan. Um but

[1:00:56] we're also benefiting and in that um in the kickoff they they called it an

[1:01:01] opening ceremony just like the Olympics. Uh they had some Olympic athletes there

[1:01:07] including a parolympian uh that were there to in uh to encourage

[1:01:13] and uh motivate students really powerful particularly the the parolympic uh

[1:01:18] athlete who is a double amputee below the knee um and competes in skiing and

[1:01:24] he was able to talk about his story and how he's overcome challenges in his

[1:01:30] life. Um, all that to say is, you know, Nibi is is been kind of our uh pilot

[1:01:37] school for the program and they embraced it and did a remarkable job. It was a

[1:01:42] busy day uh because unbeknownst to all of us, they not only had an assembly

[1:01:47] with the Gar Foundation, but they had later in the day had a second assembly

[1:01:51] with Utah State. And so it was a lot for that staff. Um, but it's something that

[1:01:57] students re will remember. >> Awesome. Are all of our schools

[1:02:01] participating, Nick? >> Most of our schools are participating at

[1:02:04] this point. I can't couldn't say that all of them. Um, it did require uh

[1:02:09] schools to shift um platforms. Many of them are using an an app of some sort to

[1:02:15] track minutes. Um, and most of them have gravitated to the the GRF um app. Uh,

[1:02:22] there are some others that are still using a legacy app of some sort.

[1:02:26] » Okay. Thanks. Any other board member reports?

[1:02:32] All right. My the board president for the board president report, I need to

[1:02:37] remind you, you should have received an email today from Tanya um asking who is

[1:02:43] planning to attend the USBA regional meeting to discuss upcoming legislation.

[1:02:49] Um that's Tuesday, September 29th at 6 PM at Maddox.

[1:02:56] And um so Tanya needs a count of who's going

[1:03:04] and also you should have received an invite

[1:03:09] from uh USBA to participate in a Canvas course.

[1:03:16] Canvas is the new platform for the master board certification

[1:03:20] and they just barely got it up and running but the deadline is still the

[1:03:26] same which is December 1st. So we all need to get on the new canvas um

[1:03:32] platform and uh take care of the professional development that's

[1:03:38] available there so that we can before December 1st so that we can qual

[1:03:43] continue as a as a master board. And that's the end of my report. Thank

[1:03:52] you all for your excellent work. There was also a legislative lunch and we had

[1:03:57] an invite too. We need to That's right. >> need to reply to that.

[1:04:02] » It's coming up October 5th. >> October 5th.

[1:04:07] Um is the is that October 5th? Is that the

[1:04:14] » Logan >> RSVP date or the

[1:04:19] lunch date? >> I thought that was the launch date,

[1:04:21] wasn't it? >> That's what I thought, too. Yeah, I

[1:04:23] think it's mistake. >> All right. So, as long as you're all

[1:04:26] aware, it sounds like you're all aware of it and you can RSVP for that as well.

[1:04:32] Uh, superintendent. >> Yes, thank you. Just one item for the

[1:04:36] board. As you're aware, um, we have finally cleared inspections at Old

[1:04:41] Ephraim and students are are going to be starting Monday. Um,

[1:04:46] » wow. >> We're very excited about that. I know

[1:04:50] the community is very excited about that. I just want to express my

[1:04:54] gratitude um to all involved. It's been a challenge and a struggle um these last

[1:05:01] couple of weeks as we've tried to to manage that um to allow the the

[1:05:07] contractors time to finish up their work. So there I know there's been

[1:05:11] stress on the community on parents as they've had to shuffle students back and

[1:05:15] forth and they've had to ride buses. It's there've been a lot of um anxiety

[1:05:19] on the part of teachers as they've started school and now they're packing

[1:05:23] up and going to have to restart school next week in their new location. Um, but

[1:05:29] I I hand it to um our contractor to Don Adams, our facilities manager, all of

[1:05:35] our departments from facilities to technology, transportation across the

[1:05:40] board, everyone has stepped in and really have have done their very best um

[1:05:46] to ensure that students did not miss out on learning. And I'm just grateful to

[1:05:51] everyone for their their work. It it has been a heavy lift. Um, but it's amazing

[1:05:57] to see how pe everyone has come together and to pull this off. And so we're all

[1:06:02] excited. We'll all celebrate next week when the the children entered old

[1:06:06] Ephraim. And that's my report. >> That's an exciting report. It

[1:06:10] » is. >> All right. Anything else? Anyone speak

[1:06:15] now or hold your peace? [laughter] Uh we will adjourn

[1:06:21] until Thursday, October 1st at 5:30.

Business Session - Sep 17 2026

Transcript