[0:05] Good evening and welcome to the april work session meeting of the richardson isd board of trustees.
[0:11] I'm chris poteet, board president. Mr. Eager will not be joining us today.
[0:15] however, we do have a quorum present and this meeting is called to order at 6.01 p.m.
[0:23] at this time, we will proceed with our public comment section. Ms.
[0:27] renteria, do we have any persons who have signed up to address the board?
[0:33] we do not, mr. Poteet. All right. Thank you. With that, we'll move
[0:38] to our first item on the agenda. It's an information item,
[0:43] and we're going to receive a presentation regarding algebra 1 for all.
[0:47] ms. Brannan. Thank you, president poteet. Thank you, board.
[0:52] several years ago, our teaching and learning team, along with school leadership,
[0:57] underwent a journey to really look
[1:02] at and why many of our students were not accessing higher level math, as well as looking
[1:06] at tsi scores, sat, act, and continued
[1:12] to recognize that one of the barriers that our students have in taking that higher
[1:16] level math was algebra 1, and really not taking algebra 1 until that freshman year.
[1:22] and research has been very clear that when students take algebra 1 in eighth grade,
[1:28] they that it opens up tremendous avenues for students, especially
[1:32] first-generation college students. And our team at that point made a commitment that we
[1:37] were going to do the work, and we knew it was going to be a long road ahead
[1:43] to adjust curriculum, to provide professional learning to teachers,
[1:48] to support student readiness, to help communicate with parents the reason why this was such an important project
[1:53] for us. We are not where we need
[1:57] to be yet, but man have we made great strides and we are excited
[2:02] to just provide an update. One of the main outcomes that
[2:06] we wanted for this meeting was we know every time that
[2:10] we present for example our math scores we always look at that funky kind of grade
[2:15] seven and eight and part of that is because we have this acceleration and so we just
[2:20] wanted to provide you board as well as our community. With a little bit
[2:25] of deeper understanding of why this is important and the
[2:30] work that we are doing to increase student outcomes,
[2:34] student achievement specifically measured with algebra 1. And so huge applause to our
[2:38] teaching and learning team and to our math team who have just been steadfast.
[2:43] and there have been many times when we look at each other and we say, hey, is this the right work?
[2:49] and we keep coming back to our why of our north star goal and providing access
[2:54] to every opportunity for students that we can. So I'm going to now turn it over to dr.
[2:58] leeper and to ms. Teague, who are going to just walk us through the work and where we are and how
[3:03] we're going to continue to improve those outcomes. Thank you so much for such a
[3:08] great introduction. I feel complete now. All right, so we are going
[3:14] to be looking at algebra for all tonight, and we do appreciate the opportunity to bring an update because it
[3:19] really is important work. I want to start off, as we always do,
[3:24] by grounding ourselves in the north star goal. Every student, teacher, and
[3:28] leader will meet or exceed their academic growth goals.
[3:35] the next thing I want to do, though, is introduce you to the newest member
[3:39] of my team. She's been with us since last july. Her name is mia watson.
[3:44] she is our middle school specialist. She works with our
[3:50] pre-algebra and algebra and even our algebra one in high school.
[3:54] so it has been a wonderful year working with her.
[3:58] and so she is going to bring, y'all know how I like to do in math, I like you
[4:03] to have a little activity. We're going to call this the ignite activity because we are
[4:08] paying homage to the learner framework and so we want to do that for you and
[4:12] we are so excited and mia is going to take it away now.
[4:18] hi everybody. The first thing I would like to do is, this activity is called the
[4:24] algebra, the equation elevator. I would like for you all to look
[4:29] at the cards that are in front of you. There are pink cards,
[4:34] there are yellow cards, and the blue cards. The blue cards are the grade level. So we're going to start
[4:39] at sixth grade, and we're going to go all the way down to algebra 1.
[4:43] and then we have the purple cards, which are the teks indicators. And then we have the orange
[4:48] cards, which are the equations. So I'm going to give you
[4:52] about a minute. You and your partner are going to work together.
[4:56] and you are going to match the correct grade level with the correct equation and also
[5:01] try to find the right indicator for that grade level.
[7:44] we're yes.
[7:48] okay. Do you want to tell them the answer? Okay.
[7:52] so thank you for doing that activity. I loved all of the talking
[7:58] and like processing all of the vocabulary that are inside of the cards.
[8:04] and you were able to match the teaks with the correct grade level. And also I saw that
[8:09] in the groups, you and your partner may have been wondering that.
[8:13] seventh and eighth grade, how they went, what order did those equations go in, and sometimes that's where
[8:18] our students, that's how they feel. Like, I don't know what
[8:22] to do first or what comes before something else, and so here in risd,
[8:28] we have tried to make a conscious effort when we, now that we don't have a actual
[8:32] seventh grade math class, that we embed those skills within sixth grade and then
[8:37] also embed them in the eighth grade. Math or the seventh grade math that they take now.
[8:42] so the pre-algebra class that we have. So the first equation for sixth grade is equation a,
[8:47] which also goes with the one step equation.
[8:51] so all they have to do is combine like terms and then isolate the
[8:57] variable. Then seventh grade is equation d.
[9:02] they have to know how to combine like terms and then isolate the variable. Second is the eighth grade
[9:08] teac, which is equation b. Equation b has variables
[9:13] on both sides, but this question has a variable, I mean a constant
[9:18] on the outside where they have to distribute to the parentheses. And then equation c is
[9:23] algebra one, where they combine all of those skills. So it starts really early. You may think it starts
[9:28] in sixth grade, but it actually starts in elementary. Can you believe your students do algebra
[9:33] in elementary school? Yes, they are. This is a building block. For where we are sending our
[9:37] students. So when you think about algebra 1 for all, you need to think ground level.
[9:41] like where will they start? How are we preparing them in elementary to go up into
[9:45] secondary math and being successful? This is a very good indicator
[9:49] of how college will go for our students. And we want
[9:54] to make the math accessible to everybody. And that's what we've been doing here now
[9:59] by having our pre-algebra in 7th grade and our 8th graders taking algebra 1. It helps them.
[10:04] and we are able to build that math skill that we want people to have.
[10:08] and it makes them confident. You can hear them talking like today. I was at north, you know,
[10:13] helping with star. I've been helping prepare the kids for star and they look so happy today.
[10:20] they did not look stressed out at all. So our teachers are doing a really good job bridging the
[10:24] gap from where they were to where we are now. And the students looked happy
[10:29] and I was happy to see that because I'm a math person. So I just I wanted I want everybody
[10:35] to feel the way that I feel about my content. And I could see it in the students when I go
[10:39] to the campuses and visit with the middle school kids. So yes we were very excited to hear one
[10:45] of our co-workers got a call from her son and he said oh it was easy. It's a little bit scary
[10:51] to hear that but at the same time we're going with it was a positive.
[10:56] okay I want to start off tonight looking
[11:00] at the journey of algebra for all because it it has been a journey
[11:04] to get where we are now. In 2018-2019, risd made the decision
[11:10] to begin the work to make rigorous math accessible
[11:14] to all students.
[11:18] and so they phased in a program called algebra for all.
[11:23] and I will tell you, just personal, I love that name. I think it's a great name.
[11:28] I think it's a great message. Our second step occurred in
[11:32] 2019 and 2020 when we actually launched. The program.
[11:37] we started it at two schools, liberty and apollo, and unfortunately
[11:42] covid hit, and so we never got star scores that year. We went home
[11:47] at spring break, and we didn't come back until the next school year.
[11:52] 2020 and 2021 then were our second year, and we continued to phase in
[11:59] that program and roll schools into the program.
[12:04] in 2023, tea jumped on our bandwagon. They released senate bill
[12:11] 2124, which encourages all schools and all school
[12:16] districts to get students into algebra 1
[12:20] in eighth grade. In 2425, all eight of our
[12:26] junior highs and middle schools were implementing algebra for all.
[12:31] and so that's very exciting because it tells you where we are now. We're fully in.
[12:37] I want to talk about the why. Why is it important that we
[12:41] put eighth graders in algebra 1? And there's several things
[12:46] that we have to think about with this. First of all is college
[12:50] readiness and access for all. We want to increase the
[12:55] opportunities for underrepresented students. We want to ensure that
[12:59] they're not shut out of pathways for college and competitive careers.
[13:04] I always think about this. It doesn't end when they walk across the stage.
[13:08] we want them to have good jobs and be strong members of the community.
[13:13] and so what we've done those previous 13 years, that's the start
[13:17] to get them going. The other thing that is
[13:21] really good with algebra is for abstract thinking. And if you've seen me present
[13:26] before, you know that I talk about concrete, representational,
[13:30] and abstract. Abstract is what we get in algebra 1.
[13:35] and the great thing about that crucial, critical thinking and problem solving
[13:39] is that it's transferable. If you can problem solve in algebra 1, you can transfer
[13:44] that to other disciplines and areas in your life.
[13:49] and that's what we want. Our kids need to be able to solve problems.
[13:53] finally, we know. That research supports this. Research tells us that
[13:58] getting into algebra at an earlier age will increase and
[14:03] make higher math scores and a greater likelihood of taking
[14:07] advanced mathematics. And I'll show you in just a second,
[14:12] that's true in our district. It's also with better long-term outcomes because
[14:16] what we see is kids completing degrees and having greater earning potential.
[14:22] and those things are so important. And so when we look at algebra
[14:27] at the early ages or in eighth grade, we really are seeing and setting our
[14:31] kids up for more success. And maybe, julie, could you touch on,
[14:36] we also recognize that for many students, going directly into college
[14:41] may not be their pathway. They may have their eyes set on a career going right out
[14:46] of high school that might also be high wage,
[14:50] high demand. How does this work also prepare them maybe for some
[14:56] of those skilled trades? That's a good question and it obviously does because what
[15:00] we see with our kids that have completed algebra and moved on to higher
[15:05] mathematics is they have those crucial critical thinking skills and so they're able
[15:10] to problem solve. They're able to be working on a construction site and
[15:14] realize that something's not right or realize that something doesn't fit.
[15:19] we see those kids really grow in their personality and
[15:24] in their ability. It's not just math. It really is
[15:29] about skills that you can use in your lifetime.
[15:33] not all kids are going to go to college and do that route, and we know that.
[15:37] one of the things, well, I'll talk about it on another slide, but we're
[15:42] seeing such improvement in our ccmr scores, and that's something that we
[15:46] really, really want to celebrate. On the next slide, you'll see
[15:51] that we've come a long way in just a few years.
[15:56] when you look at what our scores are or how many
[16:00] of our children took algebra 1 in 8th grade in 2018, the
[16:05] year before we rolled out this program,
[16:10] you see that we had a total of 960 students that were
[16:17] in algebra 1 that year. In 2025, you see that we had
[16:21] 02,061 students in algebra for all.
[16:27] and the other thing that I want you to notice are the numbers
[16:31] below the 2061. Because what you see there is
[16:37] almost an identical snapshot of our actual enrollment in the district.
[16:42] and that is so important for us to understand. Because we are getting our
[16:46] kids in there that were
[16:51] underrepresented and now are able to do this.
[16:55] just to point out that those demographic percentages almost mirror that of our district.
[17:00] I went and looked today. We're at 30% white, 38% hispanic.
[17:05] it was almost identical. I was really surprised and very happy when I looked
[17:11] at that. When we look at the number
[17:15] of testers, this is where we will see some different numbers come into play.
[17:19] and I think it's important that we acknowledge this and look at it.
[17:24] in 2023, we were well into algebra for all. We'd been doing it
[17:28] for two or three years at that point. And so you'll see that
[17:33] in seventh grade, we only had 202 seventh graders taking the seventh
[17:38] grade star. Two years later, as we rolled everybody in,
[17:43] last year we had 14 seventh graders take the seventh
[17:48] grade star. It didn't all leave the
[17:53] district. They were just all in eighth grade math.
[17:58] and so that is what is so exciting. When I look at,
[18:02] and I'm going to jump over to the column that says eighth graders taking algebra 1, I
[18:08] think it's important to see that in 2023, we had 01,772 students taking
[18:13] algebra 1 in eighth grade. Bless you. In 2024, we had 2007.
[18:22] and in 2025, we had 2,061 eighth graders taking
[18:27] algebra 1, and that is exciting. The other number that you'll
[18:32] notice that really is changing is our ninth graders taking algebra 1. The more kids we can get
[18:38] through algebra 1 in middle school, the better off we'll be
[18:43] for those kids. We know that we will never
[18:48] have no kids in algebra 1 in high school. Because there will always be
[18:52] kids that move in that were at a place where maybe algebra 1 wasn't as prevalent
[18:59] in eighth grade as it is here in richardson. There will always be students in there, but we went from
[19:06] 01,946 in 2023 to 1,210, a difference of over 700
[19:13] students in two years taking algebra
[19:17] in high school. I want to look at some data
[19:22] trends that we've seen because it is important and it is something that we are
[19:27] very cognizant of that the scores are not exactly where we want them to be.
[19:32] the work is not done. We are continuing to improve and work
[19:37] on things, but I want to look at this full picture. You can see that we had
[19:42] seventh graders taking the algebra 1 test. These are a handful of advanced kids who are
[19:46] obviously actually working. Two grades above where they
[19:52] would be and you can see how high their scores are and so that tells you they're
[19:57] exactly where they need to be. They have not overstepped what they can do.
[20:01] in eighth grade, taking algebra 1, you see that our scores are really hanging in there.
[20:06] some years, the test is harder than other years. We know that.
[20:10] but we also can see that our kids are doing a really, really good job.
[20:15] in ninth grade, we see that as well as eighth grade. We need some more support
[20:19] there, and we are looking at ways to get that done,
[20:24] and I'll talk about those in just a minute, because it is important that we know the
[20:28] work isn't done. This work continues and we are continuing to do it.
[20:32] on this slide, I wanted to
[20:37] give you a teacher's perspective. Catherine, and she goes by
[20:41] katie caravano, is a middle school teacher at apollo
[20:46] junior high. She has been there for several years.
[20:51] she taught pre-algebra and now teaches algebra. And so I thought she was a good voice to talk
[20:56] about how it feels on the... On the end of it
[21:00] of a teacher and so I want to play her do I just point this and press let's see oh here
[21:05] we go hello I'm catherine
[21:11] caravano and I work at apollo junior high I am an algebra one teacher I've been
[21:16] doing algebra one for three years we do our algebra for all program where our sixth
[21:20] grade students move up as seventh graders into pre-algebra and then the
[21:25] eighth graders will take algebra 1.
[21:29] before we had this program, we had to convince the sixth graders
[21:35] to take advanced math so that they could move on to pre-algebra seventh graders.
[21:40] and a lot of them heard that word advanced and they're like, nope, I'm not going
[21:45] to do it. And I would have them sitting in my class bored doing the lesson before I even finished it,
[21:49] like being done. And so we would then have to do a process of have them take a test so they could
[21:54] then skip a grade and that was always more of a struggle whereas now they get that
[21:58] chance from the beginning and then they move on and they just do beautifully seamlessly one thing that I
[22:04] would love to add into the program for the students who are struggling
[22:09] with that jump is if we had a math lab, it would really be helpful to
[22:14] those students who just need a little bit more help front loading and getting those gaps in.
[22:20] and then we see, we just see
[22:24] so, like I've seen so much more growth because
[22:28] like I said, I used to teach pre-algebra and seventh grade math. The number of kids that I see
[22:33] successfully taking their algebra 1 class and that star test has just been so many
[22:37] more numbers from when we only have them taking it as advanced students.
[22:43] our on-level students do awesome in algebra 1, they
[22:47] really do, and it's great to see that they can then take algebra 2 starting
[22:51] in high school and move on and take ap courses and get that college credit from the get-go.
[23:00] okay, tonight we are kd squared. Because I had katie caravano
[23:04] and we also have katie motron who is our principal at westwood so she has dealt
[23:10] with this from a little bit of a different perspective.
[23:16] I am very proud principal of westwood junior high I'm really glad to be here to talk about math.
[23:21] also our principal of the year by the way secondary principal of the year well, I
[23:28] have a great math team I think that's why you know, we started the pre-algebra.
[23:32] so I say pre-algebra because eighth grade math, seventh graders taking it always
[23:37] confuses me. So pre-algebra, we started that in 2023.
[23:42] and certainly, you know, as we've kind of talked about, our data isn't exactly where we need
[23:46] it to be. But what has been really cool is every year we have made
[23:51] huge, huge strides. And then when we look at that seventh grade math. Our students
[23:55] in seventh grade on the eighth grade test are performing higher on that than other seventh graders
[23:59] within the state. And I think that that's a really important piece to make here,
[24:05] that while maybe our seventh graders, you know, there's a few gaps in terms
[24:10] of how they're performing against eighth graders
[24:14] statewide, they're outperforming seventh graders in the state in math.
[24:19] and so I think that just tells us just... A linear analytical person, I think that that tells us that this is working, right?
[24:24] we need strong teachers who know how to differentiate for kids and who know how to meet kids where they are and
[24:29] grow them and believe that this is possible for them.
[24:34] certainly at first it was a little scary, right? Our numbers were really high when you have kids who are
[24:39] self-selecting and accelerating into algebra 01, and now everybody is going to be in there.
[24:43] there's a few, you know, teachers can be apprehensive about that.
[24:48] but I do know that with the right support from really our curriculum
[24:54] department and within the campus, it can happen, right?
[24:58] our algebra I scores have remained high. We have still been competing
[25:03] and higher than the state. And that's eighth graders compared to a lot of ninth
[25:08] graders and mainly ninth graders. So I think overall it's really, really exciting.
[25:13] I love the opportunities that it expands for. Students in high school, right?
[25:18] they can take... More rigorous math at the high school and just even seeing kids be like wow
[25:23] like I'm in algebra 1 I'm an eighth grader and and ninth graders are doing this and
[25:27] I'm performing at a high level I think there's a lot that students that belief
[25:31] in themselves especially in math and moving on is really exciting for
[25:38] them you're welcome anytime you have a program you have
[25:45] to look at the ups and the downs and the grows and the glows.
[25:49] so I want to take a few minutes and kind of look at the things that are happening
[25:54] that we know are really great and then some of the areas that we want
[25:58] to see improvement. With our glows, we have 04,813 total hours
[26:04] of college math credit earned by the class of 2025.
[26:11] and I think that is so exciting. Think about that.
[26:16] that's just in math. When you think about all of the courses and all, we graduated so many kids that
[26:21] were going to walk into college as juniors. That is so exciting. And their parents are excited
[26:28] too, because that's two years they're not having to pay for.
[26:32] we also, because we've done eighth grade eoc
[26:36] in eighth grade, so we've got that off their back, they're able to have that opportunity to
[26:41] take those advanced math classes, and we are seeing... Increased enrollment
[26:45] in our advanced math, and I'm so excited about that.
[26:49] and the last thing I kind of alluded to a minute ago is that we had 97% ccmr met last
[26:54] year, and that is huge. That's further than we had
[26:59] even set our goals, and that's very exciting. When we think about grows,
[27:03] obviously the impact on accountability, because now it's not just our
[27:08] advanced eighth graders in algebra one it is kids who probably never dreamed that
[27:13] they would be in an advanced math course.
[27:20] but the exciting news is they are and they're passing. And that's what we want.
[27:25] we want our kids to get in there and learn it and meet and master and do all
[27:29] of that because they can. We know that this is an area of growth
[27:37] for us as we continue to get those scores up, but we will continue to work
[27:41] to get the scores up. I want to talk next
[27:47] about next steps, what are we doing next, and key takeaways.
[27:52] the first thing that we are so excited about is our new curriculum.
[27:57] we have a new curriculum resource that we will roll out this summer with trainings and then
[28:02] for the next school year in sixth grade through algebra one. This new curriculum resource
[28:07] has a lot of enrichment activities.
[28:11] it has a lot of differentiation. It's a very strong program.
[28:16] the teachers voted for it unanimously. They were very, very excited
[28:20] to have this program. We had a big committee of teachers and administrators
[28:25] and people that came and saw what the programs that we offered were.
[28:29] and this was the one they selected. And we're very, very excited about it.
[28:34] also, the vertical alignment. We're all going to be on the same program.
[28:39] and that is going to help so much with that vertical alignment.
[28:44] increased rigor and alignment for elementary, that's an area that we know we need to shore up.
[28:49] there are several things on the horizon that are going to help us there too.
[28:54] first of all, we have math academies that we're about to start rolling out,
[28:59] not next year, but the next. And we know that will increase the rigor and tie
[29:03] that alignment more tightly to where we need it to be in those early lower grades.
[29:08] my team... Audrey robertson, megan mayo, and myself have
[29:14] actually been selected to pilot it. And so we will be piloting those math academies next
[29:20] year. So we're really excited about that and the work that we're
[29:24] doing in elementary. We want to continue supporting our current
[29:28] teachers, administrators, and students as they work through these higher level
[29:33] math because we know it's so, so important.
[29:39] one of the things, and I want to give a shout out to you, is that part of
[29:46] what is so important here is that we retain our teachers. And part of retention is
[29:50] something that you guys have done.
[29:55] and that is with increased salaries. We know money talks and
[29:59] teachers listen. And it has allowed us to keep our really great teachers.
[30:03] also get teachers to come here who are great and
[30:08] experienced, but because of what we offer,
[30:12] they are so excited to be here, and that helps our administrators.
[30:18] because then they get the very best math teachers. The other thing we need
[30:23] to do is continue to communicate what it is and the why behind algebra for
[30:27] all. That's so important. Finally, with any program,
[30:32] you're going to have to refine. And I will tell you that when
[30:36] I met with katie caravano, I did not know that we were going to be implementing all
[30:42] the math labs next year. And so watching her say that,
[30:48] I was like, oh, my goodness,
[30:52] yes, because that's something that I have felt very strongly about
[30:57] for a while. Some of our kids don't walk through that door in seventh grade going into
[31:01] eighth grade math quite prepared for what they're about to see, and that's okay, because if we can have
[31:06] a math lab that front loads what's going to be taught, that scaffolds back and helps
[31:12] pick up those misconceptions, that's going to make a world of difference
[31:17] for those kids. And so the math labs are something I am super supportive
[31:22] of and excited about. Student data. With ddi, the way we have
[31:28] addressed that the last two or three years, we look at each student's name and need.
[31:34] what is it that child is struggling with? I always use this.
[31:38] it's kind of an analogy. It's just something I say. Where do the wheels come off?
[31:43] because a lot of times when you look at a student's work, you can tell exactly where they strayed
[31:49] from what they needed to be doing. One step. When you really understand
[31:53] that, that's when you can fix it. Fifth grade curriculum, we
[31:58] know there are ways that we can support sixth grade even more because sixth grade is
[32:03] aligned to middle school. Fifth grade is aligned to elementary,
[32:07] and there's a gap in there. So one of the things we've done is that... Next tuesday, our fifth
[32:12] graders will take star. And after that, the teks they will work
[32:17] on are sixth grade. We start teaching integers. Those last few weeks,
[32:22] we have over a month left in school, or about a month left
[32:27] in school. And we can't waste that time. So we're teaching integers and exponents and all the
[32:31] things that we can to get our fifth graders ready for sixth grade.
[32:37] the other thing that I'm super excited about is the middle school transformation.
[32:41] pulling those kids up into middle school, if you look at forest meadow and if you look at lake
[32:47] highlands middle school, you see the difference it makes.
[32:51] those teachers go back and forth and talk to each other.
[32:55] when I'm at an elementary school, I don't ever go to the middle school to talk to the eighth grade math
[33:00] teacher and say, what is it you really need my kids to be able to do?
[33:04] but at that middle school, they do. And it really is making a
[33:08] difference. We are seeing amazing scores from that.
[33:13] the last thing I want to say is this.
[33:18] implementing algebra for all in 2019 was a bold move, and it put risd ahead
[33:23] of the curve in mathematics.
[33:28] algebra for all is not a one-size-fits-all. And so the fact that we
[33:34] continue to refine the program. And work to make it even
[33:38] better just shows our dedication to it. Our teachers are wonderful.
[33:44] we have some very strong math teachers, and I'm so proud of them, and I'm so proud of
[33:48] the work they do. I cannot tell you how much they care, and I cannot tell
[33:53] you how proud they are of their kids.
[33:59] I know that we want to continue this work.
[34:04] and I want to say this, and tab said this when she opened
[34:09] for us, it's the right work.
[34:13] and most of all, it shows our commitment to our students and to doing
[34:18] the right thing. I want to thank you for your support with all of
[34:22] this and then ask if you have any questions. First of all, I have to let
[34:27] kaysen know he thinks after star next tuesday that it's like smooth sailing the rest of his fifth grade.
[34:32] well. So I'm going
[34:36] to do some pre-teaching of integers. I don't want him to be mad at me, but no, it's not a downhill slide.
[34:40] he loves to speak. But I think I really want to
[34:44] highlight what you mentioned around algebra one for all is
[34:49] not a middle school focus. Just like we say graduation
[34:54] is not just a responsibility, or ccmr is just not the responsibility of the high schools.
[34:59] it's a pre-k-12. So when I think about elementary, we talk a
[35:04] lot around how important it is, for example, for students to have automaticity
[35:08] of their math facts. We send home flashcards for addition.
[35:13] third graders, we send home flashcards for multiplication. We equip parents with fun,
[35:18] easy games that they can use for those flashcards. And this is just my plug
[35:22] for any parents who are out there listening on this thursday night. How important it is that they
[35:27] are reinforcing that. As our students are taking more complex math, what we
[35:32] don't want is students having to process those basic math facts.
[35:39] we want them focused on the new concept or skill that they're developing.
[35:43] and if they have to worry about what is eight times six, they're focusing on that and not the skill that
[35:48] they're applying that math skill to. So parents, please use those
[35:52] flashcards. We want our students to have, and we believe in doing it the old school way,
[35:57] flashcards, practicing that, having fun games with that,
[36:02] manipulatives, because that really does bring that automaticity.
[36:06] so, again. Huge congratulations and appreciation to julie and her
[36:11] team and we would love to take any questions or comments. All right, we'll open it up
[36:16] to questions or comments. Board members.
[36:21] yes, mr. Andrea. Thank you. Yeah, what a wonderful
[36:26] presentation. Just so much excitement behind everything that you mentioned and I think it's
[36:30] awesome. I think for me, I know my own personal experience, I struggled with math.
[36:36] but all it took was one or two really bad math teachers, right?
[36:40] absolutely. And I think that that stays with you. And so it was like a catch-up for me, right?
[36:45] and math has always, I mean, I've always seen it as almost learning another language, right?
[36:51] and like with any other second language, it takes practice, right?
[36:56] you apply it. You have to keep doing it. And so that's something or the approach we took
[37:00] with our two children. So I love the excitement and I love this awesome presentation.
[37:05] I did want to see if you could clarify for me. You mentioned math labs. Can you just clarify a little
[37:10] bit about what that is and what it looks like? I mean,
[37:15] what is a math lab? Okay. So for our kids who take start,
[37:20] obviously, at the end of the school year, one year, and then they move
[37:24] into math the next year. For our kids who are not able to meet or master, that means
[37:28] they're not really performing at grade level. Even if they approached.
[37:33] it means they're slightly under. They need to be at the meets level.
[37:37] and so for those kids, we want to offer them a class that is a lab
[37:42] in that they'll go in, they'll have a teacher.
[37:46] this is at the middle school and junior high level. It's not at our elementary schools.
[37:52] we're not doing that there next year. But at our middle schools, our kids will go
[37:57] into a class with a teacher who will um go ahead and
[38:01] front load some of the things that they know they're going to be taught.
[38:06] we know from research that seeing something more than once really does help us understand it and retain it.
[38:11] and so seeing that, our kids will go in,
[38:16] they'll see that. We'll work on math facts. A lot of times those are the
[38:21] kids who it took longer to take the test. Maybe they didn't even finish.
[38:25] maybe they got tied and gave up because they don't know 6 times 7 is 42. And so they're sitting there
[38:30] counting on their... Fingers seven times. Well, if they get off
[38:36] at some point and put 43, we all understand why, but the answer's not going
[38:40] to be right. So working with those facts is going to be an important part
[38:45] of that. Learning the rules of integers, those things like that, that they need
[38:49] that reinforcement on, those are things that will happen in math labs. I'm very excited
[38:55] about front-loading. Because I will tell you,
[39:00] when I was a coach, one of the things I did was front load with my kids. And I couldn't believe the
[39:05] difference. I was talking to a teacher last week at one
[39:09] of the schools, and she was saying that she had started front loading some of her kids.
[39:14] and she was like, oh, my gosh, we got to class the next day. And they had their hand up
[39:19] because they knew what it was she was teaching. That was the experience I
[39:24] had. Their confidence built. They were excited. And that's what we want.
[39:29] and so in those labs, there will be a lot of front-loading.
[39:33] and I don't know if that clears it. I think so. Okay. So it's only in the middle
[39:38] school, junior high right now, like you just said. So we will have a math lab for our sixth and then
[39:43] seventh and then eighth. It's really just
[39:47] about providing more time. We recognize not every student masters a skill or a concept at the same rate.
[39:53] so having additional time, smaller class sizes so that the teacher can really
[39:57] differentiate and group students based upon what they need.
[40:01] and again, either prepare the students for what's coming up next, or
[40:06] maybe it is we recognize there's a skill that you lost in fourth grade and we need to make sure that we fill
[40:11] that before you walk into class tomorrow. Okay, I get it.
[40:15] and so not every student will be, you know, in a lab, right? So it's just those that we
[40:20] find that what taffer just described. Yes, ma'am. We're a little bit ahead,
[40:25] but in our next presentation around the schedule, again, I have a fifth grader.
[40:29] and so when I think about him in sixth grade, he's an advanced math student.
[40:35] and so many people would think he would not need additional time. However, these are
[40:40] foundational. This is foundational curriculum work and one of
[40:45] the opportunities we're going to be able to provide with the new schedule is that all
[40:49] sixth graders will also have an option to take an enrichment math. So not only is it
[40:54] about supporting students who may need that additional time to master a skill,
[40:59] but kids that need to go deeper and that need to be pushed, that need
[41:03] to be challenged. It may be more complex problem solving. It may be, you know,
[41:08] raising the rigor of the skills that they're learning, but making sure that they are
[41:13] equally challenged and that they have additional time, just like our students who
[41:17] may need time to master a skill. That is something that we
[41:21] have talked about doing for a long time, and for the first time the schedule is going to allow us.
[41:26] to make that happen more time isn't just for students who need intervention it's also for students who can go
[41:31] farther exactly I think that's wonderful so thank you for clarifying that and you know once again I think this
[41:35] is awesome and it's just it makes me excited about math thank you yes other board
[41:40] comments or questions on the presentation let's check
[41:45] out hi, thank you so much for
[41:52] your presentation. I loved it. I'm so excited to see just the engagement of
[41:58] our students and the diverse groups of students are taking advantage of these courses.
[42:03] also, you know, how they're performing on their end of year course exams.
[42:09] I have a question and you all mentioned it. You know, we we are taking care of the student
[42:14] from kindergarten on. Right. They don't start math at sixth grade.
[42:19] and then you gave the explanation on the math labs, which was also one
[42:24] of my questions. But how do we know that they're ready in sixth grade?
[42:28] or do they all go and then we do math labs for additional support or enrichment?
[42:33] okay.
[42:43] so we have math.
[43:14] the kids that go into seventh grade math are in a very challenging math
[43:18] course with no calculator. When our kids...
[43:25] yes, per the state. It's not because we wouldn't give them one.
[43:29] if anyone asked, if it were up to me, we would do calculators starting in sixth grade because how many
[43:34] of us truly do division of three numbers divided into six numbers without a
[43:40] calculator? I mean, honestly,
[43:44] I'm glad our kids can do it, but the truth is a calculator
[43:48] would help them. But in seventh grade, the math is hard and there's no
[43:54] calculator. By bumping them into pre-algebra, the math is
[44:00] not that much harder and they get a calculator. And we know that helps our
[44:05] kids who are struggling, especially with those basic skills.
[44:12] they still have to know how to do the math or they wouldn't know what to put in the calculator,
[44:16] but it keeps them from having to sit for so long doing the computation of something that takes such a
[44:21] long time when we know that moving forward they will be able
[44:27] to use that calculator. And so that's one of the things that we know.
[44:33] if we go ahead and put them in pre-algebra, and if you look
[44:38] across the state, seventh grade scores are a struggle all across the state, and I'm
[44:43] talking seventh graders and seventh grade math. It is.
[44:48] and so giving them that calculator, giving them that boost, that extra lab support is really going
[44:53] to make a difference. And so that's part of the reason we're so
[44:57] excited about it. But we want to give all of our kids that chance. Ok, I love that.
[45:02] I was curious because I'm sure families are wondering, is my kid just automatically placed in this class?
[45:06] do I opt out? Do I opt in? Like, how does this work?
[45:10] so I appreciate the explanation. I'm just, you know, full
[45:15] disclosure, I wasn't allowed to use a calculator until grade.
[45:20] so, yes, I did that kind of math. But I'm glad that they can use it for when they need it.
[45:25] the other thing I noticed, and I guess like you mentioned, we'll always have some
[45:29] of our ninth graders taking algebra 1 just because we have people who move in. We have students who move
[45:35] slower in the process or just, you know, have other things that
[45:39] they're really good at and math is just not it. Absolutely. But we need math, right?
[45:44] so I'm glad that we still have those options available to all our students and the
[45:50] opportunities to enrich and, of course, improve on concepts that they may be
[45:55] lacking. So, yeah, thank you. I'm excited. I've always been excited
[45:59] about the algebra for all, and it's good to see the numbers increase. Thank you.
[46:06] other comments or questions from the board? Ms. Timmy.
[46:13] microphone is revolting against me tonight I wonder why thank you guys we're
[46:17] great all three of you presenting that um I want to thank you
[46:22] to you guys I also want to just take the moment to say thank you to your point
[46:26] to the community for passing the bond so that we can have instructional alignment it is
[46:31] it is different when you have some vertical alignment that
[46:35] have specific really direct alignment such as this.
[46:40] to have those students ready for the algebra for all. So I know that instructional
[46:44] alignment is going to make a difference, especially when you're adopting a curriculum 6th
[46:49] through 12th grade. Having them in the same spot where you can support them is incredibly important, where
[46:53] in elementary, until that happens, we're just going to have to, you know,
[46:58] have two different kinds of support and know two different kinds of curriculum.
[47:02] but thank you to the community for doing that. It will make an instructional difference.
[47:07] one of the things, while I share... I show the same reasons for liking this alignment and
[47:12] this push as my colleagues do, but also, too,
[47:17] I think oftentimes out of good reasons and good
[47:21] intentions, we predetermine kind of where we think kids will be successful,
[47:26] and so they end up in those classes because we think they might be. And I think math is one place
[47:30] where you can see some kids shine, maybe in areas where they might struggle in other areas.
[47:35] and if you predetermine what they're going to be good or not good at, you're also going to
[47:40] predetermine their outcome. And I can guarantee you that if you don't expose them to the highest rigor,
[47:44] they're never going to reach that, right? And they may not reach it if they're exposed,
[47:49] but that's because of the skill set, what they may need, and not because somebody else has
[47:53] predetermined their outcome form. So I really like that option here.
[47:58] in thinking about that, though, also, we don't want to slow other classes down or I don't know another way
[48:05] to say it, but like drag instruction down. If we have students in there who aren't ready and who do need extra support
[48:10] significantly, right, we don't want to stifle learning at class. Do we support that
[48:14] with any ways, like looking at students who might need that maybe by class size? Like looking at like there
[48:19] might be some classes that have a larger size if kids are more ready and smaller class size if we know there's
[48:23] going to need to be more support? Well, so for example, students who are accelerated
[48:27] in math, you know, they're a lot of our kids, like, you know, kacen will be actually
[48:32] taking eighth grade and seventh grade. I mean, taking algebra 1 in seventh grade.
[48:37] so, yes, like those class sizes will be bigger. One of the reasons why the math lab is so important to
[48:41] us is that it will have differentiated class sizes to be smaller so that our
[48:46] teachers really can differentiate. A typical algebra 1, what we have not done is we've not
[48:51] tracked kids. So our algebra 1 kids, we really do.
[48:56] it's... The entire eighth grade and however their schedule fell, they are in algebra 1
[49:01] together in that class. There are some challenges
[49:06] with that, but there are also some benefits. And that's where I think when you heard our amazing apollo
[49:10] teacher mention why she feels like she needs that math lab, it's that she knows sometimes she needs to provide a little
[49:15] bit more treatment and a little bit more time and intensity with our kids that need that reinforcement.
[49:20] and right now, that's where she's struggling to find that time. And I think if you talk
[49:25] to all of our algebra 1 teachers at... Junior high, they would say
[49:29] the same thing. It's having that ability to meet all of them. Absolutely.
[49:35] I would like to also echo what you say that when you can front load for kids, listen,
[49:39] if somebody front loads me on something, when I go in and I know what I'm I know what's being talked about.
[49:44] I have a little bit. You talked about that they're going to raise their hands and things.
[49:48] they will participate more. Everybody wants to be successful. And when everything's hard
[49:53] for you every day, but you have now, you have a little bit of a leg up, it gives you an opportunity
[49:57] to participate and be engaged in a different way. And kids who are engaged in instruction, in my opinion,
[50:01] are just going to have better outcomes, right, other than trying to blend into the wall and, like, not make eye contact so
[50:06] you don't call them on them. So. So, I really think that's an excellent support.
[50:11] I think also, too, sometimes even understanding what the words mean. Like, maybe they know,
[50:15] but maybe they don't. Like, and it just, yeah. Sometimes you have kids who need
[50:20] to overlearn a concept, especially if they struggle in math, right? And that does happen. You have kids who are
[50:25] stronger, right, in certain subjects. So, I do, I think that's going to be a really great model.
[50:29] I'm glad to hear that you guys are using that. It sounds like that's going to be a really good support. Let's see.
[50:35] are you guys going to correlate how many kids are
[50:40] in this and the difference in how it goes to the ccmr outcomes?
[50:44] I'm trying to get to this. Are we going
[50:49] to see the correlation of starting them early and how it benefits them through
[50:53] additional coursework so that we're going to be able to see that over time? Yes, ma'am.
[50:58] so we began tracking that, and we provided some of that for you.
[51:03] but that is our next step. Once we have that full cohort, we will begin to show, before we did
[51:07] algebra 1 for all, this is how many kids that took, for example, it may be a business math, or it may be
[51:12] an ap calculus, calculus bc. And now this is how many kids
[51:18] that are accessing that because they had that math earlier.
[51:22] so yes, we're going to be able to track that. Tsi. Right.
[51:26] yes. Tsi before, tsi after. Well, with a new system, that's going to be huge. Yeah, it's going
[51:31] to be huge. Yes. So, yeah, we even as a district, you know,
[51:37] we flipped algebra 2 and geometry, again, as another tool around ccmr and tsi.
[51:42] so, again, measuring that, allowing kids to go straight from algebra 1 to algebra
[51:47] 02, geometry is kind of a little... A whole different math.
[51:51] yes. A whole different language. So moving that,
[51:55] so kids have algebra 1, algebra 2, and then they take the tsi right there. So we really use the tsi as
[51:59] our assessment of algebra and so what is that continuum?
[52:03] so, yes, we will begin to report on all of that
[52:09] for you. That's great. And then I'm assuming, too, for the kids who aren't
[52:14] successful going through there or who struggle, you'll be able to track that in the same way and be able to see, like, how we can
[52:18] channel them so that they still have the opportunities for those outcomes, even if this is just a challenge. You know, we want growth or
[52:25] whatever, and I want them to be the best that they can be for sure, but I also would hate
[52:29] for this pushing to prevent kids from getting into some places if we can
[52:34] channel them a different way, right, because there's so many multiple tracks that sometimes you need just the
[52:39] intentionality of if you're, like, there are other options if this isn't
[52:43] working the right way. One of the things we are really beginning to look
[52:47] at and where, again, we're so excited, again, thank you to our community for the support of the bond
[52:52] of our cte center. Because we also think it's super important to match math
[52:56] with their cte pathway. Absolutely. And there are some maths that, depending upon what
[53:00] your pathway is, are going to be better aligned to what it is that you're going to need
[53:05] to do versus others. Absolutely. So if we're going
[53:10] to support you in career, how do we align your math sequence to support you in that,
[53:14] versus if we know you're at rhs, we have a student that's going to mit.
[53:19] so his pathway for math. Was very differentiated from, you know, other students. And so how do we do that?
[53:24] so it's not just here's the course catalog and you take this class and then you take this class and you take this
[53:28] class. To julie's point, name a need.
[53:32] what do you need, ms. Timmy, that's different than ms. Pacheco and how do we make
[53:36] sure that that sequence looks like that? That's so great. Well, I want to thank all of our math teachers,
[53:41] our math department, who obviously do a great job, the fact that you guys were bold with this and have continued
[53:46] to stay with it even when it's been a struggle because some of the scores when they've not been, on that
[53:50] advanced track have been really tough right like and said that you guys have stayed with that and really worked
[53:55] to find supports and to fill those gaps um that along with the community allowing
[53:59] us to have some instructional alignment by having middle schools and moving that sixth grade up I think all
[54:04] of those things are going to student growth and student outcomes and I think that's what we want so thank you
[54:12] thank you for those comments do we have I see you reaching across the table. Ms.
[54:17] harris, you're up. Great. I mean, I've written
[54:21] down quite a few notes. And really what I want to focus on is just really comments.
[54:26] because when I think of math and algebra and all the things,
[54:31] the first thing that comes to mind for me is fear. I also feel
[54:37] like there's a lot of kids out there that feel the same way. And because they are so
[54:42] fearful of this stuff that they don't recognize, don't understand,
[54:47] they would just prefer to just shut down and not try and not do it.
[54:51] so all these extra things, the flashcards, something as simple as
[54:56] flashcards, take these home, I love it. I mean, engaging the parents,
[55:00] even though some of the parents may not know what the heck is going on. But it gives that student and
[55:06] the parent an opportunity to collaborate and to kind of try
[55:10] to figure this thing out, even if they have to google it.
[55:14] right. And so, you know, I really appreciate that. I love that because I was I
[55:19] was not strong in math at all. Right.
[55:23] still not today. But yeah, it does.
[55:27] it absolutely does. I mean, but you have some people out there just absolutely love
[55:31] it. So I just appreciate the opportunity that you're giving to students who may
[55:37] not know how well they can do in this. And it sounds like you all
[55:42] are headed in the right direction in doing that. So I really appreciate it.
[55:46] and trustee harris, if I can tell you that a secret objective outcome that I have is to eradicate our students
[55:52] saying I'm not good at math. I don't do math.
[56:00] math may be a little bit more challenging. We may spend more time on it, but you can be good at math.
[56:04] and we're going to show you how to be good at math. So that's my, I may not be able to measure that, but I
[56:09] do believe if we can change that mindset that we believe you can, and then we just give you the tools
[56:15] to do it, all kids can be successful.
[56:19] I think you'll be able to see it in your percentages. I absolutely think you'll.
[56:24] and you'll be able to see it in those students that wouldn't typically. Sign up for those classes
[56:29] because I know a lot of students like that. I know a lot of students
[56:33] like that. In our math department, we say every person is a math person because a lot
[56:38] of people say, oh, I'm not a math person. Yeah, you are.
[56:43] you are. You got here on time to work today, didn't you? That was math.
[56:47] you got your paycheck and you paid your bills. That was math. We're all math people. We may be
[56:52] at different levels, but we are all math people, period.
[56:59] other comments or, okay. Do you have a,
[57:05] squeeze one more in? Okay. I'm sorry. I want to squeeze one more in because I do think it's
[57:10] important. One thing that I did hear, and I heard it on that video,
[57:16] which is why I really want to come back to it. It is clear, and to me, I hope it is clear to others
[57:20] that. A teacher being comfortable enough to say in a video,
[57:26] I want a math lab, like I would like for you all to provide that.
[57:31] and then for you guys to already have had that, to me that speaks to, a, that our teachers feel comfortable enough to give feedback and
[57:35] ask what they want. That doesn't happen by accident. It happens because you guys overtly solicit it because
[57:40] our principals are making our teachers feel confident enough that their voice matters.
[57:44] and the fact that knowing this was coming to a board meeting, a teacher felt comfortable enough in
[57:49] letting us know. What they needed. That all speaks to how
[57:53] important the teacher's voice is. I think it goes to why they would want to come to work
[57:58] in richardson, why they would want to stay. That comes from great leadership and instilling
[58:03] confidence in other leaders and all of you all implementing that. And that's a little thing
[58:08] that could pass by pretty easily. And I just didn't want to let that go
[58:12] without saying it. So thank you guys for doing that.
[58:16] all right. Any other comments from the board questions? I will.
[58:21] close this item out, but one of the words I know that ms. Timmy used earlier, and this
[58:25] is a little bit more of a global comment, she used the word bold.
[58:29] and when I look back and you went over the journey and the timeline, how we were ahead
[58:34] of where the state was. And that made me kind of think, okay, where else have we been ahead
[58:39] of the state? Maybe cell phone policy. Maybe in our project right size,
[58:43] we were way ahead of a lot of our peer districts. And so all that together. Tells me that we're making
[58:49] bold decisions to the benefit of our
[58:53] students and everybody else has to play catch up around us so that brings a little
[58:59] bit of that independent in the independent school district that we've been looking for and feel like
[59:03] it's fleeting sometimes I think that shows a little independence that we're using in our isd and that builds a
[59:08] reputation and we will have a reputation where we take the bold steps for our students
[59:14] and our teachers so anyway, those just were some things that, as I heard some of these words and saw that
[59:19] timeline, I thought about. So appreciate the presentation.
[59:23] thanks for the time tonight. And with that, we are going to go to our second item,
[59:28] our next item on the agenda. Thank you.
[59:33] yes, thank you. Thank you, ms. Matra. The next item on the agenda
[59:37] is an information item to receive a presentation regarding secondary scheduling.
[59:42] ms. Branham. Thank you, trustee poteet. At our last meeting, I brought forward a series
[59:47] of reductions to help continue to right-size our budget
[59:52] to really better align with our current enrollment. And one of the adjustments
[59:56] that I did bring forward was moving our secondary schedule model.
[1:00:01] to a traditional seven or eight period day. We know that there are lots
[1:00:06] of questions in the community that we wanted to make sure to provide as much clarity as
[1:00:11] possible, and tonight we felt like this was the right time
[1:00:16] to bring that forward. I want
[1:00:20] to assure the community, I want to assure the board, that our team would not have
[1:00:24] brought that recommendation forward if we did not believe that the schedule and a new
[1:00:29] schedule would still align and support our north star goal.
[1:00:34] everything we do is around ensuring that we bring this from words on a page to to life in our students.
[1:00:40] and so if you go to the next slide and we're sharing because jenny's going
[1:00:45] to be presenting in a minute. If you keep going,
[1:00:50] what I want to highlight for everyone is like the calendar there's no perfect
[1:00:54] schedule. I actually went back to my email emails
[1:00:58] from when we transitioned during covid to a block schedule.
[1:01:04] and if the board will remember, we implemented that
[1:01:09] in response to our health experts asking us to reduce transitions and
[1:01:14] to try to prevent as, you know, minimum moving
[1:01:18] between classrooms, large groups in the hallways, and the block schedule did afford
[1:01:23] that. And as I went back to my emails, it's eerily similar to a couple of the emails
[1:01:28] that I have received from students and parents related to this schedule.
[1:01:33] you can have a student that is an advanced student who
[1:01:38] loves a block schedule, and you can have an advanced student that thrives
[1:01:42] in a seven-period day. You can have a student
[1:01:47] with anxiety that sitting in a classroom for 90 minutes is overwhelming, trying
[1:01:51] to tackle too many concepts at once. That can be overwhelming,
[1:01:57] and a seven-period day with added transitions can be overwhelming.
[1:02:02] so it's not even a certain profile of a student may or may not fit one schedule or
[1:02:06] the other. I wanted to, as transparently as I could,
[1:02:12] really just communicate to our stakeholders, what do we see as the
[1:02:17] benefits of both? Because both schedules are fine.
[1:02:21] like, both schedules are fine. Some of the benefits of a
[1:02:27] traditional seven-period day, for a lot of our students, the consistency.
[1:02:32] when you have a block schedule, for example, depending upon if you miss a friday and then maybe
[1:02:37] monday, for example, we had to have a snow day, then you may not see your a or b
[1:02:41] teacher for six days or five days. And that, for a lot
[1:02:46] of students, missing that instruction and not having their connection
[1:02:51] to their teacher for that long. Can be something that's
[1:02:55] really challenging. So knowing no matter what day, I know I'm going to see one
[1:03:00] through seven. I don't have to guess. Is it a day or b day?
[1:03:04] like that consistency can really be a benefit. For our teachers, our teachers, again,
[1:03:09] they're amazing at what they do, and they can thrive in either schedule.
[1:03:13] I will say that when you're teaching to a 50-minute class period, there's an urgency to maximize every instructional
[1:03:18] minute. One of the challenges that sometimes we have in a block
[1:03:22] setting is that when you have 90 minutes, you don't necessarily want to try to introduce too many
[1:03:27] new concepts, because that can be completely overwhelming, and you can't introduce the next
[1:03:32] concept until you know the students have mastered the first.
[1:03:36] so a lot of times our teachers will give extended time for independent practice.
[1:03:40] they may even give some time for homework. Well, one of my kids,
[1:03:45] they are going to take advantage of every minute, and they are going
[1:03:49] to get that homework done. They're going to study. Another one, he would have been on his
[1:03:53] chromebook doing all kinds of things that mr.
[1:03:57] hall probably would have had to check out and address. So that urgency of maximizing
[1:04:03] those instructional minutes we see as a real benefit to the 7 or 8 period day.
[1:04:09] daily skills, just having that daily practice. There's less decay
[1:04:14] of learning. So I've learned something today,
[1:04:18] and guess what? I'm going to be back at it tomorrow. I'm not having to wait from,
[1:04:22] you know, thursday to monday to practice that or to ask a question of my
[1:04:27] teacher because maybe I got lost in something and I had to wait for it. Now I even forgot what
[1:04:31] question I had. So being able to every day be able
[1:04:36] to address that. Performance subjects specifically, they require
[1:04:41] that muscle memory. Fine arts, for example, is a curriculum area that they
[1:04:47] thrive with a shorter class period where they're meeting
[1:04:53] every day and they're practicing skills to get to that muscle memory.
[1:04:57] lower absentee impact. When students do miss a day, they're not having to wait
[1:05:02] for so longer as well as missing so much content. In that 90-minute block.
[1:05:07] so it does lessen what it feels like when I have to
[1:05:12] miss a day because I am sick, or maybe I've traveled with a team to compete or
[1:05:17] to perform somewhere. And then we do have to address attention cycle.
[1:05:21] and actually you're going to see that this is kind of a benefit on both sides.
[1:05:26] for some students, give me 50 minutes, I can be all in for 50 minutes,
[1:05:30] and then I get to transition and I get to move to something new. So for many students that is
[1:05:35] a real benefit. On the block schedule, again, you get instructional depth.
[1:05:40] if I'm a science teacher, give me the block schedule
[1:05:44] all day, every day, because I can get through a lab from beginning to end, and I don't have
[1:05:49] to break it up into parts. Instructional variety, when I have 90 minutes,
[1:05:54] I might be able to group students. We might be able to have different activities.
[1:05:59] all that happens in with one schedule. There is less student transition.
[1:06:04] there may be extended periods within that block where I have an opportunity
[1:06:09] to connect with our teachers. When our teachers have a
[1:06:13] planning period, they have a full 90-minute period, and I can get a lot done in
[1:06:18] 90 minutes. Sometimes with 50 minutes, by the time I get all my resources organized, I may
[1:06:23] not feel like I'm being as productive as if I have a full 90-minute block.
[1:06:28] more athletic time is built into the schedule. Some additional minutes
[1:06:33] to complete homework in class. So being very cognizant of that, and we're going
[1:06:37] to address that in a minute. And then again, on the other hand,
[1:06:41] attention cycle of kids. So having a block for many of our kids and not having to think about eight or seven
[1:06:46] different classes in a day, and just today I'm just focusing on these four,
[1:06:50] that feels doable. And so again, depending upon the individual
[1:06:55] student, they can have different impacts. So there's no perfect
[1:07:00] schedule. There's no perfect schedule. So if you come back to what
[1:07:07] we know impacts student achievement, and I know you hear us talk
[1:07:11] about this in the board, you have extended your value, as ms.
[1:07:15] teague said, to this research as well. The most consistent finding
[1:07:20] in educational research is that the schedule matters less than the pedagogy.
[1:07:24] among all student-related factors, including facilities, leadership, and services, teachers have two
[1:07:29] to three times the impact of any factor on student achievement.
[1:07:33] in the end, it comes down to the teacher in the classroom. And our phenomenal teachers are going to do great things
[1:07:38] and help grow our students, regardless if they're in a seven- or eight-period day or if they're
[1:07:43] in a block schedule.
[1:07:47] so just some context that I wanted to provide. Again until 2021, risd had
[1:07:51] implemented a traditional seven and eight period day. We had our health center that
[1:07:57] was at richardson methodist hospital, and our students traveled over there for all
[1:08:02] of the same courses that we have today. And we navigated that very
[1:08:08] successfully. As I mentioned, the block schedule was implemented to
[1:08:13] reduce transitions. I also think it's important to note that even, for example, plano isd will
[1:08:17] be in our new athletic district next year. And they are also on a seven-period day.
[1:08:22] mckinney isd, conroe, round rock, houston are just a few examples of districts that are
[1:08:26] on a traditional schedule like we are.
[1:08:30] almost every district in the state for middle school implements a traditional seven- or
[1:08:35] eight-period day. We were actually one of the outliers in middle school, and I think
[1:08:40] you all can imagine where some of the challenges I mentioned with the block schedule,
[1:08:45] it's exacerbated for our middle students.
[1:08:49] as they are developing and maturing, that 90-minute block and keeping up with everything every other day
[1:08:54] can sometimes really be difficult.
[1:08:58] and then lastly, there's really no significant risd data point to indicate
[1:09:03] student achievement or program success was impacted by a schedule design.
[1:09:08] so if you go back and look at fine arts enrollment, fine arts, you know,
[1:09:13] successes, we were equally successful. The success of our athletics
[1:09:20] programs, we had district winning,
[1:09:26] area winning programs on a traditional schedule just like we have had
[1:09:31] on the block schedule. So with that, we know
[1:09:35] everyone is anxiously awaiting for some of the details of the schedule, and so
[1:09:40] ms. Bates is going to provide some of the information. Go ahead.
[1:09:46] I'll turn it over to you, ms. Bates. Go.
[1:09:51] thank you, superintendent branham, board. I do apologize. I did not bring an activity today.
[1:09:55] I didn't know that that was a part. I'm just chalking it up to you.
[1:10:00] sorry. So thank you for giving me this opportunity to kind of explain to you kind of
[1:10:04] what this will mean as we shift over to this. First of all, first and foremost, the $4 million
[1:10:08] district savings, I think, is a good point of reference as we start this slide, because that is really kind
[1:10:13] of the why behind that. So this is actually for middle school.
[1:10:17] this is the junior high. Wait, wait, wait.
[1:10:22] I'm so sorry to interrupt you. Here's one.
[1:10:28] they're moving on to state. Yay they're going to be one
[1:10:33] of eight. They're one act play. Biddle just texted me. Oh, my, wow okay.
[1:10:38] no, that was a great interruption. I thought you were interrupting me because you said you've messed up
[1:10:43] already. She really wanted an activity. Woo, I know.
[1:10:48] I'm like, there was the activity. So that is amazing.
[1:10:53] okay, no, okay. Okay, so back to the junior high and middle school
[1:10:57] schedule. So, again, as we're transitioning
[1:11:03] to our middle school model across our district, we're going from a 90-minute
[1:11:09] block every other day to now a 45-minute bell schedule every day, just as
[1:11:14] superintendent brandon explained prior. With that, though, I will say
[1:11:19] that we will be adding 10 minutes to the day at the junior high and middle school
[1:11:24] only to accommodate for a couple of items. First, the middle school
[1:11:28] construction as we embark on that with six of our eight middle school junior highs
[1:11:33] now going to middle school. We also have to accommodate
[1:11:38] for the cte minutes. Every class period has to be 45 minutes.
[1:11:42] so in order for that to happen, we have to extend the day a little bit.
[1:11:47] and then, of course, advisory is very important, especially in our junior high and middle school years.
[1:11:53] to make sure we continue with the connections, some of the study skills as we
[1:11:57] transition to this new model. It's going to be really important that we help our
[1:12:01] junior high students and middle school students with some of those skills,
[1:12:06] and we can do that through our advisory period. And then, obviously, the
[1:12:10] instructional minutes that is needed. And then, as you can see, too, they will have a daily
[1:12:15] advisory built into the schedule. Okay, next I want
[1:12:20] to talk a little bit about the junior high reading, language arts, and math. So thank you to julie teague
[1:12:25] and cruz. You kind of led a lot into this for our math.
[1:12:31] so I will say that will be a part of this presentation as well.
[1:12:35] so I first want to start off with our rla scheduling. So one of the things in sixth
[1:12:40] grade only that rla will still be double-blocked. So we'll utilize the daily
[1:12:45] block. To focus on our literacy foundations and accelerated
[1:12:50] reading and then this total instructional time is aligned with our current elementary
[1:12:54] and middle school standards so when they when since sixth grade is still
[1:13:00] in some of our elementary schools that is that is that matches what we're doing in
[1:13:05] um our middle school so I wanted to point that out and then we will be providing an
[1:13:11] intervention opportunity as well in our seventh and eighth grades so there will
[1:13:16] be a double blocked rla, just like we talked about math,
[1:13:21] the same will apply for rla, that if they did not meet, then we will require have some intervention time
[1:13:25] for them as well. And then mta and take flight will also be separate courses. So this is exciting as well.
[1:13:30] so that way we're not having to pull them out of other courses so they can still meet their dyslexia schedule.
[1:13:34] and now moving over to math. Again, there will be double
[1:13:41] block required for students below meets. Standard including algebra
[1:13:45] so there was a lot of conversation around this in our previous presentation.
[1:13:50] so this is kind of where this is going
[1:13:54] to support all of what we just talked about. So I too want to share that I
[1:13:59] am super excited about the way that this math lab is going to be because I was a
[1:14:04] principal in this model and it really was powerful for our kids who were struggling
[1:14:08] in math. And I also seen the relationships that were built
[1:14:12] with their teachers. That helped with that confidence in math.
[1:14:16] so I just kind of wanted to put my little opportunity, have my plug in there for the math lab. And then we will have an
[1:14:21] advanced tracks for meets and masters. And in math enrichment will be required for sixth grade advanced and meets and master
[1:14:26] students. And again, giving them that opportunity to differentiate for their increased math,
[1:14:32] their love of math. And so we can continue to keep pouring into that.
[1:14:38] you will see on the bottom that because of this, each student,
[1:14:43] depending on their star performance, could actually add another
[1:14:47] elective period. So that's super exciting, and we'll talk a little bit about why
[1:14:51] in our next slide, because now they'll get an opportunity to have a little bit more flexibility
[1:14:56] in their schedules. Okay, so one of this, though,
[1:15:00] about the designated school-wide collaboration time for plcs, we are still going
[1:15:05] to provide opportunities for our tested. Subject areas
[1:15:10] for core teachers in rla 6 through 8, math 6 through 08, history or social studies,
[1:15:15] and science in eighth grade.
[1:15:19] so that is important that our teachers have that time together to collaborate
[1:15:23] in what we refer to it as a plc or a professional learning community so they
[1:15:28] can have time to make sure that they're meeting the rigor of our state test to that way that they are
[1:15:33] preparing our kids for that. So they will still have that designated plc time
[1:15:38] for our core teams. The other opportunity that this allows in junior high
[1:15:43] and middle school is our college and career and military readiness.
[1:15:49] the ric strongly recommends that all of our middle school students leave
[1:15:54] with two high school credits to increase space and high school schedule
[1:15:58] for additional electives. So this opens that for them to have that opportunity
[1:16:03] to get. Kind of leave junior high and middle school with high school credits,
[1:16:08] just like we encourage high school students to leave high school with college credits.
[1:16:13] so that kind of mimics that a little bit. And so a couple of options they could have is foreign language, health,
[1:16:18] additional cte courses, algebra 1, and then of course we're also going
[1:16:22] to continue to provide summer enrichment opportunities so they can also free up their schedule and do some
[1:16:27] of these courses in the summer. Okay, so superintendent
[1:16:33] branham kind of touched on a lot of these implications, and,
[1:16:37] of course, fine arts is going to be what
[1:16:42] we're really excited about. And, again, because pierce is now going to the state finals,
[1:16:48] that's another example. But what it will do is increase in program growth
[1:16:52] at pivotal entry points. So currently there is a struggle at the junior high
[1:16:56] and middle school because they do have to choose. Because there's not as many
[1:17:01] opportunities in their schedule for elective choices.
[1:17:06] the daily reinforcement and development of fine motor skills, when they get to see their
[1:17:10] students every day, that has a huge impact. And then increased retention of the materials.
[1:17:15] so it's very much when they're practicing every day and seeing them every day,
[1:17:20] that's going to help increase with the retention.
[1:17:24] and then, again, it goes without mentioning higher success rate of their craft.
[1:17:28] when they practice more frequently. So that will help
[1:17:32] with fine arts. The rapid feedback loop, so they're not having to wait another day.
[1:17:37] so they get to see them every day. So they can continue to do that in there.
[1:17:42] when you talk about immediate feedback, fine arts teachers do it the best. They give that immediate
[1:17:47] automatic feedback that I think even sometimes our core teachers could learn from because it's automatic and
[1:17:51] they're like, well, they practice and practice and they don't move on
[1:17:56] until they get it right. And then just retention and muscle memory. So that's implication
[1:18:00] on fine arts, which is all positive. Now, athletics, again, as superintendent branham said,
[1:18:05] that it will be a little bit of some longer days while in season for athletic staff
[1:18:09] because there is going to be some before and after school implications now.
[1:18:13] construction, that will impact the six campuses because
[1:18:18] of the way that we're having to move fields and move practice locations.
[1:18:22] we are going to have to transport and shuttle. Some students back and forth
[1:18:27] for a couple of years. So there will be some impact on that, but the long-term effects will be amazing when
[1:18:32] we see our brand new facilities. And just to know, that would
[1:18:36] be the case whether we're on block or on a traditional schedule, just like we did at lake highlands middle school.
[1:18:41] correct. Thank you for that. And then, of course, our cte, again, increased enrollment
[1:18:45] because now it's opening up a spot in their course to explore another cte option
[1:18:51] because as we know in junior high and middle school. That's where I spent most
[1:18:56] of my career. And we know that they don't make good decisions
[1:19:00] in that age. So giving them opportunities to explore some
[1:19:04] of those things and be able to change their mind when they think about what they want to do
[1:19:09] in their next phase of their life. So that's another exciting
[1:19:13] thing about this. And then offering some new course pathways for them so they can look
[1:19:18] at some of the things and do what they want. And maybe then change their
[1:19:23] mind like I just said, and then expand access to cte foundations and give students
[1:19:27] an opportunity to take principal's course, which also will give them
[1:19:31] high school credit, and then allows more time to explore cte options.
[1:19:37] the next slide I do want to make sure that this is just a sample bell schedule. I don't want, we're just,
[1:19:42] we're currently working through some mock and some schedules but I just wanted
[1:19:50] to put this up here to let you know that the schedule is, this is just a sample,
[1:19:54] but this will represent the 45-minute class periods with the advisory and then you can
[1:19:58] also see the lunch blocks but also know too it will also depend vary from campus to
[1:20:04] campus because what really impacts our bell schedule is
[1:20:08] the amount of lunch periods that a campus can have so I just wanted to note that okay
[1:20:12] now um we'll move on to high
[1:20:16] school so again we will anchor this part in with the
[1:20:22] seven million dollar district savings that it will recapture for us as we move
[1:20:27] into high school um this will be the additional zero hour option so we are going
[1:20:33] to be adding that to our high school schedule.
[1:20:39] now let me, this is not required, so I don't want everybody to think, oh my gosh, they're
[1:20:43] now extending that day. This is just to help with some of this transition so we can make sure that we
[1:20:48] can get all the requirements in. So we will be going from
[1:20:52] eight periods to seven periods, so that will be a reduction,
[1:20:56] one of the periods in this model. And so you will still have 28 credits available
[1:21:01] without zero hour, and this is where athletics will not be double blocked. We still will be having
[1:21:06] junior and senior release periods. So if you are a parent out
[1:21:11] there and your junior or senior had late arrival or
[1:21:15] early release, that will still apply. And then we will still be having daily advisory.
[1:21:19] I think it's super important to note that our athletes currently, if they're in athletics or any of our
[1:21:24] courses that we currently double block, they already have a 28-credit schedule because their athletics is
[1:21:32] taking up two of the eight periods. So we're really working hard
[1:21:36] to help educate and remind our parents of that so that they do not feel like their students are actually losing
[1:21:41] an opportunity on a seven-period day because many of our students are actually,
[1:21:45] it's almost like a wash because now athletics is one period versus taking up two.
[1:21:50] okay.
[1:21:55] next slide. So just real quick over some zero-hour options that could be possibility.
[1:22:00] fine arts, cte. Seniors needing an aid slot for endorsement pathways.
[1:22:04] this is an option for dual credit, ap on-ramps, and then it will be from 8 to 8.50, but it is important
[1:22:09] to note that transportation will not be provided for this.
[1:22:14] several of our teachers have expressed excitement about
[1:22:19] this because it also would allow them to have a flex schedule.
[1:22:23] so it might be that they could come in and teach a zero hour, and then they might actually not
[1:22:28] be there until the end of the day. So it also provides some flexibilities
[1:22:32] for our teachers. Okay, and again, the high school program implications,
[1:22:37] we have it divided again with fine arts, athletics, and cte.
[1:22:41] so with fine arts, again, it's just that daily reinforcement of the practice
[1:22:46] and muscle memory. With athletics, it will be full practice. That longer fits in
[1:22:52] within the school day. But like superintendent branham just said, that it's now no longer going
[1:22:56] to be double-blocked. But that is where it will be a little bit longer for our
[1:23:01] coaches and our athletes and our facility usage. With cte,
[1:23:06] just it's daily practice for skill mastery. And then the 45-minute
[1:23:10] requirement for funding is being met and prioritized. And then just making sure
[1:23:15] that we are ensuring that transportation and practicum courses are prioritized as
[1:23:20] well. And then for high school, the
[1:23:24] designated plc or common planning periods, as they're sometimes normally referred at, will be for english 1,
[1:23:30] english 2, algebra, biology, and u.s. History. And then also, too, just our
[1:23:35] junior and senior release periods, because we don't want anybody
[1:23:40] to be worried about those going away, because we know how important those are
[1:23:44] for our juniors and seniors. And as long as they are meeting their cte or ccmr indicators,
[1:23:49] they will still be. Eligible for those release periods and
[1:23:54] on track to graduate. Thank you.
[1:23:59] okay, so I've also provided a high school sample bell schedule here as well. This bell schedule reflects
[1:24:03] the 50-minute class periods with the advisory.
[1:24:08] again, I just want to make sure that we note that this will vary from campus to campus based on what is needed
[1:24:14] at each campus. Okay, secondary scheduled
[1:24:19] transition and support. So we also know that that is where some
[1:24:24] of the change that's coming through and how are we going to support our students
[1:24:29] through this. So we will be having some targeted professional
[1:24:34] development for our teachers because as we have talked about previously, moving
[1:24:39] from a 90 minute teaching block now to 45 minutes, we are also going to need to provide support for our teachers to make sure
[1:24:45] that they are. Equipped to meet those needs in our classroom.
[1:24:49] homework and testing schedule, it will be similar expectations prior to the last year's schedule change.
[1:24:53] so we will not be, this will not be an increase in homework. It will just be that we'll
[1:24:58] have to look at it a little bit differently. And then just-in-time support from teaching and learning
[1:25:03] and our campus instructional coaches for our teachers who are needing that as well. Bye.
[1:25:09] our teaching and learning department is working
[1:25:13] on curriculum realignment to make sure that the pacing tools and resources are
[1:25:17] for shorter daily sessions, and that makes sure that we will be have clear,
[1:25:22] purposeful lesson segments with longer concepts strategically chunked along classroom periods,
[1:25:27] and then focus on more engagement. I think that is the piece I want to pull out from this
[1:25:33] slide is the engagement piece that we're really wanting to make sure that it's more
[1:25:37] about. Keeping our students engaged in the curriculum and the
[1:25:42] activities that they're doing, rather than just making sure that we're getting through the lessons.
[1:25:47] and then leadership support. We will be continuing to revisit and look at this to make sure that we are having our leadership teams
[1:25:52] look at this and make sure if there's any adjustments we need to make. I want to also add,
[1:25:57] when we focus on engagement, one of the opportunities that we have is kind of that daily mastery
[1:26:02] check. Where we are, you know, as we
[1:26:08] introduce and students have that independent practice, did they actually learn what
[1:26:12] we expected them to learn? Did they master it at the level and the depth that we needed them to learn?
[1:26:17] and I think that we do think that that 50-minute class period allows for that
[1:26:21] to be short, frequent checks, so we catch a misconception right away versus waiting
[1:26:27] until, you know, maybe that next block where we finally
[1:26:31] realize that. Thank you guys. Yes, that is a good point. And then the reteach can
[1:26:36] happen almost immediately. Okay. And then now the next slide is just our student support.
[1:26:41] so again, we refer to the advisory period. So we will have specific advisory lessons to help
[1:26:46] with the implementation of this new model, especially with
[1:26:51] organizational and time management skills. That's going to be a huge support for our
[1:26:56] students as they transition to this new. Schedule and then our
[1:27:00] principal focus groups we use to get input and feedback and then as our amazing counselor team summer martin and her
[1:27:06] team will be providing counselor support for students who may feel
[1:27:10] this increased anxiety as well as making sure that she's supporting them in any
[1:27:14] of the scheduled changes okay so now I will turn it back over to you superintendent
[1:27:20] brandon again I absolutely want to thank our central
[1:27:25] team our principals and lead teachers who have given feedback as we've designed
[1:27:29] how we are going to support this transition. I do want everyone to know that actually beginning
[1:27:34] tomorrow morning we have communication that will be sent to students and to parents that will allow them
[1:27:38] to adjust their scheduled course selections. For some of our grade levels there's no impact because
[1:27:44] it's like a net neutral transition. For other students it might be that they get
[1:27:49] to pick up an elective or it may mean that they need to prioritize what elective that
[1:27:53] they would have. Our counselors have done a phenomenal video that walks our students and our parents
[1:27:58] through the process, and then there's a tailored way for each student to be able
[1:28:04] to give that feedback to their counselor so that we can make those adjustments as we're building the new master schedule.
[1:28:09] in addition, there is a website that will be live first thing in the morning that is specific to this
[1:28:14] schedule change. I believe it has over 20 faqs.
[1:28:19] it has sample schedules. And it had I'm sure there's some information that we have not addressed, and if there
[1:28:24] is, we will add it as we get new questions. But we really have tried to lift up a resource that our
[1:28:29] parents, students, and staff can access as we move forward with the transition.
[1:28:34] again, I just want to just reiterate that while we know it's a change, and some
[1:28:43] of our staff and some of our parents and some
[1:28:47] of our students will feel like they won the jackpot, others are going to feel like, you know,
[1:28:51] this. They're losing something that they loved. And so we will absolutely,
[1:28:57] you know, our counselors are available, our principals will be supporting everyone
[1:29:01] as we go through the change, making sure we get feedback along the way.
[1:29:07] from this point, majority of the feedback that our stakeholders receive will
[1:29:11] come from the principals. At this point, this is now kind of a campus management implementation
[1:29:17] because there are nuances at each campus. That might be different, might be unique.
[1:29:22] for example, at pierce high school, they have two lunches, whereas at lake
[1:29:26] highlands, they have to have three, just based upon preference and size of cafeteria and all
[1:29:31] of those things. So this was our night to basically say from a district level,
[1:29:36] here are our expectations, and then now from here, our campuses are really individualizing it based upon
[1:29:41] the needs of their campuses. A lot of people have asked, well,
[1:29:46] why is this a cost savings? And so I just want to make sure that we communicate that
[1:29:50] a traditional seven and eight period day is less resource intensive due to specifically
[1:29:55] the athletics double block. So if you think
[1:29:59] about a coach, if they teach ninth grade football and they coach varsity,
[1:30:03] that might be four periods of their eight period day that they no longer are teaching
[1:30:08] their actual content area. And then additional.
[1:30:12] additionally, with looking at and really strategically
[1:30:16] placing that plc, that is
[1:30:22] also supporting the reduction. We couldn't reduce plc on a block schedule because then
[1:30:27] you would have teachers that would not have a conference period every single day.
[1:30:32] and we did not feel, as we listened to teachers, that that would be a great
[1:30:37] system for anyone where they could thrive. Every teacher needs an
[1:30:42] opportunity to breathe during a day. And then, again, just want
[1:30:47] to reiterate over and over again and show great appreciation to the board
[1:30:52] that as we know our campuses are going to be reduced in their allocations,
[1:30:57] that we are doing all of that through attrition. So we are not looking at
[1:31:02] anyone and saying you don't have a job this year. It is you will have a job.
[1:31:06] it may not be in that same course,
[1:31:11] that same grade level, may be in a different campus. But everyone will have a job.
[1:31:15] I will also, as I shared with the board at our last meeting, we may
[1:31:19] not see the full savings until 27-28, because again,
[1:31:24] we're not looking at any one teacher and saying, sorry,
[1:31:28] you don't have a place. So if there happen to be some
[1:31:34] allocations we aren't able to reduce as a result
[1:31:38] of attrition, then that will help to lower class sizes or to provide additional support
[1:31:43] in another way. So I just want to make sure that we're being very transparent with that.
[1:31:49] so finally, in case you didn't guess, there's no perfect schedule.
[1:31:54] there's no perfect schedule. But I promise you our team, our principals, we would not
[1:32:00] bring this forward if we did not feel like we still absolutely could realize the north star goal and ensure
[1:32:04] strong outcomes for extracurricular and academic programs
[1:32:09] on a traditional schedule. You can see we have strong transition programs that are
[1:32:14] in place, and we will be ready to help
[1:32:19] our entire system as we move. Y'all,
[1:32:23] we've done this before. We were successful, so we feel very confident that we
[1:32:28] can do that again. And then in the end, you know, we're keeping the main
[1:32:33] thing the main thing, and that is how do we make sure that we love and grow our
[1:32:37] kids. And then, again, we're going to be soliciting a lot
[1:32:41] of feedback, and we will make just-in-time adjustments based upon the feedback that we receive.
[1:32:45] so, again, thank you to our team. Thank you to our principals, our counselors.
[1:32:50] of fine arts, athletics, all the people for all that they have done
[1:32:55] to have this ready. Without these reductions, a conversation that we're going
[1:32:59] to have later tonight about an appetite for compensation would not be
[1:33:04] even a conversation that we could have. So again, just I appreciate
[1:33:08] the staff and message this in our monday message.
[1:33:12] our staff, while many of them feel all different kinds of ways about the change,
[1:33:17] they have all been incredibly gracious in understanding why this is necessary.
[1:33:24] and I'm just incredibly grateful for them that they have just expressed a
[1:33:30] commitment that we're going to do great things for kids.
[1:33:36] and we recognize that there's a why behind why we're having to do this right now.
[1:33:41] thank you for the presentation. Thank you as well.
[1:33:46] we'll open it up to questions and comments there's a lot here so board members we'll
[1:33:51] start here and come back down towards uh miss mcgowan thank you um really really great
[1:33:56] presentation um you all have been busy um it's a lot of cognitive lift to go
[1:34:02] through this and to think of every possible outcome think of it from every single person's point of view
[1:34:07] to map it out and try to figure out where your pressure points are and to make an faq and
[1:34:12] to have all of these resources ready
[1:34:17] with all of the communications um that is a lot of work that is a lot
[1:34:23] of people I am like outside of just this room I know that goes into that
[1:34:28] to do it so um I want to say thank you guys for that that is I mean I'm
[1:34:35] saying it for the second time but that really goes back to the leadership
[1:34:40] of that and taking care of the people and trying to find the way forward and I it may be hard to understand
[1:34:45] like how much thinking all of these things through is exhausting and worrying about
[1:34:49] what you miss and worrying about how it's impacting staff and worrying
[1:34:55] about when you communicate it out like what did we miss right so I want to say thank you to you and
[1:34:59] your staff it's a big deal um also too I want to thank our staff in the
[1:35:03] buildings who are experiencing this change because not only are they hearing some messages that
[1:35:08] are hard to hear um that we hate that have to be delivered but also too that we're asking them to do some...
[1:35:14] changes as well, and I know that may mean you know for our coaching staff that's going
[1:35:18] to be longer hours and for our teachers that may mean some more prep in one day, right? They're going to be lots of
[1:35:23] different things that are going to be hardships, but I really appreciate the fact that unfortunately that we're having
[1:35:28] to make some tough decisions, and how you guys are handling that how our staff's handling it certainly certainly do
[1:35:34] appreciate that um you mentioned the money,
[1:35:38] and I just want to be I just wanna be sure we talked about it'll take a couple of years right like this to
[1:35:43] in your we're talking about when you're saying like, oh, this is $7 million and this is $4 million, you're talking
[1:35:48] about we're saving that in staffing allocations? Yes, ma'am. Is that where the saving comes from?
[1:35:53] yes, ma'am. It's purely staffing allocations. Okay, and that's why it may possibly take two years,
[1:35:57] right, for that realignment? So, for example, and this is not a specific number, but let's say we have
[1:36:02] a high school that with the new model, they may need 24 less teaching allocations than they had
[1:36:06] this year. They may not have 24 resignations or retirement. Right.
[1:36:12] so let's say they only get to 15, and there's not another campus that needs that one teacher that has
[1:36:17] that one certification. So that allocation, that teacher may stay
[1:36:22] on that campus and, for example, help reduce class sizes, those other things.
[1:36:27] so we may have that additional allocation for another year until we receive more resignations or
[1:36:31] retirements. Great. Thank you. Just in thinking it
[1:36:35] through with, like, knowing that the new cte center is coming and knowing that
[1:36:40] that's going to have some transportation implications and things like that, how is this scheduling potentially
[1:36:45] going to impact that? Just thinking about, like, getting to there, taking courses, getting back,
[1:36:49] how does that? We are very fortunate that we have a neighboring district that is actually opening
[1:36:53] their cte center next year. Plano isd is opening their cte center. And really, we were, I think
[1:36:58] we felt very confident that. The schedule we developed for
[1:37:03] the health science program. Again, if you think about like highlands traveling over to richardson
[1:37:09] methodist, that schedule will be the same schedule that we will apply to the cte
[1:37:13] center. And when we checked with our sister school district in
[1:37:18] plano, they're actually implementing the exact same model. So we will go and watch and
[1:37:23] hear feedback to make sure it's working as well for the cte center as we design and launch ours.
[1:37:27] that's great. Thank you. I mean, again, going back to
[1:37:32] this is a large lifter. I'm thinking through all the things, right?
[1:37:36] like it's hard to think through all of these things. Are you guys also looking at,
[1:37:42] and I'm sure that you are, I know that because of, I know that there is going to be potentially more prep,
[1:37:46] like there are going to be more preps in a day because there may be however many preps of certain teachers.
[1:37:52] are there caps on those things? And are there ways that you guys are ensuring that we're not?
[1:37:56] yes, I love you said that. Actually, today we sent we sent guidelines and expectations to the campus
[1:38:01] principals related to the number of preps any educator could have,
[1:38:05] as well as expectations around coaches schedules to
[1:38:10] ensure that they had they had their planning period as well as time to respond
[1:38:15] after that. They are coaching as well. So all of those expectations
[1:38:20] have been communicated to principals and they know what that needs to look like. Listen, like I said,
[1:38:25] y'all have been very busy. There are a lot of things that are happening right now between testing, things like this.
[1:38:30] it's incredibly impressive that you guys have done this. You know, to your point, there are pros and cons
[1:38:35] of all things, right? There are pros and cons to all things. I think you guys have done a
[1:38:39] really great job in trying to find the best path forward. While thinking of all the people, while
[1:38:44] ensuring that we have high standards, while ensuring also that we're being responsible and aligning
[1:38:49] to our north star goal, what we want are student outcomes, and ensuring that we're not losing traction
[1:38:54] by a change like this, while also being fiscally responsible in a time where we really
[1:38:59] have to be, and working on not cutting people and programs and really working
[1:39:03] on those things while maintaining our culture of support and importance for
[1:39:09] our staff. Because you have said it tonight and you'll say it
[1:39:14] other nights that that teacher in the classroom is the biggest determiner
[1:39:18] of the outcome of those students have. So taking care of people takes care
[1:39:23] of our students. And so thank you. All right. Thank you.
[1:39:28] ms. Mcgowan, you're next. Thank you
[1:39:32] for the presentation. Just a couple of questions. When you, one slide showed 4
[1:39:37] million, the other showed 7 million. Is that a total of 11 million in savings? Correct. It's cumulative.
[1:39:41] yeah. You add those numbers together. Okay. Awesome.
[1:39:45] and the other question I have is, are we having to cut? Does that come from like cutting the course catalog,
[1:39:49] the courses being offered? No, ma'am. There's no changes to the course selections.
[1:39:53] perfect. That's it. Thank you.
[1:39:57] okay. Other questions, comments? Yes, ms. Pacheco. Okay, great.
[1:40:02] thank you so much for the explanation on the schedule changes. I remember in the past
[1:40:06] with one of my kids we had this type of schedule and then with the other kid I had the other
[1:40:10] schedule for the last remaining parts of his years and I was always confused I didn't know what
[1:40:15] ab was and I was so happy that you guys had it on the board there when I was
[1:40:20] driving up so great yeah always used it
[1:40:25] but I had a question on the schedule changes and you know
[1:40:31] I I don't know what parents are doing right now. Do we have zero period
[1:40:35] with block period, or are we just implementing zero period again?
[1:40:40] we really don't have zero. None of our four high schools right now have a zero hour. Okay.
[1:40:45] and so this is something that they were very excited about bringing back with the traditional schedule.
[1:40:50] well, I'm just as excited because I know one of my kids did take full advantage of that zero hour and did all
[1:40:54] kinds of fun things and also opened up her schedule for the regular school day to
[1:40:59] do the things that she really liked. And trustee pacheco, just as
[1:41:04] a reminder to our parents and our students, tomorrow when they receive their scheduling
[1:41:08] information, there is an opportunity for them to basically
[1:41:13] indicate that they would like to take a zero hour and give us information so that,
[1:41:17] again, that is information that our principals can use in building the schedule. That sounds great.
[1:41:22] I do know that's good that they're doing that because sometimes she was interested in a class but there weren't
[1:41:26] enough students. So we don't have a class. Right. So I'm glad that you all are
[1:41:32] doing that early so we can have enough students take advantage of the zero period hour. With some
[1:41:37] of the middle schools, I noticed you are providing the students that opportunity,
[1:41:41] right, to take the summer classes or get ahead with this presentation,
[1:41:46] right? Yeah, all students have an opportunity to take summer enrichment.
[1:41:50] and then for our, the class that we have the most. As dr.
[1:41:56] martin and I talked the other day, we have the most concern for is making sure our
[1:42:00] juniors to seniors, that if they are impacted in any way moving from eight periods
[1:42:05] to seven periods. Oh, yes. So we will have specific
[1:42:10] virtual courses as well as in-person courses that we will be offering for free
[1:42:16] for any of our rising juniors or seniors that their graduation plan was in any way impacted
[1:42:20] by this change. We will have those available, and they'll have some options to make sure that their graduation plan is not
[1:42:25] impacted because of the schedule change. Okay, great. I was wondering about that,
[1:42:29] and I was wondering because sometimes when I used to see the options, they were usually half-semester
[1:42:34] classes. So with this option for our rising seniors,
[1:42:39] are they going to be able to do a full year maybe? Yes, we're actually, dr. Martin and the counselors, as
[1:42:43] soon as we receive back the adjustments that our parents and students will look at tomorrow,
[1:42:47] then we will begin to process what are those courses that we need to stand up.
[1:42:53] because we know that our students were impacted by the schedule change so that there
[1:42:57] will be multiple options available I can't speak to which ones yet because we need to hear from our kids
[1:43:01] but we are our teaching and learning team we're ready we're just waiting to know what the need is and we will
[1:43:06] stand those up and I know it's a lot of work it's a lot of kids so I'm really thankful that you
[1:43:11] guys are thinking through this working out with the students and their families lastly again just
[1:43:16] trying to you know get them more credits as quickly as they can can students...
[1:43:20] test out of language and not actually take a class? They can.
[1:43:28] yes, ma'am. They can do a credit by exam. And we do have several kids
[1:43:33] actually that do that. We test them, especially if they're native speakers. They can go ahead and get
[1:43:37] their spanish 1 and 2 credit and then go into spanish 3, ap spanish. We are looking at,
[1:43:42] to that point, offering spanish 1 and 2 possibly over the summer as well. Just looking at different
[1:43:46] courses that we haven't offered in the past to also help them
[1:43:51] in junior high to get those high school credits.
[1:43:55] credit to open up their courses. The 9-1-1 is those juniors to seniors making sure that we
[1:43:59] know what courses they need there but then also thinking back. We do that cbes but a lot with spanish we have here is
[1:44:04] mostly in the district but we also offer it for any language. Over 500 different languages.
[1:44:09] that's really awesome. I didn't realize I saw it there and I was
[1:44:13] like wait can they also test out besides just taking the class? So I think that's great. I know it's a change, change
[1:44:18] is hard for everybody. And I'm just thankful that you guys are working it through.
[1:44:23] you have a whole website that's going to be ready, so I'm excited that the families will now be able to look
[1:44:27] at something, look at samples, communicate, and, of course, share with their
[1:44:33] students and guidance counselors on courses. And I just think it's great.
[1:44:38] I really feel like it's going to give them a bigger opportunity
[1:44:44] at taking extra classes, you know, stretching themselves,
[1:44:49] learning something different that they probably wouldn't have an opportunity to do. With a block schedule trustee
[1:44:54] pacheco one of the the areas that we we think we will see
[1:44:58] that the greatest impact for example is students will have an opportunity
[1:45:03] to take that principles of a cte pathway in middle school and more students will have available slots to take
[1:45:07] that um and why we're excited number one if they take that class in middle school they're much more likely
[1:45:12] to finish that pathway in high school but also if they take a pathway and they
[1:45:16] realize this is not for me I don't like blood after all, and I don't want to touch it.
[1:45:21] and they still then have all four years of high school to dive into another pathway
[1:45:27] and potentially find something else that better aligns
[1:45:31] with their interests. So I think this gives them some more flexibility. It will take us a minute
[1:45:35] to get there, but we do think that that's going to be a real benefit. Yes, I think it is.
[1:45:40] I mean, we do still have the one group of kids that are going to be in that transition and
[1:45:45] senior year, and, of course, that's really important. To get them to
[1:45:49] to the final mark but I think everybody else will see the advantages and have less
[1:45:53] confused parents like myself so I appreciate it and thank you for that presentation and
[1:45:58] all the hard work other comments questions yes mr andrea uh just one quick
[1:46:07] question and this may have already been answered
[1:46:12] in what ms pacheco said but I was wondering like the programs that are like with pip.
[1:46:16] that you have internships. Help me remember, because I know that that was still
[1:46:21] something when my son did it, but even on this new schedule,
[1:46:26] they'll still be able, it's not going to affect, or when the students that go
[1:46:30] off campus, okay, so it'll all stay the same.
[1:46:35] right, right. That's what I remember. Yes, we had all of those programs on our traditional schedule as well. Okay, perfect.
[1:46:39] thank you. All right.
[1:46:44] great questions, great discussion. The one question that I had
[1:46:48] and I think I know the answer but there's no impact on class sizes right because we will be increasing I'm so
[1:46:53] glad that you mentioned that we are not increasing class
[1:46:57] sizes so that is not part of the reduction so we're maintaining our current class
[1:47:02] size and that same ratio is in place and that's how allocations were calculated
[1:47:07] excellent all right great and I know we were at the the ambassador meeting and there
[1:47:12] was a lot of questions about
[1:47:17] you know why couldn't we have done this three months ago why couldn't we have done
[1:47:22] this in the fall and I just think that it's important to understand kind of the the sequential manner that we got
[1:47:26] here and knowing what our revenue is going to be drives the decisions that we've got
[1:47:32] to make and unfortunately we don't have that until appraisal districts give us numbers so we have our final
[1:47:37] enrollment numbers so there were a lot
[1:47:41] of pieces that had to hit before we actually got this presentation as an option
[1:47:45] that we had to consider. So we're always open. I know you all are
[1:47:50] at the district level, at the administration level, to answer those questions. But I know that's been one
[1:47:54] that I've heard quite a few times is the timing of this.
[1:47:58] and with that being said, again, kudos to turning around in such quick order.
[1:48:02] the planning and the execution. I mean, it's dr. Martin and her group of counselors and
[1:48:08] department. I mean, they're burning the
[1:48:14] midnight oil trying to get this all hammered out and they will be over the next few weeks.
[1:48:18] so it's not, we wouldn't have asked
[1:48:23] for it this way, but we were given this and had to react and bravo
[1:48:27] to the reaction. So, okay. With that, I am going to,
[1:48:31] let's take a quick 15-minute break before we come back for...
[1:48:36] the next item, so it is, let's say this, at 8.05 we'll
[1:48:41] return and get going again. Thank you.
[1:48:47] all right, we're going to get started. We are one minute early.
[1:48:52] so the next item on our agenda is an information item to receive an update on bond
[1:48:57] 2025 middle school bond projects for apollo middle school and richardson north
[1:49:02] middle school. Ms. Branham.
[1:49:07] thank you. Thank you very much. We wanted to bring forward a presentation tonight.
[1:49:11] really, we chose our two most complex projects because these are going to involve the most movements
[1:49:16] in terms of phases and or may involve the most
[1:49:20] portables. And we know that as our
[1:49:25] parents and our staff are processing that information, we just want to make sure
[1:49:30] we're very transparent, make sure they know the plan. Make sure they know all of
[1:49:35] the amazing safety supports that our facilities team have put in place to make sure
[1:49:39] that this construction over the next two years is a safe one and a project that still
[1:49:45] allows for students to focus on learning, because in the
[1:49:49] end that's what they're there for. The great news for us is we've been
[1:49:54] through this a couple times. Not just with lake highlands middle school and with forest meadow,
[1:49:58] but we've also been through it with mohawk and brentfield and pierce for three years.
[1:50:03] I mean, we have had practice at how do you, northridge, stoltz, lots of opportunities for us to
[1:50:08] recognize what lifting up a project like this looks like in a way that doesn't have to completely disrupt learning.
[1:50:14] so we've invited the facilities team.
[1:50:18] I think, lee, you're going to be the lead tonight. But I thank all of them for the incredible work they've
[1:50:23] done. Also, huge kudos to our strategy and engagement team because, like the schedule
[1:50:28] presentation we just had, we have a bond 2025 website that is already listed up.
[1:50:33] it's already live, and there are already, again, faqs, information, so that
[1:50:38] parents have a go-to place as they're seeking out information.
[1:50:43] so I'll turn it over to you all. Thank you, superintendent
[1:50:48] brannon. Good evening, board of trustees. I'm going to walk through the
[1:50:53] construction phasing of apollo middle school and richardson north middle school.
[1:50:57] as superintendent bram said, you know, k-12 projects are
[1:51:01] the most complicated. You have a couple
[1:51:06] of factors. The campus needs to be occupied. There's not a big window of time except for summer
[1:51:11] where students are not there. And then you also are dealing with students, students that are learning every day. So you need to make sure that
[1:51:16] their learning environment is sacred and it's not disrupted during construction. So with that being said we've
[1:51:20] been working with these contractors who are very qualified and have done lots of k-12 projects
[1:51:24] in phase construction for the last year to really determine what's the most efficient phasing that we can
[1:51:29] have for these two projects so I want to really highlight apollo first and just to look back at the end goal
[1:51:34] right these beautiful renderings it will take two years to get apollo to look like this but we also have to
[1:51:39] remember this is the end goal right this is this is the wow this is the august of 2028
[1:51:43] this is what our students will be walking into but to get there, it's going to be quite a journey
[1:51:48] for the next two years. It's exciting, very exciting, and I want to walk through that
[1:51:53] in the most efficient, simplified way I can. So looking at this schedule
[1:51:58] that we've put together, it has from 2026 all the way to 2028, where we have
[1:52:02] substantial completion of august in 2028. For apollo, apollo's really
[1:52:07] broken down into two big phases. You have phase one and you
[1:52:13] have phase two. And if you can see the ticker on the top, where you see the two different colors are kind of big milestones that
[1:52:18] there's a big turnover or a big milestone switchover for the contractors.
[1:52:24] so from april to july is one kind of phase one part. From august to may is a chunk.
[1:52:28] the summer of june and july and 27. And then august to
[1:52:32] december. And then january to may. And then each slide that I'll
[1:52:37] go through next corresponds to each one of those chunks. To give a breakdown
[1:52:42] of bite-sized pieces as we go through from today all the way to 2028.
[1:52:46] so looking at the first phase, this is looking from april to april of 2026 to july of 2026, so this coming
[1:52:52] summer. So I broke every single slide
[1:52:56] into what's happening on the outside, exterior, and what's happening on the inside.
[1:53:01] you guys can see holistically what the plan will be. So on the exterior, starting
[1:53:05] in april, the construction, fencing, and mobilization has already commenced. You should see it at apollo
[1:53:12] right now, some construction. Site utilities and
[1:53:16] infrastructure are starting. The portables and the covered walkways are also starting. Those will not be occupied until august
[1:53:21] of this coming year, but they need to set up all the infrastructure for it. And then site paving and parking is going
[1:53:27] to be started. On the inside, which will happen after school releases in
[1:53:31] may, so june and july, there will be selective abatement in the area in red, and temporary administration
[1:53:36] suite will be getting built. Structural demolition will start happening in june and july.
[1:53:41] we'll start renovation on some of the existing, and then we'll start the new
[1:53:45] academic. And then as I go through these diagrams, I want to point out the line
[1:53:50] in blue is going to be the construction fencing. And then everything within that construction fencing is
[1:53:55] where the contractor will be laying down his materials. That's where the workers will be.
[1:53:59] parked most likely, that's where all their materials will be. Everything in red that you
[1:54:04] see is going to be kind of off limits. No students will be there, no one will be there
[1:54:09] in the chunk of time that we're talking about. So april to june, that will
[1:54:14] be occupied. Everything that you see in white within the building will be occupied, and then you'll see in the next coming slides,
[1:54:18] things that are in green are going to be occupied. I'm trying to keep it consistent
[1:54:24] for all the phasing. So after...
[1:54:31] I've got it. Sorry, skipped a slide. So just to zoom in
[1:54:36] on the portables, I really wanted to highlight some of our safety measures regarding the portables.
[1:54:41] so the entire area that you see in yellow, and it's pretty small, but the whole area in yellow is going
[1:54:46] to be completely secure. There will be covered walkways from the main campus to the portables
[1:54:51] with the exception of fire lane. And it's very small, but anytime you leave the main
[1:54:55] campus, you will be under a covered walkway with the exception of the fire lane.
[1:55:00] all of the secured gates with panic hardware, there'll be panic hardware throughout. So if there was any
[1:55:04] emergency, students can exit and leave out of those gates
[1:55:08] with the panic hardware. It's those push bars that you see on doors. There'll be sensing,
[1:55:13] like I said, all around the portables, which you can see that's outlined in that yellow area secured.
[1:55:19] all classrooms have controllable air conditioning and heating. All classrooms have emergency
[1:55:24] phones, full fire alarms, security cameras, interior corridors.
[1:55:28] and the exterior walkways, as well as the public address system that's tied into them.
[1:55:33] then another point is the restrooms are provided in the portables. And these portables are a
[1:55:38] little different than what you normally see as a typical portable. So these portables are
[1:55:43] actually a building that has a hallway and then classrooms. So the classroom doors aren't
[1:55:47] on the very exterior of the building. You're actually going into a building, there's a
[1:55:52] hallway, and then you go into your classroom. So that's one of the key differences
[1:55:56] on these portables for apollo, and I'll talk about portables at north that are different.
[1:56:01] so that's one key difference. And then another factor that I want to talk about just very briefly is why so many
[1:56:05] portables. So the way we work with the contractor is we had a lot of limitations
[1:56:10] on the existing structure of the building. These buildings were built
[1:56:15] in the 70s and 60s and 70s. So the code back in the 60s and 70s were very different
[1:56:19] than what we need today. So after working with the city and some pretty strict
[1:56:24] code interpretations that we had, they didn't allow us to occupy lots of chunks of the building that we
[1:56:29] wanted to have. But we had a lot of limiting.
[1:56:34] we could only go 20 feet. It was very unrealistic in some of these spaces.
[1:56:38] so that's what, with the available land that apollo had, we were able to say, how about we just do
[1:56:43] two large phases, move a lot of the students out into the portables, and able
[1:56:47] to turn over some of these spaces a lot quicker. So that was one
[1:56:52] of the main whys on why we had so many on the site and then so after we just had summer so this
[1:57:00] now is a snapshot of okay what is august of 20
[1:57:08] so phase one the 2026-2027 school year again, you can see the blue fencing is still
[1:57:12] intact. Everything in green and everything in white is going
[1:57:17] to be completely occupiable, so students will be in those spaces.
[1:57:21] so on the outside, the new south fire lane and the east parking lot and drive is
[1:57:26] complete, but it's only used for emergency. The portables and the covered
[1:57:31] walkways, those are complete. Inside the building, the temporary admin suite is
[1:57:35] complete. What that shows is a red dash.
[1:57:40] as you can see, everything in red is currently under construction, which included the new administration area.
[1:57:44] we needed to put... A temporary admin somewhere we did this very similar to you so the area that's dashed
[1:57:48] in red is where the temporary admin will go and then again renovation of the existing is still ongoing and the new
[1:57:52] academic wing which is on the north side of the building that's ongoing so that would be the whole first
[1:58:00] 2026-2027 looking into phase two again two big phases so
[1:58:04] the majority of that that building was taken over. Going
[1:58:08] into the second school year in summer of starting june
[1:58:14] of 2027 and july of 2027, on the outside
[1:58:19] of the building, they're finishing that north fire lane on the north. Again, it's used for starting
[1:58:25] the detention corner over there. We have a reduction
[1:58:29] in portables. That second summer, we're reducing the portables in half.
[1:58:35] there's less portables out there. We're starting a covered walkway for the new academic.
[1:58:40] I'll show you that in the next slide. And then inside, the existing renovation is still ongoing
[1:58:44] and the new academic. So the next slide is august
[1:58:49] of 2027. So this phase is showing the
[1:58:55] fall semester of 27. So on the outside now, the fire lane is still complete and the south is complete.
[1:59:00] but again, it's only used for emergency. The reduced portables is
[1:59:06] complete. So if you can see in the bottom.
[1:59:10] with the green portables those have been reduced now but they're still occupied the detention pond is ongoing and if you can see in that
[1:59:15] light blue there is a covered walkway so that new academic wing is complete
[1:59:21] on the north everything in green it's complete and so we need to connect that new
[1:59:26] academic wing to the new cafeteria so that will be a
[1:59:30] covered walkway that has fencing all around we've done this
[1:59:35] before we've done it on pierce new completed wings
[1:59:42] like I said the new academic wing and storm shelter is also complete um the renovate portion of level two is also
[1:59:47] complete I want to bring up level two because I'm not showing it in the diagram the
[1:59:51] new cafeteria and stage is complete which is on the south end the southeast corner um this is a very
[1:59:57] small image but it's a big green box in the bottom the demolition
[2:00:01] of the existing cafeteria is ongoing and then renovation of the the existing, ongoing, and the new competition.
[2:00:06] again, this is a snapshot of what august, the fall
[2:00:12] 2020 semester was. Going into spring of 2028,
[2:00:16] you can now see that a big chunk of the building now is all green.
[2:00:22] on the exterior, the detention pond is complete. There's another reduction
[2:00:26] of portable classrooms, so only one is remaining for athletics.
[2:00:31] in the interior, the new main entrance, the media center, the new administration.
[2:00:36] new cte classrooms art classrooms and all the second floor at drive on the northeast as well that's now
[2:00:41] complete too um so the you can see the construction center has moved now so now
[2:00:45] they're utilizing the new drop-off and the new pickup and the new admin the cafeteria courtyard and
[2:00:51] interior courtyards are complete and then the renovation of the existing
[2:00:55] practice gym the new competition area addition and the fine arts wing that is
[2:01:00] all under construction in the red and this is a snapshot of what spring of 2028 looks
[2:01:07] like so by spring of 2028 probably 80 of the building
[2:01:12] is now so then going into summer of 2028 the track
[2:01:19] and field is gonna will be starting construction and the fine arts and new locker room
[2:01:24] renovation and new competition gym will be getting underway.
[2:01:30] and finally... August of 2028, all
[2:01:35] of it's green. It's all completed. The track and field will be completed at the end of
[2:01:39] august. The only remaining items left for that august would be punch list items, and the
[2:01:44] building is the same. Then going on to north middle school, again,
[2:01:49] snapshot of what the end goal is.
[2:01:55] so for apollo and north,
[2:02:01] there was two different...
[2:02:05] for phasing the apollo you had two big chunks two big
[2:02:11] moves to get the project completed there was available land at north, we didn't have a ton of land, but a bunch
[2:02:16] of portals. We have some,
[2:02:20] and I'll show you that in a minute. But the mindset with north was we take it all in little chunks.
[2:02:25] so as you can see on the construction page here, there's multiple phases in little chunks where students or staff will be kind
[2:02:30] of turning over once new parts of the building.
[2:02:34] so from may to july is phase 1a. From august to december, it's phase 1b.
[2:02:39] january to may of 27 is phase 1c. And then so on and so forth. And each of those correspond
[2:02:44] with the semester. So again, a different school
[2:02:49] of thought because of the site-specific conditions. Apollo, two big chunks
[2:02:54] to get the project done. On north, smaller chunks throughout the whole thing.
[2:03:00] so going into, again, same kind of graphics where
[2:03:05] blue is the construction fencing, red is kind of off-limits, white is occupied,
[2:03:10] and then green will be... So looking at phase 1a, which is summer
[2:03:14] of this year, june and july of 2026, the construction, fencing and mobilization will
[2:03:19] start, site utilities will start, the portables and covered walkway will also
[2:03:23] start, and that's the box in the bottom right corner, and then site paving
[2:03:28] demolition. And then on the inside, they
[2:03:33] will be demolishing the northwest corner of the building.
[2:03:39] looking at portables again, again, same safety measures that we have for apollo,
[2:03:44] but there's a couple of different nuances. So the entire area in yellow is going
[2:03:48] to be secured. There's covered walkways from the main campus portables, again, with the exception
[2:03:53] of the fire lane. There's secured gates with panic hardware throughout. All classrooms and exterior
[2:03:58] doors are walkable. The fencing around the portables is feet-foot tall.
[2:04:02] all classrooms have controllable air conditioning. And again, all classrooms
[2:04:07] within those portables. They have emergency phones, full fire alarms, security cameras, as well as public
[2:04:12] address that's tied into the main campus. And then the difference on north is that the restrooms
[2:04:17] are accessed in the main campus, and we did at forest meadow
[2:04:22] where students have a bathroom pass.
[2:04:30] so looking at fall of 2026, this is a snapshot of what fall of 2026 looks
[2:04:35] like. So that north parking lot is closed. The new fine arts and
[2:04:39] athletic addition started, so that big red box at the northeast corner.
[2:04:44] and then portables and the covered walkway, those are complete.
[2:04:49] again, all of the white is going to be occupied during the fall of 2026.
[2:04:55] on the inside, the renovation of the classroom south of the courtyard, level one and two,
[2:04:59] those are started. So they'll be renovating those.
[2:05:05] and then again, just wanted to put out the bus loop is also still open.
[2:05:14] the traffic on this one, the bus loop is still open. Looking
[2:05:18] into the next semester, so phase 1c is spring of 27. So in spring of 27, that fine arts and athletic
[2:05:23] edition is still ongoing at that northeast corner. The north parking lot and parent drop-off, that's now
[2:05:27] opened. Again, going back, during the fall it was closed. They're working on it,
[2:05:32] so now it's open spring of 27. On the inside of the building, they've now
[2:05:36] finished those south classrooms, and they've moved on
[2:05:40] to the north classrooms north of the courtyard. So the strategy here is you basically flip around the courtyard every semester.
[2:05:46] one area gets completed, they flip to the next area to start renovation. And this applies to both
[2:05:51] level one and level two. So looking into summer of
[2:05:55] 2027, so that south parking lot is started.
[2:06:00] the portion of the east fire lane is complete and used for emergency only.
[2:06:05] the remaining portion of the east fire lane is started.
[2:06:10] the athletics and fine arts wing is still ongoing. And on the inside,
[2:06:14] the middle of the building is going to be completely demolished on the north side
[2:06:20] during that summer of 27. The temporary administration area renovation is started as well.
[2:06:24] this is very similar to apollo where we're working on the administration area, so we need a temporary one.
[2:06:28] and again, we've done this before at forest meadow. And then a covered walkway
[2:06:33] connecting the main campus. So fall of 2027.
[2:06:38] so fall of 2027, you see a lot more green.
[2:06:43] the new athletic and fine arts additions at north and south parking lot are
[2:06:48] complete now. That east fire lane is complete, but again,
[2:06:53] it's only for emergencies. Existing bus loops still
[2:06:59] remain on the inside. Those renovated classrooms west of the courtyard have started, so now we've taken
[2:07:04] over the west side of the courtyard. The new administration wing cafeteria and library have
[2:07:08] started as well, which is the... Big red block
[2:07:12] in the center. That's the new admin that's started.
[2:07:17] the new athletics and fine arts addition is complete. So the big box
[2:07:21] in the right, that is complete. Temporary admin area is shown
[2:07:25] in the red dashed on the south building. And then there's a covered walkway connecting the staff
[2:07:31] parking lot to the main campus and a covered walkway connecting the main campus to the new athletic and fine
[2:07:36] arts.
[2:07:43] that's shown in blue. So looking at spring of 27, so the next semester, all the
[2:07:48] portables have been removed. The track and field renovations have started. The covered walkway now from
[2:07:53] the north staff parking lot to the main campus is complete.
[2:07:57] renovation of the bus loop has started. And then the tennis courts have started.
[2:08:02] and then inside, the renovation of the classrooms west of the courtyard are complete now.
[2:08:06] now we're flipping over to the east side where the new sped classrooms and new
[2:08:10] classroom renovations on the east courtyard have started. And then the new administration wing and
[2:08:15] cafeteria and library and then finally that summer of
[2:08:22] 28 is the track and field renovation is still ongoing the covered walkways have
[2:08:27] been removed renovation of the bus loop is complete the tennis courts are ongoing the
[2:08:31] new sped classrooms and classroom renovations courtyard are complete and
[2:08:35] then the new administration wing that includes the cafeteria library in the
[2:08:40] courtyard are ongoing or finishing up that summer august of 28 the track and
[2:08:46] field and tennis courts are complete all the remaining items left are punchless in
[2:08:52] the building now that was a
[2:08:57] lot to digest and we've been working on these plans for over a year and I tried to condense it as much as
[2:09:01] possible but some key takeaways from this project or from this presentation is you know
[2:09:06] each project requires phase construction to ensure the campus remains operational
[2:09:10] students and staff safety in a priority with affordable and then the projects aligned to rsd's middle school
[2:09:16] transformation in which modernization is complete grade students to attend
[2:09:22] middle school beginning fall of 2028 as tabitha mentioned
[2:09:27] bond 2025 website is where we will keep everyone up to date on I also want to add
[2:09:32] that again this team is absolutely amazing all of our
[2:09:37] partners whether it's our construction crew or architects, they have just
[2:09:42] been amazing. I also want to speak
[2:09:47] for a minute from a mom's perspective. So karis, when she was
[2:09:51] graduating from pierce, her freshman year, she got hit with covid.
[2:09:56] and then her sophomore, junior and senior year were all construction.
[2:10:01] so when I think about, we recognize that there's disruption, even though they put all
[2:10:06] of these measures in place to make sure that students can stay focused on learning
[2:10:10] teachers can stay focused on teaching. We know that there are still going to be some experiences
[2:10:15] that is very different for this group of students as we go through construction.
[2:10:20] my own son, when he transitions, we will be under construction when he goes
[2:10:25] to middle school. Kirsten was like, mom, you couldn't at least sacrifice
[2:10:29] one. I'm like, no, I treat you equally. You both are going
[2:10:35] to have construction. So when we're in the meetings,
[2:10:40] I do bring that mom lens. It's like as a mom, what how would I want to make sure that we are looking
[2:10:44] at safety? How are we communicating to parents so that they have a heads up and they can prepare the students?
[2:10:48] how do we make sure that we message this to students so that they are aware of what the changes look like and that they feel secure as
[2:10:53] well in their new learning environment? So again, we recognize that for our junior high students, they're there
[2:10:58] for two years. And when they're there for two years, both years,
[2:11:03] they're going to be under construction. And sometimes...
[2:11:07] like I would tell karis, sometimes we make a little bit of a personal sacrifice
[2:11:11] because the outcome is going to benefit graduating classes that leave pierce high
[2:11:17] school for the next 50 years. And guess what? You still had an amazing high
[2:11:21] school experience and you don't even think about the construction anymore.
[2:11:26] but I would be remiss if we didn't acknowledge that we do recognize that what parents think about when they send
[2:11:31] their kids to that next place is not necessarily construction.
[2:11:35] but we do believe in the end the outcome will be worth it. So again, thank you team and
[2:11:41] we are happy to take any questions.
[2:11:45] all right. There's a lot there.
[2:11:51] let's open it up. Questions, comments on any of these?
[2:11:56] do any of the board members have? Okay. We'll start with rachel and
[2:12:01] then we'll go to ms. Pacheco. Thank you for the presentation.
[2:12:05] it's gorgeous, the outcomes. I think we're going to have to go back to the presentation. It's just about security.
[2:12:10] and as a mom, I think about portables and my kids being in portables. And you said, I know there's
[2:12:15] an eight-foot wall that's around the portables, but that area is secured. How secure,
[2:12:19] like truly secure, are those portables for an active shooter?
[2:12:29] well, the use of portables is pretty standard. We know from previous projects that we've done here
[2:12:33] in the district, and, of course, we know from other districts, that they're a necessary part
[2:12:38] of doing phasing as complicated as this. So when you ask about... How secure are they?
[2:12:43] so the standard starts with an eight-foot non-scalable fence with all the panic hardware
[2:12:47] in case there's an emergency where kids had to exit that area.
[2:12:52] and so that's the starting point. The portables at apollo
[2:12:56] versus the portables at north, and correct me if I'm wrong, lee, they're a little
[2:13:01] bit different in the fact that they have an interior corridor.
[2:13:06] so the classroom doors at the apollo portables don't face the exterior, don't face the outside.
[2:13:11] so there's another layer of added safety there with that additional door to enter that hallway to get
[2:13:16] to your portable classroom. Does that kind of speak to what you're asking?
[2:13:21] yeah. Additionally, it's important to note our sros.
[2:13:27] so we will be collaborating with either rpd or dpd and with those sros.
[2:13:31] this may change, for example, what their walking pattern looks like,
[2:13:36] especially at apollo when you have such a concentration. Where they're spending the majority of their time,
[2:13:41] where we locate their office, is going to be close to those portables so that, again, we have that proximity
[2:13:46] as well. It really is similar. Our students are outside
[2:13:51] practicing football and soccer, so it's under that same kind of experience.
[2:13:56] but safety is by far, and this is, again, why we wanted
[2:14:01] to bring it forward, all the steps that we've taken, security cameras, all of those things.
[2:14:06] to make sure our parents know that that is a priority for us. Yep, ms. Branham,
[2:14:10] along the same lines, thank you for bringing up the security cameras. We'll have all the same
[2:14:15] functionality that we do in the brick-and-mortar building as it exists right now, including the new phones that
[2:14:20] we updated this school year. If you remember, if the board will recall, we went through a dva,
[2:14:25] a district vulnerability assessment, and so one of the key components was that each classroom is enabled with a
[2:14:30] 911 panic, if you will, button. In case of emergency.
[2:14:34] our staff also has, through informacast, the ability to enter into any of the srp protocols,
[2:14:40] those kind of things. So all the functionality that we have in the regular building, the
[2:14:45] portable classrooms will have that as well. Ms.
[2:14:51] pacheco. Okay, great. Thank you so much for your
[2:14:56] presentation. I thought I followed it really well.
[2:15:00] I appreciate you breaking it down into the faces. And showing us the different
[2:15:04] things that both schools are going to have. I wish we didn't have
[2:15:09] to do this like the way we're doing it, but it's necessary because it is important, right, to align our students in
[2:15:14] their learning and better outcomes and to really move those sixth graders into the middle school.
[2:15:20] so I appreciate all the hard effort, our community, for ensuring that we are able to do this for the remaining
[2:15:24] schools that we have. And, you know, just... Ask our families, you know,
[2:15:30] be patient. You know, it's going to be a little bit hard,
[2:15:34] but we have a plan. We're going to keep our kids safe.
[2:15:38] they're going to still be able to stay motivated, active, and engaged in school and
[2:15:43] learning and activities. I'm sorry.
[2:15:47] and, you know, it's just going to be great. I think it's going to be really nice.
[2:15:52] it's beautiful. I truly believe our kids are just going to come in there.
[2:15:56] and be wowed by it. I just, I'm wowed and I'm looking at renderings.
[2:16:01] I can't imagine learning in classrooms that look like that and going into a school that look like that.
[2:16:06] so I appreciate it and all the hard work. So thank you. Ms.
[2:16:11] pacheco, if I could, you actually hit on a point that we want to make sure that we share with the board in that the
[2:16:15] board will continue to get periodic updates on the various, six various
[2:16:20] projects that are going on.
[2:16:24] of course, we talked a little bit about phasing, and so you can imagine that we might come back at different points
[2:16:29] during the two-year process to update you on those. As part of the comprehensive communications plan
[2:16:33] with strategy engagement, we're working hand-in-hand. We will also meet
[2:16:38] with parents and community, kind of in alignment with the phasing process. We've already begun to meet
[2:16:45] with campus staffs because they're the ones that are going
[2:16:49] to be immediately impacted. Apollo, for instance, has the fencing up already.
[2:16:54] and so those types of meeting and communication will happen throughout the course of the two years because we want to
[2:16:58] be as thorough and transparent and offer everyone the chance to ask questions so they understand
[2:17:04] the why behind it, not just the you guys decided to do this kind of thing. In addition, our junior high
[2:17:08] principals will be adding a construction connection message to each of their newsletters, so they
[2:17:14] will be providing weekly updates to parents, letting them know how the construction is progressing. They're going to also be
[2:17:19] sharing those updates with elementary feeders, so that elementary students who, again, if I'm a parent
[2:17:24] of a fifth or sixth grader, I know my kiddo is going to be going up to that. I'm being kept apprised
[2:17:29] along the way as well, so I know what to prepare when my kiddo is ready
[2:17:33] for that transition. Great.
[2:17:42] other comments? Only one I've got in question is engagement
[2:17:47] with the neighborhoods. So traffic flow, construction, traffic,
[2:17:51] all that kind of stuff. How is that being handled, communicating with all of the surrounding neighborhoods?
[2:17:57] because it's pretty tight. Yeah, actually, we met last week, and we were looking specifically, for example,
[2:18:01] at north. Parking at north is going to be really rough for a year.
[2:18:06] and it already is hard, and then this is going to exacerbate that. So when they have big events,
[2:18:10] meet the teacher, all of those things. And so some of the things that we talked
[2:18:16] about were making sure that there are, maybe that we put a mailer in the mailbox to let them
[2:18:21] know open house is coming, or we're meeting with the homeowners association so
[2:18:26] we're communicating, hey, here are the five big events. On these nights you might see
[2:18:31] extra parking in the neighborhood. We want to make sure that we are good neighbors, good
[2:18:37] friends, and that they know, again, this is for a short period of time.
[2:18:41] yeah, and to that point, I'm sorry, lee, to that point, I really want to commend both principals,
[2:18:45] ms. Gaither and mr. Lopez. Mr.
[2:18:50] lopez particularly is coming over from pierce who lived through the project there. And so he's got a keen sense
[2:18:54] of what's about to happen because he's lived it. And he was very, very clear when we met
[2:18:59] with he and his team last week about the parent messaging.
[2:19:03] the top of his list is if we tell them ahead of time, they'll still kind
[2:19:07] of have feelings about how critical mass it's going to be for a little while,
[2:19:11] but they'll figure it out because they know the end game is worth it.
[2:19:15] and so both principals really deserve a lot of accolades for their communication.
[2:19:20] we've also worked with the city jurisdictions, the city of dallas and city of richardson. We've hired consultants to do
[2:19:24] traffic management plans and traffic analysis for us, and this has all been approved
[2:19:29] by the city already as well. We've worked with the city on communication with the neighbors. We've had community meetings
[2:19:34] where they specifically talked about city or talked about traffic management. So we've gone
[2:19:38] through all those avenues on all six projects. Excellent.
[2:19:44] all right. Great presentation. Thank you, ms. Estes.
[2:19:49] thank you, mr. Hossow. Mr.
[2:19:54] watson, thanks for being here. Support. And we are going to move on
[2:19:58] to our next item. Last item, our final item on the agenda is an information item to receive a
[2:20:02] presentation regarding the 2026-2027 compensation and
[2:20:09] budget update. Ms. Brannon. Yes, thank you, trustee poteet.
[2:20:13] yes, we started this journey in january, and we are headed to the end of april, and we are still phase-by-phase
[2:20:17] moving along, trying to provide the critical information that you need,
[2:20:22] board, to make decisions. First and foremost related to compensation and then overall
[2:20:26] the direction you would like for us to take in our final adopted budget
[2:20:30] in june. So tonight the presentation is going to be shared by
[2:20:34] mr. Pate and dr. Goodson, so I'm going to turn it over to them.
[2:20:40] thank you, ms. Branham. Trustees, you know, we've talked about the north star goal, you know,
[2:20:45] the budget's 90 percent compensation and it is, its entire focus is
[2:20:50] on providing the resources. To achieve the district's north star goal as ms brown
[2:20:57] said we'll go over the general fund budget I'll turn it over to dr goodson to discuss compensation options
[2:21:02] and then we will look at some a couple of revenue increase options and then
[2:21:07] pull it all together with next steps and we'll be glad
[2:21:12] to address your questions this evening starting
[2:21:17] with the 2627 general fund budget I just want to ago. Kind of start
[2:21:22] at the beginning of the budget with enrollment. Our budget is really now with
[2:21:26] the way past legislations have gone, legislative sessions have gone, it is really all
[2:21:31] about enrollment. That is what drives our funding.
[2:21:36] and you can see going back to 2014, we were at 38,283 students.
[2:21:40] we hit our peak in the 2019-2020 school year.
[2:21:50] with 39,619 students and for this year,
[2:21:56] and I should have mentioned, all the blue columns are our actual enrollment and the red
[2:22:01] columns are the demographer projections. So here we are,
[2:22:06] the last blue column there at 25-26 school year, and these are all pems enrollment
[2:22:11] dates in blue, the last friday in october. And we were at 36,228. Our demographer is predicting
[2:22:17] 35,704 students for 2027, with a decline down to 34,207 students
[2:22:21] in the 2030-31 school year,
[2:22:28] which is an average of
[2:22:34] about 400 students a year decrease through 2031.
[2:22:39] and just a reminder from when mr. Huff presented
[2:22:44] the demographic study these projections do not have any
[2:22:48] estimated impact of the education savings accounts or waivers I mean or vouchers
[2:22:56] excuse me factored in so we don't know what those are going to do we know people
[2:23:01] just received information about whether or not they received a voucher that they applied for but we have not
[2:23:06] we do not have the data to factor that into these calculations at this point so michael
[2:23:11] freeman prepares this report for us.
[2:23:18] and it is enrollment for each week on mondays.
[2:23:23] and so he sends that out. The gray and the blue lines
[2:23:28] are the prior two years.
[2:23:33] the orange line is the
[2:23:37] current year. And as of the 23rd monday of the school year, we were
[2:23:42] at 35,585 students. And that is 119 students
[2:23:48] below our demographer projection for next year.
[2:23:54] and you'll also notice that while we always have some enrollment declines
[2:23:59] in the spring, we hit a peak in the fall, and then it declines a little bit
[2:24:03] into the spring, that our decline we're experiencing this year is a higher rate of
[2:24:08] decline than we've experienced in previous years.
[2:24:15] just a comment on that. We've dug in specifically to look
[2:24:20] at the students and just like we reported to you in the fall when we gave you an
[2:24:24] enrollment update, we lost almost another 600 students specifically
[2:24:29] in our hispanic population.
[2:24:33] so again, it is the enrollment loss is specific to a demographic.
[2:24:37] of that, the majority of those students are also economically disadvantaged.
[2:24:43] so we're specifically seeing it in a specific area based upon lots of different
[2:24:47] factors that we know exist right now.
[2:24:56] so again, this is just complicating the data for next year.
[2:25:00] I have shared this slide with mr. Huff last week, and he is
[2:25:06] taking a look at things. But again, it's not necessarily
[2:25:10] at this point enough data to modify. The demographer projections
[2:25:16] for next year. So, we have, this is just a reminder, I will not go through this in detail, but
[2:25:22] this is the expenditure increases that we brought forward in the march meeting.
[2:25:27] there's been no change to these expenditure increase requests.
[2:25:34] if I can also just add, there's been some confusion through a little, a few let's
[2:25:39] talks that I've received. The board has not made a decision on if you are going
[2:25:43] to move forward with advertising and marketing or if you're going to improve any of these
[2:25:48] expenditure increases. We just bring these forward as a reminder that these are the things that are
[2:25:54] on the table and need to be under consideration as we adopt a final budget.
[2:25:59] but there has no decision been made that we are going to invest that $500,000 in this marketing.
[2:26:04] it's an option available to the board as well as there are options that are cheaper.
[2:26:09] that we can be very specific
[2:26:14] and some some actions that the board would want to take, but no decision has been made on that.
[2:26:19] thank you, ms. Brandon. And yes, so you will see this 1m dollars in the multi year financial forecast just because effectively this is
[2:26:24] a, as mr. I said, it's a worst case scenario.
[2:26:29] okay.
[2:26:35] and here are the 25m dollars in. Budget efficiencies that were
[2:26:41] brought forward in the previous meeting. We went through the high
[2:26:45] school and middle school schedule changes in great detail
[2:26:49] in a previous presentation. And so this, again, this number has not changed.
[2:26:54] it is still the $25.7 million presented previously. And so pulling this all
[2:26:58] together into the multi-year forecast,
[2:27:03] I just want to kind of give you the foundation of what the assumptions are
[2:27:08] based on. So we have taxable property value growth.
[2:27:13] we ended up with a decline or expected decline this year of 1.22%. That is a smaller
[2:27:22] decline in taxable value growth than we were
[2:27:28] predicting back in the summer when we received our certified values. And I'll just remind you,
[2:27:33] we had the... One of the largest dollar amounts of value under protest that we've had
[2:27:37] in recent years. And so we did recover more of that than we were expecting. So we are better off
[2:27:43] on the property value there. We just received last week our certified estimated
[2:27:47] property values from dcad.
[2:27:52] so right now we're holding taxable value growth
[2:27:59] for next year at 0%.
[2:28:06] we will start in may. We'll start getting almost weekly updates from dcad on what our values are doing.
[2:28:12] so we'll just continue to monitor that. For 27, 28, and 28, 29, I'm
[2:28:18] just using a 1% value growth, being very conservative at this point.
[2:28:23] because when we have had declines in the past, some of those we have seen up
[2:28:27] to a three to four year of downward trend in values before it starts going back
[2:28:33] up. And it does not always go
[2:28:37] back up quickly. So we're using the conservative one and two
[2:28:42] percent. And again, our revenue in the general fund is primarily
[2:28:47] driven by the number of students.
[2:28:51] so higher value, less students, more recapture. So we don't really benefit
[2:28:56] from value growth on the general fund side. We do on the debt service fund side, but not
[2:29:00] on the general fund side. And then our enrollment growth is just our actual pems for this year and,
[2:29:06] of course, what our demographer provided for the future years.
[2:29:11] and then, again, with the current state of the economy and fluctuations,
[2:29:16] we're using a 5% inflation factor.
[2:29:21] on the non-payroll portion of the budget,
[2:29:26] that would include fuel, utilities, insurance, which all areas that we've seen
[2:29:30] some pretty substantial increases in, even though inflation is not currently
[2:29:34] running at 5% overall, went ahead and did a 5% inflation factor there.
[2:29:41] so looking at our multi-year,
[2:29:46] I'm going to start you there with the 25-26. Estimate for how we're going
[2:29:52] to end the year, we're looking at a $25 million deficit, almost $26
[2:29:57] million deficit. One thing I'll point out as we look at going
[2:30:02] from 25-26 to 26-27, you'll see that's about a
[2:30:06] $17 million decline in revenue.
[2:30:15] well, there's about $6.8 million in 25-26 that is one-time revenue.
[2:30:20] from the state related to property value audits that are, purdue brandon does
[2:30:28] those for us. They evaluate them every year.
[2:30:34] and so we can protest, just like our taxpayers can protest their values with dcad,
[2:30:40] we can protest property values with the comptroller's office that are used in the state funding formula.
[2:30:44] and so purdue brandon, you get, I think, two.
[2:30:50] opportunities to protest your value in a certain time period and
[2:30:55] purdue monitors that for us regularly and protests when it is advantageous to us.
[2:31:01] so we received $6.8 million for prior years in the current year.
[2:31:06] so that is part of why that drop looks so large going from $25.26 to $26.27
[2:31:11] compared to the other declines in
[2:31:16] revenue. Which are really just related to the declines in enrollment.
[2:31:22] you can see our recapture cost, relatively stable,
[2:31:28] five and a half, roughly to six and a half million
[2:31:33] dollars. Our recurring expenditures, and as you'll remember for
[2:31:37] 2526, we're using the proceeds from the sale
[2:31:43] of the sherman property to... Reduce the level of deficit we have. As I said, a $25.8 million
[2:31:51] deficit estimated for the current year. Our ending fund balance
[2:31:55] with that deficit would be $140 million. And our target for fund balance,
[2:32:01] and that is total fund balance, and so our targeted fund balance is $110 million,
[2:32:08] and that is 25% of expenditures.
[2:32:13] and then just carrying that across there, you can see.
[2:32:19] so as we get into 26-27, you'll see the budget increases we discussed
[2:32:26] of a million, the budget reductions of 25.7, total expenditures of 419.
[2:32:30] you'll notice in those total expenditures, no raise is listed on there for any year because dr.
[2:32:35] goodson will go over the raise options with you.
[2:32:40] but just at this point, even without giving a raise, we're expecting a $21 million
[2:32:44] deficit, and that deficit will continue to grow because none of those years have a raise.
[2:32:51] and you can see there in 27-28. The targeted fund balance
[2:32:57] would be $105 million, and our estimated ending fund balance is $90 million.
[2:33:02] so we're about $15 million under our target,
[2:33:07] and that also just continues to grow in future years. Two important points.
[2:33:12] we have the permanent school fund, just as a reminder to the community and the board, and we're going
[2:33:17] to talk a little bit more about that as a compensation option. And then secondly, when you
[2:33:21] say that that deficit moves forward, that's also to say if we don't do anything else to intervene
[2:33:26] to reduce our expenditures. Correct. And the other thing, and
[2:33:30] at this point, I'm not inclined to bet
[2:33:35] on this option, but just remember, in the spring
[2:33:40] of every odd-numbered year, we do have a legislative
[2:33:44] session. So this forecast is built
[2:33:48] on current law, but there's not been a substantial increase in the basic allotment
[2:33:55] in a very long time now for us. So, you know, the only option
[2:33:59] I have is to do this on current law. And again, we have options
[2:34:04] to continue to work on this. And I'll prove, as ms.
[2:34:08] branham said, we'll talk a little bit more about the local permanent
[2:34:12] school fund in a minute, and we'll talk about a couple of revenue enhancement
[2:34:17] options in a minute. But I just want to make sure I'm laying an appropriate
[2:34:22] foundation here and not glossing over anything for you.
[2:34:28] and with that, I will turn this over to dr. Goodson. Maybe click and talk. Okay.
[2:34:35] thank you, mr. Pate. Good evening, board. We just want to bring back
[2:34:39] to the table some options in terms of possible compensation packages for 26-27.
[2:34:44] we shared several options with you in our march meeting. And then based on some of the
[2:34:48] feedback that you provided, we came back and have kind of fleshed out a few of the options,
[2:34:53] tweaked them a little bit. And so, again, we always want to show you there are lots
[2:34:57] of possibilities in terms of the way that you look at a pay increase
[2:35:02] for the next school year. And see,
[2:35:06] that's why I don't get. Thank you. Ok. So just as a reminder,
[2:35:11] if you were to provide a percentage increase to all employees.
[2:35:16] the approximate cost of a 1% pay increase will be $3.6 million, 2% will be
[2:35:20] $7.2, and then 3% will be $10.8. And as noted here, david
[2:35:24] wants to be sure we remind everyone, these raised
[2:35:29] calculations are general fund only and with employer
[2:35:34] benefits excluding health insurance contributions. So last time we gave you option a, b, and c.
[2:35:39] tonight, we're going to show you a little bit of a different take with option a and then a1 and then
[2:35:44] option b. So for option a, similar to what we shared
[2:35:48] in our last meeting, this would be a pay increase for all teacher types before we've delineated with
[2:35:54] classroom teachers and then a separate increase for non-087 teachers.
[2:36:02] for this particular model, we are bringing the group back together, so to speak.
[2:36:07] so t-types in this setting are all teachers, librarians, counselors, and nurses. Anyone completing one to 10
[2:36:14] years, they would see a $1,000 increase.
[2:36:19] for anyone completing 11 years and up, they would receive a $2,000 increase.
[2:36:23] and so the bullets underneath there show you that for next school year, a teacher who's completed five
[2:36:28] years will be making $66,000. With the $1,000 increase
[2:36:32] for 10 years, it would be $71,000 and so on. So you can see this is what
[2:36:37] that individual would be making for their...
[2:36:42] new salary for 26-27. The cost for that is approximately $5.6 million.
[2:36:47] that's a little bit higher than what we shared with you last time because in our last option a, it was just classroom
[2:36:52] teachers, and then we grouped the others in a different group.
[2:36:56] so that's why that has gone up just a little bit. And then on the right, that still means that
[2:37:00] for a new year, a new teacher starting in 26-27, we would recommend that the zero-year salary
[2:37:05] will be $63,500. That would be $5,000 below what a one-year teacher would
[2:37:11] be making. So again, new teacher this
[2:37:17] year is $63,000. If they got a $1,000 increase, it will be
[2:37:22] $64,000. So then that means a new teacher coming
[2:37:26] in will be making $63,500. And then to make sure that we're staying compliant with the legislation,
[2:37:32] an uncertified teacher coming in at zero years experience will be making $63,000, which
[2:37:36] is where we are starting now. Dr. Goodson, just to clarify,
[2:37:40] when you mentioned the separation between teachers and then counselors, nurses,
[2:37:45] and librarians, that was not a delineation that richardson isd identified. That came
[2:37:50] from the state as a result of the last legislation. Thank you for the clarification.
[2:37:55] yes, that difference, that separation on the teacher scales of the pay scales and the pay
[2:38:00] increases were the result of the state legislation. Yes, ma'am.
[2:38:05] what we've done to target the other groups down below there is that all the other employees,
[2:38:09] if we're talking about central campus staff, administrators, and others,
[2:38:13] that will be a 2% pay increase. That's a proposal here.
[2:38:18] we would also propose a 3% pay increase for all paraprofessional and auxiliary staff, and that
[2:38:23] would be approximately $2.7 million.
[2:38:28] so option a1 is a different approach to the pay increase, and for this scenario,
[2:38:33] we are looking at you a $1,000 increase for one to 10 year employees and a $2,000 increase for 11 plus
[2:38:39] years employees. And that would be all employees and it would be
[2:38:44] provided in the form of a retention stipend. So I have to apologize
[2:38:50] because when you see the bullets under option a1 there,
[2:38:54] the sub bullets, it says 2627 salary. But that's my apologies that that basically is the 2627
[2:39:00] take home for the teachers and the employees. I'm sorry. The base salaries would not
[2:39:05] change because it's a one-time stipend. So our salaries would be
[2:39:09] at the same level, which is also why we have the cost as it is and the starting
[2:39:14] teacher salary. We are bringing this concept forward strictly from working
[2:39:19] towards managing our current deficit budget and trying
[2:39:24] to give another,
[2:39:29] for example, might this be the year. That since it's a stipend it
[2:39:34] would not be a recurring line item in the budget this might
[2:39:38] be the time that we tap into the permanent school fund use that to pay for this
[2:39:43] retention stipend so it gives us another year to find the additional 20
[2:39:48] million dollars and that we need to in savings to completely right size our
[2:39:54] budget um so again it's just an idea it's a concept um that would just again provide
[2:39:58] a little bit more capacity a little bit more time for us to find the reductions.
[2:40:03] again, this may not be something that the board has an appetite for.
[2:40:07] this may not continue to accomplish the objectives that you set up. But I felt
[2:40:12] like it would be remiss to at least not bring forward an option that doesn't increase
[2:40:16] our recurring budget moving forward.
[2:40:23] so for option b, it's similar to option a. In terms of the structure,
[2:40:27] but the difference here is that the dollar amount increased for one to 10 years
[2:40:32] instead of $1,000. We are showing what it would be if it was $1,500. Again,
[2:40:37] for all teacher types, teachers, librarians, counselors, and nurses, and then for 11 plus years,
[2:40:42] $3,000. And so that approximate cost would be $8.1 million.
[2:40:47] with the sub-bill is there, you can see what a five-year teacher would be making, $10, $15, $20, and 30.
[2:40:53] with this particular option, we would need to start our zero-year teaching salary
[2:40:58] for 26-27 at $64,000. So that still stays below
[2:41:04] what a new one-year experienced teacher would be making.
[2:41:09] and then again, with the uncertified, we would propose keeping that at $63,500 so that there's
[2:41:14] still a difference between uncertified and certified. And then the cost
[2:41:18] at the bottom for the other employees is the same at $2.7 million
[2:41:23] with them grouped. By 2% increase
[2:41:27] for central and others, and then 3% for paraprofessional and auxiliary.
[2:41:32] I leaned in a little close and it got louder, sorry. So this is just a comparison
[2:41:36] page for all three of these options. Again, not proposing one
[2:41:41] over the other, really just discussion points for us to consider and for you to consider today.
[2:41:46] and then the approximate cost on the far right hand side. And then again,
[2:41:50] across the bottom, if you were to give a flat one, two or 3% pay increase. Those are the dollar amounts
[2:41:55] associated with those as well. I also want to mention that the board may also have an
[2:41:59] option of doing kind of a combination. The board may decide we want to make sure that we're
[2:42:04] continuing to invest in the teacher's salary. So we might decide that you're going to go
[2:42:08] with one model and, again, add that potentially to our recurring costs.
[2:42:13] but, for example, for the central, it might be more of a
[2:42:18] retention stipend so that we're not building that in. Into our recurring costs so
[2:42:22] there even some flexibilities within what we've brought forward for the board to consider and provide us
[2:42:27] feedback moving back to the revenue recommendations you'll remember our community
[2:42:38] budget steering committee recommended a va tre and they recommended expanding explore
[2:42:45] enrollment so we're going
[2:42:51] to look at a couple of options related to that now, starting with
[2:42:56] explore. If you have detailed
[2:43:02] questions on this, I'm going to turn it over to dr. Laper, but I will do my best
[2:43:07] to cover this at this point. The proposal is
[2:43:11] to increase the, what I call the school day or school year
[2:43:15] explore rates by $5 a week for the afternoon community, free and reduced lunch,
[2:43:20] and then a $6 increase related to for our employees.
[2:43:35] and you can see the comparison. There in the middle are current explore rates with the proposed for 26-27
[2:43:40] and the rate increases on the far right. An increase of $10 a day for our holiday explore
[2:43:45] program and then summer explore, an increase of $25 a week.
[2:43:53] and all of this combined would generate about a $700,000 increase.
[2:43:58] and it would so part of this is also in the lower
[2:44:02] left corner is a raise for our explorer personnel
[2:44:07] from $16 to $18 an hour. And so that would help offset
[2:44:13] the cost of that increase
[2:44:18] in the explorer, I mean, for paying our explorer staff.
[2:44:27] and historically, our explorer program has made a contribution back
[2:44:31] to the general fund. It is not a cost center. It is a small profit center.
[2:44:35] and, you know, with wage inflation everywhere and the
[2:44:41] competition that we have for staff and our attempts to increase our enrollment
[2:44:50] in explore, we do need to pay our staff some more so that we can stay staffed up and
[2:44:54] attract the quality of staff that we need for our explore program.
[2:45:04] and then moving on to the vatre.
[2:45:08] you may remember that back in the fall of 2018, our
[2:45:12] voters approved a tre for all 13 cents available
[2:45:19] at the time. And then immediately
[2:45:24] in that spring of 2019, back in the 86th legislative session, the state passed, I do not remember the house
[2:45:30] bill number now, but it compressed our property tax rates. And so the state actually
[2:45:35] took away. 3.17 cents that our voters had given us.
[2:45:39] and so they made it so that
[2:45:43] we have to go back to the voters to get back the 3.17 cents
[2:45:48] that they had given us back in the fall of 2018. So what you have here, the
[2:45:53] top half is just property tax revenue, state revenue,
[2:45:57] and recapture. Without a vatre,
[2:46:01] and they changed the name from tre, tax ratification election, to voter approval
[2:46:05] tax ratification election. And so the top part is no vatre.
[2:46:10] the bottom is with the vatre. And really the important
[2:46:15] number for you is the blue row
[2:46:20] at the very bottom, and you can see the increase
[2:46:24] in revenue for a successful vatre.
[2:46:29] is about $7.7 million. It's all really in the property tax revenue side.
[2:46:35] we have an increase in property tax revenue, small to no change
[2:46:40] in state revenue, and then an increase in recapture.
[2:46:47] so we end up netting with all of those changes, again, about $7.7 million.
[2:46:52] a couple more comments
[2:46:57] on this in just a second. Just a little bit more information for you here.
[2:47:05] so this is our statewide peer districts and how many pennies they have left
[2:47:10] available to them if they wanted to call the atre.
[2:47:16] and you can see several of them are in the same boat we are.
[2:47:21] they have 3.17 cents. Some of you have gone to their voters for all of their pennies.
[2:47:26] the little asterisk there. Ector county, midland, and spring branch, all are also
[2:47:30] in the same boat we are. They have a local option homestead exemption in place.
[2:47:35] and you can see at the bottom of the slide there in the lower right,
[2:47:39] I just put the amount of pennies available to us for a vatre, that 3.17 cents.
[2:47:46] here are our north texas peers.
[2:47:50] and you can see, again, very similar.
[2:47:57] allen has a little over $0.05 they can go for.
[2:48:02] carrollton, dallas, and frisco all have the same
[2:48:09] $0.0317. Garland just recently passed a vatre, so they have all
[2:48:14] of their pennies now. Mckinney, same boat we are. Mesquite has nine cents available. Plano, rockwall have gone
[2:48:19] back to their voters for all of them. And wiley with 12. And in dallas county, I know
[2:48:23] we've discussed this many times, but dallas and highland park are the only two districts in dallas
[2:48:27] county that still have a local option homestead exemption. And we do not use highland
[2:48:32] park isd as one of our peer districts for this.
[2:48:38] so some vatra considerations. We only have 3.17 cents to go for.
[2:48:44] yes, ma'am. And if I can say that the main reason that we are bringing this forward and
[2:48:48] highlighting this, as david mentioned, we are going into a legislative session.
[2:48:53] and one of the items that is always up for consideration is austin making it more
[2:48:58] difficult for districts to bring forward vaters as well as bring forward bond
[2:49:03] elections. Whether it's changing a vote majority number or not even
[2:49:08] giving us this option. So this is really the last window of time where we have
[2:49:12] certainty that it's an option. We're not necessarily recommending it.
[2:49:17] we just want to put everything out on the table and make sure that the board knows their full menu
[2:49:21] of options and what it would look like to move forward with this process, just so you're aware.
[2:49:26] thank you, ms. Brennan. Yes, legislative outcomes are
[2:49:30] always uncertain. At one time, we could have removed the local option homestead exemption, but the
[2:49:34] legislature several sessions ago set a date, and we cannot consider removing the local option homestead exemption.
[2:49:39] and they have extended that deadline in the last several legislative sessions.
[2:49:49] so we are being punished for having done that
[2:49:55] at this point. We leave money
[2:49:59] on the table. Just like all the other districts do that have a local option homestead
[2:50:03] exemption. So we're at a competitive disadvantage to our peers that either never gave a
[2:50:07] local option homestead exemption or removed theirs. Some of the other vatre
[2:50:12] considerations in addition to legislative uncertainty, we do have the 3.17 cents
[2:50:17] available. We will have to hire an auditor to conduct an
[2:50:22] efficiency audit if you want to move forward
[2:50:27] with a vatre. Our current audit firm can
[2:50:31] conduct the efficiency audit. They've done so for other school districts. I have reached out
[2:50:36] to them. The cost of that efficiency audit is $15,000.
[2:50:42] we will have to have a board meeting to discuss the results of the efficiency audit,
[2:50:46] kind of a public hearing type situation. I've got all the important
[2:50:51] dates related to the vatre process on the following slides, and we'll go over those
[2:50:56] in just a second. And I just wanted to.
[2:51:00] remind everybody of the tax rate. So I have,
[2:51:05] assuming I've got a with and without a vatre for 2627 listed here.
[2:51:09] so with a vatre, the m&o rate would rise to
[2:51:14] 78.69 cents. The ins rate does increase
[2:51:20] from the current 35 cents to the 39 cents.
[2:51:24] that's the four cents. That we told the voters that was associated with the $1.4
[2:51:29] billion bond election. So with a vatre, the total tax rate would be
[2:51:33] $1.1769. Without the vatre m&o rate,
[2:51:37] I expect to stay at $0.7552. Again, that could change when
[2:51:45] tre, excuse me, tea gives us our maximum compressed rates,
[2:51:51] but it would change in both cases.
[2:51:55] the ins rate. It's still going to the 39 cents, and I expect us to be
[2:51:59] at $1.1452 without a vatre.
[2:52:04] so what are all the dates? So I've added in red on each of this is the budget
[2:52:08] calendar you're used to seeing, but anything in red is key dates that are associated now have been
[2:52:16] added for the vatre timeline. So we will need to, at the
[2:52:21] june 4th meeting select an auditor and get that
[2:52:26] on the agenda to hire the auditor for an efficiency audit.
[2:52:33] that is our last meeting before july 3rd, last scheduled meeting,
[2:52:38] unless you wanted to have another one, but that is the last scheduled meeting.
[2:52:43] and the deadline to hire an auditor to conduct the efficiency audit is july 3rd. The other key dates, august
[2:52:50] 7th. We will need to publish the notice of hearing
[2:52:55] on the tax rate, no less than 10 days, no more than 30s.
[2:52:59] that is all the normal timeline. But if you choose to call for vatre, we will have
[2:53:04] to publish a new notice. That is, there's no option there.
[2:53:09] we will have to do that. August 17th, and this is just what the timeline has
[2:53:15] to be. August 17th is the last day
[2:53:19] to call a vatre. That is a monday, and we do have a work session scheduled on august 20th, but because that's the
[2:53:24] last day to call an election, august
[2:53:31] 7th, and you'll see right there, august 5th, that's the last day for tea
[2:53:37] to provide our maximum compressed rate.
[2:53:41] we need that information. To get our notice in the newspaper.
[2:53:45] and so this is as early as we can push up anything, is to have that notice published
[2:53:51] in the morning news on august 7th.
[2:53:56] therefore, because it's got to be 10 days, at least 10 days before that august 17th, and that is the last day
[2:54:01] to call an election. Then october 1st,
[2:54:06] we would have to post the results of the efficiency audit on our website and hold an open
[2:54:11] board meeting to discuss the results. This is a thursday. There is no meeting currently
[2:54:16] scheduled that I'm aware of for that thursday, but it is at least on a traditional
[2:54:21] board meeting night. And then, of course, the november 3rd general election
[2:54:26] date would be when the vatre would be held. And then november 17th is the
[2:54:31] last day to canvas the election results. And then we would send out tax bills as close to
[2:54:38] november 18th as possible as soon as we can get those published.
[2:54:44] what are our key takeaways
[2:54:49] and next steps? Despite the $41.7 million
[2:54:54] in budget reductions since project right size began, we'll still adopt a deficit
[2:55:00] budget for 26-27, even without a raise.
[2:55:05] we don't know what the impact of education savings accounts is going to be at this point.
[2:55:09] I wish I could give you information
[2:55:14] on that. I would love to have information on that. It would make me a lot more
[2:55:18] comfortable with this whole process. And as ms.
[2:55:23] branham said, is now the time to tap into the local permanent school fund or rainy day fund.
[2:55:28] to carry us through the 90th legislative session, which begins in january.
[2:55:32] so the local permanent school
[2:55:37] fund, just for a refresher for everyone,
[2:55:41] our predecessors created this, prior boards, prior administrations created the
[2:55:46] local permanent school fund. When I bring you the document in the summer
[2:55:52] to restrict fund balance, is on there.
[2:55:58] that is one of the things you're restricting for. We've recorded in a completely separate fund
[2:56:03] number. It is a local special revenue fund.
[2:56:07] it has various one-time kind of found monies that were put in it over the years,
[2:56:14] and we invest it separately, and it continues to earn interest, and it has
[2:56:18] grown, and so there is currently a balance of $27 million
[2:56:23] in that rainy day fund that is an option for us. We will not spend it
[2:56:31] without board authorization. And then the community
[2:56:36] budget steering committee has recommended that we consider a vatre.
[2:56:41] again, it would generate about $7.7 million. And then as ms.
[2:56:47] branham said, it is unclear as to whether or not the vatre will be an
[2:56:53] option after the 90th legislative session. We do know that there is a
[2:56:57] desire to reduce isd's taxing ability, taxing authority.
[2:57:04] and city.
[2:57:10] and city, county, basically anybody that levies a property tax.
[2:57:15] there is a desire to restrict that for all of us.
[2:57:20] and it is our only real source of revenue. Cities do have various fees,
[2:57:24] water, sewer. Sanitation fees, cities do collect sales tax benefit
[2:57:30] from sales tax, property tax is our only source of revenue outside of the
[2:57:35] state funding and they are very closely linked. With that we'll be glad to
[2:57:42] answer any questions and thank you.
[2:57:55] well, with that presentation, thank you very much. We will open it up
[2:58:00] to comments and questions from the board.
[2:58:05] that's right. All right, ms. Pacheco, you can start us off.
[2:58:09] all right. Well, awesome presentation on all the things that.
[2:58:13] and should not happen to us as a school district.
[2:58:20] thank you so much for all of the hard work, the explanations that you do, mr. Pate.
[2:58:25] I think our community and I know we appreciate it so much. One question, I have a couple
[2:58:30] of questions, but it may be out of order because my brain is a little bit out of order
[2:58:35] with this. If we were to do like a vatre and we get those pennies,
[2:58:42] when I looked at the chart, recapture increases so recapture is not based on
[2:58:47] student enrollment numbers it's just based on tax rate value that we earn they're
[2:58:52] linked but it increases like by three million dollars
[2:58:59] that's I mean more than three so that's kind of yes but
[2:59:04] it's all it it all ties back to wealth per student is what the recapture is it's part of
[2:59:08] the old terminology robin hood and so the wealthier per student we become the larger
[2:59:14] the recapture is but because um we do because our voters authorize them we do get
[2:59:22] to keep a portion of the additional revenue generated uh through the atre through those essentially local
[2:59:30] option pennies but yes you're right we we do have
[2:59:35] to give some of them away right I yeah I know it's
[2:59:39] disappointing because not that I mind giving away and providing support
[2:59:44] to other school districts, but if we're already doing $6 million and we know we need more money here,
[2:59:50] we should be able to keep some of that, more of that, especially when they
[2:59:55] took it away to begin with. But that's just an opinion, but thank you
[3:00:00] for explaining that. The second part I had a question on was one of our pay-raise modeling
[3:00:05] comparisons, and option a1 is a stipend. So with this amount, it's a
[3:00:11] one-time amount that is given to each person. And is this amount, like
[3:00:17] in corporate world, it gets charged as a bonus, or does this get taxed as
[3:00:23] whatever tax bracket this person belongs to? Like what happens
[3:00:27] to that amount? Yes, ma'am.
[3:00:32] go ahead. It is taxed as ordinary income. So it would be taxed.
[3:00:36] based on whatever an employee put on their w-4 and the appropriate tax tables.
[3:00:41] but I will point out that because it is a one-time payment, a retention stipend,
[3:00:50] if you will, it is not part of their trs salary,
[3:00:55] so it does not contribute to their trs because it is a one-time payment.
[3:01:00] like you said, it's more like a bonus. Than pay for work done.
[3:01:06] pay for work, okay. And then if I could add,
[3:01:10] one thing that we've done in the past is we stagger the payment so that it's usually not all
[3:01:16] in one check as well. So we wait a few months until the school year is there so we make sure that the person
[3:01:20] has actually come back to receive the stipend. And then we've broken it up into two payments, one
[3:01:25] in the fall and one in the spring. So it's not 2,000 additional dollars, for example, all in
[3:01:30] one check that could cause more taxes. We try to just break it up into chunks.
[3:01:36] and so it'll cross our employees' income tax year, which is the calendar year
[3:01:45] generally for most, if not all, employees.
[3:01:49] okay, perfect. And then just for further clarification, I just want to make sure,
[3:01:55] option a and option a1. Option a is ongoing,
[3:01:59] and it'll compound for the following year, right? Right, that would be
[3:02:04] recurring. Recurring. Okay. And then option a1 is that one-time thing we added and
[3:02:08] then it's gone. Correct. Like we don't add it again,
[3:02:13] ever again. Yes, ma'am.
[3:02:18] okay. Option b, we added continuously?
[3:02:22] recurring. Okay. Yes. So option a, so going back to the multi-year, option a,
[3:02:27] you would see, options a and b, you would see in the 26-27 column, 27-28 column, 28-29 column,
[3:02:31] and 29- 30 column. Option a1 would only appear in the 26-27 column.
[3:02:39] and you could bring revenue in, you could do a transfer in from the local permanent
[3:02:44] school fund, as ms. Branham said, into the general fund for
[3:02:49] 26-27 so that there would be equal revenue and equal expense for option a1 and it
[3:02:54] would have no net impact. On the 21 million dollar
[3:03:00] deficit, whereas a and b would increase the deficits.
[3:03:05] it does increase the deficit,
[3:03:10] but we can't use that fund. Right or we can you week week I mean yes I can make a
[3:03:15] decision even if it was recurring so that doesn't matter right the board that's
[3:03:20] right if the board decided we yes we want to invest in a recurring raise the board can still make a decision you're
[3:03:25] going to commit x percent of the permanent school fund
[3:03:29] to help offset the increase in expenditure and again give
[3:03:34] us more time to find those efficiencies also I want to say with a one as I mentioned that it could be a
[3:03:38] combination. You all could decide. For teachers and
[3:03:43] for t-types, we're going to do that as a recurring. We're going to invest
[3:03:48] in their salary. But for central, for example, that might be more of a
[3:03:53] retention stipend that we would pay for one time. So you have some options and
[3:03:58] flexibilities based upon just kind of your willingness to see what happens in the
[3:04:05] next legislative session. You know, each time we go to find $20 million of
[3:04:09] savings. It gets harder and harder to find $20 million in savings.
[3:04:14] so I just want to present a menu of choices for our consideration as we
[3:04:19] continue to right-size.
[3:04:23] yes, I know you say $20 million, but I feel like it's a little higher than that at the end of the day,
[3:04:27] right? Yes, and just to reiterate what ms.
[3:04:32] brenner said, you could direct us, for instance, to bring in, say, a fourth of the...
[3:04:39] balance in the local permanent school fund, just divide it by four and bring
[3:04:44] in one fourth every year for years 26, 27 through 29, 30 as an option.
[3:04:49] right. But that then reduces the investment opportunity of the fund itself. And that's probably not the
[3:04:54] best move. Okay. So with the combination of things, I do have a
[3:04:59] question and I know you mentioned this before to us, but is there
[3:05:04] like a reason, I know the reason between certified and uncertified
[3:05:08] teachers, and the amount, but is there a reason why the difference is only 500? Like, why isn't it 6,300 and
[3:05:13] the other uncertified teacher, I don't know, 62 or 61?
[3:05:17] like, where did these numbers?
[3:05:22] sorry, we just picked the number that aligned with the particular option that we had.
[3:05:28] we could always have that uncertified teacher number be lower. It was just a requirement
[3:05:33] with the legislation to make sure that there was a difference between the compensation for
[3:05:37] it. A certified teacher and uncertified? Where I would caution having
[3:05:41] too much of a differentiation is, for example, our cte teachers.
[3:05:45] many of them are uncertified, but they're highly skilled because they've had such incredible industry
[3:05:50] experience. So even if I think about some of our health care, they've
[3:05:55] had such incredible industry experience that that is a part of our district of
[3:05:59] innovation plan. So it's not the same thing as the plan that we brought forward to the board.
[3:06:04] to reduce our uncertified teacher in core areas. So I would just caution us
[3:06:09] because we need our strong cte teachers
[3:06:14] for our pathway. I get it. So thank you
[3:06:18] for the clarity. I mean, you know, some people don't know, and they don't, you know, I don't fully understand what a
[3:06:22] certified teacher versus an uncertified teacher. So that makes a lot of sense as to where
[3:06:27] uncertified teachers are and the things that they're providing our students
[3:06:32] around the district. So that's really important to know and understand and why the difference is smaller
[3:06:36] versus bigger. Let's see. I think full fund,
[3:06:41] restrict fund balance.
[3:06:45] okay. I think that's it. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
[3:06:50] thank you, ms. Pacheco. All right. Ms. Timmy, go ahead.
[3:06:54] okay. I want to just talking about one, about a1, specifically
[3:06:59] in the stipend. I just, this is just my opinion. One of seven, I know, but
[3:07:04] just my opinion. I always get concerned when we talk about doing a stipend
[3:07:09] and masking the raise that we're giving while I understand the flexibility
[3:07:13] that's needed, but it may mean in order to catch up and then potentially give another
[3:07:18] raise, we're at 4% to 8% at that point. And so we almost at times anti-ourselves
[3:07:23] to perception. And I think that's really,
[3:07:27] really important. I would rather... Just my opinion, I would
[3:07:32] rather us give the raise that needs to be given versus a stipend that masks what we're
[3:07:38] doing. We got ourselves into
[3:07:43] trouble, and that was part of the compression issue. It was part
[3:07:47] of the reason it looked like we were giving raises at one point in time, and then we came back and we were
[3:07:51] not. I think there's a different message that that sends. So I just want to throw that
[3:07:57] out there just as my feedback on that. I mean, I certainly want to look
[3:08:01] at do some other research on some of the other ones just to make sure that the due
[3:08:05] diligence is done for that can we look at slide 19 real quick?
[3:08:10] I just have a question on that.
[3:08:17] on that one, when we're talking like it says total revenue, and it says, you know, approximately $3.5 million
[3:08:22] overall in revenue on the bottom right part of that table, is that less expensive?
[3:08:30] so that would be like expense, like that would be like we're bringing in 3.5
[3:08:35] after expenses. That's just our profit. Okay. It's not.
[3:08:39] okay. Great. That's what I wanted. And then on slide 20, I think I'm asking a dumb question,
[3:08:43] but I'm going to go ahead and do it. When I'm looking at, listen, I do it all the time.
[3:08:47] I'm, you know, nothing new over here. I'm just preparing y'all. Right.
[3:08:52] so the giggles stay minimal. Looking at the increase on the vadr on those bottom blue lines.
[3:08:56] if I'm looking at what the forecast is for 28-29 and the forecast for 29-30, why is there
[3:09:00] like a $2 million difference there, but all the other ones look the same or more similar?
[3:09:06] I am still trying to figure that out. I will be honest with you. I don't know if that is an
[3:09:10] error in omar's template or
[3:09:21] if it is just really that's the way it's supposed to work. I have concerns that it does
[3:09:25] drop that much in that year. Especially if you look
[3:09:31] at the year before. Yes. There's some other pricing difference or other revenue pieces in there that are
[3:09:36] lower and look different, but yet it doesn't drop it. I don't know.
[3:09:40] I can't understand why it would devalue by $2 million. I'm still trying to figure that out,
[3:09:45] and I will continue to work on that. Not as dumb as I thought. No. Thank you very much.
[3:09:53] I just did a shorter number, and I was and I apologize that I did not highlight that
[3:09:57] earlier because that has been driving me a little crazy. Absolutely.
[3:10:03] okay. I think, I don't know, I mean, I'm not really sure
[3:10:07] what's being asked. I think this is just information and presentation. I do just want to say that,
[3:10:12] like, I do think there's some due diligence that really needs to be done here. I would be remiss if I didn't say that we've talked all
[3:10:16] night about, like, how having the best teachers in that classroom is what's going to get us to our north star goal.
[3:10:22] I know some of our neighboring districts that we're going to compete with. I've seen some of their
[3:10:26] starting salaries. I've seen some big percent raises. I've also seen some other
[3:10:30] funding models that we'll compete for for some of those experienced teachers. I think we jumped out ahead
[3:10:35] of the curve, as we should have, appropriately. But I also think, too, like if we're really going
[3:10:40] to be committed to that north star goal, then we have to really be sure we take care of our teachers.
[3:10:44] now, how we do that, right, that's what we get to decide. But I do think that ensuring
[3:10:49] that what we're putting in in a really tough time frame,
[3:10:53] in a really tough time to be paying teachers and having to make some difficult choices
[3:10:58] and whatever choice, whatever we end up going with, I know is going to make
[3:11:02] more difficult conversations down the road.
[3:11:07] and to me, it's not just a risk tolerance. It's that.
[3:11:11] but it's also the tolerance of the conversations that we're going to be forcing going forward
[3:11:16] for that. But this is I mean, listen.
[3:11:21] this is why we get paid the big bucks, right? We have to have these conversations,
[3:11:25] and that's part of our job. But I do hope that just as the board, and we do continue
[3:11:29] to keep that north star goal and aligning our resources, as small as they might be at this point, with the
[3:11:34] outcomes that we desire, I do think this is a situation where you get what you pay
[3:11:39] for. So that's it. Thanks.
[3:11:43] timmy, do you have any feedback related to our... Just as I think about modeling this out
[3:11:48] further and bringing back the information that you would need to help give us directional approval
[3:11:54] in our first may meeting, because we would like to share our compensation in that may meeting, get
[3:11:59] directional approval. Y'all don't adopt the budget until june.
[3:12:03] do one of these models speak to you? I hear a1 is not something that you would like for us
[3:12:09] to continue with, and of course, look forward to other feedback
[3:12:14] from the board. But a or b in any way. Yeah, so listen, I tend
[3:12:19] to lean more towards a and I mean, listen, if I had my heart's desire,
[3:12:23] we would definitely be doing that is where I would land. That being said, I also feel like it is incumbent upon us
[3:12:28] to do our due diligence to look at the modeling. I think what I would like to look for is I would like
[3:12:33] to see what the other starting salaries that we are competing with.
[3:12:38] I would also like to see how you guys have done it before where it looks like we're the experienced
[3:12:43] teachers. I know that's a little bit harder. But that benchmarking data from the other districts,
[3:12:48] like I know that mckinney is giving like a three and a half percent raise. I don't know where that then
[3:12:54] puts us in relation to them. I understand there's some districts that we won't be able to model against because of the model
[3:12:59] that they're using, which is fine. That's I mean, that is what it is. But what I would I just would
[3:13:04] like to see where we land. We worked really hard to get where we are. I am committed to our teachers in this
[3:13:08] district. I know as our enrollment drops that we are going
[3:13:13] to have to have different conversations. I understand that,
[3:13:18] but we're going to just have to really, I would like to see that because I just would have a very hard time
[3:13:23] dropping in where we've been when we've made the progress that we've made. And so those would be the
[3:13:28] kinds of things that I'm going
[3:13:33] to look at. Okay, thank you for that. One last just follow-up. In terms
[3:13:38] of other employee types, would you like to see any adjustments in that percent increase? Would you like us
[3:13:43] to lower that? Would you like... Any feedback on that? You're talking about outside of just t-types as you're
[3:13:47] defining them now? Yes, ma'am. I'm talking specifically central and paraprofessional. Listen, I would like
[3:13:52] to give everybody all of the money. Let's just be honest.
[3:13:57] that's right, matt. I think I know we've done a little bit of pay on paras. I would say that I would have
[3:14:04] to go back and look at that to see because I would want to see what that looks like. I mean, I think I'd be
[3:14:08] hard-pressed. I mean, 3%. On what we don't pay them enough already
[3:14:13] for what we ask of them. I would be extremely, it would be extremely hard for me to ever get behind
[3:14:18] anything that would drop that. That's how we felt as well. Yeah.
[3:14:24] I don't, and I don't know that I think I would want to on central office either at this time, especially
[3:14:28] given the cuts that we're making and the amount of work that they're having to pick up in light of the cuts that we're making.
[3:14:33] like we're making these cuts and we're getting a lot of less people, but it doesn't mean that those jobs
[3:14:37] aren't there. It means we've shifted them to someone else. Right.
[3:14:42] I know that we'll also be asking for additional cuts, right? I mean, it's going to have to happen.
[3:14:46] I don't know where that comes from. It will be starting in august.
[3:14:52] yeah. I don't know where that's going to come from, but I
[3:14:57] would assume we would be doing the same thing. It's not like the work's getting less.
[3:15:01] we're going to continue to shift more work on fewer people. And so I would have a hard time then not giving them an
[3:15:06] increase, asking them to do more work while they're being prepared to determine what cuts we're going to make. Well, we're not giving them a
[3:15:10] salary increase. I would have a very hard time getting behind that. That's just my thoughts. That helps us know kind
[3:15:14] of what to model. All right. Others. We'll go to ms. Mcgowan now.
[3:15:20] yeah. Would you like to add on to ms.
[3:15:24] timmy?
[3:15:29] I think ms. Timmy and ms. Pacheco have said plenty.
[3:15:36] I do have just explore. I just had a question wrote down, like, is this our only child care option?
[3:15:41] or do we look into other options for after school? Or does that even make a
[3:15:46] difference? I don't know. We provide what I think is a
[3:15:51] high-quality after school option, and it's very, very affordable. Right.
[3:15:55] I was going to say, you can't find anything cheaper. Even with the increase, you cannot find cheaper than that.
[3:16:00] and we've not. We purposely, again, we recognize that. I know.
[3:16:04] cost of living for everyone is increasing, so we have been very conservative
[3:16:09] in not addressing explore. I think it's been three years, maybe four, since we've last adjusted this.
[3:16:14] we did look at all of our benchmark districts, and we are by far charging right now the lowest.
[3:16:18] and I feel like there's even financial assistance for parents in the explore program.
[3:16:24] so where does that assistance come from? It basically drops the revenue from the explore
[3:16:28] model. Yes. I mean, again, this program
[3:16:32] still generates revenue. It still generates. It just reduces the revenue. Is this,
[3:16:37] is it a separate company? No, ma'am. It's all us. Yes, dr.
[3:16:43] lieber and david burkholder and his team lead the entire thing. Okay. Well, I know because the ymca
[3:16:48] has tried to break in. I thought they were like an outside. I thought it was outside of the district.
[3:16:52] but if it's all internal, then we've got to hold on to all of that. Yes. For sure. Again, it is a revenue
[3:16:57] generator for the district. One of the hopes that we have, and this is one
[3:17:02] of the recommendations from the community budget steering committee, is if we can increase, and we didn't
[3:17:07] model this because we don't know, but if we can increase that hourly rate and we can attract more workers, we have
[3:17:11] a significant waiting list for our explore program. It's so cheap.
[3:17:16] yes. It's just finding enough workers. So we're hoping that if we
[3:17:20] can increase this hourly rate, maybe we will attract some more workers so that we
[3:17:25] can get more students in to even increase the revenue.
[3:17:29] gotcha. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Thank you for that.
[3:17:34] I would also like to see, I know ms. Timmy mentioned seeing the comparison
[3:17:38] with or benchmark districts, but I also wrote down the different employee types,
[3:17:44] like you were saying, your parent professionals. I would like to see, and I wrote that down, are we aligned
[3:17:49] with our neighboring districts on that pay?
[3:17:54] today, are we even aligned? On the specific raise or on salary?
[3:17:58] salary. It depends upon which employee type you're talking
[3:18:03] about within that category. So within that, there are layers
[3:18:07] of employees. It might be auxiliary staff. It may be a classroom
[3:18:12] paraprofessional. It may be an executive assistant. It may be our sdss.
[3:18:17] so there's a... Multitude of positions and each one benchmarks differently based upon what
[3:18:21] we've been able to do and adjust over time. I will say they probably,
[3:18:26] they all at some point will have to do some market adjustment,
[3:18:30] but we know we don't have the capacity and the budget to do that. And that's why we knew we had
[3:18:35] to at least bring forward a 3% consideration for that job category. Dr.
[3:18:42] goodson, I don't know if you want to add anything to that. No, that actually is... Very accurate.
[3:18:46] they are the lower paying positions. And so over the last several years, we've tried to bring
[3:18:52] forward those groupings of employee types that needed to have some type of adjustment because they were
[3:18:57] the farthest behind the rest of our benchmark districts
[3:19:03] with actual salary and in some cases the starting salary for new hires coming in.
[3:19:07] so we've made progress coming into this year. We targeted assistant
[3:19:12] principals, we targeted central special
[3:19:17] education, paraprofessionals, executive assistants, different groupings within the paraprofessional ranks.
[3:19:26] and so we know that that's going to have to be the case moving forward.
[3:19:30] I think we have to stick to that.
[3:19:35] I feel like that we have to stick to that pay increase for that type.
[3:19:41] and my last question is, ms. Pacheco touched on the certified teacher.
[3:19:46] and then you clarified, because I wrote the same question down, and then you clarified the cte space.
[3:19:51] but then my mind went to, but what about in the classroom space for our non-certified teachers
[3:19:56] there? Can we further that?
[3:20:01] can we widen that gap, like the classroom uncertified versus the classroom certified, and not touch the
[3:20:06] cte uncertified? Well, there are a few other. Job categories that I would
[3:20:11] recommend we would want to keep
[3:20:16] in that close differential. What I would offer is, for example, this year,
[3:20:20] unless we have, I don't anticipate having as many openings because of some of
[3:20:24] the attrition work we're doing. But if we do, hr knows we
[3:20:29] have to hire certified people. We are under legislation that
[3:20:34] requires us in the core areas to have certified teachers. We have presented a plan that
[3:20:39] the board approved. To reduce the amount of uncertified teachers we have
[3:20:44] by 50%. So I think we have kind of a project in place,
[3:20:49] a system in place that will address that without having so many different salary
[3:20:54] schedules that it makes it incredibly complex for our hr system and our payroll system
[3:20:59] to make sure that we are adequately paying everyone what they need to.
[3:21:03] of course, whatever the board, I'm at the will of the board.
[3:21:09] but I think we have another way to solve that that would allow us to kind
[3:21:13] of maintain. Pulling all uncertified
[3:21:17] teachers out of the classroom. Reducing, yes. Kidding.
[3:21:21] working to reduce that. Just kidding. Okay, awesome. I appreciate that.
[3:21:26] I love that plan. I appreciate the work. It's a lot. So, yeah, that's all.
[3:21:30] thank you. Thank you. Comments or questions?
[3:21:35] mr. Andrea.
[3:21:39] I think my colleagues already said a whole lot. I mean, I just, yeah, I agree with everything that
[3:21:43] was said, especially on the part with the paraprofessionals and all.
[3:21:48] absolutely agree across, I mean, for the longest time, I mean, they have been the most, I guess, underpaid,
[3:21:52] and they do so, so much work. I mean, they are equivalent to what a teacher does
[3:21:57] in the classroom. And so that, again, I agree with that. One of the questions I did
[3:22:02] have was on the very beginning, on the very, I don't know what slide,
[3:22:07] what slide is this? Slide seven. You know, I just think it's super important.
[3:22:12] I think all of us here, when we get to a certain topic, we talk about how important that is,
[3:22:16] right? And so absolutely, I think all of us agree that the teacher compensation is super
[3:22:21] important. If we could, we would give them exactly, I mean, give everybody the top most,
[3:22:26] yeah, in a race. But I think it's offsetting these things. So when we talk about,
[3:22:31] I know we talked about the marketing. How important that was when we did that presentation,
[3:22:35] right? I just feel like whatever's in front of us, we're like, yeah, let's do that. And then, yeah,
[3:22:40] let's do that. And yes, we'll do that. But when it comes to this, again, I think for all
[3:22:44] of us, I know for me, the teacher compensation is super important and top priority.
[3:22:49] I mean, what everybody said here is absolutely right. But when I see some of these other things, I
[3:22:53] mean, this right here on this slide, are these like, I know the advertisement one you said,
[3:22:58] we can go back and forth. There's things that we can move around. But are some of these pretty
[3:23:03] much, I mean, there's just, and I know it only adds up to that, you know, the $1
[3:23:08] million here. But say like property auto
[3:23:12] liability, cyber insurance, is that like just something that it is what it is,
[3:23:16] right? The cost increase.
[3:23:21] where the board would have some options, for example, the fine arts supplies. That is a request that mr.
[3:23:25] sinet with visual arts brought forward. We've not made any adjustments
[3:23:29] in supply budget. For elementary or secondary visual arts teachers um and so he he did ask that we make
[3:23:35] a a small adjustment but the crossing guard is required by the city
[3:23:40] of richardson and we have to we have a cost associated
[3:23:45] with that. The two special education teachers and four central paraprofessionals,
[3:23:50] we could continue to work with our special student services.
[3:23:54] we could potentially put a pin on that and see if we can find some efficiencies, maybe
[3:23:59] add one or two students depending upon the special program that it is.
[3:24:06] we just know that our students... Identification continues to
[3:24:10] increase our request is that we hire that early so we can
[3:24:17] get higher quality individuals versus realizing in october that we need those
[3:24:22] classrooms and then trying to find teachers and paraprofessionals
[3:24:26] in that classroom in october so there there potentially might be some flexibility there so really advertising
[3:24:31] and marketing plan potentially the special
[3:24:35] education classrooms and the fine art supplies the other things are unfortunately
[3:24:40] that's just what it is okay well that was my question because I didn't know what else yeah
[3:24:45] but again I think I agree with my colleagues here where I mean the as far as the teacher pay I agree that's a
[3:24:50] tough part yeah thank you and thanks for the presentation
[3:24:54] do other board members have
[3:24:58] any feedback related to a versus b you go
[3:25:07] to slide slide 16. Slide 16.
[3:25:14] and, again, as we referenced all models, we brought but there may be something else that you would like
[3:25:19] to see us model and compare to benchmark. So we're open to your
[3:25:24] feedback. I'll go last. All right.
[3:25:31] just waiting over here. As far as feedback, I think I
[3:25:36] would definitely want to see more on a and b. Maybe there's a combination or something we do in
[3:25:41] between with it.
[3:25:46] I agree with ms. Timmy on seeing benchmarks on teachers with experience and what do the salaries
[3:25:51] really look like for our auxiliary and paraprofessionals.
[3:25:56] I asked about the stipend because I was just really curious.
[3:26:00] I hadn't seen something like this before, and I was like, does that really move the needle?
[3:26:05] what is it exactly? But really and truly, it's kind of like one of
[3:26:10] those that doesn't really change a lot for any of our employees.
[3:26:14] and when it doesn't also help with their retirement and it doesn't help with other
[3:26:19] things versus a salary increase. It truly is.
[3:26:24] it's very different. I mean, thank you for providing an option.
[3:26:28] but that's definitely not one that I would think it's going to really make a difference. Is that one, so the one to
[3:26:34] 10 years, 1,000, 11 plus
[3:26:38] years, 2,000, that is the stipend we're talking about, right?
[3:26:42] that's going across the... So a and b, actually, that is a salary increase, whereas a1, it would be a
[3:26:47] one-time, two times a year, but it's more
[3:26:55] of a one-time stipend. So it does not increase the actual salary.
[3:27:01] I'm going to lean towards because I know what they're doing in fort worth, which is
[3:27:06] insane. I mean, it's not insane, I'm so sorry.
[3:27:11] but I'm going to lean more towards b. We're going to adopt the deficit.
[3:27:18] and, I mean, it just doesn't even really move the needle that much in salary pay,
[3:27:22] right? But if that's on the table, that's what I'm leaning
[3:27:26] towards. Anybody else want
[3:27:31] to speak? Any other trustees? Okay.
[3:27:35] can you go to, no? I can't see. Okay.
[3:27:41] can you switch back to slide 10?
[3:27:46] and I know we're focusing on compensation decisions and stuff ahead of may.
[3:27:50] slide 10, and I'm kind of, I keep coming back to this big overall picture
[3:27:55] of where we're headed, right? And I know we're focused
[3:27:59] right now on decisions that we're making today. We're kind of touching on.
[3:28:03] next year and impacts beyond that. But when you look at this and you look at the
[3:28:08] ending fund balance compared to the fund balance targets,
[3:28:13] we hit an exponential cliff in 27-28. You can see we go to a $15
[3:28:18] million deficit in where we need to be with our fund balance to a
[3:28:22] 50 to 110 or whatever. I don't know what the plan is
[3:28:27] going forward to. I mean, how many cuts can we make
[3:28:32] to make up $100 million in the next two or three years? I mean, that's just not.
[3:28:37] so I know we're talking about. We're kind of splitting hairs on compensation discussion a
[3:28:43] little bit because when we're talking about that magnitude of change, and that's not
[3:28:47] like in five years. I remember when we had this conversation years ago and we said, oh,
[3:28:53] it's five years out. We're going to take some bold moves, which we needed
[3:28:57] to do and we could. Well, the light in the tunnel is the train, and it's about on top of us.
[3:29:03] so this is an important slide for me to kind of think about things.
[3:29:08] I know we've committed to bold moves. We've committed
[3:29:12] to bold compensation moves for our teachers, especially multiple times,
[3:29:16] because we go back to our north star goal and we're looking at outcomes.
[3:29:21] and we know that the teacher in the classroom, the veteran teacher,
[3:29:26] the good teacher that we want to retain, the great teacher we want
[3:29:31] to recruit, those are what's going to so when we take these bold actions, I just have to remind myself there's
[3:29:36] additional pressure now to produce outcomes. I mean, it's just you feel it, right?
[3:29:40] I mean, because we're taking risk. And I know you mentioned a
[3:29:46] risk. That's part of the equation, right, the risk proposition. So we're taking this risk
[3:29:51] on a fiduciary side of the house for the roi on the student outcome side. And so the more risk we take,
[3:29:56] the more pressure I feel, right?
[3:30:01] and I think that's how it's supposed to happen at the end of the day, right? But this is a lot of
[3:30:06] pressure. There's a lot of risk there. And I know that $8 million this year, a decision, or
[3:30:11] $10 million, or $12 million, or whatever. We're just talking a few million here and there.
[3:30:15] but according to that, I mean, we've got bigger problems than just $8 or $10
[3:30:20] million. And that's really what at least caused me to say we needed
[3:30:25] to have this conversation. Because without a compensation increase.
[3:30:30] we need to find $21 million next year. Just next year.
[3:30:37] you want the year after that. Right.
[3:30:41] 50. Right. It's not, yeah, it increases exponentially. Absolutely.
[3:30:47] I hear you. So I'm more talking than asking a question, but these are things that, as
[3:30:52] we have the discussion that keep going through my head, one, compression. We took care of that,
[3:30:56] right? So none of these reintroduce compression. We've kind of made the.
[3:31:01] that's basically why we adopted this. Okay. I just want to make sure in
[3:31:06] my mind that I understand we're not accidentally sliding back into something like that.
[3:31:14] use the term completely right size our budget. That's something later on we
[3:31:18] can see what that looks like. The challenge I have is that
[3:31:22] what the amount is that I need to identify to right size our keeps is a moving
[3:31:27] target. Yes, absolutely. And as long as we're losing
[3:31:33] enrollment, it's like catching a falling knife. So, I know.
[3:31:37] okay. Well, bear
[3:31:42] with me. A couple of questions on the audit.
[3:31:46] I don't understand what that all means, the definition of the efficiency audit. But it sounds like, I mean,
[3:31:51] this is probably going to be a no-brainer on having to do that.
[3:31:55] but how long is that audit good for? Because we're operating on all these slides
[3:32:00] on we have to go to the voters in the fall. Yes, I will double check.
[3:32:04] there is a time period where it would have to be refreshed, and the
[3:32:08] audit is actually state. The testing or the procedures associated with this efficiency audit is mandated
[3:32:14] by the state. So it's not like your normal financial statement audit
[3:32:19] that we're used to having it as a special purpose.
[3:32:27] so my leading question there is, do we need to go
[3:32:32] in the fall? And I know we talk about the pressures of potential action
[3:32:36] at the legislative session. And we talked about that last time because we almost accelerated our bond
[3:32:41] to get ahead of that, which it ended up it was a bill. It went to the house. It did not get passed.
[3:32:46] thank goodness. But, you know, can we do it in the spring?
[3:32:50] if they do legislation, when does it take effect? Is it immediately? Is it september 1? I'm just seeing is our only
[3:32:56] option. Just to note, right now, vaders can only be done in november. November, okay.
[3:33:01] so it would be this november or next november.
[3:33:06] so, yes, only in november, and chances are, based on prior legislative activity, if they pass any legislation
[3:33:11] related to vatre, we let's see, in 27.
[3:33:27] chances are like 20 legislation coming out of the 90th session in 27 could very likely prevent us
[3:33:32] from having a va tre in the fall of 27 they had a
[3:33:39] kind of out the last time if we had discussed it within a certain time period,
[3:33:44] but I don't know if they would give that to us again.
[3:33:50] okay. So my point is that we're tying this to this
[3:33:54] november. One of my other concerns with that is the and please note, we're open
[3:33:59] to board feedback. We just want to make sure you had all the information that you needed to let it, like,
[3:34:04] nope, we don't have, like, that's not something we even want to explore.
[3:34:08] no, we need to continue to see what that would look like. And that vader, I think we're
[3:34:13] getting to the point where if you look at this, we've got to execute every, we've got to pull every lever that we
[3:34:18] have. We've got to consider it and we've got to probably do more than consider it.
[3:34:22] we've got to find the change in the cushion of the couch. We're digging everywhere we
[3:34:27] can. I know you've talked about the permanent fund. That's a good option as well.
[3:34:32] I'm not sure I want to exhaust it all in a year or two or whatever. But I also wonder what the
[3:34:37] appetite of our voters are going from a bond to a vader
[3:34:41] in a short order. And so the whole point of that question was,
[3:34:45] can we put space between those two requests?
[3:34:52] and I totally know and we can preach all day that they're two different buckets of money and two colors
[3:34:57] of money. But it's a tax, all of us. Right. And so that's my concern is
[3:35:04] that separation between the bond. And the vader.
[3:35:09] and so that's what leads me to ask about the audit and the timing of the election and
[3:35:13] all that kind of stuff. So anyway, that's my comment
[3:35:18] is just a concern that I want to make sure that we keep on our radar. And if I can note
[3:35:24] to something you mentioned about the bond, I just just
[3:35:30] to clarify. We did not accelerate the bond to a november election just out of concerns
[3:35:35] from legislators. It was also if we wanted to have any chance of being open in the august of 28.
[3:35:41] that's true. We had to do it in november.
[3:35:45] otherwise, it would have been like a january, which doesn't make sense with a school calendar year.
[3:35:50] I know we were on a five-year cycle, and then we got off of that for a number of reasons.
[3:35:55] hopefully just this one time. Yeah. Mr. Poteet, can I add just a piece?
[3:35:59] I do want to add, there was something that you said, and I think you've said a couple of times, but I actually think it's
[3:36:04] like incredibly relevant. So we're talking about like the $10 million raise for our teachers, right?
[3:36:09] like 10.8, right? I think is that what it is? But we also, if that's what we went,
[3:36:13] right? Like at max, like max is I think what we're talking about. But if I'm really,
[3:36:18] and I know we're talking about like these deficits and things like that and out to
[3:36:22] 2930 and I fully get that. We already know that on the legislative priority list that there is a piece to go
[3:36:27] to zero ability to collect any tax payer or any property tax, which is, as you said,
[3:36:31] our sole source of funding, which means the whole system at some point, if that goes
[3:36:36] through, they're going to have to figure that out because then what?
[3:36:40] so then it doesn't become those numbers at all.
[3:36:44] and I know we cannot plan on what we think the legislative session will or will not do,
[3:36:49] and I get that. And I'm... On one hand don't think we should but I also think too
[3:36:53] you you mentioned we're talking about splitting here is about 10.8 million dollars to
[3:36:58] give teachers a raise and a potential of a complete and different funding system so
[3:37:02] like when I look at that when that's the legislative priority I do look at those
[3:37:07] deficits a little bit differently um because 10.8
[3:37:11] in that and having no funding sources coming in at all I I just I it doesn't seem like well we want
[3:37:16] to be while we want to be responsible fiscally
[3:37:22] with our funds, if we don't continue to fund
[3:37:27] our teachers the way we are, trying to base it on a current system, which we don't know if it's going
[3:37:32] to be there, which we don't, like, I, in my mind, have to keep my eye on the prize,
[3:37:37] which is student outcomes, because I can't with all the other things that are happening. I hope that, listen,
[3:37:42] I very rarely will get into politics in here for a number of reasons on, from a work perspective.
[3:37:48] however, I do hope that our community will get out and understand the impact it's going to have to our
[3:37:52] education system should we not find a way to fund our schools without the strings and
[3:37:56] without the harnesses to programs that may not be right for our community in order to increase that.
[3:38:09] but I think that it makes it not arbitrary. I don't mean that those
[3:38:14] numbers are arbitrary, but I do think that... I think in some ways it does.
[3:38:18] and so I just want to leave it at that.
[3:38:24] I also want to recognize what both of you said. I hope you know that there's not a person in this room
[3:38:28] that does not share your urgency around student outcomes. And we know that...
[3:38:33] again, you have made the investment, and now our
[3:38:37] central systems have to support our educators
[3:38:41] in realizing those outcomes. So 100%. Yeah, and just now I was speaking more about my,
[3:38:47] the pressure that I feel, you know,
[3:38:52] and I know you do every day, all day. But I just think that it's like everything else we do.
[3:38:56] it's a balance. It's a balance of looking at sticking with the north star goal and the
[3:39:02] commitments, the bold commitments we've made. But then it's a balance of also looking at.
[3:39:08] knowing the landscape as it is today, the law as it is today, you know,
[3:39:12] this is what we're looking at in two and three years out. So where do we find that balance and where's the risk
[3:39:17] in the decisions that we make? So I appreciate the presentation.
[3:39:21] hopefully you got a lot of feedback from the board. Ms.
[3:39:26] harris, are you good? Can I ask a couple of clarifying? Okay.
[3:39:32] well, we're not voting here. I know, but do you have any directional feedback on what you'd like us
[3:39:37] to bring back? What I want to see? No, I mean, I do feel that the stipend, I
[3:39:41] appreciate you bringing that forward just so that we could have the discussion, understand that option and
[3:39:46] what it means. I do think that there's, while it looks good
[3:39:50] on paper, there's other second and third order impacts, like we said to trs
[3:39:55] and things that that's culturally impactful as well. To our teachers so um so I I
[3:39:59] am more interested in option a and b and to our
[3:40:03] point that we had a while ago you know is is two million dollars in the grand scheme
[3:40:09] of things do we get but also the questions ask you know
[3:40:14] does an extra two million dollars does that what do we get for that so you kind of got to look at both
[3:40:18] of those but I think we're I see some coalescence around those kinds
[3:40:24] of options. Yep. So all right do you have one
[3:40:29] more question? Talking about stipends, while we're on the stipend point,
[3:40:33] I know a lot of our bilingual teachers received a stipend for, like, our bilingual.
[3:40:38] we're not changing that. So we're going to continue that? Yes, ma'am.
[3:40:42] okay. Not in the presentation related to stipend reduction. We are not, our special
[3:40:47] education, bilingual, many of our other specialty stipends, we are not reducing that. We're really targeting things
[3:40:52] like travel, for example, to earn a certain. You know, travel allotment,
[3:40:56] you know, a staff member may have to travel 172 miles in a month
[3:41:02] to have earned that amount. We know that that is probably not happening. And so it's those kind of
[3:41:07] targeted things that we're looking at, but we're really trying to maintain, especially for
[3:41:12] our bilingual and our special student services classroom teachers, we're holding on to those stipends.
[3:41:19] I just wanted to add something too.
[3:41:23] I think that, you know, it's, it's, for me, it's a frustration, right? It's really a frustration
[3:41:28] because both sides of what mr. Poteet and also what ms. Timmy said, you know,
[3:41:33] we're kind of caught in the middle. And I think the frustrating part for me is that, you
[3:41:38] know, with austin, you know, it's the blatant almost, you know, intention to dismantle
[3:41:42] public education. And it's coming at all of this, right?
[3:41:47] because we're doing the very best we can.
[3:41:52] I mean, and I know that our... That other districts are doing the same thing
[3:41:57] in the state. But, you know, again,
[3:42:01] I think that as we talk about we don't know what's going to happen with this next
[3:42:06] legislative session. We don't know what's going to happen, and we're all trying to guess, and
[3:42:10] at the same time trying to do what we're supposed to do, and then at the same time provide and keep those teachers.
[3:42:15] it just seems so impossible, right? I mean, we're trying to split hairs here on what it is, and it's really hard,
[3:42:19] you know. But I get frustrated because, you know, the cuts keep coming from further up.
[3:42:25] and it's an intentional and, you know, just like I said, a blatant and intentional point to just continue to dismantle
[3:42:29] public ed. I would also just add that
[3:42:35] it's not only the underfunding, but then it's
[3:42:40] also a continued change in the rules of the game.
[3:42:45] so just ccmr is one example of as districts have continued to work towards.
[3:42:49] what they're holding up as like this is where we need you to be,
[3:42:53] then they continue to change the rules of what counts, what doesn't,
[3:43:00] how many points you get. And so even for our current high school students, we're having to reimagine all
[3:43:05] the work we have done to make sure that we're doing great things for kids.
[3:43:09] we're having to reimagine it all over now because the state has moved
[3:43:14] that target. And that's just one. That's just one area.
[3:43:20] that's not alone, all the other areas. And, david, if you could hit the last slide, the takeaway slide, because I do want the
[3:43:25] community especially to hear this as we're having this conversation.
[3:43:31] I know this year, as we hear a $25 million reduction, I just have
[3:43:37] to continue to communicate that we've not been on this journey just one year. We have been on this journey
[3:43:42] since project right size. We have reduced our expenditures by almost $42
[3:43:48] million in three years. So we have not taken this lightly. We have not put our head
[3:43:55] in the sand and pretended
[3:44:01] like we're not in this. This current financial
[3:44:06] situation, every year we have continued to find as many efficiencies, keep them as far away from
[3:44:11] the classroom as possible because we feel that urgency.
[3:44:15] but to think that in three years we've reduced by $41 million and
[3:44:21] to know we've got to do another 20 next year. That is still not enough.
[3:44:25] right. I mean, and every time we get to a certain point, they move the needle.
[3:44:31] yes. I mean, they're just moving more and moving more. And that's what I'm saying.
[3:44:35] and then for those who don't understand that it's like, well, our public schools aren't doing enough. Our public schools don't
[3:44:40] provide this and that. And even to mr. Poteet's point about having, I thought the same thing.
[3:44:45] I was like, well, we just passed and our community was kind enough and understood how important this bond was.
[3:44:50] but then to also come again and say, hey, guys,
[3:44:54] now we need this evader. It's like, what more do you want? And we're just trying
[3:44:59] to stay afloat. We're just trying to stay afloat. It's like a hamster wheel
[3:45:03] because if we don't have facilities and if we don't have the learning environment that will attract and retain, it's kind of
[3:45:08] like the marketing, right? Right. I recognize we don't have $500,000 to spend
[3:45:14] on marketing. I get it. Like, we don't. At the same time, we recognize the only way
[3:45:19] to increase revenue is to try to recruit more. And so it's a hamster wheel in every area,
[3:45:24] and I'm desperately trying to find the off ramp to get us
[3:45:29] off the hamster wheel but we keep getting like sucked back in exactly
[3:45:33] so I just I just had to communicate like we had
[3:45:37] the board has been very strategic with charging staff to find
[3:45:43] these efficiencies the community budget steering committee was very strategic in making recommendations so
[3:45:47] I just that's why I just feel like we're all doing our part right we're all trying really
[3:45:52] hard except it seems like austin is not austin's not
[3:45:56] doing their part and that's what's frustrating and minutes. Yeah, yeah,
[3:46:01] exactly. I do just, okay, and I'll be quiet over this. I do just want
[3:46:06] to add, I would be remiss if I did not say we are so lucky
[3:46:10] that you are superintendent. I know you're not asked for this because this is hard work. Your team and what you
[3:46:16] all do, this is such hard work. And I know you guys get hit with so
[3:46:20] much negative all the time. I mean, that just. Somewhat of the nature
[3:46:25] of the job. I mean, we get that as principals sometimes too, but not always all the positive pieces of this, but this is not easy work.
[3:46:30] this is extremely hard. I'm just thinking of the presentations we had tonight, all the thought and all
[3:46:34] of the planning and all of the repercussions and all of the different things that you all are working through
[3:46:39] from just a cognitive load of just thinking through every single aspect of that,
[3:46:46] how difficult that is. We don't tell you thank you
[3:46:50] enough for those things. We don't tell your team thank you enough
[3:46:54] for those things. It takes the entire team to make this happen. I'm so glad that you
[3:46:59] guys, you have such a strong team that helps her do that, but also, too,
[3:47:03] for your leadership in allowing them to help and work with that. I hate to think
[3:47:09] where our district would be if we didn't have somebody who could lead this kind
[3:47:14] of stuff. It's hard. So thank you. Any other? Oh, yes, ms. Mcgowan. One more question, and this is
[3:47:18] probably the dumbest question, ms. Timmy. So I'm going to take that. Is this a competition? I'm taking that
[3:47:23] on tonight. Okay, so, and just for the public to understand, because people are always speculating and
[3:47:27] throwing things out, like, oh, they shouldn't do this, they shouldn't do that, oh, they should do this. Can you
[3:47:31] put it in layman's terms? Like, what would it take to truly right-size our budget?
[3:47:36] like, what would you have to really do? Shut down what at this point? And because we
[3:47:41] can't, like, realistically, you cannot do those things, right? It's not possible. So if you were talking to
[3:47:47] someone and they were like, well, why don't you do this? Why don't you do that? Tell them exactly what it would take to
[3:47:51] truly right-size our budget. Sorry, it's a moving target.
[3:47:58] so if you're asking what are our next steps in finding the next $20
[3:48:03] million? I'm saying options that are not even on the table, options that
[3:48:07] we're not even considering. Like what would you have to do to just be like, if you had a magic wand and you're
[3:48:12] like, I can't even, I wouldn't even want to speculate on that.
[3:48:17] because people are going to speculate. Yeah, I don't want to become a headline
[3:48:22] on it. What I will say is
[3:48:26] just like it took us to find this $25 million, our team will start in
[3:48:33] august. We will get school started. And then that very next week, we will get back to the work of identifying
[3:48:38] every opportunity. To find the next efficiency. So, you know,
[3:48:44] changing staffing models, you know, looking
[3:48:48] at how can we provide services to campuses differently
[3:48:52] with less people. You know, we'll have to start looking at programming and are there
[3:49:00] certain programming options that we we have
[3:49:04] to explore and look at differently. So it's it it will start in august and we will work august through
[3:49:09] december. Just like we did this year to begin to identify those and then begin to bring those forward for
[3:49:14] feedback all right thank you somebody told me a term one time called abundance mindset
[3:49:20] heard that so that's a good way I think to bring this all back
[3:49:24] around that we we deal with this we've got hard decisions we got hard discussions but
[3:49:29] as you've told staff throughout the entire
[3:49:34] district we need to approach this with an abundance mindset you sometimes that's harder
[3:49:39] to do than to say. We absolutely do. Well, thank
[3:49:44] you very much. Thanks for all the information, mr. Pate down there. Thank
[3:49:49] you. Thank you, superintendent branham.
[3:49:54] thank you, dr. Goodson. Appreciate it. Didn't want to leave you out
[3:49:59] down there. So with that, I would like to thank the staff, our visitors, and my colleagues for being here this evening.
[3:50:05] we will not have a closed session tonight, and therefore this meeting is
[3:50:10] adjourned at 10.04 p.m.