[0:00] Welcome to the board meeting of the severe school district. Today is Wednesday, August 12, 2016. It's clear clock and we are meeting in the severe district office. Those in attendance are board members Rick or Jill Porter, Vice President Ryan Savage, Jack Hanson and myself, John Foster. From the administration, we have Superintendent Dr. Kate Douglas, Assistant Superintendent

[0:29] Lieutenant Mike Willis.

[0:31] This was the Administrator of Chad Boyes.

[0:33] It will be, it is not present, but will be on source.

[0:37] And I can accept that he, Kristen Millson,

[0:41] will start off with the preliminary

[0:43] and really the vast eight levels to prepare for.

[0:47] Our

[0:50] father and dad are grateful for the opportunity

[0:52] that we have to meet together this day.

[0:55] We're so grateful for my hand in our lives

[0:58] with the guidance that we strive

[1:00] I actually see from the grateful for the less even goodness that they come from the grateful

[1:06] for our board members and for their dedicated service, their involvement in our community

[1:14] and for their concern and support of the students in our schools or so grateful for the teachers

[1:23] and support staff and the leaders that we have in our schools and pray for their safety,

[1:27] be grateful to their patients and perspective and continue

[1:33] the efforts to do what's best for the children in our area.

[1:38] We pray a special blessing to be with.

[1:41] The youth in our area, those that attend our schools

[1:44] and the children, we pray for which we continue to.

[1:49] Protection, we pray that our community members

[1:52] will have led us and continue to support

[1:56] work together for our community that they. The adults in the community will continue to become involved in the schools and be positive in their efforts to solve problems with us.

[2:10] And we pray for that help in our meeting today that we will make good decisions and we'll be able to keep clarity and do that a little.

[2:18] We are so grateful for the valley that we live in here, and we are grateful to those

[2:25] manually that serve and protect us, and we are grateful to their contingency, as well

[2:30] in the city, as well.

[2:32] Jesus Christ, amen.

[2:34] No doubt.

[2:37] Please follow me.

[2:38] I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic

[2:47] for which it stands, one nation under God,

[2:51] an individual with liberty and justice for all.

[3:09] But the thank you everybody for being here

[3:11] to let's go on time, since we've been together

[3:13] as a board.

[3:15] Good to see everybody, we'll start off

[3:16] with the consent agenda.

[3:19] Is there any comment or any discussion

[3:22] on any of the items in the consent agenda?

[3:27] Next up, one quick question.

[3:30] The notification received from the view of our courts, is that just something very sinister?

[3:39] They want to stand in there?

[3:40] Yeah, so this is a new, these policies that you're seeing are based on most recent legislation.

[3:50] So we've talked about this, how the legislature passes new laws, and then you respond and are required to draft new policies.

[3:57] This particular policy, we actually use Patrick Tanner, he's the attorney for the

[4:05] Justice School Board decision, and he, it's one of the, a real benefit that we've seen

[4:12] through the USBA, where he drafts policies according to the law.

[4:20] This one, we didn't, we didn't make hard to get any changes, we just took his draft policy

[4:25] that meets the law and adapts adopted fully.

[4:28] Several of the policies will look at that draft

[4:30] and then other district drafts

[4:32] and make sure that we're in compliance

[4:33] with the law that will be making them our own.

[4:36] So yeah, this has been a program that's been in place

[4:40] for several years and it just continues to get better.

[4:43] When a juvenile that lives in our area or has attended our schools

[4:49] is adjudicated to the courts, we receive notification.

[4:52] And I work with our student services director

[4:54] if you know what Anderson, he reaches out to the principal

[4:56] and makes them aware.

[4:59] Some of the students have reentry plans

[5:02] that come with them.

[5:03] This particular policy, the new law,

[5:06] I think the biggest need of the new law

[5:10] was ensuring that other students are safe.

[5:13] So if there's a particularly dangerous student

[5:16] that we have lots in place to either not allow them

[5:20] into school and provide their education in other ways,

[5:23] or have reentry plans to ensure that everyone may be interested in safety.

[5:28] So that's what most of those, well, every policy you see is either an adjusted policy to meet a new law or a new policy.

[5:37] I think there's no news.

[5:39] I think there's a written difference.

[5:41] Yeah.

[5:41] I think the other sort of news is a different one.

[5:46] Yeah, I totally think that's a great question.

[5:51] Any other comments or discussion?

[5:54] What's your call for any attention to student recognition?

[5:58] South severe students won the America 250SA contest

[6:03] at the House of their High School Student Green Mitchell

[6:06] and South severe mental school student,

[6:08] Alan Henry, were selected as the Grand Prize winners.

[6:12] Those students recognized that in the award ceremony

[6:15] they won $1,000 scholarship.

[6:19] That's terrific.

[6:19] We're proud of these students from the South Severe.

[6:25] Any other items in our consent agenda?

[6:30] If

[6:35] not, then I would indicate a motion

[6:37] that we accept that we can send a agenda and the statements.

[6:41] I'll make a motion.

[6:42] Second, the move to the seconded.

[6:45] All in favor?

[6:47] Aye.

[6:47] Any opposed?

[6:49] Motion carries.

[6:52] Next item would be items from the board

[7:04] On our schedule, we have snow college, scholarship benefit dinner on September 23rd.

[7:11] Chris, did you need to take a nap?

[7:14] Yeah, and I can get a hold of you if you don't want to, for sure.

[7:17] Yeah, I do.

[7:18] Yeah.

[7:18] I mean, we've got a town, and I've never missed that, like, they're kind of bad, but I was

[7:23] going to see if my capacity of 10, might your chat, so I still want to support it, it's

[7:31] important. In fact, we've talked queues into supporting as well. They now buy a table and

[7:36] several of the superintendents from the huge region are planning to attend. So I'm

[7:41] hopefully you still support it and you'll be present there. But I very likely won't be there.

[8:01] I am kind of a cheap guy, but I was willing to pay money and I just got out of it again.

[8:06] What I felt was a pretty fair bid.

[8:11] Yeah, as it gets closer all up to here.

[8:14] I think I'm 90% sure I would be able to make it.

[8:20] Probably, yeah, Christy can check in with each of you.

[8:28] There's a second point is the Q's reason to legislate the collaboration meeting.

[8:32] It's at the 30th, it's at the P.M. at the Sickle Bill Elementary School.

[8:38] We want to drive it individually.

[8:40] Yeah, I think if we find a meet together like we've done in the past,

[8:43] and we can get a hand from the high school,

[8:47] can you help us on that, just to get an hand range?

[8:50] If there's one available, what do you think we can hear at what time, Chad?

[8:59] Yeah, I'm not sure how long it takes to probably five.

[9:02] It's probably nine.

[9:04] It's about five to be okay.

[9:09] And then just to clarify that, I was just board membering me.

[9:12] I know some time you knew my spouse has a long,

[9:14] I was just a board member, a bunch of them,

[9:17] but hopefully you can get over with the other.

[9:46] It's about a year or five.

[9:52] Discussing the requirements for the board.

[9:56] Of course, we're going to do about the fact of school bash

[9:59] that's coming up.

[10:07] Nothing else that will move along to the next item, which is the item from the administration.

[10:15] I

[10:30] looked like I'd gotten a fight. I'm just getting that age where about every year I have to go have spots burned off my face by the dermatologist, so that's what that is.

[10:41] Real fun, real fun to deal with.

[10:43] So I didn't get the fight, it was just a squads.

[10:49] My items, I do want to remind you first off about the back to school bash

[10:55] and our opening institute, just created a little flyer for that.

[11:03] I'm excited, I've been in touch with the three teachers,

[11:08] the former teachers that are going to be presenting it,

[11:11] opening institute and I'm so excited to hear from them. We've called it reflections and

[11:17] reminders from a lifetime of education and I really think it'll be a lot of fun to hear

[11:21] from them and just hear their perspectives at this point looking back on their careers

[11:27] in service to kids and children. It'll be a great day.

[11:35] And then, as always, the Monday after

[11:38] the first day, which is August 24th at 5.30. We'll do the back-school bash. We're continuing

[11:45] to see good participation in that. I think most families really appreciate it and it's

[11:50] a lot of fun just to get together. Also, I wanted to thank Christopher all of her hard work

[11:54] on our annual video. It takes a ton of work. I think the hardest part is getting the pictures

[11:59] from the principals. It's just constantly reminding them to send pictures and take pictures

[12:04] throughout the year, but that video is really fun because we play it throughout the back

[12:08] school back, hoping you can all attend and participate in that.

[12:14] My second item, I always include our principal's goal setting sheet, leadership self-assessment,

[12:21] growth plans, school improvement, professional learning plans.

[12:25] This is a key piece in holding ourselves accountable every year at every school, so each principal

[12:31] response with all of these different self-assessments, growth plans, goal-setting sheets.

[12:37] It's kind of their roadmap for the year and we review those very carefully and we talk

[12:43] to them.

[12:44] I want to thank Mike Willis for his hard work.

[12:47] He's constantly out meeting with principals and assistant principals and having the crucial

[12:52] conversations.

[12:53] They're always friendly.

[12:55] I mean, we have such a great report in our district, but they're very crucial in critical

[12:58] conversations.

[12:58] They're not always comfortable conversations about things we can do better, constantly striving for improvement.

[13:05] So, I just always include a copy of that.

[13:08] My third item, I just wanted to update you, our district website, school registration.

[13:15] I wanted to thank Craig, Curtis, and Miguel at Javaria, our two programmers.

[13:21] So, I've really done some fantastic work to continue to improve registration for students

[13:27] and families as well as assurances for employees.

[13:30] It's becoming a very difficult thing to manage and Trista constantly is tracking those

[13:37] registrations for each school.

[13:40] Parents have to sign off on certain things every year as required by law and employees have

[13:46] to sign off on certain trainings.

[13:47] It's one frustration we have that I've been talking a lot about up on the hill is they

[13:53] have heard us that one of our greatest needs for teachers is to provide time for them

[13:57] to prepare, just preparation time, and they stepped up big a few years ago with two

[14:03] additional contract days for teachers, but then those days have been taken away by requiring

[14:10] hours and hours and hours of training that the teachers have to take each year, so it's

[14:16] a little frustrating that for the first year it was wonderful. Teachers had time to catch

[14:20] the breath and plan and be working their classrooms and now there's so many different trainings

[14:26] that are required that the majority of that time gets eaten up. So we're going to continue

[14:30] to ask for more time. So we have seen some things that have improved, for example, required

[14:37] training on, I don't know, you could name, there's probably seven or eight different required

[14:44] training for teachers on various topics. Some of them now are only required every

[14:49] three years or every two years, so we're going to continue to work with the

[14:53] legislature to find some relief. We do need well-trained and well-prepared teachers,

[14:58] but we also think they need well-prepared teachers, but we also think they need

[15:03] I also wanted to, we've really seen improvements on our website. It's clear, it's easy to navigate. I've updated the superintendent's scoop. Binary is still very, very essential. It's number one, a safe place. Our employees are all aware that you do not communicate with students in any other way, other than Binary. Because there's more than one adult monitoring and

[15:29] involved in communications with students.

[15:33] It's also a great way to keep in touch with parents.

[15:36] It's like a social media platform that they can see

[15:39] the good things going on in the schools.

[15:41] Most of our schools do a pretty good job

[15:43] kicking out pictures and updating the communities

[15:47] at each school with binary.

[15:49] I know you're all familiar with it.

[15:50] I won't take the time to show you.

[15:52] But if you want to see just really feel good about what's

[15:58] going on in schools and I do it. If I'm having a bad day, sometimes I'll just jump on

[16:02] binary and look at the schools and it makes me feel better. There are so many wonderful

[16:06] things going on every single day in schools. We still don't do enough of it. We really

[16:11] ought to have teachers sharing at least one post a week. Some teachers are really good at

[16:17] it. Some schools are really good at it, but it's one of the principles that we believe

[16:21] in is that we need to share our story and share the positive. Otherwise, it seems like

[16:27] in society today those those empty spots get filled by negative. So finally is a key piece

[16:34] of that.

[16:37] My fourth item is actually really exciting. I think I've spoken on this but maybe

[16:43] I haven't given you enough of an update. Last year, about a year and a half ago, I was in

[16:52] leadership in the superintendent's association and there's four of us. So there's a past president,

[16:56] President, Vice President, you know, there's four.

[17:00] And I was at the time, I think I was the Vice President, and the four of us got kind

[17:07] of ballin' told by the legislature that we were going to be in a pilot for service.

[17:13] Remember the original proposal from the Governor and Lieutenant Governor was to require service

[17:19] as graduation credit.

[17:21] We were able to help them understand, hey, let's not do that, let's find other ways to

[17:26] make service more important, more strategic for students and families.

[17:31] Anyways, we're basically a year and a half into this now where we are one of

[17:36] four districts piloting, and it has been really a blessing. It's a really positive

[17:42] thing. One of my core values that I've been taught ever since I was young by my

[17:47] parents is if you're having a bad day, you're not feeling good about things or you're

[17:51] depressed, go serve, go serve other people and better yet serve them without them knowing

[17:56] that you serve them. Try to do it in a way that it's something you can do for someone

[18:02] without receiving any credit for yourself. And our students in schools, our four high

[18:08] schools have really taken hold of this opportunity and we've received a little bit of funding

[18:14] to help us. We have service coordinators at each of the schools that function on a very

[18:20] part-time limited hours basis but they're navigating looking for service opportunities.

[18:25] One of the pieces I love the most is reflection on service and we have a platform, a technology

[18:31] platform that helps students track their hours and reflect on the service.

[18:36] So every good teacher knows that closure to a lesson is super, super important.

[18:42] If you teach a great lesson and then you don't have any closure, a lot of times the kids just

[18:46] leave and it's gone.

[18:47] But if you have a way to reflect on the learning or what was learned, it sinks in and sticks.

[18:55] So this program that we utilize tracks, what the students did, and how they felt when

[19:02] they served.

[19:03] And it's been really powerful.

[19:06] The numbers have come in from last year and it's super impressive.

[19:12] So, for our district, with our four high schools, all four high schools are participating.

[19:18] We have just over 71% of our students that are fully engaged in this, which is good.

[19:23] We'd like to see 100% because we know what service can do for kids.

[19:29] And they've actually put a dollar amount.

[19:32] We've had over 8,000 hours of service that students have documented.

[19:37] And we knew that I'm sure we had a lot of service going on in Utah and in severe county

[19:44] before we started tracking, but they put a dollar amount that the service rendered by

[19:48] our students is almost $300,000 worth of service, and there's been some wonderful opportunities

[19:55] serving younger, you know, older students serving younger students visiting lonely, the visiting

[20:03] care centers I mean any any type of search you can think of they've done some

[20:08] projects with the BLM they've done just wonderful service opportunities to

[20:12] help others and then they're reflecting on it and we all know it's why we do

[20:17] what we do in schools when you're tracking something and monitoring it you tend

[20:22] to value it more and it becomes you become more strategic and deliver it in

[20:26] your your service so one of our major goals we know that we have amazing well

[20:32] around it out outstanding students that are serving. We want to get every single student

[20:38] serving in our district. It's been a good program. It's been an additional thing on everyone's

[20:44] plates, which has been tough. There's been struggles and challenges with it. But overall,

[20:50] it's been really, really positive. And I thought it was pretty impressive, as the numbers came

[20:55] through. Several other districts are now wanting to implement service. One of the areas

[21:00] we need to do a better job is celebrating it and letting our community know that we're doing this,

[21:05] that it's been a real positive. So, any questions on that?

[21:10] How do we see that?

[21:13] Those hours and those...

[21:16] Okay, yeah, so they...

[21:17] Is that school?

[21:18] Yeah, we have the data by school. The reports I received were just by district.

[21:24] I have a presentation that I presented all the other superintendents two months ago.

[21:30] Jennifer Tristan sent our CTE director as she's overseeing the project because it actually has some really good alignment with CTE

[21:38] And she in that presentation

[21:41] It's got pictures and act it's it's showing all the different

[21:44] Kit you know the kids in action the things that they're doing north severe for example the whole NS project

[21:51] It we really tried to align it to this as much as possible and we actually received a little bit of funding through this to help with that project

[21:59] And it was really cool.

[22:01] Friends will hear us send some pictures of those community members up there working on

[22:05] the NS.

[22:06] I know there was some controversy.

[22:07] People just wanted the ask for Salina and others were very clear.

[22:12] They wanted NS.

[22:13] You know, it's kind of a struggle.

[22:16] Yeah.

[22:17] I didn't see it up there for a long time.

[22:20] Oh, wait a minute.

[22:20] Yeah.

[22:21] Yeah.

[22:21] It looks really sharp.

[22:22] It was re-engineered.

[22:24] There are some exciting things that have happened with the service, but I can even all

[22:31] share with you my presentation.

[22:34] I'll just email out that presentation and kind of take a look.

[22:36] Well, that would be nice especially when, at the end of this school year, when we try to choose who your service,

[22:44] I mean, your scholarship winner is, you can go back and kind of look at some of them.

[22:49] I'm actually glad you brought that up some of the funding other districts and we were too late in

[22:56] the game but other districts that are piloting it have created additional scholarships using

[23:00] the funding for students we'd like to do that we need to do it it's just we came up with the idea

[23:06] after it was too late I don't like to do scholarships or awards without clarifying the criteria before day

[23:11] one so it's it's fair to everyone involved but the others concern we had was we're not we want

[23:19] service to be self-driven. We don't want kids to do it because they know they're

[23:25] going to get a scholarship per se. We want them to do it because it's the right

[23:27] thing to do. So we're trying to find balance. But we are very much considering

[23:33] some scholarship opportunities while we have the funds. It's not something that

[23:36] will stay funded forever, but this pilot's been a pretty positive thing. Thanks

[23:41] for bringing that up. And yeah, I'll try to give you more data. I think my

[23:47] My favorite part of the whole thing is when the students do little, just simple self-reflections

[23:50] about what they felt more, pretty good stuff.

[23:54] The other one, item number five that I love, this stuff, school merits.

[24:00] So again, one of my favorite quotes is you get what you expect and inspect.

[24:07] So when you truly inspect and value and start measuring growth in an area, is when you

[24:14] really see focus and strategy.

[24:17] And this merit, we call it our school merits

[24:20] for lack of a better term.

[24:22] What it is is when we deliberately send communication home

[24:27] and choose a postcard to parents,

[24:29] when their students do something great.

[24:32] I know in our home, my daughter's a student,

[24:35] she'll be going into seventh grade at Red Hills Middle.

[24:38] And last year she received three of these cards

[24:40] at different times, and it's just a teacher

[24:42] that's taken the card and said,

[24:44] hey, you did a great job in this area.

[24:46] Thanks so much for helping another student

[24:47] or whatever that might be.

[24:50] And it's male home to the family.

[24:51] And let me know those hung on our fridge the whole year.

[24:53] We still have one hanging on our fridge.

[24:55] It really is a positive, it's wonderful.

[24:59] When you communicate home with positive, not just negative.

[25:03] Some of the principals and teachers are calling home.

[25:06] And sometimes it's interesting because the parents

[25:09] and it's like, okay, what did K do now?

[25:11] And it's like, hey, actually did something great.

[25:13] I'm calling to tell you things.

[25:15] He did something great.

[25:17] The cool thing is, as we started tracking these numbers,

[25:21] so we had 10,216 positive notes at home last year

[25:27] in our school district, which I just love.

[25:29] I'm so proud of that.

[25:31] That means every student surely got one.

[25:34] Most students got two or three.

[25:35] The prior year we were at 6,000, the prior year we were at 6,000, before that 4,500.

[25:47] So this year we really accelerated and I truly believe in my heart and soul that communicating

[25:53] home positively with parents and students will do more for our academics than anything else.

[26:01] It's a powerful piece of success in our schools.

[26:05] So I love that.

[26:07] I didn't know if you were aware that we tracked that, monitored that, and we're getting better

[26:10] and better at doing that work.

[26:14] So positive communication is really helpful.

[26:19] Any questions on any of those?

[26:23] By discussion items, number one, I just wanted to mention the rural schools conference.

[26:29] We always take all of our principals.

[26:32] Principal Blackworth, Mitchell, I, and Principal Hepworth from south severe high both presented

[26:36] at the conference and talking to our principals who attended those were their favorite presentations.

[26:41] I thought that was pretty cool. They learn a lot from each other and it's amazing the good

[26:47] things that are going on in our district. The keynote that I enjoyed the most, his name was Brad

[26:52] Monagu and we're working on see if we can't get him for maybe one of our opening institutes down the

[26:57] road, but I don't know if you're familiar with the Kid President, if you Google Kid President,

[27:02] and it's really fun. He's the mastermind behind Kid President. He's kind of the producer

[27:07] of that. He's written a few books. I'll be talking more about him at opening Institute,

[27:11] but one of the quotes that he shared that I wrote down, and I just love it. I feel the

[27:16] same way. He said, be who you were needed when you were younger. Basically, be the kind

[27:22] of teacher, kind of person that you needed when you were younger. And we all needed that

[27:26] extra caring adult so I think we'll keep him on our radar and you'll hear more

[27:32] I'm gonna read one of his books that he wrote at opening institute like I like

[27:36] to do I gave you my second item a copy of what great teachers do differently I'm

[27:43] very excited Todd Whitaker has always been one of my educational he-vows I'm

[27:47] gonna have him autograph the book when we get him here like he's he's awesome he's

[27:51] a veteran expert. This book details 19 different things that great teachers do.

[27:59] What makes a great teacher? Some of the 19 focus on people on programs. Say

[28:06] what you mean, mean what you say. Prioritize behavior prevention over revenge.

[28:12] When we talk about that all the time with our in our schools, with our

[28:15] principals, we want to do positive, positive prevention and reinforcement,

[28:19] the non-punitive, those types of things. Focus on students first. Create positive

[28:26] cloud to classroom atmospheres, monitor student comfort levels. There's just

[28:31] some really good principles that are backed up with really great stories in the

[28:36] book. You'll enjoy reading it. It's a great book. We're going to probably study it

[28:40] for two years. Next, not this January, but the next, when we have our next Midwinner

[28:47] institute, we're going to try to, we've already got a book, I think, we're, we're planning

[28:50] on him. He'll come and present, we're, we're faced to face with our principles and

[28:56] teachers, and we'll likely figure out a way to have him come back. And like we've done

[29:02] in the past, have him come and spend time, time in our schools with our principles and

[29:06] teachers. So I'm excited about it. I think it'll be a really good. Re-focus on instruction

[29:12] and teachers. Any questions on any of those?

[29:18] I just wanted to mention that you look on

[29:20] our vision mission and goals. We're really excited. We've kind of rebranded. There's

[29:24] not major shifts because we're still not there. We still have a gap from where we are

[29:29] and where we need to be with the vision mission and goals. But the teachers are excited about

[29:34] it. We've created these new signs. They hang in the schools. We've created the classroom

[29:37] signs that are small, so every single teacher has them from the center in their classroom.

[29:43] We've made a few small tweaks, you know how hard we've worked on.

[29:48] We don't just teach, we ensure students learn.

[29:50] On our old vision, it had teaching across the out.

[29:53] We were trying to be very bold and help teachers realize that they're not hired to teach.

[29:57] We saw from that a little, because I think we have,

[29:58] we saw from that a little, because I think we have,

[30:00] Close the gap. And it's actually a little more clear. It just says, we go beyond teaching. We ensure students learn. And I think that's more easy. You know, these are teachers to understand what we're trying to do. But we're, we're excited. If you look on our website, you've got the vision, mission and goals. Then you have all the initiatives. They're all lined up. It's, it's a little more simple. Wanted to think, Christa and Shiloh were really hard on that. Really rebranding it, making it look crisp.

[30:27] Just has been gluing these up all over the place, printing them, and getting them out

[30:32] of the teachers.

[30:33] I'll talk more about it at an opening institute, but I'm excited for it.

[30:35] I think it'll re-energize our vision mission goals.

[30:40] Last thing on my list is the JLC priorities.

[30:43] I just gave you a draft.

[30:46] Jack attended this year.

[30:49] I wasn't able to attend, but they were actually pretty smooth.

[30:53] We didn't have quite as much controversy as we sometimes do with board members and super

[30:57] attendance just wanted to give you a copy of that draft and I that's what

[31:01] we'll stick to and push really hard for this legislative session. We'll be

[31:05] bringing it up when we do our meeting at Circle Bill Elementary. We've already

[31:10] sent it out to most of the representatives and senators and it's I met with I

[31:16] spent a lot of time last week meeting with the speaker of the house just

[31:20] in advocating the legislative issues as later I so any questions for me that's

[31:26] all that I had.

[31:30] Okay, thank you.

[31:47] Even get the air going in here. It's a little dead, isn't it?

[31:52] It's been a dead air in here. A while since I've been in here.

[31:59] It's old air.

[32:03] Okay. I hope I don't sound like broken record of all these things. I just want

[32:07] to reintroduce. New year. I could tell it's a new year, not by the calendar, but by how many

[32:13] parents, and having to talk to on a daily basis lately. So it means new year, this year

[32:20] parents are going to be interested in their child's education. So first off, starting

[32:31] with some of the things that we'll be doing next week to prepare our teachers for the kids

[32:38] coming. We're starting with a new teacher training on August 19th, 30th, so just a reminder

[32:50] this used to be a full two day seminar if you will and now training it was brutal way

[32:57] back when we've fine tuned it. We work with them pretty much throughout this day and then

[33:06] And then we have follow-up sessions, three follow-up sessions afterwards.

[33:12] So it's a lot to go over in a two-day stint.

[33:17] They feel very overwhelmed.

[33:19] They're trying to get a new classroom ready and jump in with the right attitude.

[33:23] And if we overwhelm them too much, sometimes they lose a little bit of that excitement for

[33:27] the first day.

[33:28] And so we've learned that if we cover what we need to and we try and pump them up,

[33:36] I

[33:36] district and in a very positive light with them and getting them excited about being

[33:41] here.

[33:42] And then we train them.

[33:43] We use our curriculum council members that I'll go over here in a second with you.

[33:48] And then we save a few things and then if they formulate questions in the upcoming months,

[33:55] we do about an hour to two hour of training, three separate times, one each month for the

[34:03] following three months after our new teacher training.

[34:08] Our efforts are to support all the new teachers.

[34:11] We give them the mentor.

[34:13] They're mentor teacher who is the assistant principal,

[34:16] basically, and they are required to spend time working

[34:19] with them and helping them.

[34:20] And if they have questions, they need some advice,

[34:24] or they need some training, so forth.

[34:26] They need to go see other teachers.

[34:27] Whatever it might be, the principals in the assistant

[34:29] principals have been really good to help with that.

[34:31] And so it's a very valid part of what we do with the new teacher training.

[34:37] Our goal is to hire the best and retain the best.

[34:40] And a lot of times if we burn them out right out of a gate without the support, then that defeats our purpose.

[34:47] So that's our plan and that's what we've done and it seems to, it's done as well.

[34:54] So we're excited to get this new batch.

[34:57] It isn't as many, we didn't have as many retirees last year.

[35:00] And so it's not as many as we normally have, a few less, but we have some great prospects,

[35:07] really, really good people that we're excited to have come on board and be a part of our

[35:12] district for the sake of our kids.

[35:16] So that will be on the 19th and then, like I said, in, we'll just show you real quick.

[35:22] We'll also invite our principals and mentor teachers or assistant principals to come

[35:27] in and do a working lunch on that day and the goal is that you'll see all these checklists

[35:39] this for the principally or no the mentor checklist here and then the principals checklist.

[35:45] All these items are just things that prep the principals and the mentors to go over and make

[35:51] sure they're ready to answer any questions along those lines so they're prepared to discuss

[35:56] us these things with them and then if the new teachers have additional questions that

[36:00] pertain mostly to the schools and they have that opportunity to sit with them and discuss

[36:06] those things. It's really a welcoming way to do it. We found it's not intimidating. We

[36:11] try and make it as user friendly as possible and it's, like I said, it serves us well.

[36:15] These are the additional days. You see that we, people from the district office, we give them

[36:21] assignments to kind of go over other aspects of the district. There are so many things

[36:25] that they have to learn and know about, so it's been a good program and we're excited to continue

[36:32] that with our new teachers and help support them.

[36:42] Okay, and then Superintendent mentioned our

[36:46] opening institute. I just wanted to point out our, which remind you who are curriculum counsel,

[36:53] specialists are in the district for secondary math. We have Melissa, but I'll not only introduce them at

[36:58] opening institute as well, Peyton Ashby, secondary language arts, Jessica Ivy, whoops

[37:04] side, let me change that real quick, he is actually a social studies,

[37:12] Peyton Ashby is

[37:15] over the social studies, Jessica Ivy is secondary language arts, Amy Morris science, Ashley

[37:21] Larson is elementary math this year, and Amy Nielsen is elementary language arts, which incidentally

[37:26] will be our textbook adoption for this year, so we're here enough for that as well.

[37:32] So moving on down the line, I mentioned that we have as many, if you took time to go over

[37:39] that graph there, you'll see that we have 26 new assignments, but that doesn't mean

[37:44] that we have 26 new teachers.

[37:46] We have a lot of shifting, one person that's been in the district for a number of years might

[37:50] become an assistant principal or a principal and a lot of shifting is the shell game basically.

[37:55] And, but 12 actual new teachers that will be attending new teacher training for that day.

[38:05] Another thing that I'll be bringing up at our opening institute is that the Master's

[38:11] Grade program, the reimbursement program that we support, will be recognizing those from

[38:18] the 2526 year that received their Master's degree in our district.

[38:24] It's something that we believe in.

[38:25] We want our teachers to be well trained and continue to further their education and

[38:30] not only for them, financially, but also for the fact that we feel like as long as they're

[38:35] learning and growing and become better at their craft, it's going to benefit our students

[38:40] in the long run.

[38:42] So we continue to promote things like this so that they can continue to get better and better

[38:50] and sharpen their skills and so forth for our students.

[38:59] We have our individual school assessment data reviews coming up which we put together

[39:05] a chart that shows all the scores from all the various assessments that we do throughout

[39:11] the year.

[39:12] Mostly our end of level from the previous year it helps us like superintendents said to

[39:18] keep them accountable and we can sit down with them.

[39:22] And it's their opportunity and their responsibility to share with us their data.

[39:28] We already give it to them and then they share it back with us and where there's places

[39:32] to celebrate and also places that might need extra attention.

[39:37] We can all put our heads together in that meeting and discuss that.

[39:40] We'll be doing that in the next few weeks with all of our schools or principals and their

[39:46] administrative teams.

[39:49] This, it's kind of an ebb and flow, when you're, you might be really good at something

[39:53] and you might need to make improvements the next year and so it gives us the opportunity

[39:56] to sit down with them and really push that narrative that we should always be striving

[40:02] to improve.

[40:03] There's always room for improvement and we need to continue to do that and so it's just

[40:10] another way that we not only hold their feet to the fire but give them that responsibility

[40:16] to really look at the data and use it in their meetings, their faculty meetings, their

[40:21] PLC meetings, and all these things that they get with their teams and their teachers.

[40:25] And then they could also, if they see a wholesome word, as a good assistant principal or

[40:32] instructional coach in the principal, they really need to focus on, what can we do to help this

[40:36] teacher do a better job and maybe relaying the information or those types of things to

[40:43] where those scores will continue to improve.

[40:46] So this is a great opportunity for us to get in the schools

[40:48] and talk about individual success

[40:50] and areas we can get better at.

[40:56] Last couple of things there,

[40:58] one big push right now,

[41:01] due to Senate Bill 241,

[41:04] where you've heard about that one

[41:06] where by 2030 it's an expectation

[41:10] that high percentage of our students

[41:13] are on reading level or grade level. And if not, there will be retention. It's kind of

[41:19] a big deal right now. And so we are being very proactive with that. There's money attached

[41:27] to this bill where there's expectations of professional development and training teachers

[41:33] and so forth. And so we've already jumped kind of in and wrote an MOU, put it out, and

[41:42] are an R&B rather and it was a very, we had a lot of great people bid on this to come in

[41:49] and train our teachers along these lines and it was awarded to impactful learning and they've

[41:56] already got dates in place. I put up their September November March May just depends on which school

[42:03] what day and those months will happen but impactful learning will come in and work with our

[42:09] principles and their teachers on how to address some of those things listed in

[42:15] Senate Bill 241 to make sure that we're ready for when that happens so that we

[42:23] get those kids where they need to be and there's no question that we're doing

[42:27] our due diligence to to help move that needle. So we're excited for that and

[42:35] We really think you're all familiar with the model where we've been hiring some of the best experts in the world in certainly in the country.

[42:44] We started the model with Jimmy Cossus with Culture Eyes where we actually hired him to come in and mentor principals and assistant principals in elementary, middle and high school.

[42:54] He spent two years working with us and our principals.

[42:59] We realized back then we weren't investing in our pencils.

[43:03] We were possibly looking for professional without amount of opportunities,

[43:08] professional learning, professional opportunities for teachers.

[43:11] We wanted to start investing in our new years.

[43:14] So if we had give you costs, then we had Mike, Tom Schimmer,

[43:20] Tom Schimmer, Miron DeWitt, and we kind of started,

[43:24] But we had such a tremendous need in the standard-based rating that the last four years have been heavily invested in our high school and middle school principals.

[43:33] This is a shift now taking some of our limited funds and really investing in elementary principals as it relates directly to improving sharpening, needing instruction, really digging into the data.

[43:48] that the target is to have every single student on a big level by a third grade of course and this SB241

[43:56] made it easy but it's expected.

[43:58] We've got to work through to ensure that every single student has quality.

[44:03] We're going to see more and more heavily on this.

[44:06] We're in a good place with reading instruction, but we need to refocus and

[44:12] a certain lack and really sharpen some of our instruction

[44:17] in our data with reading.

[44:18] So it's a good opportunity to invest it

[44:21] in secondary principles for the last several years

[44:23] and I was talking to you.

[44:24] You invested in elementary principles.

[44:26] But the most part, they seem to be embracing it.

[44:28] This is a good opportunity to support them in your area.

[44:31] They were very, very welcoming of it.

[44:34] They're excited about it.

[44:35] Matter of fact, Jill recognized the engender for throughts

[44:37] and she is the one that is running.

[44:40] That's her company is impactful learning.

[44:42] So she is, no longer with USBE, she was the curriculum specialist over the whole state,

[44:48] super smart lady, and just really good to work with, she's great.

[44:53] It's her company impactful learning that won the bed, and we'll be working with our principals

[44:57] and I think us jumping on the...

[45:00] That right out of the gate, like that, puts us in a really good place because having Jennifer

[45:06] Thronson working with our teachers, especially her time is going to be limited anyways with

[45:10] all the things she's doing. And so others that think about it after the fact, we've already

[45:15] made those commitments, so we're in a really good place with that.

[45:21] And then just a reminder,

[45:23] Deloitte University, that was a courageous principal's conference. We're looking at a second

[45:28] At run of that, we went two years ago for crazy principals one.

[45:34] We're mostly going for two, but we do have some new, obviously, return over.

[45:38] We do have some of our principals that will be in the park one while simultaneously.

[45:43] The rest of us that have been to part one will be going to part two.

[45:46] That's an investment with our funds as well that we're excited to, again,

[45:51] and like superintendent said, invest in our principles

[45:53] and try to make them reach their potential

[45:58] the best we can.

[45:59] And then obviously the solution tree,

[46:01] you'll see a work conference will be June 8th

[46:04] through the 10th, you'll hear me talk about it all the time

[46:06] because I think it's such a valuable training

[46:09] for our teachers in the district throughout the year.

[46:12] And so we've already purchased the slots for next year.

[46:19] And excited for that.

[46:20] So that said, the only other thing up there, number eight, we will be doing Noel and Anderson

[46:26] and myself will be doing our substitute.

[46:29] Hiring and training coming up, roughly August 31st, so that'll be one more thing done

[46:37] for the beginning of another year, and we'll kick it off right, so there are any questions

[46:41] for me.

[46:43] Okay.

[46:44] Thank you.

[46:45] Mr. Lewis.

[46:48] Mr. Lloyd.

[47:00] Oh, yeah.

[47:01] The

[47:06] items, um, which scroll, what's the one before that?

[47:12] Nothing before that?

[47:19] Rather be normal.

[47:20] Where should we do that?

[47:22] It's definitely last one.

[47:25] So if you're familiar with saline at all, um, across from the middle school parking lot,

[47:32] we own, we own a parking lot, but it's unfinished.

[47:36] it's well maybe it was paved one time but the pavement's pretty much gone.

[47:43] There's

[47:44] some apartment buildings there. Can you all see where I've written this

[47:51] property on there?

[47:55] So it's that little square trunk right there. There's apartment

[47:58] buildings just to the east of that that are some old church, old LDS church

[48:04] buildings. And those were recently purchased by a guy in

[48:09] Salina and he's he's actually contacted us about purchasing

[48:13] this property.

[48:16] Talking through it with Anthony in the school

[48:20] and just my knowledge of the property is God I would love to

[48:24] get rid of it. It's kind of a pain in the neck. We've had over

[48:31] the course of the years that I've been here we've had weed

[48:33] issues that we've had to go in clean up the city's got mad at us or we've had

[48:38] homeless people living here in trailers that we've had to go evict you can

[48:45] see to the north at the top of that property we do have some storage buildings

[48:50] there they're old and I'm not sure what's in them if we did consider selling the

[48:56] property we we might have to figure out where to relocate those or get some new

[49:00] storage on our actual campus which is there's plenty room on the campus. That's not really an issue.

[49:07] So what I'm seeking is just and I have it listed as an action item is just the ability to pursue

[49:16] selling this. I would like to just get a hold of a reputable agent and have them give me a cost

[49:24] estimate or a value estimate as well as a write-up on what they feel like the highest

[49:31] and best use of the property is and if they think it's feasible to just

[49:36] negotiate directly with the person that's interested in the property or if they

[49:44] think it would be a value to actually list the property. I have my own thoughts on

[49:49] that. I mean it's basically a parking lot for those buildings already

[49:55] So the highest and best use is probably going to say that, but it's best use is being a parking

[50:02] lock for the adjacent rental buildings.

[50:05] But I would like to, like I said, get ahold of somebody that lives in that world, contract

[50:13] with them to give me those things, especially the value, and then move forward with presenting

[50:20] that information to the board next month and deciding if we're willing to sell the property

[50:28] here if we want to list it or how you'd like to proceed so yeah it's basically been basically

[50:43] been there free parking lot for I don't know I mean probably even back when you're in the principal

[50:52] I don't know that the districts ever actually used it for anything of value.

[51:01] It's the middle school.

[51:05] That's the middle school.

[51:06] Is there a doubt?

[51:08] 20 of parking.

[51:09] Yeah.

[51:10] The big parking lot across the street is probably three or four times the size of what the middle school actually means.

[51:38] I don't know the people realize that's even a public, you know they probably think it's a private lock so I don't know the people parking it much.

[51:47] You know, I've never seen people over there

[51:49] who are home to me, and you have the home to them

[51:51] and you're afraid you'd like to see a parking lot

[51:53] that sometimes I may have a little rest of it

[51:55] because where those trees are,

[51:56] the people that believe in the apartments,

[51:59] part, right?

[52:00] Yeah, that's basically just been their free parking lot anyway.

[52:04] So I actually think that the person that's approached us

[52:08] has, you know, some level of integrity

[52:09] that he feels like he probably should just own the parking lot.

[52:13] But,

[52:16] any other questions about otherwise,

[52:18] of it just be for the end of the meeting for action.

[52:24] My

[52:28] second items are just giving

[52:30] you a project updates. Northsphere high school auditorium is really close to being done.

[52:39] They did have a beginning of year like freshman orientation in there either today or yesterday

[52:46] they were able to utilize the space. Ryan gave me positive feedback on that and the community

[52:52] members and what not that have been that have been attended that really loved it thought it was

[52:56] awesome all the lights aren't installed the house lighting isn't installed they've been on

[53:03] back order we probably won't get them until September but like the sound the systems I believe fully

[53:11] functioning they were installing all the stage lights when I was there on yesterday so those things

[53:18] are going to be up and running and I don't think they start their play until kind of

[53:23] the start of play practice until kind of the middle of September so everything should

[53:29] be in line and working by then.

[53:32] We've done a bunch of lists on it so all those indie things are kind of getting buttoned

[53:37] up.

[53:40] North Korean middle school that administrative remodel, safety remodel, that's essentially

[53:46] done.

[53:46] If I can't think anything, it's lingering out there on that job.

[53:51] The storefronts down the entryway, which we were waiting on some ceiling lights in the

[53:56] entryway and some walk-off models, those things are all done.

[53:59] That looks great in there.

[54:00] That project turned out really well.

[54:04] That faculty and staff should have now have a great space to utilize for faculty means

[54:11] or on the prep period or whatever.

[54:14] the admin area just looks great, it's modern, and then the fact that we were able to make it a safe secure entryway.

[54:23] So it was kind of hit a home run on that project, it got done. Right on time, Tusher really did a good job managing that job.

[54:31] Richfield High School Track and Field Project still mostly in the planning stages of that, especially for the track and field itself.

[54:42] The bleachers, we have finalized the plans on those and the plans have actually went out to

[54:50] the

[54:52] Subcontractors and bleacher providers, so they're they're reviewing those plans right now, and we're gonna bid that at

[54:59] The end of August

[55:01] Just because we needed we need to get that out and bid before the rest of the project because of the sign frame of getting those orders

[55:06] They're just a really long lead item

[55:10] last I think the last one told me there about 200 days out so we're on track we

[55:15] should be able to get those ordered and have them here in time for the end of

[55:19] next summer to be able to install.

[55:23] That's the items like just little details on

[55:26] the track, track colors, where the electricity needs to be, where water is

[55:32] thickens need to be, those things we're kind of working through still with the

[55:36] architects out of the West London with the school, so probably next board meeting, I'll

[55:42] be able to give you an update on the only bleacher bid and how that went.

[55:50] Any questions on

[55:51] those items on projects? Okay. Number three item, I have time to come in but she's actually

[56:01] off today, but we were able to go through the hiring process for Carey Carter's position

[56:06] and we had a really great hiring pool and we'll say too much public meeting about it,

[56:14] but we had a very competitive pool, but we were able to hire a great candidate

[56:19] and Tammy Hanson, she's a CBA, she's got tons of experience in high level accounting

[56:28] and governmental accounting, and it should be a great replacement for Carey.

[56:38] Any questions about that?

[56:41] She lives in Gunnison.

[56:44] Yeah, she's born and raised in Gunnison.

[56:46] She asked if she could wear her Gunnison high sweatshirt,

[56:50] or if she told her no.

[56:52] The only requirement we had,

[56:55] I think she did show up in the one day

[56:57] as she's already breaking the rules.

[57:01] No, she's great.

[57:02] She's from here.

[57:03] She was actually probably our first applicant to put in for the job she saw it and was excited for it and timing was right like

[57:12] Things just seemed to fall in place for her to be able to even apply for the job. So

[57:22] That's all I have we do have some things to discuss and close meeting and then that action item at the end

[57:28] I'll know to you guys to debate that and take action on

[57:32] Thanks.

[57:35] Thank you Mr. Wood.

[57:42] So we do have a closed meeting and the purpose of closed meeting is to discuss the real estate transaction or what else.

[57:48] No, just personnel.

[57:49] First of all, so I entertain motion to come out of our regular meeting and go into closed meeting.

[58:01] I'll make that mentioned in just a couple of seconds.

[58:07] We'll do this by order.

[58:12] Mr. Orr?

[58:14] Yes.

[58:17] Is it Porter?

[58:18] Yes.

[58:19] Mr. Savage?

[58:20] Yes.

[58:21] Mr. Henson?

[58:22] Yes.

[58:23] And I'm a yes.

[58:25] Mr. Perry's will close his meeting and pick a short recess.

[58:30] and we'll keep that up for a couple of days.

Board Meeting

Transcript