I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the standy and justice for all. Thank you everyone for joining us this evening. Uh we'll go ahead and uh let's look at the agenda. Is there any are there any changes to the agenda? No changes. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda as presented? So moved. So moved by Schmidt. Second by Mlen to approve the agenda as presented. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. Motion passes. Uh moving on to some future events, please check the district calendar and resource guide or the district website for a complete list of monthly events. Tuesday, June 24th, 2025, school board work session at 5:00 pm. Moving to consent agenda. Can I get a motion? So moved by Forsber, second by Vala to approve the following items of the consent agenda. Minutes of the May 13, 2025 school board regular meeting. Bills paid for April 2025 in the following amount of $4,967,479 and personnel items. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed? Motion passes. Moving on to presentations, special guests and recognitions. Panther Foundation presentation of donation. Tanya Hardwell, Panther Foundation chairperson. John Selner and Andy Kuzi Kznia. Thank you. I almost had it. Uh Panther Foundation board members, welcome. Good evening, everyone. I'm just going to take a moment to introduce the ladies behind me and maybe John Selner will be flying in here. But I have Andy KNA with me, a board direct board member, and then Tanya Hartwell, who is our chairperson, and this is her last official duty as chairperson uh before she ends her term. So, we're really excited to have her here. But we're here tonight to present uh a really big check to you. So, Tanya, hi everybody. I am so excited to be here. It is an honor and a privilege. As Colleen mentioned, this is my last official duty. It's been an amazing six years, but I am very excited to be here on behalf of the Panther Foundation to present this check representing the various grants and special projects we've been able to fund this year. Thanks to the generous support of our community and many of you in this room from back to school supplies, handing out books at the Tower Days parade this week, being able to support various athletics and activities, and really being able to support students and families at all age levels and grades throughout our community. We're really fortunate and proud to be able to do that. And as such this year, I'm excited to report that we funded $49,950 in grants and special projects. And that is on top of the over $2 million that the Panther Foundation has given to support worldclass learning and initiatives in our community over the years. So, we're very excited. And with that, we have an obnoxiously large check. I I will say that amount actually doesn't include the funds that were raised at the uh party in February for the X Factor as well. That total was an additional $43,000. That $43,000 actually is going to stay with the Panther Foundation instead of coming over into uh the school district funds at this time. But uh so that's an additional 43,000 on top of this that we expect will be um supporting our students with those experiences that we talked about in February. So I think uh Mr. Easter, if you'd like to come down and take a a picture. Sure. Thank you. I can't believe that you're aged out, Tanya. I know. Don't forget you have one year break and then you circle back. one of the highlighting. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. And we we are just so appreciative of the Panther Foundation. I I often think of it as we put all the building blocks into place. Panther Foundation comes in with their generosity and and their fundraising and they kind of fill in the gaps the things that people don't think about that need to be supplied for students, for teachers, for staff like busing to events or uh the one that just shocked me was sending our our uh band over to Europe, paying for, you know, the the shipping of the uh instruments. So, it's the Panther Foundation is extremely important to our district because they fill in those little gaps and things that maybe get overlooked or not seen. You're always stepping up and and filling in those gaps for us. Let's not forget the signs, the senior signs. Oh, yes. That is such a huge community building. And I mean, I'm always awed because you think you know where everyone is and you're like, whoa, I didn't know there was a senior on the street. Yeah, that's fantastic. I also just wanted to add that I think we're incredibly lucky to have the foundation because not only are there are the grants and the wonderful things they do for the seniors, but it's also um one of the things in our district that is just community building like K12, come out to the truck event, come out to the um you know golf event, whatever they can just everybody can come and feel like we're all part of it and it's uh one of my favorite aspects of the Pan Foundation. So I'm great really grateful that we have you guys. Thank you. Thank you. And I since I have interaction with a number of other districts, they are jealous and amazed at the amount of funds that Panther Foundation raises. So, thank you. Thank you. So, moving to um discussions, report and information items. Engaged, enthusiastic, enthusiastic learners align work of adults to continuously improve personalized instruction and responsiveness to meet our students unique and varied needs. Athletic and activities update winter spring 202425. Mr. Will Wackman. Hi, thanks for having me. Yeah, I think that the project X thing that was just that was a real eye openener for people. I think our whole community is like, "Wow, this is unique. I don't know any other school district trying to do this, you know." Um, it just speaks to our school. We're a can do school. There's a lot of I work for a lot of people that are at can't do school. So, um, that's just another way. And Jeeoff and I were at the volleyball game. How do we keep volleyball going? How do we grow the youth because we're really kicking butt in volleyball and we want to keep doing that. So, how do we keep doing that? Well, that's exactly why we have project X and we and I know a lot of people I've met with a lot of people that are really excited, you know, when we do that and it makes a direct, you know, impacts all of our with the varsity sports. People don't realize our feeder programs. We got to get kids in there. You know, if you don't learn how to skate until you're 15, you're probably not going to be on our hockey team. You got to start skating early and things like that. So, um, we've had a great partnership with the Panther Foundation. The golf tournament's coming up. So, if anybody's watching on YouTube, the plug is get your foresome in for Colleen for that. Um, so this is a I like being here at this this meeting. This is like a culmination of like a great month. You think about May prom, 500 kids, awesome event. Uh, senior awards night, um, you know, then I get to go to all these North Suburban championships. So, kids are wrapping up their their careers at Spring Lake Park, you know, and then the grad parties and then graduation obviously was awesome the other day. So, um, I just get to continue with that. And, uh, you know, Marilyn loves to keep hearing that. So, I love being here. So, Marilyn, I come for you. I'll tell you that much. Um, that's Ana Ericson on there. Anya is going to be jumping on Thursday. So, she has her she set her school record of triple jumps. That's a great picture. I took that at the Northwest Suburban Conference Championships. Um, so she's hoping to be all state. And I think if she keeps on the trajectory she is, she will she will be she will not like that I put that picture in there because I did put that on Instagram. She said, "Why'd you put that one in?" I said, "Well, I like to celebrate you." Um, we have I kind of talk about this all the time. We have 15 boys and 15 girls sports and then we have 50 clubs. I always, you know, I count up the clubs before and I'm like, I think we're under 50 this year and we're right on 50 again. Um, we have 85% of our kids do something at our school and that's I want that to be a 100. Matthew does that at graduation where they stand up if you're in athletics and right away and I'm I'm looking I was in the back looking who's sitting down, you know, how do we get them? Once again, our can do attitude as a district. What are we going to do for these kids? We have a lot of kids that come in and I talked to the eighth graders. What if you don't have a club that you see? Come up with something. Find some kids. Find an adult and and we'll make it happen. Um I was looking at the list the other day and I I thought if you like games, you got a lot of clubs here. Um if you can see on that list, you have chess and tabletop games. You have Dungeons and Dragons. You have competitive video game club. Um, then you have like pastime club games, which I found out I'm like, "Well, isn't that like tabletop games?" And the difference between that one is it's old tabletop games. And I'm like, "Well, old is what I played. Scrabble." So, that's what they're calling old now. The Scrabble and Monopoly and things like that. So, how cool is that though, that they're they're sitting around school. It's not just a, you know, 810 to 255. And I tell that to kids. If you're just here from 8:55 to 210, you're missing out. And they really are. You know, I live that at my house, you know, and and I know Allison, the things I mean, I'm thinking about Allison right now. Student council, National Honor Society, Panther Mentors, all you know, tennis. I mean, it just goes on and on. I mean, she took advantage of that. So, um you know, she's expanded her horizon. She's going to do awesome at at UW. Um it's awesome having these these two because I love meeting with them. Colleen's like, "Yeah, she was telling somebody he prepares them and I don't really prepare them. We just talk, right?" Right. And so that's that's the cool part. So I love talking to you guys and hearing what you're going to do. I mean that was was kind of decision day every time, right? And so we finally got Madison and we it was a good thing. That was probably good good decision for mom too on there. So but that's what we have, you know, and I'm going to highlight a lot of these groups later on. But um we do a lot of great things and we have a lot of great adults and we have a lot of great kids. Um and it is a celebration. This is a celebration. Um we have a lot of partnerships. I talked about that with uh with other schools. Um like I said, we we we had started a new co-op with our girls girls lacrosse team because a school didn't ha didn't have enough girls to have a team. So we said, "We want to help you." Um and they were awesome. Our coach Sam Hazbrook did a great job of melding two schools together. That's a really hard thing to do. So we took the nine Rapids girls and said, "Be a part of our program." It actually allowed us to add another level. So, our girls really got to play at the appropriate levels. That's actually a good thing in their development. So, they're actually touching the ball and things like that and it's not just, you know, a game where they're where they're they're not involved at all. Um, so it was it that was a really good thing for us. Um, we had a great year. Um, I was telling one of the Panther Foundation members, it was like hard to pick what to put on this, especially our spring. We've have never had a spring like this. So, in my 26 years here. So those are you see all those our track programs got 260 kids in there. It just keeps growing. I mean we're running out of uniforms. It's like holy cow we got to keep getting more. We got to do that. Those type of things. So that's a good problem to have. You know other people say that's too many. Um I think it's that's a good thing. we have 40 kids that tried pole vault. And I go, "Wow, that's like, yeah, I mean, I I wouldn't try it, but there was 40 of our kids that tried pole vault and and credit to credit to our coaches and things like that that do that." So, and we have a three of them that made the same tournament. So, it was great. Um, I talk about this a lot. What's our purpose? Um, obviously create a positive experience. I've talked about that for years here and we're doing we're trying to do that every day. We're striving for that. Are we perfect? No. Uh I talked last time about our connection with a caring adult. You know, I brought I brought in uh words from kids. I like to look at those surveys from senior. I've talked to a lot of seniors and say, "What did you get out of your experience?" I think I highlighted Coach Dave who was a tennis coach last time. But I want to kind of highlight the last one because I haven't done that as much. Um and this is important to me. um having a child in the school district. Um but it's important to all the kids in the school district, right? Because I want for them what my kid gets and so does Colleen. I know that. So that's why we chose Spring Lake Park Schools. Um so when you think about it, why do we do athletics? Well, it supports our vision perfectly, right? I showed this to eighth graders and I said you this is we're we're co-curricular. I've said that every time I'm in here. And people go, "Well, yeah, you're extra." you know, we're we're the cake, part of the cake and we're the icing. I always say that, but you know, kids feel valued when they're part of a team and we're part of something, right? They get inspired. I watch that every day. Um there's a sense of belonging, right? You're there. I I feel that's why I want kids to be in activities, not to win games, is because I want them to have that that feeling. Um plus, it's good for college readiness. It's good for it's good to have a schedule. It's good to have self-discipline. All those things that they learn. Um, and that's kind of what I want to hit on today. I Here's what they said. Here's what our seniors said. What did you learn? I say, "What do you what did you learn from your experience, from your coaches, from the to work hard, to be responsible, believe in myself, advocate for myself, consistency, be positive, embrace my role, uh, teamwork, sportsmanship, being on time, it's a good one, right? Face adversity, be positive, be patient. all things that that we want that I want for my child that we all do that we want for all of our students, right? So that they can take those on. Why? Because those things those things last. They go beyond a lesson at school, things like that. So, and we want them to be productive citizens, right? That's why I coached, right? It says we want to affect them more than wins and losses. You know, that is part of the game, too. But that's okay. There's a picture there. Uh I put this picture on there purposely. This is the robotics team. We didn't we didn't win state or anything like that, but I saw them at the Rotary Club. Colleen invited me to the Rotary Club. Me and Colleen, we're connected. She invited me to the Rotary Club. But it was kind of to show off what these kids can do. And the when they showed their robots, and Blaine was there, too. These people were floored. And um it goes, "Wow." and they're picking up a ball and they create all this stuff and they're shooting a white canister and and it's like wow and I said after I kind of raised my hand and I said yeah you know what's cool about this like what they kept asking about like building the parts and all that kind of stuff and which is super cool that they built their own parts they use those machines that that we've invested in but I said you know they also learned a lot of other things um like failure like holy cow I they probably they probably failed thousands of times times and go, "How? Well, okay, we failed. Do we just give up?" And no, they figured it out, right? And I watched them pick the ball up and move in and go, "Wow, I know that didn't happen the first time they did it." Uh, so there's some resilience there. You know, I watched today at our volleyball game. We we didn't play very well the first game. I'm like, we're in trouble here, but they bounce right back and by the end of it, we were playing like we we always do. So, you learn those things besides learning how to see and see a heart and all that kind of stuff. if you learn other things that probably are as important as as the the skill that you learn. So, I think that resonated with them because somebody came up to me and said, "Yeah, I really really got I believe in that." So, um that was really cool to see them and it's not about winning. It was about creating a cool thing in a class that some kid got a spark and said, "I want to do this, you know, I want to be on the robotics team." So, I'm glad we have that team for that reason, you know. um and what they can create. Holy cow. When when they do it, I mean, we got some we got some studs, too. Holy Sam Cretchar is the state champion in math. The state champion. He had a perfect score to like the last last meet. I mean, it was like he didn't get one wrong. I get like 17 wrong on every time I do math. That's why I didn't I was a social studies teacher. But he that mean 11th place at the state tournament. We host the state tournament, right? Because they love our building. Um we go we won the math the Oaklair I talked about that last year where they actually win college credits the best trophy ever. You get college you get college credits when you win. So we Mike Hillston Amanda Presinger do a great job with that. Uh our DECA has just grown huge. Uh Sarah Welcon the coffee shop and that but they've just grown in the number of kids involved going to state FCCLA three kids going to nationals. So we're I mean it's awesome. It's awesome to promote, you know, these kids and they just smile and they're, you know, how do we got to figure out how to get them to Florida now? Um, OEC, you know, um, OEC, first, second, third. I was like, I I laughed. I go, Bill, you know, I wrote first, second, and third last year. He said, "Yeah, we got it first, second, third again." I go, "Okay, it's just don't have to change that ever." So, but you know what's interesting about it is, and I they have 11 students that have passed a national EMT test. My son passed that. I have no idea what that was. So I said, 'Well, what does that mean? You know, you get a badge or whatever. And he said, 'Well, dad, I could I could ride be in the back of an ambulance. I'm like, you could? He's like, yeah, you I have to do a little training about which ambulance, but I could be the guy back there. I'm And he's like, that's like the lowest level of medical. I go, well, that's pretty important when if I'm in the back of that. So, don't do, you know, uh, so it was kind of interesting his view on the on the medical totem pole. And I said, well, you're way pass. But, you know, I said this last year, they they save lives and Bill's changing lives. Holy cow. Um, he's awesome with that. I saw his motorcycle. I was went to school before I came here. His motorcycle's there. So, he's there again today. He had a panel of students yesterday when most people are teachers. Yeah, they've had a long year. They're here. I know it. Get out of here. I got to get to summer. He's in there with the student panel saying, "Okay, what do we need to do better? What should we throw out? What What did What helped you learn?" And I'm like, that's like a top program. That's why he's so good. He's figuring out he's not saying, "Well, we're we're good. We don't have to do anything. Another another example what we can do." So, we know about Bill. He'll probably be here in August with national champions and all that kind of stuff. And it's just awesome. It's just fun to watch. Um, Trap and Ste, another great thing. I've talked about them forever. Uh, fine arts, second place in the one act play. It's awesome to see that. You know, I went to Stillwater to go see them do that. It was awesome to just uh see our, you know, our our fans going, we think we got a shot and we got second place and we didn't get first, but whoa, holy cow, we're right there every year now. That's a that's a consistency thing that that we've developed. Hello Dolly was a huge success. Then I want to highlight our music. The our our music had four allstate kids. I mean, we have tons that are all conference and all that, but we had four that are all all state. No other school in our conference has more than one. So yeah, and this is like they go to more, they audition, they get picked, they go to Morehead for a couple days, then they take off and they have to go down. I mean, it's unbelievable what they have to do to get picked for this and we have four of them. So, you know, I'm like, "Wow, that's a big deal." Um, especially, you know, we have a lot we have great fine arts in our conference and we're kind of the leader of that with that. Our speech team, we hosted speech. I I can't say no to hosting. So, we host everything. Um, but everybody raves about our buildings. They do. I I mean, I was with a a at the high school league in a speech guy said, "Your building is perfect for speech." And I said, "Yeah, it's perfect for a lot of things. Come to come to a football come to a football game. Come to a come to our fine arts." You know, those type of things. It it it's it's awesome. I mean, we have great facilities. People are so jealous of us uh with that. Um, I didn't our ultimate frisbee team that was a club. They were sitting on our baseball grass. I'm like, "What are you guys doing out there?" "Well, we didn't have a place to practice." Well, I called the high or I called the NSC. They got on turf. Like, hey, we got turf. You shouldn't be on that. So, another cool partnership we have. But speech, um, what a great life skill if you can get up in front of people that you don't even know, right? These adults judging you and they're scratching as you write. I mean, how hard is that to do? Um, and they just it's just awesome. Uh, our our arts, there's Norah's serenity of turtle. That's a spotlight award. We have like 12 kids that get awards of excellence and superior and this is like the top award you can get. So, we had one her do that and that's what she created at school. So, her spark is art. How cool is that? So, we have something and Miss Art does a great job with them. So, I wanted to highlight those things um because they're really important to me too, not just the sports and and all that. And sometimes people forget we have all this other other stuff at our schools. We had a great sports year, too. Um we were at the XL Energy Center uh with our girls hockey team. So that was awesome to see. Um we were conference champions in in Alpine Ski. We're right there at Nordic Ski. We're this close in Nordic Ski with about everybody coming back. Um those are two co-ops. Um Centennial called us about five years ago and said, "We have eight people that want to be in Nordic. What do you want? Can you Can you help us out? Yep, we'll help you out. But we might have some PE kids that want Alpine in the future. Make a deal. We made a deal. Now we have Alpine. These two coaches are unbelievable. They make every kid what what no matter what school you are, feel part of the team. We have cap. Our Nordic ski team has a captain from every school, St. Anthony, Centennial, and Springley Park. Because it's not about what school you're from, it's about the team, right? And and it's totally fa family atmosphere. Um, I'm floored by by our alpine coach every time we have a postseason meeting. Just how he talks about not they're winning by the way they're winning, but he's talking about, you know, teaching kids resilience and those type of things because in this sport you fall. If you fall, you're done in that. And that's okay. You know, our best skier actually didn't make the state tournament because she fell. And that's tough lesson to learn, you know. Um, but he's doing a great job of making people feel welcome and it's just it's been awesome. um our partnership with them and they love Coach Miller. So, it's a it's been a great thing. Um individuals, Addy Roar was a went to state as a Nordic skier. We had four dancers that were all state. Uh Lauren, Caitlyn, Kennedy, and Gabby. They're all coming back. Uh so, that's a good thing. Clayton's our two-time All State wrestler. He's got the most wins in Spring Lake Park School's history uh for that. Um so, credit to him. Wrestling in and of itself, that sport alone is a life lesson. You know, it is tough. Um there's no it's there's not a fun day when you're at wrestling practice. There's no scrimmage. Scrimmage is wrestling. So, it's kind of the same for about four months. So, credit to him. We had 18 kids get all conference. Uh spring, I told you, we're just not I mean, it's I I can't think of a team that didn't didn't play great this year. Um, our golf team, our boys golf, you've heard me talk, conference champs, second in the section. Chase is playing right now, probably finishing up at the state tournament. Our girls, they're ramping up. Um, now they got second in in the section. So, we're we're just moving forward. Boys volleyball, it's a section seven or state entrance. Uh, for that, we just played today. We're in the state semi-finals tomorrow. So, it's a busy week for me. Uh, but that's a good thing. um third in the conference in track and field and you're talking elite elite track in our conference better than these section tournaments. So our conference track mean if you win that that's that's harder to do than our section. So if we're getting third in those against going up against some really really quality athletic programs. Uh Coach Hail and Coach Falcon are doing a doing a heck of a job. Plus I said there's 260 kids out there. I don't know how they do it but they do every day. Um, with that, uh, Remy, there's Remy right there. He was awesome today. He's not a Mr. Foot volleyball finalist. He is Mr. Volleyball. That was he was announced that. So, he's the best volleyball player in the state of Minnesota. The first person ever to win that award. So, that's pretty cool. Um, that he's been a lot of first, our first scholarship athlete that in volleyball. So, he's been on the team for five years. Um, with that, uh, there's Chase. Chase has been around since he's a seventh grader and he just gets better and better. We're hoping that he follows in his brother's footsteps. We want to be not his brother, but we want him to get those accomplishments because that's his goals for that. Um, we had 18 track and field kids that are competing today and Thursday. 18. We've never had that many. Um, that's a school record in there. Naa, she was bowling. She was all state in bowling. I mean, it just goes on and on and on. It's awesome. Um, like I said, Remy and three guy, I mean, we're gonna have more All State kids because we're not done competing, you know. How cool is this? School's over and we have over like 50 kids still doing stuff. So, that's awesome thing uh for me, too. I got a busy week this week. These are the fun weeks, though. And then we had 35 allconerence. I don't That's We Yeah, I Ridiculous. It is. I'm like I I kept counting. Are you sure about that? Yeah, it's 35. So, uh, we're hit 22 kids going to college to college to play athletics and that's awesome. I always say they're us. They go out into the world as Panthers and go do great things. You know, we've had a lot of really really good athletes. You know, we have we have a guy in the NFL. We have somebody in the PGA Tour. You know, that's pretty cool to say. Not many schools have that um out there. So, they're small. I had to kind of crop them all together, but there there's those kids for you. Uh Carter and and and Leila are AAA. That's a MSHSL award given to somebody that's academics. They're very high in academics. They're really good in arts and they participate in athletics. So both of those uh kids are if you haven't met them, they are the real deal. So they're very very well-rounded. Once again, like our example here, they have done a lot of things. they have taken advantage of what we have to offer. Um, and that's why we, my department exists because school is more than just six periods. That's important, too. But, you know, it's, you know, those things changed my it changed my life and I know it's changed other people's life. So, that's what I always say there. U, and then Brianna, she's she's going to be in the finals of the our 4x1 is setting records and then she's in the 100. She's one of the fastest girls in the state. Plus, she was a Miss soccer finalist and she's going to be a jack rabbit at South Dakota. So, she's a multi-port multiport athlete that multi-allate kid. So, she was our Athena Award winner this year. Um, so like I said, awesome deal. I mean, what a what a I get to do this. So, that's that's fun. So, I appreciate that. I like talking to you about it, but I like going to the games. I get to be a fan today. So, at multiple places. So, you know, and I I don't think Chase shot as well as he did, but what what's he gonna learn from that? He's going to learn. He's gonna he's going to come back stronger from that. Those type of things. So, it's pretty darn cool when he did that. And so, I know there's teachers here and things. We thought, my wife and I reflected about our Arsenal graduated second. There was over we think 200 to 300 employees of Springley Park that had an impact on them. That's pretty cool. So, thank you. You went to early childhood. So, so that's cool. So, you started him on this path. Now he's leaving and we're kind of excited about that too. So, but no, so so he did he took advantage of that, but I was think we were thinking about that and going, "Holy cow, that was like that's a lot of people whether they were custodians or food service people and obviously teachers and coaches and things like that." So, um you know, they helped raise our kid, I guess. So, I feel that way. That's all I got. Sorry. I usually usually usually it's a you know longer than that, but I I try to pack it up. I these people back here don't like that. Marilyn loves it. So, she's my audience. So, does it open up to the board for questions, comments? Marilyn. Well, I would just say if I had advice to give to students, particularly as they come into the high school, I would say take advantage of us. Don't get that offer very often, but we have so much to offer that it's unfortunate if students don't take advantage of us. But thank you so much. Yeah. I mean, there is a flavor for every taste that's out there. I learned I didn't know we had a fishing team until this spring. And so like anything that you ever could imagine, it's available. And so I think it's just so amazing that our little community because we're not huge. I mean, we're not we're we have neighbors much bigger and yet all the variety and all of the opportunity that's available. It's impressive. Yeah. People ask a lot. They say, "Well, what are you? We're big. We're big enough to offer everything, but we feel small." because that's an awesome feeling to have, you know, being part of that. So, living in the community as well. Absolutely. Um I many times when you give this presentation, I I I mentioned this and I'm just going to mention it again in case somebody new is watching. You know, um my kid was one of those kids who was like, I have this activity I want to do and it we didn't have quite as many then. Like they've really they've grown so much even in the last seven years or so. And I I love to see that because it's like the the spark has has ignited and kids are figuring that out. But I also wanted to say that, you know, I talk a lot about how I I've always been very proud of being a part of this district, but one of the things that I'm most proud of is the continuous improvement. Like yes, we're doing it good. What can we do a little bit better? And the fact that you are out talking to seniors and actively trying to talk to kids about their experience, I'm not sure that was is an active thing happening and I really really appreciate that you're doing that because nobody knows better what the experience is like in our activities than the kids who are participating in them the young adults. So um thank you for doing that because to me that's a definitely continuous improvement thing. So thank you. That's amazing to go off of that too and we talk to the eighth graders moving into nth grade which is a huge milestone. They'll be able to figure out over the summer what their spark might be if they don't already already have one in all of those things that you just listed, which is amazing. They go there feeling confident they're going to belong somehow with something or multiple ones. So, I just want to say thanks for investing in the kids like you do. You're definitely passionate and you're in the right spot. So, we appreciate it a ton. I've had a lot of kids come through here, too, and I do really appreciate that. It is it's a genuine thing what you're doing here too and how much you do care and how many names you know because it matters to kids being known by someone. So I just appreciate that a ton. Thanks Will. Thank you. I love the passion will and I just want to know have you ever been Parker? No. No. They hey they so they tried to put it in our department and Colleen said no we are keeping Parker. said, "You can have partner. I'm busy enough." Yeah. Um something Will said earlier when he was talking about um the opportunity to provide and Dr. Kelly made a comment. Jim Eller used to work in the district had a phrase that he used where we're personal in size, extra large in opportunity. And um I always used to say that. I don't know if we've always had that extra large opportunity and I think that's something you saw in the presentation tonight from Will that I think has really happened in recent years and that's a testament to uh the work Will does and you can tell that he's got a strict script um with his presentation. Um no it's like I was waiting for him to say can I get an amen because he has that passion which is real. I mean like since I was sitting with him at the volleyball game today and he's pumped up about the volleyball but he's talking to me about all all other kinds of things and ideas that he's got. So I mean we're lucky to have him and uh he really does bring a passion to the work and it it's just cool you know just doing math that's over 1,700 kids that we have involved in athletics and activities just at the high school and uh he mentioned the the project that the Panther Foundation want to undertake and how do we get the last 300 by getting working with kids that are even younger and making sure they get involved in activities. So, thank you all for the work that you do and it's fun to see. Yeah, you can't retire. I don't know if I can I don't know if I can say any more than what everyone said. You're just doing a phenomenal job and just appreciate your passion and drive and and I can see you're the spark behind the spark that everybody else is receiving. Maybe speaking to the leadership club about passionate leadership. I go, why did you pick me? Well, I still it's there because I think I think it's your passion and your drive and the spark that you have that ignites the spark in the leaders and that just is it just starts that chain reaction. So, well, thanks. Uh I don't do the hard work the coaches and the teachers do. I get that. But it but I appreciate the compliments and I just want to support them. So, that's what you got to do. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Moving to effective operations, improve our effective management of human, financial, and physical resources, monthly financial report for April 2025. Miss Amy Schultz, executive director of business services. She know I was just going to say as Amy comes up because we always kind of joke because she does these budget presentations right after we have a bunch of students. Very exciting. will with the enthusiasm. But one of the things I do want to say is a lot of these things happen and Will is the first one to say because um he talked about it earlier. He said we're not a can't do or a can do. And a big part of that is we've got uh somebody the director of business services who doesn't say no. We'll look at how can we use our resources flexibly. How can we think about doing this? How can we make that happen? So I just think that's important she comes up with all these things that we're hearing about. The numbers may not be as exciting of the presentation, but those exciting things that were just talked about wouldn't be happening if it wasn't for the work that's happening out of that business office. So, with that, I hand it over to And I wish I had Will's level of energy. I do not. Um, so I'll be up here for a couple reports tonight. So, the first one is our monthly financial report. This is the report we see each month. The same three slides on that. The first one, our treasures report shows our beginning and ending cash balance as well as the cash receipts and dispersements for the month of April. Uh you can see we end the month at about 66.5 million. Receipts for the month are primarily from state aids about $8.5 million plus about $200,000 in interest. And then we have some um donations, miscellaneous gifts, things like that as well. Um, one thing at this time of year, and we've said this for the last two months as well, there are no tax receipts. So for February, March, and April, while the state aids are higher, we do not receive any property tax payments. The next two months, we will have very large property tax payments when it's May and June. And then the state aids decreased during those months. So that is where our cash balances sit for the month. Our second report is our statement of revenues. This shows our April monthtodate revenues as well as year-to date our budget for the year which was at this time appro uh revised in January. Um and then that where we are as a percentage of that budget and where we were in April the previous two years as a percentage of budget in those years as well. So on this one you can see that on our general fund we are a really in line with where we were two years ago. um some of that. Last year we were a little bit behind on a few things from where our enrollment sat with the state. Well, this year our enrollment numbers with the state. We have adjusted them down based on our new assumptions, but we had not done that back in April. So, where the state is metering our payments, they are paying us on additional kids that we are not going to be reporting at the end of the year. They will chew that up. So, as soon as they kind of have run those updated numbers, we'll see that come down in future months. Um, on the nutrition services side, we've talked about this one each month this year. Uh, last year and the year before, we were receiving large federal payments in the early months of the year. Uh, supply chain assistance was a lot of it. Um, and those were received August, September, and October and sort of ahead of what we were going to spend. We did not receive any of those this year. Other funds are very comparable to where they have been. And then on a statement of expenditures, obviously the same report again our general fund is a little bit behind where we have been in previous years and we have talked about this one every month. So just very quickly we have several capital projects that are budgeted. Those dollars will be spent in June. So with the large projects we have currently going on and when I mean currently I mean started yesterday and today. So park terrace rough chillers at the high school and our furniture projects solar started at Center View yesterday. So those are all things that we will be paying for in June. Had we been paying them throughout the year, we would look like we were much more in line with previous year's budgets. So we will catch up very very quickly in the next few weeks. Um on the food service, this is also a little bit in line. Our um food prices have gone down. We were expecting them to raise more than they did and they have not done that. So with that on the expense side, we're a little behind budget there. Um, community services, I think on both the revenue and expenditures, their budgets were a little lower last year. So, when we looked at where they were as a percentage, it looked as though they were higher. This year, the budgets have been raised, so they're probably a little more accurate to where we're going to land, which just makes that percentage look a little bit different. So, that's what we have for the month of April. If there are any questions. All right. Moving to fiscal year 25 revised budget and fiscal year 26 proposed budget. All right. So all the work that we've been doing with the school board for the past year plus here we are tonight for the budget presentation of the 2526 school year. Um so as they are pulling that up actually printed it out for a change. Um so for tonight what you're going to see there's two separate parts to this presentation and hopefully you will see it. Um the first one is the budget revisions. And so with that under our current school calendar and you'll see this a little bit later as well on a slide we have to approve a budget for the upcoming school year by June 30th of the year. And once that is done any subsequent changes to um either known revenues or expenditure changes we make adjustments during that school year. And so it's something that's done. Um, all school districts do this. It is not unusual. You make assumptions at the beginning of the year. Your assumptions are never going to be perfect. Um, you're not going to have the exact same number of students show up as you budgeted for. Uh, the state will change something. So with that, uh, we are presenting the budget adjustments for 2425 tonight. That's what we just covered. So on the revenue side, what you're going to see on the next slide are increases in revenue to interest earnings. And this was something that throughout this past year, we've been hearing that the Feds are going to drop rates. Well, they have not. Um, for the most part, they have held throughout the year. So, we are just increasing our assumption in interest earnings to reflect that. Um, as well as this is something that happens each year because when we close out one school year for an audit, we do that around October. Well, the state doesn't actually finalize their data until the following spring. Right now, we actually do not know our final 2023 24 special ed revenue. So, but at this point, they have finalized a few of those things. And so, with that, we received more in final revenue for last year than what we had received when we recorded the audit. So, that's the adjustment. Um, it's called an under approval of last year's revenues. And then in addition to that, we have had some increases in county grants. So, and just miscellaneous revenues. So, we've adjusted for that as well. And on the expense side, we have increased staffing costs. And this is primarily due to filling positions. Every year, we make assumptions on how many positions will go unfilled. And our all of our departments um and programs as well as human resources has done a fantastic job of getting those positions filled at a higher level this year. So we are adjusting the cost up and that is a good thing in this case. So with that you can see the chart that's going to show in the green column what the proposed revised budget will be. The only number that has changed is the general fund. All other accounts are the same as what they were when revisions were done in January. So with that the general fund would be increased to n almost 92.7 million. On the expenditure side 102.8 8 million. Um, and so those again reflect those large capital projects that are one-time spending pieces where we are using some assigned fund balance to get those projects done. And then so in total on the revenue side, our budget is 113,172695 and on the expenditure side 122,739796. These are the numbers the board will be asked later in the presentation to approve. So I should say before we move on to 2526, were there any questions on 2425? Any questions? All right. And I should say the board has heard this multiple times. So what we're presenting tonight is not new to the school board at all. Many questions, more detail. What's tonight is more summarized for the public. So all right. So moving into 202526, one of the things we really try to focus on is that our dollars are really, and Dr. Ronberg spoke about this earlier, they are aligned to what we want for kids and staff. So a budget is really just that. It's a tool to get done what we want to get done. Um, and so with that is really dei developing this budget so that it aligns with our purpose and vision. Um, and so with that, you'll see some of this language repeated throughout several slides in the presentation. Um, and one of those you can see like right on that first page. I can't tell if it's showing up better with what other people are seeing on that, but you can see our district's uh one page it doesn't strategic plan. So with that, and I realize no one's reading the small print on these. These are all on our website, so people can see them there as well. And many of these we hit on the bullets as we go through the presentation. Um, again, we'll touch on just the calendar really quick. The board's been seeing this since last spring when we walk through a long-term projection model. So, they've seen this year plus several more. Um, but then in July of last year, we start with the property tax levy where we report data to the state. They do some they call them property tax runs. The board approves a preliminary property tax levy in September and then the final is done in December. So that December approval that was done in December 2024 has driven the property tax revenues that you are approving tonight as a part of the overall budget. Um and then again from last year through this entire school year we've been working with the school board um making sure that we kind of come to an agreement on what are those assumptions we want to use when building the budget. What are those priorities as a school district? um that we would like to make sure that we are funding not only for the current year but as we're looking into future years as well. Uh so in May the school board reviewed the proposed budget and again asked a lot of questions so discussion on that and then tonight it is recommending that the school board approve the 202526 budget. So again on the guiding change I don't slides Jeff want to take I can take it or well I was going to go back to this whoops the previous slide real quick because one of the things is anybody that may be tuning in and they see all these you know numbers like $122 million and it's just a quick approval after a brief presentation. I think what's key is if people look at this, it goes back to the spring in 2024. And we're talking with you um all the way back to those times about what are strategic choices that we want to make. things like we have a fund balance, but a fund balance is onetime money. But what are some of those things that are more onetime in nature, such as maybe a curriculum resource adoption or um an HVAC project or some of our facilities improvements where we're moving, we're utilizing some of um our fund balance strategically so we can create room in our fund balance, I mean create room in our general fund to continue that programming and and make sure our class sizes are down, make sure that we have some of these things in place that we uh want to have in place. There's a lot of conversation that goes on with the board, you know, from spring to get to this point tonight. Um, this conversation really started a year ago as we were making decisions on last year's budget because the decisions you make today are going to have implications down the road for future budgets. So, I just think that's important for the public to know. Um, and so one of the things that Amy just shared the strategic plan and what we look at that the other piece that we work with you on as we do that work throughout the year is we use what we call a guiding change. within that on the left side and I know you can't read the small print that's not the intent on this but we do have the context and rallying what are the assumptions and that's something that um we bring a first draft of this for this budget for you all the way back in like November and December where we start talking assumptions and Amy will have an initial draft and what are the assumptions that we can make on enrollment um at that time and then we adjust that throughout the year. what are some assumptions that we think might happen with the legislature in the spring and we make adjustments on that. But um so on the left side are really those context and reality and the assumptions and then what are the desired results? What do we want to happen with the the resources? So um those are some of the things we do. I'll kind of let Amy walk through some of these um influences and assumptions that we kind of hit on throughout the year. All right. So with that um when you looked at that guiding change document those columns kind of the next few slides outline really what those are speaking to. And so those um when we talk about those assumptions we don't just okay we're going to carry forward last year's budget and add 3% to everything. I mean we go through each program each line whether it's utilities transportation um our federal grants. We go through all of those and at that point we kind of say, "Okay, this is where this program is expected to be and we make sure we're aligning our resources to support the program and what it has coming up in the future year. Sometimes it's a large curriculum adoption. Um, other years it's lower. So though, and sometimes there's a large technology influx where we know we need to buy a lot of iPads in here. So each of those things may not be the same amount year-over-year. So they're not budgeted that way. Um so we do look through our entire system and what are those things that we need to adjust on an annual basis as we do this. Um and as a part of that we look at what not only what are the funding sources, what restrictions do they have and in what ways they need to be used but we really try to start with what are the student funding needs and the student support and then we look to how do those funding sources support it and how can we use those as flexibly as possible in order to meet those needs. Um as far as the 20 25 legislative session. It is now done. When this was put together last week, it was not. So, one of the things um Dr. Annabber and I talked about last week though was what we expected to see happen. We knew that on Friday. Um but really the change is going to be so minimal from what the board has seen in our projection model that it wasn't worth changing what you had already seen for the numbers we were going to present. We do know there are things that are going up. um they are holding compensatory education harmless for one more year. So that's another one-year kind of a band-aid where they're going to hold that up. So that would make our projections higher. And on the other hand, the student support aid as well as the library aid which they just gave us in the last session, they are now lowering those as well as lowering the reimbursement for special ed transportation by 5% this year and then another 5% on top of that next year. So, as we look at those, the net effect on our budget, it from what has been presented already is kind of flat. We might end up slightly ahead, but it's I mean, we're talking maybe $100,000 in the course of the whole budget. So, um where it closed was not a windfall compared to what we've been expecting things to be as we've been doing this process. Um, in addition to that, so on the enrollment side, this is one of those things you'll see an enrollment slide later on, so I won't talk a lot about that other than we are using our average daily membership. So that is the average time students are spending in our school over the course of the year. We have about 6,200 students come through our doors in every given, you know, each year. But with that, some of our high school students might take four courses with us and two courses as a post-secary enrollment option. Well, when they do that, they are not a 1.0 student. They're a 67 student. So, each of those things kind of influences how those are recorded. So, when we say average daily membership, it's the average amount of time students are in our system. Um, but that is a reduction of 45 students from what where we expect to land for 202425. So, other assumptions, the general education formula increase, this is going up by $200 per pupil. Um, 2.74% over the current school year. Um, and we I know we talked a lot about this with the board um the last time we talked about the budget. That is a 2.74 increase on half of our general fund budget. So, when we look at the $13 million number, it is not a 2.74% increase on that. Um, as we look at our general fund graph in a minute and you see that it's 70ome percent of our general fund comes from state aids. This is a portion of that. So it usually ends up being about half of that. So instead of being a 2.74% increase um to our total general fund revenue, it's really about 1.37. So, um, in addition to that, we just talked about the compensatory aid and then all of our other revenue streams we've assumed will continue forward at the same levels that they have in 2024-25. So, that includes our title grants, uh, Q comps, achievement integration, and other grants that we know are ongoing. And on the expense side, we do budget inflation, but not in all of our areas. So, we really have tied those to mostly the purchase services and utilities. So, those go up. Um, in addition to that, I think transportation is on here in a few. That is one where if we already have a signed contract, we know what that increase is going to be. We built that inflation into the budget as well. Staffing costs are based on either contracts that have already settled or what our expected settlements would be. Um, maintenance. This is one where we have obviously our buildings and grounds department as well as our long-term facilities maintenance, health and safety. Those are also a part of this budget. And that's one of those that later on tonight you will see a separate action item that is also approving the long-term facilities maintenance plan. It's a 10-year plan, so it kind of outlines what we think our spending is going to be over the next 10 years. But with that, it is setting the amount for fiscal 27 actually that we will be levying for for that program. And so that is something again that's coming up as an action item to approve that plan as well. Um class sizes we're maintaining are already highly competitive class sizes. Uh special ed cross subsidy. This is one where while the state did make some strides in the last couple of sessions, um it is still there's still a large cross subsidy within special ed. So what that is is we are required and we should be to provide the services to students but with that the state does not fund the entire cost that we incur to do that. The difference is considered the cross subsidy. Um compensatory this is another area where this is something the legislative session did do and it's a one time only. We have been required to allocate 80% of the compensatory revenue that a site receives back to that site. The other 20% can be used across the district for student needs. Um this session has allowed for next year only to do 40%. So 60% would have to stay at the site. 40% can be redistributed. And so really what that does is that allow that's that flexibility we use when we say we really look at student need and then apply the funding sources to meet it. So in approving that tonight, you would also be giving us the flexibility to continue to meet student needs based on that. medical premiums. This is one that we that is based on our expected costs going into next year. Um and then any other supports that we've had going through all of our other um positions and programs. So on desired results, you know, this is that one that we talk a lot with the school board about our desire to create a structurally balanced ongoing budget. Um, we know that there are years where we will use our assigned fund balances in order to get larger projects done, but we really do work as a board and an administration to make sure that year-over-year our revenues are in line with our expenses. So, and that is something we will continue to focus on and we do that to make sure that, you know, as we've said earlier, those programs that we are offering now, we are able to continue to offer into the future. Um obviously our continued focus on improving student learning and we our u desired results is that our negotiations assumptions reflect that student resource investment. Obviously we want um highly competent and staff that are happy to be working in Spring Lake Park. So we will develop that budget based on that current reourse system. This is something we kind of talked about in a previous slide as well. So with that those are all those assumptions that we have built into the budget numbers that you will be seeing in a few slides. All right. So one of the things that it's important to do you've been talking all about the allocation that really comes back to this district operational plan. So we looked at the strategic plan earlier. One of the things that um we talked with you about a number of at a number of work sessions and meetings recently is what kind of what's that focus for next year. Um, one of the things that I think is important how the budget and this work hand in hand. When we put together what's on the right there, our 25 26 district operational plan kind of at at a glance, these are the projects we're working on. As we develop that though, we're looking 5 to eight years out. We're thinking where do we want to be in five to eight years? What and so when we look at something like deep and student engagement through innovative and personalized learning, we're looking at what are those things that we want to see happening for kids that want to be in place and we get input from people throughout the district on that. And then we come back and say so what can be accomplished in the next year and we allocate resources for it for that hand in hand that's where we can't just say get really excited about this plan and say cool we've got the resources to do it all this year because then we don't want to have the resources to move to year two. So that's where that forecast is important. So the budget that you're looking at tonight really aligns resources with this for the coming year. But we also have that forecast that we talked about where we can look at how do we utilize those resources? How do we make sure we're positioned for this district in the future to make effective decisions and have effective programming for kids not just today but also into the future. Um so these are some of the things that are really important that this is our primary focus is how do we continue to deepen the engagement of our students. I think Will did a nice job when you talked about athletics and activities that it's not just what happens in the classroom it's what happens throughout the day um for kids and there's a lot of ways that we're going about doing that. um the Schlei Center who you know we've been partnering with a great deal. They they really assert that that core business of school is to produce work that engages students, right? We want students to really look at the work they're being asked to do and see value in that and choose to volunteer their time and attention. Um so they persist when it's difficult. So, that's something that we're really working on and really have looked at how do we make sure that we have people in place like you've had a chance to hear from some of our teacher facilitators in the past year who um receive extra time and training maybe sometime like at the secondary level they might have an extra hour to be able to do some of the planning for that so that they can support their colleagues in doing this work. So, that's just an example of how we utilize those resources. Um so that's something that's really important and with that we can move into um just one more part of our budget. So I'll hand it back to me. All right. So again we've spoken with the board about this quite a bit when we talk about our levy resources. So a component of our general fund and our debt and community service funds are our levy resources. So our property taxes. Um, back in 2019, our voters did approve a renewal of our operating referendum as well as a capital projects levy that were set to expire. Uh, those currently are set to expire now after the 202930 school year. Um, this is one of those areas. Our general fund operating referendum has not increased since 2002. We are the lowest of the metro school districts in our operating referendum per student that is voter approved as well as second lowest when you combine both our capital projects and our voter approved operating referendum. So we have been very fortunate to be a growing district that has helped. But we have also been very fortunate to have a school board and administrators and leaders in our district who have been very purposeful in how they use their resources, how we used our COVID funding dollars and all of those so that we weren't adding programs to then reduce those and then going back to our public to try to continue something that we added maybe at a time when we should not have. So this is one of those things that as a district we have been looking at this um and just making sure that we're kind of making sure we know where we stand on this. So as that goes right now we are in the lowest but we have been able to continue to offer excellent programming as we have done that. Um again enrollment was a big part of that and that is something we are going to see in one of the next couple slides as well. So on our long-term facilities maintenance revenue again you'll see that action item later on to approve that. Um, so I won't talk about this a lot other than to say kind of what this fund is. This is to um to handle our deferred maintenance within our buildings. So when we think of roofing, carpets, painting, um, as well as any of our health and safety pieces that we need to do. So think in a science classroom and you have eyewash stations. All of those things come through this program. And so with that, the funds to support that will be approved later on tonight. We did approve the N Metro 916 long-term facilities maintenance program at the last board meeting. So student enrollment as like I said we've kind of talked about that one. We have known demographers have been telling us that our enrollment was going up but have been going up and that we were going to plateau and then start to decline and we are seeing that. Um, so when you look at this graph, I know the specific details are harder to see. At the very very bottom is early childhood and can um pre kindergarten. That red block is kindergarten through fourth and then it goes fifth, 6th, 7th, 8th, and 912 is the blue at the top. You can see where we were growing and we plateaued for several years where we were within just a couple of students for several years in a row and then we have gone down slightly the last few years. Um, in order to make the graph not even more difficult to read, if you put 10 years prior to this, so if you went back to the 200 78 school year, between that and 201617, we went up 1,200 students. So at 120 a year was our average increase. So So we mentioned just the graphs. We won't spend a lot of time on this. This is really just kind of a graph format of what you're going to see on a slide that shows all the total numbers by fund. So, we did mention that 78% state aids, you know, and kind of how that ties in when we hear a general education formula allowance. Um, most of these are pretty self-explanatory. Under other, those are things such as summer school. The way we receive that funding, it's not considered a state aid. It's actually considered different because we get it from an outside source by partnering with Northeast Metro 916. So that lands under other as well as participation in athletics and activities and gate receipts and miscellaneous donations, things like that. On the expenditure side, you can see by far we are very um peopleled organization. So compensation is our largest expenditure in the general fund. In addition to that, we took purchased compensation. This is sort of to reflect where we believe if you were going to compare us to other districts where they have um programs such as transportation inhouse and they're paying their own bus drivers. We aren't doing that. We use bus companies to do that. This is kind of the amount that we believe if you were going to look and try to compare us across those districts, the portion of our purchase services that would actually relate back to staffing costs. Um, so with that, just within these programs, again, the compensation piece, that's our salaries and benefits under purchase services. This is a very large category. It includes our transportation, our northeast metro leases, so leases that we help pay for on behalf of being a member of that district that our students attend, our postsecary enrollment credits for no Ramsey Community College. Um, and then contracted special education staff. Um, anybody that we're kind of contracting to do work with it for us. Um, under supplies then a lot of that is our classroom supplies and softwares. capital equipment is obviously those some of that work that we're getting done such as roofs. Um and then other are just kind of those smaller pieces. So with that that final piece then is this is the amount that um what the board would be approving in total for 202526. Um and then again as a part of this we talked about what that would mean from compensatory education that it includes long-term facilities. You can see that amount broken out on here, but you can see in total then this is really coming in very close to where we had our 202425 revision. Um, so with that, this is what the board will be asked to approve later on tonight. Uh, what the board approves is really that total by fund. So in total about 113 million for both revenue and expenses. So with that, if there are any questions, any questions from the board? A lot of this we've covered already writing in. Thank you so much for explaining so much of the center other times. Like for real, it helps a ton. So, thank you so much. I'm also going to say I'm so grateful for your leadership and your entire team's work on this. Um we have been very lucky with the growth of our district in the years past and um we're lucky to have a thumb balance to lean on when we want to do some of these onetime projects. But as we all know, you know, we talked earlier about what's happening in the legislature. Things are um not really growing there, of course, and our our student population is plateauing and going down a little bit. So, it makes me uh very glad we're in the position we're in that we can continue to provide for our students and But it's also great that we're doing long-term planning so that we can make the necessary decisions we need to make in the future to keep um you know to keep giving our students exactly what they need. So thank you for all your leadership. Other comments. All right. Thank you. Thank you Amy. Moving on to superintendent report. All right. There's all kinds of fun things with the end of the year to um share. So, it is pull that up. So, I kind of scroll through and let you check out these pictures and won't uh try to talk for the pictures first and I'll comment later on graduation, but one always the best shots each year is getting the kids throwing their uh um caps at the end of graduation. Oops. I should turn this on. There we go. All right. So, last days of last day of preschool. Last days of preschool. Sweet moments of discovery for our youngest learners. So, let's see what some of our kids were up to. Pretty amazing job down there. Right. So, this is Louis. He's a 2-year-old student in early childhood. He got a special surprise to help him make his hearing aids more familiar and fun. So, a new stuffed animal friend that wears their own mini pair of customdesigned 3D printing hearing aids made by Dakota, a senior in the how to make almost anything course. So, I thought that was very cool. So, again, very cool to see how the learning at the high school is relevant, making a difference for a kiddo, right? Um first graders uh created their own number corner for a summer month and then they wrote about their understanding of mathematical concepts, justified their choices, described challenges, presenting their findings to peers. So much more than a worksheet. So it's just that's kind of this this kind of work that was coming directly out of some of that work that you had the chance to hear about throughout the year um around engagement. These third graders had their final art project of the year. Each became a food truck entrepreneur where they designed their own truck with a name and a logo. Cool. So an out of this world experience when mobile ad productions visited the school with the sky dome planetarium. Students made connections to what they've been learning about in their wisdom space module. Sixth grade. So Will talked about music earlier. It starts early. So sixth grade choir had their final performance of the year. So a ton of kids up there which is fun to see. Um this was fun. Most of you had the chance to get around during staff appreciation at each of the schools and Eric and her team did a great job taking these comments and feedback that we heard from the community at each school. So each of these were unique to each school. Um so staff could see the many comments that families had to say about their experience. So it was always fun to see the teachers and staff go over and read the comments. So we celebrated uh some of our staff who are retiring. So had fun with them getting their bells. Can't remember what did Karen have. It was the first time somebody had something other than their name engraved on the bell. I did it. She had it engraved on her bell. So it was that was pretty cool. All right. This is one of my favorite stories that we've had. So Isaiah attends 916. Um been there since fourth grade. He's always been an athlete though through Spring Lake Park schools because he's one of our kids. um and he actually qualified for state in the triple jump. And it took so many people from 916 from our high school, from our coaching staff to really make this happen for him. And that's at um 9:16 at Kora them celebrating him when he was running out um after qualifying for state. And uh just pretty amazing. It's the first um student at COR at 916 has qualified for state. So very Yeah. Yeah. That's the Yeah, that's what he's That's the pep rally that he's running through the sign there. So, very happy for Isaiah. And then this was I know some of you were able to be a scholarship night. 173 students were recognized. Over $86,000 in local scholarships awarded to our to various seniors. And this is fun. This has been growing in recent years. And so you can see shots from each of our schools where some of our graduates go. And uh the kids at the elementary schools love seeing the seniors walk uh walk through. Be fun to see. This is also was new last year. Did it again this year. Our fourth graders wrote notes to the graduates that were tucked into their diploma covers. So, I'll let you read that one. Yeah. And I like how you didn't make it through so many oh so many years of school. A little picture. Yeah. A little little bit of picture book influence there. Oh, so many years. And then graduation, which was just awesome down at Maruchi this year. It was it was a blast. The student speakers were amazing. So just it was fun. Yeah, I already commented on them, but yeah, our student speakers were just amazing. And I just have to share because I didn't get a chance to share with all of you and she went mind me sharing Liliana in the middle. She was on the superintendent principal's advisory at the high school. Met her as a sophomore when she was first on it. And what was so cool about seeing her be a student speaker, I remember first meeting her and she could hardly get herself to speak in a group of just 10 to 15 students. She was so shy. So to see her and the growth that she's made to get up there and speak was I was super proud of her. How's that? And I just thought this was kind of cool. We got this message um from our school resource officer, Erin Em shared this and I thought this was important to share especially when we've heard about some of the challenges some of graduations have had. So he he just uh he shared this. This is just a direct quote. The University of Minnesota Police Department shared with school resource officer here Nimik how impressed they were with how our graduation ran. They advised that our graduation ceremony was probably the smoothest one they had. The sergeant in charge of graduation ceremony stated that if they ever have training on how a school should organize their graduation, they should use us as an example. So that was pretty cool. So huge kudos to Colleen and Erica from the district and to Matthew and and Megan and the staff at the high school. So many people over there work so hard to make this happen. So very proud of them for that. So and then last week we had our tower days parade. So good looking board already to walk the route there. So So just some upcoming dates on the calendar. So people can find next year school year calendar on the website. Um they can also see SLP summer at spring parkschools.org to get information about summer meals, summer hours, summer programming, school supplies, etc. The district service center summer hours will be Monday to Friday 7:30 to 4. So I've been ask people ask where what are you going to do all summer? I'll be here. We're getting ready. You approved $13 million budget earlier. that doesn't you don't typically just shut down $13 million business and open it up in a day. So, it's going to be a lot of work happening this summer to be ready for next year. Some more these are just pictures end of the year pictures. So, kind of fun. What's cool is the kids like um Hope often talks about her vision of our personalized learning is you know the kids are running in the doors um you know because they're so excited to be here. One of the things the last day is you see the tears. You know, it's good. Kids are always excited for summer, but they're also very sad to to see school away. There's our staff that's over at Westwood giving their wave to the buses as they go. That I don't know. Yeah. And then I just wanted to before I go, just I did want to share Amy talked a little bit about the budget in the legislative session, but I thought I'd just share real quick. It's part of the super report. So yesterday the legislature completed their special session um as you know and this was good um one I'm just glad they actually got it done. So that's good. Um and this was good and bad news for us as a district I guess I'd say. So the best news is that the basic per pupil formula um will continue to be linked to inflation at least for next year and the following year. Um there was talk of dellinking it from inflation but they did keep that linked and that's really important. That was something that um there had been a lot of advocacy that for years and we got that last session and so that stayed so that's important. One of the key things though that Amy mentioned is that's um not on 100% of our budget. So when they see that we get two and a half% increase that's only two and a half% increase on about 64% of our budget. Right? And so when people say well if you're getting two and a half% increase and inflation is only two and a half%. How are you not keeping up with inflation? Well because that's only on 64% of our revenue. Most of the rest, like for example, the levy that was passed in 2002 hasn't changed since then. It's the same amount. So, our expenses have changed. Most of number of our federal funds and so on have gone down. So, I think that's important to point out. In addition, um there was a hold harmless provision for compensatory aid, which Amy mentioned, um which is very important for us. So, we get a lot of compensatory aid. It really supports um the academic specialists that we have in our elementary schools. um some of the courses and things that we have in place like ACE at the high school for students who might be struggling and need some additional support. So that's really important. However, the hold harmless is only for one year. So there's still going to be important that will be some important work for us to do in the next year is some advocacy for the legislature to get that right and get it fixed long term. So it's not this thing to wonder. One of the benefits we had as a district with our fund balance was that we were able to in our budget planning to keep our academic specialist place keep all those teaching positions in place because if they would have made um if they would have got where we were at one point projecting to lose two $2.4 million in compensatory aid, we had a fund balance to cover that. So then we could make really purposeful decisions long term. some of our neighboring districts and other districts had cut those positions already because they didn't have the fund balance to be able to cover that if that happened. So, they had to make decisions um because the legislature wasn't done. So, I think that was a benefit that we had that. But now, that's something that has to get um fixed. But, there were some cuts that impact us. Um one is, as Amy mentioned, the area specialed student transportation. So, there's cuts in each of the next two years. There's also cuts um in student support personnel aid in each of the next two years. So that's where we've added some counselors in recent years and now they've cut that funding that we were planning on to implement some of those changes. They also are cutting school library aids. So those cuts will incur each of the next two years. Um further is this bright sunny information that I'm sharing is that the legislature will start the next biodium in a deficit. So um we're going to have to to look at that. So that idea of what are the choices that we're making today, right, with that budget as a board, you've looked at that long-term forecast and that's one of the things I think is important for the community to know we're not just looking at balancing budget for next year. We are looking forecast and we're not expecting a windfall to come and and be a rescue. So how can we use our resources wisely over the coming years? So I think um that's really important. So that's it. Thank you. Right. Moving on to action items. The first two action items are related to the uh budget which we just had a presentation on the uh fiscal year 25 revised and the 2020 2025 2026 proposed budget. Um so can I get a a motion to approve the uh fiscal year 25 revised budget? So moved. So moved by Skully, second by Valva to approve the fiscal year 20 25 revised budget as presented. We already had the discussion. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. Motion passes. Can I get a motion for approval of the 2025 2026 proposed budget? So moved. Second. So moved by Mlullen, second by Hennon to approve the proposed 2025 2026 budget as presented. We just had the presentation. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed? Motion passes. Moving to approval of the fiscal year 20 the fiscal year 27 application for long-term facilities maintenance revenue. Can I get a motion move? So moved by Forsber, second by Skully or sorry Schultz Oh my good. We don't have a Schultz. We don't have a Schultz. We were just listening to my All right. Sorry. See her? She started to stand up. Yeah. Sorry, Summer. Now you're making motions up here. Summerrain. So that was Schmidt. Yes. To approve to approve that the fiscal year 27 application for long-term facilities maintenance revenue be submitted to the Minnesota Department of Education. So that was also part of the presentation. Uh Miss Schultz had touched on that. All right. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. Motion passes. Can I get a motion for designation of school board meetings for the 2025 2026 school year? So moved. So moved by Vala. Second. Second by Scully. to to to designate the second Tuesday of the month for the regular schoolboard meeting 7 p.m. with communication to the board administration starting at 6:45 p.m. and the fourth Tuesday of the of the month for school board work session 5:00 p.m. for the 2025 2026 school year unless otherwise noted at the district service center and it's the address here and then also it lists the uh dates uh through 2025 in 2026. Any discussion we covered this in our board retrieve sorry couple of meetings that are not on Tuesday but they're due to elections. Yes, that's correct. Would you have that We do have an election coming up. Other discussion. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. Motion passes. And moving to approval of 2025 2026 annual QC count memorandum of understanding. Can I get a motion? So moved. So moved by Forsber, second by McAllen to approve the 2025 2026 QCount memorandum of understanding. And we have Dr. Oan. I know. Good evening everyone. I just wanted the the QC comp memo. The QC comp is a program that both Tony Mayor and I work on uh together. And so the memo of understanding um Tony um collaborated with our teachers union on that. But at this time it makes sense to give the board and our annual report update on Q comp. So I just wanted to take a few minutes to do a very brief update for you. So uh districts that participate in Q comp or the full name quality compensation are are of course required to provide an annual report to you. We additionally include this in our note member not world's best workforce anymore but our comprehensive achievement and civic readiness annual report that we do in August and the written report I submit to the department of ed in December. um you know quality compensation or Q comp is only one aspect of all of our continuous improvement and innovation efforts and one aspect of our professional learning um for the the school year and just we are going to walk through those components as a refresher. So uh comp involves four components. The first is that of our teacher leader positions. So we have our innovative and personalized learning specialists, our student services specialists, our continuous improvement and innovation coaches, curriculum leads, uh learning and innovation advisory and this year actually that we didn't do that separately because of all the work of our teacher facilitators um this year and then our learning and equity teams which are at the building level. The second component is that of job embedded professional development or what we call professional learning and uh our how for that are our professional learning communities that happen each week. Uh teacher evaluation is the third component and our teacher we we in Spring Lake Park we call it teacher learning and evaluation because we're focused on the learning and growth. Uh so that includes um different conferences throughout the year for goal setting or check-ins and end of year. And there are so many hows for how um that feedback happens through observations or walkthroughs. Um people might be co-designing units or lessons together. Um people might be modeling lessons for teachers, making arrangements so teachers can go see another teacher do a lesson. Many many house for that. And then finally the last component is that of performance pay. And uh that happens at the individual teacher level, at the professional learning community level and at the school level. Uh here are a few of the insights um from 202425. As you know uh we are in year 2 implementation of proserva which is uh the platform that we're using for uh our profession some of our professional learning and for relic licensure and for teacher learning and evaluation. Uh last year was a success year one. This year we expanded the use um to better track clock hours and requirements for teacher license renewal. And I was talking to Annstad who works in HR and between learning and innovation and she was saying that all of our tier three and four teachers have successfully used Proserva for a very seamless renewal process. This is the smoothest it's ever been and I think all of every single tier three four teacher has made their way through that all before deadlines things like that. that. So that was super cool to hear. Um we talk about um teacher learning and evaluation and there were 5,495 points of feedback um that were uh given to support our educators and and those points of feedback always include recognition of what's being implemented um well and next steps for growth. Um, we had 1,581 teacher conferences this year that happened between our coaches and our innovative and personalized learning specialists, our student services specialists, and our educators. Um, and those always just provide opportunity for reflection and then um, determining action steps specific to increasing student learning and engagement. our weekly professional learning communities. There are a number of things that are that are touched on in our PLC's, but a lot of that focused on the um our actual focus this year on designing for student engagement leading to high levels of student learning. Um what we you've heard us call working on the work, our quotation marks there. Um and then uh our professional learning and coaching support, we also support our teacher leaders, right? So those who are doing the coaching, we bring them in and support them in their growth specific to their leadership development, the type of feedback they're giving our educators, all the hows that they might use um to provide that um feedback and coaching. And then we also do a lot of work with them on the strong um on strong design and implementation of professional learning. And then we always gain insight from uh our teachers through rounding. Um how did it go? what things do you want us to know? What went well? What might you need as we look at this in the future? Um, so just based on our insights this year, some of our next actions, just kind of aligning to those four four areas. Um, we'll continue to provide leadership learning to our teacher leaders as they continue to support our teacher facilitators and that actually I should say all of our teachers. Um, we want to continue to make connections between student engagement and all of our other theories of action uh for professional learning. Clearly, we'll continue our professional learning communities as one structure for that design work for working on the work. We also do a lot of calibration of student work. If students aren't getting it, what might we do? How do we learn from the people in the on in the table around us? um in that area of teacher learning and evaluation. Um next year we'll expand Proserva one more level to get to our tier three and four teachers um and see the ranging success I'm sure of what we saw with that um clock hour and relicure for tier one and two um and then we have talked to you about our district operational plan for next year but there's one project that we're calling enhanced school structures and one of the milestones is that we'll just take a look we'll review all of our processes related to teacher learning and evaluation and see if there's any areas of refinement that we want to make there. And then finally, we will certainly continue with the performance pay component of Q comp again at the individual professional learning community and building level. And that is our brief update and annual report on quality compensation. Thank you. Any any questions from the board? Any discussion? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. Motion passes. Moving to acknowledgement of gifts. Can I get a motion? So moved. So moved by Schmidt. Second. Second by Mlullen to adopt the following resolution. Whereas schoolboard policy 706 establishes guidelines for the acceptance of gifts to the district. And whereas Minnesota statute 40465.03 03 states that school board may accept a gift of real or personal property by the adoption of a resolution approved by twothirds of its members. Therefore, it be resolved that the school board of Spring Lake Park Schools accepts with appreciation the gifts given to the district. Any discussion? Just thank you to all of our generous donors and and it is greatly appreciated. And again calling out special you especially want to recognize the Panther Foundation and and their generous gift. Clerk, would you please call the role? Yes. Miss Gorsburg? Yes. Miss McCleen? Yes. Miss Hennon? Yes. Miss Skellyy? Yes. Mr. Vala? Yes. Miss Schmidt? Yes. Mr. Easter? Yes. The resolution passes on a 70 vote. Thank you. Okay, moving on to board forum and reports like how it has if any. Okay, so we're going to start with our regular board for we're going to save the student board members for last. Yeah, let's keep them around a little bit longer. All right. Anything on this side? I have something quick. Um, last week I worked um the senior all night, excuse me, senior sendoff uh at Bolero on Tuesday night and not only was it just always the good energy and the kids are very, you know, like seeing seeing how they're being sent off, but um we had 190 kids, which I also worked last year and that was 60 kids more than uh the year before. So, it's great that more more and more are taking advantage of the of the evening. That's it. Thanks. I love graduation season. I just do. It's it's like there's so much energy this time of the year in the spring. It's just it's great. And I just loved when I come to school and I see that billboard up that says, "Oh, the places you'll go." And it just gives me that warm fuzzy. So, I don't know who's responsible for that. Is that Erica? That's fantastic. I mean, that's that's out of the box thinking. I mean, I know everybody that goes to the school sees it because they go right by it and it's it's there. So, that's fantastic. Um, I went to the final wind ensemble concert and just so impressive. Again, you know, Will was talking about it earlier, but I mean, all those kids, all the great things they're doing. I mean, they're all just doing such great things. It's fantastic. I mean, I think it's a testament to the to the music program. Wolf and Pagle, fantastic. Um, I thought the graduation at the U was a home run. I I left there thinking, my god. So, exactly what they said. It's like that went like clockwork. It couldn't have gone any better. It was perfect. You know, what a great experience. You know, everybody's going to love this. So, super happy about that. And I thought also the parade went really good, too. So, so lots happening. I agree that the graduation was amazing and the parade was fun. I also went to the last choir concert of the year and Add's last choir concert ever. So, that was kind of sad, but it was really very fun and interactive. Um, lots of laughs, appropriate laughs. Um, yeah, it was fun. So, I am sad to see our students leave. You'll be back. Yes. I forgot you're not a senior. Well, I'm glad to have you back. And Allison, all the places you'll go. I know. Just a quick, last Monday, uh, I attended a Panther Foundation meeting and they moved another $100,000 to their endowment this year, which is amazing as that continues to grow. And they also approved a few more grants. So, more continued great work from the Panther Foundation. Awesome. I'll go. I also really appreciated graduation and not getting any messages from anybody about anything being bad at all. I got I got all good feedback from people about graduation. So, that was really nice. I thought that was a good thing. And then I also just want to say Erica, I'm always amazed by how much um peopleing things you do that are the feel-good things that no one really knows that you're behind. you do a lot of that and like the little things at the schools when we did teacher appreciation and just how much the teachers look at those just there's a lot of little things that you do that really make people feel seen. So thank you. One of my favorite things about graduation is when the students are asked to stand for the activities that they have been involved in and I hope that kind of recognition continues on. Um I was at the 916 meeting. Uh lots of contracts approved. Um also a budget for next year in the amount of 90,000 plus 90 million. Wow. Don't we wish And the board also voted to approve increases in access fees, membership fees, and tuition rates for the 26th year. Um there were recognitions of individuals who were retiring including the assistant uh superintendent and Mr. Meyer was a guest at that meeting because he is acquainted with that gentleman. Um, as far as the legislative stuff, I think if I read the quickly enough today that there's going to be a study about specialed transportation and several years ago, 916 did a study on transportation and the districts pay for the transportation even though 916 did the study, but they enabled districts and neighboring districts to use the same buses and they've really gone through some uh activities to try to reduce those transportation costs. Um we have brought students and and needs back in district which certainly reduces costs. Um there are staff from 916 that travels to districts rather than having students travel and the use of smaller vehicles. So, even though there's going to be a study, it's very interesting to me that there has really been some efforts made to reduce those costs. Um, AMSD, MSBA, and others are sponsoring a session on June 23 at 9:00 a.m. It's projected to last about two hours to discuss what has happened at the legislative session. So, it's an online. So if any of you can catch the it should provide some good information for those session. Anything else? That's that's okay. All right. We'll turn it over to our student reps. final update. Yeah. Our kind of final event for student council, we had a nice spirit week that was focused on community building and also giving back to the teachers. So, we had students write notes to teachers and staff anywhere in the district. Um, I think we had about 500 notes sent out to staff. So, it was very popular and hopefully we'll bring it back next year as well. And then we ended that week with a pepfest outside which was really fun because most of the students save the seniors hadn't had that experience at all. And so I think it was kind of a unique way to end the school year. And then beyond that um that last week of school was just like you know the fabulous experience like school nothing really is happening anymore and you just kind of Yeah. Well, there was stuff going on. My science teacher made me write a paper. Yeah, but I personally enjoyed how empty the parking lot was the past the last two days. So, on that high note, that's what graduation. Yeah. Yeah. So, I'm glad seniors leaving gave that opportunity for the underassman there. I knew the schools were going to be empty, so that that was enjoyable. Um, so I will be leaving the school district and this is my last board meeting. However, Mia will be returning next year taking her position as student council president. So, congratulations to her. It's going to be an awesome year. They have an amazing group of officers and I'm wishing you guys all the luck and success. Um, but I am leaving. I did graduate and it's a very bittersweet moment looking back on the past 14 years of my life coming in in preschool and leaving in 12th grade. I've put a lot in but I've gotten a lot more out. I'm bilingual so I can speak both Spanish and English and I've used that very much throughout my time. Um, on top of that, I'm leaving the school district with 51 college credits transferring to my college. Um, so that's a combination of PSO, AP courses, and college in the classrooms at Spring Lake Park. So, that's an amazing opportunity that I've been able to have, and it's going to save me and my family a lot of money and hopefully some years of schooling. Um, but other than that, it's been an amazing 14 years, and I'm sad to say goodbye, but I'm excited to see where everything's going to go. I think mom likes that idea of saving money, [Laughter] especially when she's staying closer, not Arizona State, for her more than me, right? Yeah. She'll be up every weekend. I already know that. Yeah. or she's excited to get away from me. It's one or the other. Awesome. Well, Allison, I'm sure you've heard everyone refer to all the places you can go. Yes. Well, we want to send you off with a gift. We just want to share because Mia, you'll be back next year, right? I will. Yes. So, we wanted to share a little a little token of appreciation and just a gift to share with you and just we are so excited and just you know I I think mo most of the staff watching you grow up in the district and almost being a you know ingrained in being a part of the district more so than than a lot of students. We just want to share our appreciation and we got a little token for you all the places you will go. We're excited to see where your future's going to take you and we know you're going to be successful at whatever you do. So, I'll open up to the board if they want to share any other comments. And I've kept the tears in the whole meeting. So, Oh, go ahead. Let them flow. Let them flow. Erica, did you want to Do we get a picture? Yeah. Okay. Nelson, you are remarkable and you're going to do amazing things. Thank you for being here with us. One of the best things about this job is seeing kids grow up. She has a special place because I do. She's been the assistant director of community ed for 14 years. She's been at the school store. Um, she's been at Lion's Breakfast. I mean, she's been dragged all over. I was going to say she's been more parade than she has been every parade. Yeah, she's been dragged all over this district. And it's amazing to see what an ambassador she's become for the school district. And when I remember when I can remember her in preschool and I never thought then like I'm going to be a superintendent here still in 14 years like you actually let me stick around that long to see Alison get all the way through. So it is um that's a privilege to see from these little kids to grow up and see um you have a bright future. So thank you for all that you've contributed to make the high school and the district a better place as a student. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. If we're if If we're going to tell old embarrassing stories, [Laughter] Colleen was part of the beginning of the Panther Foundation along with myself and she had a little baby that she didn't have anyone to take care of. So, she brought her to the meeting and she was so nice. I held her through the whole meeting. So, it's been fun to see her grow up. No, no, not at all. Not at all. [Laughter] 23. Yeah, just 23. Now you're going viral, man. Great. Oh, if that's going to get people to watch, we're going to have to do this more often. A sentimental episode. Yes. Well, all I can say is congrat again. Congratulations. Looking forward to seeing what the future has for you and and mom and dad, you did great. Did amazing. [Laughter] All right. So, let's move to adjournment. Can I get a motion? So, move by Forsber, second by Schmidt to adjourn the meeting at 8:47. All in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed? Motion passes. Meeting is adjourned. Thank you everyone.