- Aligning our work, what students need toknow and be able to do with the national or the state standards. And it's also bringing clarity around what learning materials we will use in order to teach those standards. And then we think about how isour instruction gonna change based on student needs, and what are assessments gonna look like? And so there's key components. And as we think about what teachers need in order to have clarity,it's those look-fors, those learning progressions,those unit plans. Because we know thatthere's so many standards that the MDE gives us, weknow there's not enough days to be able to teach all ofthe standards in the year. And so one thing that wedo to bring teacher clarity is we look at what are we gonnafocus on for our standards, and then what standardsare gonna be supporting. And that kind of, that guidesour work as we move forward with developing learning progressions of what students need toknow and be able to do. And then that guides instruction as we think about ourteachers working in teams and our CITs. And then also as we thinkabout assessing students and aligning our assessmentswith the standards, this framework really isable to help bring clarity to teachers and tostudents and to families around what we teach, how we teach it, and how we ensure learning. So why standards-based learning? This is really important to align our work with the supported research, and we used John Hattie's"Visible Learning." You can see Hattie'sbarometer of influence. It goes from red, whichis reverse effects, to yellow, developmental effects, to orange, teacher effects. And finally, over that hingepoint of a 0.4 to the blue zone or that zone of desired effects. So Hattie identifies teacher clarity as a key factor in student achievement, which is achieve whenteachers work together to define learning goals,and to adapt instruction based on student progresstowards these goals. And you can see teacher clarityhas an effect size of 0.75. Strong teacher belief intheir collective ability to improve student learning. Thus, collective teacher efficacy is seen as the most impactfulfactor for John Hattie. And that has a 1.57 effect. So as we think about whystandards-based learning, why we have that framework, it really is to bring teacher clarity, and that becomes a realitywhen our teacher teams determine the focus ofwhat students need to know and be able to do. It's aligned with the standards, either the state or national standards. And as we think aboutcollective teacher efficacy, that occurs when teacher teams are able to adapt theirinstruction based on student needs to further their learning onprogress towards the standards. So we are now gonna focusin on the grading aspect of standards-based learning. And I have with me Dr. Christina Pierre, our principal at SunrisePark Middle School. - All right. Good evening. So I wanna start with this diagram, and I think it ties well towhat Jen just talked about too, the important componentsof learning the curriculum and instruction and assessment, and grading touches all of those things. And grading is a tool for communication. And all of that communicationneeds to be about learning. Grading is a tool forcommunicating about learning. And when we shift howwe're using that tool, it will impact everythingthat we're doing. Grading impacts curriculum,it impacts our assessment, and it impacts instruction. And so you can't reallytalk about one of them without talking about all of them. And that's really makes, that's what makes the shift to standards-basedlearning so powerful is that it really pusheseverything forward at the same time. And so one component ofstandards-based learning is that our grades are uniformly defined. So teachers, classes, curriculum areas, they don't have differentdefinitions of what is an A, what is a B, and so on. We agree across the board that this is what it takesto earn these grades. Grades are assessed by standards. So the standards tell us whatour students need to learn. And so that's what we're assessing. And so for example, when we have a test, we're not going to just have one score or one grade for the test. We're gonna break that testscore out into standards so that parents and students and teachers, everyone knows how a childdid on that test in each area. And so we know which areasthe child did really well on, and which areas theystill need some work on. Depending on that test, it'snot just gonna be one score, it'll be a score by standard. And then grades are reported by standard. And so this breakdown that you can see is just for one standard. So we might have assessedstandard number one in different places, right? Maybe we assessed it on an assignment, we assessed it on a quiz,and we assessed it on a test. So we're gonna put those grades together to form one grade for that standard. And right now we do havegrades weighted on learning. And so 15% formative, the practice, we wanna acknowledge thepractice that students are doing. But the place where we'rereally wanna know what they know is on the summative, right,practice is for practice. We wanna give them some credit, but we also really wanna putour emphasis on the summative. And so then how do we come upwith an overall course grade? We put those standards together. And so like the overallgrade for Standard 1. And then we have an overallgrade for Standard 2, and for Standard 3. And we average those all together to come up with an overall course grade. And so what I'm really excitedto talk about is the impact. And so like I said,everything is connected to how you are communicatingabout learning. And so when we shift theway we're communicating, we're shifting everything. And so our curriculum isguaranteed for every student. We know that it aligns to thestate and national standards. Our instruction is ensuring that our students arelearning those skills, the skills and knowledgeof those standards. And our assessments are measuring our students' learning of those skills and their knowledge of those standards. - [Jen] All right, andnow we have principal of White Bear Lake AreaHigh School, Russ Reetz. And talk about recording. - Ah, so fired up too. I can't wait. This is super fun stuff. And great work has beendone by the high school. And also we have these twoamazing instructional coaches at the high school, TroyStrand and Shannon Treichel, that have been reallyengaged in providing support for our staff in puttingthese plans together. So just a quick update of wherewe are at the high school. We're starting withstandards-based learning, grading, and reporting in ninth grade for all courses that havea ninth grader next year. A lot of our elective coursesinclude nine through 12. That would be standards-based. And then all of our core coursesfor ninth grade of course will be standards-based. Year following, the yearwe move into trimesters, will be 9-12, all standards-based learning,grading, and reporting. I want to talk a little bitabout sort of the support that we provided our staff in this work. So the first step was identifying what we call priority standards. So we asked staff to think about choosing between 16 and 20standards for a year-long course, and then looking at the benchmarks and really pulling out the skills that we would expect studentsto be able to perform within that benchmark to show proficiency forthat particular standard. So we've got over 66 courseswhere we've identified anywhere from 16 to 20 priority standards for a year-long course. If it's a semester course, we were looking at anywherebetween eight and 10 standards. We've provided a handbookfor our instructors, our teachers, certified staff, that goes through somefrequently asked questions. It talks about ways toengage in conversations with parents and the students. It also gives some comparisons between a traditional grading scale and a standards-based grading scale so we can help to provide greater clarity. And then it really gets intothe nitty gritty of the work, specifically of creatingproficiency scales. And looking at a proficiency scale, which really is a progression of learning. So if you think about anytime we're lookingat learning a new skill, we would enter into the very basics, or the fundamentals ofthat particular skill. And that's what I wouldcall somewhere between a one and a two on a proficiency scale. And as we become morefamiliar with the content, as we dig in and practice some of the skills that are required, we move up this progression of learning. And that's really advancingup the proficiency scale. And what we're doing forstudents is trying to define what's the differencebetween a one and a two, what's the differencebetween a two and a three? The jump from two tothree is pretty great, 'cause we're startingto look at application, and then the jump from threeto four is not quite as big as the jump from two to three. But that really is givingthe clarity in learning or what's expected from our students. And that has also helped our staff think about proficiencyskills in different ways. We've allowed release time for grade-alike subject-alike teams. So they're not doing this work together. They have thought partners. We've provided support withour instructional coaches and our administrative team has joined our teachersduring that release time. We've also given them a lot of time during professional development to walk through some 60-dayplans to support their work. So we've set some goals for what we would want to see achieved in terms of the priority standards, and then writing ofthose proficiency scales. And then most recently we provided staff with a Synergy Sandbox. So they got to go into our software and play around with whatthis would look like. So they were able to addassignments, add quizzes, add tests, add scores to those, and figure out what that's gonnalook like at the end result from a teacher perspective, a student perspective,and a parent perspective. And we continue to playin the Synergy Sandbox. I was encouraging stafftoday to continue doing that. We've also provided a verydetailed feedback plan for evaluating the proficiency scales, and then helping with making improvements so that when we do step intoour first unit in ninth grade, we're able to use these scales,and we're off and running. Many of them have been writtenin student-friendly language so that it's clear to them what we want them toknow and be able to do when they reach proficiencyin that particular standard. So I've included acouple of artifacts there that we've shared with staff. There's a Google Classroomthat's very comprehensive, full of tools so that they can self-guide when doing much of their work, either in a CIT team or whenwe are providing release time during our professional development days. Just to touch brieflyagain on proficiency scales as a way to guide the learning, it really, we go back to this has helped us think differently about instruction, but really about how our students are receiving that instruction, and how they're moving througha progression of learning. We really want to make it safe and clear for students to understand it's okay if you come intothis at a one or a two. Like most of us aren't experts when we enter into newlearning, it takes us a while. There's some practice thatwe have to engage with in order for us to move up and through that proficiency scale. And so the scales are written in that way. They're written to identify specifically what we're trying to ask thestudent to be able to know or how to demonstrate their learning in a way that shows they are proficient in a particular benchmark or standard. So each standard that weidentify as a priority standard also has a proficiency scale. Those scales will be given to students, the best practice is that students would look at the proficiencyscale and self-assess, like where do theycurrently see themselves, what vocabulary can theypull out of that standard or benchmark that they alreadyknow from prior learning? And what are some things thatthey don't know much about? And then they'll kind of assess where they land on that proficiency scale before the unit begins. In some cases we'll provide a pretest so they can actually show right away based on their performance,this is where I land. But of course, that pretest doesn't countagainst them in the grade. It's just where are we starting? And what I love aboutthe proficiency skills, if some students showimmediately from the beginning they're at a three, they'reoff on a different path then on what they would need to know and do to demonstrate a four, right? So we're looking at waysin which we can enrich and change their learning. It might be self-paced, itmight be in small groups while we're working with other students on moving from a two to a three. So that's what I mean by thesescales have really allowed us to look at progressivelearning and sort of changing how we look at differentiatingour instruction. I want to talk a little bitabout the reporting part, 'cause I get a lot of questions. So I think it's important to share, we're providing staff with some autonomy on how they want to report grades. We are asking staff toenter the practice work and link it to the specificstandard or benchmark that that work is related to. But that practice work doesn't change the grade on the standard. So you might see inthis particular example, there's a 18 out of 20,there's a 13 out of 15, there's a six out of 10. Those are scores that still provide input on how the student is doingin any particular area on a particular assessment. But what the staff is asked todo is look at the artifacts, the mounting evidence of work over time to determine what the scoreis on the standard, right? It could be an assessment at the end, but it could be, we've seen growth, you started here at a two, we gave you four or fivedifferent opportunities to show progression in learning. And now we see you at a three or four when we start entering the standard score. The score for the, justlike Dr. Pierre mentioned, the semester grade is the aggregate score of multiple standardsover 18 or over 36 weeks depending on the length of the course. And that's an average of 4, 3, 2, or 1 across multiple standards. And I already saidthere's somewhere between 16 and 20 for a full year course, you could have eight scores of two and eight scores of three, andyour overall score is a 2.5. And then we are taking that 2.5 and putting it into a conversion scale or a conversion table. And that 2.5 would be a B- grade, and that would be a 2.7 GPA. So I'm happy to answerquestions on this too when we're done. But this is how we arestill at the high school providing a letter grade and a GPA for each course on the final transcript. So when students are applying for colleges and looking at what theiropportunities are post-secondary, they're still gonna havethat traditional transcript that they've always had. So again, the aggregate scoreacross multiple standards is combined to create a average score, that's put into the scale andthen converted to a grade. The grade is converted to a GPA. So I think we'll stop there and answer any questions you might have on standards-based learning,the grading aspect, or the reporting aspect. - [Jessica] Great, thank youso much, questions, Dr. Arcand. - I just wanna first say I really like the direction we're going. I like the idea of takingand supporting standards and putting those in our ones and twos, that it builds up to wherethat standard is at 3.0. One of the things I know sometimes we see and thequestions we receive is, are all priority standards equal? So that you said they were across, can some priority standards be worth more and some worth less? Have you built that in your calculations when you're figuring out the grade? - So there's a couple options we've allowed teachers to play with. One is this idea of adecaying average, right? So the larger standards that show up multiple timesthroughout a semester, the most recent scores mightdominate the final score. Some staff have asked if theycan average scores over time, but that doesn't really honorthe progression of learning. So we've really tried to say to staff, it's okay to wait too if that standard is gonnashow up multiple times and they're not ready, and they haven't showed proficiency yet, to not grade that right away,to wait until the majority, or our students are showing proficiency before putting a numbernext to that standard. The larger standards, we've also said we can breakdown into specific skills, and you might see askill in a math standard in a certain equation happenwhere it receives a score, and then you might see itlater on in a different way. So we've tackled kind of how we're gonnahandle that by department. It was kind of specific tothe need of that content area. - And I like the fact that in Synergy we could put scores in,but not have them grade. So that allows parents andstudents to track where they are on that journey that they're on. And that's always helpful, even so some of thoseformatives can get in there and they can see wherethey're walking to it. The other thing I reallylike, I'm gonna say this, is that when I getassessed, I can show growth. So even though I'm not here,I can see that I've moved up, and so that I can takepride in where I'm at, and then I can see where I'm going. And that's important for students, because if they don't feellike they're being successful, it's hard for them to continue to truck. And that's an advantage thaton the proficiency scale they can see that they're moving up. So thank you for doing that. Thank you. - [Jen] Do you have any otherquestions, Dr. Newmaster? - [Marge] I agree with alot of what you've said, and we've all dabbled instandard-based learning, but never taken thiskind of a deep wide dive. And I've just got a couple questions. You've got some realbig brain-bending things for people to do to changehow they look at things. And the courses that we've developed here that are state standards mightbe more easily approached. What's the plan for AP andcollege in the schools? Because that's more typical, and we've been reallystrong on supporting, earn your credits in highschool and save a lot of money and register early. So, but they have theirset what you need to do and you can't change it. - Yes. Thank you for that question. Yes, we are following thecollege board for our AP courses. So we will look to theirstandards and guidance, and we'll continue tomatch what they're doing. And then our concurrentenrollment courses, we will match what the colleges arerecommending and doing as well so that our student experiences match what either the college is doing, and/or with our AP curricula,which is very rigorous. So yep. So we're aligning to that. - [Marge] And I find thosecourses often are well-organized because they've created it, whether it's in a worldlanguage or history or whatever. So, but I wondered how you'd apply it. And the other thing I just wanna say is something I wished foroften, and I love the approach, is that you're doing sameteam groups working together. I can't tell you howmany times we've said, could we please meet with ourdepartment and work on this? And it was a differentapproach many times. So this I think will be a real strength. - Yeah, the challenge at the high school has been two separate campuses,but the beauty of this work is it's taken place withingrade subject-alike. So our ninth grade team is together, our 10th grade team is together, and then at South campus, 11th and 12th. So they've been able to do this in collaboration with one another. As we come together, the opportunity forthat vertical alignment will also take place, anddoes on those PD days, right? Where full departments canmeet and work together. But much of this work has happened in groups of three or four that are all teaching the same subject. And that provides a lot of consistency in terms of what standards are selected, how the proficiency skills are built, and then also how we'rereporting out at the end. It's been good. - [Jessica] Miss Daniels. - When you select or emphasizea portion of the standards, because you said there's so many, you have to sort of select which ones you gonna be focusing on. Does that mean, I mean, doall districts the same ones? Or if it's a different district and maybe you come into ourdistrict halfway through year? I mean, I just wondered how that worked. - Yeah, that's a really great question. So we do, MDE has a lot of guidance around how to unpack a standard, and really they'recalling it focus standards instead of priority. But same thing, we've called them power, we've called them priority,we call them focus. And so really, you know, I think, and MDE does have professional learning that we send our teacherrepresentatives to, or myself, or folks from the Teachingand Learning Department. So I mean, if we were to kind of look at an audit betweendifferent schools, I would think that there'sgonna be commonality among what teachers in that content area really believe is the priority. But you know, we're not leavingout the standards, right? We're including all standards, but we just focus in on priorities, and then we have our supporting. So supporting may be something that teachers are usingas a formative assessment. They're not necessarily gonna grade it or report it on the reportcard or in the grade book, but they're still teaching it. And so, that's a great question. And I think that whole piece, going back to Hattie's research around that teacher collective efficacy, when teachers can reallycome together and just say, yeah, this is what's mostimportant for our students. There's a lot of similaritiesamong the districts that I've seen. - [Jessica] Ms. Thompson. - [Angela] So for me,I like a lot of this. And I had a question asto, and it's probably because we're doing a lotof transition next year, is that why we're only gonnastart this in ninth grade to allow everything to. - That's a great question, right. - [Angela] Before we bring it to. - So partly, but mostly we were looking at how we could build upon whatthe middle schools are doing and have one consistent experience. As those ninth graders cometo us, they've had two years of standards-based learning and grading. And then as we ease into thetrimesters, we're looking at the scope and sequencepart of that transition. So most of our full year courseswill go down to 24 weeks, and our semester-longcourses will go to 12. That also goes right along with identifying those priority standards, and what's gonna be offered. So it made sense that ninth grade, we continue what we've been doing, and then the following yearwhen we go to trimesters, we are 9-12. - Okay, and then just kind of a little bit on what Dr. Arcand wassaying, I like the idea of being able to grade themon the standards individually, because they might havea strength in one area, and a weakness in another area, but instead of just across the board, nope, you didn't do what you need to do, we're gonna say, well,you have a strength here. This is the area we needto focus on and help you. Because I mean, just in math alone, there's so many different, some students do really well in geometry, and some students excelin algebra, and you know, there's a little bit ofa cross difference there. So I like that a lot. And I think this is gonna be good. I'm excited to see it progress, and how it goes for our systems. And then just one other point on the, I've been listening to a podcast, and I was gonna bring something up in another part of our discussion tonight, but I'll kind of mention it here, a little bit of neurodiversity. We have students in our districtthat are neurodivergent. We have a lot of staff that areprobably also neurodivergent and might not have evenknown it until they got older and still may not know exactly what it is, and so some of thisstuff can help with that. But in the group think part of like getting teachers together to talk and everyone thinking inthat group thought method isn't always beneficial towhat we're trying to do, especially when we're tryingto grow and build something. So it is sometimes nice to have somebody who isn't on that same path, right? Because they can question andsay, well what about this? So is there a way of, I meanI'm sure it's happening, but is there some sortof thing that we're doing to get them to kind ofgo a little bit beyond and to like think aboutanother way of doing, I don't know how to describe it or word it the right way, but. - So I'd say that, I mean, there's always a danger of group think, but I think that thevalue of collaboration is that we're better together than we are individually, right? The sum is greater than the, the whole is greater thanthe sum of the parts. And so that is thevalue of coming together is bringing lots of differentways of looking at things. I can tell you today in ourstaff meeting, we were talking, this is just so exciting. So we've been doingstandards-based grading and then a group ofteachers started saying, well, I have a different ideaof how we can make it better and can we try this? And so we brought it to ourstaff this morning to say, this will be an option for you next year, kind of like a grade book2.0 if you wanna try it. And you know, we wanna experiment a little before we go all in with something. And our staff just broke intothis 25 minute conversation about the pluses and minusesof how we're doing it now and how we might be doing it,and it was just so beautiful to see that robustconversation happening about, I mean, that is how we shouldspend our staff meeting. And so I can tell you thatit definitely is happening that we're bringing lots of different ways of looking at things and really having seriousconversations about it. - [Angela] Yeah, that's great. And 'cause that to me says all the staff, so not just departmental, but bringing. So that's, thank you. - [Jessica] Dr. Arcand. - [Scott] I'm just gottawrap up my comments, but I want to kind ofbackpack on Dr. Newmaster's, which she's kinda said, to remind us that if we're looking at aconcurrent enrollment, or we're looking at an AP course, yeah, the grading may bethere, may be, you know, set, but that doesn't mean we can't do some standard-based practices. And even if you want todo priority standards, all you have to do islook at the assessment and how much of eachstandard they're assessing, that's gonna tell you whatyour priorities need to be and what your supporting ones need to be. And then you can, like I said, you could just follow thepractices and do their grading and that'll still showprogress for those students. Thank you. - Oh, sorry, just, you just cut. I know at St. Kate's when I was leaving, they were looking at adifferent way of grading and getting rid of thegrade F and all that. So other universities andcolleges are also looking at this, and I think in the future we're gonna see that it is gonna change across the board, and probably move a little bit even more away from the GPA system, but. - I have just a couple ofquestions about continuity. So my first question is,how are the middle schools and the high school working together to kind of build this track to help our students in themiddle school figure it out? 'Cause I've looked at this with my kids and I'm like, I don't know, you know, there's justso many moving parts. So how are we doing that to continue? And then my other questionrelated to that is, when we get to the point where we're 9-12 at theunified high school, we've got our 11th and 12th graders who will have not had as muchexperience with this process. So how are we gonna help those students? - So I'll do the firstpart and you do the second. So we've been walkingtogether on this journey, middle school and high school, and all the while recognizing the needs of our students are different, the needs of our schools andour staffs are different. And so we have regular meetings to talk about where are you now? How are you doing this? Howare you interpreting this? And we respect that we needto be a little bit different because of the developmentalneeds of our schools. And so I appreciatedthat Russ said, you know, we wanna continue the experiencefor those ninth graders that are coming from the middle school. And I would also acknowledge, we're still learning thebest ways to communicate with parents and students about this. And so I think we stillneed to keep getting better to your point at that. - We have a pretty big hill to climb in terms of academiclanguage and communication around standards-basedlearning with our upperclassmen that haven't experienced this yet. And for our seniors, theywould be rising juniors now, their last year will be the only year that they have standards-based learning. But we'll have a planfor how we roll this out, both in our communication with families and using our advisory period to explain really the why behind the move. And that we think by providingthe learning progression, by being transparent about how we show or demonstrate what we knowand can do, and how it's just and accurately atreflecting learning, right. And so we'll continueto be a broken record in terms of the why and then how and what it means forthe transcript, right? I think really at the end of the day, they want to know what the end looks like. And so we can describehow this is gonna look and what it means when theyare start applying for schools or whatever their plansare for post-secondary, that we'll work withthem through the process and they're gonna have a verysimilar experience at the end. Hopefully a more positivelearning experience throughout, but then the reporting at the end is gonna look much the same. - That's great, thank you. And then my other questionis about teacher training, and how much support teachers are getting throughout the process. You know, 'cause you know, I'm looking at theskills for these slides, there's a Google Classroom, and there's an opportunityfor, there's release time, there's a training site, but my guess is that there will probably need to be opportunities throughout. What is that gonna looklike for our teachers? - So I'll tell you whatit has looked like, especially in middle school. I mean it is ongoing. It is intense work. Like when I said likeit touches everything, teachers are rethinking everything, right? So how do I make sure my assessments are aligned to the standards? How do I make sure thatI'm instructing the kids on all the things they need to do to be successful on the assessments? How do I make sure I havethe right curriculum in place that reflects the standards that students are supposed to be learning? That is intense work. And so we have made sure that we are prioritizingthat time for teachers, for teachers tocollaborate with the people who are teaching the same thing as them. We're making sure that we as leaders are all taking a few departments that we touch base withregularly to check in. How are you doing now?What are your questions? What do you need from me? That is regular ongoing support. We also spend a lot oftime learning together. So, you know, as we'rechecking in with departments, we're realizing, oh, we needto learn more about this. And so then we can planthat into our next PD day to make sure staff are continuing to learn what they need to learn. So it's a lot, they need a lot of support, and it's great work. It is some of the bestprofessional work that we've done. - I think from a district perspective of how we are looking at alignment between the middle schooland the high school. And then we have our districtinstructional leadership team that's 6-12, and we haveour curriculum leaders that are now our professionallearning leaders, and our instructionalcoaches and our principals all come together to have conversations. What's going well? What'sworking, what have you learned? Kind of that collaboration piece. We have that throughout the year. And then also a second checkpoint is when we have new standards, our curriculum reviewprocess is gonna engage all of our teachers, again,in those content areas to say, okay, there's new standards. Now let's again look atwhat we're currently doing, but what are our focusand supporting standards? And then how do we developthose proficiency scales for learning progressions,and then those assessments. So it's kind of a seconddose of those things. And what we've reallybeen intentional about is as new standards come out that teachers are learningthose new standards so they're not havingto do the work twice. But really it's provided an opportunity to really re-look atstandards-based learning again in the curriculum review process, so. - [Jessica] Thank you. - This is kind of just a general question for people that may be listeningthat aren't in education. How often is a subjectarea standard review? Like it's every, it's not like every year, it's like every four, I mean, so people gettheir feet on the ground, this is standards, andthey can make some progress before things are reviewedand perhaps make a change. - [Jen] That's a great question. So it's every 10 years, however, during the pandemicthere was a pause point where the standards, theywere pushing them out another year and another year. So now we have new standards that we'll be implementingnext year in science, and then we have language arts, and then we have social studies, and then we have mathematics that are kind of boom, boom,boom right after each other. And so that's another piece that we're really tryingto work with our educators and ensuring that they don'tget overwhelmed, right? And making that manageablebite-sized pieces throughout. And so the standards-based learning work has really helped us tomove the work forward, but knowing that that standardswork is yet to come to, and yeah, it's like a lot, yes. (all laughing) - [Jessica] All right, Dr. Newmaster. - [Marge] And just one morething in this huge moving piece, we haven't really talked aboutthe huge change in trimesters and content and standards. And that's a whole anotherthing to condense your subjects and I guess I'm the parent of two kids that went through the music program who are professional musicians, and I can't imagine not havingmusic every day of the week. All year. - Staff had an opportunity today to look at current course offerings in our current sequence of courses, and then as a departmentcreate some consensus around changes to currentcourses, new course proposals, and then also this opportunity to propose a course for extended time. So if they had a courselike our ensemble groups in band, orchestra, and choir that they believed shouldbe all three trimesters, they would be able,they have an opportunity to propose that thenand for consideration. If there's a semester coursethat the certified staff wanted to see over two trimesters, they could propose thatextension request as well. The next step will be to review that as an administrative team and as a teaching and learning team. We'll go back and have conversations if we have questions about context or what were you thinking here,help me better understand, we'll have conversations withinour building leadership team and our lead learning leadership team before a decision is made on what courses couldbe all three trimesters. But I know that music has proposed that all three be full year, and there's some support for that. Most of the five by three schedules that we're comparing to in the area, Roseville, Waconia, Farmington,and the Anoka schools offer their ensemble groupsall three trimesters. So it's likely that we'll beable to do the same thing. - [Marge] I can't imagine not. Okay. - [Jessica] All right, alot of good change coming. Thank you so much for all your work and thanks to all of yourstaff for their work as well. - [Jen] Thank you. - [Jessica] So we'll move intoour next discussion item B2, teaching and learning updateactivities and athletics. Like Dr. Gillespie, are you gonna? - [Alison] I'll just stand. - [Jessica] Okay. - [Alison] Chair Ellison,members of the board, I'd like to introduce BrianPeloquin, Activities Director, and Adrian Turner, AssistantActivities Director, who are here to share anactivities update with us, welcome. - [Member] Welcome. - Not to be confused with Aaron Turner, where him and I lookalike is what I've heard. (all laughing) Yeah, just a quick updateon Leadership Academy, some of our successes, andsome of our future plans. Go ahead. Leadership Academy thisyear was new for us. We bought in all of ourcaptains for every season of fall, winter, spring,and met biweekly, you know, some sports we got our springcaptains out of the way before the season began, 'cause a lot of them havefour o'clock varsity games, you know, so we wanted to meet before they left school in general. So most of the things we covered were how to be a good leader, beingpoised, showing character, why and how to deal withconflicts on your team between player to playerand player to coach. And just kind of how to be a bridge and a better leader for our programs. I would say this yearwas decently successful. You know, we learned a lot with doing this for the first time with how we need to proceed in the future. But a lot of good feedbackfrom the students. We used the book, the bookwas highly recommended, but we didn't go strictly by the book. You know, we didn't wanna pull the kids for a little bit during beartime to strictly open a book and go page by page. A lot of it was discussion-based,and we used the book kind of just to guide thediscussions on the topics. But yeah, really good results, really good feedback from the kids. They enjoyed it, they enjoyed hearing that they weren't the onlyone in certain situations on, hey, my best friend is on the team, but they're being a knucklehead. How do I get them to snap out of it and to join the rest of thegroup eventually, you know, so. - Some exciting things thatwe had happening this year. Saw many of you out atmany of these events, but in the fall we had 10of our student athletes sign national letters of intent to receive scholarships toDivision I or Division II NCAA. We do have several more thatwill be signing this spring, and that will also berecognized these spring. So that is a big number for us. 10 was our second largestin my seven years here. And by the time it's all said and done, I think we will have ourmost number of athletes signing to DI or DII scholarships. Our girls soccer, our girls basketball, and our boys hockey teamsall made it to State, which was very exciting as a team. You can see some of the picturesof them not only as a team, but also them with thestudents out supporting them. It's a big community event, especially when we makeit to a section final. So those are always fun events. We also had severalindividuals in cross country, gymnastics, wrestling,swim and dive, and speech who also made it to theState level this year so far. And looking forward to a great spring. Some things that we'recontinuing to build on in the athletics andactivities department. Continued regular coach PD. We meet with our head coaches twice a year to go over professional development. Looking forward to continuing to host our head coaches each year. We recognize the need toconnect with all of our coaches, including our assistants. We have heard that fromour head coaches, you know, when they come to our PD, man, it'd be nice if Ihad some of my assistants. And so we are recognizing that we do need to getthe assistants involved, and we are looking forways over the summer to have a professional development where we can get them all together. Just to help you understand, we have over 200 assistantand head coaches. And so looking for a space and looking for how wecan get them all together to create some professional development that everybody could takeaway from is our plan. We are looking to deepen ourwork with our student leaders. As Adrian said, we had yearone of Leadership Academy. Some things went really well, some things we're looking to improve on to deepen our work with ourstudent leaders for next year. Booster club board, we have booster clubsin all of our sports. That wasn't necessarilysomething that was in place when I started here, workingwith Andy when she came on, and I came on to get many ofour programs with booster clubs and learning as we've gone through that, that as booster club boards change over, there are lots of questions that ask. And so we are looking at doing regular booster board meetings. We had one last year, lookingto have one again this year. And then planning on regular meetings just to get our boards together, to get our parents who are there involved in volunteering theirtime on our booster boards to get together and tobounce ideas off each other and make sure that we're allon the same page with things. Next one, I'm hoping atsome point this summer to come back to you with a proposal, but I'd like to look deeperinto the student part of our student athletes. Currently to participatein our high school sports from a state high school leaguestandpoint in this district, they use, what's the term,on track to graduate, which our current guidelinesand our current policies are attaining X number of credits. And we have academic probationand we meet with kids, but what I'm finding andwhat I'm hearing from parents is our kids are eligible because they have enough creditsto be on track to graduate, but they're currently failingfour of their six classes in their current season, andhow does that make sense? And so I am working withAdrian and our coaches to come up with a process that would be a little bit more concrete that I think would createhigher expectations for our student athletes to be students while they're participatingin our activities. You know, the biggest issue and the biggest thing thatwe've gotta work through is what does that looklike from a work standpoint on holding those kids accountable and creating those expectations. But my goal is to comeback to you over the summer with a proposal that wecan possibly work through and talk about and getinto place for the future. And then lastly, went down to the NationalAD Convention in December, and one of the coolest thingsthat I encountered from an AD that an AD did down at a largehigh school down in Florida is he did an end of year award ceremony for all of his athletesand the activities. And if you watch sports at all, ESPN does the ESPYs every year where they've got all these cool awards, and he brought that to his high school. And I just think that thatwould be a really cool event, especially as we get underone roof, nine through 12. We've got this big beautifultheater that's almost built, that would be a fabulous backdrop to have that end of year award ceremony for all of the programmingthat is under our umbrella. And so those are the thingsthat we're working on to continue to build our foundation in the activities office. And then lastly, future plans we have that we're working on that are in place. We've got our first homefootball game coming together at the new stadium. Obviously there's some things that need to be in place before then with regards to certification, and with getting the features finalized. But last I heard those are on schedule, so we're excited about that. We are already starting to plan for our first events in ourgame gym, which is finished, and everybody's excited to walkaround that space and see it looking forward to the daythat we can actually access it. So we'll have our homefirst volleyball game in there in the fall. And then obviously we'll have our first basketballgames there in the winter, and do our namingceremony for Coach Galvin will be tied in as thatfirst basketball event, should be a pretty cool community event that we're hoping to make. Similar to what we did with the last home basketballgames at South Campus where we turned it intoa big community event, was quite cool. We are currently working on building our Legacy Circle around the Game Gym, which will be filledwith our athletic history of accomplishments and legends. We'll be bringing our trophies over and putting them aroundthat Game Gym Circle. We are planning on and currently branding, working with Mr. Reetz and KJ Branding to create a Hall of Fameand updated Hall of Fame. And also working withKJ Branding and Tim Wald on a wall of legends forour coaching legends. And so once it's all said and done, I think that Game Gymand the circle around it is going to be an outstanding environment that celebrates our community and all of the accomplishments. And then lastly, we're looking forward to reporting back in the fall. I've given an opportunity to come back at some point in the fall to report on how these things are going, and hopefully be able to celebrate the things that we've got going on as we unify into onehigh school and rough. That's all I have. - [Jessica] Thank you. Any questions? - [Scott] I do. - [Jessica] Dr. Arcand? - I just have a somequestions and comments. Yeah, I hear that you'retraining your coaches, and I think that's really exciting. I read that book that you'veused, and I like the idea, and I'm gonna make the assumption that you're working with your coaches and bringing your assistant coaches, that you're teaching thembe transformational leaders rather than transactional leaders. And we've had a lot of coaches in this district overthe years, I'm gonna say that were transformational leaders, and they really caredabout you as a person. You know, you may not alwayshave the best performance, but you always knew they cared about you. And that has helpedmany of us come through that have the opportunity to participate in different activities and events. Also, you know, you talkedabout how some of our students are failing maybe four classes, and I like the idea of being proactive and getting them some helpsomehow, somewhere, maybe. And I don't know, you know, atleast maybe a study hall even to help them if theyreally wanna get help. But the thing we haveto remember about the, you talked about these athletes signing Division I and DivisionII letters of intent. There was a high rigor forthe NCAA that you must meet. So these kids in the classroomhave to applied themselves, especially in Division I, whenthey take those 16 classes and they figure out their GPA, they have worked hard in the classroom to be able to sign in Division I. And so we can't forgethow much work they put in. And I know there's a lotof students out there that are carrying a very excellent GPA, and you know, we have toremember those students that I can't believe howthey take all those classes and they get those gradesand they put it out on the athletic field or in the theater. So, you know, we can'tforget about those students that are shining for that. And so, and I like the idea about building theleadership of these students, but giving them skills thatthey'll be able to take way away from athletics and activities, but in the real life they'regonna be leaders somewhere else and using it too. So I'm excited to hear what we're doing, and I'm excited to see thedirection you're going, and I wish you the best of luck, and I look forward tohearing from you again. - [Brian] Thank you. - Thank you. - [Jessica] Miss Daniels. - Yeah, I just have a question. Thanks for all your work on this, but in the Leadership Academy, you talk about the captains of sports, and is there an opportunity for people that are in activities butaren't captains of a sport, can have some leadership training also that are in all the otheractivities that the school has? - We are working to build that,and I should have said that. Thank you for bringing that up. We're working to build that not only with our student leaders but also all of our advisors. We've started bringingour advisors together, and we'll continue to dothat regularly of our clubs to talk about leadership and then bringing those kids in as well. Absolutely. Yeah. - And some of the feedback wereceived from a few captains, you know, hey, how'd you like this? Well, I didn't really need it. Oh, you know, and some ofthem felt bad for saying it, but it's like, no, explain. And the explanation would bethe last two years of varsity or the last two years of this and that. Other kids have taughtme how to lead already. You know, so I just continuedto build on what they gave me, you know, so that's a bit ofsharing it into the community is just making sure those kidsknow how lead first, right. Yeah. - [Jessica] Ms. Thompson. - So just thinking aboutthings like, you know, the Bears East Annual Awards night, that would be really exciting to do it. And just overall, everythingwe've talked about tonight, how adaptive sports, right. We're including theminto the whole program, and would they be included in the Bears? - [Brian] Absolutely. - Award night and the? - [Brian] What, yeah, absolutely. It would be.- And all of those things. - It would be. Yep, yep. So that night would be not just athletics, it would be everythingthat's under our umbrella. Anything that happensoutside the school day, whether it was service,it's our fine arts, it's our state high school league sports, it's our non-state high schoolleague sports and activities. Anything that has an activity would have an opportunityto be recognized that night. Yeah, absolutely. - [Angela] Sounds like exciting stuff. And of course, you know,they already know everything so they would never needto learn more, right. - No. - Just a couple of questions and comments. You were talking about thebooster club board meetings. Is there some sort of handbook or guidebook that wehave available for them? - [Brian] Yep, it's on the website. - There is, okay, okay. Yeah, with the turnover it can be hard. - We have at learning, I'mlearning that very quickly. Just the moment you get into a good groove with one of your major,you know, sports teams, booster clubs, that president,their kid graduates, and you're starting over again. So yeah, we have a set of guidelines that we use that I email out, that's also on our webpagethat can be accessed, that has do's and don'ts,what the expectations are, what the protocols are. Yep, and then it's gotour contact information. And I tell our booster boards just as much as I tell our coaches, hey, don't hesitate to ask questions. I'd much rather have youask questions up front than do something incorrect or do something that isn'tnecessarily what's best for kids. And then we're trying to recover, so most of them do a really good job, especially the new onesof reaching out and said, hey, I'm supposed to ask youthis, this, this, and this. My goal in these meetings is to not answer the samequestions 15 times each year, and actually come together and allow them to bounce off each other and answer those questionsahead of time, so. - That's great. I agree with Ms. Thompson. I think that having theawards ceremony would be great and a good opportunityto recognize those kids who might not take homea trophy or a record, but feel really good aboutthe work that they do and have accomplisheda lot for themselves. I think that's a really good opportunity. And then the one last question I had was, and I know you're, you know,focused on the high school, but as I look at the middle school sports, are there thoughts, arethere conversations happening about expanding our middle school sports to help bring more studentsinto high school sports? Because you know, like mygirls both play softball, and in order to play high school softball, you really have to gothrough association ball, which isn't alwaysaccessible for everybody. Same with football, you know, hockey. So obviously this is along way down the road, but it's something I think about a lot to make sure that things areequitable for all our kids. - Sure, I mean, I know in the last year we have worked withcommunity ed a little bit, and middle school sports to make sure that our varsity coaches are having a hand with themiddle school programs. You know, just making surethat they're getting some help, getting some coaching. Not all of them havebeen able to do it yet. Some have, you know, sowe're just working on it. And it's been piece by piece. You know, our newly-hiredvarsity boys soccer coach has been working with ourmiddle school students lately, you know, and some of our football coaches are doing the golf program 'cause that's just theirother sports and such. But we're getting toit. We're getting to it. - We've recognized that there's a need. - Yeah, I appreciate that, because I know that cross country is in middle school and in high school, and I've seen this beautiful continuum of the high school coach really talking to and working with themiddle school runners. And so I think that's just agood opportunity for students to be able to do thethings that they love. - And a part of that is justworking with the middle schools and with Matt Rieboe and communityed in continuing to build and grow not only the programsthat are already there, but creating programs as they're needed from an equity standpoint. - [Jessica] I did see thatthere's flag football this year for community ed, which is wonderful. I'm so glad to see that thatis an option for our kids, so. - Yeah, that's a big option. And actually they just reached out to ask, the youth association reached out to me for the youth night for football, if the flag football teams could be recognized that night as well. We're like absolutely. Sothat's gonna be a big night. That'll be our opening nightbefore school even starts, and it should be fun. Big community event. So that'llbe a part of it, absolutely. - Oh, Christine, I just have a comment. I sit on the advisory councilfor community services, and so does Marge, and they have, and actually Ben has been really adding, even though they mightbe four or five week opportunities in the spring, like May, and for both Sunrise and Central, and it's not just playingfootball, there were two others. - [Brian] There's a couple of sports that he's added this year. - Yeah, I wanna say was it Frisbee, and maybe I think it was a soccer also, middle school soccer opportunity. So they are discussing it andthey're trying, they're adding and you know, of course with them they have to also findcommunity volunteers to coach. And so there's, you know,things like that too that have to be taken into consideration, but they are workingreally hard on that, right. And I think you hit the nail on the head to start collaboration talking to the. - [Jessica] Dr. Newmaster. - [Marge] We have so many good resources with people in the district that I think that anotherone that we should celebrate is a big booster club in your schools. In the elementary ones isyour PTA, PTO, whatever. And I'm always amazed at whatthe Otter Lake families do. And I've seen ECFE when theymet and planned activities, and sometimes I think, and I know they dotraining for the members, they have like a convention and things, but I don't know ifthere's anything actually that celebrates that onour official websites. They all have their website,and they're extra outside of, but they do an amazing amount, whether it's somehow gettinga climbing wall in the gym, or whatever, an outside classroom, and they're anotherforce to be reckoned with and wondered at. So I just wanna acknowledgeall that the parents and the PTOs, PTAs, whatever do looking at their own little section, whether it's celebrating graduates coming through againthat last week of school and giving a littlescholarship or something. So I think we have an amazing community with a lot of people pouringout energy and resources. - All right, thank you both very much. - [Brian] Thank you for having us. - [Jessica] So we'll moveinto discussion item B3, teaching and learning UpdateCareer Pathways, Ms. Babiash. - Thank you Chair Ellison,members of the board, Dr. Kazmeirczak, I am here with a team to talk through ourCareer Pathways update, and also to talk aboutthe Grow Your Own grant, an update on that, and thenalso a new course proposal that comes out of that grant. And so I'd first like to introduce our Peer Pathways coordinator, Katy Olson. She'll talk a little bit abouttheir Peer pathways update, and then our student familyengagement coordinator, Brianna Santoscoy, and our principal of thehigh school, Russ Reetz, will talk more about the grant, and then I will close withthe new course proposal. So Katy. - Awesome, thank you. It'sa pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me. So just a little backgroundof where Career Pathways has been for the lastcouple of school years. I just came on board last spring in March after we had a vacancy for almost an entire schoolyear in the position. So we had staff that did a great job at the high school levelto keep up the programming and our Perkins work tosupport the Career Pathways and the career technicaleducation classes that we had. But a little backgroundabout what my role is and what Career Pathways really entailed, if you're not as familiar with it. But some huge elementsto the role that I have is to develop and maintainindustry partnerships within our local community. But we certainly branchoutside of the local community to across the metro as well,as the industry changes, and different employers come to the table and look to partner with us. I like to support our currenttechnical education teachers in what they're teaching,what they wanna teach, what they think isn't relevant anymore in their own partnershipswith industry partners, because we have awesome teachers that create their ownrelationships and sustain those. And then sometimes Ijust come in as needed. As well as supporting thoseopportunities for their students to engage one-on-one with our employers. We work, and I work really hard with our teachers and our administration to align and adjust the coursesthat we have to make sure that they're fittingcurrent industry standards. And again, I mentioned relevancy. We are constantly engaging our employers to ensure that what we're teaching is still what they'redoing in the workforce. As technology changed, practiceschanged, safety practices, what new things are upand coming and so forth. And then also our school district is awarded a federal Perkins grant. So that is specific money that's designated just forcareer and technical education, and we're able to employ that from grades eight to grades 12. And I work with our teachers. They really get to put in requests for what they would like funding for to support for the next academic year. So it goes, or fiscal year, it goes fiscal year by fiscal year. And so we're able reallyto tap into that funding to support a lot of theprogramming we offer, and even use that to help supportour industry partnerships, our advisory boards and things like that. So Career Pathways reallywhat is the mission behind it? What our mission is is no different than what you would see across the state, across the metro, across the nation. So we've got a nice visual here really kind of showing that in high school there's a variety of ways that we can embed career exploration and these pathways intoa student experience. So we really start with letting studentsexplore what that looks like. What is a nursing, youthink you know what it means to be a nurse, but do you really? You think, you like to make things? What does that really look like? What kind of machinery can you use? You like to use wood, do youlike to use metal and so forth. So we get to embed thatexploration into coursework, career-focused courseworkin the classroom. We try and embed field experiences. So visiting our industry employers, potentially doing someinternships or summer jobs to have that opportunity really to get a firsthandexperience in that career. We are also working reallyhard in each of our pathways, which I'll have somevisuals for this as well, to embed one of the following,and ideally in multiple ways, either opportunities for college credit or the opportunity to earnan industry credential. So that could either be the college credit to support their education if they do need a post-secondarydegree and training to go into that field, and/or with the industry certification that they are able toput that on a resume. They can get a job whilethey're in high school, or right after high schoolwith that certification and/or maybe do both. They're going to college andalso working in the industry with that certification. And then ideally, right, thegoal is to be career ready, whatever that looks like. Pathways support students goingto the four year university because that's what the industry requires. It can support goingto a two-year community or technical college, or as economy, as we've seen the last fewyears has really shifted. It can support a great career going right out of highschool into that job. So a few visuals, I won't gointo a ton of depth on these, they're on our website. And then we have a flyer that we give out to our industry partners and folks in the districtall the time, families. But we put a visual diagramto what career pathways means and what it looks like. So we have one for everyone of our pathways. We have foundational to advanced. They are not necessarily prerequisites, it just means if you arenew to that industry, if you think it's somethingyou're excited about, these are good courses to start with. And then as you continue along what might be moreadvanced or more in depth in a certain area within that industry. The affiliated courses columnis really to show students give them that impact ofwhy am I taking this class? Why is it important, whenam I ever gonna need, you know, heaven forbid, public speaking, or you know, some mathclass or accounting right? And they think they're nevergonna go into that field, and those are all greatexamples just from automotive. So our teachers went through and picked the affiliated courses that they thought wereapplicable for their industry, and that's sometimes a big ahamoment for students to say, oh what, you know, what do you mean I'mgonna need to use this if I go into some other jobthat's totally unrelated. So that was a nice way to piece together all of the classes they're taking and their experience in high school and sometimes middle school as well. The courses that arein a color that match, and I'll go along to the nextslide too, that match, oopsie. The color of the table are courses that eitherare for college credit or have that industrycertification embedded into it. And on the handouts we havethat information on there so families would know. So I won't talk aboutall of these in detail. Like I said they're on the web page, on the families web page if you're interested inlearning more about them and looking at them closer. Currently we have nine pathways, and so some other things we'redoing to support our students in their career explorationaround these pathways. We partner with ourlanguage arts 10 teachers, and they did mock interviews. They do it every year in January towards the end of the semester. I had some wonderful folks here who have volunteered theirtime to help with those. And we had over 60 of ourindustry partners come in and support our students inreally learning that first step towards what is it gonnatake to and be like to maybe get my first job, my second job, or a job in an industryI'm actually interested in. Because we were able to pair students if they wanted to with theindustry of their choice. We celebrated currenttechnical education month in the month of February. We hosted an industrypanel at South Campus. We brought in some VR this year. And then jumping over topartnerships, part of my role as I join the board forthe Chamber of Commerce is to reinvigorate thebusiness education network. So they had a gap in thatprogram running as well. So that'll be a great waythat the entire thing, the goal of the programming is essentially to do like what I'm doing now, but to support those industry partnerships kind of from the businessside now and say, and then we have thesestudents over here, how do you, you know, What does that look like? How do you want to get them,inform them, work with them. We have them here for you andthey wanna work with you too. We've had our advisoryboard meetings this year. We have two every year. And then just continuing with that concurrentenrollment partnership work too in college classes. We recently met with thesystem director for P20 and Student Success Education to talk about what optionsare on the table for us, what subject areas teachers have to meet the college credentialsto teach those classes. So we're really trying to maximize what opportunities we have. And then the last thing I have are some things we're workingon for the next school year. Again, we're looking at whatis industry calling for? Where are there labor shortages, along with what employersare coming to us saying this is changing, this is cool. We need your students to start getting trained in these areas. So we already have anaerospace and aviation class, and so we really wanna tap into that. Getting maybe into some drones, getting the private pilot's license. We've had some partners that we've been talkingto in the industry, and this isn't reallyan up and coming area in current technical education. So we wanna be one of thefirst school districts really to get on board with this. We're looking at kindof re-inviserate, re-in, re-envisioning a couple of our pathways, potentially a potential name could be visual communication careers, pulling out certain classesfrom other pathways, and kind of marketingthose a little differently. Tapping into the amazinginfrastructure and technology we're gonna have in thenew high school building, and what does that looklike having it student-led for activities, sports, and other things. And then also trying to tap into adding some girls to ourconstruction program. Electrician is the number one career and asked about by students, and we have a minimal to nocurriculum surrounding that. And so that's something, it's harder to do than you would think. But there is curriculum bysome of the local unions that they work with highschools to embed that, look at that, what's a good fit. And so we're gonna seewhere that might take us. - Excellent. - Thanks, I wanted to share an update on what we're callingthe Grow Your Own grant. Our version of this isFuture Bear Educators. So we recognized we hadlow participation rates in our education pathway, and we were looking forsolutions on how we could create more enrollmentopportunities for our students as well as recruit more ofour BIPOC student population into the education pathway. So the four of us got togetherand worked collaboratively on the Grow Your Own grant through MDE, and were recently awarded the grant. So we'll talk a little bit aboutwhat that means financially and the programming thatwill come along with it. The Grow Your Own grant is designed to recruit current students, and the student bodybeing a representation of our overall demographics. So the goal will be that at least 30% of our students enrolledin our career pathway are students of color. And with the intent that we provide some wraparound supports, we get them into the education pathway, figure out what theymight be passionate about, and then they return toour district at some point, and become teachers within our system, which is super exciting about diversifying our future workforce. So we are gonna partnerwith Minneapolis College to offer concurrent enrollment. We'll offer up to 14 college credits within our career pathways program. That's five additional courses, and those courses are going to replace two of our CIS courses. And we'll touch on thathere in a little bit. I'm gonna have Briana talk alittle bit about the activities and some of the things we're gonna do to support our students inthe the Grow Your Own program. - Sure. This is super exciting, right. I'm really excited thatwe actually got the grant. You write grants sometimes and you're like, I don'tknow what's gonna happen. So students obviously will beable to earn college credit while taking high school courses. They're gonna have a lotof different opportunities like different summer internships, culturally like responsivementoring opportunities with different leaders in the community. A lot of wraparound support that the program will be providing for students and their families. And then the curriculum,really one of our focuses is that the curriculumis culturally responsive, it's centered on diverseperspectives and experiences, and that the educatorwho will be leading this and the educators who areinvolved in these courses will be trained inethics studies pedagogy. So the goals for thisprogram really were twofold. One, we wanna enrich the experiences that White Bear Lake Students, White Bear Lake Area Schoolstudents have access to. But also we want toencourage diverse students to return to White Bear Lake Area Schools and be educators, right, in our system. So to do this, we are committingto a number of things. One is offering that training to staff in ethnic studies pedagogy, and really thinking aboutthe myriad of opportunities that students are going to have access to, summer internships,including opportunities to continue to explorewhat education looks like as it relates to ethnic studies and other areas of education. We're also committing toproviding culturally relevant and responsive supportfor families and students. So in areas of academicadvising, financial aid, and guidance, career planning, we really want to beintentional about that, and really think about how we are engaging with our different communitiesto make sure that, you know, families are really having an equitable, are able to equitablyaccess all of these things, the students in this program. And then the students will have an opportunity to participate in a really cool nationalleadership organization, the Family Career andCommunity Leaders of America, which would be a first and very exciting. - And they provide mentorship in all different aspects of education. So not just certified teaching, but all different types ofopportunities within education. This grant, really it was a$500,000 award, which is so cool and we can sort of usethat money how we need, it's not necessarily has to be spread out over the five years of the grant, but we sort of allocated it in that way. We'll be using portions of that to compensate for some of the staffing, and then the trainingthat will take place, as well as some of the offsite experiences that we're gonna provide for our students. We wrote goals, and in that we hope that over the duration of the grantwe impact over 150 students, promote education as aviable pathway for them, and then help them getinto a four-year program, and then obviously keepthat relationship ongoing so that they can returnand influence and impact our students in our community,which is really exciting. So again, students canearn up to 14 credits through our dual and credit or our. - Concurrent enrollment. - Concurrent enrollment process. And, sorry, we'll talk a little bit about, am I doing this one too, I can't remember? - [Jen] Yes. It's on service. - [Russ] Okay. Thank you. So in our education pathway we currently have twoconcurrent enrollment courses, CIS courses, that haven'trun in the last two years. This year we had, I thinkseven students enroll in one and 12 in the other. And that's really what spurred the urgency behind writing the grant. So we are gonna replace those two courses with the Minneapolis college courses that are listed on the slides. So the first course thatwe'll introduce this year, well, we're introducing it tonight maybe. - [Jen] Yes. - For approval. This will go into the courseguide for next school year, and we'll spend the firstsemester recruiting students primarily from our ethnic studies courses, US history and ethnicstudies, world history, in hopes that we can run two sections of Intro to Urban Educationand Reflective Practice in semester two. The following year we would offer threecourses in the pathway. We'd offer Intro to Urban Education again, we would add technology for educators, and we would add introductionto ethnic studies. And then the following year we would add courses four andfive, intro to special ed, and multicultural approaches to education. So eventually we'll havefive courses running, and that really is kindof how we set it up through the grant in terms of the goal and how we are funding staffing as we move ahead in each year. But we will be able tooffer those five courses, and students can earn those 14 credits by completing all five. - Thank you Russ. So just a couple thingsI wanted to point out. Minneapolis College used to be MinneapolisCommunity and Technical College and now they've expandedto the liberal arts. And so this coursework that you see here is part of their associate's degree. And then those courses can also transfer into a four year degree program in our MnSCU system within Minnesota. And so just, I wanted tomake sure to bring that up. And we do have a partnershipwith Minneapolis College. We have an instructor who has been doing a lot of professional learningwith us with ethnic studies, Kleber Ortiz, and so thatwas another partnership and relationship that we already had with Minneapolis College. And so just a reminderon new course proposals, we really look to ourworld's best workforce goal of all students are collegeand career ready by graduation. And so really taking inmultiple perspectives as we look at new courses, and really looking atincluding employer needs, college expectations, pastand present student interests and experiences. And like Russ said, becauseour enrollment was so low in those current teachereducation courses, we really feel like this newcourse is gonna open it up to more students who maybe interested in education. So we think about socialwork and school counselors, not just necessarily teachers. So we're really excited about that. Also with the new course proposals, some things that we justtake into consideration are, like I mentioned, student interests, and how then we can handle the course in terms of staffing andscheduling and facilities. And so really wanted to ensurethat the student interest, we can support that withthe resources that we have, and we do believe we can withthis new course proposal. So you'll see the new course proposal. And just a couple things. I wanted to point out that this course would be for the 2024-2025 school year. It would replace the two CIS courses, Exploring the Teaching Profession 1 and 2. So when I come back, I dothink I need to also recommend that we remove those twocourses that we currently have, but we'll get there. So with this course,students are going to explore the realities of teaching, the historical background of education, and current challenges in schools. The course also includesclassroom discussions, community education activities, and 30 hours of the field experience, which we're really excited about. And so obviously as we mentioned before, the ultimate goal of the new course is to increase student interestin teaching profession, and hopefully our students will come back and wanna be educators inWhite Bear Lake Area Schools. So I'll come back later with a recommendation forthe new course proposal. So we can pause here if there's any questionsthat you may have. - Sure, thank you. Dr. Arcand, I knew youwere gonna have questions. - I always have questions. My first question waswith the introduction to urban education andreflective practices, are you integrating the PELSBfoundational standard sense? So they're getting through those? 'Cause I see that you hada special education course that you were coming in at number four. So I was just wondering are we covering those required PELSBfoundational skills on it? - So I think that's areally great question that I want to ensure that we are, so I'll get back to you onthat, but I would assume we are, but I wanna just make sure. - Reading it looks like itis, that you're using this, and you know, they're gonna teach the standards in this class. So that it has some contextual relevancy to the students that are taking it. It seems like that would work. So that's what I thought. My other question is justbecause I'm a CTE nerd, when you looked at our POSshere we have at White Bear, how does that match upwith the top nine POSs that you're submitting for yourNortheast Consortium grant? Are they commission line? You know, we have to haveour top three priority one, priority two, or priority three. Are we kind of in line withwhat the consortium is doing? - So our consortium leader submits those. - [Scott] So you don't talk about them. I didn't know if you did. - So well, we don't talk about them. We haven't recently in our meetings, I know in our metro area, healthcare is definitely important. Education, we understandthat, hence the grant. And so yes, we try andalign with those as well, and typically are, althoughwe are also sometimes at the mercy of our industry partners and who's willing to come tothe table to work with us too. So sometimes it's a little. - Yeah and it looks like yourindustry pathways you have really align with what the needis in the Twin Cities area. So that looks safe. I was just curious, howclose we matched through, but they're turning in for thegrant and what you're using because I know funding is always based on those top nine, so. - Yes, yeah, and they're just at the point where they're having those conversations and rewriting that proposal. 'Cause we had to submit whatwe submitted to our consortium and now those leaders are submitting it to the state level, so. - [Scott] All right, well, thank you. - I think we hear about that actually tomorrow in our meeting, so you're a day too early.- All right, thank you. - [Jessica] Mrs. Daniels. - Comments and a question or two, how does PSEO concurrentenrollment kind of align? I mean, you know, whatdoes the post-secondary education options. - Yeah, yep, yep. That's a great question. So that concurrentenrollment gives the students the opportunity to stay at the high school to take the course. And so they're able to getthat college experience, the rigor of that college course. But on the high school campus,and don't have to leave. Where PSEO, right, that's where students actually leave our campusand go to the college. And so, you know, we believe with the concurrent enrollmentoptions, it really provides, you know, that communityof the high school and of that instructorthat we have as a teacher, as an employee, to have those relationshipswith their kids. And so we just think that that's a really valuableexperience for our kids to be able to stay on campusand experience high school and everything it has tooffer outside of academics with that concurrent enrollment option. - So I'm just gonna tellyou one small story, it's just that when Iwas teaching 20 years ago here at Central Middle School as a special education teacher, back then all the studentshad a study hall for you know, more than I think itwas like, I don't know, 70 minutes or something because we're on a fourperiod day way back. Anyway, I had somebody who would volunteer in my special ed class everyday for a full semester, and that person now isa school psychologist in our district. So I think the potentialto get kids interested in whether it's specialeducation or education in general at this, you know, really critical age is just really gonna be great. And I think shifting alittle bit like we are with abandoning some coursesthat weren't that interesting or at least that appealingto whatever reason to this new path is just so exciting. And then one last thing, Iwas able to go to a workshop, well, it was a conference really, on the Association forEducational Service agencies, which is like the 916, 'causeI sit on their board too. And this is somebody thatpresented in their state for, was it Connecticut,and actually that state started with one college because they had such a teacher shortage as we all are experiencingacross the United States and other countries too. But they had some of their state colleges who gave free tuition to any student who wanted to be a teacher, and then now has grown tofour or five, six colleges now in their state. So you know, you just don't know. I mean we're all experiencedas, I'm just gonna say, I mean it's just terrificthat we're gonna you know, get some kids hooked earlybecause it's such a great field. Such a great career. - [Jen] Thank you. - [Jessica] Ms. Thompson. - A question and comment, I love this. As somebody who back in my day, 20, whenever it was that I was in high school, I went into OJT which wason job training at the time, and I was a member of theBusiness Professionals of America, which I thought was really cool. And we went to like a state conference, and we had to likeinterview with companies and you had to do resume,you had to do all the things. And I actually worked in thehigh school that I graduated for the entire year after I graduated 'cause I had grant funding that allowed me to work in the office. And still today I'm an office manager, transitioning into a new career now. But it provided me with a pathway to, I had to move out ofmy home when I was 17, my senior year of high school. And it gave me all the resources I need to be successful in life andto be able to live on my own and to be able to provide for myself, 'cause that was somethingthat I had to do. So looking at all this,it's very exciting, and I love how many more pathways we have as there were when I was in school, and talking about thewraparound support services. So one of the things that stop students fromdoing something like this is the inability to gettheir driver's license. It's expensive. I had justsigned my daughter up. It's $400 just to put her inthe course to do that piece. And then I have to have a car, I have to be able to put gas in that car. I have to be able to afford insurance. Is some of this part of those services, do we have funding for that? I know Ramsey County has a program where I believe they startedworking with districts to kind of help with thisdriver's license piece. Is that something that we'relooking at and talking about? 'Cause it can be a big thing to stop a student from doing this, and college isn't for everybody,not in the four year sense. - Sure, yeah. So something that helped makethis opportunity work for us, we thought we had that exactdiscussion, transportation. Was with the location of the 912 building, we now have so many more schools within what we feel wouldbe a safe walking distance for students that needed that experience, and you know, walking wastheir best or only option. And so we have the partnerships in place and they've had discussionswith the schools to say hey you know, we'relooking to embed this and have these partnerships, and so they're aware that our students could be coming as well. - And we have LincolnElementary right in the backyard of the unified high school. So that's a prime opportunity where our students would be able to walk to be able to get those30 hours in as well. - So looking at the otherpathways that we have, 'cause I know like someof the medical pathways, they actually go to Regions andthey go to some of our like. How are we supporting that? Do we have ways to support that, and to help them get the license? Because even in like anelectrician apprenticeship program, you have to be able toget to the job site, and the job sites canbe all over the place, and in any of the construction pathways. That is a big piece to that. - Yeah, yeah. So there's a couple areas. Specifically for, we have asummer construction program and not we, we support it. We actually provide the busing, and we provide the physicallocation for most of it called Minnesota Trades Academy. And so part of that end ofthat programming actually is our instructor providesdriver's education training or he used to, and nowsomeone else does it, something switched a littlebit, but gives students, those students in the program, there's 15, the opportunity to do theirdriver's education training that's built into the programming. So there is also somethingthrough Ramsey County that, what is it called workforceready, or something ready where it is a brand newgrant that was wonderful because this is an area that districts planning programmingthrough pathways budgets don't always have builtin the funding to support, is that opportunity thatif there is some barrier that because they can't buy work boots, they can't do the internship, or because they can't getthere, they need a bus pass, they can't do the internship, That they have the funding where we go, we as administrators go to them, and say hey, here's theapplication for this student, this is their need, andthey provide that funding. So that is new. We've donea few webinars about that. And so it's, I think it's just kind of that evolving conversation is hopefully counselorsand myself and teachers, we partner together, orsometimes industry sponsors, they might be willingto provide some funding in that area as well tosupport the students. So it's kind of seeingwho can come to the table to make this work. - It's good stuff. I mean, I think we had a presentation where we have a senior who's already, or a couple who already have jobs at some of our local auto dealerships. As you know, auto mechanics.Yeah, that's good. It is exciting. Thank you. - Writing grants is alot of work, so thank you for all your work in writingthe grants and congratulations. And I also just want to put a plug in that if anybody hasn't done the 10th grade mock interview day, Ms. Danielsand I were there this year, and it is so much fun, andthe students are so fantastic. So highly recommendanybody in the community. All right. Thank you all very much. And our last discussionitem for the evening before construction update, Ms. Gillespie. - [Member] Are you playing with that? - [Member] I am. (members chattering) - [Alison] Chair Ellison,members of the board, I am here, well, Mr. Wold andI are partnering with this. So as a team I'm here tointroduce some familiar faces. I was going to attemptto say their last names, but I'm now afraid that I'mgoing to not say them right, so I'll just say first names, our good friends AJ and Samhave been here multiple times. Welcome. And then John, Ido know John's last name. John and I are herereference local schools international here tonight. So welcome. - Thank you for having us. We're excited to do an update of how the referendum projects are going, including some very excitingconstruction updates. So today we'll go throughthe overview of the projects and status update of all of them. We'll do construction updates for those that are in construction right now, and then John's gonnashare some reflections from staff and impact,and then we'll open it up for questions and discussion. So all of the referendum projects are reflected in the map on the left. This has been a part of all of our referendumconstruction updates to the board since the bond passed in 2019. The major themes of the referendum were of course district-wideadditions and renovations to accommodate on enrollment growth, including a new building, safety and security improvementsthroughout the district, some deferred maintenance projects, and then classroom and building updates to create flexible learning spaces. It's exciting to see the list on the left hand side ofthis slide grow over time. So on the left you can see all of the projects that are completed. I'll make a couple of notesof projects that have changed or moved in location on this slide since the last time we were with you. All elementary schoolfurniture is now procured and been installed for nearlya whole school year now. And then you can see we'vegot Oneka elementary school is at 99% billing. So getting very, very closeto being done in Oneka. We've really just got somecompletion tasks left there, which leaves a few projectsin bid out or in construction. Of course the high school is one of those. As of last month we read 93% complete from a billing perspective,and actually as we speak phase three furniture install is going. So that's in the 100, 200 circleand some in the music area. And then the kitchen, a coupleother random little spaces. Central Middle School, soobviously attached to this Tony is at about 23% complete,and in furniture installed for that building is happening in phases kind of timed with like the construction, and we'll show you thephasing plan tonight. Mariner, which is a project focused on long-termfacilities maintenance work. It's kind of just gottenstarted, it's at 2%, but they are getting theirmajor furniture installed that building this summer. And last but not least, Sunrise Park. So the future district service center slash transitions educationcenter, early childhood, and I should have listedsenior center as well, is also at about 2% complete. Mostly people going onthings like shop drawings and submittals, and thatfurniture will also be in phases. So I'll start with the project that's kind of the least complete because it hasn'tstarted construction yet, which is Sunrise Park, withthe four programs listed here. As I just said, for thosewho are not familiar, the project scope is renovations to create that districtservice center, TEC, early childhood and senior center along with some maintenanceneeds for that building. It was in design from January of 2023 through November of 2023, and went out for bid last December. Had a great bid day, bid under budget, and construction startsactually pretty soon here. So July of 2024 through December of 2025. It is in phases that I'll let AJ talkabout in a minute here. Here's a floor plan of the building. I don't expect you to beable to read all the labels but kind of the major colorcoding can help you understand what programs are gonna be where. So the light, the mainentrance is on the left, the big black arrow on the left, that is on the west side of the building. And if you went in that entrance for the district services center, you'd kind of go to the left, to go to the adulteducation or senior center, and then go to the right togo to the district office. Then the orange color on thesouth side and the two wings is early childhood, and theywill have their own entrance on the south side of the building. The transition education center will be on the east side of the building on the right side of thismap with their entrance in that light blue color. And then last but not least, we've got some kind of shared services including the kitchen and cafeteria area, we've got the gymnasium, we've got some storage, lockerrooms, things like that. And then the future boardroom, which might be ofinterest to this audience, is in that kind of upperleft hand corner there. I'll just go through acouple of renderings. I know you had a design update before this project went out for bid, but here is a rendering ofthose three main entrances. This is something we'vebeen working on quite a bit with district communications to make sure we get the phrasing right. So you can see the top is the District ServiceCenter at Sunrise Park. So that would be the entrancethat's on the west side. Then bottom left would bethe early childhood entrance, and finally the transitioneducation center entrance. Here's a view, I'll just go through a couple of rendering views, and then I'll let AJ talkthrough the phasing plan. Here's a view is whatit's proposed to look like inside the welcome center, it's kind of right after youwould come inside the building at that main entrance. A view of the districtservice center hallway, a little washed out onthe computer monitor here, but a view of the earlychildhood family commons. So for those who are familiar with the Sunrise Park building, this is kind of right across from what you think ofas the main office today. There's kind of that widened hallway area looking out over the courtyards. So a gathering space for families. We've got a view of what the hallways up and down those earlychildhood wings will look like. Planning for things like boots and coats, and then the transition education center, life skills commons as they're calling it, in the center of thedesign of their space. Here's a view of the proposed boardroom, I should have said itearlier in all of these. These were actually goingthrough the furniture design and selection process as we speak. So there's kind of conceptual furniture shown in all of these renderings, but final selectionshave not been made yet. And then last but not least, a series of training or conference rooms across the hall from the boardroom, shown with a lot of flexible furniture. You wanna talk phasing? - [AJ] No, yeah, those are my colors. So the green portionon the top left there, that's phase one. So that's gonna be the renovation of the district officearea, the boardroom, and the storage areas over there. That'll be starting in July of this year. And that's gonna run throughDecember of this year. Phase two, which is that blue area, that's the renovationof the senior center, the gymnasium, kitchenand cafeteria areas. So these are just kind ofone right after another. So we'll be starting that bluearea in December of this year and that'll run throughJune of next summer. And then phase three, that'sthe early education classrooms and transition education centers. So that'll be starting in June of '25 through December of '25. - [Sam] Next we can move onto Central Middle School. So scope here at Central Middle School is to renovate the district office to create additional classroomand flexible learning space. There's a gym addition that I'm sure everybody'sseen going up and on, upcoming summer renovation activities include kitchen and cafeteriarenovation expansion, and updated classrooms, meeting center, and flexible learning areas. We have some safety and security upgrades. And last but not least, some long-term facility maintenance fundedprojects around ventilation. Design for this project was summer of '22 through early of January of 2023, and we went out bid about a year ago. It has been under constructionsince last summer, and will continue through fall of 2025. Here are the floor plans of the building, including the district office. Sorry, it's hard to read 'cause it's a really big long building. So hard to fit on the slide. But you can see these colored boxes really reflect some areasof major renovation. And we had come to you all withsome of that design concept about creating some homes outin the learning communities with grade levels, some lake gathering areasat the media center, and the learning commons or cafeteria. And then last but not least, some trails that kind of reflect that you're entering or exiting one of those spaces. The intent is to have grade levels really be housed in one endor other of the building to reduce travel time, and then to have allof the shared resources be in the center. So things like exploratory,cafeteria, gymnasiums, what have you. Here are some renderings of what that is proposed to look like. Here's a rendering of thecafeteria for some context. The columns in the center of the space really reflect where the hallway is today. So the existing cafeteria would be to the left of those columns. And then the expanding cafeteria is taking all of the spaces to the right of that second row columnsall the way to the windows. Here's a view of the spaceoutside of the learning commons. So a lot of openness andtransparency and flexibility. A view of one of theflexible learning areas that would be in one of those grade level learning communities. Again, kind of in thatcreating a home concept, and what's supposed to happen to this room that we're sitting in, it's supposed to be a fitness center to increase physical educationopportunities for Central. - [Member] Back to PE. - [Sam] And then last but notleast, a view of the gymnasium that is currently getting added. So a view inside of that. I'll let AJ talk aboutconstruction fees in here. - [AJ] Yeah, so the green is the gymnasium slash storm shelter addition. So that was just that lastrendering that we were looking at and so we're working on thatportion of the building now, obviously everybody's beenseeing all the precast going up for that. We'll be wrapping that upat the end of this summer. And then all of that pink, that's gonna be what we'restarting this summer. So we've got a lot of square footage coming down the pipeline this summer. And then basically the rest of the colors will be the following summer. So we're gonna havetwo pretty busy summers inside of this building here. - [Sam] And some of it's aboutgetting Sunrise Park ready for district office to move to so that we can takeover their space, right? So there's kind of a (indistinct) there. I think if I go, it'll goonto the video on its own. - [AJ] Oh, is it. - [Alison] A couple more. - [Sam] One more. (upbeat music) - [AJ] As I said, I got acouple other updates otherwise. - [Sam] Oh, I'm sorry. Thoughtyou were ready for the video. - [AJ] I didn't wantto miss out on this one just because we've done. - [Sam] My apologies. - No, it's good. This is at random so. But we've done a lot ofwork, right, physics joke. So approximately 8,919,680 joules worth just to set the precast wall panels. So that's the approximate weight of lifting 81 school busesonly one foot in the air, which we lifted these muchhigher than that by the way. So also going on in theCentral Middle School here, we've got the new precast double T joists, roofing, interior slab ongrade, MEP below grade, and in wall for the gym addition, we've done some newsteel joists and a roof over the tech labs adjacentto the gym addition. Some other items that we got going on and coming up this summer are the hydronic piping and the tunnels, that's gonna serve thenewly-renovated spaces this summer. We're installing the gym equipment, paint and tile in the bathrooms, which you'll get to see in the video. Chiller enclosure and infiltration basin around the outside of the building, along with the new loading dock area and the flex areas in area A. This summer we'll also be setting new RTUs along with the chilled water and hot water piping up onthe roof and up to those units that'll serve basically theremainder of the building. So now we do can do the video. I'm gonna jump in withmy random facts, sorry. (upbeat music) It's got a nice shot lookingeast here at the Price Field, flying into the chillerenclosure and infiltration basin that you can see there, with the gym startingto come up on the right. So looking inside the gymnasium now. You can see they got these duct work hung, they got the storm shrouds in there, they got lighting comingin, got paint on the walls, as you can see by the floor,a lot more to still install. Windows and the curtainwalls, the storm windows will be going in. Different shot inside the gymnasium there looking right now at theback of the screen there is where the gym entranceand the washroom is, as well as the mechanical mezzanine access on the east side here,looking at that wall, that's where all thenew storage areas are. Inside of one of those storage areas, spin around and look at some paint. It had to be built, too. It'll get used, for sure. (upbeat music continues) So you can see the washroom and the boiler that's in the new gym, as it spins. That's the washroom wall. Nice building too, copingup around the storm shelter, and that new roof, we have a new roof. (upbeat music continues) Central and North. BaldEagle in the background. (member speaking indistinctly) - [Alison] Okay, we can gointo the high school now. So as everybody's well aware, it's a very simplisticdescription of the scope, but additions and renovations to create a comprehensive9-12 high school. Obviously you are occupyingparts of that now. We also have a lot of workto the kitchen and cafeteria, safety, security, and long-term facilitiesmaintenance upgrades. Amazingly design wasback in January of 2020 through April of 2021 withspring of '21 bidding, and has been under constructionessentially ever since. And we are in the last phase right now, which AJ'll talk about goingthrough October of this year. Here are some floor plans. Difficult building toget all on one slide, but I'll start on the left. So that's the field houseand game gym levels. So you can see it in the red there. Red is activities and athleticspaces on these plans. Then the plan that has thegreenery and sidewalks around it would be the main level plan that you enter the buildingon for the most part. The union is that kind ofgolden color in the center. The classroom tower that's already open is on the left hand side ofthat with the green studios and the blue CTE spaces. And the field house showsup again on this level with the walking track. And then we have the next image over would be the second floor, which would include the learning commons that's under construction,about to get furniture. And then there's alsoa third story of course to that classroom tower. Some views, this is aview of what the east side of the building will looklike at the main entry. I'll make a couple of comments. The tall volume on the right hand side is the fly loft of the auditorium and then the white volume tothe left of that is the house or the area where guests actually sit. And then we've got the entrance canopy. This is a view rightinside that main entrance. So the main office wouldbe directly to your left, and the auditorium wouldbe directly to your right. Here's a view frominside of the auditorium, which is actively underconstruction as well as a view. Suggested what it could looklike during a performance. A rendering of the union,part of which is already open. Oh sorry, I thought I had onemore. So now it's up to you. - [AJ] Yeah, so again, veryhard to see all of this, but the left side is essentiallyan overall site plan. You can see Central at the bottom there along with Price Field, working all the way up to the north side where the Regis fields are. The green area, you'd probablynotice if you drove by today, we're already working on thecurb and gutter around there. So the site is startingto change substantially, but we're working in that green area now, and everywhere that is pinkis going to be shortly after we get through the rest ofthat green area on the site. So you're gonna see a lot of, I'm sure you already have,dozers, excavators, trucks. There's gonna be a lot of traffic around the site at NorthCampus this summer. And then on the right, short version, everything that is a color is where we're underconstruction right now. And at the end of this, allof that by the school start, all of those colors except for 7A, which is the auditorium piece, will be ready to go for school start. So then we can do the next one. But before we get to the video, I gotta get my snapshots in here too. So I got a laundry list of items because. - [Sam] Yeah, I know, oh. - Yeah, it's a big list, soI have to keep notes here, but we can't even barelyscratch the surface of what's going on really. But, so if this were amarathon, based on the billing, we'd be at mile marker 24.18 of 26. So it's still in the distance. - Darkest part of the woods. - Yeah, it's still, yeah, it's probably the hardestpart, right, yeah. - [Member] Marathon is 26.2. - And 368 yards, right? Yeah. (all laughing) The loading dock concrete is complete. Be paving up to that around the loading dockin the coming weeks. We'll see most of thisin the video as well, but North Ponds are complete,and the wetland delineation will be getting removed this summer. Curb and gutter movingsouth into the main lot after the first lift coming here in May. June 19th, after school is out, we'll be starting onthe west side landscape and the concrete bear paw, so everybody's beenwalking over the asphalt into that west entrance, pretty soon that's gonnabe a big concrete walkway with a colored bear paw in it. It's gonna look pretty cool. The bus garage, the belovedbus garage by us anyway, I don't know if you guys noticed we've been officing outta that, so. That's starting the demo as of today. So we'll be taking itdown piece by piece here. Starting the basketballand field event area south of Price around June 10th. And we'll be moving north, kind of meeting in the middle there. And then the main gym is complete, and we'll be working onthe AV wall graphics, divider curtain, and I'm wrapping that up before school start, butI'm sure you're wondering how many basketballs you can fit in it. It's 90,706. We're also working in thesecond half of the union. The terrazzo's going down,miscellaneous finishes. Sales are gonna be completebefore school starts as well. I'm gonna try to rattle through this. Learning commons on leveltwo and area G and H is awaiting carpeting, skylights, glass, and furniture's starting toget staged in there as well. The auditorium, they'repainting the clouds next week, and be pouring slabs starting in May. As well as building up all of the acoustic wall panels in there. The theatrical riggingwill be starting in May, and then we'll be workingon the remaining AV, seating, lighting, and that'll be going into the school year. The music areas, working on the soundisolation booths and rooms, they're actually set now. Ceilings are in, walls are painted, casework's coming in May, they're tiling in the main bathrooms and moving into the corridors,we've got MEP startup. So that's mechanical,electrical, plumbing startup, that's gonna be mid-Mayfor areas C, D, B, and A. So in the construction world, startup day is kind oflike the big milestone day. So all of these parts and pieces we've been putting in the buildings, they just sit idle essentiallyuntil they're ready to go. So when everything, all your air handlers, we start putting water through everything, it's kind of exciting andnail biting at the same time. Power to the building substations, that'll be in May and June. And then road work for Division and 8th, starting June 10th through August 16th. A little bit of mockup,quick as we could go. - Those are highlights. (upbeat music) - Got a shot looking west there at the new auditorium addition, you can see the existinglot's been milled up. (upbeat music continues) Auditorium looking west, kindof flying to the north here. These were two weeks ago. There is outdoor courtyardin between area J and the breeze coverthere on the back side. We were pouring thatbuilding down concrete. Said last time people aren'tdriving 40 miles an hour on the job site, we haveto speed up the video, otherwise this takes forever. (upbeat music continues) So flying north, lookingat the field house over towards the entrancethere, that's asphalt, and that's where thatbig concrete bear paw will be going in the summer. And then this is the interior 360 there. The admin area, the mainoffice, so you can see the, finishings are just about in, got a lot of textures coming off, but this space is justabout ready to turn over. (upbeat music continues) And inside that gym,that's all the basketballs. Kitchen, it looks a littledifferent now, it's more full. And so that's been turned over to use. (upbeat music continues) And this is the secondhalf of the union area, so everybody can get inside the other side on the temp wall. So this is what's going onon the other side of that. A lot's been going on. This is where you can seeall that material staged in that space, and youcan see all the epoxy and the too. This is up on level two area,G, H, the learning commons, you can see the skylight tubes there. (upbeat music continues) Inside the auditorium. From the stage, looking outand over the orchestra pit. (upbeat music continues) Pit wall. - All right, I think I'll let John. - All right, I get to, I get to, get to take it to the side of that one slide that had completion, which is super exciting totalk about and think about with our elementaryschools and our furniture, the learning commons, and those things. And you know, one of thethings that, you know, we talked about a lot in the principles is really about our strategic plan, and how we build whatwe're doing as a district into our schools, intowhat we do every day. And when we mentioned2020, they're like, wow, look what we've done in, and what's a really short amount of time. And if you haven't seen someof like our learning commons, seen our kids when they'vegone into the learning commons, into their classroom with new furniture, the wow on their face is just amazing. The picture here is just oneof our little soft seats there in between our bookshelvesin the learning commons. And to see kids dashingand excited to be in there grabbing books andengaging in their learning is super, super fun to see. Especially I remember, you know, working with you allearly on how, you know, we've taken some of ourfacilities, you know, Matoska, a lot of our facilities really that were built in themid-century prior to this, and we are really takingthat to a modern era, and had this amazingrealization, you know, when we're getting ready for this, that our studentsactually were born today, coming into our school today, are gonna be working in themiddle of the next century, that mid-century modern student. So we've literally come, itfeels like a full century. a full century ahead. So we're super excited abouthow we can use our facilities, use our spaces, for thatpersonalized learning. Again, connecting back towhat we're trying to do as a district and developing each child to develop the ability forthem to grab onto their dreams, their hopes and apply them,you know, in their every day, and apply them in their classrooms and in their learning commons. Again, you know, with the furniture and specifically beingable to be flexible, and allowing, we heard about earlier with our career pathways,being able to develop teamwork, critical thinking, flexible thinking. And our spaces have transformed from that previouscentury of desks and rows into really collaborative spaces, spaces where students canengage, they can work together, work independently, and develop, you know, develop their skillsand pursue their dreams. And I could probablytalk a lot about that, but I know Marissa and Tiadid a lot of really great work with actually gettingour kids to talk about what's going on. So I'm gonna just hitthe enter button and. - [Member] You should be able to. - [Member] Or press down. - [John] Press down. (upbeat music) - Since we've gotten this new furniture, I definitely have seen an increase in the student choice of it all. I even asked them, do youthink you're picking furniture that's going to help you learn? And they have that accountabilityto kind of say yes or no. - I think that it has really honestly built critical thinking skillsbecause they need to think where am I going to learn best? And they're able to make choices to pull themselves upcloser for the core lesson, and then they can find aspace that meets their needs to do their independent work. It seems like a little thingwhere they're going to sit or what they're going to siton, but it empowers them. - Getting to see the kids becomfortable with moving around and being comfortablereading in this space and being comfortabledoing math in this space and seeing preferences play out. Some kids just like to sit on the floor, some kids like to sit on a spot, some kids like to stay at their desk, and then being able to open the doors and see it with two classes. - [Teacher] We've seen thatit creates more of a community within our three classrooms instead of three separate classrooms. The students are really used to us bringing them all together and they know we're all their teachers. - I definitely think the collaboration from the furniture has increased. I mean we're moving stuffwhenever we need to. The fact that it's all on wheels. We can make new groups,we can move things around. If suddenly we're doing an acting or reader's theater for the day, all the tables go to the side, and it's just so easy and movable. And I definitely think that helps kids engage with each other indifferent ways than before. - Being able to work with multiple friends that they might nothave been in class with, and getting to work withor getting to sit next to. Kids are more flexible withdifferent teaching styles and so being able to open the doors, and being able to hear acouple different voices. - The Flex Lab that wehave is a great space, and we often talk about how can we figure out ways to use it more. It's nice that we haveoptions and places to move. - I think being able towork with another teacher and collaborate andfeed off of each other, we just work off ofeach other really well. - We get a lot of energy that way. Even just checking next door to see what somebody else is doing. It's just much easier when we are able to slidethe doors wide open, or be in the classroom workingwith one group of students, but monitoring studentsthat are out in the commons. It's really easy with the glass doors. (upbeat music continues) - Mine is probably the wheelchairs. There's like the lilypads and then the rockers. I love the ottomans, they're my favorite piece of furniture, and I just love sitting on them. They're just nice. - My desks, they aren'tlike the same as last year. They're way more comfortable. (upbeat music continues) - It's easier to learn,it's like more comfortable. So I can focus more. - On days where I'm super excited, I'll sit in like a wobbly chair, and I think that gets my energy out just rocking back and forth,and it helps me calm down. And if I'm like super relaxed, I'll sit in my favorite pieceof furniture, the ottoman. - In like second gradewe didn't have all this, so I got kind of bored of that chair, and now it's more comfortable. - I feel like for some people, flexible furniture canbe very helpful to use because like sometimes people need to fidget with their hands, but then they can fidgetwith their furniture that they're sitting in. Just think it's a very niceaddition to the school. I think it's probably helpeda lot of people learn better. (upbeat music continues) - I like the Commons becauselike it's kind of a place where you can go and it'skind of quieter out there instead of being in a loud classroom. - I like that there's a lot of like room that we can move aroundto a couple places, and it's not that crowded. It's kind of fun, likehaving more options. - The learning commons,it just got rebuilt, so I like how big it is now, and how more, and it has more spaceso that you could read. - I love that if you'reworking on something else that some other people are, you can go into a different space. Like you can go out into the commons outside like your classroom, and your teacher can still see you and monitor what you're doing. - It's easier to payattention to your work out in the commons or themakerspace because it's quieter and you have less going on. - If you need to take a break then you can just sit inthe commons and read books. (upbeat music continues) - My teacher gets to learn stuff with me. We can have tons of people learn instead of just like one class, there can be like more teaching. - I think that she like enjoys also being comfier, comfortable, and not always just likestanding like all day. - I think they like how peoplecan like come up to the front and they'll still be comfortablewith the new furniture. - They have more space forteaching and doing stuff. - We actually have this big spot, and the first grade and the second graders are all squished together, which is kind of maybe a little fun. Maybe you're seeingyour friends passing by, and we can fit so much furniture in here for so many other sittingspaces, it's amazing. - [Jessica] I was gonna say, I vote for student videos like that. (all laughing) All right, that's wonderful. Thank you. Questions from the board?Miss Daniels, sorry. - If I may make a quick,so third floor in Central, is that, I saw two floors, right? Is third floor gonna be all redone too? - [AJ] Yes. - So that'll be studentspaces. So classrooms, okay. I just, when I look at the plans, I just couldn't see the other one. - [AJ] It's hard to tell in the picture 'cause it's just overwhelmed by the other. It's the little square that'slike off the right there. But that'll be in thefirst summer as well. So, or second summer, sorry. - Second summer. Yeah. And then this is really anodd question, but you know, Morikas, and then we've got the wetland, and then you've got that partthat kind of goes like this up to Oligo Road or Oligo Avenue, which I think is part of the property. And you know, 'cause there's that house, it's like a peninsula, so that's to the north of the peninsula. So what's happening with that? I mean, is it gonna betrees again and everything? It used to be, it used tobe, you know, that way, I'm just wondering because it seemed like itwas part of the property, and now I don't know what it is. - [AJ] Yep, there's gonna be some landscape and green space. It's kind of hard to tell, but. - Okay, so that's part, yeah,so it would be that green, I mean the gray at the very top, the one on the left would be that gray. It's almost like a triangle. I mean it looks kind of like a triangle. So you know what I'm saying, it's on the left part of the left drawing. - [AJ] Running east,west there, right? Yep. - [Kathleen] So it wouldbe the, to the other one. - Yep, so the watershed, they have their requirementson what that becomes and so that, right now it's been a native seed mix essentiallyis what's going back in there. It takes about three yearsfor the native seed mix. So it kind of doesn't looksuper fancy right now, but it has been worked on. So it's a long process to get it. - [Kathleen] It is part of everything. - Yep. - I guess I just didn't know what was is it a piece of the township,is it part of the school. It's part of the it be down road. Anyway, I just, I did reallyget a big bump and a thrill from the video of North Campus. I mean really it was just so beautiful. So, or our future highschool. So it was great. Thank you so much. - First board meetingwill be when? At Sunrise? - [AJ] First what? - Board meeting.- Board meeting. - [AJ] Oh, well I guessit would probably be the. - Well they're gonna, we'regonna hold you to this AJ. So be careful. - [Member] We need it. Careful. - Be careful. - [Member] January. - [AJ] It would be the January. - Maybe late Januaryperhaps. It'd be built. It'll be completed in December, and then it'll take a fewweeks to move in and then. So maybe late January work sessions? - [AJ] Yep, absolutely. - [Sam] And that's not that far away. - All right. - [Member] Darn. - You can come in and assist. - [AJ] You're just trying tomake Eric sweat over here. - Oh yeah. We get flexiblefurniture too, like do we get? - We're working on orderingfurniture selections as we speak right now. - [Member] The ottoman, the girl was reallyselling the ottoman, so. - [Jessica] It looked nice. - [Wayne] Ottomans for everyone. - Any other questions? Oh, Ms. Thompson. - A, I'm always just sothankful to our community when I watch all this wonderful stuff that we are able to do because of their supportbehind our school district. I mean, especially when I know how many other schools are struggling, and don't have thisopportunity that we have, it is just, I just getoverwhelmed at this part. And so I do have, and I did take science in the third floor of Central Middle School, and the teacher I had at the time, which I should remember his name, but if you had the hiccups, you were not allowedto leave the classroom to get a drink of water. He had a little drawerand he opened it up, and he gave you a lemon drop, and he promised if thatdidn't take the hiccups away, you could go get, and nobody ever left, you got that lemon drop and the hiccups just magically went away. But and then I just had a question and this is just gonna be one for AJ. So how many blades of grassare on all of our turf fields? - Oh man, I wrote it down last time. I want to say it was in the3 million something range. - That's what I recall. - [Angela] Work on that for next time. - 3 million, yeah. - [Angela] I think my daughtertook a class last fall called career explorationsat the high school with a teacher called Mr. Dahm. And I think you would be a great guest speaker in that classroom just to provide students with, and you really just exude joy when you talk about thisstuff in your career. And I think sharing that with our students would be wonderful. I would love to connect the two of you, 'cause he does look for people to come in and speak to the students and just give them ideas of careers that they can have whenthey leave the school. - [Marge] And the mathof how many basketballs. - [Angela] Yeah, I know. Just all of it. It's really great. I enjoy it. And those students, Imean, (scoffs) forget it. It's great way to end myname. Thank you very much. - [Marge] I'm gonna ask one last. - [Jessica] Dr. Newmaster. - Slightly foolish quick question, but I went to many a baseballgame near the slough, and we would see, you know,all the water buffaloes or whatever was outthere, whatever happened. I mean is there anywetland left for biology to take field trips in or is it all gone? - The wetland's there. So in the drone videoyou can kind of see it. - In which drone video? - This one. - This one? Okay. - Yeah. A little ways in. (upbeat music) It's still there. So you'llsee there's a silk fence that kind of surrounds the whole wetland so that's had to have been protected through the whole course of construction. So as soon as we're done, it's just. - [Marge] Well I didn'tknow if we had to mitigate the removal of the wetland, or. - [AJ] We actually had to protect it. So it was to remain as it was. - [Marge] That's traditional,that's what all the. (upbeat music continues) - Right here you can see that black line that kind of runs all the way around on the bottom right corner there. That's the wetlandmitigation and protection. So we've had significantmeasures from the watershed to keep that area as it has been. - [Marge] It's good to knowsome things don't change. - Yep. - [Jessica] Other questions? This is all really excellentwork. Thank you all so much. - Thanks for having us. - [Member] Thank you. Thank you very much. - And we'll move into oursingle operational item, C1, our action on the courseproposal, this batch. - Great, good evening ChairEllison, members of the board, earlier tonight you heard a presentation on the current Pathwaysupdate, new course proposal for Intro to Urban Educationand Reflective Practice. And we also talked about the removal of the two concurrent enrollment courses that have low enrollment, that haven't run in the last three years. That is Exploring theTeaching Profession 1, CI3901, and Exploring the TeachingProfession 2, CI3902. So the recommended action is to approve the new course proposal for the 2024-2025 school year, and removal of theconcurrent enrollment courses that are currently at low enrollment. - You've heard the recommended action. Can I get a motion to approve? - So moved.- Second. - A motion by Ms. Thompsonand second by Ms. Daniels. Any further questions or discussion? Seeing none, all in favorof approval, please say aye. - [All] Aye. - Opposed same sign.And the motion passes. - [Jen] Thank you. - With that, I will askfor a motion to adjourn. - [Scott] Chair Ellison,I move for an adjournment. - A motion for by Dr.Arcand, and a second? - Second. - Second by Ms. Daniels. All in favor ofadjournment, please say aye. - [All] Aye. - Opposed, same sign. Weare adjourned. (gavel bangs)