- I'd like to call to orderthis work study meeting of the School Board ofIndependent School District 624. I would ask the clerkto please call the role. - Newmaster.- Present. - Streiff Oji.- Here. - Thompson.- Here. - Arcand.- Here. - Daniels.- Here. - Ellison.- Here. - Thank you. We'll start with ourfirst discussion item B1, White Bear Lake Area High School Update. Dr. Gillespie and Mr. Reetz. - Chair Elison, members of the board, I'd like to introduce orreintroduce Russ Reetz, our principal at the high school who will provide an updatetonight for the high school. Thank you. - Hello.(chair thudding) Good evening, Chair Ellison, Directors, Dr. Kazmierczak. My name is Russ Reetz, principal at White BearLake Area High School. Tonight, I'd like to provideyou with a short update. We will talk a little bit about our first 60 dayinstructional focus. I'll share some data with you, which drove our planning this summer for opening the new high school. We'll celebrate our evolving culture and then we'll discuss afew of the partnerships as well as what's next for us in the next 60 day instructional cycle. So I'd like to start withour mission statement. Quite simply, our mission at White BearLake Area High School is to influence student belonging and student agency in pursuitof personal excellence. We had staff gather to put together our purpose statement and our objectives and some of our tactics last year. And we are working every day to realize the mission of our building. Our theme to start the schoolyear was around belonging, more specifically, you belong here. We are working everyday to help our students answer yes to thatquestion, "Do I belong?" To that end, we had an amazingstart to the school year. This picture now hangs in my office. It's a photo of ourstudent body in the gym during our first nine through 12th grade, pep fest in 40 years. So my personal goal tostart the school year was to ensure our studentsfeel happy and proud of the time they spend at the high school, and our homecoming week went a long way, and helping our studentsfeel a strong connection to each other and to their school. If you were there, thiswas a goosebump moment and it really resonated with me what is possible when wehave a large comprehensive nine through 12 high school and what that studentexperience could potentially be. And we hope to harness thatmomentum as we move forward. As I said, our focus, the first 60 days of schoolwas around, "Do I belong here?" We created instructional, a60 day instructional cycle, that included the introductionof our 5D Framework. So this framework is usedas our teacher development and evaluation framework. We were especiallyintentional in our planning and implementationaround student engagement and classroom environment. It drove much of the PD that we provided to staffduring workshop week as we built norms to welcome our studentsinto our new spaces. We've also been working really hard on standards based grading. Our ninth grade students are experiencing a newgrade reporting method as well as all electivecourses with a ninth grader. We're working with proficiency scales and having our students get used to this reporting on what they know and can do, right? Their grade is reflecting,is more accurately reflecting what a student can know and do. We're also working on ourtrimester schedule change. So these are our big items that we'll talk a little bitmore about as we move through. I wanted to share with you the impact that the five dimensionsof teaching and learning is having on our overall school culture, but also on our planning anddevelopment of our staff. So as we enter into the first 60 day instructional rotation, we've pulled out thingsfrom the 5D Framework that are directly relatedto student belonging. Each dimension includes some criteria. We use this criteria to help us evaluatethe student experience. We do this by engaging inwhat we call ROAR Walks. So I'm gonna talk a littlebit about those Learning Walks and what ROAR means here in a second. But our staff uses atemplate to collect evidence in each of these nine areasthat are on the slide. We spend around 15 minutesin an academic space. We see two spaces at a time, and we then talk aboutnoticings and wonderings that we are observing in those spaces. And this is done withteachers and administrators. So we're having a robust dialogue about the student experience and what's happening in our classrooms. And those will continuethroughout the year, but much of what we're collectingthrough these ROAR Walks is what's driving then our professional development planning. We had our first full daywith staff on October 26th, and we'll have an additionalstaff development day on November 5th. And again, much of whatwe're working on with staff comes from the evidence or the wonderings, things we are not seeing yet, in class related to belongingin the 5D Framework. We're also working with our CIT groups. So these are ourcollaborative inquiry groups. They're using the 5D Framework to aid in their planning. And again, this is aroundour mission statement of welcoming and belonging and leading, but also around our four core values. So you'll see the ROAR acronym again, it stands for, Relationships, Ownership,Awareness, and Respect. We also talk a lot aboutour three questions. And so the first questionbeing, do I belong here? And the next 60 day phasewe'll be leaning more into, is this meaningful? Followed by our lastquestion of, can I do this? That will be the last 60day instructional phase for our staff. The Learning Walks arereally what allow us to collect the street leveldata on how we're doing. We are also able to look intowhat our staff is sharing with their CIT team. So what they're recordingin their weekly meetings, we're able to analyze and summarize and then set goals that help us, it drives our decision making around professional development as well. So just to share a little bit with you, on what these ROAR Walks include. These are done with teaching staff and it really is not toevaluate the teaching staff, it's more to lean into whatthe students are experiencing. So these walks help us better understand the student experience. That includes how ourvision is being implemented or acted on within the classroom. It's meant to calibrate anddeepen our understanding. And really what that is, is how is our common languagelanding with our staff and how are they turningthat into lesson plans that are increasing student engagement and fostering more student belonging. It's also helping usunderstand how we're doing with our school improvement plan. So we set three goals for our staff. One of those goals is that our students are ableto connect with each other, a meaningful staff member in the school and can point to a class or a co-curricular that theyhave a strong connection with. And we're learning a lot about how our students are connecting with staff and with each other duringthese Learning Walks. And then a little bitmore on our CIT teams. Our teachers have beenmeeting with their CIT team one to two times per week. These teams are made upof mostly grade level and subject to like teams. The focus of the meetings are on that WBL and our mission statement,welcome and belonging, leading as well as relationship building. As we move into cycle two,middle to end of November, we'll be focusing onownership and meaning, ownership, one of those core values. And is this meaningful?That second question. And then again, our last60 day cycle will focus on self-awareness andself-efficacy for our students. I wanna share why thiswork has been so important to start the school year. Of course, we opened ourbuilding with 2,645 students. It was a really cool moment. The first day we had all students, nine through 12, in the building to stand on top of the learning stairs and look down and see whatthat actually looks like to have over 2,600students in our building. But the challenge thenwith such a large building, is how do we ensure that no student falls through the cracks? How do we work every day to make our really largebuilding feel small? So we really dug into our attendance data, and I don't have any comparison data yet, but we will be comparing firstsemester attendance this year with our first semesterattendance last year. On any given day, over 20% of our students were missing one or more class periods last year. That's around 529 students every day that are missing at least one class. And then during any class period, there's around 265 studentsthat were marked absent, a year ago. So we're committed to being a place where our students want to go and learn. And so as this comparison data comes in, we hope to see our attendancerates are increasing and we're working intentionallymeeting with students that have one or moreabsence the previous day to talk about their plan boththat day and in future days. We're also dealing witha new cell phone plan. So I'll kind of share how that's going here in a second. We have decreased, thisis comparison data, so we're able to pull our data for September and October. Our suspensions so far thisyear have been cut in half. Chemical use has gonedown quite a bit there. I have a theory around that. Our students were usinga digital pass format so we know who's out inthe hallway with who. And we're also restricting cell phone use when students leave the classroom. And so it's deterring students from being out of class for long. And it's also, they'renot able to organize outside of class. But we've seen our fights go down and we've seen our cell phonereferrals go up, of course, we didn't really have cellphone referrals last year, but so far we've onlyhad to meet 72 students. We've only had two repeat students who haven't complied withthe cell phone policy. So it's going remarkably well, far greater studentengagement in classrooms because the phones are away. And you can see there, we've had over 170individual conversations with students aroundtheir daily attendance. And I expect that numberto continue to go up. Of course, we're dealingwith some students that would rather skip a classso they can have their phone. But we'll continue working through that and on an individual basis. And so far, that seems to be workingquite well with our students. But again, I feel like a lot of this data is a direct reflection of how hard we've been working on ensuring that our classrooms arewelcoming and belonging for our student body. We have a modified schedule on Tuesdays and Thursdays this year. Our students report toan advisory classroom on Tuesdays for 30 minutes. We're committed to responding to what's happening in our school and to the world aroundus during advisory. We use this time to sharesome common language to build relationships. We ask students to do some self-reflection and work on getting themselvesorganized for the week. We also have what's called ROAR time. This is really a studentchoice or flex time that's offered to ourstudents on Thursdays. Again, this is also 30 minutes and we've added ourdaily video announcements called the Daily ROAR. I think Tom has come down a couple times, shared some things on Daily ROAR. Is your picture up there? - No.- No, sorry. (audience laughing)Next time. What this is doing is it's highlightingall the amazing things that are happening in school. We're also able to be proactive with our expectations for students, and reactive when we don'talways meet the standard in our building. So has gone incredibly well and has been really fun. It's my highlight every morning to work with students on getting those video announcements done. We've added a student run, school store that's increased theamount of school spirit in the building. We've also opened ourstudent led coffee shop. So again, a lot of this just speaks to the climate and culture of the building and again, will help usreach that goal of 85% of our students finding aclass or a co-curricular that they're passionate about. So each day students hearabout what's going on in our building, what's possible, what's coming up. Groups and clubs and affinity groups all have a chance to promote their program and try to recruit morestudents into their clubs. So that's been a funthing with the Daily ROAR. I just wanted to share a fewpictures of homecoming week. We had a great week. And to be honest, our studentsare attending our events and supporting each other and that's been a really fun part of promoting school pride eachday within our four walls. But here you have our band playing, Friday morning of Homecoming. So our students left forfirst period listening to the school song beingplayed on the learning stairs. We had coronation on Sunday night, which was student planned and student led. There's a picture of our student section and then obviously the entire home side during our homecoming game, a very well attended game and a victory over the Raiders, which is also fun and meaningful. Thought I'd take a moment to highlight some of ourcommunity engagement activities, we have planned so far at the high school. August and October we'rereally busy months for us. We've been giving a lot of tours, which has been really fun. And you realize fairlyquickly how big our school is, when each tour takes a littleover an hour to walk through. But a few of our alumni have returned, the Class of '67, the Class of 1974. We had a very wellattended family open house as well as a community open house during that last week in August. And then we've had someprograms come through the, we had a GAPP exchange program, the German AmericanPartnership Program came and spent a couple weekswith us over homecoming and got a real authentic experience for what it's like to go toschool in the United States. We presented to the Chamber, we've had Rotary out, we even had the Vadnais HeightsEconomic Development Team come out. Our Pathways program also hosted the, or the, sorry, the state isthat not on there anymore? Let me see if it's on my slide here. The US State Department and the Pacific IslanderGroup on October 10th. And they were able to come in and ask questions aboutour career pathways program and take a tour of all of our classrooms that include some ofthose pathway courses. So we've had a reallygreat time with outreach and showing off our new facilities. We have a lot to be proud of there. So what's next? We have our next 60 dayinstructional cycle on question two. We're gonna really focus in, on purpose and curriculum and pedagogy, two of the dimensionsof that 5D Framework, which will change kind ofwhat our CIT focuses as well. So our teachers will be aligning with this new 60 day instructional cycle. We'll continue our ROAR Walks. We're also working hard on proficiency scales andfinalizing our trimester work. So in a couple of weeks I'll be back to talkabout the 29 new courses that have been proposed, the 15 courses we're planning to remove, some additional trimester requests. So just so everybody's aware, a full year coursedefaulted to two trimesters under the new schedule, a semester course would be one trimester under the new schedule. But we do have some courses that have requested additional time. So we'll talk that through. And there's been some otheradditional things requested in terms of required credits or additional time that we'llwork through together as well. And then several grade levelor course title changes. So you can see some dates up there. We're working with ourlearning leadership team. We'll present to the, to our systems accountabilityteam on October 30th. We'll come back for a school board vote or a school board worksession on November 25th and then a final vote on December 9th. And then lastly, standards based learning. So we've worked really hard to get our ninth grade classesready in any elective course with the ninth grader. We continue to work withour 10th through 12 teachers on identifying focus standards and creating proficiency skills. We're also working on aligningour common assessments with the focus standardsand proficiency skills. So that work stillcontinues on those work days and when we're meeting with our staff in terms of professional development. So I'll stop there and ask if there are any questions. - [Chair Ellison] Wonderful. Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Reetz? Dr. Arcand? - [Dr. Arcand] My firstquestion I have is, how does the advisory or ROAR time improve the academicachievement of our students? I think this is importantfor people to know. - Yeah, so first advisory, there is a staff member that's checking in with our students. And so we provided sort of aself-assessment guide for them to report back to their advisory teacher. If there's an interventionthat needs to take place or a core teacher thatneeds to be addressed, the teacher can eitherprovide or equip that student with some skills toadvocate for themselves or they can actually bethe one that reaches out. So that's more of a support type process. We're also helping ourstudents get more organized for the week during that advisory time. And then they have sometime to study in that class. The ROAR time, this is 30 minutes a week and last year we hadwhat we call Bear Time, and it was every day,at the end of the day. We're doing this betweenfirst and second period. And so our attendance andparticipation is far greater, but during ROAR time,students have choice time. So if they want to sign upto go work with a teacher that they're maybe struggling or have some questionsthey want help with, they can go get that extra help. They can also go downto the learning commons or the tutoring center or go into our testingcenter and retake a test. So those are all ways that we're trying to help our students academically. - And then the onlyonly question I have is, but the school store or the coffee house, are we running those with our DECA and are we using SCLA forthe coffee house then, so there's a certain organization? - Yeah.- So, now you're gonna getthe leadership of that along with your goal. - Good question. Yeah, DECA is running our school store and then our school grounds is run by our family consumer science class, yeah. They're getting their ServeSafe license certification, so. - [Dr. Arcand] That's great. Thank you.- Mm-hmm. - Ms. Daniels?- Can you talk a little bit about the ROAR walks? Are those administrators or leaders walking throughclassrooms and observing, making observations of students and staff and just kind of helpingdo some reflection if they see something that is great or if they see something that makes, the teachers struggling with? So that's, in the old days, we used to do teacher observations and we had so many ayear, then we would get, that was how the teachers were evaluated, - Right.- This kind of, in place of that? - It's separate fromour teacher development evaluation process. So we're still doing thosemore formal observations and really workingindividually with the teacher on next steps or you know, some wonderings that we'd like to see. The Learning Walks are more for evaluating what the student experienceis like in that room. So we aren't providing directfeedback to the teacher. It's at least one administrator, it's at least one instructional coach and at least one teacher fromour learning leadership team. In most cases it's four people, two administrators, a teacherand a instructional coach. And then we're in twospaces each for 15 minutes. We have a template that we'refollowing for documenting what we're noticing and wondering. It's evidence-based. So there's a little bit of training that goes into what we're looking for. And then the most important part is the dialogue with betweenthe four, afterwards, you're having a collegial conversation about best practice instruction. And then we're using asummary of those meetings to drive our staff meetings in our future professionaldevelopment days. It's been a really cool addition. And Joe Held has done anamazing job getting us organized and he's not just 'causehe's here tonight. (audience laughing) He really has, his title is Associate Principalof Teaching and Learning. And he has done an incredible job with our instructional cycles and making sure we're aligned across all those different areas, CITs and Learning Walks and PD days. And so yeah, it's been great. - So valuable, especially forsome of our new teachers too. I mean it would be soawesome as I think a teacher to have some colleagues come through and to reflect and to support what you're doing in the classroom and observing the students (faintly speaks) instruction. So that's (faintly speaks). - Yeah, it's fun to be in classrooms. So the visibility of all, of those are have been great as well. - [Board Member] Mr. Russ Reetz, So I had a question on how and who are working with kids proactively around the rationale to not have phones. - To not have phones.- Yeah. - So advisory was kind of the first stop at delivering some common language around the, really the essential why, in what this decision means for students and sort of explaining the why it was so necessary, right? What we hope to see from it. And then we talk a lotabout cell phone use on the Daily ROAR. We also have some norms in each classroom. So in most classes, I hopeyou could tell me more, teachers give that general reminder, okay, it's time to put phones away. And then there's one more subtle reminder if a student doesn't comply before we get into any sort of, reactive type, referral type situations. But there's so many interactions and you know, to only have70 some referrals so far, when there's 2,600 students that all have six classes in a day, there's a lot of potentialfor a referral to be written. But for the most part, our students are complying and on the ROAR Walks, we aren't seeing phones out at all. And I think anecdotally the, my favorite comment of the year was, for the first time in years, I'm asking my students to quiet down and it feels pretty good. So I think student dialogue is up and collaboration is up and so that means theengagement is much higher, now that the phones are away. - Just seems like it would be really good on their social emotional health to put those away for a while. Take... - And it's reflectedin our behavior issues during the school day as well. We're not dealing with as manyof the social media things after school either. So hopefully we keep that going. - [Chair Ellison] Ms. Thompson? - They asked some of the questions. So just a couple like follow ups or things that I think are great. One, I'm a fan of not having Bear Timeat the end of the day. I think that's definitelygonna improve our attendance, even if students weren't necessarily in a specific class at that time, in the school is the bestplace for them to be, during the school day. So I'm thankful for that. And then I like talking about the walks and not taking down what you're seeing, that immediate thing, and then telling the teacher, well here's all the thingswe saw you're doing. Not maybe necessarily wrong, but that we notice thatwe're noting for the future. And then bringing it toprofessional development and not calling out teachers specifically, but then just highlightingareas where everyone can approve is gonna be, I think, I think would be beneficial to everybody. Because you know, nobody wantsto be told what you're doing. These are all the bad thingsthat we see you doing. Not even necessarily bad, but just things that we noticethat maybe are, you know, not necessarily good waysto engage with students. So to just bring that intothe professional development without calling out everysingle thing, specifically, should help just improve and let teachers grow without feeling like, oh gosh, you know? And especially for newteachers who are just learning and getting the hang of it or maybe you're switching and teaching a class that youhaven't taught for a while or you know, whatever it is. So I really like that aspect of not- - And that came out of theInstructional Leadership Academy that some of us wereable to attend last year and we have some moreadministrators attending this year. But it's evidence-based, non-judgmental street level data is reallywhat we're collecting. And so yeah, teachers are more easy to, I guess welcome that method, right, in growing and learning from that, so. - The other piece that-- I exciting to see the data. - The other piece that you're tapping into and I think is importantfor people to know is the principals have a huge influence on the academic achievementof our students. Teachers obviously do,but also principals. And so those walks, we'll talk more, as the year goes on and what we're doing across the system. Those walks are also to help them with their own leadership as you think about how do we make sure we're increasing the achievementof all of our students while simultaneously closingthe gaps that we have. So both of those things are happening. So that's great. - Dr. Newmaster? - I'm just thinking aboutover various advisories and paradigms and things like that that I've participated in at North Campus. And I think it's great. The timing of it duringthe day is always better, between first and second. Seems like a good place to put it and encourage people to be there on time. What I wondered is you talkingabout the Learning Walk versus the ROAR Walk, another ROAR Walk soundslike it's administrative, a team scheduled through every classroom. - Yeah, good question. So Learning Walks is what the InstructionalLeadership Academy calls 'em. We just call 'em ROAR Walks because it fits with our four core values. But it's the same thing. Yeah, they're not separate. - [Dr. Newmaster] That'swhat I was not understanding. - Yeah, sorry. It really is like, in parentheses, they are Learning Walks, that's what they are. But we're right now focusingon the relationships part or the belonging part for those walks and yeah, it is a team of four people. - And how,- Oh, how often and where, so we've set up a rotation time - (faintly speaks) here, ifyou're teaching something, do you have a schedule that says it is your turn next Wednesday to have the team walk through or...? - [Russ] We don't pre-schedulewith the classroom or the teacher. So it is a bit of a surprisewhen we come in, but we. - I'm just thinking of whatyou could disturb, whatever. - Sure. We prepped our staff toknow that there's gonna be, at times people walkingthrough your classroom. We're only in there for15 minutes at a time, but we've set up a rotationthroughout our building. So every area, notnecessarily every classroom because you're in a studio with nine or well up to nine teachers, six classes. We'll be at some pointpart of a ROAR walk. So we've got it allmapped out for the year. - Okay. So I understand now the Learning/ROAR walk is an administrative and learning coach team, that's probing. - [Russ] That's right. - And any other, oh, Ms. Daniels? - Oh, this is kind of a, it's on a trimester timeline. - [Russ] Mm-hmm. - Just the systems of accountability, is that what we used to haveas a curriculum committee? So is that like a group of teachers, administrators, communitypeople that look at curriculum that we're gonna either approve or abandon or you know, is that what that is? I think it's (faintly speaks). - It's then a replacement of what we used to callthe world's best workforce. So yes, curriculum is part of that. We also bring our schoolimprovement information, all the world's best workforce goals, achievement and integration. And so each, we're tryingto increase representation. So each school right now is working towards at least one staff member, one community family member and one administrator thatattend the quarterly meetings. - Great, thank you. - Other, Dr. Arcand? - [Dr. Arcand] I'm justcurious if we have any plans, I'd like to hear with the students how they feel about the cell phone policy because I'm wondering it'd be a positive if they feel like it's a good place now. That'd be interesting to hear from them. - Yeah, so we are committing to surveying our students inregards to their experience. We're doing the DESA survey tomorrow, but before we leave for the holiday break we'll have one other survey done to check in with our students. I do have listening sessionswith our class officers and our student council. So I'm getting feedback. It can be somewhat mixed. (all laughing) - [Dr. Arcand] Be nice to hear those... - Yeah, get some actual raw data on. (board members indistinctly chattering) - Yeah, I was thinkingwe didn't introduce, so Lydia Klein is ourstudent representative and then also joining us is Tom Reese who's our junior year alternatestudent representative. And so you don't have to, but would either of you care to, I'm gonna just put you on the spot. (all laughing) Do you have any thoughtsabout the cell phone policy? - I think it's not terribly enforced. Like it definitely isn't no problem, like it was last year or last year, it would be like you'dbe in a group project and like people wouldn't do the project, they'd just the whole time. But I'll see people ontheir phone a little bit but people aren't just like- - Totally disengaging.(all laughing) - Yeah.(all laughing) - It was pretty bad last year. - Yeah?- so I was surprised to, I was expecting it to just be enforced for a little bit and then have peoplemake a big deal out of it and then have teachers not want to do it. So I think it's going pretty well. (board member faintly speaking) - I definitely think, well I mean first of all , I'm only taking one, like, academic class so I'm not a good example of someone who's like in classrooms all the time. But I think at least from my teachers specifically, they're more lenienttowards juniors and seniors. He said that it's kind oflike I could enforce it but you guys are 17, 18, so I'm not sure. I think it's good for the underclassmen but I think for the upperclassmen, there could be a different policy but I also am not in theclassroom when it's really not. - Sure.- Good. Thank you. - Thank you.- Lydia, you wanna follow up on that? So you're a PSEO student? - Oh yeah.(all laughing) I got same kicks all the time.(all laughing) - She does go to school.(all laughing) - Alright, any othercomments or questions? Alright, thank you so much Mr. Reetz and we will move into ournext section, item B2, Lakeaires Elementary update. Dr. Gillespie and Mr. Krusemark. - Chair Ellison, members of the board, I'd like to introduce Cary Krusemark, Principal of Lakeaires Elementary to give us chisel. - Good evening everyone. Chair Ellison, Dr.Kazmierczak, board members, thanks for the opportunityto be here tonight. I was thinking back to, you know, it's been a while since I've had an opportunity to sit down and just connect with allof you in some fashion. So again, I appreciate the opportunity to share a little bit about Lakeaires and kind of what what's beengoing on in the last few years. So I figured I woulddefinitely be highlighting a couple key things toyou all this evening. (keyboard clicking) Down arrow. There we go. Just a quick overview, (clears throat), excuse me alittle bit about Lakeaires. We are a Pre-K-5. I like to always highlight that we have a lot of little four and fiveyear olds in preschool, around 395 kids. We've seen our student and our school and our student populationhas really changed over the past few years. You know, we have seen anincrease in our student socioeconomic status growing to a higher level offree and reduced lunch. Our BIPOC students havereally seen an increase since 21-22 school year and we've really seen a big growth in our ML students,multilingual English learners, bringing a lot of diversity, a lot of different types of learners and really having us to really think about who our friends are in front of us and how we need to think when we're giving instruction to best meet their needs. A couple unique things to Lakeaires. We have been an AVIDelementary certified site for quite a few years. We did add autism spectrumdisorder cluster this year, so that's brand new and we have been a BARRImplementation site and I'll talk about acouple of those items, AVID and BARR, in thenext couple slides here. Again, overview today, just kind of wanted tohighlight these three things that kind of unique to Lakeaires and we have about nine elementaries. Lakeaires is of course, as you know, down on our south side of the district, AVID, Advancement ViaIndividual Determination, which you probably have heard that because it is also inour secondary settings. BARR, Building AssetsReducing Risks, which again, you know, we don't definitely have that, a little bit at our highschool but in middle schools. But three elementaries are participating and we're in year four of that program and I'll share more about how that's impactedour students as well as AVID. And then a little bit aboutour family engagement event at the end of September and how that went. And some highlights and some learnings that we took away froma brief parent survey. It's always good to capture families and get an opportunityto hear their voice, so. AVID at Lakeaires, as I said, I'm sure you've heard about it, you've heard that acronym before. But again, it's kind of a great collection of best practices. A lot of times parentswho are new to our school ask what it is and I say it's like, good teachers do good instructionalpractices all the time. AVID is just a framework that really helps us do it collectively as a building systematically, vertically aligned, scaffold strategies, teach students purposely how they can be more engaged, increasing rigor for our students, putting that cognitiveload on the students and having them really, welike to use the word, noodle, through things and insteadof just Google, you know, you can Google things but noodling is that higher level thinking and really giving them opportunities to engage in those learning practices, so. A little history, you know, we started this back in 2019 through some Foundations Training. Year one was 19-20 and I like to highlight that Lakeaires Elementary is a K-5Elementary Certified site, which you know, I'm kind of bragging here because we're one of only a few. I've actually asked ourregional AVID person to get the data. She didn't have the data, how many elementariesin Minnesota are K-5. A lot of schools that are elementary AVID, there's over 70 in Minnesota. They're mostly like third, fourth, fifth or fourth fifth, and so she said I'm gonna bring that up at the next director'smeeting that she goes to because it was a really good question. I said thank you, I'd really like to know 'cause it is very unique. But you know, we incorporatethose AVID strategies and the framework to really,you know, help our students build those academic skills that can carry on into middleschool into high school. And of course scaffoldingit based on age level. What we do in kindergartenmight look a little different than what we do in fifthgrade for certain strategies, but they're doing it in kindergarten, which is super incredible. The teachers have figuredout how to just make it work. And of course you know, AVID has always had thatcollege and career readiness, kind of coin Fraser, whatever, how, I guessis how you might say it. I really love the idea ofhow they've started to shift of that career piece. Obviously our workforce has changed and as a school in elementary, our AVID site team talks a lot about how are we gonna make thisconnect to our students 'cause we have five, six yearolds, 11 year olds, you know, it's a different range of ages. And how do we help themunderstand what they're doing, what they're engagingin with these strategies and practices as well as youknow, college and career. Well what does that mean to me? Well we figure one of thebest things is curiosity. Elementary kids comewith so much curiosity, giving them aspirations, asking questions, learning more about what they might be, where they might go, all the places you might go, right? And learning more aboutcareers, not just a college, 'cause college is one way, but what are you gonnado when you get there? Or maybe there's different ways to find your path in life. Lakeaires also, as I said, we are a part of the utilizing the BARR process, Building Assets Reducing Risks. Like most of our sites, everybody is doing somekind of multi-tiered systems of support in their schools. For us, BARR was an opportunity to really take what we were doing well and the things maybe weneeded some improvements on. And you know, bring that to our school to ultimately do a better job of serving our students when it comes to problem solving. How to better support kids, enriching student experiences, identifying skills or need areas and what to actually do in the processes that gointo that with more fidelity, more transparency as a school amongst our administrators,amongst our teachers, so they had more awarenessof how this process works. They're not just siloedin their own world, they know what's going on because we have differentlevels of teaming to help work through the support process. And I think one thing that when Dr. Gillespieactually brought this as an opportunity to me, when I started learningmore about the BARR program, the thing that capturedme was the approach of a strength based approach for students. And you know, we know thatkids sometimes come to us with growth areas, teachers are fixers, they love to, you know, they like, you know, they're driven. Like we know that we wannaget our students from A to B and they would always havepositive conversations. But this has justintentionally put more focus on what are the strengths that thestudent brings to the table. Yes, we know we're gonnatalk about some needs at our meeting, but what do they have? What are they bringing? What are those strengths? And to have thoseintentional conversations really changes the dynamic of how we take, maybe some of those biases we have when we're working on a student's needs and seeing more of that whole child. And then finding ways toenhance those strengths, give them more opportunitiesand that can build confidence and better social connections, better behavior in the classroom. So really taking a look atlots of different things in that whole child perspective. I kind of already sort of talked to this, but just again, alwayslooking at all the pieces. I like the visual wherewe talk about the learning that we need to do so that we can do bettersupports of our students. It never ends. We keep looping and looping and looping around in this process, evaluating, implementing new things, analyzing how things are going and then replanning, reworkingand continue continue. Like anything that's complex, students are definitely complex. There's many factors. We have internal, external factors. Nothing is ever a straight path. We might like it to be that, but we have curves and hillsand valleys throughout. I like this visual as another way to just kind of demonstrate that MTSS, those multi-tiered systems, and the BARR framework, of the work we do, you know, students have a need. We're working as small block teams. It's usually that grade level, first grade team, second grade team, supporting each other, coming up with goals, what they can do at their classroom level. We move into BIG BLOCK if students aren't really making progress that we'd like to see, which the best thing aboutthis is a newer piece to what we didn't do is having even more verticallyaligned conversations with a lot more intentionality. It's scheduled every X number of weeks where a K, 1, 2, 3, 4,5 teacher is sitting in and they're talking aboutone or two or three kids that have been planned to be discussed. And we're hearing lots of expertise at the table talking about what it is, that one or two things that, that teacher's trying tohelp the student achieve, overcome whatever it is. It could be academic, social, emotional, but again the collective mindset of experts working together. And an example from lastyear, we had a student who, one of the teachers that wassitting in that BIG BLOCK had a student in her classthat needed something as well. And it was a kindergarten,a second grade teacher. Those two students endedup being like buddies with some structure. And if we hadn't had that intentionality of like these conversations, I don't know if we would'veever connected these two kids, but they both had an incentive because they wanted to work together, strive for a goal, and their behaviors in theclassroom change drastically. It was just like it, you know, it doesn't always work that perfectly but when it does, you definitely, you know, you tell the board about that. (all laughing) But again, one of thosethings where you're like, when those conversations happen, it's amazing what we can come to find out and how we can work togetherto support our kids. And another new layer that really helps our students with BARR, for my experience inLakeaires and our teams, we call it community connect, but it's a small core group of the BARR leadershipteam in the building. And just every week wemeet and talk about kids. Could be kids that havebeen through our process of small block, big block who are working withteachers or teams of teachers on academics or social, emotional or you know, we just foundout a student is homeless or there's some other high needs thing. And of course we don't wait till Friday when we have that meeting. If we have to hit go button right now, we definitely do that. But that team works very well together. And then making sure like we'reletting the key people know who are a part of that student's life that to best support what'sgoing on in their world. So definitely has impacted the work around our multi-tieredsystems of support, much better, more transparency. Teachers have a betterunderstanding of what's happening. A lot more looping back. And I kind of threw up the icon up there, the picture of just the roundabout. 'cause sometimes that's what we feel like, we're just like, didn't we just do this? But sometimes it takestwo or three go arounds just to really figure out our students but not stopping, so. Moving into kind of the lastthing I wanted to highlight was our family engagement event. We did September 24th. We didn't know how manyfamilies would show up and how many kids and Dr. Kazmierczak, I know, was there and I saw his, the look on hisface when he was walking in from coming out from the back recess area. I was like, wow, there'sa lot of people here. - [Dr. Kazmierczak] Pizza linewas really long, I didn't- (all laughing) - The pizza line was extremely long but we figured we had over 700people there at this event. So great turnout. You know, one takeaway from that was like whenever Lakeaires has an event, whether it's a PTO or something like this, school, musical or concerts, they come out, they come to support theschool, their children, they love to connect with the community. We are really a close-knit community. Neighbors just getting together. So, but anytime, like I said, I think earlier when you get parents or a key audience at your site, you know, if you have an opportunity, like to get some data from them or ask some questions, we had a couple of quicksurvey questions that we asked. One was just reallylike what was the thing that they really love aboutLakeaires or the school and oh a lot of the themes were around how they value their child's teacher. The teacher's relationship or just the relationships in general and the positive learning environment. That was very affirming 'cause I feel like ourteachers are very invested in their students. We have fifth graders who go down and see their kindergarten teacher, then they see their first grade teacher, they're on the walk and I'm usually the one going, okay, come on, we gotta get this class, (claps) you know, but how doyou not let 'em do that? It fills their bucket and it fills theteacher's bucket for sure. But also what did parents want us to know? And really it came down totheir kids have a lot to them and really what else canwe do to get to know them as individuals and all their strengths and all their interests and really like how can we connect that to their learning day. So we have a culture climate committee that meets next week I believe. And some of this feedbackthat we're getting, it'll be something thatwe'll noodle through and talk about like you know, what do we take from, especially the part aboutgetting to know our kids better, you know, where are our teachers at? Are there things thatwe could do to highlight or expand on those strengths that our students bring tothe table, their interests. I think good teachers do that, but it's always good to always think and reflect on that again. Future, a little bit moreabout what's coming up, what's coming up in the future. This year, specific to AVID priorities, our AVID site team or AVID committee, we meet monthly and one of the things wetook away from, you know, where we are at, where things have, you know, progress with our levels of implementation, was really around curriculum and CKLA, our literacy curriculum, excuse me, was obviously a big undertaking last year. Teachers did a great job of digging in, learning it, getting to understandall the pieces of it. But as they went through that, one of the things thatthe team has recognized is we really need moretime with a new curriculum to really find ways toalign those best practices. But those strategies that we use or ways to like we like tosay wicker eyes, you know, how can we raise the rigor in lessons? Where do we find connectionsin the curriculum? And that takes work and time to dig in. One nice thing is teachershave started to recognize that there are definitely lots of spots throughout the curriculumthat is AVID-like, they like to say AVID-like 'cause it's very similar but maybe it's not quite the way AVID framework mightput it, but that's okay. It's very similar high level. What can we do to findthose specific strategies or skills to highlight throughthe literacy curriculum? And so that's some ofthe work we are designing during professional development days and continue to have CITs, those grade level teams work together to do some pre-planning 'cause they have gone through it, now they can start planning of how can we implement and actually documentingthis unit, this lesson, here's some ideas that wecould do some AVID strategies and getting that down on paper because when we get to next fall, we're like, what did Ido last year? (chuckles) I should have wrote it down while we're writing it down so we can remember andhave a nice structure. And then also just expandingour career awareness and like just the visibilityof AVID in general. Kids experience it in the classroom but how do we take it further so it's not just this instructional piece and bringing in more career, a career lens, having speakers. We started some of that last year where teachers were havinga few parents come in and speak to their career. Dr. Gillespie was a guestspeaker in one of our classes. But then connecting it to the learning and what your schooling has done to help you do the jobs. And we've had lots of different varieties, college graduates, to people right into the workforce and sharing their experience and why the skills they learn now and how they transfer inthe future are important. And continuing to just,you know, build that, that culture in our building. And BARR priorities, as I said, you know we wanna really continue to work on providinggood strategic efforts to help support studentsin lots of different ways. But one of the things thatthe priority this year is really to take thoseTier 2 interventions. A lot of our Tier 2 interventions typically happen in the classroom and really having deep dialogue and data-driven decision making processes and action steps in theclassroom in collaboration with like our intervention teachers. Teachers not just sittingin a classroom by themselves in a silo feeling unsupported, like really it's a collaborative effort. They meet periodically totalk about the students. What can we do? Do we flex group? Do I create a group in my own homeroom? How do we meet the needs of those kids in those Tier 2 level that are still in the classroom during what we call windtime, what I need now. Some kids go off to somemore intensive support and others are gettingbroken off into the classroom doing some differentkind of flexible groups. But that was a definitely area of how BARR can better support those teachers through that data driven dialogue and being very strategic to support studentgrowth in the classroom. And then one of ourgoals as a site team too is to apply to be a presenterat the National Conference. We'll see if we get accepted but we feel after going through the BARR process, the learning, the training, for three years going into year four, we've definitely learned a lot of things that we would tellfuture schools not to do or try it this way or be flexible. But that's part of learning, you know, learning from our mistakesand making adjustments and if we have anopportunity that would be something we'd love to strive to do. So we're gonna apply and see if we get selectedto present at the conference. I think that is the end if there's any questions.- Right. Any questions for Mr. Krusemark? Ms. Daniels? - I think so, a comment. I really like the roadmap and how it was you wentthrough the small blocks and big blocks and triedagain in roundabout especially before youtake that final referral, especially in Special Education because there are so many things that, you know, the staff can do and does do for students (faintly speaks). - I didn't mention it but one big part of thestructure system too is our Special Education Department, is a very key member of our BARR process and they're very involved too where maybe in the pastthey were kind of like, when you need us, we're here. And it's changed drastically. They're very entrenched with like, let's work together now 'cause these are all our kids. - [Ms. Daniels] Yeah, that's great. Thank you. - [Chair Ellison] Other questions Ms. Oji and then Dr. Newmaster. - So I just want to thank you and as you shared, you have seen some changesdemographically in your school and that takes adjustment and learning and growing and growth and you're obviouslylistening to your families and adjusting and monitoring. So thank you.- Thank you. - I wanted to say thank you also, I really like the way BARR and AVID, you know, have fused to make a real goodsupport system at Lakeaires and that's a school thatI do my first 11 years in that special place inmy heart for Lakeaires And I wonder is it stillas much of an elementary, walk-to-school? 'cause I remember we hadhuge parent participation, whether it was volunteersor just attending what was happening because it's also a neighborhood, a real specific neighborhood. Is that still the case oris there a lot of busing? - It's probably 50-50, you know, after the attendance boundary changes. Even before that wedefinitely had, you know, out of the 380, 390, you know, a good third to 50% road that ride the bus and then there's a big group that are either walkersor as it gets colder, there's a lot more cars picking up their children. (chuckles) - Yeah,- so- - [Dr. Newmaster] That'sthe mom and dad system. - Yep. Yep. - Anyway, it sounds likeit's going very well. Thank you. - Ms. Thompson. - And just a thank you again for the great work being done at Lakeaires and to the district for using these multi-tieredsystems of support. As someone who works in child welfare, that roundabout is very necessary because sometimes that kid mightnot necessarily need an IEP or some kind of intensivesupport system put in place, but just some temporary, it depends what's happeningin the home, right? It a parent just lose a job and they're struggling untilthe next job comes along. Have they lost a family? Like is there more intensivethings happening at home? So to see that we're continuallyreassessing is great. And then having BARR and AVID in our, having an AVID in the elementaryschools is just fantastic to me because the younger wecan show kids opportunities into the future and get 'em thinking about what do they wanna be when they grow up. Yeah, even in kindergarten they can start thinking about those ideas, especially for all of our students. But to give that thought to a child who might be living in an environment that isn't as friendly as other students in our district are living in, to have something to like, think about, and to dream about in a future way is very beneficial tothat child's ability. To hold on to some little bitof, I can do this when I get, when I cope right? It's so important. And just knowing that we'relooking at all the ways our kids are struggling and then being able tofind like the moving away from the deficit language into the strength basedlanguage is really important to helping those kids see where they're doing great in school or where they're doingbetter than other areas. And then still focusingon the areas obviously that they need improvement, but really focusing on thatstrength based approaches, really crucial to those students, 'cause they need that. And in a school that has that 46% freeand reduced lunch rate, there's students in there who really need those supports in place. So it's wonderful to see that. - [Mr. Krusemark] Thank you. - Alright, thank you so much.- Thank you. - And we will move intoour last discussion. Item B3, elementaryimmersion program update. I think Dr. Kazmierczakgonna start us off. - [Dr. Kazmierczak] I'll just kick it off as everybody's coming up. So I'm gonna lay out therecommendation for you, here at the outset. We're gonna talk abouthow we got to where we are and then also where we're headed as we look to implement anew program in the fall '25. So the recommendation that'sbeing presented to you tonight and then follow our background information is that we established a Spanish Dual Language Immersion Program in White Bear Lake Area Schools. We offered at Otter Lake Elementary and the Matoska International Elementary, beginning with the 2025-2026 school year. And I think Tim, you're gonna kick it off now to your team and I think maybe everybody introduce yourself.- Yeah. (Dr. Kazmierczak faintly speaking) - Yeah. Yeah, we'll get startedwith how do we get, go to the next slide, so recall that in, atan April Board Meeting, we presented to the board the notion that we would begin adeveloper steering committee to get to work and look atwhat are the possibilities of developing an elementaryimmersion program in White Bear Lake andwhat would that look like? And we suggested at that time, we'd come back to youin October and report and with a possible recommendation. And so here we are tonight. Next slide. We also identified in April that this is really consistentwith our strategic plan, especially those middle two bullets. We will promote, encourage and support students' personal learningexperiences and aspirations. We will ensure ourorganization continuously, transform to fulfill our mission. As you hear more tonight,I think you'll see how those things, this plan, really fits into those two bullets. Okay, Ayan Ibrahim was aco-chair of this committee. She's gonna talk aboutthese next few slides. - So as you see here, for the White Bear Lake Spanish Dual Immersion Steering Committee, the names of the committeemembers are up there. And the group representeda diverse skillset. And collectively, each person was a strongleader in our district. And we collectively fully committed, were committed to thework that we were doing. Next. So our purpose for the steering committee was to really focus, was to establish the framework for a Dual Spanish Immersion Program within White Bear Lake Area Schools. The committee determined keyparameters for the program to guide future stakeholdersengagement efforts and to help inform the recommendations that will be made to the board today. So for the framework, it was really based on the best practices. From the research, theframework is informed by research on Spanish dual immersion, and then it focused onproven methodologies and strategies that drive student success and looked at cultural competencies. Next. Steering Committee, oops, sorry. - You're good.(Ayan chuckling) - So the questions you see up there are those three questions. We really dug deep into research. We looked at what are the best practices in Spanish Dual Immersion Program. We know Spanish DualImmersion Program is good, but like why? So we looked into researchto really figure that out. We identified key findings. We considered questions wemight explore as a system and outlined our next steps. And then the secondquestion we looked at was, if we did I immersion, where would it be? So what we did here, we also,we looked at different datas, we looked at differentscenarios, building capacity. And then lastly, we lookedat what are the needs and desires of the community. So for the first phasewas from May to August. And then for this part, the district leadership team study the elementary languageimmersion program models and site location within our district. And then for the second phase, from September to October, the district leadership was to develop and recommend implementation plan. And then our original plan was actually for tonight's discussion to be followed up within an action item at the November meeting. But then after ourdiscussion with families and planning sessions withour steering committee, we are confident in amore modified timeline and we're asking for you to take action on the recommendation on our next agenda item. - Alright. Hi, my name's Julian Stanke. I'm the principal at Birch Lake and a proud member ofthe steering committee. I'm here to help out a bit, and gently will leavea little early tonight. So I get to talk to you about the benefits of this dual immersion program for our White Bear Lake Area students. So starting out withthe academic benefits, the research suggests that bilingualism canboost cognitive functions like problem solving, criticalthinking, and creativity. Studies have shown that over time, students in dual immersion programs often outperform theirpeers in standardized tests, especially in math and science. And then dual immersion can help children develop better executivefunctioning skills such as planning,organizing, and multitasking. When we look at the benefits for language and cultural benefits, we're really looking at whatwe've learned in our research and meeting with other programs that have been successful already. Here in the metro is three big pieces, being biliterate, bicultural,and most of all bilingual. And so through those, children become more proficient in both English and Spanish, which opens up a widerange of opportunities in their future. Their exposure to Spanish language and culture can fostera deeper understanding and appreciation ofdiverse life experiences and perspectives. Bilingualism can help childrenbecome more globally minded and understanding ofdifferent cultures, so. And then for the socialemotional benefits, learning a new language has been proven that can boost children'sself-esteem and confidence. Bilingualism can enhance communication and interpersonal skills leadingto stronger relationships, which we know is at the coreof student success at school. And the challenges oflearning a new language can help children developresilience and adaptability over their time in the program. And then finally, withthe future opportunities, there's career advantagesthat bilingualism opens up. There's proficiency in multiple languages can be advantageous for admission to prestigious universitiesand graduate programs and bilingualism can make traveling and living abroad moreaccessible and enjoyable. So we know that the world is becoming a more accessible place and this helps prepare all of our students an opportunity to relish in that. - Thank you, Julian. I get to pick it up from here. I'm John Leininger, principal at Matoska International School. And some of the otherresearch that we found that was the dual immersionprograms are desired by our families in the community. The world language opportunities have long been an interestin White Bear Lake. I know I see a lot of heads nodding and we've had conversations for a while and we're really excitedfor this opportunity. An increasing numberof families are looking for unique programming, including immersion around the metro area. The number of Spanish speaking, heritage language familiesin White Bear Lake, it continues to grow. We're very excited for that. And we also know that thereare immersion daycares existing even right here in our own community, meaning there's a stronginterest for this. We know that Spanishdual immersion is good for the White Bear Lake Area Schools. The Spanish dual immersion program aligned with our strategic plan, including creating a safeand nurturing environment for all students focusedon high quality instruction and educational excellence. Personalizing instruction, ensuring each student realizes their own unique talents and abilities. We also know that we in White Bear Lake, we strive to meet theneeds, hopes, and dreams of all the families that we serve. I've been really privilegedto be here for a while and know that's one of thethings I'm most proud of with White Bear Lake is we don't coast. We are all always looking forward to meeting the needs of ourfamilies to doing right by them, listening to our families and doing the best to meettheir hopes and dreams for their children. And we know that immersion programs are attractive to families and strengthening our future enrollments. And again, we as a school district have always been about being a thriving school district and not just coasting along. So part of our process was to hold a family listening session. As I mentioned out on the 21st, we held a listeningand engagement session, over 45 people attended. It was an amazing turnout. It was really exciting tobe down here in this room. And it was quiet for a minute and all of a sudden it just filled up. Lots of excitement, universally supported and a lot of enthusiasm I had a chance to sharewith the Matoska PTO. And there was a lot of chair bouncing when they were listeningto about this potential. And we asked them three different questionsduring that night. The first question, what are your hopes anddreams for your child? And, you know, academics and learning was very important toour families, you know, irregardless of dual immersion, but that academiclearning was super strong. They wanted their childrento be happy and healthy. They wanted their childrento be socially connected and importantly they wanted their children to develop a global mindset. The next question we asked was, what excites you most abouthaving a Spanish dual immersion option in White Bear Lake? Our families talked about thecultural diversity perspective that would bringdeveloping language skills in both Spanish and English and continuing their bilingual journey. We spoke with families thatwere heritage speakers. We spoke with familieswhere their children with their first dual language experience and then, you know, also those families, for example, at the childcare, where they have already anin-depth dual language experience and they wanting to continue that. And then the last questions we asked, what would you hope to see outta the Spanish Dual ImmersionProgram for your child? And our families there said they wanted a culturallywell-rounded child. They were looking for strongacademics and learning. They wanted their children todevelop that global mindset. And of course, you know, one of the goals of adual immersion program is being bilingual. So I think I turned it over to Tim to see where we are now. - Absolutely. Yep. And so the recommendation is that we, as Dr. Kazmierczak said, establish a dual languageimmersion program in the White Bear Lake Area Schools to be offered at Otter Lake Elementary and Matoska International Elementary, beginning with the '25-'26 school year. If you can advance that? Choosing the Otter Lake and Matoska, lots of discussion on that. And you know, really acouple things that came up. One is we have a northern location and a southern location, which is good for families but also schools that have capacity in ourbuilding, in our district. Not all of our schools are very big. Our elementary schools,especially Otter Lake, has significant capacity and Matoska while it hastraditionally been pretty full, we're seeing some changesin kindergarten enrollment at Matoska as you lookahead to birth rates in that attendance boundary. But also, we think that Matoska families would be more apt to want immersion. They're more globally minded and we've heard from families, Matoska families whohave expressed interest in immersion programs. We think it's a good fit for Matoska. Next. From a budget perspective, there are some budget considerations and some budget benefits to an immersion program. Planning and curriculum development, we have some major categories there. There's some startup costs, especially as we explored, we need some substitute time for teachers on our program committee for work days. We also would have some curriculum writing each year when we start upas we had a grade level, there'd be some additionalcurriculum writing time in the summer. Professional development. We already have budgets forprofessional development staff, so it would just be extra. So that's a fairly small professional development amount on there. But all of our schools haveprofessional development budgets and so this would just be in addition to what we already have. Materials and resources,again, we already, the materials and resourcesfor all of our students. So there may be some times where we need to pay a little extrato get Spanish versions. So those fits in there very little in facilities considerations, just some bilingual signage, we think teacher recruitingwill spend some on. We'll be posting those positions soon and when before December. And so we are hopingto have a robust number of applicants excited toteach in White Bear Lake. Transportation. We already bused district wide to Matoska. So a minimal, if any increase there, we would be busing the northern half roughly of the district to Otter Lake. So there'd be some increased costs there. And then contingency, there's of course, unexpected expenses that willcome up during this process. There's built some in for just to be safe. For startup costs of $148,000. But a key line on the bottom there is the enrollment gain break even point. And so we know that we havefamilies who are looking for immersion programming and they're gonna attendan immersion school. Many of 'em have told us that and have said we're reallyexcited about the possibility of keeping our kids in White Bear Lake. And so the break even point of about 15 students the first year and then about 22 going on from there. And we really believe that those are really realistic numbers where people are gonna blow those numbers out of the water, in terms of keepingstudents in our district and potentially some openenrollment possibilities too. When we go next, well we'restarting the, go ahead. We're starting the Phase 4 with the program design team and they'll focus on some key areas including curriculum,instruction, assessment. Our teaching and learning team will dig in deep in that area. Family and community engagement. What are best practicesin immersion schools around the metro? The family engagement and then of course, staffing and professional development. Our HR department'salready working on staffing in our teaching and learning team, on the professionaldevelopment in that group. And along the way therewill be family focus groups. We've asking parents alreadywho have attended the sessions to consider in signing up tobe one of our family focus or one of our family focus groups. So we can keep them engagedthroughout the process and understand what their interests are. Okay, when we presented toour parents on October 21st, we developed some FAQs that we, questions we knew people would have, such as will transportation be provided. And I shared a little bit about that. We'd be adding some transportation in northern half of the district. We won't be transportingopen enrolled students just 'cause we don't transport open enrolled students right now. So just be for district families. When will the enrollmentinto the program begin? We were just doingkindergartners this year. So our kindergarten enrollmentbegins December 16th and families will be ableto register for kindergarten and select immersionas one of the options. So it won't be a real complicated process. We'll be recruiting all of and promoting our kindergarten enrollment across the district. Immersion will be oneof those opportunities. How will enrollment be prioritized? Our school district familieswill be the first priority when we enroll. We know that there'll be someopen enrollment interests and we'll put those off to the side until we've gone through theperiod of initial enrollment. Then once we've gotten past that period, typically around, itwould be January 15th, is when we would then startto look at open enrollment. But our families, we would fill this up with school district families first. What will world language opportunities for immersion students looklike beyond elementary? And some of the parents who are interested in this program have asked us that question as well. And we would anticipate thatthere would be a middle school and then high schoolelementary immersion program. We don't need to make that decision on exactly what that'll look like yet. I think, we'll as weget to know the program and as the families engage, we'll understand what people want. But most school districts whohave an elementary program and then extend it to middle school and then on to high school. And then will this program replace other elementary programming including internationalbaccalaureate programming at Matoska? And the answer to that is no, immersion actually fitsreally well with IB and which has a language requirement that we already offer at Matoska. And so this will only strengthen our IB programming at Matoska. Okay. So what can families expect? We'll be rolling out ourkindergarten enrollment process. They'll be receivingdirect mailings in December that will open up on December 16th. And so they'd registeras they always have. Again, like I mentioned just a moment ago, open enrollment won't be considered until after January 15th when our district familieshave had an opportunity to register. And the communications department is just, is that posted here or would it be posting a...- It is, it says information coming soon, but it will be not very soon as possible. - It be posted very soon. Yeah, online, on our website. Okay. This that's just a list of resources with, as I have already mentionedwe did our research and dug into some researchthat's just a list and so it's available forpeople who want to look at. - If you click on it, it takes you back to Google Drive. So if you click on it, it has like different titles and then it like at diff abunch of different articles. - Okay.- Alright. - I bet you have some questions.- I bet we do. Alright, any questions? Ms. Thompson? - Just a question like what is the cap? What are we looking at for first year? How do we have an ideaof how many students, we can't like just say it explodes and everybody wants to sign up right away for our immersion program, do we have a limit of what we can take? - Well, we're targeting60 at each school site. - Three class periods then?- Three sections. - That'd be three sections, yeah, sections - And then it's juststarting with kindergarten and then we would add the first grade, the nextyear and so on and so forth. - Yeah, so in 2030 then, we'd be adding thesecondary element to it, at middle school. - Yeah, it's just great overall, I'm really excited for this. This is forward thinking education. When I look in the job market, you know, like almost all of 'em wantyou to have a second language, whether it's Spanish or whatever it is thelanguage is looking for. So I think this is justanother asset for our students to be able to, like mydaughter didn't take, you know, we have Spanish in elementary school, but not to this level of whatwe're talking about here. And so she hopes to graduatewith her college, you know, with her certification in Spanish, but it'll all happen inher high school years. Which we know if this couldhave happened at a younger time, it would just make the process. It really embeds it into who you are and how you think about everything, if we can start it younger. So I'm just really excited to see what this program does with the district. I think it's gonna be, I think it's really gonnabe amazing what we see. Well thank you to the team. - Other questions? Now, Dr. Arcand. - I have some quick questions. So let's say I have akindergarten coming next year, but I don't sign up and in third grade I say, boy, I should have gotten in there. Is there opportunity thento add in third grade or is it you too lateor how does that work? - So I've done some research around that and we still, some of thestuff we have, you know, still to figure out, but some programs allowstudents to enter later, but they have to take acertain language proficiency to make sure it's a successful experience. - Okay.- Other kids might be coming and families from adifferent immersion program. So we have some thingsto learn around that. Also, some of our familieswere wondering is it possible to accelerate the secondary options because there are families that wanted to come to White Bear Lake. So we're excited about that and those family focus groupsare really gonna be key for us as we dive into it. But it does seem like, some immersion programs figure that out. But again, there has to be some level of language proficiency so we make sure that the students can meetthe outcomes of the program. - [Dr. Arcand] Thank you. - [Chair Ellison] Other questions? Oh, Dr. Newmaster. - As a, or originally a language teacher with Spanish and German. I just think it's a great opportunity that it's one more path we can add, but it's also one more supportfor your bilingual family. And I over many years I told every child I ran acrossas I was a media specialist, your language at home is you are gonna be the best choice when people look for anemployee no matter where, if you're bilingual. And so I just think it's another good path we offer for folks and whether it comesfrom a family heritage, I used to say to kids, look at your last name, you would be an excellent German student. You know, there's a heritageif it's your background, you maybe remember grandmabarely spoke English. I did. But I do know that itclicks into many places that I think it strengthens a child's self-esteem as well as being wonderful for developing and learning skills. So I'm glad we're rolling and I think this is a good bite to start, without jumping intothe deep end right away. So congrats. - Other questions, Ms. Daniels? - Consider say, I think it's great. I've had emails and conversations with community members over the years and this has been a topic in our community or a blog desire for parents. So really excited about it. Thank you for all those links because I did access the links and read a lot aboutdual immersion programs because I, you know, had a lot to learn and it was just really interesting to read all the benefits. - [Chair Ellison] I'vegot a couple of questions. One, how, as we're thinking about, we start with kindergarten and we had first gradeand we had second grade. What is that gonna look like for the staff who are currently at Matoska and Otter? - Yeah. Yeah. - So we've had a lot of conversations. We know, you know, one of the things that in our conversationwith the HR department and we know with attrition, no one will be out of a job. There's always been plentyof attrition for, you know, in our White Bear Lake Schools. It's one of the benefits ofa school district our size is that every everyone will have a job. How that looks, you know,in the distance future, we'll have to see how that unfolds as we know how manystudents are enrollment, how many sections do we have, how many teachers retire, how many teachers decide to, you know, move to other schools, which are constant conversationswe have every year. But we have talked withour teachers and staff and assured them that, youknow, no one's going to be, you know, this isn'tgoing to push anybody out. I know that it'll buildour Matoska staff stronger as we've talked about that. And there's actually afair amount of excitement and interest in the staffthat I've talked to. - Okay, good. And the other question I have is about, kind of, the long-term trajectory of this. And I appreciate there'salready been discussion about how this would look in secondary, because I'm thinkingabout IB in particular and how a couple of years ago the district had middle school IBand then pulled it back. And so what is your, what is the plan for thinking toward middle school? So that doesn't happen again, learning from our, you know, our past. - Yeah, we learned a lot from the past. But the other piece is, is immersion looks verydifferent at the middle school. So it's not, you're notstarting a whole school where every single class is in Spanish. What typically school districts have had is they have some sort oflanguage arts or heritage Spanish, which we already have in oursystem in terms of a class that we've tried to start, we just haven't yet had the enrollment. And then usually it'sother, another content area. So a content area like social studies, maybe taking a world history class and then that's actually, you know, given in the target language of Spanish, but then the rest of theirday would be English. And so it really is thinking through, again with our families. 'cause there is a lot in that picture, there was a lot of expertise of people who had done their research, had ideas, knew whatworked in other districts. We have a lot to learn from. But that would be what it looks like. And then students, thereare opportunities in terms of taking college classes onceyou get to the high school and you can earn quitea bit of college credit to support you in that, in your,you know, in your language. And our students areinterested in heritage Spanish. So that's where I think we might be able to accelerate some of those opportunities for students and families. - [Chair Ellison] Yeah, I wentoverseas for my job last year and I was the only person there who did not speak two, three,or four other languages. And so I think this is reallya good path for our students because everything is globalnow, so it's wonderful. Any other questions? Oh, Ms. Thompson. - Not a question, butjust a comment on that. Overall, I'm just thinking about it all. It also brings an acceptanceto kids who may grow or live in a home where their parents or family members don'tspeak English, right? But then they come to schooland might feel some shame or just, you know, to be ableto see and go into the school and see their language beingtaught to other students as like a celebrated way and something peopleactually want to learn, can help them remove thatshame of being othered. Just my own heritage. My grandfather came herewhen he was nine from Mexico with his mom and his brother. And he never taught his language to anybody else in the family. So my dad didn't learn it. My dad's father didn't learn it. Like I didn't learn it. We just, we didn't learn it. It was, you can't be that and also be here and be accepted. So seeing that happen in ourdistrict allows students say, oh my culture is also my culture can be, my Hispanic culture andalso my American culture. And we can celebrateboth of those together. And I just really thinkthat that is so important for our kids to see right away. So thank you. - All right, thank you all so much for all of this time and work. - Thank you.- And so, we were gonna move to our single operational item action on elementary immersion program. Okay. Yeah. - [Dr. Arcand] After you(indistinct) presentation. And now we're asking you to take action. We recommended action is to move to approve a Spanish DualLanguage Immersion Program in White Bear Lake Area Schools to be offered at Otter Lake Elementary and Matoska International Elementary, beginning with the 2025-2026 school year. - You've heard the recommended action. Could I get a motion to approve? - [Ms. Thompson] I moved. - [Chair Ellison] A motion by Ms. Thompson and a second?- Second. (chuckles) - And the second by Ms.(indistinct) (chuckles) Any further questions or comments? All in favor of themotion, please say aye. - [Board Members] Aye. - Oppose. Same sign. And the motion passes. Thank you so much. Thank you again foreveryone for being here and for our student liaisons to be here. Remember to vote on Tuesday. You can get your sample ballot and your polling place on Minnesota Secretary of State website. With that, I would call for a motion to adjourn.- Chair Ellison, I move for an adjournment. - And motion by Dr. Arcand and a second? - Second.(all chuckling) - Second by Dr. Newmaster. All in favor ofadjournment, please say aye. - [Board Members] Aye. - Opposed? Same sign. And we're adjourned.(mallet thudding)