Good evening. I'd like to call to order uh tonight's meeting of the ISD 191 uh school board. Uh the date is April 9th, 2026 and the time is 6:30 p.m. Uh I'd like to start by welcoming everyone who is joining us in person as well as those who are joining us online. Uh we do always appreciate folks uh who take the time to join us and learn about the the business of of uh the school district. Um we'll start with the pledge of allegiance. Director Chester, would you lead us, please? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. Uh we will start by approving tonight's agenda. Uh do I have a motion? So moved. Moved by Director Chester. Second. >> Seconded. Seconded by Director Mikkelson. Any discussion hearing? None. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. >> Oppose. Nay. And the motion carries unanimously. Uh we will start first with the information portion of our meeting uh with a school report about Edward Neil Elementary School uh with Dr. Chris Belmont, assistant superintendent Lyall Bomba, principal, and um Misba Herrani and Jordan Petri. Welcome all. >> Thank you, Chair Alt, Superintendent Daniels, members of the board. Um school report. We have the we have our Neil Stars here tonight to share um about how datadriven uh decisions are going on at our elementary schools that are driving results. So um without further ado, Principal Bomba. Good evening. I'd like to start with just the um first slide and this is all about some exciting math data that we have and this math data is fast a math data and one data piece that we've been tracking for multiple years is the students that are at advanced or low risk. And um we call it start green stay green because that's how it shows up in Educ Climber. And the idea is is that this is a good measurement of tracking kind of your tier one success points. And um it we started to see some dips as you can see in the graph a few years ago. And then we started paying attention to that. Really paying attention to attendance, paying attention to our tier one instruction. Using tools like data walls, we can track student by student how they're progressing with the things that we're teaching. And then increasing the level of collaboration between uh teacher teams and all of those things. The reason I bring up all those different points is there's not one thing that makes that work. Schools are complicated ecosystems. And so if you want to improve your instruction, you really have to um look at a wide variety of different pieces. So we're excited about the data, but you know, it's kind of like professional sports teams when they're working for a championship. You know, sometimes they um it's not so much about that game. It's more about all the little behaviors that you do to win. And that's what we're focused on is first, let's get the kids at school. Let's keep them at school. Um let's get into the details of what our tier one instruction looks like and let's work that machine and and keep paying attention to that and and making progress. And so I'm happy to see that we're on an upswing. Um but even though I like the data and in the direction it's going, it's more about paying attention to those details of how we interact with each other and um and making improvements that way. Uh an exciting thing that the team, the fifth grade team here is going to share is an example of kind of like what's next. um some of the things that they're going to share is kind of our we're kind of in experimenting with and it's not at a place where it's like standard work but it's the type of work that um is needed if you start making differences with I don't want to talk too much but um if we um we want to start looking at how do we get information about kids and their progress and uh they have some exciting things that they're going to share with you. So this is Miss uh Miss MPA and Miss Petri. >> Good evening and thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. We are the fifth grade team at Edward Neil Elementary and we're excited to share two instructional practices that have had a meaningful impact on our students. Our use of podcasts for pre-teaching and our use of daily formative assessments. Our goal has been simple. Meet students where they are and respond to their needs in real time. We've worked to create a system that is both engaging for students and informative for us as teachers. We'll start with our podcast. We wanted to introduce math concepts before instruction in a way that was accessible, engaging, and efficient. To create these, we began by uploading our district provided math expression slides into Notebook LM. Along with that, we included Minnesota grade level guarantees, our district grade level guarantees, and our report card expectations to ensure alignment. Next, we select the specific lessons or concepts we want students to preview. We then prompt Notebook LM to generate a 2 to three minute studentfriendly podcast or video that introduces the concept in a clear and engaging way. Once the podcast is created, we upload it into Seesaw. We make sure to provide both English and Spanish versions so all of our learners can access the content. Students engage with these podcasts during their morning routine while they are eating breakfast. It's a calm, consistent way to start the day. Before each podcast or video, we include one to three quick questions. One question reviews previously learned material and another acts as a preassessment for a new concept. This entire process typically takes 5 to 8 minutes, making it manageable while still being impactful. The real power of this system comes from what we do next. Before math instruction begins, we review the data from these formative assessments. This allows us to immediately adjust our teaching. If students already show understanding, we can extend their learning. If there are gaps, we can address them right away before the lesson. This process has shifted our instruction from reactive to proactive. Instead of waiting to see who struggles, we are identifying the needs before the lesson begins. We are already seeing the impact of this approach across all learners in our fifth grade classrooms. Whether students are advanced, on track, or showing areas of risk. We've seen growth in all students, not just those receiving interventions. For example, one of my students had plateaued and remained at the same level for a couple of years. At the start of this year, he was identified as low risk. However, through consistent pre-teaching, daily formative assessments, and targeted instruction, he has made significant progress. According to Fastbridge data, he has now moved from low risk to on track and even into adv advanced range at times. This is especially meaningful because he had been stuck at the lower level for several years and is now truly thriving. This approach has also helped us support all learners including multilingual students by providing content in multiple languages and formats. Additionally, the data we gather helps guide our win intervention groups, allowing us to target instruction based on real daily data rather than relying on only one formative assessment. Overall, the system has helped us become more intentional, supportive, and student centered in our instruction. By combining engaging pre-eaching through podcasts with meaningful daily formative assessments, we are better equipped to meet the diverse needs of our students. Thank you for your time and for supporting innovative practices in our classroom. We'd be happy to answer any questions. >> So, next attendance matters and um so we have an amazing attendance leader, our school social worker, Mrs. Sarah Parker. She uh she's a varsity volleyball coach. So, that's where she is tonight. Otherwise, she would gladly be here sharing this information. So this I when I asked her about uh tenants, we kind of sat down and did a mini interview and through through that process uh this quote came out and I just thought it was wonderful. Um and we do these routines with kids. Each teacher has different kind of morning routines where they involve the kids in attendance and even kindergarteners. Everybody does a morning routine where we're talking about and it might be kindergarten they kind of sing a cute little song and it's very adorable. in fifth grade it looks a little bit different but um it's really about engaging the kids in that in these routines that attendance does matter and so it's a conversation that sometimes as a principal I didn't always think you know you would engage kindergarteners in talking about attendance but we do it's at their level and it's it's in a way that they accept and is engaging and it's and and but it makes a difference and so I thought this was a great quote from Mrs. Barker and and it and it was like when a first grader cheers because their teammate showed up today. That's amazing. That's what we're after is we're trying to create a culture. And it's not that data doesn't matter, but that's one phase of that. And I'm going to address that in a second. Here's our uh attendance data. Um obviously there was some dips there in the winter that probably most schools or many schools um face and it definitely hit our community as well. Um, and I'm glad to see that we're climbing up and the goal is to get, you know, above that 95 number again, um, and then even higher, uh, before the school year ends. But we're on track and it's exciting to see that number jump back up and climb where where it needs to be. This is kind of how how does our attendance work and and so when the data the data pieces, the tracking, the spreadsheets, all those kinds of things are kind of that phase one. You have to have it. It's super important. We do pay attention to data. We meet monthly as an attendance team and we um look, you know, student by student or group by group and we're paying attention to that. But now once you have those tools in place, that's just not our primary focus. We move into other phase two and phase two is where you get into more problem solving, identifying things like the um we have the attendance rewards and this the different things that kids are doing. That's kind of in the phase two. So we are in between phase two and three. We started some phase three things, but but that's that's our biggest thing. next next year we identified as a team is it's really about now getting into the really into the weeds and the details of how do we make things work for families and what we envision is that that's really kind of individualized and so our task for next year and we've started it but we'll be dumping or diving into phase three a lot more next year is how do we systemize things that are unique to individuals because some of these things that's unique to one family that makes it work it's going to be different to that family but we we believe there's still going to be patterns there for us to systemize and then learn from those things and keep make that into a process that we can just keep living and that's how we think we're going to go from that 95 and higher percentage point. So what's next for Neil? You know, so we have a you know, one, can you get the kids into the school? We're we're kind of proving that and we're going to keep pushing on that. We don't let that go, but then like what do you do next? And so one piece of data that we do need to work on is all around our our tier three and tier uh tier 2 and tier three students. If you're going to say uh start green, stay green. The bar below that is red. And so that's the bar I'm talking about. That bar is kind of hovered around that 50% and and we don't want that. So when we reflect about that, you know, who what are who are our tier 2 students? Who are tier three students? And who are our teachers that work with those kiddos? We have great teachers. We have curriculum. we have time, we have positive culture. So then now the question is so if we're not seeing that data really move, then how do you get it to move? And so to me, uh the next thing is to really look at the system that's driving that. And so that's what we start we just started actually on Monday to really unpack of how do that how does that group of adults work with kids and support kids. And so it's not just getting them to talk, but we're systemizing it. We're putting some new different tools. It's come it's living through the master schedule process. But sometimes you think about a master schedule and you see like a spreadsheet of how the day works. But underneath that there's a lot of human behaviors and that's what we're attacking and we're addressing and we're getting different groups of people talking to each other and we're being very planful student by student on what we're going to be doing next year. And then we're introducing some new tools. Um we're calling it a service grid and it it is it's just a spreadsheet but how we're organizing the information is really showing us live like where are our people? where are my tier 2 and tier three staff, EAS, everything. It's going to be really be a live document that shows me exactly what people are doing and how they're doing it. It it does a lot of different things. Um, and because of AI, and we've learned that you can interact with some AI tools with that, you can get quick immediate information that will be helpful to me as an administrator, but to that special education teacher who's trying to change EA schedules to match student needs. we're going to be able to use that same AI thinking to be able to get that kind of information and make things quickly. Um, instead of guessing or let's say like one year at Neil, we had like 13 newcomer students come to school in April. That was a challenge because how do you how do we plug that into the system that so the one tool that we have that service grid tool is going to allow us to see exactly where the adults are and it makes all those things faster. Um, so it's it's very exciting. It's new. Um, we're experimenting. I'm sure they're going to be, we call it creative tension as we work through this because this is really going to be pushing adults to be different. Um, and so when you have that, there is going to be some tension, but we know as a building leadership team, we're fostering that tension in a safe way because we don't want to push so far that the system can't handle it, but at the same time, we do have to push the system. So, there's tools in place and creative tension is one of them. So, that's what I'm really excited about. We're really kind of readjusting and and really um um examining our tier two and tier three system and the backbone of that and and and building something for next year that we think is going to be uh very impactful. This is one of my favorite quotes. I think um sometimes my staff know that sometimes I'll refer to things as the one room schoolhouse because I think that's a mental model that sometimes is is deep in education and and even though for many many years that that model has been chipped away I think it's still deep in our brains uh as in part of a teaching culture and educational culture and so this quote to me is powerful uh because I think that it it's true when we are all work together and you uncover that and we show that we're working as a team it makes a difference and and for us uh this is one of our mantras our master schedule work is We're moving away from my student to our student and it's not just fifth grade, but it's really prek5. These are our kids and how are you going to work together and how do you get that system to work together? And I do feel like that's going to have an impact. >> Thank you. >> Any questions or >> awesome. Thank you very much. I will open it up for questions and comments. >> Dr. Mickelson. Um, so I just want to confirm my understanding of the podcast that you're putting together that it's it's they're originally kind of AI generated that for the podcast that you're putting in some prompts, some information and that's what's generating the like 3 five minute. >> So what we're doing is we're putting in our math expression slides that our district gives us into AI into notebook which is also verified through our district. Then we put in the report card standards. Then we also put in our scope and sequence and then our grade level guarantees. We put all of our standards in there as well. And then we um prompt it. We say, "Please generate a 2 to 3 minute studentfriendly podcast or video that will pre-teach fifth grade students with the selected slide." >> So then it just pulls from all the documents that we want it to. It doesn't pull it from the whole web, just our selected document. And then it generates either a podcast or a video. >> Sure. I was just kind of wanting to confirm my understanding that yes, that's kind of what the final product is kind of coming from. Um, you mentioned that uh the podcasts are currently um also being done in Spanish. Um, you had commented then a little bit later about some multilingual um options. I mean, are are the podcasts uh available or do you think you might be able to expand it to other languages besides just Spanishes for multilingual students since we do have so many different languages that our students speak at home? >> We've done Spanish cuz majority of our students speak either English or Spanish, >> but it does I don't know how many, but there are so many different languages that you can choose from. So, yeah, >> I think it's about 35 languages or more. >> Right. Right. whatever Google that's what I was assuming but yeah wanted to um make sure and clarify >> so the concept would work with lots of languages >> and and definitely just a a final comment I guess is that uh kind of it seems with what you were saying around data that it's data is driving then the action it's not just gathering the data is the action is would that be a fair kind of statement that with kind of what your goal is that this is going to inform our action M when we started thinking about this and and we started talking about as a team. The idea was to get quick information so they can react that day that moment because this occurs in the morning, math is later in the day and it's not meant to be, you know, be a beall catch-all. It's more to just to key one or two points and then that helps them make decisions about what they can do right away that day. >> Sure. Yep. And that's a very good point is that data so often is we're collecting it so late after everything is done. So, um, excellent. Great with the initiative. So, thank you very much for the presentation. It was fantastic. >> Thank you. Any other questions, comments? >> Yeah, kind of going off of what uh Miss Mickelson said, um I think it's very important. and I'm currently a senior at Brunswill High School and being able to learn how to use AI appropriately and to your advantage, especially for fifth graders, just setting such a wonderful standard for them as they enter middle school and are given more assignments and knowing how to navigate it in a positive light. So, um I really appreciate and I hope more elementary schools can implement that as well. I would also like to know I really love your flannels and there's a place I can get it. I would love to know. Thank you, Favven. Any other questions? Um, I just had first off, thank you. Um, always appreciate school reports just to get a glimpse into um what's going on into each of our schools. Um, dovetailing on Director Mickelson's question and I'm kind of revealing my ignorance as far as AI goes. Um, I'm assuming that we validated the translation of into Spanish into Somali so that we so that we know that you know when you're translating into a different language that it's it's legitimate. >> Yeah. one of that is a challenge and that's like we were even talking about it at a meeting this morning about the the amount of staff that are interacting with AI including us and and including probably you and then that critical step of how do we make sure that still the quality is there there's a phrase that recently I learned is garbage in garbage out and and that's a big AI problem because getting information is not the issue anymore right getting quality information in a timely way that makes a difference is the issue and so there isn't um you know I don't want to speak 100% for you, but I know like that was one thing that we kind of investigated. Um, and in the beginning, we kind of did some tests to see how how would that be? Um, and that's the beauty of notebook LM. LM is a language model or an AI. I'll just keep it really simple. It's a it's a closed system. And so, it's not when you interact with it, it only interacts with the sources that you give it. And that's why it's a very good teaching tool because they give it the high quality pieces from the district, from the standards from and that's what it's going to make up or interact with. And so there sometimes like when I've played with it, there's some there is sometimes glitches or whatnot, but it's not um it's like um the a voice will come out kind of funny or whatnot, but it's not content that's inappropriate or or whatnot. It just sometimes misreads a word, that kind of piece. Um but we didn't but obviously once they get the machine working and they've kind of vetted it a little bit I'm sure you don't check it every time now but um that's something that was you have to consider and then that is the strength there is using LM where we probably would not use like Gemini or an open like chat GPT or another um like an AI system that's more open to the world. It wouldn't that wouldn't be appropriate for this model. >> Awesome. Thank you. Yeah. And I I appreciate the innovation. I mean this is just a great example of just a little not probably quite a little bit of time on your part but with the students a snapshot with the students probably makes well it it makes a big difference with the learning of the students and you know that's that's music to everybody's ears the kids and the confidence that it's building in them and to your point um it just the the one student um who's who and and if if it's making a difference for one student, well then let's just rinse and repeat and and keep going with it. So um so thank you for that in innovation and also um Principal Bomba, I appreciated hearing you say pushing adults to be different because our kiddos, they're going to be in our schools, right? And what makes a difference is what the adults are doing. And if we want to have change, then our adults need to be different. And so kudos to you. Thank you so much. Appreciate you encouraging change. And we're seeing that. So, thank you so much for your support and have a lovely evening. >> Uh next, we will um enjoy a rep report from our student representative. Thank you, Director Alt or Cher Alult. So, as students entered their fourth and final quarter this Tuesday, the approaching end of the school year is becoming more real than ever before. But thankfully, that hasn't slowed down the exciting activities happening across the district. The Burnsville High School Theater Guild is in the midst of prepping for their final show of the year, High School Musical the Musical, but their first show on May 7th. Students are also promoting the 4th annual culture week, which begins on April 27th with the first ever schoolwide cultural pepfest featuring a cultural runway show and performative dance. Throughout the week, students can expect to hear fun facts in the announcements as well as try different cultural meals for school lunches. Seniors in AVID, a college and career success elective, have become have begun a school supply drive for incoming freshmen as part of their classwide senior project. Burnsville drum line will perform at their community night event at Burnsville High School tomorrow as they prepare to defend their state title at finals this Saturday. Burnsville speech is almost has almost concluded its whirlwind of a season as they competed in their state section tournament this past Tuesday at Eden Prairie High School. Big congrats to Reese Canoe who placed fifth in creative expression no small feat. Spring sports have also begun with softball, boys volleyball, bat mitten, golf, baseball, track and field field, as well as girls flag football all ramping up their seasons as various games and tournaments have begun throughout this previous month and continuing on for the next two months. On a final note, juniors are hard at work studying for their ACT exam on April 22nd, while seniors are making their final post-graduation decisions on May 1st. But don't worry, they'll all have prom to look forward to on May 2nd at the University of Minnesota Landscape Arboritum with the theme being garden of the lights. This now concludes my report. Wonderful. Thank you very much. Any questions or comments for Favven? >> All right. Uh we will turn next to um our superintendence report with Dr. Daniels. >> Thank you, Chair Alt. Welcome back. We are two weeks in from spring break and finally spring is in the air. I hope the time away offered everyone a chance to rest, reconnect and recharge. As we return, we enter the fourth quarter of the school year. A time that moves very quickly and calls for focus, collaboration, and commitment to finish strong. Before tonight's board meeting, we had the privilege of celebrating the community of excellence awards, honoring individuals and teams whose contributions make our 191 community exceptional. The ceremony was a powerful reminder of the dedication, creativity, and care that define our district. Each honore embodies what it means to serve with purpose and to make a lasting difference for students and families. We also have much to celebrate in our student outcomes. Graduation rates continue to rise at Burnsville High School, Burnsville Alternative High School, and the secondary virtual academy. This growth reflects the perseverance of students, staff, the expertise of leaders, and the unwavering support of families and community partners. As we move through this final quarter of the school year, let's carry forward the energy and pride from tonight's community of excellence celebration. Together, we will believe in every student's potential, belong to a community that lifts one another up, build pathways for success, and become the district our students and families deserve. Thank you for all you do in 191. And chair, all this concludes my report. Thank you very much. Any questions or comments for Dr. Daniels? All right. Any uh board member reports? I'll remind folks that uh this would be individual member reports um about activities out and about in the community. Um committee assignments um and school assignments will be at our second meeting of the month. Nope. All right. Then we shall move to the business portion of our meeting uh to the consent agenda. Although board action is required, it is generally unnecessary to hold discussion on these items. In the event a board member wishes to discuss an item, that item will be moved for separate consideration. Uh are there any items that board members wish to move for sec separate consideration? Seeing none. Um, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? So, moved. Moved by Director Anderson. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Hume. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. >> Oppose. Nay. >> And the motion carries unanimously. Uh, next we are moving to the new business portion of our agenda. Um, starting with a request to adopt a resolution relating to the termination of teaching contracts for named long-term substitute teachers effective at the close of the 2025 2026 school year with Stacy Silvine, executive director of administrative services. Welcome Stacy. >> Good evening, Gerald, Dr. Daniels, members of the board. Each spring we go through this as a part of our um annual cycles where we need to say goodbye to a number of staff who have worked with us, provided services for our students and families and have helped us move uh learning forward for our children. The next three proposals will include uh recommendations for our long-term subs which we release every spring as a matter of course. They do have contracts that outline the number of days in which they're working, but this just kind of ties the whole thing up at the end. We'll also be releasing uh teachers who have more than a 1.0 FTE um or more than their current assignment. These will be folks who are taking on additional responsibilities such as overloads, traveling, lunchroom supervision, other miscellaneous responsibilities. Then finally, we'll be wrapping up with our probationary releases, which includes a number of different uh reasons. Anyone that is under a tier one license, a tier 2 license that expires at the end of June, those that are being released for budgetary concerns, and those that are being released because of performance. So, with that, I will begin with the first one here for our long-term subs. Um, it is my recommendation that the board of education adopt the following resolution. Be it resolved by the board of education of school district 191 that the teaching contracts of the following long-term substitute teachers be terminated at the close of the 2526 school year. Be it further resolved that written notice is sent to set teachers regarding termination and non-renewal of their contract as provided by law. >> Thank you, Stacy. Uh, is there any discussion uh about this agenda item? >> Don't we need a motion? >> I'm getting there. >> Okay. >> Hearing none. Uh, is there a motion to approve? >> So moved. >> Moved by Director Hume. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Worb. Um, as this is a resolution, uh, this will require a roll call vote. Um, having been moved and seconded, um, in a second I will ask Sarah to call the role. And when she calls your name, please please respond with either an I if you are in favor of the of the resolution or nay if you are opposed. Uh, Sarah, will you please make the roll call? >> Director Mickelson, >> I. >> Director Anderson, >> I. >> Director Hume, >> I. >> Chair Alt, >> I. Director Saxi >> I. >> Director Worb >> I. >> Director Chester >> I >> having seven in favor and no one opposed. Uh this resolution uh is declared duly passed and adopted. Uh next we will we're being asked to adopt a resolution relating to the termination and non-renewal of the portion of teaching contracts in excess of 1.0 know and or beyond contractual rights at the conclusion of the 2025 2026 school year. Staying with Stacy Soine. >> Again, these are those portions of the contracts that exceeds their current assignment, bringing them back to whole as to what they were hired for going into this upcoming school year. With that, uh it is my recommendation that the board of education adopt the following resolution. Be it resolved by the board of education of school district 191 that the portion of the teaching contracts of staff in excess of 1.0 and or contractual rights be terminated at the close of the 2025 2026 school year. Be it further resolved that written notice is sent to said teachers regarding termination and non-renewal of their contract as provided by law. >> Thank you Stacy. Is there any discussion about this agenda item? Is there a motion to approve? >> So moved. >> Moved by Director Saxi, seconded by Director Chester. Um, again, since this is a resolution, we will have a roll call vote. And Sarah, will you please call the role? >> Director Mickelson, >> I. >> Director Anderson, >> I. >> Director Hume, >> I. >> Chair Alt, >> I. >> Director Saxi, >> I. >> Director Word, >> I. Director Chester. >> I >> having seven in favor and no one opposed. Uh this resolution is declared duly passed and adopted. Uh we next agenda item. We are being asked to adopt a resolution relating to the termination and non-renewal of the teaching contract of probationary certified personnel at the close of the 2025 2026 school year. Staying with Stacy Soine. >> Again, this is the the portion of the releases that is related uh for our probationary staff that is related to tier one, tier two that are expiring at the end of this uh June. Uh those that are being released for budgetary concerns for right sizing and those that are being released for uh performance. So with that, it is my recommendation that the board of education adopt the following resolution. Be it resolved by the board of education of school district 191 pursuant to Minnesota statute 122A.40 that the teaching contracts of the following licensed probationary teachers in independent school district 191 be terminated at the end of the 2526 school year be further resolved that written notice is sent to set teachers regarding termination and non-renewal of the contract as provided by law. >> Thank you Stacy. Is there any discussion on this agenda item? Hearing none. Is there a motion? >> So moved. >> Moved by Director Hume. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Worb. Uh having been moved and seconded, this final resolution will require a final roll call vote. Sarah, will you please make the roll call? >> Director Mickelson, >> I. >> Director Anderson, >> I. >> Director Hume, >> I. >> Chair Alt, >> I. >> Director Saxi, >> I. >> Director Word, >> I. Director Chester, >> I having seven in favor and no one opposed, this resolution is declared duly passed and adopted. Thank you, Stacy. Um, next, uh, we are being asked to approve the proposed 2025 through 2027 collective bargaining agreement with the 191 liaison association and uh, ISD 191. uh staying with Stacy Sovine, executive director of administrative services. >> This is our first two-year contract with the cultural leaison uh that recently became a union. The first contract that we had with them was for one year um just to kind of bridge the gap and to get us this point uh to be on cycle with the rest of our units. Uh we met with the union over two months. Um it sounds better than two meetings I suppose but over two months with uh with them we had a number of language items that we addressed. We updated or removed datedus. Uh we updated language on employee rights, union deductions, pay uh breaks and payroll and breaks and payroll selection. The 2-year package will be about $150,000 reflecting an MSBA package of 9.59%. uh that includes uh career steps, insurance premiums, as well as a schedule improvement. So with that, it is my recommendation that the board of education approve the proposed revisions and readopt the unchanged language in the 2527 collective bargaining agreement with the 191 liaison association and independent school district 191. >> Thank you, Stacy. Um is there a motion? So moved. Moved by director Chester. Second. Second. >> Seconded by uh director Saxi. Any discussion hearing? None. All those in favor please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Nay. >> And the motion carries unanimously. Uh next we are being asked to approve the proposed uh adopt oh proposed adoption of the terms and conditions of employment for confidential employees of independent school district 191. Staying with Stacy Sovine >> we have five confidential employees uh within the district. Um these are at will positions um and don't fall under they fall under the definition under PEL for confidential and are not a bargaining unit. They do they are at will employees. Um with this uh terms and conditions we updated dates. We added the Minnesota paid family leave language. uh we increased the uh 403b contribution with a total 2-year increase uh package of $56,000 or an MSBA of 7%. With that, it is my recommendation that the board of education approve the proposed revisions and readopt the unchanged language in the 2527 terms and conditions of employment for the confidential employees of Independent School District 191. >> Thank you, Stacy. Uh is there a motion to approve? >> So moved. Moved by Director Hume. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Chester. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. >> I. Oppose. Nay. And the motion carries unanimously. Uh, next we're being asked to approve a proposed adoption of terms and conditions of employment with operations and maintenance supervisors. Staying with Stacy. So, >> yep. again uh four supervisors that we employ within the district. These are the individuals that work under David Lake, our director of operations and transportation. These supervisors are covering either uh general maintenance for the uh for the area, our transportation, our evening custodial services, and the other one as far as just straight up maintenance um and ground grounds crew. Um, so their work then supervises the direction um on a day-to-day basis with the other custodial staff. Again, we are updating the Minnesota paid family leave language, updated the dates, added some longevity and 403b contributions. The 2-year increase cost for the four are is $31,000 with an MSBA package increase of 5.31%. Therefore, it is my recommendation that the board of education approve the proposed revisions and readopt the unchanged language in the 2025-27 master agreement with the operations and maintenance supervisors. >> Thank you. Uh is there a motion to approve? >> U by director Saxi, seconded by Director Chester. Any discussion hearing? None. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Oppose. Nay. And the motion carries unanimously. Uh, next we're being asked to approve third party administrator for flexible spending account FSA and health reimbursement arrangement HRA with Stacy Soine. Um we have we're bringing to you tonight to ask that you will approve the third-party uh administrator that uh administers these two different areas. Part of the reason why is we believe it'll be a better experience both for our employees as well as for the back office staff who have to deal with the administrator. We get better information. We're going to have better results um in the long run. making sure that information is accurate and timely for our employees overall to be a better experience for our employees as a whole. Went through a process to where we requested proposals from a number of different folks that are in this type of business. Narrowed it down to two that we asked to come in and do interviews with. They did a presentation in front of um members of our benefits committee that uh chose to be a part of that. Um and after the presentations the the the recommendation was to go with um let me with the um benefits extras group I'm too many benefits on my page of notes here I apologize for that benefit extras once we had the recommendation we did check with other districts that are also using this company and felt that this would be the best choice for us moving forward. So with that, it is my recommendation that the board of education approves benefits extra as the flexible spending account FSA health reimbursement arrangement HR third party administrator to reimburse employees payments for the district self-funded plans. >> Thank you, Stacy. Is there a motion to approve? >> So moved. Moved by Director Worb. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Hume. Any discussion or questions? Hearing none. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Nay. And the motion carries unanimously. Uh, next we are being uh we're on to our policy section. We are being asked to approve on a first reading basis changes to policies. 404 employment background check. 406 public and private personnel data. 410 family and medical leave policy. and 70701 establishment and adoption of school district budget uh with Stacy so excuse me the mentioned policies were brought before the policy review committee on March 24th and without going through details of each and every one the the long and the short of it is they are aligning with state statute so much of this is cleanup one way or the other uh did go through the policy for the first reading with you. Therefore, it is my recommendation that the board of education approve on a first reading basis changes the policies 404 employment background check 406 public and private personnel data 410 family and medical leave policy and 701 establishment and adoption of school budget district. >> Thank you Stacy. Is there a motion to approve these policies? >> So moved. >> Moved by Director Chester. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Anderson. Any discussion or questions? Hearing none. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Opposed? Nay. And the motion carries unanimously. Uh we have one more agenda item, a work session to hold an insurance plan review. Uh prior to that, we will uh need to take a brief recess. Uh the time is now 7:13. Uh we will uh reconvene at 7:20. Is there a motion to um recess? >> So moved. >> Moved by Director Chester. Second. >> Second. >> Seconded by Director Hume. Um all those in favor signify by saying I. I. >> And we are in recess until 7:20. Thank you. 7:20 720 >> and we will begin our work session uh with uh of an insurance plan review. Um like to uh welcome Stacy Sovine, executive director of administrative services and George Vanderwite, our one digital insurance representative. >> Good evening again. Um, as a also a part of our annual cycle, we will be bringing before you our insurance premiums for approval at our next board meeting. Prior to that, we do a work session so that you can see much of the information that our benefits committee gets to see every month as they help guide the direction, plan design, information, and training for other employees and representing the different bargaining units. George uh presents this information at each of the meetings and is highly involved in our in our plan and helping our employees uh understand the plan that they have and the great benefits that they actually have. Uh with that, I'm not going to take away any of the thunder and turn it over to George. I think this is down the next. >> There we go. All right. Well, welcome everybody. We will uh we'll we'll jump in. We'll we'll talk a little bit about the 2526 uh medical year first. Then we'll we'll talk through some of the renewal. Uh give you a little bit of a background on what's unfortunately happening in the the medical uh marketplace as well, just so that I think board members have a perspective in terms of the the work and that has been put into this program and kind of where we stand from a district standpoint as well. So on this page first you'll see our 2526 information. We break it out into a couple of categories for uh you tonight. We'll show you the medical claims both from a projected standpoint. So that would be the annualized uh claims that we expect uh and then what we actually have in terms of data through the month of March as well. So you can see the progression there. Uh fixed cost as well. So that's the administration, it's our stop loss, all the other items that uh are either on a per employee per month basis or on an inins insured uh contract basis. So you can see about 2.3 million there and so far year to date about 670,000. So our total plan cost then would be our claims plus all of that administrative or fixed cost to get us to about $25.8 $8 million medical plan uh that the district administers for uh the members. Currently, uh year to date, we're about 13.8 million. From an internal funding standpoint, we are trying to stay ahead of the medical inflation, pharmacy drug inflation as well. So, you'll see that we do have an internal uh funding, which is the premiums that both the district contributes and the members through their payroll at about 27.9 million. um projected 17.1 uh currently. We also because we are self-insured, we maintain an internal service fund. So the the eb and flows of that uh program stays within that internal service fund. So if we have a positive experience year, those dollars stay with us as opposed to with the insurance carrier. Inversely, if we have a year where we spend more than we uh bring in, we have that internal service fund hopefully to help us out. So, that's our our savings account and and right now that's at about 12.6 uh as our projection by the end of the year. Right now, we're at about 14 million. Again, we will have some run out for claims that have incurred during the plan year that get paid out after the year. So, we typically have a value greater than projected at this particular point in the year. uh our target is about 55% of total cost to maintain in that fund balance. Uh projected we're at about 48% and then right now we're slightly above that because again we will have some runout claims to to deal with for this particular plan year. So we're in a really good spot right now from a fund balance perspective and even how we're running from a a plan projections questions on this page. All right. Where was it? right there. Nice. Okay. And then on this page here, we're just showing uh the board just where that kind of fund balance started out. Started out at about $10.7 million. The red indicates where we are uh currently at about 14 million. If we run at expected, uh our projections are about $14.6 million. That target being about $13 million. for perspective, we wanted to share with the the board where that fund balance has been at the end of each of the last couple of fiscal years. Just so you can see overall again, we have been maintaining with the hopes of slowly growing the last couple of years. Uh we do we have seen kind of an increase in our overall fund balance. And if you recall, uh we had some really tough conversations a few years back with a fairly large increase to help to start to build uh fund balance to the target that we wanted. and we are making good progress uh in regards to getting ourselves closer to that target. So for uh committee as we or not excuse me not committee but for board as we kind of look at this and and when we talk to the insurance committee some of the things that we've noticed within the plan just so you have some reference uh when we're looking at the spend of our our programs about 25% of our spend now is through prescription drug costs. So that averages at about $195 on a permember per month basis. So you'll see that there. Uh mental claims are are an area that continue to rise for most health plans. Ours is about uh $1.1 million. Uh that is up about 9%. We also have catastrophic uh claimments within our program as well. So we have three highcost claimments. Uh each of those individuals incurred claims uh north of a million dollars in the last 12 months. So that impacts some of our fixed costs when we're looking at stop loss and we'll talk a little bit about that uh when we get to the renewal as well. Uh high-cost claimants in general. So when we're looking at that uh that value is 50% of our stop-loss level. Uh represent about 18% of our our spend comes from high-cost claimments alone. Uh that has obviously continued to rise. So when we're talking about again those three high cost claimments uh on the bill before the other items that um are happening is just overall medical inflation. So we're seeing a much higher change in medical costs. We see 8 to 10% for changes in medical spend uh or cost of services and then we're also seeing that pharmacy uh costs are up around 18%. So brand name drugs, specialty drugs that our members are taking. So overall with these uh changes trying to also maintain and build fund balance to make sure that we uh stay fiscally responsible uh we are looking uh at a 5% change to our overall funding for the upcoming year which honestly is significantly better than a lot of other school districts and also a lot of other uh private employer plans as well. So a 5% increase uh to our overall premiums. Questions on that? Yeah, just um what are I know we've talked about this in the past. What are we doing to help our employees make the most of our plan to you know make good choices for themselves for their health and also for the plan itself so that everything's well balanced. >> Yep. So some of the things that uh committee talks about that also is part of what's called annual open enrollment. So each year when members are looking at the plans and making decisions to either participate in our programs or into others uh there's benefit guides that are made available where there's a lot of additional resources uh in terms of programs that exist from Blue Cross and from the other vendors that we have. Also with our open enrollment uh presentation, there are links that members can access there, whether it's virtual care services, uh mental health services, uh family planning services, all part of our our plan that members have access to to be able to help navigate Blue Cross. Also within their member portal, so their blue advisor has uh tools in which the members can access uh to be able to look up uh cost of services. So if you need to have a joint replacement, they can look at various providers in the area to make determinations as to where to get that done. Uh both from uh an efficiency of care and also from a cost standpoint. Similarly with the prescription drugs as well, members can enter their drugs into the system and and look to see if there's opportunities to purchase those drugs uh cheaper for themselves and for the plan as well. >> Great. Thank you. >> Hi George. Um I just have a question about like what is being done to keep down the the drug cost? Are they doing any sort of like specialty drug programs or encouraging um patients to use the the uh patient assistance programs or >> Yep. So Bluec Cross has uh or Prime Therapeutics has a program called Flex Access. So that is a program where there is outreach to the members letting them know of either manufacturing coupon discounts or other programs that exist within uh the the pharmacy benefit program. So there are there is there are outreach that happens to try to encourage some of the lower costing okay >> options there. Other questions? All right. So this just recaps the the overall annualized cost for the 26 27 year. You'll see uh we're projecting medical claims at about 25 million. Our overall fixed costs again that's the administration stop loss at about 1.9. Uh we get to about just under $27 million plan. That 5% increase to funding uh would be at about 27.4 again slowly building fund balance as well. uh our projections in terms of where that fund balance may be at the end of the 26 27 year at about 14.9 or again right around our target value. If we run at expected uh we have an opportunity obviously to run worse than than expected or better than expected. We do have uh stop-loss protection from an aggregate basis. If we were to exceed 115% of our claims uh we would then have protection uh in regards to that as well. Blue Cross's administrative rate is on a rate hold through the contract that we have. Our stop-loss premiums are also capped at 17% and I will say that is a blessing because our loss ratio last year was over 200%. So for board what that means when we were talking about a 200% loss ratio for every dollar of premium that we paid in the stop-loss vendor reimbured $2. So I'm sure none of us go in the business to collect a dollar and spend $2. So that will be something that we will have to navigate uh when we go through this next RFP cycle as that experience will definitely drive uh market costs as well. So having uh a an adequate fund balance will also help us with potentially a larger stop-loss increase as we come out of this 17% cap at the end of the 26 27 school year. And I will say with most school uh programs, those stop-loss uh programs do have some sort of caps on them. It's not common in private sector. Stop loss is typically something that honestly we wouldn't even have firm rates a lot of times for a July group at this particular juncture. Our schools uh do have a little bit of uh luxury in regards to that and just in terms of how that those are structured and then you'll see that our uh consulting cost is not not changing for the upcoming year as well. questions on the expected cost for 2627. So this just represents again the the overall fund balance uh a projection for the end of this year uh at the end of the calendar year to be about a 14.9 million. If we were to run at expected roughly about 15.4 uh very close to our target at 14.8 million. So, the hopes are that we're able to get very close to our overall uh expected target. Questions on medical before we talk through dental? All right, dental is a lot simpler of a program. It's a very uh fixed liability. Uh there is no stop-loss. We're really just paying administrative cost. So, we're showing here uh the projected cost for the year along with where we what we have data through the month of February. So, we lag a little bit uh with the dental plan versus the medical. About $900,000 in claims uh projected about $600,000 uh so far are at overall fixed costs for administration of the program at about $60,000. Uh currently uh we've paid about $40,000. So our our plan costs are just under a million or yes at 965,000 and then uh our actual costs around 643,000. Internal funding you'll see that we're only bringing in 881,000. So this is an area that we are uh making some adjustments to our rates. Uh we currently have brought in about 587,000. We have about a $400 plus thousand fund balance uh as a projection. Right now we're at about 446 about 43% of our cost with a target at 25%. You will see that we have been depleting our fund balance uh fairly uh significantly. So we are looking to make some adjustments to really try to to slow that down. Uh again this is a limited liability type program. So, we don't want to go too crazy and then have significant excess, but we do need to kind of make some adjustments. Last year, we made a 1% adjustment. We're going to be coming with a little bit larger increase in regards to that. So, you'll see on the next slide, this is our projected cost for 2627. Uh claims at about 940,000, fixed cost at about 65, so we're about a million dollar dental plan. uh internal service fund at about $925,000 of funding uh which would get us to about $337 uh reserve value at about 33%. We're with the target of 25. So we're still above our target overall. Our dental administrative cost would be increasing by about 5.9%. On the next page here, you'll see our recommendation uh would be a 5% increase to the rates. Really more so to try to get to a point of stabilizing this. So, we may be coming for 5% for a few years. Again, more so to try to to slow and land this uh very close to that target of around 25% and not get to a point where we make a significant increase and then have uh a fund balance much larger than we need. So you'll see where that fund balance position has been decreasing over the last couple of years. And then that box just shows you the the costs on a a claims per subscriber basis. Uh again about three or so percent trend in regards to that. And we haven't been making increases to that other than the 1% that we uh came to you for last year. So our recommendation that you you guys will be seeing is a 5% change to the dental funding as well. So a question usually dental is there's very little to discuss with dental why all of a sudden the change >> kind of I'm going to jump in here George and correct me once I say something wrong um really co changed everything for both of our plants for many many years we were looking at 0% increases on our dental it was flat. It everything was stable. Everything was working. Same way with our self-funded medical plan. We were pretty stable. COVID hit. Okay. People stopped going. Dentists stop going doctors. Then they all went back and on top of all of that, we had all of the inflationary increases both with across the country for everything as well as within the medical and the dental industry. So, in both of our plans, we're playing a little bit of catch-up, setting a new normal, >> being very conservative about this, making sure that our fund balances there, cuz as you recall, it has always been our plan to have enough of a reserve in place for both funds to where it's more stable even during the highs and the lows. >> So, that's what our target is, and that's what we're building back towards. >> I'm not used to having much of a conversation around dental, so that was Thank you. I appreciate that. is. >> So, >> but again, and 5% is on a much smaller premium level as well. So, from a hopefully from a paycheck and from a district standpoint, it's not >> as painful as the the large increase we had to deal with on the medical a few years back. >> Yeah. For for family dental, if I recall, we're right around $100. So, it'll go to about 105 or a little more. Well, and and we want people to use it, >> right? >> That's >> Yeah. Yep. >> Any questions that we might be able to answer? >> You just answered one of them. >> Yeah, that was my question, too. >> So, a couple couple points in here about funding recommendation is increasing rates by 5%. So, I think you just answered that question for dental that for a family it would be going from about $100 to about 105. What about for medical insurance? What's that look like for >> it? It varies amongst the nine different groups, >> right? >> So, we can go anywhere between 70 to about 83%. >> Um, that is uh contribution from the district. So, we're going to probably be I don't I don't know. Uh yeah, I will have those numbers during our um recommendation which will show what the premiums are going to >> district. It's a more complicated question than you think it is. Title. >> Yeah. And I and I don't want to tell you it's only going to be five bucks. So that's not going to be right. So >> we wish >> we wish indeed. >> Thank you. Yep. >> That was my question as well. So any other questions? I think that was the last slide. >> Perfect. >> All right. Thank you. >> Well, then I will call us a journ. >> Wait two minutes.