e e I would like to call the August 26 2024 school board meeting to order Lisa will you please call the role director Weber here W Felton here Claflin here La birie here T Felton here and director human is absent chair rash here at six present excellent thank you if we could please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance 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 [Music] all right uh I would ask for a motion to approve our agenda for this evening as well as the work session and regular minutes of July 22nd 2024 the special work session minutes from July 29th 2024 and the work session M minutes from August 12th 2024 do I have a motion so moved second any discussion all in favor please say I I opposed with that the motion carries um all right we get to kick things off with quality and action um we have our building principles we have some administrators um to provide some highlights from the coming 2425 school year come on down I invite you to the podium hello members of the board thank you uh we are going youngest to oldest so I'm Christen sum Town not me being the youngest but hold that that's okay but our students um so uh we are very excited to start oh I should introduce I might the Early Learning coordinator um and we are excited to welcome all our staff back today it was a very exciting morning um and we have a lot of exciting things coming up this year as well uh in ECFE we have some brand new teachers and we have new class offerings that we've never offered before uh including family learning which will include uh English language learning for the parents from the ab staff and also learning in the early childhood classroom for the students um and we have a single parent class that will happen in the evening on Tuesdays I believe uh so very exciting there um we also in preschool have a number of initiatives that are happening as part of our uh three-year strategic plan um the first one being the letters training which is part of the Minnesota read app um that is going to be our biggest lift this year but we're all very excited to work on our early literacy training for our staff and to improve our our preschoolers Early Learning uh early literacy skills um and then we are also really putting a lot of focus on our current curricula so right now we use creative curriculum which is an early childhood curriculum based in play and research based and um we've been using it for a number of years years but it's time for a refresh and to make sure that we're using it to Fidelity um and we are also uh really working to uh use our our uh social emotional C uh curriculum to fideli which is conscious discipline uh we have a trainer coming in from conscious discipline to really work on getting our staff back on the same page and as we've had staff turn over over the past few years we've we need to do like a reset so that's happening soon and we are really excited exced about it and that is early learning for 2425 and it was exciting to talk to you in the hallway about you know the Revelation that uh our preschool students were born at the height of the pandemic and so yes we have students coming in this year they're on putting in the birth dates and and it's all 2020 2021 so this is going to be an interesting year to see how how things are going to shake out they've all had an interesting start to their lives interesting yeah excellent thank you thank you ch all right we got Lincoln and kosia coming down yes we do good evening Terry btoy principal at caposa and Teresa Marty principal at Lincoln Center thank you for having us yeah thanks for having us and I want to ask how your experience was talking in front of that large group today you did a nice job by the way that's not easy to do um so we're presenting tonight we have a lot of similarities in in uh both buildings that we want to talk a little bit about tonight uh the first one was when we walked in here and we kind of shared well how' yours goes how' yours goes it was fun we had a lot of fun so we had this day is always spectacular when staff who maybe haven't seen each other over the summer reunite again and then I know we have 16 new staff members so it's fun to see the new and meet the new and so we spend a large portion of the first part of our meeting really just getting to know one another and playing games and just having fun being in the same space with one another so I know that uh tce and I kind of similarly planned our mornings just that way and I love the fact that we start in our own buildings people come to where their second home is going to be hopefully and they feel that way uh and then we go to the district uh you had mentioned the pandemic right we're still like thinking about the pandemic and where kids are at since the pandemic I feel like we're back too we both have kindergarten classes that are higher than they've been since the pandemic hit too uh and we're really excited about that we both added kindergarten sections to our building which super excited so yeah very cool uh and also just about the staff that we've hired as well um we have really Diversified our staff and our hiring here and and we're going to see it this year kids are going to walk into our classrooms and they're going to see themselves in our staff and the amount of comfort um and and just wanting to be in school and the inspiration that that can deliver we're really looking forward to um and so I think across the district you're going to hear that too about how our staff has been uh Diversified in a way that we just Haven in the past so Lincoln Center welcome welcom 17 new staff members today um Terry's really good about games and stuff so he gave me some really great ones to do with staff one of them was a scavenger hunt of all the things that we need them to complete anyway including like the safety folder making sure you everything but but we said take a picture with your team and time it and run around the building they also had to do some things about putting notes about themselves in the staff Lounge um because we've made that like a no work Zone where that's just for getting together and having building Community among staff not talking about students or appearance um and so they had it was so much fun to watch them cuz I was really first we talked we like oh yeah we're going to give them today it's going to be the deadline and then we're then we talk again it's was like no we should give him the end of the week right because we had so much other things to go over today and no everybody couldn't wait to run around the building with their team doing all this really fun stuff so it was it was really fun and exciting um the other thing just you know we got went through all the things that we needed to but seeing our building um instructional leadership team stand up and present um the things we had worked on all summer because they had three full days with us and so they were ready they are just ready to be leaders and understand the focus um that was very well laid out for us by The District administration which was um really fun and then we had spent a lot of time on our staff survey results and then our rounding activity like I can't tell you how excited I am to be able to meet with every single staff member and um and talk with them um which we do anyway but this is going to be more purposeful and and also help us with the ways that we continue to build that School culture mhm so another uh just highlight from composure too is we had a visit from waler Subaru today and uh we have partnered with them the past three years they work with adop a classroom and they call me every spring and they say hey do you want to be our partner this year and I'm like yes yes yes how much how much how much um and and this year they had donated kind of kits uh school supply kits for uh classrooms and then $7,500 uh that that teachers can use classroom supplies for and they actually sent Channel 9 today and it was supposed to be on on at 5:00 or 6:00 tonight so I went home and taped like I didn't know there was that many news shows to be honest with you but I have about two hours of news shows to watch through because Channel 5 was there today and it's just really cool because um with our curriculum as well there's a lot more stuff that we need and and we have to kind of work a little bit harder to go out and secure that stuff chart paper whiteboard markers things like that that are really expensive and so having something like that as a gift uh for our kids cuz the kids will ultimately use it was really kind of a cool experience so I I will make sure I send it on to the board for you to view okay one more thing I'll talk about is like science like we're super excited about having our science Specialists both of um at Lincoln and kosia spent considerable amount of time the summer preparing so you there's like that cross um District school alignment which is really exciting and then based on that um our theme this year is like to stay curious like ask questions we want kids to be inquisitive and so um two years ago we did the book called magical yet and the same author did the curious why and that's what we're reading um for our students this year in our classrooms and our theme this year is this is me so uh each year I kind of go on a road trip and the theme kind of comes to me it's really weird so it' be like early August and I'm in panic mode um this year I I sent out about a half a dozen songs we always tie it to a song and then we look for a lyric that's in the song that kind of matches uh our theme for the year and this is me really has to do with part of the daily desired experience or desired daily experience uh the the line I'm I am seen heard valued and respected for the unique person that I am has a really strong ties to our kids but also to our staff as well and so things like we want kids and staff to feel like it's a second home like I had said that their identity experience culture and language are honored by all student staff and teachers and that school is an inclusive environment that Fosters creativity and positive connections so we're hoping to tie that theme throughout the whole year to make sure that our kids and our staff stay connected to what we're doing so a lot of fun stuff today's always a fun day it's a blast and um yeah so we're uh we're excited yeah thank you excellent thank you thank you guys thank you and Middle School you all whisper middle school with like an air of uh mystery um thank you for having me I'm Leah Borg I'm the principal at the middle school um and I'm going to I know that the um the elementary principles talked about their theme and our theme is a little bit longer in the middle school but we have a little bit more stamina to have that um last year we were South St Paul Middle School a community of Learners and we wanted to continue that theme of community and really describing what it means to be a Community member and describe what it means for each of us to be a Learner in all of these different classrooms and content areas but we added that South St Paul Middle School is a community of Learners where each of us create the conditions for all to succeed and so talking about what it means to create the conditions for yourself to be successful and then the planning that goes with that organiz building organizational skills making sure that your behavior is not impacting negatively for the others and also how do you make sure that you're helping your neighbor do better how do you make sure that you are not creating an environment where that people want to get away from you um and then our staff really are owning that and what can they change in order to get different results um if you haven't already heard but we uh I'm going to tell you we've had some really big gains in our MCA scores in the middle school and we hope to continue down that trajectory um and so looking to if we want different results than we got last year if we want better results what are we going to do different and how are we going to serve more students because we are acknowledging that there is still that achievement Gap and it's our job as the adults in the building to make sure that we're closing that we had an amazing presentation this morning by our um summer curriculum writing crew that worked on writing curriculum for connections class which is similar to a home room and they presented how uh connections class is going to be the same and different than it was last year really um adding in some scheduled grade checks scheduled and targeted um helping students continue to create that community and talking about community and practicing the uh skills it takes to be a good Community member and then making sure that we're connecting families into the school and having families have a connection with that connections teacher and and having a point person uh additionally we talk this morning with our staff around our professional development plans for the year and we have three um big points one is equity and making sure that everything we do is working to close that achievement Gap and make sure that our students of color are also included in that um feeling of community that's in our theme we're also going to be working with teachers um to continue our work with Catalyst and make sure that we are providing lessons that um start at the beginning you know when from Bell to Bell when that bell rings at the beginning and then goes all the way through uh and making sure that we're using some non-verbal communication that helps students uh take ownership of their learning so if a student were to ask a teacher wait what what are we doing um and the teacher can give the kids the tool tools to find those that information out on their own um and we're also going to be working on um writing stronger learning targets for each of our lessons that is connected to State Standards um in the time that I've been working in the Middle School um we've we've kind of it's not that we have not been teaching the state standards but we're really going to be analyzing which state standards are being taught is there a scope and sequence that makes sense or makes better sense for our students uh our building instructional leadership team has worked really hard to write a a school continuous Improvement plan which I I am very proud of um we're going to continue to make gains in math and literacy and then this year we're also working to make sure that our students are involved in conversation in every class um making sure that they're talking about what they're learning about because as many of us learned in our summer training for um our science of the reading the core training students need to be able to talk about what they're learning to solidify it and to to be um processed and analyzed a little bit further and so we know that students that can have conversations with their peers about academics are going to do better um we did start with a game in the middle school and um our game was soup salad or sandwich where I would name foods and they had to be categorized as soup salad or sandwich the biggest debate was cereal is cereal in milk a soup or a salad um and the Middle School is divided so to be continued but thank you so much for having me and I hope you have a great rest of your night thank you thank you good evening I'm Andie Ryder the assistant principal of the high school I am here in principal oaki stad as he is at uh college with his oldest doing dorm setup Duty in this excellent weather oh that is rough mve in weather and he's going be suffering um the high school staff as and high school kids are much less tolerant of games so we didn't really do games today um what we really focused on the summer last spring we surveyed the high school staff on areas that we need to improve upon knowing that we are better together we ran um committees over the summer and any staff member that wanted to be on a committee was welcome to to be on that committee um we ran five committees tardies in attendance excuse me cell phones and electron when Wednesday lesson design and academic honesty and each of those committees met weekly um the committee studied the issues brainstormed and research Solutions and designed new practices to help South St Paul High School continue to move forward and strive to be one of the best high schools in the metro area um we are I'm really excited to see how the the new structures that we're putting in place are going to continue to help us be better together uh in addition to the committee work this summer uh we continue to strengthen our College and career Pathways we hired a College and Career tosa who had work experience um teaching uh from we took him from St Paul we got we got a lot of folks from St Paul I love it um Word of Mouth spread and many of our new hires have come from one of the neighboring schools because they have followed their people and it has been a really exciting change to some of our departments to see kind of that perspective come in which has been great in addition to hiring a college in career tosa uh we worked on designing curriculum to better support our Pathways including a concurrent enrollment college algebra class so that our students can get college credit sitting in a classroom in our high school love that um we've also worked on planning ways to help our kids get exposure to all the different Pathways that we are working to put into place and let our kids kind of move forward in a way that is good for our community and good for our students uh I and the rest of our staff are really looking forward to having an exciting 2425 school year thank you thank youie hi good evening I'm Robin Schwab I'm the administrator for the state approved programs or you might most recognize the Community Learning Center or the CLC so I want to start tonight with a couple celebrations and then a couple things that we're really looking forward to so one thing I do want to share is we have till mid-september to report on our our graduation rate so we ended up up graduating quite a few students in the spring there was a handful that went right away in June more in July and we're squeaking out a few more right now and when we were making schedules there's there's a handful that's within like under under five that five credits that are needed so we're thinking that we're going to cross the finish line with even more students to hit our grad rate rate for 2024 so that was a huge celebration that we started our training with today um it was great to see all of our staff back in the building and another celebration that we have is we have zero turnover in any of our programs for Staffing so we retained at all of our all of our levels and we are able to expand our middle level program so we are expanding that Alternative Program into the middle school so we have we have somebody on board now so that is a new hire in our program so that's a celebration that we have trying to on board him and and help some of our our students in the Middle School get connected and have that early interview ion we had staff in the building and it was great hearing the buzz and um when are the kids coming and getting ready for that welcome back night so just a a plug for if you guys are rolling around on Wednesday to to stop in and see that we we have some dinner for the families as well and we have different resources from the community so it should be a a One-Stop shop for the whole family so we end up having different supports in our building um so to highlight some of the work that we did same same thing we we dug in and did a lot of work last year on the standards Bas and really taking a look at our assessments and seeing if it's assessing exactly what we needed it to do and so we jumped into the standards-based world last year and it was messy at first um but our goal at the end of the year and everyone's on board is we will have all of our work standards based and with the addition of Project based learning we are able to offer more creative ways to show Prof Proficiency in those standards and give students um more student agency and voice in how they're doing doing their schooling so next part um everyone who is enrolled in a state approved Alternative Program whether that's in the elementary middle school high school or at the CLC they need what's called a continued learning plan so we had a committee this Summer that worked together to revamp that to really make a goal for focused and put the action steps for those goals and we really added um a lot more room for parent involvement with that and um the students involved in it so as part of their connections every Friday they're revisiting their continued learning plan and making sure everybody knows where they need to be for graduation and the last thing I do want to share out about is um another committee that our staff came in and worked on we do a lot of outside of the school learning so our team got together and planned out all of our interdisciplinary days for the whole year so we have a plan and our theme this year is healthy you uh healthy you the letter you like a university so we thought that was pretty creative and so everything is tied back to that and our connections themes and all of our field trips are Extended Learning activities so we are looking forward to entering quite a few new students to the CLC this year and looking forward to meeting their families and with you guys on Wednesday night excellent thank you you rob yeah Oh I thought question thank you there is little that can compete with like what back to school energy and excitement feels like it's like this full Renewed Energy that uh is pretty infectious and and it's clear from all of the leaders of the buildings and I'm I'm very excited about the year to come excellent excellent no it it sounded really cool and I'd be really interested to learn more about the the academic honesty committee that you had at the high school level cuz just just thinking about different sources of information um and where students could get some of that information um or have it created for them that may or may not be correct is just such a vastly different world than it was even 5 years ago much less 10 years ago or when these students were in elementary school um so I'm sure that we can be a a leader on that type of issue so that'd be a fascinating topic to learn about absolutely excellent all right thank you so much all right up next um would be our session for public listening submissions we did not have any public listening submissions done at this time uh but from the community if you are interested in making comments to the board um that can be done uh at the first meeting of the month at the district office at 6:30 um and always um through the form on the website um and then next I will turn to Vice chair an Claflin for a little report on what our work sessions have been up to thank you um as always the agenda includes for the agenda for this meeting includes minutes from the previous work session that was two weeks ago and those Recaps are always fantastic um but to I give a recap of a recap uh and save you the reading we had um guests from The Peacemaker program come uh John laber has been working with this program for quite a few years uh since capoa was uh founded about 30 years ago really and uh they talked about how The Peacemaker program has been involved in the school at caposa helping students develop positive relationships and prevent bullying um resolving conflicts peacefully it's really their goal helping students learn those skills and they are seeking funding to uh participate and be a partner with the school again this year and uh then there are just a number of HR updates and um an overview from the the work that the school district is doing with the the stter foundation to come up with a framework for the communication and accountability on our strategic plan um and finally uh the recap of tonight's work session was it's going to be very brief we had a very short discussion on uh the the HR issue the HR issues are coming up later on the agenda The Joint power agreement uh that was discussed tonight is also coming up later on the agenda uh that's about it excellent thank you all right and I will turn over to Super nant Dr Zam bro for some highlights around the district as we're kicking things off yeah what a fun day I don't think I can top our our building leaders and and program leaders there with what they got to do like they said it's so fun uh having been a principal when everybody comes back and seeing seeing everybody come together and even though we we did normally when everybody comes what one of the things I love we're small enough all of our staff come together and that's unique in smaller districts I've been in big districts where you could never fit everybody in one space uh but we have a great tradition and we have uh food trucks if anybody saw the food trucks out in front of the secondary we uh have them started the building then we have a meal together and like I would say food is love so it's fun to uh pick what you want to eat and pick who you're going to eat with and see that and then um we did move into the to the auditorium this year CU we had our cafeteria has been remodeled kind of revamped so I'm very excited to hear how the kids respond when they come in at the secondary and see their new um their new digs and so but we had a really uh fun launch it's a little hard to stand on stage it's not my style to want to stand there I love to be engaged with people but uh they did a great job staying engaged knowing that that's a long day um one of the things we've been rolling out is our board is aware but I want to make sure our community is aware a tight partnership with our city council and our school board around core values and so we rolled that out at kosia days it was a collaboration last year but very appreciative of the Ed Foundation uh helping us provide uh the new core value shirts to all of our staff so we'll have all of our staff out and about in our new core value shirts and we really are hoping and expecting as a city and as a school district because we are uh one and the same in terms of our boundaries that everybody will take these core values to heart and then we'll start uh honoring other members of our community who aren't necessarily connected directly to the district or the city for modeling those core values we also have some fun shirts that the foundation helped us with our kindergarteners so our families and staff will be seeing those soon um but obviously lots of logistical pieces as we launch the year so I do want to make sure our families have the best information to to know some of the things that are coming so one we're we're asking I know at the back to school events people had heard we have our annual educational benefits applications and we do ask that all families fill that out you may think oh we don't qualify you don't know you know we'll never know unless you fill that out so we really appreciate everybody filling out that application that used to be how our students qual ified for free or reduced priced lunch uh but because of the state funding the meals um that's no longer a driver of these FMS but there are a number of benefits that families can get by applying so um they can get free or reduced priced uh athletic and activities fees I know there's internet deals and phone service discounts uh for families who qualify there um energy and home utility assistance and discounts Prime Membership discount with Amazon Local Museum so lots of benefits and I'll just be honest it does generate revenue for the district and but all of our Revenue almost all of our Revenue goes right to our classrooms our biggest expenditure is people and we put our people in front of our kids as much as possible so uh it benefits our kids in that way too with smaller class sizes more opportunities so do want to ask everybody please please please continue to fill out those forms they're very important for your family important for our district uh and if you need information you can find that on our website under the nutrition services uh web page and there's just a link to go out and click and fill out the form it's it's pretty easy um but if you need any help please reach out to your school so that's one big piece uh we're doing something new with our Infinite Campus which is our student information system we love our acronyms and things we call it our sis if you ever hear that our student information system is Infinite Campus and we're trying something new this year using the annual census feature really want to make sure we have correct information for your family it's super important um you're going to get prompted as you go in there to review and update any emergency contact information maybe you think it's set maybe it's changed you know it's always good to just take a look make sure that's right make sure we have the best contact information for you because pretty soon I'm going to start losing sleep every night when the weather changes to Winter I know it's hard to believe on a day like today but Minnesota changes quickly and there may be delays or closures and we want to make sure we get that information uh we want families to choose their home language that they prefer to get information because we do have lots of great tools to provide Communication in very different languages but unless we know that language we wouldn't know uh what to send that to you in uh when you start when you log in you'll see your your information is autop populated we just ask that you confirm that while you're in that Parent Portal there's also field trip form that's really nice if parents just go in it's for the whole year so you don't have to get inundated with uh field trip forms and things like that so we ask that everybody just does it once it's all you have to do is go in there once before the school year you'll get your field trip done you'll have all your information accurate and ready to go so want to make sure families are aware of that annual census piece as well um last year we did a lot of work around our Safety and Security work the the banner you see there the flyers from I love you guys that's the nonprofit We partner with around our safety training protocols and we are required to conduct fire drills and lockdown drills there are five required during the year and then we have severe weather as well uh but we do start those right away in the first two weeks of the school year so we always want to make sure families know that especially if you have a child who has maybe some anxiety you can talk to their case manager staff to make sure that they understand but we do not try to scare our staff or our kids when we do drills we're very transparent here's the drill here's what we're going to be doing here's why we do it we do that in an age appropriate way so that our littlest Learners hear that in a different way from our secondary but it's been really great work that we've done and I think it's it's helped a lot I know uh we've talked about here but when I came in you know if we had to put the building in a hold people got that confused with the lockdown and thinking the school's in lockdown and everybody went into a panic where one of our goals last year was really to normalize that hold so for example if somebody has a fall and they're in the hallway and they're injured we wouldn't want kids passing or seeing that we want to respect their privacy and to deal with that issue so we might put the building or a part of the building in a hold and just say continue teaching continue learning but just stay in the room for now uh but you know again having people understand these protocols and procedures is really important so we'll be uh doing that with our students and we have all kinds of videos and things on our website if you want to learn more about that uh but we did a really nice job with that this last year and we're going to continue to bolster that work knowing that safety of staff and students is is really the number one priority uh very excited to heard a little bit about our Packer Pathways here with our building leaders uh very excited to see this work coming to fruition uh this year uh still some work to do but um Elementary as you heard uh what we really want to think of Elementary is a chance to like spark interest in academics and really give our students a well-rounded educational experience so as we looked at sunsetting the primary years program of IB and the middle years program we talked about what's the bright Sunrise so we can have a beautiful sunrise on the other end of that so we gave ourselves last year to do that work and then we engaged with our stakeholders our staff our students famili talk about what is it we want to offer and we heard loud and clearly from our families they value science they value the Arts and so what people will see is our Elementary schedule really is going to respond to that feedback where there specialist classes will be science media arts uh physical education music and we have fifth grade band which is great to help bolster music before the kids go to middle and then visual art so a really well-rounded experience want to spark interest in excitement and then I laughed as Leo was walking up and and mentioned Middle School the the the comment comments here I actually said to our staff today I said hey hey Elementary they're like yeah I said how many of you want to go to middle school they're like yeah not so much and I said hey High School how many of you want to go to Middle School yeah not so much I said hey Middle School how much how many of you love teaching middle school and they just started cheering it's it's a niche and they love it and principal Borg does as well but then we think about Middle School being a time of exploration uh we don't feel that kids are just quite ready to make big choices around this is the path I want to pursue for the rest of my life so how do we give them exposure and so you see the pathways we're going to have and those continue through our high school computer science and business transportation and trades Health and Human Services and then really thinking who's on that four-year University uh opportunity so we really want to give kids exposure there so that as they approach the high school they're able to make more informed decisions about the courses they're choosing and then of course uh just the full complement again of a well-rounded education uh for high school again you see the Pathways and they kind of flesh out a little bit deeper but what's really nice is since we again there's nothing negative per se about the middle Year's program but what it did is it really hamstrung our schedule and it says you have to schedule this way where when we Sunset that we were able to say what is it we want to do based on the feedback again from all of our stakeholders and what's really nice about it is for example in myp a class had to be offered all year so if you if it wasn't a full year class you had to do things like offered every other day and make it last all year where this year we were able to say you know what we're going to do things the way we see fit for us and so and then there's great teacher empowerment in this so Within These programs teachers like Dr Burke and the health and human services or in computer science uh Tom Hart they were working this summer to create like Standalone courses that are trimester long that don't require to have to go this class first that class second that class third they're like we don't have to think that way we can offer this content in this class this content in the next class and another cont so kids can take them in any order and so again we want to have onramps and off ramps cuz I still even would say at high school it's hard to say what are you going to do for the rest of your life right um so some kids know it and they jump right in and they might go deep and and far into a pathway other kids may say I want to try a little bit of everything and so they can kind of mix and match as they see fit uh you heard about the concurrent enrollment that we're bolstering this year so we're offering um Luke Olen is going to be teaching in college algebra so our kids don't need to leave they can take it here they knock out a year of college math and they get the credit for it both high school and college which is what concurrent enrollment means when we talk about concurrent enrollment uh but then again that well-rounded piece uh with lots of extracurricular opportunities we know that Athletics activities those uh clubs and things are really a way to get kids connected in school strong core instruction in math English science social studies let's think of think mess that's what we mean when we say core classes uh you heard a little bit about bolstered uh advising and support from counseling and so that was again direct feedback from our students we asked how are you choosing your class and they said honestly we're not that well informed and we really want that and so we made direct change as a result of that uh from our students and so student voice really matters and and what we're doing there as well as F uh staff and family so very excited about our pathway work we're not done so we'll continue to build these out but it makes things a lot more clear for students for families to know what we're offering and again having that opportunity to really try and number things before they have to make some more substantial Life Choices so shout out to all of our building leaders and our uh teacher leaders for the work they've put into this uh I keep saying it because I mean it we're a small But Mighty District on the move and and we're really excited about the work we're doing so uh just some important dates as we uh kick up the start of the year so some of this kind of is rolling so you should have received this I know you did from your school and if you have questions or confusion as a parent or Guardian please reach out to the school uh but on the 29th we have family connection for prek and then grades 1 through five so you should have received information on that but then as we roll out the first day of school after Labor Day it's a little varied so the very very first day we have uh the first day of school for grades 1 through five but Kindergarten doesn't start right away because you you'll see there they're doing their family connection to get to know the families get to know the kids um they also have preschool parent meetings happening the 3rd through the 6th again same thing and then the first day of kindergarten is actually our actual second day so they come in September 4th so that Tuesday we have the other grades 1 through five kindergarten starts on the 4th and then preschool starts on the 9th again that's a lot of dates we'll have this information readily available on our website and I know our schools have sent that out for secondary uh family connection is happening on the 28th from 2:30 to 6:00 that's the high school and our CLC and then on the 30th from 9 to 1: and then um September 3rd is our first day there but we do all of the entry points so our sixth graders ninth graders then we bring in our seniors and then we also have any new students that get that opportunity come in and then 7 8 10 and 11 start on the 4th so again it's kind of a rolling start uh you can find that on our website and again I know our teachers have uh shared or our our schools have shared that out so make sure to look at the school information as well and then any other materials again like I said everything's always on our website our team does a fantastic job keeping our website up to date we don't have big web Masters we have a small team that does great work you'd be surprised who's doing it when you see the quality of it but please follow us uh anytime online and find out what our great board is up to excellent thank you thank you again more back to school energy all right up next we have our consent agenda items uh which are typic which are financial and Staffing claims and personnel and nature um have been presented as a part of the board packet and have been up for review at this time I am looking for a motion to approve our consent agenda so moved a second any discussion all in favor please say I I opposed with that the motion carries we have no policies under review at this time um most of our energies have been in into the ramp up of school year and still signing new contracts that uh HR is delivering even on the hour as we go through um and so that brings us to our business items um in which we are looking for approval for the South St Paul school board to approve the health dental and LTD insurance rates for 2025 do I have a motion so moved second and for discussion I turn that over to Joel Miler but stick around you've got a few items on here have a few items tonight thank you in 2017 we moved to a self-insured plan for dental insurance and in 2018 for health insurance with rates determined annually by the district a key component of the self-insured plan is to build and maintain an adequate Reserve to ensure funds are available to offset fluctuating costs based on the analysis of claims history expected future claims and the need to continue to maintain our Reserve account for payment of claims Administration recommends no change in the rates and approval uh of the proposed 202 2025 health and dental insurance rates are presented additional information regarding this recommendation is listed below and so we've listed just kind of what our history has been over the years from 2017 to present and you'll notice in uh health insurance rates we started off with some 8% increases initially but over the last four to five years we've been recommending 0% and the board has been approving 0% increases for our staff in health insurance and dental insurance has been at 0% for the entire period that we've been on these plans so it's been great for our staff and the district to be able to be part of our health insurance have themselves their families on the plan and be able to experience that we're hoping and looking forward to many more years to come of this as long as we can continue to maintain uh our health insurance as is for our staff and we continue to maintain healthy staff we appreciate all of them for everything that they do to take care of themselves each and every day and be here and present for our students excellent thank you uh um and all in favor please say I I I post at the motion carries up next looking for approval for the South St Paul school board to approve the Biba trust change uh do I have a motion so move second and for discussion I come back to Joel Miler thank you so the Viva is our voluntary employee beneficiary association's plan the district uses a company called medur to help manage this plan uh and our health reimbursement accounts previously the district offered a Viva plan for employees to be able to set aside pre-tax income for future payment of medical expenses the district has been notified that maurity uh upcoming changes by maturity of upcoming changes to our Viva trust partner this will impact employee members of the plan who still have dollars in their grandfathered HRA or Viva plans currently Met has two funded HRA and BBA trusts there's one called bass and another called Matrix matur has terminated the bass trust which leaves the Matrix trust and is now recommending that we transfer everyone on the bass plan over to the Matrix plan as we move forward so we're recommending to Administration the approval of the Matrix HRA Viva plan as our new trust partner for that going forward it's a whole lot of complicated moves to make sure we maintain the benefits for those employees exactly any discussion or questions all in favor please say I I I oppose with that the motion carries uh next we are looking for approval of the South St Paul school board to approve the 2025 continuing teachers contracts do I have a motion so moved second discussion comes back to tr Miler thanks again as part of our annual Staffing process Administration identifies probationary teachers to retain and those who will be granted tenure for the upcoming year as a result the attached document reflects additional probationary teachers from the 23 24 school year who would be granted a tenure for the 25 2425 school year and these are additional teachers over the ones that we brought forward in May um so we're looking for approval from the school board to approve these two additional teachers to move forward into their 10year career with the district any discussion or questions all in favor please say I I I post with that the motion carries and next looking for approval for the South St Paul school board to approve the acceptance of gift report do I have a motion so moved second and for discussion um I will take over um and um our local South St Paul Lions Club has uh contributed $2500 um through community ed for the gymnastics program and um as always um continually AED and impressed by the continued support by um the organizations and inside our Community to uh lead to really strong uh activities um for our students any questions or discussion okay all in favor please say I I opposed that the motion carries and a thank you to the sou St Paul Lions up next we are looking for approval for the South St Paul school board to approve the joint Powers agreement for childhood vaccinations between the count count uh Dakota County and Special School District number six um do I have a motion so moved second and for discussion I turn this over to Candace BG yeah wonderful yeah we are asking for your um approval of a joint Powers agreement that would allow us to be able to host vaccination clinics at our school sites um that would be facilitated by Dakota County um in Minnesota all students are required to have immunizations or an exemption from immunizations so we just really want to be able to provide a free service to our families and make it even more accessible to to have their immunizations wonderful any questions or discussion during our work session we were also able to reference kind of the sheer number of families that um would be able to utilize this benefit and um keeping a strong healthy Community I think is just a really great opportunity for them to be able to do and thank you for your efforts on this all in uh all those in favor please say I I opposed with that the motion carries thank you so much all right that concludes our business items for tonight we went through those in pretty rapid succession um I will turn to our board members to see where they have seen a passion um or committee updates and excitement for the new year and I will kick things off with Wendy Felton okay I just want to give give a few announcements about exciting things for this coming school year um as you know um linin Center we're very fortunate principales Marty and sex are will be doing another volunteer event for their for their school to raise up a little bit of funding starting on Monday September 9th at the West St Paul Culver's Restaurant which is on Maria Avenue just a half a block off of Robert Street from 4: to 8:00 p.m. they will be volunteering there to help any any parents family members that that would want love to support their The Linc Center programs if they would want to volunteer to come and they and have dinner because principales Marty and suar will be there also helping in the in the restaurant and I was so happy to hear also from kosia their new theme this is me that is so kind and wonderful it is it is they will feel seen heard valued and respected for who they are so we look forward to that and thank principal btoy for coming up with that new theme and also um coming up as as I also serve on the senior center Board of of directors as I know I've mentioned it in the past coming up on Wednesday October second is our senior center fashion show if anyone is interested in attending that you please register up it is a $20 fee and what that does that pays for our luncheon which is Catered through the coupe and there's you also have an opportunity to possibly if you'd like to wa wager some money and enter they have many drawings there with and it's a it's a very fun event so if you if you'd like to do that and then also coming up with the Education Foundation as I know have mentioned in the past coming up our wathon this year will be held at at the kosia education center on Wednesday September 25th so we're looking forward to to that event down at kosia around their school will be walking around the block and they also will be having a lunch in there providing hot dogs and a beverage and and a and a snacks of type of thing so kind to keep that in mind the wathon which which is held every year and also planning our our Gala which will be held on November 13th with which this year is being held at the men Dakota Country Club which is such a wonderful event major fundraiser for the Educational Foundation we look forward to it and also kind of on a personal level as you notice I had my Packer Pride t-shirt on today so looking forward to the start of the school year as we will be having the graduation class of 2025 starting our their senior year next week in school looking forward to it and also on a personal level since it is the the year of 2025 for graduation next year I also am a graduate of sou St Paul high school but believe it or not next year in 2025 is my 50th class reunion which we are also planning on right now so Packer Pride for me has gone on obviously all my life so thank you very much thank you uh Tim Felton oh I just want to congratulate the South St Paul board and the whole South St Paul community on a great golf tournament they raised they netted over $48,000 and that helps sou St Paul activities so congratulations to everybody absolutely it's an incredible effort on part of the open and Claflin thanks um um over the past month I've talked to students all over South St Paul um night to you night talked to quite a few students and was asking what they're excited about for this upcoming school year and so many of them were talking about the culinary arts classes the variety of electives that they get at the high school and middle school now and when I was talking with younger students uh I was asking their advice that they would give to students that were coming into the class that had just finished the year before and really across the board they all said okay it's it's going to be it's going to be tough don't worry about it it's going to be okay you're going to work hard you're going to learn a lot and they were excited about that part and they were really excited because they had fun and they're all looking forward to starting the school year I love that excitement about going back to school it's not just the parents that are excited about it it's not just about seeing your friends again making new friends it's a whole part of being back in school and what you can learn um I shared that when I spoke with the teachers today and gave them the same message of you know it's it's going to be hard you're going to work hard you're going to learn a lot uh I hope you have fun along the way I think that's um a good perspective to come into the new school year with all this new school year enthusiasm abely absolutely a lot of work but we'll have fun that's great messaging Nikki lur um I have nothing at this time all right Monica Weber I'm just excited for the beginning of the school year just wish everyone like the best of the first days um I haven't been in school in a very long time and I still get excited in the fall just to see all the people and the weather will not be 90° as soon as we know it and just to have fall and the fall play and football games and all the other you know academics and Athletics um it's just a very exciting time of year so everyone go off have fun enjoy and yeah that's what I'm excited for excellent thank you um it's just this time of year that I have a great deal of gratitude for those who continue to serve children and serve our community um and so excited for the year that you have in front of us and um have have my absolute respect and admiration for the work that you do with our students and for students um try new things this year and filled with excitement so excellent all right with no further items on our agenda I am looking for a motion to adjourn tonight's meeting do I have a motion so moved second any discussion all in favor please say I I oppos with that uh the motion carries and our meeting is adjourned tonight at 654 thank you so much