We're starting a little bit late um at 5:36 p.m. Um our first item for tonight's agenda is the superintendent search discussion. I have um as you all may know I actually as you all do know um uh Dr. Mary Perry Reed has sent out notification that she is not seeking renewal of her contract um and not um going to be able to serve the year um that she would go into per her contract if um it was not renewed. So, we are embarking um on a superintendent search and wanted to give the board and I do am grateful to Dr. Mera Perryi Reid for giving us this time to conduct what I think is going to be hopefully a thorough search process. And um I wanted to make sure that we were able to have a discussion tonight about what that could look like. um because I believe that nobody on this board has been through a superintendent search. Um I have um as a member of the 287 board. So wanted to give everyone as much information as possible so that we can get this started. Um so I prepared the following slides and um are you able to project them Natalia? Okay, great. Um so just wanted to make sure that you all uh feel comfortable like at any time p offer your thoughts. This is really just an information and um where we can go next. So step one from all the discussions I've had with other school boards who are have recently completed a superintendent search or in the process of one and um my board colleagues on 287 who were part of that search process. Everyone has recommended that we hire a search firm. Um and the research I have done um I think that that is the way to go. It is a board decision whether we do that or not. Um knowing that then all the costs and all the effort would be internal. Um which would be I think a very heavy lift. Um so there are these are the search firms that work locally in Minnesota. Um MSBA who we are a member of they do do an executive search. Um, in the past I heard they were maybe not the top, but right now all of the current uh metro districts that I am aware of are using the MSBA um executive search um piece of that organization and are extremely happy. So, um I spoke with recent recently um boards who recently hired and ones who are in the process using MSBA and and they got rave reviews. I have linked to the um sites for each firm. So, um then there is HYA and I I don't know is that one that you had experience with? I just know it's the one of the three that have the most recent experience serving boards in Minnesota. >> And then School Exec Connect is the I believe the hiring firm that we used to hire that Hopkins used to hire um Dr. Mary Perry Reid. >> Correct. Um I have heard from board members who have used school exec connect since then and they have not been pleased with the um with the candidates that they got and then um there is Rayan Associates and I have not heard anything about them. Do you have any >> only that experience? >> I believe they may be connected with CISO which is an organization we are partnering with. Um but I don't have personal experience working with Ray and Associates. >> Does anyone have any questions about that? So those would be I think the four that um we could dive deeper into. So next slide. And then I reached out to MSBA um Terry Morrow just to talk about what the process could look look like hiring a search firm. Um and these are our options. We could issue an RFP, review proposals, and select firms to interview and then hire. Um, we do not have to issue an RFP, but we can still request proposals, interview firms, and then hire. We can select firms to interview without a proposal and then hire. We can request proposals from firms and hire without an interview or hire a firm without doing any of those things. So options are pretty wide open. Terry did say that um options one and two are the most common in the metro area. Um sometimes firms are hired primarily based on word of mouth or recommendations for other districts. Um so I think that it's kind of up to us what we want the process of hiring a search firm to look like. So just wondering if anyone this is I think the the slide in which we'll have the most discussion about what feels right for this board at this time. >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. >> Um I I'm well aware that I'm not going to be here for this. Um but I was part of the community interview team when uh we made the excellent decision to hire Dr. wrote a Mary Perry Reed as our superintendent obviously was the board at that time uh making the decision but I was involved with um multiple community meetings um and it was school exec connect who um was used at that time I have some concerns um I had some major concerns at the time I didn't feel that their approach was incredibly culturally responsive um that was eight years ago and so um even though the the outcome was really great there were some process concerns there. So I would advocate for if we look at the process options for option one um because I think it gives the board multiple opportunities to really understand the expertise of the organization um kind of the lens that they use to implement the search process. My one I thank for thanks for um offering that. My concern with number one is that I feel like it would be placing a lot of work on our administrative staff to go through the RFP process and if we don't have to um I feel like that is a step that I would wonder what what is the value ad of an RFP. Um, that's my only hesitation with >> number one. I feel like we could get to the same place with number two and not place that additional workload on admin. >> Cuz I don't know how to do an RFP. >> I think it's helpful if the firms know that you are um asking for proposals from multiple firms because then it's more competitive. Right. Right. Um, >> so if we get requests proposals on our own without an RFP, >> that's number two. >> Um, Chair Andre Singh. >> Yes, Director Roer. >> So, thank you for um the uh information on the search firms. Is there um so I know that we have four and I'm kind of just thinking like Shark Tank style, right? Like we have four. >> We have four. um you know contestants who are you know promoting the same product. What is the difference that we're looking for in like one of the firms that that one firm doesn't offer? because I assume they're going to do, you know, like their like Jen said, like the um uh director respon like their processes, but is there like one specific thing that we need this firm to absolutely and relentlessly look for um or to offer before we, you know, select one? >> Um I think that we could have that discussion as a a board and put it, you know, make that clear. um or it's part of our selection criteria or my understanding from people that I've talked to that have used a search committee is that um they're really directed by the board like we tell them what we want them to do um and it's very much our search um so I think ensuring that whatever search committee we hire that that's how they approach the process that we are the ones conducting the search and they're there to facilitate it and to bring in their network. Um I think as you said is really important that we make that clear that it's our search. Um >> J Anderson. >> Yes. Um, as an example, at least one of these firms um has a past practice that does not include going out and recruiting candidates. >> Whereas at least two of these firms, that is their practice where they go out and they recruit and they help vet candidates versus waiting for candidates to come forward. So that's an example of a criteria that the board may want to include in their set of specifications. >> Thank you, >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. Hi. Um yeah I think uh one question uh and because I am used to private uh industry um is is there a model where these search for firms um you know get our requirements and they pitch us for lack of a better word on a few candidates that they like and we select out of those for folks to interview. Right? So, you know, it's not really like locking into one firm, but just seeing what candidates they bring and then whoever we decide on is obviously, you know, they get the referral money or whatever. Is that not a thing that in for the superintendent search? >> Yeah, I don't think that's how it works. I think before they do the work of getting in candidates, they require that you sign with them. >> Okay. >> Unfortunately, >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. So the the RFP can serve as that clarifying document for the board like laying out some of the criteria that the board is looking for. Um but I think there there's also a way to do it without a formal RFP. I would be curious about the workload that it would add to our administrative staff and what exactly that would look like. I think more details probably needed to kind of pro and con like doing a formal RFP versus going with sort of a version of an RFP. Um that's number two. There's a way to get that specificity either way. Um but I think it's important to know like exactly what that would look like in terms of workload. >> Yeah, I like that too. I also tend to not I I like to get proposals um because I think people will pitch what they're good at and then if we internally have criteria we can say oh they hit all the things we want. Um I guess it's just either one. Do we want to tell them what to pitch or should we see what they pitch? I don't know. Any thoughts? >> Could certainly go through the process ourselves internally to create an RFP or a list of selection criteria like a matrix. I'm thinking just logistically. So, if the board were to agree on priorities or selection criteria, that would have to happen at a public workshop or a public meeting. So, these search firms would be able to see that information anyways. So, maybe perhaps to help move this discussion along. Um I think timing wise we were hoping to be able to do this before our first meeting in January to start at least asking for proposals. So, if we're going to, to your point, um, Director West Morland, if we're going to have a set of criteria for the search firm, um, before we request proposals, then I would say that's bumping our timeline back um, a month or more. So wondering if this board would feel comfortable um going out and requesting proposals. Let's say we do it for all from all four of them. >> Um and then we could all interview them, right? I mean, I don't think we have to narrow it down from four. Or is there one we just want to get rid of? Like maybe we want to think about that. >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. >> Um I respect the you know the need to get in motion. I definitely do not want to be at a time crunch you know in coming into the summer. Um I it's a big undertaking. I'm finding myself like a little overwhelmed at some of the choices and very much think that we must make some kind of um matrix amongst ourselves um in order to even like know what we're screening for and asking for. And there's potentially even some training options that are available. Like I know at some conferences there have been some best practices presented. >> That's our next slide. >> Okay. Um like I don't want to just sit here in silence and have you think that this isn't uh isn't a big deal to me or or some of my fellow colleagues. I just I'm the truth is I am not entirely sure as you say it's not something that we've been through before and so possibly talking about some best practices or some training possibilities for us would >> Yeah. And I think like right now I I I know it's overwhelming and that's why I tried to break it down. Right now, we're just t talking about hiring the search firm and not this isn't the superintendent. Um, so this is we're just hiring the organization that we feel is going to help us do the entire process that you're talking about, Treasure Hardland, which is a a huge undertaking and a big endeavor. Um, so I don't want us to get too stuck in this part. Um the other option to get um in order to make this more nimble is if this board would feel comfortable um deputizing like an executive committee to create the criteria for selecting just the search firm, not the superintendent. We would all be part of that with um the search firm. that's their job to help us do that process to create the selection criteria for the superintendent. So the full board would be part of that. But um we could right now at this meeting select an executive committee or say you know the executive committee is is going to create this criteria and then we'll request proposals um based on that criteria and then it wouldn't require a special meeting or any of that. It would just be that committee working on this one item. Um, Sharon Drees. >> Yeah. >> I I just I I was thinking kind of my gut reaction was, you know, I was liking that number two as well. And I just feel like to to kick it off and get things moving to ask for proposals from all four, you know, and then when we get to the interview step, you know, then we're kind of able to refine you, you know, what are we looking for out of each of these proposals. So, I don't know. That was sort of my gut instinct here as I was seeing this. >> And would you feel comfortable having an executive committee do that piece >> or do you want the full board interviewing the firm? >> I I think I prefer the full board doing that. >> So, then we would be in January before we'd hire a firm. And thinking timeline wise, does that feel comfortable for you? I think it's still a competitive timeline. >> Great. Does anyone have any strong feelings either way on that? >> Chair Andre, can I ask a quick question? What What is our um it I'm sorry, we already mentioned this. What is the timeline to hire a new superintendent? >> Like are we looking to hire before um June or like maybe mid April? >> Very much so. Yeah. So preference would be like we would start I think in February like really going out and recruiting and that kind of stuff and then yes spring interviews. >> Yeah. And we want them to have as much time as possible with >> the current superintendent. >> So my contract ends June 30 and if we had a couple of months overlap that would be ideal. So, do we all feel comfortable with that? Like request proposals from all four firms? Um, and then I would like to advocate that we just have an executive committee create the criteria and then we can all use it for the interview process because I don't want to have to call a special board meeting to create a criteria list for a hiring firm. >> Chair Andre. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Um, could the executive committee uh, you know, have an individual conversation with each board member, get our input, and then >> massage it all together? That'd be great. >> I think that that might be a good hybrid. >> I do think there's an open meeting law concern there. >> Oh, yeah. >> We can't like one can't talk to one and then bring it to a committee. >> No, because that would be a serial conversation. Or could we have an open document that everybody can have access to like even the public? >> I don't think outside of a public meeting. >> Okay. >> So the three can work together and then present this is what we're doing or if you all want to give feedback then it needs to be done in a public >> meeting. I mean, I I feel like, and I'll just say this again, everybody's going to have tons of input. Um, one, they'll have it on the interview process and who we decide to hire. Um, and everybody is going to be part of what I think are the important selection criteria, which is the superintendent. Um, so in in the issues of time, I just feel like we should have a committee just to create a selection criteria for the hiring firm. Are there any strong objections for for that? And then we can use that as part of the interview process. So this would be in service of number two on this list >> and this committee that you're envisioning would what have a couple of board members and >> three board members would do this work. >> Um I don't know. I'm kind of inclined, if I had to choose, would be somewhat inclined to have an even kind of long I don't know if it would be a workshop or what it would be. Um, I could probably be fine with a an executive committee of the or a committee of board members doing it, but I think my preference would be >> to have all of us do it. It is like our job. It is like our Again, I'm just going to reiterate this is just for the search firm. >> Yep. I don't I know. >> Okay. We can we can do um I in the is I'm sorry, Clerk Thompson. >> Yeah. I I just I I just wonder how necessary it even is cuz if we're able to see four proposals ourselves and do the interview, I mean, could we even do that at the January 13th meeting? Like, I think, you know, we'd each have kind of ideas of criteria for how to interview them, what we're looking for in the proposal, that type of thing. I I just wonder if we could even just skip the executive committee step is just my thoughts. So just not have selection criteria, just go into it. >> I wonder. Yeah, I I'm comfortable with it. >> Look at the proposals. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Anyone else >> thought? Yes. >> Obviously, it's up to the board. I do think we're talking about firms that have some significant experience working with districts and there are going to be some best practices that will be common across these firms. you're not going to see huge distinct differences between how they operate and I think you'll get a really great feel for what they are best at in their proposals. But that's just my perspective that I wanted to share. >> And just for context, um 287 um it was literally the board chair worked with this superintendent and they hired a firm. like the board didn't have any part in it. So, I think we're being more inclusive than a lot of boards are in this process. So, does anyone have any strong feelings against Clerk Thompson's proposal that we we get four proposals if they all want to send one? They might not want to send one. Um, we we request proposals from all four firms and then we review the proposals that we get and interview the firms at either our like at our first board meeting in January. Does that sound good? >> I think it would be really great if we can have community voice like at least give us some input about what the search firm should be looking for in a superintendent. I mean, if that's even an option, >> that is part of the process for the superintendent. >> Okay. >> Absolutely. And lots of it. >> Yeah. Great. Okay. That's my biggest concern is that community boys have to be involved. >> That is definitely part of it. >> Okay. So, I'm comfortable moving forward with that plan. >> Um, so then next slide. um to treasure hartland what you were um indicating MSBA does do an in district workshop for member districts called hiring the right superintendent we can have it in person um the cost is um pull that up >> 1395 >> for inperson and the cost for virtual is 195 and includes all the time and materials Um, so if I can get in thoughts about if that's something that um, board members would feel valuable, we can schedule something for right away in January. Um, and then one of the things I found incredibly valuable when we were hiring a superintendent in 287 was um, they did an equitable hiring practices training and I reached out to um, 287 and they said that they would be willing and open to doing that for us as a member district and it would be created and tailored to Hopkins by their director of equity and inclusion. Um, so that again will be another layer to training that the full board will receive as part of this process and that would probably be happen right before we're going to start the interview process. Um, any thoughts on if we feel the MSBA in district workshop would be valuable? Chair Anderson, I think. Yes, both of them. I don't have strong feelings about in person versus virtual, but I mean, I think that this is a really serious undertaking and would want us to have some shared um not just the training, but some shared language and and understanding and foundation before embarking on this. great >> on this task. >> So, I will go ahead and get the MSBA training on our calendar. That feels good to everybody. Okay. I will reach out to them and schedule that. Um, any thoughts on timing? January feels good. Okay, great. And that's all then. Thank you for having this discussion with me. I appreciate it. And that takes us then to our next order of business, which is the tax levy levy update. I will turn it over to Dr. Mary Perry Reed. Thank you, Chair Andre. So earlier this year at a September 25 special meeting, our school board certified the proposed property tax levy at the maximum for pay 26, which is fiscical year 25. And um as the board is already aware, we will host a truth and taxation hearing just in 10 minutes here, which is required by state law and has to happen before December 30. Um, so to prepare our board for that meeting, but also to prepare our board for the adoption of the proposed levy for pay 26, I invite our interim director of business services, DD Carring, to share some information with you and also with our community. Thank you, Dee. >> Thank you. Um, I don't know if you were hoping that I'd go through the whole presentation ahead of time or not. I'm not sure there'll be quite enough time, but I'm happy to No, you're good. >> We'll be here for the >> I I knew you would be, but I didn't know if you wanted to just >> get give me a practice shot or not. >> If you want the practice, then yes. >> No. No, I'm fine. I'm quite fine. So, um, tonight we'll go through the, um, levy certification process for the payable 26 levy, which as you know is for fiscal year 26. Um, in the documents for the actual levy certification, there's a document that you're used to seeing. So, that's down in the actual action item that provides you with the history um, back to 22 um, all the way through payable 26. So that will be the actual document that we'll go through at the time that you do the levy certification. So the total amount of the levy will be 73 million 051535. It's an increase of 5.9% over the prior year. And as you know, as a district, you passed a bond referenda. That is the majority of the increase that you will see over the prior year. There are some other adjustments that occur and that's due to um student counts. It's due to prior period adjustments. It's due to uh population of your district, your LTFM. There's a number of things that can change that. We'll go through all of that when I go through the presentation for the um truth and taxation hearing. But overall, your general fund will go up 3% over the prior year. Community service fund will go down just a little bit. It it's it's a small number anyhow, but um negative.5 or excuse me 5.8%. And then your debt service, that's where you'll see the increase, the largest increase of 15 um.3% which is then that voter approved referenda that you had. Um during the presentation, I'll be able to explain some of the budget that's a requirement of the presentation as well as talk about the purposes of the of the levy. uh what the changes were and we'll have some slides on the tax impact for the presentation as well. So I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have. I'm also trying to be aware of that we have to start the presentation in five minutes. >> Yes, thank you for that. >> Um I did just have a quick clarifying question about the community service fund. I know part of what we had discussed um when we were going over this was that there was about 80,000 that we weren't realizing. Does that include >> the 80,000 and it's still gone down. >> Um so you're talking about the child school age child care. >> Yeah. you'll see that that number is one that has changed back from 2223 um at a greater amount. We do have levy in there for 26 at $120,000. So, we do have some included. Um one of the things I was explaining to the superintendent is that um the state of Minnesota picks up your expenses as it relates to school age child care. And in particular, keep in mind that that is related to students who have some form of disability or are displaced temporarily. So if those figures which when your audit is completed then your UFAR's data your uniform financial accounting information is submitted once that is final then we will go to the MDE and ask them to review and and verify and we'll verify as well to make sure that the district is capturing the right um expenditures to submit to the state of Minnesota. >> Okay, great. >> Yeah, >> thank you. >> Yes, you're welcome. Any other questions? >> Great. Well, thank you so much. Look forward to >> seeing you in four minutes. >> Sounds good. >> From a different perspective >> and I'm assuming right at the podium. You want right. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Well, thank you everyone. This is your final workshop. >> Now a journey. >> Wow. >> Final stone. >> Yes. >> Oh my gosh. >> I know. >> Here we go with the final truth and taxation. >> I know. >> Do we do this every year? Truth and taxation. Okay. They also have this Okay. >> So, I'm child. So, So you're like >> you want me to give you a signal? >> Do you want the mic? >> I don't think they said that's not working. >> Do you want this mic? Hi everyone, welcome. This is a truth and taxation hearing um for the Hopkins School Board starting at 6:15 p.m. on December 2nd. Thank you. Um, Madame Chair, members of the board, um, Superintendent Mary Perry Reed, and community members, thanks for being here tonight. This is the public hearing for taxes payable 2026 for the Hopkins School District. And, um, we'll move through um some of the truth and taxation requirements. Uh the meeting must be held between November 25th and December 30th and it must start um sometime after 6:00 p.m. It can be part of a regular meeting or it can be scheduled separately. Um the levy may be adopted at the same meeting which tonight we will be asking the board to do so. Uh the presentation must include discussion on the current year budget, the levy and then allow time for the public to comment and that will occur at the end. So if we want to move to the first slide, um we'll be talking on the agenda. Um do you it's not moving forward. Nope. The other one that was sent in the board packet. >> Okay. I have. Thanks for holding. That's okay. >> Say what our favorite pie is. >> Sure. What is your favorite kind of pie? >> Mine is rhubar. >> That's good, too. >> Sweet potato. French silk. >> Do you want me to get my computer? It is. Yeah, >> it should be in the the packet, I believe. >> That's a close. There we go. >> Thank you. >> If you want to go to the agenda slide. >> It counts. >> It counts. >> Is that yours then? >> No. My favorite pie is 3.14. >> There you go. >> All right. >> We need to hear yours. Thank you. Thank you. Um so um the truth and taxation agenda for tonight will be some background information regarding um funding uh tax levies as well as the budgets and then in the end we will talk about public contact comment as I mentioned earlier. So moving on to the next slide, the funding districts. Um for school districts, the state of Minnesota, it sends it states, excuse me, public school funding is highly regulated and revenue formulas, tax policies, and the tax levy process are established through state law. It's important to know that while school districts can lev underlevy what is authorized by state law, they cannot levy more than what is legislation gives them authority to. Two examples of authority are referendas such as the district has for operating capital and bond referendas. Next, let's talk about the levy development. Um, in this slide you see data that the district must provide to the state of Minnesota in order to develop the levy certification. It includes student enrollment, facility information, and any voter approved referenda that are included in the general fund and certain expenses. In community services, the population for the school district and the number of children under age five are included in the information submitted to the state. For debt service, the principal and interest scheduled for voter approved and facility bonds must be included in the data necessary to finalize the levy certification. The certification process uh be spans over six months uh starting with the district submitting the required information to the state of Minnesota. The school board approves a preliminary levy in September, which is important in order for the county to mail out the property tax statements in November. The final step of the process is for cities, counties, and school districts to hold a truth and taxation hearing, which is the purpose of the meeting tonight. After the hearing, the board is asked to approve the final levy setup certification, which will occur uh later at the official board meeting. the levy certification process. Throughout the board action of certifying the district's levy at tonight's meeting, the taxes are collected by the county in calendar year 2026, which provides funding for the school district's 2627 school year. Next, let's look at the fiscal year 2526 budget. So if we look at the preliminary budget for general food service and nutrition services, community service, debt service, construction and capital projects, you'll see that they we have the those different funds and at 74.6% the budget for the majority of K12 operations lies in the general fund. The amounts for each fund on this slide shows the approved budget for revenue and for expenses for fiscal year 2026. that was approved by the board in June of 25. Since the general fund is the largest portion of the budget, the upcoming slides will relate to that portion of the budget. So when we look at the general fund revenue summary, 74% of the funding are found in those first four categories or first four revenue sources that you see on this slide. The operating referenda and local operational revenue make up 17.8% of the district's funding with only 3% of the revenue coming from federal aid. The remaining two categories equal 5.3% of the $130 million general fund revenue budget. When we look at the general fund expenditure summary, 78.7% of the expenses for the general fund are made up in salaries and benefits. This is in line with other school districts in the state of Minnesota. The next largest portion of expenses is in purchase services at 15.6% of the budget. This includes expenses such as transportation, utilities, insurance, professional services, tuition bills, communications, and travel. Next, if we look at the 2025 payable 26 tax levy, want to talk a little bit about what causes increases and decreases in the levies. So the local property tax is levy is used for school districts to secure funding for those programs which property taxes are the mechanism made available through state law. The majority of other school district funding comes through state or federal aid as we discussed on the last slide. Other than specific voter approval, there are four major ways that the levy can change. The first is through changes in state law. It's important to know that the district's ability to level levy for local financial resources highly regulated by state statute. A local school district cannot increase a tax levy without there being a specific statutory authority to do so. The second way may that levy may change is through pupil unit or specific population changes. Some levy formula formulas are linked to number of students served in the population or in the community. The third option is or third category is changing market value or tax capacity of the district property and it is an important factor for levies. Some levies are equalized which means that a portion of the levy formula is based for through state aid and the remainder is through a local levy. As the market value grows, these types of levies are designated to decrease the portion of levies picked up by the state aid and increase the portion picked up by local levy. Specific to Hopkins public schools, the net tax capacity decreased by slightly by 3% and the referendum market value increased by about 1%. The final way that levies may change is when the expenditures for those programs whose revenue is based on actual expenditures. An example of this is an LTFM play pay as you go levy. Next, if we look at the categories, the three categories that the district levies for, that would include the general fund, community service, and debt service. Almost 72% of the total levy is for general fund which provides fundings for programs listed on the right side of the slide. Only 1.4% of the levy is for community services and just about 27% of the levy is to repay principal and interest payments on the desk district's debt service. Next slide is to show the proposed tax levy for taxes payable in 2026. So, as you can see, the three categories that I just described are on the left. Next is the column with the actual levy from a year ago. And then the proposed 26 um property tax levy. You can see that the general fund will increase by 1.53 million or 3%. Community service will decrease by 62,000. Debt service will increase by just over 2.5 million. And then I'll talk about why all of those changes occurred between 25 and 26 on the next slide. So the major changes in the general fund has to do with increase in referenda revenue by 1.5 million mostly due to changes in equalization in referenda revenue. Also, prior year adjustments occurred for the achievement and integration at 316,000 and remployment at 245,000. All of th those two categories listed in those bullets are offset by a decrease in the lease levy by about 525,000. The community service budget is decreasing slightly due to prior year adjustments. And then finally, as you know, uh, Hopkins voters approved a $140 million bond refer in referendum in November of 25. This increased the bond and interest payments by 3.9 million, which is offset by a reduction in 1.7 million in LTFM debt service. Next, this was kind of covered before, but the state limits the school district's property tax levy by statutory def defined formulas. So, those pupil counts again, the number of students we have, eligible expenditures that we might have um related to the specific category, the voter authorization, population, and then property valuation. Next, in order to calculate the property taxes, um there are three key variables. It is the estimated market value which is established for each parcel and that is accomplished by the assessor. It's not done by the school district. the property classifications those which include um residential, commercial, apartments, agricultural, non-homestead properties, industrial those are set by the state legislature. And then finally the tax levy is um by the taxing jurisdictions and that would include city, school district, county and others. Next, it I know this one's probably a little small to read, but the upcoming examples that I'm going to show you of property taxes are shown based on two different factors. One with no change, so a property looking at four years with no change in the property value. And then we'll show you one where the slide with that has that the residential property increases by 7.1% for residential homes over that four years. These examples that are given are for the city of Hopkins. And then the amounts um are preliminary. They will be final um in in they could change just slightly, but it's likely not be much at all. And then uh estimates have been pre approved prepared, excuse me, by Ellers, which is the district's uh municipal advisors. Again, I know on this slide um you it will be difficult to see from the background. This is the the document that helps with the slides coming up. It's mostly talking about again the four the property types which are residential homestead, commercial, industrial and then apartments and residential non-homestead. The next column is market values and then looking at taxes for payable for 24 25 and then 26 and then changes in those property taxes. Um you'll see for a residential home of 400,000 the property increase from 23 to 26 is um $846 and from 25 to 26 is $85. So it's been blended over the years and in the most recent years it does show the in impact of your new um operate or bond referenda. So next slides that will have some bar graphs will show you then what those property taxes look like. So on the left hand side is a pro residential property of $400,000 and on the right is a $500,000 property. And this is assuming that yeartoyear there is no change in that property value. So, a $400,000 home in 2003 paid $1,595, whereas in 2020 uh6 it's 1600 or 16 1,641. The net change over that time is $46. Likewise, on the right hand side at no change in property value, meaning a $500,000 home in 23 was at $1,998 and now 20082, an $84 increase. And we'll look at that with a 7% increase in a future slide. The next slide is looking at then uh what the impact is um of the property taxes on a thousand commercial industrial property on the left. thousand a million dollars, excuse me. And then on the right, a million-doll apartment non-residential property. Um, and you can see what the impact is if that same property remained at a million dollars over that time. Um, but yeartoyear, um, from 25 to 26, a commercial industrial property at a million dollars will see an increase of $55. and then a million-doll apartment non-residential at they'll see an increase of about $249. Then the next slide is then showing the difference when you have a 7.1% cumulative change. So on a $400 $400,000 resident home property today, four years ago that property was worth 373,400. So, this is looking at because your property values increase, the the estimated amount of that increase is $27,000 over that time period, and your taxes went up $158 over that same time period. Then on the right hand side is a $500,000 home. Same exercise today worth 500 previous 4,000 466,000 an increase of 33,000 over that time and taxes went up $217 from the previous 2003. So for tonight the recommended levy certification amounts are listed on the screen. The general fund at 52,549,730.50 50 community service at 1,3,859.33 debt service 19,497,946.3 for a total of $73,51,535.86. Next steps in the process is the board will accept u public comment. The public comment must be related only to the property taxes for the school district and no other topic. Uh later in the evening, I believe the district welcomes other comments from the community member. And then board certifies the 2026 property tax levy at the meeting later on this evening. With that, um welcome to have any public comment from anybody in the community. Okay. >> No, no public comment. >> Okay. Well, thank you. Um, I know the district um is grateful that you have paid attention and listened tonight or tuned in, whichever case might be, as well as supporting any of the prop the uh property tax levy questions that have been brought to the community. They greatly appreciate your support. So, thank you very much. Oh boy. >> Oh my gosh. Thank you for meetings after meetings. I seen um Kissy at Walmart. >> Did you? I was asking her Are you >> Thursday? That's like local housing. Hi, welcome everybody. Um, thank you so much for being here this evening. This is the um Hopkins School Board meeting for December 2nd, 2025. And every um before almost every meeting, we take some time to honor um students and people in our district that are making us um excellent and amazing and brilliant. And so tonight we are going to honor two of our departing board members, uh director Jen West Morland and Vice Chair Jason Ross. Um, we would like to invite you to go down and walk the royal blue carpet. Oh my god. >> Now you're going to know what it feels like. Okay, >> it's really far away. >> So, um, thank you all for being here tonight. Um, I know some of you are here um for other reasons, but we are really excited that you're here to honor Jason and Jen for their last board meeting. And I'm going to apologize in advance because I don't think I've made it through either one of these speeches without crying. So, um, our first board member that I would like to invite to walk the royal blue carpet is vice chair Jason Ross, who served on the district um, who served on the school board for four years. I first met you as a face on a t-shirt at the Raspberry Parade, and that's still my favorite campaign item ever. From those early moments to today, your steady presence and genuine commitment to our community have always stood out. As vice chair, you have stepped in seamlessly whenever I couldn't be there, offering not just support, but true partnership. As chair of the policy and monitoring committee, you guided us through complex decisions at and from developing a new cell phone policy to navigating changes in transportation, always with clarity, patience, and a deep sense of responsibility to our students and families. When you first joined the board, I had the privilege of being your mentor. And even then, I was struck by your thoughtfulness, your careful consideration, and your unwavering dedication to the community. You were and are perfectly suited for this work. You will be missed not just by me, but by the entire district that has benefited from your leadership, your heart, and your service. Thank you for everything you've given. >> Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. And Jen West Morland. She has served on the board for eight years. Tonight we honor a leader whose impact on Hopkins will be felt for years to come. Jen, your service on this board has been nothing short of extraordinary. You first served in the board position of clerk for Hopkins, strengthening the structure and accountability of our governance. You then served as chair for four years, providing steady, thoughtful, and valuesdriven leadership through moments of growth, challenge, and transformation. and you changed what it means for students to have a voice in district leadership by creating our student board representative cohort model. You redefined representation, opening a pathway for students to speak to their own experiences and shape the decisions that affect their lives. You didn't just include student voice, you centered it. You are also a key board member in developing vision 2031, helping chart a bold future focused direction for Hopkins. You have been our north star for vigilant equity and authentic inclusion. A constant reminder that our work must always be rooted in justice, belonging, and humanity. Jen, you are a mentor, a community leader, and someone who unfailingly centers people over process. You have strengthened our community by investing deeply in local leaders and lifting others into their own power. And through it all, in tough decisions, long nights, and complex conversations, you carried us forward with humor and grace. Thank you for the impact you've had on this board, this district, and this community. You leave behind a legacy of courage, compassion, and possibility, and we are profoundly grateful. Thank you. >> Okay, >> come. Oh, I have some to sing. >> Oh, you have to like face. >> Okay. Okay. >> I'd like to This is fun. >> Yes. >> Stepping close. Okay. Um well, good evening everyone along with Chair Andre. I also just wanted to share some thoughts with our two amazing board members. Um, every superintendent yearns to serve and be supported by a balanced, caring, thoughtful, firm, but kind board. And as a superintendent, I have been extremely fortunate to have served under your leadership and board uh, director guidance. This is because you, Jen and Jason, are quality humans with exceptional leadership abilities. You supported at the right times, questioned and critiqued at the right moments, and through it all, you have genuinely supported our students, rarely bringing up the needs of your own children, and certainly never prioritizing their needs over others. Jason, we hate to lose you because you have such a powerful voice at the board table. You are measured, thoughtful, and unafraid to raise a critical perspective. Thank you for making such a positive impact on policy monitoring, and I'm grateful that we benefited for four years from your quality service and leadership. And Jen, I'll never forget how you supported me and our amazing district during CO. As our previous board chair, you and I responded to quite literally thousands of emails and navigated very challenging political dynamics. And through it all, you maintained a laser focus on equity, on belonging for all, on high academic expectations, on fiscal accountability both at the district and state levels. You are a courageous and compelling leader, and I will miss you. Thank you to both of you. >> Thank you. >> Sure. >> Yes. Any want to say anything? >> I >> I have some comments, but they're at my computer. Is it okay if I say them when we sit down? >> Yes. >> Okay. >> You don't want me to go off script? >> Thank you. >> Thank you. That was really wonderful. I would invite if anyone else would like to make a comment, now would be the time before we uh go to public comment. >> Chair Andre. >> Yes, Director West Morland. So, thank you to um Chair Andre and my board colleagues for allowing me to share a few thoughts with you. At my last meeting as an elected school board member, it was kind of hard to decide what to share. Uh, I vacasillated between a list of the many district and community accomplishments I'm proud of, a litany of worries about public education that keep me up at night, or a blooper reel of my most awkward moments at the board table. It's been eight years, so there's a lot of content there. Um, but I landed on this, a reflection and an invitation to meet the current moment as co-creators of public education. If you visit the same corners of the internet that I do, you've seen the sentiment, public education is a public good that we must protect. The term public good reflects the immense funding, time, and labor we as educators, students, community members, advocates, administrators, schoolboard members, researchers, and lawmakers have invested in a system that holds incredible promise and has caused harm to people who have historically been excluded from the collective imagining of what this system could So yes, we must fight to protect public education as a public good while simultaneously leaning into the transformative possibility that comes with periods of political and economic uncertainty. I find it helpful to visualize public education as a web of relationships, beliefs, and practices. These webs form at the community, school and district levels. And as the webs grow and connect, they become structures of possibility. We use them to imagine and build futures where every learner can thrive. Sociologist Dr. Ruha Benjamin writes, "Remember to imagine and craft the worlds you cannot live without, just as you dismantle the ones you cannot live within. I've spent my career and much of my personal life co-creating community webs to do the work of education reform because I cannot live within rigid systems that privilege some learners and their caregivers over others. Systems that suppress valuable forms of cultural knowledge. And I've learned that I cannot live without these aspects of our Hopkins Schools community that we've co-created, especially during our work over the past decade. Centering the perspectives of students in decisionmaking. Opportunities for deep learning from community members diverse lived experiences. socially just teaching practices that honor the lived experience and brilliance of all students. An abundance mindset when it comes to meeting the needs of learners and the adults who serve and care for them. safety, not in the form of compliance and criminalization, but in the form of belonging and accountability to authentic relationships. Physical spaces where every mind and body can participate and truly be in community. School cultures where queer and gender expansive people can show up as the fullest versions of ourselves. Prioritizing creativity and critical thought that surpass what any standardized test could ever measure and working collectively toward a shared vision of educational justice. As a community, we still have so much more work to do to fulfill the promises of vision 2031. And this involves thoughtful, systematized accountability processes and respectful generative interactions between community members, board members, district leaders, students, and staff. So, I leave you with a question. When it comes to public education, when it comes to the web that is our Hopkins Schools community, what can you not live without? As we fight to protect public education as a public good, we must continue to leave behind practices we cannot live with while imagining and building educationally just futures together. This is the last time that I'll speak to you from this side of the board table. Well, I'll say a few other things tonight, but you know what I mean. But you can't get rid of this Hopkins grad. Our collective work continues and I'll be doing it in the web with you as a Hopkins parent, educator, educational researcher, and community member. Thank you to our fantastic Hopkins students. Your voices have shaped my leadership from day one. Thank you to my colleagues and friends at this board table and throughout our Hopkins school staff. I have learned so much by working alongside you. Thank you to my spectacular kid, Laya, for traveling on this journey with me. My parents are here tonight, and I'd like to thank them for modeling how to show up with and for people. They have modeled this for me my entire life. My aunt Mary Pat is here tonight, too. I'd like to thank her and my sister Annie for listening to countless schoolboard stories, for your support and belief in what's possible in public education. And thank you to the love of my life, Mary, for doing the hard work of systemic reform every day and for being the best thought partner. I started this schoolboard journey eight years ago alongside Fortuna, the first Somali-American woman in the country to be elected to a school board. Our shared campaign was incredibly meaningful and allowed me to meet, become friends with, and strive to understand the experiences of our Somali American families here in Hopkins schools. They are an essential part of our Hopkins schools community and I strongly denounce the dangerous rhetoric and actions from leaders nationally and in our state who seek to divide us in this moment. Thank you to our entire Hopkins Schools community for the opportunity to serve you in this capacity. It has truly been one of the great honors of my life. Thank you, Director Ross Morland. >> Thank you for the time. >> Vice Chair Ross. >> Oh, I guess I didn't realize I was supposed to say something. >> No, you don't have to. >> Uh, well, I'm going to go off script. I didn't make this as beautifully eloquent as uh my uh board member to my left, director West Morland, did. As probably some of you guys do know, um I want to say thank you for inviting me to uh enjoy this board experience. Uh uh my wife had she um had stage two ca breast cancer when I first did this role. I thought that was probably the dumbest decision after the fact. If I had known she was going to have breast cancer, I would have never run. I would have never sat up here. So, I never said anything for the entire four years I sat up here doing these meetings and then going home uh talking to my kids when they were much younger to ensure they didn't equate cancer meaning death. M >> so they were very worried about their mother um and um spent a lot of time sitting in these meetings and I know most people thought I was a deer in the headlights. Um there was a lot of things that were weighing on my uh psyche and as a parent you could imagine talking to your children ensuring that they understand one of one of their parents is still going to be around um and you are the primary person they're talking to sharing their feelings not to also realize that yes I really don't care what anybody thinks I have ADHD. I have served here with ADHD. Um, so if you probably see me as a deer in the headlights, it's because I have ADHD. And sometimes, as most people don't understand, it's a lot of when there's a lot of information. It's called taking time to process everything that everybody is saying all at once. I drive my wife nuts at home because she will talk to me. and I have mentally moved on to a completely different topic in the midst of our conversation. Still to this day, I drive my kids bat crazy because I move on when they're telling me something. So, it was also difficult to be uh managing ADHD. So, if you guys talk to me and I'm like, "Yep, I'm not in my head." And if I don't say anything, that's because I'm processing and then I need to decompress later on because it's overwhelming amount of information. As you guys can probably imagine, serving as a board member is very challenging, especially when you're neurode divergent that I've always kept to myself. At this point, it's my last meeting, so doesn't really matter. I can share this skeleton in the closet, but I do appreciate the empathy that um all of my colleagues, especially superintendent, uh showed during that time. Again, I never said anything in the past four years. Obviously, my wife is in the clear. She's in remission. But yes, for that entire January through June, it was I tried to focus here, be uh a great steward of the financial resources that you guys uh have blessed us with and be able to run home to the kids and then ensure that the kids are mentally focused on something else versus what my wife was going through. So with um that I do appreciate uh all of the support. I tell you a story to show the community that I am a human being as well. Um I'm not sitting in an ivory tower pretending to think anything that is coming down is not going to impact students and the community. and just want to ensure that public school education gets the support that it needs because obviously private schools don't uh need that level of support. I don't bleed blue, red, green, whatever you want to fill in the blank. I a focus on how do we make Hopkins uh the most competitive and influential school district in the western and greater Minneapolis uh suburbs. So again, my wife probably didn't like the fact I went off script. ADHD, what can you do? So there you go. Thank you. And we have one last um person that would like to speak to the board. Um I would like to invite Mayor Hanlin up to address the board and the rest OF >> THIS. NO, you can pick. >> I like this stuff. >> Thank you. My name is Patrick Hanlin. I'm the mayor of the city of Hopkins. >> Welcome. >> I'm not here to talk about taxes tonight. >> This is it's great sitting here. This is this feels like family. Uh coming here with the relationships that we've built uh between our city and the school board. uh that continued a lot during the campaign uh that we just had uh with a lot of members going out and sharing issues out in the community. Uh and let me tell you, you all have a very difficult job. I did some campaigning with uh Sarah Willham Garbers at one of the meetings and uh and we had a great meeting talked about the city of Hopkins and then went on to talk about schoolboard and it just it's rough the job the the role that you all play here. uh people take the education of their children very serious and they should uh and you often take uh the brunt of that and it's incredible work that you all do. So, thank you uh board member Ross uh board member uh West Morland. I'm uh I'm going to uh pay special attention to Jen West Morland uh this evening uh for your your commitment to Hopkins. Uh I came up here saying that this feels like family and a lot of that has to do with you and how when I was running and I know even previous to me running uh you really made it an uh importance to make connections to the city of Hopkins and and the other cities around here. Um in fact our connection actually goes beyond uh both of us. I think your your mother used to do a lot of uh advocacy work in the in the Boston two thumbs up in the Boston garden in our restaurant uh uh growing up and I think we found that out found that out later. Um but we have a lot of work to do. This is a we have a growing city. We have a growing west metro uh area and there are a lot of families coming in here and there are a lot of families that are moving into uh low-income housing, affordable housing. Uh and so we have a lot of work to do in terms of connections uh with each other and continuing to build um those connections together and that really started with you uh when I when I was running you you made a special point to sit down with me. I think Molly Cummings had referred you to me and we sat down and and you've been a huge supporter of myself and our other council members in Hopkins. So, I just want to say we're so grateful uh for that and for making that connection that is going to uh outlast uh your time here on the board uh in our relationships moving forward uh between our two organizations. So, this evening I have a short proclamation recognizing Jess uh Jen West Morland. Uh this is kind of it's a little intimidating reading to a bunch of education specialists uh but I'll do my best. Uh whereas Jen West Morland has served the Hopkins community with exceptional leadership in her four years as the chair and eight years on the Hopkins School Board during one of the most challenging periods in the district's history. Whereas Miss West Morland collaborated with colleagues to revamp the district budget to be revenued driven, strengthening the district's long-term fiscal stability and contributed to the development of vision 2031 to prepare Hopkins students for a rapidly changing world. Whereas, there's lots of whereazes in these. Whereas, she championed the inclusion of student voices by leading the creation of the Hopkins school uh student board and gathering student leadership input for the gender inclusion policy, which now stands as a guiding model for equity, belonging, and authentic inclusion. Whereas leading the human resource committee with Miss West Morland partnered with staff and community members to address complex issues, build trust, and foster collaborative solutions while also bringing national and statewide perspectives to Hopkins through her involvement in local progress. And whereas she has consistently demonstrated a deep commitment to Hopkins, the Hopkins community, mentoring youth and ensuring they center those they serve as human beings, leaving a lasting and positive impact on the city of Hopkins and the greater Hopkins area. Uh now therefore I Patrick Hanlin, mayor of the city of Hopkins in the state of Minnesota along with my fellow council members who are here in spirit um recognize and thank Jen West Morland for her outstanding service and contributions to the Hopkins schools and the community as a whole. Thank you very much for your commitment and your service to our community. Thank you so much, Mayor Hanlin and um the Hopkins City Council. I am I am uncharacteristically speechless and I'm just going to give you a hug now. >> Thank you. >> Is it really sign that's not autom? >> Wow. Oh my gosh. I can't spill water on these. Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mayor Hanlin. >> Thank you, Mayor. >> And thank you for those words. That meant a lot. Um, now that takes us to um uh public comment section of our agenda. Do we have any public comment cards, any voicemails? So, we do value hearing from our community. So, we host a public comment section um at the beginning of every meeting and also at the end. Um you have two ways to comment um to the give comment to the Hopkins School Board. You can either leave a voicemail. Um the number is in uh our board packet or you can show up here in person before the meeting and fill out a comment card. Um, so we will move on to the next part of our reports. And I just want to quickly thank everybody who came to celebrate our board members and all who are departing, but also to celebrate um, Hopkins Public Schools. We know that um, you're here and your support is unwavering. So, thank you for all of that and have a great evening. So, I would now turn it over to our amazing student board reps. Thank you for being here tonight. Um, and I will hand it over to you to give your reports. >> Hi. Um, my name is Manuel and I'm a junior student board representative. So, I just wanted to start out with a teacher spotlight for my AP Euro teacher, Miss Saturn. So we just wrapped up unit five and six which talked about the French revolution and the industrial revolution and we learned how the bgeoisi of the third estate began rebelling against the first and second estates for more equality which began the French revolution. Um we then learned about the radical phase of the French revolution um where around 17,000 people were beheaded by the guillotine including king Louis V 16th and his wife Marie and Twinette. And then we learned about the rise and fall of Napoleon and the impacts he had on um the continent. In unit 6, we learned about the first and second industrial revolutions and what social, political, and economic factors caused the industrial revolution and what changes resulted from it. So, moving on, there's a new exciting trip being planned for the spring break of 2027 to Egypt. So, current AP World History, AP European History, or AP African-American Studies students or current sophomores who took AP World or AP Euro last year, or students signing up for AP African-American studies next year are invited to join. And um there will be a trip interest meeting on Thursday, December 18th at 5:00 p.m. in West 112. And if you're interested, you can also ask Miss Heimlick for any if you have any questions. So next, um, if you are proficient in a language other than English, you may be eligible to earn some college credits and receive a world language proficiency certificate, a bilingual or a multilingual seal notation on your high school transcript. There are over 30 languages offered, so if you're interested, you can register through the Google form sent out in the newsletter. The tests will be interested or the tests will be administered on April 16th, and the deadline to register is February 27th. Finally, congratulations to all of the high school students for completing term 1. Um, your term one grades are now available on your transcript, which can be accessed through infinite campus. And I'd like to end by just thanking Vice Chair Ross and director West Morland for your service. Um, it's true that you guys have really centered um, student voice, whether it be through um, being the student board leaison or including student board in the monitoring committee. It's all really appreciated and I just want to thank you for all the work you've done. Thank you, Manuel. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Hi, my name is Claire Fischer and I'm a senior uh student board rep. So, the first thing I'd like to talk about tonight is the virtual financial aid night. Um the Hopkins public schools will be hosting an insightful workshop on the latest trends and changes in college admissions. Um this session will provide essential information to help navigate the college um search process with confidence. So, some of the key topics will include changing college admissions trends, standardized test requirements, um scholarships and how to find them, and how to find the right college for you. So, this will be on February 12th at 6 p.m. and it will be over Zoom. Um it will only be available through a sign up. Um the next thing I'd like to talk about is the library fundraiser. So, the Hopkins Public Schools will be partnering with Cream and Amber Bookstore for a special fundraiser. um running from December 1st to the 15th. So that's already started. Um the purchases will help raise funds to buy new books for Hopkins Media Centers. Um and alternatively, you can simply just shop in store at Cream and Amber between um December 1st and the 15th and you can just mention Hopkins Media Center fundraiser um at checkout um to just help out with that. Next, I would like to talk about the HOSA blood drive. So, the Hopkins High School chapter of HOSA, which stands for Health Occupation Students of America, had their annual blood drive on the 21st of November. Um, there were around 80 donors, which means that there were around 80 pints of blood donated, which is very, very helpful to our community. Um, since I am the secretary of HOSA, I got to work on that project for a little bit, um, by just figuring out some logistics and as well as volunteering at the signup table during lunch. So, I'm really happy I could be a part of that. And I would like to finish by saying thank you to our departing board members. Um, so yeah, I just wanted to say thank you to you guys, especially director Russ Morlin for being an amazing student board liaison and just giving us very influential and significant support to our work. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hello everyone. My name is Eloise. I'm a junior student board rep. Um I want first we're going to start off with next Thursday the 11th there is a digital learning day for the high school. Another one. Wonderful. Um Greece. So this uh play was very successful. They showcased so much talent. Um the final show of Greece was the weekend after or the weekend uh before Thanksgiving. It was wonderful. And the auditions for the winter show are now and yesterday. They were December 1st and 2nd from 5:30 to 8:30. You only had to show up to one of the days. Um, but it's going to be student directed and it's a oneact play. Uh, winter break is right around the corner. Um, so a lot of teachers are scheduling finals and big tests for right before we leave, which is so fun. Um, there's an array of winter concerts. So this Thursday there's an orchestra concert uh symphonic strings, philarmonic, women in jazz or women in strings sorry in chamber and then on December 9th there's band so concert band symphonic band win ensemble and jazz 2. Um jazz one has a separate concert on the 11th and then choir is the 16th. So I'm so sorry if I'm butchering these names guys. Uh, Vox Choir, Bella Voce, uh, concert choir, Royal Blues, Sirens, and you showed me how to say it and I already forgot. Um, >> you >> by you. Thank you. Um, and then the on December 10th, the 9th graders have band, choir, and orchestra concerts, but it's only for freshmen. And then instead of a teacher spotlight, I'd like to spotlight director West Morland. So last year was my first year on the board and I was very nervous. I was nervous about what my first meeting would look like and I was really worried that um adults wouldn't listen to us because we're kids, you know. Um but she welcomed me with open arms and really really listened like truly made me feel seen and heard. Um she's always the first face I look for in new situations and at the LAC gatherings. So, I just wanted to say thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Hi, my name is Adena Toggle and I'm the freshman representative on the student board. Um, I'll start off by talking about the upcoming winter sports that are happening. So, many sports have started or are starting soon. Those are floor hockey, alpine skiing, Nordic skiing, both girls and boys basketball and hockey, dance, gymnastics, swim and dive, and wrestling. We're about a couple weeks into the winter sports season and many exciting games are coming up. Next, I want to talk about conferences for term two. So, turn two conferences were held today. There was an option to do them in person at school or you can set up a meeting with teachers to do it virtually. Um, it was a way so parents and teachers can or students parents and teachers can meet to talk about students grades and how they're progressing. Um, next there is an upcoming DECA practice on December 10th which will give students a chance to get more guidance and help with their presentations and problem solving. This practice is for students to solve solutions and then present them to professional DECA judges and get feedback on how they did. They are 15 minute sessions where each group of students has about eight to 10 minutes to come up with solutions and fill in all the um areas that they need to come up with and then they take the rest of that time to present to the judges and get asked some unprepared questions. Uh next the winter carnival is tomorrow. There will be many games for people to play where you can earn tickets and get prizes. Many of the clubs will be there with booths. Uh there will also be a movie that will be playing for everyone to enjoy. You can buy eight tickets for $5, 20 for 10, and 30 for 15. Lastly, I want to do my teacher spotlight. Today, I'll be spotlighting Mrs. Donald. She's my health n teacher. Mrs. Donald was always is always super active and engaging with her students. She makes sure that they are fully prepared for all the assignments and summitives and is always checking in with students individually and together to make sure that they get the help that they need. Right before Thanksgiving break, we finished our brain unit where we talked about the different parts of a neuron, how neuron communications work, and how teens brains work differently. Um, I just want to congratulate and thank our um board members. Thank you so much for um really guiding me into like the first part of being on the student board. It was really helpful. So, thank you so much. >> Thank you. Um any questions or comments for our student board reps? I'm really excited to hear about the outcomes of the bud drive. Um was that another record-breaking event? Do you know? >> Um I'm not sure. Every year it's like pretty popular and we do get around like a hundred donors somewhere around there. 80 100. So it did go pretty well. So yeah. >> Great. >> I think all the slots filled up. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> It was very busy. >> Wonderful. >> I and almost like all of my friends went and donate. I saw you there too. >> Saw a ton of people there donating blood. So I I looked like it would turned out really well. >> Nice. That's great. And um thank you for mentioning conferences. I got to do those today and it was I really um enjoy the flexibility. You can do them virtually, you can show up or you can do it via phone. I feel like we've increased access to um parent teacher conferences immeasurably since I've been a parent in the district. So thank you for highlighting those. I think they're important. So that um unless there are any other questions or comments, chair and say something quick, I want to just say RA told you all, but thank you so much for serving. I'm so excited for you all to be here and work alongside of us >> and I know um you know uh vice chair Ross and director West Morland are leaving and they have been intricral support for you, but please know that you have you still have that support here on the board. So please reach out to me if you all have any questions. I'm here to support you however I can. So, >> thank you all. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, appreciate all your reports. Um, and I think everyone agrees this is the highlight of our board meetings knowing what you're doing and what's important to you. So, thank you for being here. Dr. Mary Perry Reed. >> Thank you, Chair Anderson. And thanks also to our students. keep up the report shouting out our teachers because when you shout out a teacher, I'm sending I'm typing what you say and I send a quick note to the teacher and they love it. >> So cool. >> Keep it up. >> Okay. Well, for my report, you know, um I don't have too much because believe it or not, it's only been five business days since our last board meeting. So, I was like, hm. But of course, significant things happen in our schools and across our district every single day. Um, welcome Fonda. Um, but I thought I would share just a few things. So, yesterday as we all know, was a non-school day for students and this allowed our staff to engage in professional learning. So we had educators across our system who were engaged in reading and math curriculum training in program review in um the multilingual learning and world language departments and other school focused training such as world savvy was with our high school educators and at Metobrook um there was a session on how to build restorative classroom cultures. Today was a non-school day for our high schoolers. Was this a happy day for you? Um uh so that families could engage in conferencing with teachers. So tomorrow will be a regular school day for all students and we welcome everyone back after a holiday break during the time of Thanksgiving. And you can go to the next slide, Natalyia. Thank you for helping with this. Um during the time of Thanksgiving, our schools really do try to ensure that our recognition of this holiday is inclusive and culturally sensitive. So for example, there's um a new addition to the halls of Glenn Lake called the folds of gratitude. And during this experience, our Glen Lake students were artists who took time to think, feel, and put their thoughts of gratitude on white origami paper with expressions both in drawings and words. And if you love student art, um this is a great time of year to visit all of our schools, especially our elementary schools. hallway walls and classrooms are adorned with all kinds of beautiful student created art. So, make sure you visit. November was Native American Heritage Month, and this is a time to honor the history, culture, and contributions of Native peoples. Please make sure you greet our new American Indian education coordinator, Katie Soo, who recently came to us from Minnotonka schools. We were extremely grateful for the service of our outgoing outgoing American Indian education coordinator Annie Huberty who was recruited to Commissioner Jets cabinet. And now we're excited to work with Katie. I interviewed Katie Soo and her associate Deb Andrin for a November episode of Inside Hopkins featuring the significant work that these educators do to support our native students in building cultural pride, identity, and belonging in classrooms. Please check out this latest episode of Inside Hopkins. And in the spirit of gratitude, thank you so much to all of our schools and students that collected food for families who struggle with food scarcity and also to donate food to our local a food shelf. Some of our high schoolers provided food to more than 50 families, 50 high school families last Wednesday, I think it was, at our high school's food and resources giveaway fair. And additionally, these are students at West who recently collected more than 1,000 pounds of food. Some of the collected items remained in the food pantry at West, which is a sponsored, and some of it was delivered to the larger food pantry that's accessible to West Metro residents. At our schools and especially at our IB schools, students are encouraged to embody a core value of community service and the success of the food drive is evidence of that. On this next slide, you'll see some very happy seniors. November 12 was National Signing Day for many NCAA Division 1 and two sports, excluding football and basketball. High school athletes in sports like softball, soccer, volleyball, and others officially committed to their college programs by signing financial aid agreements. Hopkins High School celebrated nine outstanding student athletes as they officially signed their letters of intent to compete collegiately. Each student shared a few words about their Hopkins journey and they were cheered on by family, friends, teammates, supporters, lots and lots of folks in the space. So, congrats to Anna Jagger, who is going to be doing rowing at the University of Albany. Brillan Reynolds, baseball at Western Technical College. Van Talier, baseball at St. Cloud State. Frank Mouser, baseball at Iowa Central Community College. CC Rasmusen, softball at University of Wisconsin Superior. Piper Dosef rowing at University of Louisville. Two rowers. Isn't that amazing? >> Yeah. Piper's a >> And Eloise. Where do they practice rowing? You were telling me about this on November 18. >> Twin Cities youth rowing. But Piper is a coxin. >> Oh. >> Which is like the leader of the rowing, right? >> She yells at us while we row. >> That's amazing. >> I row too. Piper sits and she she's very good at it. She >> They yell at us while we row. And you can >> and they steer the boat too, >> right? >> Yeah. >> Incredible. Marshall Craft golf at University of Northwestern St. Paul softball or sorry, Kate Loots and um Kate's mother works in our district. Kate Loots will be playing softball at William Penn University and Jaden Moore basketball University of North Dakota. So, it's very fun to see where these kids are going to go and what they're going to be doing. And then um before I introduce my colleague, our director of special services, I don't have a slide for this um but I was um running an errand this evening listening to NPR and hearing the latest news about the federal administration's intent to scare if not detain members of our Somali community. Um the metro area superintendent are committed to remaining in conversation. Uh we started yesterday and really every day moving forward to check in with our Somali community and to keep each other updated and to stay vigilant as the superintendent of Hopkins. I want to denounce the rhetoric and scare tactics that are being used by individuals and institutions who are supposed to protect and serve. And as a Hopkins community, we will do our very best to protect, to partner with, and to support our Somali students, staff, and families. And I wanted to share that. And um thank you Director West Morland for also mentioning the support that um is truly our duty to provide. And with that I would like to um offer a moment to highlight special services. So I don't know if you know that you know it's not just special education which is in special services but Fonda runs a really comprehensive department that includes nurses and school counselors and psychologists social worker seal lots and lots and lots of student services beyond the very big role of providing support and leadership for special education. So here to tell you all about special services is our director Fonda Contrarus. >> Good evening everyone. >> Welcome. >> So as Roa spoke about um our department is comprehensive in providing additional supports. The title is always different. When I announce special services or introduce people are like what does that really mean? So, there really are three main areas of special services. And because I provided an update this fall, I'm going to highlight some um current updates and really save the last spotlight for staff. So, health services is one of the tenants of special services and right now the department is working on at each of our sites making sure immunization records are in. So, it's a state mandate and I think it's been laxed with some immunization records. Um, and we've been really trying to not have students miss school because of not having um imun immunizations up to date. So, we've been brainstorming many things for a long time now. So, that includes multiple contacts out to caregivers. We also reestablished notaries at all of the sites last spring and fall so that if caregivers are choosing to opt out, they have that option of getting a signed um form notorized if they if there are reasons that they're choosing to not elect to get those um immunization shot records. We've also increased um immunization clinics. We always refer caregivers back to their primaries, but just trying to have other ways to close the gap so that our records um can be complete as best as possible. It's more challenging at the secondary to get these done and I think there's been more immunizations required over the years as well. So with some of those challenges, like I said, working with parents, multiple contacts, and brainstorming with staff ways to be compliant and not have so many kids out, but yet meeting that threshold of where we need to be um just for safety issues. So, that's kind of what we're working on um in health services. Um in addition to the day-to-day u medical need supports that our teams provide at each of the sites for and mental wellness, I think um it's so important that um physical health and mental health is looked at to support holistic learning. uh we know that we are in the days of increased needs whether a student is disabled or not but just there's high needs across the state the nation um and luckily for Hopkins we started this work prior to CO so our Panorama screener was started before CO we've increased usage we're currently under review to see is that the right screener for us or do We adopt one that's more connected to the current SEAL curriculum and supports that we use through character strong and purposeful people. We are increasing the usage of that in tier one across um the district and also just making sure we have supportive adults in each of our buildings whether it's our Hopkins staff or colllocated services. Um and then I just shared some information on the slide about um the usage of Panorama nationwide. This is me stepping in for ROA um with a group of politicians. I was a little nervous, but um there's competitive funding um to continue a lot of the services that we do offer with our colllocated services. So that it's not always a direct charge to parents. We go through MA billing. Um there's also dollars that Henipin County has supported us with, but like everything else, it's competitive right now. And so Henipin County has a lot of people vying for these dollars. And so we're hoping that um they will continue to fund St. David's who provide services to our early childhood learners and our elementary learners. and they're at all of our sites providing that um therapy for students and families within our system so that again we're meeting needs of holistic learners. So just a little bit intimidating but it was they got off a bus y'all and I had to do this pitch to them. So just a little bit nerve-wracking. >> Julie said you did great. >> Thank you. They did ask a lot of questions. So hopefully that means something big. >> I think they were the lucky ones there. Director Contreres. >> Thank you. So last but not least, our special education update. So the state of special education, we continue to increase. So our percentage um has went from 17% of our total population to around 20. This does include um the services that we provide at private sites for special education, early childhood through 12th grade. We are creatively coming up ways to recruit staff um for the growing needs cuz as you know we evaluate year round. So in early childhood we have staff that work around year 12 months and they are doing evaluations around the clock. So that means more students are identified throughout the year K12 as well. So when we meet case load caps, we sometimes have to hire. Um in addition, we're doing a little better at not having to do additional hiring, but we always have increased case loads. Um, and so I wanted to spotlight staff that do this work, including our board chair, who her daytime job is a pier at one of our LDL programs, which is our DCD, our most severe students, um, in elementary. Um, so she works there, but we also have some smart people in this work. So, two of our people I want to spotlight um is our physical therapist who will be presenting. No, she actually already presented at the National Practice Fair of American Physical Therapy for Pediatrics this year. And then later this spring, we have two occupational therapists, Jennifer Brady Johnson and Paula Stones, who will be presenting in Anaheim, California. And they were selected out of 15,000 people, I'm sorry, 1,500 people. So, it's kind of a big deal that they're presenting and I look forward to um seeing and hearing more about their presentation. And I also just want to stop and pause and give thanks to all of the staff that do this work to support students with special services, whether it's our general education staff, our counselors and nurses who work with students in the general education for students with accommodations on 504s and to our special educators. So in this slide that's the social workers on the left slide. They were coming together to learn how to do billing which is a way of recouping funds for services that they provide around mental health and health services to students with high needs. It's a big lift for them to get this started. it was removed from their case loads like maybe 10 years ago and now reinstated. So it is a revenue generator for thirdparty billing. So they removed it from the providers. Now it's back. It's a big lift. So we had a work session, a few work sessions for them to um regain that billing process so that they can generate dollars for their work. And then al alongside that is a picture of one of our resource teachers. But I want to just say special educators don't just teach, they challenge lives. And in addition to the teaching, they are dealing with behavior needs. They're feeding some of our most vulnerable students who can't feed themselves. They're pushing wheelchairs, changing diapers, communicating through speech, language, devices, pictures, signs, and other forms so that students can understand. They all if it's a center-based classroom, our most severe students, it's a multicategorical classroom with different age groups. our our teachers who teach students who access general education. They have up to 22 students on their case loads. And in addition to the services they provide, they spend a great deal doing due process work, which means they are touching every IEP at least once, sometimes more, and they're doing evaluations. So that is a heavy lift for those staff and I just want to take time to give them a shout out for that incredible work. So they are doing work of providing services to the most vulnerable students in our district and um I know through negotiations there was a lot of acknowledgment of the hard work that they do and I want to continue to support them. So that is my report. Thank you. >> Thank you, Fonda. >> Thank you. >> Any comments or questions? >> I did have one about St. David's. >> Yes. >> Um, is that the mental health in the schools grants or are there other dedicated funding streams for particularly our practitioners in our schools? >> Yes. So, for St. David's we are accessing some title funds but there's only so many years that we can use that for St. Davids >> so are for any group. So we are accessing title funds and then for the 27 year we plan on accessing some of our LCTS funds, our local collaborative funds. Um and that's just a small portion that we supplement for. I mean, the the price tag on it, we it's $50,000 for all six elementaryaries and early childhood. So, that's a small fraction of what we contribute. >> Thank you. >> Yes. Appreciate that work. It's important. It is. >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. Yes. >> Hi, uh, director country, I do have a question. Um, you mentioned that the rate of special education went up 3%. Um, do you have a sense for what's causing that? Are we, you know, detecting it a little bit better or is the population shifting? Just curious what's causing that. >> Um, I think rising needs. Um, we go through the child find process of evaluation, evaluating to make sure students qualify, um, and putting interventions in place when appropriate. And so, just I would say rising needs. >> Thank you so much for what you do. Sure. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Um well, thank you Fonda for your um presentation. I just wanted to I I don't have a question. I was just saying thank you. Um I just wanted to reiterate uh thank you Dr. Mary Perry Reed for your um for your superintendent update. It's really exciting to hear about the commitments that the students made to their respective colleges. I'm excited to see what the future brings for all of them. And I also would love to thank you and um Dr. um Dr. West Morland and still is Dr. West Morland um director West Morland for bringing up the denouncing of the um you know the what's happening in our Somali community. I also think it's really important that we reiterate Hopkins have a no bullying policy that um should be shared as well because you know as we continue to see things unravel um at a national and federal level um it's trickling down to our schools and bullying is like starting to um there's uptick in it. Um and so we've seen it across our social media platforms. We're just seeing it in real time. And so I think it's really good for us to also denounce bullying in all forms of kids, of adults, of cultures, of um politicians, of um you know, everyone. So I would like to also denounce bullying right now. >> Thank you, Director Roer. >> Um I also appreciate your reports, um Dr. Mary Perry Reed and um yeah, I just appreciate the perspective you bring because we don't all know about all the things that are happening at all the schools and you do. So, thank you for that. >> Um I would look for a motion to approve the agenda. >> So moved. >> I have a motion. Is there a second? >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please say I. I >> the chair vote oh any nays the chair votes I and the agenda is pro approved and that takes us to the consent calendar. Um these items provide the board with information considered to be more routine in nature. If the board deems an item to be necessary for additional discussion, a motion will be made to move the item to new business. I would look for a motion to approve the consent calendar. >> So moved. >> I have a motion. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion? I would just like to mention that our um there are two contracts that are in the consent calendar. Um and I would like to thank everyone involved in that negotiation process. Um I think that the process as it usually is in Hopkins was very collegial uh very respectful and um brought to uh a satisfactory conclusion um quite well. So I'm I'm very very grateful um to everyone who does that and in particular I'm I'm looking at you assistant superintendent lifeoot. Thank you for all your leadership in that ongoing and annually and really appreciate it. Thank you. So, um with that, I would look for u um all those in favor uh please say I. >> I. >> Uh any opposed? The chair votes I and the consent calendar is approved. And that takes us to the treasures report. Treasurer Hartland. Wonderful. Thank you very much. Um, good evening everybody. Um, I wanted to as we are fully into having our treasures report come from Skyward. And so again, it's a, you know, it's a change in format from when we were producing it from Oracle. And so a quick reminder of um the various funds that our dollars come from. So in our previous report um it named those funds and now you can find that information on the far left hand side of the report um where it has a numbered um uh account or fund number and I I will send this to the board but fund one is our general fund and that's obviously most of our daily operating expenses. Uh fund two is food services. Um fund three is transportation, four is community service, five is capital expenses, um six is capital projects, um like building construction fund. Seven is the debt service fund. Um and then there's a trust and agency fund. Fund number eight, which we don't see um a lot of on our expense reports, but those main revenues are gifts and donations. Fund 14's adult basic education. 16's capital lease levy. 19's local grants. 20's our internal service fund. 41's professional development. 51's the Royals Athletic Center. 61 athletics. 81 federal grants. And so I do have a report to share with you about and uh where our primary expenditures and revenues come for under each of those each of those funds. And so that will help clarify slightly when you look at the report. Um again like sometimes it will show that we pay for either like athletic officials or a field trip for a particular group and those typically do not come from our main general expense operating fund. Some expenses of note this period are the audio v video electronics. Um it looks like two identical expenses but that it's not a duplicate. It's actually a single invoice for $14,999 and it was split into two lines for internal tracking because that expense was split between um boys and girls athletic expenses. And you do see this in a couple other places on our um check register for this period and you see it quite often actually. Another one is our SFM Mutual workers comp insurance provider. That is a single $45,552 invoice for December's workers comp insurance, but we internally split it into nine different line items that reflect our internal practice to assign expenses to particular sites. And so that's why again you'll see nine nearly identical line items. $8,768 went to Flagship Recreation for playground repairs at various sites. $7,764 went to Lake Country, our busing vendor, for transportation to indistrict charter schools. So that's $7,764 spent transporting students to charter schools within our boundaries. And that is only for the period of October 19th through 29th. So, we paid $7,700 for those 10 days worth of transportation. We paid Normanddale Community College $118,516.50 for Hopkins High School students taking PSO classes and $3,95055 for virtual edu students taking PSO credits. And so those expenses represent 465 college credits earned by our district students at no additional expense to their families. Uh you see the company Imperial um mentioned um multiple times and that is not actually a new vendor. It's the parent company of Delo. So that's a company that has a Minnesota company that has been on our uh expense report often. uh they're a company that provides our cleaning and janitorial supplies. In a similar way, we see Kelly Services. I highlighted them during our last board report, and that is also not a new vendor. It's the parent of teachers on Call. Um and finally, we had 39 community members who worked as election judges during this previous election that just happened in November. Uh we've paid 39 of them so far. Community members do have the opportunity to volunteer if they wanted, but typically we pay those. So, six volunteered and then we are waiting for info for two others in order to pay them. And so, the 31 election judges, we paid $4,028 um for their time on November 4th. And this is a small percentage of the expenses the district must bear to put on an election because we also rent spaces and equipment and have a whole variety of filing fees. So you will hear more about our election related expenses at a future board meeting and treasures report. So with that I move that we approve total dispersements in the amount of 1,992,629 for the period of November 1st to November 15, 2025. I have a motion. Is there a second? >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> Seeing none, all those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any nays? The chair votes I and the treasur's report is accepted. Thank you, Treasurer Hartland. And that takes us to our first order of new business, which is the Legislative Action Coalition State Platform. I'll give you a little bit of background. Um, the LAC does a lot of work in reviewing legislative priorities of other educational groups. Um, the Minnesota School Board Association, AMSD, and the district's LAC Steering Committee developed their platform for 2026, incorporating insights from the board, district administration, and residents. Katherine Callahan, the LACE legislative liaison, along with LACE members, which includes myself, Treasurer Hartland, and Director Roer will present the platform and respond to board member questions. That means we will be moving over there to become presenters. So, um, we will run back to do the voting. to beam it to the uh >> Yep. >> Okay. >> Technical issue. >> Should we do pie again? >> What's that? >> Favorite pie. What's the last time we experienced technical difficulties? We just have talked about pi. >> I changed my mind as key lime. >> I'll just remind the uh the board >> bold. >> We may be doing shadow puppets tonight. Um I remind the board the role of the LAC, the legislative action coalition. My name is Steve Adams. I am the community chair co-chair for the uh legislative action coalition and our role is to represent the the interests of the school district the Hopkins school district to the state legislature to our senators and representatives at the state and um as part of that process we get together every fall actually starting in the summer and put together a uh a platform form that we think represents the uh the interests of the district. And in order to acquire that that data, that information, we meet with the the cabinet, uh we may when we consult with the Association of Metropolitan School Districts because they usually have an agenda of their own and we want to make sure that we're in uh uh in sync with that. and um and then we meet in the fall and put together what we think is an appropriate platform and bring it to the board for your approval. And once that's done, then we have a breakfast with our legislators prior to the uh the opening of the legislative session and um hope that we make some impact on on their thinking and on their voting at the legislature. And I'll just ask members here to introduce themselves. Um, we've got three board members on the board, which is kind of unusual and the most that were allowed by state law. So, um, we'll start down here with Brooke. >> You can start with you introduce yourself. >> Oh, okay. >> Hello everyone. My name is Broo Roer or as known as Director Roer and I've been with the LAC for about two years now. Go on two years. >> Hi everyone, Shannon Andre. I started as a community volunteer with LAC I think 13 14 years ago. >> Good evening. My name is Matt Lowauour. Um I am a new member of the legislative action committee. I'm a community member and a parent. I've been with this group for three months. >> Hi, I'm Jen Cameron. I'm a parent LAC member since god knows when. >> Yeah, four, five years. I don't know. >> Yeah, it's been a minute. >> Steve Adams. I've been on the legislative action coalition for gez 14 years I think. And u first uh as a member, then as a board co-chair, and now as a community co-chair. I need your thing. >> I'm Katherine Callahan. I'm the legislative liaison for the LAC. >> And she's amazing. >> Um, she is. Uh, my name is Rachel Hartland. I am the treasure of the school board and the board uh facing co-chair of the legislative action coalition. I think this is my fourth year on the LAC. >> Um, and I appreciate Matt and your position very much because it takes a while. It's like a it's a bit of a fire hose. The only thing I wanted to add to Steve's um, comments is that the LACE is 41 years old. And so it is one of the first in the state and is a continuing model to our surrounding districts when they are undertaking this kind of important work of representing our community to our uh legislative partners at other levels of government. And so this is kind of an honored thing that we do. And the work is uh is heavy and it only kind of happens in in slow motion. It happens with dedicated effort year over year. And so I want to thank this group for those efforts. >> Uh Rachel's right. It does happen in slow motion. You know, some of the things that we've worked on have taken up to 10 years to get implemented at the state at the by the legislature. And um I think what it was kind of remarkable a couple years ago we were kind of as an LAC kind of uh the impetus for the free school lunches for kids and it took about two years which was almost record time >> for us to get that implemented at the state. So that's one of the things that we're we're proud of. Um, moving into our presentation, uh, we've tried this year to limit our priorities into three buckets because we found that legislators don't have much of a patience for anything beyond three. So, um, if you can try and, you know, >> not how we'll present it to them. >> Yeah. distill it down to three important buckets that we uh were concerned about that there it's more digestible digestible on their part. >> Mr. Adams. >> Yes. >> Before you begin, is this an actual picture of our Hopkins students? >> Thanks for bringing it up, but it is not. >> Oh, it's not. >> Sorry to inform you. >> It's not okay. >> But they are so cute. I was just gonna say those kids are >> I think the correct response is Yeah, they're from Glen Lake. I don't >> No, Gatewood. >> No, they're tangling. >> Okay, they're not. I'm sorry. >> Yeah. So, >> Oh, okay. Sure. Um, this year our our legislative platform outlines three core priorities. It's safe schools, stable funding, and flexible tools for teaching and learning. Together, these pillars reflect what our families, educators, and communities consistently tell us they need most. Environments where students feel secure, classrooms supported by predictable and adequate funding, and local authority to meet the diverse needs of learners. By advancing these priorities, we seek to restore trust, protect critical student supports, and give our district the latitude to innovate, ensuring Minnesota remains a place where every child can survive. Um, we wrote two statements that we feel like um will connect with our legislators that outline our why and our ask for this work. And so I just want to take a minute to share those with you. Um, we feel that the Minnesota students deserve schools that are safe and stable and fully equipped to prepare them for a rapidly changing world. In a year marked by heightened fears about school safety and unprecedented financial pressure on districts, our communities are being asked to do more with fewer resources. Our ask is that the Hopkins Legislative Action Coalition calls on state legisl state leaders to provide the funding tools and flexibility needed to keep students physically and emotionally safe, maintain strong academic opportunities, and ensure every learner is prepared for Minnesota's future workforce and democracy. >> I think Rachel, were you going to review one? All right. Yeah, this one is >> so falling into the first the first bucket is to increase the safe schools levy from $36 where it's been for I think 10 years uh to $100 per pupil and to allow its use for training and restorative practices. Um, this is something that is also being championed by uh the Association of Metropolitan School Districts. So, we're hopeful that we can push it across the line. Uh, besides additional funds, we're looking for expanded uses of the safe schools levy. It's currently geared towards physical safety, and we know that that's just one element of of public school safety. So, we would like the flexibility to include the uses for school-based counselors, social workers, and mental health supports, threat assessment and prevention teams, digital safety, cyber security, and secure technology infrastructure, and restorative practices and climate building work. um and mental health supports to stabilize funding for school social workers, psychologists, community schools and models that address wellness, health and food security. So in in lie of additional funding or maybe in addition to uh we would like some flexibility it a lot of it is depending on what the the uh state's budget report looks like. the budget forecast which is due sometime this week. >> Thursday. >> Thursday. Okay. And that will give us an idea of what what potential dollars the legislaturator is going to have to to work with going into the session. The actual amount that they base their decisions on doesn't happen until the end of February, but this gives us kind of a preview of what the state budget might look like. So, in if we can't get additional funding, which it seems likely, um, or minimal funding at least, uh, some flexibility. The legislature has been generous in the last couple of years in granting school districts flexibility to move funds from one area into another. Uh last year it was the school nutrition funds which could be moved into another fund if we had an excess and if we had a need in a different area. So um we're going to be asking for additional funding but also for additional flexibility and how to use those funds. So Shannon, I'll turn it over to you. >> Thank you. Um the second priority is strong staff, strong schools. Um, and in particular, the ask is, um, I'm not quite sure what the slide is going to say. Okay. Provide districts with flexible funding to maintain strong courses, essential supports, and individualized learning opportunities. Um, in particular, we um are urging the state leaders to partner with school districts to authorize and fund microcredentiing pathways that allow educators and support staff to earn targeted competencies quickly, expanding the pipeline for high need roles. I don't think there's anything additional that you want me to share on that point. >> No, that was beautifully summed up. >> Thank you. >> Very succinct. >> Thank you. Um, and our third bucket pertains to funding flexibility. In an environment where we are unlikely to successfully secure additional funding, flexibility becomes paramount in our ability to provide programming, highquality programming, and keep all of our student outcomes while costs and and wages rise. And so we would ask our legislators to modernize the long-term facilities maintenance um funding so that districts can use those funds for today's safety and technology needs. So, current statute blocks um spending on facility security and most cyber security or technology upgrades. Even if those projects directly protect our students and help keep our schools running, um the the uses of those funds have not been updated for some time. And there uh as we mentioned there are kind of many asks that fall into each of these buckets. And we chose a particular ask to highlight in each of these buckets and are looking to kind of have a conversation with you our board today um to see if you have any additional questions. So, this looks different than some past legislative action programs that you've seen before where we had more like seven buckets >> with three to five asks under each. Um, we stand ready to maintain or or to continue conversations that we've already had with our legislators over the past years. So there are we we have data and talking points for many asks in in these three buckets. Um and I think is that our last slide? Are we ready for questions? >> Yeah. So, with that, uh, we look to the board for any questions or comments or, uh, reprimands, uh, about something we may have put together here that doesn't reflect your, uh, your your thinking, but um, this is this is what we uh are looking to you to bless tonight so that we can present it to our legislators. >> I would Can I add one thing? >> Yes, please. Um, in thinking through how we will present this to our legislators, we really spent time thinking about what does it look like to package an easily consumable ask so that when we're handing a platform to a group of legislators, there's not 7,000 words on a piece of paper. and to make it clean and clear and concise um in that sort of packaging way. Whereas what will get put on our LAC page of the um Hopkins School's website will be a more robust PDF with lengthy detailed bullet points around some of these topics that we have addressed uh peripherilally. And that way um there's a really clean and simple easy way for us to say these are the three things that we're prioritizing. let's have a conversation. And if you want to read more, click here, go here, and dig in deep. And I think that it's just a little bit of a different approach to the way that we have done it in the past. And so I would absolutely be open to hearing your feedback on that and if you have thoughts on on that approach. >> Thank you for that, Jen. I also think um important context for the board is um and it's something that the LACE just takes for granted but our legislature is on a cycle. So is this a policy year or a funding year >> because that does shape our platform. >> It's a policy year. So, what you'll find in a policy year is we um don't heavy hit the funding um because that's that's what we'll hear immediately from legislators that we talk to is it's not a funding year and so they kind of just ignore us when we talk about that. It's always an ask. Um but we hit that strong in a funding year. So this year is a policy year. So when we develop platforms in a policy year, we make sure that we're really hitting those because that's what the legis legislators want to hear because that's something they can do something about in this session. >> Um so that's just a little context for why it >> Yeah, >> you might be thinking like, well, where's the funding formula? Where's >> the subtext is give us more money. Yes, >> but that's not something they would really address in a policy year. So, >> yeah. >> So, because chair and on that side of the table, is Vice Chair Ross driving right now? >> Yes. Take the wheel. >> Vice Chair Ross. >> Are there any questions for my board cohort? >> I I do have one, Vice Chair Ross. Thank you. >> Sure. >> Okay. Um, so, uh, Chair Andre, to your point about this being a policy year, I just want to clarify for anybody who might be like looking at this and say, "Wait, you said there wasn't nothing about funding, but there is stuff about funding." It's that we're asking the legislator legislature to change the rules around how we can use the money. We're not asking for more money this year because, to your point, they'll say, "No, that's not what we're doing this year." Um, I think the the updated format is excellent. Um, over the past three years, we've seen our format become simplified more and more, and I actually think it's more impactful this way, um, because of all of the points you mentioned. Um, one point that I would add is that this format's really helpful for community members who are newer to advocacy, um, to really wrap their minds around the big buckets and have some talking points when they go to town hall conversations with their legislators, when they run into them at the coffee shop, um, that type of thing. So, I think you're doing a great service to our community members, too, who um, are interested in being involved with advocacy but sometimes don't quite know what the pathway is or or what they should be saying. Um this is related to the uh increase the safe schools levy bucket. Um one of the the talking points or data points that you might want to consider there when you're talking with legislature legislators um is uh Dr. James Densley's research on what actually does keep students and staff safe in schools. Um so there's kind of this knee-jerk reaction right now in the political space around hardening our schools, right? um there is there are copious amounts of data to show that that is not effective. In fact, it has um the adverse effect. Um so I think that would be um a helpful message to continue to um kind of push at the legislature so that our decision makers understand really what the research says and what the best practices are. >> Thank you. >> That's all. and thank you so much for being here and for all of this work. >> Yeah, thank you very much. Um, anytime of course that we can emphasize to our legislators and communities that these efforts are sound and researchbased, um, you're right, we should highlight those. So, I did take that name down and we will consider the incorporation of that. I appreciate the feedback. Um, and a quick point of clarification as you mentioned like, well, of course, this is talking about funding. I mean, we can't get away from it. of course, it's kind of the basis upon which we operate. But the the safe schools levy would um it has not it's set currently set at $36 per student and that hasn't changed since the time of its inception. So back in the early 201s and so it has remained at $36 for more than a decade now despite our costs and needs growing there kind of exponentially. So this safe schools levy instead of directly asking the state for it would allow districts to levy their community members directly in a way that we already do um for the safe schools purpose but expand the dollar amount in alignment with the association of metropolitan school districts ask. >> Nice. >> Any other questions, comments? >> Vice Chair Ros. >> Yes, please. This is a question I can also ask my superintendent colleagues, but for strong staff, strong schools, you mentioned funding microcredentiing pathways, which we have those opportunities here, but in your research is um is that kind of professional learning common in other districts? I have not engaged in that conversation with other superintendents. >> Micro credentiing, >> I can't really speak with any authority on that. Who can Dr. Erdle is saying some yes, some no. Not not quite common yet. So, we're we're ready we're on the leading edge of that. >> Yeah. And it actually that um came from um a conversation at the board table about what Hopkins does and that that is a way not um I think a very innovative way to grow >> our own staffing within the district and to have them trained. um in a way that's cost-effective for them and then also you know enriches the district. >> Yeah. Package professional learning in small doses. >> Yes. >> Align to competencies. >> Yes. >> And makes it a very manageable process. >> Yeah. And so that staff can if they want to advance along a pathway. >> Thank you. >> Any other questions? Vice Chair Ross. >> Yes, sir. >> Yes. Hello. >> Directors are >> Yeah. Um, hi LC. Uh, so just to echo what Director West Morland said, I I really like the more streamlined uh handout. I think it's if you ask for more, you're more likely to get what you or if you want ask for in a denser kind of concerted way, you're more likely to get something. Um, one thought and question, and I don't need a response necessarily, just some thinking, is um, have you considered, um, putting some material in here to educate our local legislators about, uh, what Hopkins is, right? You know, I think it's, you know, we're we're kind of operating that that you know, all these things are like self-evident that we wouldn't want, but like is there anything that we can kind of just say like, you know, we are asking for some things, but here is like what it the impact and the positive things it'll do for our community uh you know, e economically or socially or whatever. Um it just seems maybe uh we can educate our our local legislators about who we are as well and our some of our outcomes. Just a thought. Well, we do try and do that on any anytime we're lobbying the legislator, a legislator to act because they want they want to know how it's going to affect us personally and um they love being able to speak from experience and um we like to give them some data that they can carry into committee meetings or on floor debates at the legislature. But yes, we we try and do that specific items. >> We do that um I think very robustly at the legislative breakfast that we host every year. Um, also I know the LAC used to produce a book literally and most of that was educational in nature to educate our legislators about um not just Hopkins but about the state of education. Um, and I think that most found it overwhelming. Um, and I think that one of the ways that the LACE does that education is through developing relationships with our our representatives. And um when we find that we have a new one um that relationship building happens I think more intensely at the beginning to let them know who Hopkins is and also the role of well their role in um providing for and supporting public education. I've always been struck by what a great job the LACE does with that >> and because of the longevity of the LACE and then also the kind of the longevity of several of our lawmakers that are that represent us of which we currently have nine >> nine. >> Um it is at least fairly well established like going to them who Hopkins is. Um but your point about highlighting specific benefits um is a good one. And >> and >> anytime we make an ask >> Yeah. And this is a draft. Um so often what we'll do is we get Hopkins specific numbers to put in to talk about the impact. Um, and if it doesn't make it into this very um, nicely designed platform, it will definitely be part of our our breakfast presentation where we give those statistics and data to them. Yeah, I think it's important context when we're having those um relationship building conversations, when we present at the breakfast, when we give the nuts and bolts sort of um bite-size pieces of information that are really easy to consume and then bring back to their own work outside of Hopkins. Um so that when we say things you know like 12 to 15% of our revenue is diverted into private school um services for our students. Um we have in Hopkins actually a really high an unusually high um number of private schools and charters in our district. So that students who would be enrolled in Hopkins schools that choose to enroll in private schools carry with them a higher percentage of that of that funding in Hopkins than they might in another district. And so having that data that we're able to carry into those conversations to say this is how this um piece of legislation affects Hopkins in a way that might look different than it affects another school district um is is really key to developing those thoughtful conversations. So we do annoy I'm sure uh Nick and Fonda and Roa um pretty incessantly asking for um really specific data around what the impact of these decisions are in Hopkins so that we can paint that picture for them. It's important, you know, not they don't have a lot of context when they go in and they're voting on a piece of legislation. it. There's no requirement for them to ask tell me the total dollar amount of this and there's no requirement for school districts to say this is the dollar impact of that decision. So it only happens when we choose collectively to share that information. And so I think we've done a really good job of like making that a part of our conversation whenever we can. >> Yeah. Um, >> and by we, I mean they, >> LAC, they, >> um, I also think it's important, and part of what I think makes the LACE really powerful is our student board reps also serve >> Yeah. >> on the LACE and they love it. So, they get really um, uh, excited about doing that and they have created videos for us in the past that talk about the direct impact of legislation that we're proposing. Um, so that's another layer of providing what you were um, uh, recommending, Director Xiao. Um, that really tangible impact. >> Yeah, it's really powerful when a student says, "I can't get to this program because I don't have transportation to get there." >> Y >> um, it's much more powerful to hear that from a student than it is to hear it from a grown-up. >> Yeah. Or I still think about the video of school nutrition, the universal meals where they held up the >> baggie of change which was how one kid paid their >> their school lunch debt. >> Yeah. So, >> one comment that one, thank you guys for putting this work together and um the depth that you go and walking us through this. Unfortunately, I'm going to use my ADHD side and ask a contrarian question. Knowing that the governor's race is November 3rd of 2026, do you guys see I guess how interested do you think these um goals and objectives will be to be able to to try and like lay the groundwork. My assumption is going to be Tim Walls versus whoever the Republican side decide they're going to go with. Will this just be an evolution in case you're not able to get any traction this year to All right. Now, we're going to ask for funding and we're going to do something different for 2027 because I guess I'm looking at March is probably when they're going to realistically might do something with funding. more likely May 17th, I think. >> They always seem to go to the end of the session, >> and sometimes beyond as we've seen. Um, I I don't think we really think too much about the governor in the in this whole whole process because it's the reps and the senators that really make the the decisions. So, they're the ones we try and influence. um the governor has to approve it finally, but um as we really concentrate more on our representatives and and senators, and it's going to be interesting. We've got some lame ducks in there this year. So, um we've got two senators who have announced that they're no longer they're not going to run again. And we've got a representative that's announced that he's not going to run for that seat again. He's going to run for a Senate seat. So, um, and who knows what other changes might happen in the next couple of months, but, um, it'll be an interesting session. So, and we'll know more on Thursday when the budget forecast comes out. >> And, and certainly to your point, even if the governor's race doesn't factor as heavily, um, in addition to the lame ducks, we've got, you know, many of them are running again. And so it kind of felt even more imperative that we hone our message and deliver it as like sharply as possible because you're right, there will be attention split and there will be people either jumping on or not willing to touch a cause because of its perceived effect on their race. And and so those sorts of things are absolutely on our mind. And >> yeah, >> thank you guys all. Any other questions, guidance? >> Thank you. >> Oh, are we done? >> We are now. >> I I think the the board chair has to dismiss us, I think. >> Get to your voting, please. >> Do your voting. >> Thank you, LAC. Um, so the, um, I would look for a motion that the board adopts the LAC's state legislative platform for 2026. >> So moved. >> I have a motion. Is there a second? >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please say I. >> I. I. >> Any opposed? The chair votes I and the legislative action coalition platform is approved. Thank you so much. Alex for all your work. >> Thanks. >> And just um so you know, I do take I I shop this around everywhere. Um and everyone is delighted to get it. >> So other board members find great value in the work you do. >> Thanks. >> It's true. Before we go, I'd just like to invite the board to our legislative breakfast, which is January 30th this year. >> All right. January 30th. >> Mhm. >> Is it the board calendar? >> Chuck. >> They haven't put it on their personal calendar. >> That's what >> Jen and Jason, >> we can still come. >> Yes. >> Yes. I'll probably figure it. >> Um, and that uh takes us to the certification of the 2025 pay 2026 tax levy. Um, I would invite uh D caring to the um I hope I pronounced that correctly. Did I >> caring >> caring um to the table and turn it over to Dr. Mary Perry Reed. Thank you, Chair Andre. So on September 25 earlier this year, the board certified the proposed property tax levy at the maximum for fiscal year 25. And earlier this evening, our interim director of business services, DD Carring, provided an update to the board during the workshop and also conducted the truth and taxation hearing open to the public which began at 6:15. And so at this time, Miss Carring will review the proposed property tax levy for pay 26 for um hopefully the board's adoption. Thank you, Dee, for being here. Thank you. Um I get this a little closer. Um thank you very much. Um as a superintendent mentioned, we did have a truth in taxation and the board was briefed on the levy certification prior to that. Uh the levy the proposed levy for the general fund um 15 million or 52,549,730. Community service fund 1,3,859. The debt service fund 19,497,4946. The total property tax levy 73,51,535. It's an increase of 5.9%. This increase is mostly due to the uh voter approved bonds that took place in November of 2026. And with that ask the board to approve the certified levy at the 73,51,535. >> Thank you. Are there any comments or questions from my board colleagues? Well, I would um direct our public to the full presentation that was provided at our truth and taxation hearing. Um you can review it um online. There was a lot of really good information contained within that. Um, and I think that if there are questions after viewing that, certainly um, feel free to email the board. Um, and we are, um, looking at, I would say, approving this. Um, so I would look for a motion to um approve the um certification of the Wait, the board approves the resolution. Is it a resolution? Do we need to read this out? >> I didn't provide you with the resolution, but >> Okay. >> Okay. I would look um for a motion that the board approves the uh certify certification of the 2025 um pay 2026 tax levy. >> So moved. >> Uh I have a motion. Is there a second? >> Second. >> There um is a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> Seeing none, all those in favor, please say I. Chair Andre, does it have to be a roll call? It says >> it is not a resolution. So, no roll call is needed. Thank you for clarifying. Um, I would look for Oh, wait. All those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> I. >> Any opposed? The chair votes I. And the 2026 pay 2026 tax levy is approved. Thank you so much for your time. Yeah, thank you. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you, DD. >> And that takes us to our comprehensive achievement and civic readiness annual report and winter data review. I would like to invite um directors Erdle and Vang to the board table. Oh, and there's a bonus. >> We have a bonus presenter and I will turn it over to Dr. Mary Perry Reed. Thank you, Chair Anderson. So, this particular agenda item is about student achievement. And um if you're familiar with the the term world's best workforce, which striving for the world's best workforce was a bill that was passed in 2013 to ensure every school district in the state of Minnesota was making progress toward improving student achievement. And now world's best workforce is called comprehensive achievement and civic readiness. And if you love acronyms, you can call it CACR for short. But I don't know how we would say that phonetically. >> We say ker, >> do you? >> We do. >> I will not say that. >> I don't blame you. H. So the comprehensive achievement and civic readiness sets five goals for districts to improve achievement and this is around preparing students for lifelong learning, active community participation through increasing achievement, closing learning and opportunity gaps and ensuring students are ready for college careers and of course graduation which has to happen before college and careers. Okay. So, I'm going to turn it over to our director of innovation design and learning, Dr. Anne Erle, and to our district assessment and school data coordinator coordinator, IA Vang, and to our literacy specialist and coordinator, Kim Smith. >> Is that your title? >> Close enough. >> Yes. Okay. Well, >> so thanks. I know that um putting together this report, I know that you spend hours literally. So, thank you for the preparation and um we're happy to receive the information. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thanks for having us here tonight. Um Dr. Mary Perry Reid and board members. Um so, we are situating the CACER report within the context of our winter data report. Um, Natalia, you can go to the next slide, please. So, just as a reminder, tonight we're going to talk about the comprehensive achievement and civic readiness report as well as um literacy data from our fall screening season and social emotional well-being data from our um fall screening season as well. So, we'll start with the comprehensive achievement and civic readiness formerly as Dr. Mary Perry Reed mentioned formerly known as the world's best workforce. You can go ahead. So the focus of um this will be really around a retrospective of goals from last year. We are not talking about this year's goals. So the comprehensive achievement and civic readiness statute requires districts to annually report progress towards goals outlined in their existing strategic plans. So as such today we're going to be kind of backwards looking and evaluating the goals from 2425 strategies and actions highlighting strengths and some areas of progress and then places where um our approaches might need some refinement. Some of the data that is included in this ker report such as graduation rates, ACT results are things you've already seen um through other data reports that we've done. However, because the state requires us to compile these into a single comprehensive report um that's submitted annually on December 15th, that is why we're presenting it here tonight in within like this packaging. Um the other thing I want to mention is that CACER is new this year and it replaced the former world's best workforce. So we entered into our goal setting process for 2526 with some limited guidance and incomplete information about what this plan was going to entail. We knew it would be very similar to World's Best Workforce, but we didn't have a complete picture of what was going to be required on the on the plan. And so we did despite that we did continue on with our typical goal setting process um that you know we do annually using vision 21 as our strategic plan. So these goals uh guide but are distinct from the from the khacker plan. And so one of the important things that Dr. Dr. Campy and I work really closely together with our school leaders is to ensure that these state required plans are aligned with our school plans are aligned with our federal required plans so that we are building this coherent system um both for funding decisions but also outcome measures as well. Um so with that with all of that sort of context um we're going to talk about some information from last year and then um identify future moving steps. So the first goal is all children are ready for school. This goal required that 80% of students in our Hopkins prek program be rated proficient on the spring work sampling system within the personal and social development domains. Uh, just so you know, the work sampling system is an observational portfolio-based assessment system that gives teachers a holistic picture of each child's development through authentic classroom observations rather than a formalized testing. And as the data show, this goal was met and exceeded with proficiency continuing to rise each year, demonstrating really positive growth in our youngest learners. Um, and these results reinforce what we know is true. Children who attend preschool in Hopkins enter kindergarten wellprepared and are positioned for long-term success. Um, high quality, accessible early learning experiences matter. And our director of early childhood has worked um really intentionally to make sure that we are expanding access through sighting skills tuitions, targeted outreach, inclusive programming, and strong strong partnerships with our families. This slide is um goal number two, achievement gaps are closed, which it aligns really directly with our vision 2031. So this goal was to reduce the MCA reading achievement gap between white and students of white students and students of color. And the data show that the gap actually increased slightly from 33.4% 4% in 2023 to 34.8% in 2024. This was an increase of 1.4% rather than the 2% decrease we had targeted and therefore this goal was not met. While white student proficiency remained relatively stable, proficiency for students of color declined, which did widen the gap. And as you know, we are working diligently to interrupt these patterns through strengthened literacy instruction, professional learning focused on science of reading, implementation of foundational skills blocks, leadership capacity building and support for our schools. And Kim is going to speak later on specifically to literacy data and what we are doing to accelerate reading growth for our students. The next goal reflects the a retrospective on college and career readiness, specifically the percentage of Hopkins 11th graders earning a composite ACT score of 21 or higher. Hopkins met this target with 48% of students reaching the benchmark on the April school ACT, school day ACT. A notable accomplishment given statewide trends and shifting test taking patterns. Over the past five years, Hopkins students have consistently outperformed state and national averages and Hopkins has remained very stable, which demonstrates the strength and resilience of our programming. This stability indicates that students continue to be wellprepared for college ready benchmarks even as some national participation patterns change. While the ACT is only one measure of readiness, it aligns with vision 2031 and our profile outcomes and complements other indicators such as course rigor, advanced coursework access, and career pathway engagement. Looking ahead, we'll continue strengthening math and literacy instruction, which are key contributors to ACT success, while maintaining our focus on multiple measures of readiness beyond this just this test score. This slide reflects the four-year graduation rate reported on the Minnesota report card showing that 84.7% of Hopkins students, that's high school and virtual edu, graduated within four years. This is below the goal of 87.4, meaning that the goal was not met. As we shared with the board in August, our internal high school data indicates a difference between our locally verified graduation rate and the rate reported by the state. And IA is continuing to work closely with our high school data team to understand the source of this discrepancy and ensure that all student records are accur accurately reflected in state reporting. But at the same time, we are implementing several strategies to support students who are not yet on track to graduate. For example, our cultural liaison are actively partnering with specific student populations to address barriers and improve engagement. And we are launching a new after-school credit recovery program for seniors this winter to address credit deficiencies earlier than we have in past years. So these efforts are part of our broader commitment to ensuring that every student has a clear and supported pathway to graduation. Finally, the last goal is all students become lifelong learners. We are very pleased to share as you all are well aware that the district met this goal by selecting a new K through5 core math curriculum. Imagine I am. This evidence-based and equitable program aligns with our district learning goals and strengthens the foundational math skills that students rely on throughout their academic careers. Highquality early math instruction is essential to developing the confidence, problem solving skills and curiosity that support lifelong learning. And this adoption positions our youngest learners for long-term success. So with that, I am going to transition to IA and she is going to share some information first about student well-being as measured by Panorama. >> Thank you. Hello everyone. So at Hopkins, we currently use the Panorama survey in grades 3 to 12 to screen and measure students social emotional wellness. We want to note for the board though that some school leaders, especially our elementary leaders, principles um have raised some concerns about whether this tool fully meets their needs. Um so as a system we are actively reviewing the measure and considering potential adjustments while keeping in mind that it is important to maintain consistency and coherent data across the district. So some context there. Um so the penoma survey asks students how um how supported they feel at school and how they are doing emotionally. Students in grades three to five respond to two surveys. The support and environment survey has questions about their school experience related to topics like belonging, relationships, and expectations. The other survey, which is the student competency and well-being survey, include questions about positive experiences, feeling welcome and supported in schools and skills that help them deal with challenges. Similarly, older students who are grades 6 to 12 also reported to also respond to two survey similar survey. So the support and environment survey asks about inclusion, respect, and how connected they feel to school. There's also a greater focus on cultural awareness and diversity and inclusion along with questions about personal skills to like managing their emotions and also staying motivated. Please note that last year the grades 35 surveys were revised to make the student the survey more easily accessible to our third grade students. That was a challenge. Um and so because of that re revision in the next few slides you won't see any national percentile comparison because of that. But before we look at it I want you to understand when I say favorable percentages they're like what is happening? I want to kind of explain some context first. So before we look at the results here's how the survey works. Each topic has a set of questions. For example in this example right here sense of belonging is one topic in the student supports and environment survey. Students answer four question in that topic. They choose from three possible responses. If a student picks one of the green responses, it's not green on the survey, but I just wanted you to know that those were the responses. It counts as a favorable answer. In the next slides, you'll see the percentage of students who chose a favorable answer for each question. Then these percentages are average to get the overall favorable score for that topic. So what I am reporting on is the overall favorable score for each topic. Providing more context, it is important to know know that grades three five use a three choice skill. So a three-point liker scale on the survey. So their posit so their scores are going to be more positive than the 612 surveys because the 612 survey uses five liker scale. So they use five choices. So instead for example for sense of belonging there there's five options that students can choose from for 612. for grace 35 is just three option. Um so yes we can move on. All right so now here are the results from this fall. So students took this in October. 91.2% of students in grades three fi 3 to 5 participated in the student support and environment survey. Overall they feel very supported at school with high expectations and sense of belonging both scored at 95% positive. Belonging improved the most since last spring, increasing by two percentage points. And the supportive relationship score 84%, but it also improved slightly. 91.5% of students in grades 35 participated in the student competency and well-being survey. Students report feeling mostly positive, 96% and show strong social awareness, 94%. Emotion reg regulation is also high at 91 91%. The biggest improvement was the topic challenging feelings increasing of two percentage points. Growth mindset did decline by two percentage points from spring 2025 to fall 2025. For this survey, 79.9% of students grades 6 to 12 participated in this one. Overall, students reported having supportive relationships. about 83% but engagement is very low 25%. Compared to grades three to five students, grades six to 12 students reported less favorable in sense of belonging which is 51%. They also reported less favorable in academic expectations 58%. Both of these topics are below national averages showing areas where students may need more support. >> The two topics that had an increase of five percentage points are respect and sense of belonging. So even though sense of belonging was low, there was an increase in that topic. And the last survey, 81% of students in grades 6 to 12 participated in the student competency and well-being survey. Students share mixed feelings. So for positive feelings, 62% uh rated it favor favorable. Challenging feelings was 56%. Emotion regulation went down by four percentage points to 49%. And then growth mindset is the lowest score at 36%. Which is consistent with also our grades 3 to five with growth mindset. So overall I think one of the things that we can do is to make sure that we have a higher percentage of students participating especially at the secondary level um to build more of a comprehensive um more students represented in that data for sure. Um something to look forward to in the winter. Um, but besides that, these are different topics of focus that schools can do and every school also has their own data that they also specifically look at. >> And then now I will turn to Kim. >> Thank you. We're going to look at literacy and you'll notice it's called literacy in action. And I think that's because we are sort of on the cusp of moving from compliance with all of the redact training into some really actionable steps that should see some some pretty solid outcomes. So I think we're the work we've been doing with literacy feels really exciting right now. Um you can see there kind of our data strategy. We've really been looking at the district level very closely at our data specifically into like individual programs, schools, grade levels. Um we've then moved that to the classroom level and actually created classroom response or district response things teachers can do in five minutes a day that will change outcomes by winter um based on specific areas. um and then moving that also into uh our work with the schools. And so we'll talk a little bit more about that as we go through the slides. Um I'm going to start kind of with a little bit of an overview on the read act. So when we think about language arts and reading, there's always sort of a tension. So at the early grades, a huge part of those ELA standards are about how to learn to read, those foundational skills. And as we move up into the middle school, those foundational skills fall away and it's more focused on ELA kinds of things. ELA teachers often do not see themselves as teachers of reading. They're much more focused on um comprehension, text analysis, synthesis, content learning, text structures, themes, plot, all of those kinds of language arts things that are separate from how to read. Um and so when we look at kind of the read act, it's looking at a couple different areas. On the left, you'll see we have kind of the K12 ELA reading pieces. Those pieces that are in the ACT and the SAT, NAPE, all have reading pieces. Um, the MCA all align to the standards. So, those grow with their relationship to ELA in a way that's more similar to like our standards grow. um our fastbridge early reading, a reading and auto reading help us dig into the actual reading skills, looking at those specific skills needed at different grade levels to be a successful reader to be able to access and read um and be successful with those ELA standards. And then we also always have some kind of local standards aligned assessments at the classroom level. One thing that's new this year is there is now a 4th through 12th grade screener for dyslexia. So this is brand new as part of the read act and this is the first year. Um MDE selected only one assessment that we can use. Um it's called CAP read basics and it is designed to identify characteristics of dyslexia and other reading difficulties. Um and the test looks more at those reading skills and is not focused on like ELA standards. So it's much more looking at foundational skills but it's one of the first assessments that does that specific to secondary students. Uh, one thing that we want to are trying to be really clear with people about is we we don't diagnose dyslexia. All we can do is look for characteristics of dyslexia, provide relevant instruction based on what we notice as needs and communicate to families. But dyslexia is actually diagnosed through a medical process. Um, and so the best what we do is communicate. Um, there are a combination of challenges related to kind of parsing out reading from ELA. And so that's kind of one of the pieces that we're we're continually working on. Um the next slide you'll kind of see kind of a visual of this. So we have our K12 ELA standards. A subcomponent of that is how are kids reading across K12? And then a subgroup of that is do we have kids who have characteristics of dyslexia. So at K3 we'll use be using fastbridge. Um and at 412 we'll be using cap capy read basics. A little bit more about captive read basics. So it's given universally. We give it universally to all 9th graders. This year we're about waiting awaiting about 20% who have not yet tested. Um some of the challenges that we faced have been just giving a assessment at the high school is really challenging with a block schedule. We can't say everyone will take it in ELA because not everybody has ELA during the quarter. And so that makes it really challenging. We've tried doing it during uh Royals Connect, but that's also hard because kids are pulled during that time for various programs and things. Um, so we're we're hoping to get that last kind of 20% done. Um, the six subtests that are on the CAPY screener are listed there and you can see most of them are very short assessments and then there is one longer reading comprehension. Um, Ian and I actually went out and and were there for the first administration. We sat in classrooms. We talked to students to ask about their experience, whether they would want it on two days and split up, whether they'd rather do it all in one. Um, and gathered some good data that way. Um, and we're actually giving it earlier than was required by MDE this year. Um, initially they wanted it given in the fall, but their process was delayed, so they said by winter. We jumped as quickly kind of as we could so that we can build up our our training and our reports and understanding of how it works within our system. Um, let's see. We can go on. You can see here's kind of an example of one of the reports. So far, we're really pleased with Capy. It's very easy to use. The the system is easy for kids to log into. The reports are easy to read. Um, customer support has been great. Um, and you can see just even with the kids that we've tested so far, there are a fair number that need support with decoding still. Um, and especially with fluency. Um, and that fluency is kind of a variety of reasons. I think that's kind of a national trend as we see kids reading less for pleasure. Um, and just reading in general. And so, um, you get better at what you practice and if you're not practicing it as much, you don't get as fluent at it. And so, um, that's kind of a trend nationwide, but we do have some kids that have already been identified that could benefit from some more advanced decoding kinds of work so that they can be successful with their coursework. For FastBridge, we uh screen all K through 8th graders universally. Um, the subtests kind of vary based on the grade and they change throughout the year to match kind of the development and key predicting prediction indicators. Um, we have improved our completion rate across our site. So, we're glad about that. Um, and we test actually beyond the read act subtest requirements so that we're able to access what's called the screening to intervention report. And by doing that fasttrack assessment components, it gives us a little like report and it's I know it's a really small screenshot on the right there, but what it gives teachers is based on your specific class, here are some interventions. Here's what you need to do tier one with your whole class to change outcomes. And then here are specific groups of kids who would benefit from interventions. And then those interventions are linked within the fastbridge system. You can use others, but there are recommendations in there. And then you can actually uh do the progress monitoring right in the fastbridge website. Uh the subtest change. So there's early reading in K1. That's really measuring those early foundational skills. The CBMR is the reading fluency and decoding um accuracy. The A reading is more of reading comprehension. And then the auto reading is given in fourth through eight. And that's really more kind of advanced decoding, morphology, vocabulary, those kind of pieces that are needed for long-term reading success. So, we'll kind of get into the data. Um, this first one is the district for early reading. And what you're looking at here is winter a year ago and then fall of last year, winter of last year, and spring of last year, and then fall of this year. And I wanted to kind of give you that longitudinal data so you can sort of see the trends that are happening over the course of the year. Um, and so what one of the things that we know is that the expectations in fall are significantly lower than the expectations in the spring. So this is not the kind of test where it the the expectation grows based on where you need to grow. So what we need to see from every classroom is that they're making at least a year or more growth towards what the expected growth is to be maintaining sort of the proficiency rate. Um in the fall for for kindergarten especially the the benchmark to be kind of like on target is very low um or to be low risk is very low. It's concepts of print is rated very heavily. It's things like directionality. Can you point to the difference between a word and a sentence? Um can you point to the difference between a letter and a word? So very very kind of basic skills. Um and then that grows really really quickly over the course of that year. The other thing to kind of just orientate yourself to is the hot pink is the high-risisk category. The light pink is some risk and then the light purple here is um low risk category. And that that's the only categories for K and one. And then we'll see when it changes in second to adding in a meets target category. So this next one is looking specifically at kindergarten. And you can see the subtests that are listed there. They stay fairly consistent across the year. Onset sounds falls off by spring. Um concepts of print is only given in the fall and then you can see we add in sight words um in the spring. Uh one of the trends that we are are seeing is that our kindergarten in general is coming in lower every year. Um and so we're trying to do a lot of work with our community with kindergarten readiness to to to build that up a little bit. Um and that's a trend that I think is not unique to Hopkins. Um the in the fall the expectation for kindergarten is to know three letters. So they are able to score in that lowrisisk category with a very small number. Most kids know that just from knowing their name. Um it doesn't necessarily mean they have a strong like readiness to kindergarten learning yet. And so um the expectations for them to grow over the course of the year is significant. in first grade. Um you can see that first grade is significantly more flat um over the course of the year and it's been pretty stable. The other pieces to consider if our kindergarteners are coming in lower and our first grade is staying flat, we actually think that's kind of a sign of growth because they're maintaining that proficiency even though the kids have come in lower the year previous. So we're really hopeful that that's a sign of our UFly and our our letters work starting to show some fruition even though the kids are coming in lower. So, it's something we're watching really closely. Um, again, you can see that the subtest stay pretty much the same. Sentence reading um falls off there in first grade. Uh, CBMR is our kind of our best predictor as far as how kids are reading. It's kids reading one-on-one with their teacher. Um, and the teacher is indicating both errors that students make, so that accuracy rate, and the fluency, so the how many words they're reading per minute. Um across the district, we're seeing kind of some ups and downs. Um one of the things that we really need as families to support reading at home because like I said before, the only way to get better is to practice. And so reading fluency comes from practice. Um and so the more that we have kids who are coming in less ready, the more instructional time that's needed and the less time that's available for just practice. Um you'll see here on this slide that there's also that lighter lavender at the top. Those are kids who meet target. And then the per the darker purple is is low risk. And then the the pinks remain kind of the same. For the CBMR, it is a one minute timed passage. Um so a kind of short and quick assessment that's given frequently throughout the year, especially as we monitor progress. The next one is the A reading. This one is kind of it's reading comprehension. It's most like an MCA reading passages followed by multiple choice questions. Um again, pretty flat. um across the board on that one. A celebration area that we've seen is that in second grade we are seeing consistent growth um in A-Ring, which is that comprehension measure. And so we're we're really hoping that that's an indicator that our our solid focus in K1 on decoding and foundational literacy is starting to pay off um and lead to greater comprehension by second grade. Um so that's a piece that we're we're paying attention to. We're also doing a lot of kind of studying of what what really is going on in second grade that's helping to lead to that. Um, in general, our second grade teachers were some of our early adopters of UFly and so we we think there's also some connections there. They've had a little bit longer with that tool. >> The auto reading is sort of like the CAPY. Um, it has subcomponents for fourth through 8th grade that look at kind of more advanced decoding, vocabulary, synonyms, morphology, word identification, and encoding, which is spelling. Um, and you'll see that those scores tend to be a little bit higher, which is great. Um, and we're seeing some really good sign in in classrooms of um, especially in grade three, four, and five where we're seeing kind of those scores go up or four, five, I guess, because we don't do that one in third, but those we're seeing growth there. And we think that's in relationship to have adopting fire as a foundational skills in 35. Um and so that in in improved focus especially on morphology, advanced decoding um and spelling we we're thinking is part of why we're seeing increased growth there. Some of the actions that we're taking are to continue our redact training. We have 130 teachers uh finishing volume two this year. We had data meetings with every site um and we included classroom level data reviews in that in that process. Um, we have screening to intervention recommendations. So, that's the piece I was talking about at the beginning. You can see kind of a screenshot of an example on the right hand side. And what we what I did was I took and looked at our specific district data and then looked at what were our lowest areas and what are some quick, fast, easy things that teachers could do right away that could change outcomes. Um, and then those were shared with sites and and and CTT teams. Um, we've implemented the K5 district common assessment for both dictations and writing prompts. and 68 is in development. Uh we are doing literacy learning walks. They'll happen in the next two weeks in every elementary K5 classroom. Um we have launched the Hopkins literacy toolkit for caregivers and we've increased engagement with families prior to kindergarten. Some of our needs are we need strong support for now the implementation. So, we've done kind of some of those beginning read compliance pieces, but now is when the real work starts of actually making sure things are implemented and done well at the classroom level. Um, we need dedicated literacy coaching to ensure that materials and learning strategies are used with fidelity. Uh, we need to maximize investment into early childhood and K2 literacy. And Dr. Erdle referenced this earlier. Every penny spent in kindergarten is maximized because the sooner we can catch kids, the sooner we can keep them from going off track. Um it's it's almost impossible to that's why it was read well by third grade because the data on trying to catch kids after fourth grade is it's not good nation I mean anywhere there there's no magic tricks after that and part of that I think I've shared with the board before is kind of that Matthew effect the rich get richer and the poor get poorer so if you are not reading or if you're not reading well the materials that you're reading stay very limited while kids who are reading well continue to be exposed to much broader topics vocabulary and it the gap widens very quickly. and it's hard to catch up. Um, a consistent data collection system used in every school to ensure adequate or accurate screening results. So, right now we've had some inconsistency with how the assessments have been given. We're tightening that up. Uh, we really need time for teachers to look at and respond to the data. So, those PD days are incredibly valuable and important because without the time to really dig in deep and look at it and then be able to act upon it, um, we're not able to use the dataful in meaningful ways. Um, and then we need an appropriate secondary model to address literacy needs in older students. And I was with Bright Works earlier today. They're our regional literacy network. Um, and there are not great models across the nation for how to do this in in secondary schools without interrupting electives or delaying gratification or graduation or um impacting the same pieces that we looked at earlier. How do how was your growth mindset if you are now pulled out of the classes you are excited about for career preparation to do a reading intervention class? So trying to find that balance of providing kids with what they need and support but also not take away the things that bring them to school. >> Um and finally some of the barriers that we faced. Um there are a ton of unfunded mandates related to the READ Act. Um and multiple priorities that just make it really difficult to provide all the support needed for systemic change. Um there's limited PD time for implementation due to all the days that we're just doing with initial training right now. So that's why I say we're kind of on the cusp. We finished volume two coming up here and we're going to be able to much more heavily focus on implementation and site support. Um our kindergarten students are arriving less ready than in the past and so we need to figure out how we can better communicate with families early um because our best chance is before they even arrive. Um there has been reduced site support due to budget constraints. So we unfortunately lost most of our instructional coaches in the last round and so they are now mostly doing reading intervention. Um but they aren't able to support classroom teachers with implementation. Um we have some varying beliefs around practices around screening and assessment across the system and guidance and timelines from MDE are constantly changing. So for those people with the the legislative action committee or those of you who work with legislators um most of the deadlines are not being met very well. We were supposed to have the interventions by November 1st. Um, we still don't have them. Uh, phase 2 was supposed to be out also November 1st. We just got it last week. So, they're not meeting their deadlines, which then impacts our entire system. We need those pieces so we can plan district PD days as calendars go forth, as budgeting is done. Um, so that's been been definitely a challenge. Um, I would say the other pieces are continually adding things to their website that they don't communicate out. So, for example, nonsense word cut scores were added a couple weeks ago, but it was added after we've done our fall screening. So, then like the data doesn't match. So, I know they're trying to do their best, but it's making it really challenging on the ground. >> That is the end of what we had to share, but we're certainly willing to take any questions or feedback. >> Thank you. I appreciate you being here tonight. Um, this is an information only presentation, but I think it's important information. So, um, any comments or questions from my board colleagues? >> Uh, chair and >> yes, >> do you have a few questions? Thank you so much for coming to do this presentation. I know that putting together such a robust um, you know, uh, slideshow had to be a lot of brain work. So, thank you. Um I do just have a few questions and just a few a few point matters to address quickly. One, so as a testing coordinator, right, I do testing coordinating for um a different district. Was just wondering um for that data point that we're seeing in some of the numbers. Are we looking at um or have there been any consideration of the students who are literally just like clicking through the test? um you know I as I proctor tests I see students all the time just clicking through right and then so even working and proctoring test to our ASD students who may have a little bit who are non-verbal or who um are still required to take the same test um uh and who may have like a little bit more uh developmental delays again you know they're clicking through the test and then those numbers are being um added into the overall all data then that's sent to the state and then like we're getting you know that we're still like in this achievement gap. So are there any is there any thoughts about how to do the rec not the recording but to um gather data differently than what we have in the past because I could just see that with the with um with the more electronic testing. I could see more students just clicking through and I do not believe that is truly because um you know they are like behind and some are. I do think that students are just tired of the excessive testing that um excessive testing that is happening. Um I've already proctored like four tests since September and so kids are over tested and I I'm I'm a very big component of um advocating for this and so um and that's something that some uh educators are talking about as like a nationwide conversation like the role of assessments and how we could look at it differently. So that's just one um observation and kind of like question comment. And then the second one is also around um AEES and their um and them leading small groups. So I know that we often tend in classrooms to pull students out or teachers or you know will have AE supporting small groups. Um, and some of these AEES are not trained with the proper instruction or uh ped uh, how do you say pedology? >> Pedig. Yes. Thank you. >> And you're talking about pair professionals, right? >> I don't know what are. >> Yeah. Oh, sorry. Uh, associate educators or pair professional. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. >> Yes. So, some of them are leading groups and they're not, you know, like they're not trained or do not have the the proper instructional hours that teachers have, but they're leading these groups where they're supporting these students with reading and math and they're teaching it in a different way that teachers are um you know, instructing it. And so, I can also see that being a big gap as well when we're pulling on AEES to support instruction and they don't have the instruction training. And so is there any conversations around um you know thinking differently about the role of a AE in a classroom because I just don't I just don't see that being effective moving forward. >> Yeah. >> We've had a lot of conversations. So our pair of professionals are going through redact training this year. They will get eight hours of intensive training. Um, and we are really trying to shift our model so that the the most trained person is working with the most needy students, which means that it may be the classroom teacher who's working with the with the students who need the most attention and that our prayer professionals are working with the students who need the least amount of support during that grouping time. Um, and so that is a shift that we are making and have made in some spaces already. I think the what I would add um to your the previous question around the clicking through I mean we know that that's a thing and I know um Kim has has mentioned before that that becomes even more true the older kids get they feel even less sort of interested and it's and the the the way that the tests with the littles work is um it's it's really teacherled and so it's harder to do that but to your point when our staff is looking at the student by student data, they they typically will recognize if a student's performance on the assessment does not match what they see every day. And so I think at the at least at the student and classroom level, our teachers are, you know, are able to recognize that. But to your point, it does still feed into, you know, what we are seeing at the district level and then in some cases what we have to report to the state. It's there's definitely an impact. All right. Thank you so much because I'm seeing it in real time. I'm like, "Okay, this is absolutely a problem that I could see going into the future where we're still just kind of giving these reports." And then just one quick thing is, is there a way is there any training for parents on the curriculum? Because I'm a '9s kid. I was taught extremely different on how to read and do multiplication than what I'm teaching students now. And what my and what my uh students are bringing home. I'll be quite honest and I feel a little embarrassed to say this, but sometimes I don't understand the homework that they bring home as a second grader and I'm like, "Oh my goodness." And so I think I don't think that there is a um I think there's just a disconnect between how parents are teaching and knowing how to do the homework. Um >> absolutely >> at at home. So I think there's some opportunity for a district training. We've actually been kind of talking about that with our marketing and communications team because uh we attended the kindergarten information night and Kim was there at a table and I mean I don't want to speak for you but like was noticing that some of the questions that families had about what you need to be what you need to be able to do to be ready for kindergarten um were surprising. And so that led us to think what can we do then to provide more community um engagement and information sessions. So we're thinking of maybe you know some kind of a virtual session for anybody who's interested in our community who wants to know what kindergarten readiness actually means and looks like when it comes to literacy and numeracy. So, we we are also concerned and thinking about that because as Kim said, um when kids aren't reading as much at home and getting that practice in, um that really is having a pretty significant impact in their school day as well. >> What were some of those misconceptions? Um I would say things around amount of conversation that should be having knowing how to write their name knowing the letters in their name. Um fine motor skills um yeah self- advocacy some of those just >> okay >> um yeah I think the other piece that was just there was an article yesterday in the 74 that talked about how um parents are reading to their children less. So only 41% of parents were reading to their children under age five. Um and there has been a shift in especially middle-class families believing that early edtech like learning games are more valuable than them reading with their children. >> And the research says that's actually not true. Um but there's sort of this belief that if I if I put my child on this this game that does letters and colorful things and moves that that's a better use of learning than just sitting and reading with them. So, I think there's lots of ways we can engage with our community to help them um know. The the literacy toolkit's gotten a lot of really positive feedback. It's got videos of games. It's got games that are ready to go. It's got all of the cards ready to go. Um and and videos of how to do those things. So, things you can do at home that are just really easy to I I think we don't necessarily want parents teaching, but we would love for parents to practice and take the things that kids have taught and move that into automaticity. Um because the speed is what what needs to increase. Um, >> basic. >> So, the play devil's advocate, >> I'm assuming you guys have seen pre2020 maybe what kindergarteners I'm assuming kindergarteners in 2019 were stronger than the kindergarteners in 2025 is my excuse me, my assumption. 2019 we had about 83% of our kindergarters coming in low risk and right now we're about 65 70 >> 65 is low risk if I'm tracking. Okay. So I'm I'm almost curious, I guess anecdotally, qualitatively, like what changed in 2020 to cause parents because I'll be honest, >> once 2020 happened, we lost our kids because >> yeah, >> they had no like once they were sent home, they had no way to connect with their friends. And so now I cannot pull them back from the screen. >> Yeah. at this point where before >> screen time really was not right >> an issue >> they had 30 minutes >> there was no like a there wasn't a fight at the house >> so I'm wondering parents are still in somewhat survival mode with their kids so I'm just curious like if there's any other surrounding school districts that you guys are seeing like from a benchmark perspective that I don't know I don't want to throw them at like Minnotonka is like I don't know their kindergarteners now versus 2019 are doing better. Our St. Paul I don't something that's probably I guess more comparable to our school district. I mean, I hate because it's like Minnetonka's right next to us and I know that's what everybody always uses as a benchmark, but I don't know if there's somebody help another district in the metro that's more competit more comparable to our district with the makeup to say what happened in 2019 and is at the same trajectory. >> So, I've I'm a part of a a large number of literacy leads across the state and I would say across the state we're seeing sort of a mix. So there are some places where kids are kind of rebounding coming into kindergarten and many places that are sort of like us where it's sort of a a a decline. Um I do know that our neighbor Minnetonka is having lots of conversations around technology use and healthy screen time. Um because as a parent I receive those. So they're regenerating a lot of those conversations that they haven't had recently because they are seeing a lot of technology issues. Um and I think exactly what you said it we we've lost our kids to technology a little and it's much harder to pull them back. Um, and I think pulling back and then dealing with the behaviors that result. And I mean, honestly, it's like an addiction, right? And so then you have to deal with that, pulling it away, um, and deal with that for a while before kids kind of reset themselves. And that's hard. It's really hard, especially for parents who are dealing with lots of other things in a world that's moving quickly and already really stressful. So, >> and assuming that the parent knows that that's even the right thing to do in the first place, >> right? >> So, yeah. No, thank you for I mean this is incredible and for a a non-normmy like everybody else here, I found this very exciting. >> Thank you. >> Um I did want to just comment on one of the questions about the um just the assessment and the ways in which students engage with and show up to that. Um, I think that, you know, one of that's one of the reasons why I appreciate the various goals that are in the CACR report. >> Um, is that it doesn't re rely on one assessment. like I see a clear mix of different ways that we're assessing and um measuring how we are doing in preparing students. So um I really appreciate that because I think it it it solves as best as it can for that >> problem of engaging with assessments. So, I just wanted to to say that I I see that you as a system we're trying to solve for that. So, thank you for that. >> Any other questions or comments? >> Director Xiao. >> Yes. Hi. Uh well, it's uh it's December, so it's data time, so it's kind of like Christmas for me. Um so, so thank thanks for all this stuff. Um one one thing is I was really struck by the growth mindset uh decline from 3 to 5 to 6 to 12. Um I mean it declined like 50%. So >> um you know to me like kind of continuous growth is the whole point of you know the of school existence really. And so, um, what, and I know you kind of talked a little bit about, you know, some, but I'd really like to see some plan or some sort of, um, effort to to get that back up, uh, and stabilize it. Um, because it, to me, it seems like we, uh, at least from the AP results and, um, and, uh, our ACT things that like it looks like we do have growth. So, so why do what is the disconnect between these panorama results? >> Yeah. and uh and and that aspect. >> Yeah, it was really striking to us too. Um one speculation that we had was you know um the even the sort of phrasing of growth mindset. Um while the concept hasn't gone out of fashion, that sort of language for a while was being used really intentionally and directly with students. So, we wondered if if maybe teachers aren't naming that in the same ways that they have been. Um, but but I agree with you. It is concerning and particularly because foundationally um what we want students to believe is that wherever they're at, they will grow. And that's really connected to those three trajectory changing ideas. That's the that's one of the key components of belonging is a student feeling like you know me and you've got me wherever I'm at and you're going to help me grow. And so it's definitely something that we're going to continue to watch um to see if that is a trend over the course of our next administrations and and then and dig into kind of what that means. >> I'd like to add to that. Um there's a report from the Brookings Institute. I did actually send it to our secondary leaders when it came out in um in January of this year. And it talks about the disengagement gap across our nation. Um 26% of 10th graders say they love school. 44% of 10th graders say most of the time they learn a lot in school. 29% of 10th graders say they get to learn things they are interested in. And I was struck by and obviously I've seen these slides before but I am always struck by this engagement at 25% of our that is striking but it also um is consistent with how our secondary students nationwide are reporting on their feelings around school. And then I think there's also a relationship between engagement and rigorous expectations. So in our classrooms where students feel that teachers have high expectations of them and that the learning is not just rigorous but also relevant and real world. Remember those three Rs. Then theoretically my my theory of of action or the hypothesis would be that there's a relationship when there's the high expectations and enga um rigorous expectations then we would theoretically see engagement increase. So what I think is important here because we can disagregate by school and teacher, right? Absolutely. >> I think we need to look classroom by classroom and we never want to, you know, sort of highlight or penalize classrooms or teachers where those marks are lower. But we want to learn from classrooms where we know students are engaged because of high expectations. And you would think that then is also that is also generating a growth mindset. So I'd like us to disagregate by school and teacher to see what are the bright spots and then how do we engage our school leaders in conversation about how we replicate those pedigogies, those restorative conditions in the classrooms, the affective uh dispositions those teachers have because I am confident there is a relationship. Um, and then I was going to ask a question, but I can fall back if our board members have questions. >> And then maybe lastly, um, and I know math wasn't really the focus, but, um, you did mention it with the with the curriculum. When are we going to potentially see some of the, you know, the the green shoots of that? Is it is it too early in the fall or sorry, in the in the spring? >> The green shoots. >> It's like signs of improve. >> Oh, yeah. I know. I know. Um that's a Well, okay. So, this is what I'm thinking. We're coming back in March for our next um for our next sort of data overview. And I think I have been thinking what I would anticipate us being ready to look at in March is really some fidelity around implementation data. Um we've had um Elsa Gaul, our math specialist and our math implementation folks visiting exhaustively visiting classrooms and measuring how many minutes of math are happening. What is the consistency and coherence across the lessons and so I do anticipate in March having that kind of data for the board. Um, I think the, you know, of course I would like to say our MCAs are going to show this spring some tremendous growth. I think um that is probably overly optimistic. I I think there is sometimes um some research that I've read says, you know, you c it can take two to three years to really see the fruits of all of this work. Of course, we hope it's not that long. Um, but I think we can look to and I can ask Elsa to to remind us when she comes. You know, we have um with this specific material set, we do have other districts that we've looked at who have implemented and they're further along than us. So, I think we could look at how long did it take them to really start seeing those good results. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Chair and Dre. >> Yes. >> Uh, could I ask a couple questions? Yeah. >> Uh, thanks for the presentation. Appreciate it. Um Dr. Earl, just sort of a couple quick questions for you. So in slide four, we talked about how World's Best Workforce has been renamed um the CACR. >> Um and there are kind of these five big CACR goals and and so the second one is talking about the uh racial and economic achievement gaps. And then in slide six, we talk about our um proficiency in um as judged by reading MCA scores. >> Um and so was first of all do we we come up with some specific goals? >> We we are the ones who write the goals within those categories. Yep. >> Within those categories. And so was was that the only goal that we wrote within that category? >> It was. Okay. Yes, it was. >> And do we submit the goals themselves to the state as like this is what we're going to work >> only in retrospect? Only in retrospect. Yeah. So this particular report um is due again on due on December 15th, but it is for last year's goals. And so this year we sort of had to look at what some of our other systems goals were and look at what we've used previously for world's best workforce in order to develop this. But I what I think will happen >> um for as we do our goal setting process for next year is we'll use these categories to build out what our sort of systems level goals will be. I I'm just wondering is there any opportunity maybe could the board see the goals as they're being developed or something like that? I I just honestly would just be curious. But >> yeah, I mean typically what our process has kind of been is um we have the three the three strategic goals. So the teaching and learning and then the um culture and then the operations and um the world's best workforce goals have sort of sat alongside those um and then our each of our schools develop goals as well. And so what what we have wondered about is would our system benefit from more of a a shared we're all working toward you know maybe a literacy goal or a math goal or whatever that is versus um sort of leave it um and not that we don't collaborate with our sites but the the schools sort of um create their goals based with their building leadership team and so we've we've explored that idea as well. I think there there might be some opportunity for alignment. >> Yeah, I think that's a great idea. Thank you. Um and then my final question uh for Kim, thanks for your lens on literacy here and on slide 29 looking at the A reading um AC across our whole district and um you know I think that that's good that there's not as much fluctuation. It's fairly stable there. And so, you know, you know, it's right around 6040 and seems like it has been for the last few testing periods. So, I'm just curious sort of in your expertise, you know, what would you like to see that at? And where do you think that could eventually go to? >> Like it to be at 100. >> Okay. >> Yeah, that's my goal. Um, I mean, typically a 3% increase is considered good year-over-year. Um, I would like to focus less on that and every classroom having aggressive growth. Um, because if every classroom has aggressive growth for the majority of their students, then K every kid's making more than a year's growth. So, regardless of where they come into us, they are closing any gaps over time. Um, and if we can do that consistently year-over-year, then we are making sure kids are getting to where they need to be. Um, a reading is a tricky one. It's exactly for what Dr. er said like there the farther you go up in age the more kids are going to click right and so the better measures are when you look at the actual classroom assessment data of things that they do in meaningful ways in their classrooms and so one of the pieces that actually so we have the K5 writing assessments that we've put in place and 68 has actually asked for them um so that they have a chance to have a fall and a spring writing assessment where they can really look at what what are students producing um because that's honestly writing is going to always be your best measure of how kids litery skills are developing. >> Good. >> And I just want to add on to that to to Dr. Mir Perry Reed's point about disagregating and looking classroom by classroom. So, we've started sort of socializing that into our system with our we did a a data meeting where we did look at classroom by classroom, grade level by grade level with um building leaders. Um and again, not in a punitive way, but in a where are the bright spots, who might need more support, what's what might be happening here. And so we are starting to really help our school leaders um drill down to that classroom level data so that they know where the some targeted support or celebration might be needed as well. It's also been helpful because we can see that when classrooms are overly weighted with kids who are coming in less ready that they tend to make less growth. Whereas if the balance is about twothirds are are pretty close to where they should be coming in then those classrooms tend to accelerate. Um, and so that finding that balance, it might mean that we don't cluster kids necessarily in ways that we might have before with our ML kids in one group because it makes it easier to pull out for scheduling, but if it's not helping kids growth over the over the course of their year, then we need to rethink if that's a best practice. >> Thank you. Any other questions or comments? >> Chair Andre. >> Yes. So, um, related to what director Roer shared earlier in terms of what is our students mindset in real time as they're engaging with the test. >> Um, one thing that I've been thinking a lot about because our society does fluctuate with how attached we or parents or systems are to test scores, right? So like no child left behind. It was like teaching to the test and it was all about the test. And then we're moving toward more balanced holistic measures. And now we are seeming to start returning back to like the sheer importance of those scores which I have mixed feelings about. However, it really is our responsibility to think about the ingredients that that help our students be as successful as possible in those environments and during those moments. So, if you think about all of the intentionality that we put into restorative practices in our classrooms so that kids can show up as themselves and feel a sense of belonging so they can learn. Or if you think about in our athletic spaces before a competition, all the mindset and um sort of psyche work that our coaches do with our athletes. >> If you think about what our teachers are doing with students before students have to take a test, that is going to be varied. >> Absolutely. >> Some teachers will give that pep talk. Some some students will, you know, do a whole chant together, do some kind of mindset work, but we're not systematizing what we might do as a whole collection of educators before every testing period. >> Yes. >> Not that we want to be like, you know, so weird or sort of um >> test prep all the time, >> right? However, I I do think we should start thinking about what are the teacher and leader moves that folks engage in before an exam without getting, you know, too obsessed with it. So that we are ensuring that students have the most favorable conditions in which to perform because this is about performance. Mhm. >> And so I'm just really thinking about what that balance looks like. Like I really don't want to have our whole system orient so vehemently to these exams and these tests, but I also don't want us to be lazy fair with it. But then, you know, we're scrutinizing the scores as though >> they're everything, right? So if they do if they are important which they are and we have to have balanced and holistic um measures then what what are we doing to attend to the importance and we we need to just start thinking about that as a system. >> Absolutely. I know that's something that I and the data team talk a lot about because our data specialists also serve as our assessment coordinators >> and they they're wildly different experiences. Yes. >> And and different beliefs and attitudes and and you know giving these three times a year is new practice >> in our system relatively new >> and it takes time away from other important work and so I mean yeah there's a variety of >> feelings and beliefs about >> about um the importance of it that we are really working to to build that consistency. So, and and honestly, we need the consistency so that the data means one the same thing from one place to another. >> Well, and if as adults, if we're not treating each experience with a special level of importance, >> then kids do like, oh, this again and the and you know, and the the the engagement level right from question one is not where it should be. >> So, there's some things that I think we can do differently and systematize across all of our classrooms. I agree. >> Thank you. Um I had a question um just with in all across all these levels of assessments um how are we including or not including our special education students? >> Do you want to talk about that? >> Yeah. So for for the literacy screening any student who takes the MCA takes the screening. If they take the MTAS, then they typically are not listed for for the the district screening. Doesn't mean that we don't do some activities with them to figure out where their goals are and needs are, but they tend to go off of their IEP goals more than the screening process. We already have more data on on their learning needs. Um, >> and our English learners take they do the fast bridge screening after level >> 2.3 >> 2.3. So, we're not using all of these screenings with our new to country kiddos. And um what about the panorama? How are they included? >> I think it's inconsistent. I don't know what the procedure or process look like for every site. Um but I know that we've lost so because of the revision we lost the translation option. So there's like a different translation a different languages that happened for 612 surveys. But because we switch it, we revis it for 35 um there isn't a translation option. So what I did was I just we put it through um Google Chrome and turned it into Spanish because that's the primary language that I think a lot of our sites like we need our students who speak Spanish to be able to read it and participate in it. I've sat with multiple students at my book to also just like we're reading it like I want you to just read it in Spanish and I'll just translate it for them. But there isn't a really good way for that yet. Um but yeah, I would say it is inconsistent. I'm not sure how our students who receive services actually take or complete the assessment. >> I would think that if I would think that they would participate unless their IEP exempted them specifically, but we can follow up with um Director Contraros about that. >> Yeah, because I'm just wondering um especially like it looks like we have really good completion rates at the elementary level. So, I'm wondering does the supports that are put into place for kids to complete it just fall away when they go >> into secondary? Um, and then in particular, I would imagine that they would be a lot less for our our kids with special needs, right? >> Yeah, I think >> that's just kind of how it works. >> Possible. >> Something we can investigate for sure. >> Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate that. And then um I I I heard quite clearly um you talking about unfunded mandates. >> Um and I just wanted to let you know that our newest member of the LACE is creating an amazing report all about unfunded mandates. Um, and so I will be forwarding to him that there your information and perhaps you guys can have a conversation about the ways this shows up in the readact. Um, and I was also I saw that um, one of the needs is dedicated coaching and then also saw that we lost our coaches. So, um what are the ways in which the board can support um more coaching opportunities for staff? >> Yeah, I think um I think Elsa would say that a huge piece of the success of the math implementation so far is having some people focused on at the building with implementation. And so I think as we look, you know, and look to next year's budget, it's how do we prioritize the pieces that are going to get us the most bang for our buck with literacy outcomes. Um, and then focusing that on the earliest grades we can. And that's always a really hard piece, sort of like Director Thompson's comment, like I I'm not going to be happy till we're at 100%. And how do you how do you allocate resources to K2 >> knowing that then it means you're pulling resources that could be served for kids who like I'm not giving up on kids that are older than that. And so finding that right balance, finding things that we can do that that serve the most number of kids and provide the most opportunities is is sort of tough. Um I think as far as the unfunded mandates go, so phase 2 PD has been released. they are only requiring training of ELA teachers for fourth and above. Well, if we think we're going to change literacy outcomes with ELA teachers, which is what, a 45m minute class that the high school is going to be one semester, not even all year long, we're we're not going to change literacy outcomes that way. Um, and I know it's because they don't have the funding to pay for more broadly than that. So, it leaves us as a district, we could choose to train more people. We could choose to put funding to train all of our content teachers. Um, so it's going to require that we like really commit to deciding who who needs that training and who would benefit from it. Um, I would say as far as the legislation, it's really complicated. They're not I we've heard consistently they're probably not going to allocate money for phase 2 compensation for teachers. So, our phase one teachers who've gone through letters have received really good. Hopkins has been amazing, better than most districts with honoring micro credentials and or graduate credits that's eligible for letters as well as the cash payout because that was money allocated by the read act to create thatou. If that money is not coming for phase two and the trainings can't be done during the PD days that we have in the hours, then that puts us as a district having to pay or figure out how to compensate those teachers for the same time. So, they're really putting districts in a really awful position >> or go the cheaper route or pick the least hour program. >> Yeah. Right. >> And on that great like nervous. >> So, it sounds like we'll be having some important discussions >> um about budget allocation and something that we can definitely talk with our legislators about as we um advocate for public education and an act that they passed. >> So, thank you for that. >> Yeah. Um appreciate all your time and expertise that went into this. Thanks a lot. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much, ladies. >> Happy holiday. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> And that is our final item on the agenda. Um, and it takes us to board member reports. So, if we would like to go around the table, um, say who we are, you know the spiel. Um, >> I don't know. Did I start last time? I'll start. Um, hi everyone. My name is Shannon Andre, current chair of the board. I um am completing my sixth year of service and I have a senior um at the high school and work in the LTL program at Gatewood as a pair professional. >> Yes. >> Hi everyone. I'm superintendent uh Mary Perry Reid and I have an eighth grader at West and I have provided my board report. >> I am treasurer Rachel Hartland. I use she her pronouns and have three children in our school district. I am finishing my fourth year. This is like officially the end of my first term on the school board and will be rejoining you in January. >> And it has been Yeah. Yay. Um, it's been a long time since we gave board member reports and so I don't know, I'm a member of our legislative action coalition as you saw tonight, our citizens financial advisory council, um, our audit committee, um, and have spent quite a bit of time supporting all of those endeavors. Hello, my name is Brooke Roer and uh I have two amazing kids in the district and tonight is the I have completed my official two years um as a board member and I would um I'm like you treasure heartland we haven't gave our reports in so long. Um I will say that um one of the things that are coming up that we have first and foremost I'm looking forward to rest and I hope that you all are looking forward to some of the rest as well that's coming our way with the break. Um but we do have an event for the Hopkins Coalition for Black Scholar Success that's coming up um on the 17th which I will have more details sending out in the email. But we're looking um that we're going to be having a holiday and family engagement celebration for our students. And so I will I'm looking forward to that and we'll again share out more information. And then I don't think we got to share any of our sentiments to Jason and Jen, but I want to just say to you both that I truly and deeply appreciate working with both of you, Jason especially. Um, you know, I felt I I saw hope to be completely honest as a black school board member. I'm like, wow. Like Hopkins champions diversity. Um, when I first ran, I didn't even know how many black schoolboard members existed. And so when I came onto the board and had the opportunity to connect with you and learn from you, I really admire your sense of first and foremost um your sense of uh your sense of humor is very funny. I think that you have one of the funniest dry sense of humors and then also just like the way that you ask questions and position yourself. And um I'm will continue to pray for you and your wife and your family and I hope that we can stay connected beyond the board because I do value you as a leader in the community and I see you doing great things in the future. And Jen, of course, I always say that I just so appreciate you. You are very intricral to um you running for the school board and just like helping me understand what a school board member was and all the work that you do in the community is so amazing. I've learned a lot from you. I appreciate your advocacy and I am going to miss you. I always tell you that all the time, but I am happy that you will remain a resource. You are a parent in the district. I can see you coming to give a public comment soon. Um I hope maybe >> you're going to complain about something. You still got a few more years. This is gonna be on her rotating list. >> Yes. So, I am just looking forward to just like seeing what you're going to continue to do in our community beyond Hopkins and you know and just to go live your best life and thank you for wearing my favorite glasses tonight. I really really like those. So, um thank you both. It is a pleasure. It was a pleasure and I'm just happy for both of you. >> Thank you, Director Roer. >> Thank you, >> Kai Thompson. I'm the clerk on the school board. I got three kids uh fifth through 10th grade. Um also finishing halfway through my first term here. So um yeah, I will decline a further board report, but thank you. >> Hi, Jen West Morland. She her um finishing eight years in the Hopkins School Board and I gave my report at the beginning of the meeting. I just want to thank everyone for um all of the the great vibes tonight and I'm gonna miss you a lot. >> Hi, I'm Jiming Jao. I'm halfway through my first term. Uh I've got two kids in the district. Uh they are in fifth grade and second grade at Chingshing in Eisenhower. Uh two things of note. Um I did give blood during the blood drive and um one piece of the borderline TMI is that I can it took be only 5 minutes 20 seconds to donate a whole unit of blood. So >> is that fast? >> That is it seems really fast. >> That is quite fast. I I did ask the nurse the record is 4 minutes 11 seconds. >> Oh wow. >> I did also ask if I could practice to like get break the record >> and and you cannot practice that at all. Um you can drink more water. So I'll try. >> I was under six minutes. Yeah. Okay. It's not a competition. >> I mean, I didn't like you, but they tie in. >> Well, I asked. Yeah. And then there >> And then the second thing is um I had a chance to uh do a tour of uh the Shakipi with the Ford NGL uh program that uh we've been talking about uh looking at that model and uh Dr. Dr. Mary Period when you mentioned the engagement gap I thought you know kind of put some pieces together that like oh this might be a really interesting thing to shore that up and um uh their academy model looked very interesting seemed like the students were very engaged in a very kind of um them specific uh career or interest uh professional interest and uh very interesting uh so we'll we'll see if it fits here. All right, I guess last but not certainly not least. Uh, yes, my name is Jason. Tonight's the last night. You're welcome, Hopkins community. Um, I have three kids. I guess it really doesn't matter cuz I get them usually mixed up anyway. I a set of twins, a boy and a girl. My daughter's oldest, >> my son is the middle, and then my youngest is the baby. uh they were very excited to know that tonight was my last meeting and they look forward to seeing me uh unfortunately for them uh on more Tuesdays and uh they tried to stay up because I was getting texts from my olders to say when are you coming home and I said I'm still in a meeting right now. So yeah, uh I appreciate the kinding words from Brooke. Brooke, I uh Director Roer, I expect and I know you're going to do great things. Um you are a force to be reckoned with. So I know and I look forward to seeing you champion um the work that's coming forth. Shannon, I do appreciate your level of support. When I first joined, again, I didn't know what I was doing. uh and I was managing multiple things on the home front. So I do appreciate the support and uh the care you uh provided. Uh Director Wes Morland, Director Hartland, I do appreciate the campaign trail. Um I gave my wife a hard time about, hey, do you think it'll be funny if I put my face on a shirt and just run? Uh and she thought that doesn't seem like that's appropriate. And I was like, if my wife voted it down, that means I need to go for it anyway. Uh, I went for it. Uh, it was I thought it was a funny marketing ploy. She didn't find it funny, but hey, here we are. Uh, director Thompson, director, I definitely appreciate the questions and the thought leadership. Um, stuff that, you know, I didn't think about and some of the great questions that you guys asked. Um, and it was great partnering with you guys, uh, especially with the data nerd here. I don't like as much data as uh, director Xiao, but I do probably, it's not Christmas for me. It was probably, I guess, more of a spring break, I guess. Um, and then, uh, last, but certainly not least, I want to give a shout out to Superintendent um, Dr. Mary Perry Reed. It was a pleasure to get to know you. Um, it was a pleasure to watch you lead in this environment. Not something I would want to do. So, it was great watching, you know, from my seat. Um, you know, you're a great leader. Hopefully, you've already have heard that. Um, I appreciate all the work that you had done from before I even joined all the way through now. Um, and then, uh, Superintendent Lifeoot, uh, it was a pleasure to work with you as well. um to be able to get your thought leadership. You have a wealth of knowledge and again not something I want to do because uh I could only go so far with my ADHD. Natalia, you have been a great project manager of keeping me on board and on task um in some of the meetings. Uh the rest of the administration, I appreciate all the work that you guys have done throughout this. Hopefully my ADHD questions didn't catch you off guard or offend you, but hey, here we are. Sarah, it's great to see you. I expect great things from you and look forward to hearing the great things that this board is going to do. Sorry for the long- winded uh send off, but >> what about the rest of cabinet though? >> Yeah. >> Oh, yeah. Rest of the cabinet. >> Rest of cab's like, I want to go home. >> All of you guys are great. >> Let's keep this going. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Amazing. >> Thank you. Um, and with that, I would look for a motion. I don't even want to say it. A motion. >> I think Jason and Director uh, West Morland should do the second and a motion. >> Oh. >> Oh. >> Um, I would look for a motion to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Second. >> A motion and a second. Any discussion? >> Not approved. Yeah, we just never end the session and you and you go to serve. >> Uh, all those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Besides me. >> Um, the chair votes I. And this board meeting of the Hopkins School Board is adjourned at 10:18 p.m.