e e e e e e e e e this is very impressed do you yes sorry a said I did not double check to see if the names were spelled correctly like the Tennessee hello hi everybody um we're going to go ahead and get started with our workshop for this evening um thank you and for coming and attending um uh Vice chair Ross is on his way he's um transporting kids so we'll be here as soon as he can once those duties are done um so we are really excited um to welcome our leaders here at the table to talk about College and Career Center um update um I know that lots of our students um take advantage of the great Pathways and classes in there so welcome thank you for being Dr Mary per Reed thank you chair Andre and good evening to everyone so yes um the one and only very exciting thing on the workshop agenda for this evening is our College and Career Readiness framework and the work that's being done around that at the high school and Beyond and as um many of you know um the Hopkins Education Foundation funded a few years ago um a grant to place a college in career specialist at our high school so Dr Michelle Co responded to that challenge and has been raising expectations for College and Career preparedness as well as building the infrastructure for schoolwide and Beyond Focus because we we talk about the pathways to College and Career Readiness starting before high school so thank you to our um High School principal principal Ballard for setting the stage and for um you Michelle Dr Co for um creating a culture of preparedness and Readiness and I think maybe a couple of your claims to fame will be the the um senior wall that we all know and love it was her idea I implemented it uhuh claim to fame for both of you and then I think there are so many students getting a full ride to college and really um increasing scholarship opportunities for all of our students that's really important work so thank you for all of the work and we're really excited to hear the report from you tonight so maybe do you want to provide a framing Ballard and then we'll launch in um just to reiterate some of the things that uh Dr mayor Peri said about our foundation it was really nice to have the support of our Hopkins Education Foundation for funding the program the position initially it really puts us in alignment what's H with what's happening in our area high schools so most high schools have a person that is specifically there to work with college career Readiness to kind of uplip the high school and support the counselors so our counselors work in that area as well but they're also responsible for things like registration and providing seal supports so it is great to have someone who has had experience in the field um as someone who has worked in higher education and also supporting families through the um College search process process prior to become coming to the high school um just giving that that professional lens and also the experience um and for the high school school so I think um that through having Dr Co we've elevated The Experience prior to me becoming the principal at the high school some of the feedback was that we need to improve in the area of College and Career Readiness and we've done that by providing um education for our community also for our staff and we're getting into a space where we're uh We've developed a framework for each grade level where we identify the different elements that are necessary for our College and Career readiness or Life After High School so during this presentation you'll have an opportunity to look at a postcard that will be shared with our families because we wanted to be very clear about what each scholar should be doing at each grade level to get to that um 12th grade experience where they're leaving the high school ready with a plan and then I'll transition to um Dr Cole we'll go back and forth and talk about the slides that we have prepared for you this evening thank you principal B so um when you're creating something new um it's exciting and also some daunting so I thought that we would go ahead and start by sharing some of the guiding principles that we use um when taking a look at at the work that the Royals College Career College and Career Center um does so one is that um I work in tandem with our school counselors we have six of them to provide a comprehensive planning process two that we develop planning mil milestones for each grade level so you'll see one set of Milestones here on a postcard that will be sent out to All Families shortly but we actually are developing scope and sequence um for 6th through 12th grade and we're working with our middle schools on that we'll be talking about that later um that we collaborate with our middle school counselors for early planning that we stay up to date on the latest practices and policy in the field and that we ensure each scholar has a personal plan for Life After High School which there's about 500 Scholars per class so that's a very it keeps me very very busy next slide okay so um planning uh one of the main areas um of course is planning at Hopkins High School we want to make sure that each scholar has a plan we call it life After High School we learned that when we called it postsecondary um or any of those kind of big fancy words some of our families were not as familiar with what we were talking about you'll see here one of the main points on our um plan is that we have to develop a vocabulary around College and Career planning and so we're working with that um counselors have engaged I'm sorry oh counselors have engaged in the following work to make sure that um all of our scoun all of our Scholars um can do planning in a scaffolded way so one is we have class meetings one every term for each grade level 9th through 12th grade and we share information there we share weekly information during our Royals connect if you're not aware what that is that's kind of like a home room that happens every Tuesday and Wednesday so there's work that's put in there this year we have instituted a new um a new practice where we meet um the counselors meet with their small groups by grade level so the counselor's um portfolios are divided up by last name and we were very intentional with meeting with our 9th 10th 11th um and 12th grade students all before registration to be talking about what they should be doing in terms of preparation and this was in response to a request by principal Balor that we um experiment with different types of meeting um instead of always doing individual one-on-one meetings that we experiment with different types of formats so that we're making sure to reach a broad audience so we have about uh 20 Scholars at the high school and to have an expectation that each counselor there six of them have an opportunity to meet with each scholar individually is just beyond the capacity so we figured if we could identify like what are the Salient points or Salient information that is necessary for each ninth grader each 10th grader each 11th grader and have them meet in small groups we'll be able to reach them faster than we would in an individual format also um as you know that just emails or just having a large group presentation during our class meetings isn't the most effective way to be able to engage with them so breaking those groups down smaller so that they can have the support of their friends because even when they're one-on-one meeting sometimes there's some intimidation around asking questions but when you have small groups um of your peers and you're developing that rapport with your counselor you're able to ask more questions um and create a a more safe environment to take risk so we're finding that by having the smaller groups this year were able to reach more Scholars more Scholars are actually sharing that they know who their counselors are versus in the past it has been like I met with my counselors about a schedule change one time but they're having those conversations around their plan and with um the way that we're doing registration specifically this year um Scholars are planning for all of their years of High School versus just the next year so there's some opportunities for counselors to be able to see um more of the interest of our Scholars and doing it that way and it will make our registration process in general more efficient okay um in addition so we've alluded to the um postcard that are I worked with our counselors um we decided we took a look at our area high schools and found that many of them have like a 20page parent handbook that is almost never read and so we felt like just rather than producing a paper format um handbook that would be 20 Pages um that we thought we would this might be a more more efficient way so um we worked with principal Ballard with counselors I handed them out already um to try to do the highlights right so what are the things um so that families would know as well and parents and and we tried to design it so that's one of those things that you can put on the refrigerator or tape up somewhere and be referencing it um each and every year as your Scholars going through Hopkins High School and then um in order to continue to reach as many students as possible I have presented in our AOC classes this year and worked closely with our AVID program which is also a College and Career Readiness program that's housed in the high school I have helped develop a new course called career search I'm actually in the middle of that right now with our teacher Miss Branda BAU where we've completely revamped the curriculum um and it's pretty exciting some of the work that we're doing in there I've also developed um in in collaboration with Beth okar who was a AP Langan literature teacher we are the the only High School in the area that offers a course called Royals prep so this is a course that's offered term one only for seniors and only for seniors who are College Bound we hope to develop other formats of it um in future years but um for students who are College Bound and it is a class for credit where they do their entire college application write all their essays learn how to do a scholarship search and become prepared for their college cyclical experience in ter in term one so their applications are done for what we call early admission early decision timelines which falls right at the end of term one that's grown from a class that started with about 18 students last year we or this past year we had two sections of 30 students and I anticipate we're going to be asked I don't have the registration numbers I am going to anticipate that that's going to be asked to be increased probably to two to three sections would be my my guess it's become a very popular class is that okay to say it is it's a great guess and it's a class that our Scholars constantly give us feedback on um and our families too um there's families that have talked about like the the the individualized support that their Scholars have gotten through the college application uh process has been amazing um some of our former student board reps has talked at this table about how um being in that class has reduced their anxiety around um just their College Planning in general so to have someone walk you through the entire process from start to end um puts our seniors in a really great place I wish we have the capacity um to offer the class for all of our seniors um but of course there's you know some skill building and um some other things that we need to do with making sure that we have the right teachers in place to do that um and we also only have one of Dr cool um to ensure that that happens for our our Scholars and that class is co-taught um so we did something a little differently this year um with the course because we increase the number of sessions so we have to be strategic if we want to expand that course to make sure that it's still meeting the needs and still getting um the amazing outcomes that we are getting um from our Scholars that are in those classes in addition oh and then in addition um where I spend the vast majority of my time on a daily basis um I just consulted my check-in form and to date I have met with 650 had 650 individual career or counseling um College counseling appointments to date and we're in February so I anticipate that number will go up by a couple hundred by the end of the year okay and our Scholars are um finding their their appointments with Dr Cole very meaningful um in fact I was sharing with Dr Cole I overheard some Scholars talking at the B game about how well a meeting went and she was encouraging her friends to have a conversation with Dr Cole so not only are they getting the information in the formal ways that we share it but the word of mouth of how beneficial it is to have a conversation and sit down and do some career in College Planning with Dr Co it's spreading there's a buzz around the high school around that particularly for our seniors um we're hoping that it will get down to our other grades as well but we also have to think about capacity because today she's done 650 individual appointments thank you you're welcome um so one of the important things that we um identified in in um our professional development our district professional development um workshops was that the middle school counselors and the high school counselors wanted to be better aligned around scope and sequence um for our College and Career planning and we didn't really have anything mapped out we didn't really know what do they do in sixth grade or seventh grade to prepare and as well we did not use the same technology um in our middle school and in our high school and so when students would say oh I I did this exercise in seventh grade none of their High School consors would have access to it so last year principal Bard um with the support of principal balard um and the district as well there were many district um people that helped out as well we moved to a brand new College and Career planning technology that um we rolled out this year in the high school we are training our middle school counselors on it as we speak this year and it will roll out in to our middle school next year and it actually has the capacity to roll into a k through 5 program at any point if our district would choose to do that as well which would mean we could have a scope and sequence from kindergarten through senior year um within our district all using the same platform so if they're doing exercises um in sixth or seventh grade about what they think they might want to do we're they're going to be able to bring them up to the high school with us and when we're meeting with them we'll have access to those materials as well and this is really nice in Alliance with the conversations that we've had in the past around our Scholars having a portfolio so that they're not starting the process of College and Career Readiness at the high school but they have a culmination of experiences and evidence that is stored away that they have access to their families have access to and we have access to to help them along the way um in the conversations that we've had with our late conference high schools uh we we're talking about the different platforms that we're using in the past we were using navian and and many of our schools are using navian we found that it wasn't the best platform for us we have been using that platform for quite some time and my learning allows us to have some personalization allows us to interact in a way that is more relevant um with our with our Scholars and families and it is um it's more intuitive uh the way that you do things in my learning versus Naviance which we've used for um several years prior to this so a little bit more um information about my learning um interestingly enough it is um a tool that um we were an early adopter so Orono school district is the only School District before us in our area that adopted it um and I have since had um been asked to come do presentations um at Wisa and be in conversation with Min tanka um many of the schools St Louis Park in the area are having conversations with Maya learning after um Oro and us have been espousing the benefits of having made that trans transition I think a lot of school districts get nervous about the migration of the data and how intense that process is but um they see the benefits to using a different platform um in addition as I alluded to earlier we're going to be rolling this out to our middle schools next year so our current middle school counselors are being trained on the platform for this year um and then hopefully we'll be rolling it out to parents the year after that so that we'll have a um fully supported program in terms of collaborating with our Middle School um we have scoped out our goals and objectives for 6th through 12th grade we have a rough draft that we're working on and on our February 17th District professional um development um time we will be finalizing that draft and proposing it um to all the necessary people in order to um make sure that we're all on the same page and then what we plan to do is take the curriculum within Maya learning and within our professional School counseling standards and we will um literally spend the summer mapping out every assignment that you would do in 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th 11th and 12th grade and if we don't have one we will create one we will digitize it and we will be able to send it out um on a calendar that will be developed um so that you can know at any given time what students will be doing for their College and Career planning that is awesome and another piece just adding um that is is similar is that um one of our dreams was to have some alignment with our English classes um at the high school so we're working with our English Department so that at least one of the essays that they write for um where they get feedback and um as a part of the course will align so that they are able to use it for their college essay yeah so they are piloting it actually this term um Mr bobian is planning it in our piloting it in our academic research and writing course as well I yeah okay I think yeah okay so ways that we stay up to date with best practices and policies one we have um our counselors um surprisingly enough there was never a handbook for certain things that happened in our office and so in collaboration with our counselors we have been creating one so that we are standardizing our practices and making sure that as people move in and out of the office that we are well aware of what's going on um we regularly do work with professional Development Association so Asuka is the school counseling Association um maak um I still belong to the associate Association for the study of higher education I have periodicals that I still subscribe to that I'm reading every single week um so we we do that as well um this year I was because of my work last year I was asked to serve on the admissions Advisory board for Ohio State so when those opportunities come up um you know there's a set of us from across the country that are asked to um help Colleges and Schools and this is one way for me to be able to get into Insider information on where are we heading in terms of a field where are we heading in terms of the value of the ACT test where where are we going what are people thinking from all across the country so that's very helpful we do many college visits both locally um and I actually leave on Sunday to go to New Orleans to visit four colleges in a three-day time span two HBCU two pwis so we try to keep ourselves uh my child who is in the back he will tell you every time we take a family vacation there is a college visit involved so um and that's just because you know if I want to be able to help students narrow down it's not fiscally responsible to expect that students can um go physically visit every single college that might be on their list but if I have visited that college say in the last five years at least I'm up to date on what might be some pros and cons for them as they're considering that particular campus so Dr cool I think most people understand the acronyms you just used but can you just cover them just just in case we have a listening audience okay HBCU and pwi oh HBCU historically black college and university and predominantly white institution I'm sorry if I didn't Define that earlier yes okay other ways that we stay up to date so as I've mentioned we have quarterly meetings um the Southwest Metro counselor meetings so we get together all the area high schools we talk about policies and practices that are going on share information we um our counselors do our school counselors continue in their professional development for lure through different programs that are held at the high school for our professional development we have quite um a great CTE coordinator car Cara lvon um our Career and Technical education components and so we work closely with Cara to talk about how that works with our College and Career preparation program and then also just different projects that we have within the um uh Royals college and Care Center and counseling uh Center so personalized planning the most common Pathways for our Scholars about 75% of our students will attend a two or foure college and the other 25% will pursue something else okay um the pathways are four-year College 2-year College international institutions I was just Consulting with a student today who's first choice is the University College in London we have a student this year applying to Australia we have several students who have dual citizenship where it's cheaper for them to go to school in Europe than it is to go in the United States and so Maya learning um unlike Naviance is a platform that cuts across internationally so not only does it keep track of all the schools and universities in the United States you can switch the platform at any time that you wish to any other country in the world and we can investigate how you can apply to college in any other country some will go to the military some go directly to the workforce some take a gap year and some do other very interesting things so for example we have a student last year who took off his entire um second half of his senior year to try out for professional soccer teams in Europe and he is now playing professional soccer he did take my role as prep class he did prepare all his college applications but he did not send them in he chose to play professional soccer so our Scholars are doing really interesting creative and wonderful things that sometimes do not involve college but we encourage them highly okay so what are the activities that I've done well we've kind of covered a lot of these in terms of the Royals prep class career search class individual appointments um we with Maya learning one additional um added benefit of Maya learning is that it's digitized our NCAA process so as you know we have numerous scholar athletes um at Hopkins and so um now they simply can be cleared academically with one press of a button through myo learning it connects automatically into the NCAA portal and takes care of it for them so far uh when I looked yesterday we have had 2200 college applications submitted on behalf of the class of 2024 so far and they all go through my learning and they've all gone through my learning which means we probably sent about 5,000 transcripts through my learning which is a very uh it's much easier than it used to be yes it is I've met with all the junior a classes um I am in the process in two weeks we will have our in school college fair every year we bring in over a 100 colleges into our gymnasium at Hopkins High School um actually I'm busy planning that now so they will come in two weeks and we will run all our entire High School through a visit process with those colleges we have digitized the scholarship process so last year we calculated that our students received $10.4 million in awarded scholarships obviously when a student receives multiple full ride offers they don't take them all but in awarded scholarships our Scholars were earned over $10 million my goal of course is by the time um we'll get to that okay then um we are also in the process besides the college fair we have instituted a new ACT prep program through Winward Academy it's integrated into our Maya learning platform um it's for all Juniors um so we um all Juniors receive a weekly email from me with their study schedule for what they should be doing for their act they have two options they either took the practice diagnostic test which then Winward Academy can actually personaliz their learning plan so rather than just saying oh you need to improve in the area of math it'll actually break down the 12 topics covered in math on the ACT and tell them which topics they know and which topics they don't therefore they they can make sure they're studying the things that they need to and not be working on the things that they don't know in addition to that we are running um inclass Sprints so I have four teachers um or four all four subject areas Math Science Social Studies and um English and we have teachers I have wonderful teachers that I work with at the high school who are piloting an idea that actually came from superintendent Dr Mary per re and Crystal Ballard when we met in the Summer where as you know in our Junior highs they start each class with 10 minutes of reading before each class so we have um teachers in all four subject areas piloting 10 minutes of ACT prep three times a week um from now until the ACT test okay so students are getting in-class learning um teachers are getting real uh data on a weekly basis about what things students know and what they don't know and then we're also doing um an an individual study program for all Juniors as well that doesn't mean all juniors are choosing to do it I'm working hard on that but um but the information is out there and available to them right on their Chromebook do you have access to like individual names of Juniors that are I do I actually can tell you how much time they spend in it and actually this Friday is a major deadline for anyone that has a junior I will say because I told them that I'm giving them three weeks to log in play with the tool test the tool um if they have chosen not to log in for three weeks that I will pause their license until they come and talk to me because if they're not going to take it seriously we're not going to pay the money for them to do it nice I'll turn it back on if they come and have a meeting with me I I'll share that message yeah yeah I feel like three weeks is enough right we started right we had an allass meeting I took them how to do it I've showed them how to log it in I'm doing weekly announcements in their Royals they should know how to get in there okay and then um and then last year we hosted over 105 College rep visits um for the class of 2025 they came from Florida California um we had an increased number of Highly selective schools in including Ivy League schools coming and requesting visits with us I did not solicit any one of these 105 schools to come and in fact the one school I did solicit turn me down which is the University of Wisconsin Madison um but that's it's okay I'll get there um so so we're quite busy in the center uh there's a bunch of other activities that I have on here but I feel like I've talked a lot is there any that you want to um I know um Eloise one of these is that I meet with families so I do meet with families sometimes it's necessary to get the parents myself and the scholar all on the same page sometimes it can be really hard if I'm meeting with a scholar and then things can get lost in translation Eloise would know um I have Sunday meetings with families so every Sunday there's one or two families that I meet we meet at a coffee shop we meet at a doughnut shop we met with the bullins at a donnut shop it was great and we just go ahead and have a family meeting so that we're all on the same page about how the scholar is going to move forward um I'm trying to think if there's anything else on there you already talked about aligning with academic research and writing their name tags are moved over a little bit your um Eloise is in here Iris yeah I if she were though she could tell you so we had a family meeting at a donut shop to talk about her and her brother as well but adding to that some of these meetings um especially at the beginning of the the College and Career Center development they were happening in the summer at different coffee shops so Dr Cole was um reaching out to our families to meet them at different areas in the community because some families for all of the reasons that they may not want to come to the high school um and we found that reaching going out in the community to have those meetings and sometimes like multiple families would come to have more intimate conversations in the summer um so it it's just so many ways that we're trying to engage our families in the building outside of the building um and as we learn more around what is working we'll increase those things and decrease the things or stop the things that are no longer working for our families did did you say that there were some reasons families were reluctant to come to the high school for these meetings well there's reasons that families are reluctant to come to the high school for these meetings and other things too we don't always know what those reasons going to ask what the reasons are yeah we don't always know because they don't tell us but sometimes we we're able to meet with them off campus and that works for them okay and I try to hold them at different times of the day right um as well to accompany work schedule family responsibilities things like that um and and actually just so you know uh so college applications open August 1st and if that is the pathway that a student is choosing to follow um we actually hold four workshops before school even starts up at the high school where students can come in if they are not in my Royals prep class where they can come in and start their college application process and then for terms one and two I stay after twice a week to work with students as well so um we do spend a lot of time trying to make sure that we're covering all the different tyes types of schedules and accommodating for different students needs okay so future goals where are we heading what's the plan um so we want to continue to work with all of our families and Scholars to make sure they know what the options are how to plan for it and then how to implement or take action we want to make sure to find out to reach uh find ways to reach out to families whose first language is not English that has not been a strength of our program to point we we have done some workshops we have done some Outreach but it is an area of capacity building that we need to um make sure that we take care of we need to continue continue to find ways to work with our teachers to bring Mya learning and planning Concepts into the classes personal finance has really embraced Mya learning it actually has a way for you to put different colleges in and then adjust the rate of inflation to start comparing the cost of what college will cost so personal finance is implementing that piece of my learning and then as you mentioned the academic research and writing Pilots we need to find ways to build sustainable Partnerships with community members one of the things um I did in the past was bring in speakers from across the country to start talking about different careers um I just hav honestly minona rotary is very interested in building a partnership with us I I just literally have not had the time to be able to coordinate these things so that's one of the things that I look forward to doing um Maya learning has the ability to build an electronic job and internship board where we can actually be inviting employers from our community right in and they can be filling out and putting jobs on a job board internship experiences Etc so I hope to have that elemented before the end of the year um selfishly find a way to move this position into a permanent FTE instead of principal Ballard always having to um uh say yes Michelle you have a job for next year so this position is funded out of discretionary funds it was funded out of a grant before that it's not a permanent position at the high school continue to grow scholar capacity with myo learning and I think by having the grade level targets and continuing to roll that that out that will be helpful um as I mentioned rolling out parent accounts so that parents um so the way Maya Learning Works is that you can see your child's information but you can't edit it but you can see what they're doing where they're spending their time and use it as a tool for having conversations about career in College Planning and then as I said so I um sometimes jokingly will say that I came in with my oldest child who was in the class of 2023 and I'll be exiting with my youngest child who is the class of 2031 I feel like eight years is enough um no I say that lovingly but um you know and so my goal is by 2031 that we would have $50 million and awarded um scholarships for our students awesome just because I'm a quantitative researcher by training I like to put numbers to things I hope that's helpful that's what we've accomplished in two and a half years I started this job in February of 2022 and I hope in another two and a half I'll have more exciting things to come back and tell you mhm and every senior having a life After High School plan is also an indicator of vision 2031 yes are there any questions at this time Dre and I quick question first of all I'm so excited about this um oh okay good thank you all so much I'm over here taking notes like this is amazing first when is the college fair going to be February 25th from 9:00 to 10:30 but it is an in school Fair which means no One external to the school is allowed in obviously a school board member would be allowed in but we don't allow students from other high schools and things like that to come to the fair okay so you said from 9 9 to 10:30 okay um and then also do you all work with any um College access programs so when I was in high school I went to school in North Minneapolis at Patrick Henry and we were introduced to a program called the um uh cap and it was a partnership with Minnesota State University and they helped um students who didn't meet the uh the GPA requirement to get in traditionally admitted traditionally through a specialized process now was just wondering if you all work with any programs like that currently it was a very very like yeah I'm a northsider as well so I'm aware uh um no I am aware there's things like North Side achievement Zone there's all kinds of programs I'm actually meeting with the Phillips Family Foundation in two weeks to talk about how we they have a scholarship program and a mentorship program specifically for black males who are from the north side of Minneapolis so um I am aware of Partnerships out there um it is just an area that I like literally have just not had the time to get to one of the things that principal Ballard is trying to help me visualizes how I might put together a group of parent volunteers who might be able to take on some different tasks to be able to help us in the College and Career Center not only do I think it would it be great to have families come in and find ways to help us out talk to students about what they do for a career um but it would help it could also free up some of my time to be able to do some Outreach and build more Connections in this area currently the answer is no oh I'm aware of the programs I support them like we advertise them we let students know about them but I wouldn't say we have a meaningful partnership in them oh okay well and that's fine and um well thank you for that cuz I know that that works get really busy do you all um how do you keep up with the um YouTube school right like when I say YouTube school like literally kids can go on YouTube and learn how to build a car right or learn how to learn learn different career um building uh jobs right like they don't have to go to college for it anymore necessar um how do you like how are you all like addressing that like students who are finding that oh I don't need to go to college for that I could just learn how to do that off of social media or using chat GPT to you know just like write up I don't know well let's not talk about chat gbt right now um just AI it's just it's like social media and streaming is just making it easier for younger people just to learn different skill sets without having to go to college and I just see that that's like a different yeah for sure no we talk about that and I talk about that with a lot of students I have a student right now who came into me and he was like look I just want to do construction I know that's what I want to do this is what I want to do I don't want to go to fouryear college right but he has a 3.6 GPA I was like are we sure we don't nope I don't want to do it so when I work with a student who um whose Life After High School does not include a two or four year college necessarily um I say okay that's great for for now we're going to plan for 5 years from now right and so um so it is important if they want to go into a trade to understand what are the requirements to be successful in the trade right there there are lots of things that you can learn off YouTube but that doesn't mean you necessarily can make a livable wage at it so then I engage in a career search process with the student um we Maya learning actually I'd love to give you all a demonstration sometime if there was time to do it but they actually have year uh data in Mya learning where you can put any career you want in it tells you exactly the certifications you need what level that's at whether you can do it without a college degree what the average income is in Minnesota what it is in any state in the country and what it is nationally and then it pairs it with who are the top schools that train for that where can you go to school to learn how to do it so usually usually the student ends up in some sort of a certification training two-year technical programs so for example this student who wants to go into construction he has a real aptitude for Math and Science in general so what we did is I showed him a mortensson scholarship that is out there specifically for construction and he's actually going to be pursuing a two-year degree now in construction um mortensson will pay if he were to win the scholarship it's a scholarship that pays for all of your school and it if you do well it gives you a full-time job when you're when you're done and then the great thing is we're going to look at sending him to dunwitty for that because it's a 2 plus two program so he can go for two years go work and then if he ever ends up needing a four-year degree because he wants to own his own construction company and he needs a business degree or because of whatever reason he might need a four-year degree some later time later in life he can go back and just complete the last two years and they count his first two years so he doesn't have to have redundant credit so we talk a lot about different options for different times of life and how to keep the flexibility open does that answer your question yeah no that answers it adding to what uh doctor cool shared I would like to add that like um it's important for us as an organization Hopkins High School not to shy away from like the AI and all of the technology that is swimming around our Scholars and ourselves all the time um so it is not uncommon that our teachers like um teach our Scholars how to use it I remember um doing a walk through in a classroom in our business class specifically where Scholars were using um AI to generate names for their businesses um the teacher had also it was an entrepreneurship class so they're trying to find the right name as a part of the the learning activity that was happening that day but then the teacher also taught them how to develop different prompts um in the AI to be able to support them with their project plan so the teacher isn't walking around trying to give individual support to each scholar but they have ways in which they could organize or or teach um the the AI tool to be able to support them and um in each week I do a a scholar Spotlight and the one that I recorded for next week um today the scholar talked to me about what was going on in their computer science class where they had an opportunity to develop this complex code to build a video game um and talked about the ways in which they were utilizing technology outside of what we're teaching but many of our teachers are in a place where they're able to embrace those things to support and enhance what's going on and we know that when our Scholars are interested in something they're more likely to engage deeply in it um so we're in a place where we're trying to support our teachers and create the opportunities for them to learn about it so that they're able to support with the understanding that we are not going to know every single thing about the technology but we can support our Scholars to be able to use it appropriately and one final point that I would love to just say um because they just don't get enough um accolades I feel is that are CTE teachers or Career and Technical teachers so if a student um wants to go more deeply into something um you know I have the ability to say oh you want to learn about engineering take the intro to engineering class we have mechanical engineering we have civil engineering so I don't know if you've seen the um CNA um classroom that's there so our the best thing about my job is I think is that while I am sort of a central hub for College and Career planning I work with the staff at the high school where all of the teachers are really vested in making sure that kids are prepared for whatever they're going to do after high school and bringing more certifications and more um experiential learning into our high school so thank you for that um I just am keeping an eye on the time and I want to make sure that everyone's getting their questions answered anyone have any other yes I'm worried about Samia she might be tough on me okay I'm just teasing um I was recalling the last time we had a College and Career Readiness update before you came into this role Dr cool and it there was one yes and it was a very different update let's put it that way um and it's really inspiring to see how much work has been done I'm struck by how many on-ramps there are for Scholars and families and caregivers to really engage in this work and how um creative you've been in terms of resources I love the idea of small groups of Scholars meeting to talk about this because um principal Ballard as you said it helps with anxiety a bit but also I think it's like um a place where they can engage in some thought partnership and encourage each other and I think that's really really important um I'm wondering how many of our Scholars if you know this have access the Northstar promise and kind of how you introduce that and talk about that in this planning process and the Northstar promise just to clarify is the state the um the funding for students to attend Minnesota state schools yeah um so I don't actually have the data about how many students qualify for the Northstar promised scholarship but we do um Talk extensively about financial aid which I did not realize is like this very murky topic for our families like they don't necessarily understand how the financial aid process works I figured that out last year that it wasn't it couldn't just be about the college applications it had to be about everything that came after right so financial aid how do you put an enrollment deposit in how do you choose housing in a roommate how do you what does decision day mean and know you can't commit to more than one school like I didn't necessarily realize like that people needed to understand the whole cycle right so when we talk about financial aid we do a financial aid work shop that speaks to it um you know it's that's a pretty sensitive area so I generally don't have like Financial conversations with students although I do help them complete their FAFSA forms um and um and we advertise resources for for students and families to be able to do that so we do talk about the Northstar promise I know our counselors actually have a link to it in their signatures where they're like learn more about the Northstar promise we put we put posters up we you know we um tell students when we talk about how to do a scholarship we're in our scholarship um season right now so we make sure to let students know um but it's not really anything you can apply for right you have to fill out the FAFSA and then you either are qualified or you're not so the bigger emphasis for us is making sure that our students and families um successfully complete the fasta so just today I was very proud of myself I've been trying to work with this student for like 4 days now to get their faasa completed and we could not figure out what we were doing wrong and then today we finally like the light went off and I was like oh this is what we're doing wrong and we got it successfully submitted so um so that's been the the bigger emphasis but we certainly let students know about it and take advantage of it makes a lot of sense thanks uhhuh J andreon yes Dr cool you talked about the um Royals college prep class I don't remember the name of the course the Royals prep Royals prep uhhuh easier than Royals college prep so um who is the other than seniors who's the target audience I know you said um students who are on track but is it kids who are who are definitely going to be in a two or four year or kids who may not get there unless they have this help I'm just wondering who the target audience is and then in order to reach all of those students how many sections would we need to offer okay so the target audience would be students who are on track to graduate because if they're not on track to graduate our primary emphasis would be making sure that they are taking the high school classes that they need to be on track to graduate so um so it's students who are on track to graduate students who are an avid are not allowed to take my course because they're going to be doing the exact same thing in their senior Avid course Miss heick does a very good job so we work um in parallel to each other but we don't overlap students if that makes sense and generally it's going to be students pursuing fouryear degree options um at least one of them twoyear degrees might also be like a backup plan in that but generally it's going to be students pursuing those four-year options which is why I mentioned that I think um you know sometime within the next 3 years it might be it might be nice to develop a parallel course for students who don't see themselves on that particular track and so what does an apprentiship option look like and run a class on that or you know other Pathways um but I had to start somewhere so I started with what I knew and worked with Miss okar she's an excellent resource in terms of the um developing the essay how to go through the writing process some of our kids have never had to write seven drafts of an essay before for um and they will be doing that in our class and so um and so that's the target it's only for seniors there's no prep CL like you have to be a senior and it's only offered in term one because of the college application cycle so it's a one-term class um held right at the beginning of the year okay yeah thank you and I know we're short on time but one of the things that I would like to say to um do I have say chair Vice chair I don't know the proper br um um to you do I I'm a director now director West Morland okay um I'm sorry I don't know the protocols you all that was my husband not me um but I want to say that one of the reasons why I think we've been able to be so successful um we still have a lot of work to do but able to be so successful in such a short period of time is because I have a principal who basically just never tells me no so when I came up with the idea to have a class like an actual class for credit and you know she's like if you can find a teacher to help you do it great and so um if we can dream it she sort of just lets me fiddle around and go build it and um and as as I've mentioned several times our teaching staff are very supportive of the work as well and so um it's very nice that I'm not considered the only person responsible for making sure that our Scholars know what they're going to do after high school everyone in our school really takes that on and and I appreciate that and I don't think we'd be able to see the success that we're we are having not that we don't have challenges as well but the success that we are having in such a short period of time um the biggest compliment I get from somebody is they're like oh I forgot you've only been here for two years and I'm like yep only two so um I take that as a compliment and and really couldn't do it without um principal balor's trust that I'm going to try to do my best at whatever we create and I'll add Dr Co has really big dreams so it is very easy to say yes all the time to the things that she wants to do saying yes is important it is thank you for doing that um I just had a quick um question about the is it Maya learning platform I'm wondering how does that um intersect and work with maybe parallel alongside in between Infinite Campus and camp like yeah so this is great so all the data um to populate myo learning comes from Infinite Campus so the two systems um Alyssa cappo is great she make and kashan Singh make sure that our systems are always running so on a daily basis every night um new students are added so if we enroll a new student by the next day after their enrollment is official um they're in the Mya Learning System so there's no delay in that um in terms of canvas it doesn't really talk to Canvas to it doesn't talk to Canvas um it's not built to so it is a separate app that shows up in their class link but in terms of being able to populate their data um and keep up with that on a regular basis so that anytime a new scholar comes in um Maya learning is always up to date now the other really great thing about Maya learning is it is the only piece of technology that our Scholars will take with them so they don't get to keep their email accounts they don't get to keep their Google Drives they do get to keep keep their Maya learning accounts for 4 years after they graduate and they can access it through the web So within Maya learning there's something called a Maya drive so if they create a portfolio an essay anything that they want to save from their High School experience they can load it under their Maya drive and take it with them after they leave um the other way it interacts the other technology you should know about is that it does communicate with the Common App which is the way that most students will apply to college and so we link we spend a lot lot of time each year teaching our students how to link those accounts so when they add a school onto their common app like oh I'm interested in this school it automatically talks to myo learning if they say they're going to apply to the college it puts it on their applying list and then all we have to do is click a toggle and it requests their transcripts oh my gosh so the systems are built to help ease the burden I won't go through what the process used to be but it was very arduous compared to this process that's fantastic thank you for that DET mhm I love that and the transcripts are automatically uploaded or well I know when a student is going to be applying to a school and then all a student has to do to request so say they have 12 schools on their transcript I mean on their application list um if they're all common app schools all I have to do is the student myself their school counselor somebody literally moves a toggle I don't know a half an inch turns up purple and it requests all the transcripts for one school we can do bulk uploads we just did our midyear reports kashan took one file uploaded all the midyear transcripts we sent out probably 2200 midyear transcripts this year to all the schools that are requiring them wow I'll be very happy when we don't have to send IB letter grades um so that's going to be coming up after next year's class but we send all of those as well if their IB grades are um enhancing of their GPA we um we do all of it electronically as well as all letters of recommendation are sent through Maya learning as well so a teacher uploads their letter of recommendation sends it out here's the beautiful thing say a student oh Samia all of a sudden you know she says oh here's the five schools I want you to send my letter of recommendation to miss heick and then miss heck says okay she uploads and she hits a button she sends it out and then all of a sudden three weeks later sm's like wait I forgot about these three other schools the system my learning is actually set so that if the teacher's letter is already been uploaded when a student adds a school request a letter a recommendation it literally just sends it the teacher never has to go back in it just sends it as requested wow amazing so it makes the process a lot easier for teachers as well yeah very different from the sealed envelopes I car yeah we don't do that anymore no anymore well well thank you so much for being here and for all your work on behalf of Hopkins families it really does make it difference it's huge thankk you thanks for letting us come and share with you you've done amazing work thank you thank you both okay and we've got five minutes for a quick break before our meeting starts at 7 thanks everyone e e e e e e e e e e e what's your birthday January and thank you all for being here this evening I appreciate you coming out to join us for our um Hopkins Public School uh board meeting on February 11th 2025 um we um will get started as soon as I pull up the the agenda um so I call the meeting to order at 7:02 p.m. our first order of business is uh public comment and I do have two um comment cards that have been submitted Natalia did we get any voicemails for this evening um there are two ways to address the um Hopkins school board um at a during the open Agenda public comment section uh one is to leave a voicemail that will be played at the um at the meeting the other is to come here and join us in person um which we always appreciate um meeting people in person and to submit a public comment card before the um meeting starts at 7:00 p.m. so since we do have some people who are here to do public comment in person I get a chance to read all of our great guidelines that we have um for making public comment we do um appreciate it and believe that um hearing from our community is crucial for implementing uh Vision 203 1 which is our guiding principal here in Hopkins so we will go through the guidelines uh please keep your comments to 3 minutes or less public comment is for input only members of the school board will not respond directly to public comments that are made at this meeting no specific action will be taken at this meeting in response to comments that are made or issues that are raised during the public comment period related to items not on the agenda if the board determines that action is appropriate the action will occur at a future board meeting if you have left your contact information on the comment card a District representative may follow up with you after the meeting I will recognize one speaker at a time only those speakers who are recognized will be permitted to speak individuals who interfere with or interrupt speakers the board or these proceedings may be asked to leave personal attacks on any individual including any other speaker during the public comment session are unacceptable as are obscenities or profanity persistence in making such remarks will end the individual's opportunity to address the board and may result in the individual being directed to leave I will rule out of order any statement that would violate state or federal law Schoolboard policy or the Privacy rights of an individual Minnesota's open meeting law prohibits the discussion of private educational data during an open meeting accordingly during the public comment session no person may discuss private educational data on an identifiable student the open meeting law also requires the board to close a meeting for preliminary consideration of allegations against an employee accordingly community members who have concerns about an employee or want to file a complaint or allegations against an employee are encouraged to contact the superintendent we ask you not to name any employee by name during your comments repeated violations of these time place and manner restrictions may also lead to the meeting being briefly recessed community members will have an opportunity to be heard within the limits of the law and subject to the time place and manner restrictions above thank you very much for being here and for bearing with me as I read all of those guidelines I would like to invite our first public commenter up to the table it is Alicia cair and if I mispronounced your name please correct come on up um and she is here to speak about Support over suspension thank you for being here tonight there's three minutes on the timer and you can get started when you're ready hello okay thank you um hi everyone my name is Alicia Claire I am a part of the youth Advisory board for my health clinic located in downtown Hopkins and serve um Hopkins schools which is why I wanted to speak here today through my experience as a student and on the youth Advisory Board I have noticed an increasingly harmful approach schools take towards vaping incidents instead of addressing the root cause of tea and addiction or providing support for students students are caught vaping are often suspended or expelled with little thoughts given to their well-being this response not only fails to curb nicotine addiction but also alienates students from the educational environment they deserve ignoring the underlying issues driving their behavior as a result suspensions can exacerbate the feelings of isolation causing students to fall behind academically and ignore the patterns of addiction in young teens which require understanding and intervention instead of punishment to increase more awareness in our community about addiction and Teen Mental Health and to make sure students get resources they deserve to recover I am standing before the school board today to ask with your help to prioritize Support over suspension thank you for allowing me to share my perspective thank you for being here thank you thank you thank you and I would like to invite our next speaker Jada silver up to the board table um welcome thank you for being here and you are also here to speak um on the topic of Support over suspension yes uh hello hello everyone my name is Jada silver and I'm a junior at minetonka high school and I'm here to today as a member of the youth Advisory board for my health clinic for teens and young adults which is located in downtown Hopkins today I'm here to talk to you about implementing Support over suspension policies in the Hopkins school district as a high schooler I know that many of my peers have used or continue to use commercial tobacco products including Vapes however I don't believe that Vape detectors and suspension policies are the best way to address this issue starting with Vape detectors these detectors are not affective in preventing vaping among youth instead they create anxiety among students and often do not work as intended at my school I've heard from many students that Vape detectors have gone off while they were in the bathroom and no one was vaping which creates an uncomfortable environment and doesn't help anyone Vape detectors and suspension policies do not help address the root of the issue and help students who are struggling with nicotine addiction to receive the help and resources that they need instead suspension has been shown to increase mental health issues among suspended students and cause struggles with academics for these Reasons I'm here today to ask that you consider shifting your District's approach for students who are caught vaping to focus on supporting them and providing resources to help them overcome their addiction instead of enacting punishments like suspension thank you thank you very much thank you appreciate you being here tonight and that takes us to our next part of our meeting which is our report section and we get to start off with our student board rep reports I'm not sure which one wants to go first but I'll go first thank you man hi my name is Manuel and I'm a sophomore student board representative so many of the winter season sports are coming to an end and many championship meets and games are happening this week earlier today the boys and girls Alpine Ski teams had their state meet at Giants Ridge androw tomorrow the boys and girls Nordic ski team also have their state meet and the varsity girls hockey team has their sections semi-finals game against the Dina on Friday the Royal's dance team has their jazz jazz portion of the state meet the state meet is at Target Center and is happening during school so Scholars who are interested in spectating the meet have the option to have their parent or Guardian fill out a permission slip to be excused from class um also on Friday is the wrestling teams Varsity sections finally on Saturday the dance team will have their high- kick portion of the state meet and the gymnastics team has their varsity sections last Thursday in celebration of the Chinese New Year the Chinese emerging students performed at the annual Chinese New Year performance their performance lasted from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. and showcased the language skills of the students through songs dance and cultural performances and it wasn't only the elementary students performing students in shinshin classes at the high school also performed a song while dancing thank you you thank you I'll go next I'm Iris I'm a freshman board rep the first thing that I wanted to talk about was some school visits that I did on the last High School dld this was mentioned at the last board meeting but I wasn't there to fully comment on it so I wanted to recap my findings um in case you weren't there or you didn't hear or you don't remember I went to Eisenhower Elementary and North Middle School to talk to students about things that they liked or maybe wanted to change at their schools just to have a better understanding of the experience of other grade levels in other schools instead of just representing the high school so some things that I found from both schools um were that um the middle schoolers wanted longer passing time longer lunch period they also wanted an actual recess like they had at the elementary schools because they um they think that it helps their productivity to have a break like that um both schools wanted more free time um or like Independent Learning time um the Middle School wanted more Spanish books in the media centers for the hunto students they didn't like the e-hall passes they wanted to keep win but have one more day of it so that teachers could have duplicates right now they have three days but they want four days so that in case they missed a win that was only on one day the teacher could host it again again another day so that they could participate um both schools wanted more flexible seating and generally more autocracy they wanted to do Project based learning instead of um tests from their teachers they wanted shorter or more compelling lectures so they can have more Independent Learning time to do whatever they need to do and just like I said generally they wanted to have more control over their learning um back to the high school though uh this Thursday we will have hard ofrs they are currently being sold during all launches at the high school for $5 each hard ofrs um is something where for Valentine's Day uh some choir members of the school go around and sing a song for different students um and they give out candy and stuff like that so some of the songs are l o v e Can't Help Falling in Love just the way you are and Love is an Open Door um and like I said that will happen on Thursday also um AP exam registration it opened on February 5th and the deadline is February 24th or sorry 21st this is the second registration window of the year we had one um already for terms one and two um this is one for terms two and three it is the last chance to get registered if you didn't if you took an AP class in terms one and two and you need to register now you will have a um late fee which is $50 per exam um yeah and then lastly class registration is also closing for high schoolers it closes on February 14th for middle schoolers it closed on February 7th thank you hi my name is Mia Osman and I'm the senior board representative Friday sorry I February is Black History Month and Hopkins High School is hosting several events to celebrate Black excellence and culture on Wednesday well tomorrow during Roy connect Wednesday February 12th um Hopkins community member and correct me if I'm saying his last name wrong Mr Pierre Tain along with Educators Scholars and spoken words artists present lyrical power a documentary celebrating the intersection of Arts spoken word and Hip-Hop this event is hosted by Society 101 and marks the 5year anniversary of their lyrical power debut on January 10 2020 at the Historical deot coffee in Hopkins Minnesota there will be performances by Niles a Lyricist Jessica Winnie a poet and then Ricky manique um who's doing Soul uh their message is making a difference by being the difference um it's sponsored by the City of Hopkins mayor Patrick hanon and Hopkins community Cinema group um for those who want to come it is limited capacity to 280 so it's first come first serve and for any students who want to come there is no entry without a pass so sign up in SST um the black student Alliance invites all Hopkins Scholars to celebrate Black History Month by participating in their BSA spirit week next week from February 24th to the 28th each day showcasing a theme to honor back Black Culture on Monday is melanin Monday uh so you wear brown or beige to showcase the different shades of right um yeah and then HBCU Tuesday which you wear apparel representing any historical black college or university black owned business Wednesday showing um support to Black entrepreneurs uh black artists graphic tea Thursday representing a favorite black artist with a graphic tea and then BSA t-shirt Friday um and t-shirts are available for purchase found in Miss Ballard's newsletter or on bsa's Instagram and then on Wednesday February 28th in the Little Theater BSA is hosting royally speaking a powerful showcase honoring black history and culture through music dance spoking word and other creative performances auditions were held earlier in January and it's important to show support when this event does come up as this event highlights the incredible Talent of Hopkins Scholars and celebrates their culture through ART and performances thank you thank you uh hi everyone uh my name is sufan Osman and start off mine uh this week is Valentine's spirit week so each day we get to dress up as something different Monday was anti Valentine's Day so you wear so you wear all black which I don't really get but oh why uh Tuesday was twins day so you you and another person dress up in identical clothing Wednesday is dressed up as your type so for example if you're into like a jock or something you'll dress up as that uh Thursday is Spotlight so the colors are uh red yellow uh and green and each means a different like thing so I think green is like you're in a relationship yellow is available oh you're Avail okay green is your green is your available yellow is it's like complicated and like a talking stage and then red is you're in a committed relationship and then Friday is you get to wear your class colors and since I'm a freshman I'll be be wearing white I don't know the other colors I don't know the other colors uh okay and then there's Hearts taped around the school so each like a thousand plus kids have their name in a heart taped around school and if you're a lucky person there's going to be like a silver sticker at the back and you get free Valentine's Day tickets to the dance on Saturday oh F so I didn't get one that sucks you didn't get one so and then finally on Friday we get to have the pep Fest uh just to end off the week I think be quite fun and decided to see the drum line cuz I used to be in band and I feel like that was cool part thank you thank you thank you I think that was one of the most fun reports ever had you came alive did it now I can see why you were keeping it top secret over there Kar ask a question yes what time was royy speaking on Friday or oh yeah it's next Tuesday 600 p.m. oh 6 p.m. no Roy speaking it's on the 28th oh the 28th yeah so 6:00 p.m. that's 6 p.m. and then what time is the petfest you uh it's going to be okay it's Duren School uh 9:57 or yeah 9:57 to 10:57 so it's going to be like during the rose connect time so is that um on the 14th that's Friday yeah Friday oh okay all right be careful what you wear I know right we we know who the students wearing white will be we don't know anyway we don't know what everybody else is seniors are wearing pink s wait seniors are wearing sophomores are purple yeah it's like yeah it's I don't know the picture is like a weird purple Periwinkle thing and then juniors are like red and seniors are pink oh my gosh I had a a quick question about the the is it heartagram you said that they're $5 is that a fundraiser for a student group or I think it just goes to the choir program oh great thank you any other questions or comments from my board colleagues no well thank you so much this was a lot of fun it sounds like it's a a really great week at the at the high school right now I'm glad that everyone is selling sell celebrating one of our core values here at Hopkins which is love so I appreciate that um now we that takes us to our superintendent report Dr Mary Perry Reed thank you chair andrees and yes it's always good to hear from our students very fond to hear all of the exciting ways that students are showing up at school including anti love yeah just anti Valentine's okay all right well um so happy New Year to everyone celebrating Chinese New Year Manuel you mentioned the um Lunar New Year celebration last Thursday at the high school I dragged my husband to the Mall of America um to visit the New Year festival and chat with staff and students who were Manning our shing shing Academy table there so thanks to our shing shing teachers and students for investing in promoting language immersion here in Hopkins and for honoring Chinese culture and then you heard from one of our students that um lots of people hundreds of families came together at our high school last Thursday for Chinese New Year celebration and we got to see all of the performances from our elementary students grade level by grade level so that was very fun and then as Manuel mentioned the high schoolers came into the audience and it was really fun to see The Littles with the bigger students all singing together so thanks to our PTO for organizing that and to our board members who also played a role director Jiao and director roer played a role in that experience thank you we're also celebrating black history this month with schools and teachers taking the time to acknowledge the importance of black history black culture Black Traditions while also acknowledging that um really the black experience is not monolithic and there's Rich diversity in histories and perspectives and all are important to be heard and considered so on this slide there are some great places for parents and community members to deepen their knowledge there's the Minnesota African-American Heritage Museum and gallery on Penn Avenue North North Minneapolis which is currently featuring exhibitions on the black vote and black liberation another organization promoting black Excellence is the African-American leadership forum and they uh organize very well orchestrated and well- attended events with the last event being held at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and of course another place to sharpen your understanding of black history and culture is our very own classrooms and media centers and various Hopkins events such as the one in the middle photograph celebrating local black children's author and former Hopkins teacher Kean Jones who read his newly published book at tangin literacy night last Thursday so that was a very well attended event virtual edu has exciting news thanks to the U ofm 4H program virtual edu has had the incredible opportunity to implement Hydroponics board members have heard um some details of that program before and the results have really been amazing the initial Harvest yielded an abundance of fresh produce from crisp lettuce to vibrant herbs and students then created delicious meals including fried rice lettuce wraps and fresh salads and with food science becoming more popular and also very critical industry it's great to see our Scholars grow their own food and prepare and enjoy it together seventh graders at North Middle School were dissecting frogs today and treasure Heartland was there to witness all of it Rachel was very impressed with science co-teachers Miss bod and Miss Sagal hopefully I pronounced those names correctly thumbs up from our principal back there thank you you the learning rigor is in biology content testing your own hypothesis and using lab equipment properly and the fun is in hearing students comments such as is this frog going to survive and I've never seen such good stomach contents so thanks Treasurer Hartland for sharing the pics and the quotes students at North are also meeting very audacious reading targets for their self-prescribed 2025 reading goals students have set at least 303 goals and pledged to read nearly 18,000 books and I am told that students were pumped to see and also compete with their teachers goals thank you to north and west administrators and teachers for implementing the 10 minutes of independent reading per block per day and doing it with fidelity north and west middle schoolers are building assessment capable Learners in all of their students education professor and researcher John Hattie describes an assessment capable learner as a student who understands assessment results and can use that information to determine what they need to do next assessment capable Learners are more prepared for a lifelong Learning Journey to build assessment capable learners students at north and west are engaged in student reflection so self-reflection experiences around their midyear in progress IB scores and then sharing these reflections with their parent or caregiver so for example I received an email from my seventh grader at West that read Dear Mother this week I took time to reflect on my academic progress in each of my classes the document linked here contains all of my in progress scores and a short reflection about each one and then that's just a screenshot of two of her eight subjects I would be happy to talk with you this weekend about my academic progress and to answer any questions you have although she will not talk to me at home she just wrote that in the so her teachers could see and um so then when I followed the link I was able to see not only what her mid midyear scores are but also what her Reflections are on each score in each subject area and I was really really impressed that that was happening for every student at both of our middle schools and this does not happen without the guidance of our IB coordinators who also serve as instructional coaches under the instructional leadership of our principles so thank you very much to north and west for building assessment capable Learners moving up to our high school when I was there last week I noticed art teacher Miss Bethany Henshaw hanging artwork from her drawing two course I learned that students first make a magazine cutout collage and ensuring they have contrasting images they then project onto a canvas and they trace before engaging in the painting process and Miss Henshaw helped students draw out value contrasts between their chosen paint colors to produce a very provocative multicolored work of art so I thought the art was really masterful for high school level students and wanted to share with you and hopefully you can also visit our high school in the mall and see these amazing works of art and while I was checking out the artwork I also had a sneak peek into the daily school safety huddle at Hopkins High School this is a fantastic team dedicated to working as a collective to ensure school is a positive and safe experience for all 2,000 students during this meeting these safety coaches and their two assistant principles associate principles reviewed their assigned stations for the day and also role played what to do if they experience push back from a student or even from a staff member when it comes to consistent enforcement of hallway and common space expectations thank you to the safety teams at all of our schools for keeping our schools safe safe and for promoting positive schoolwide culture schools across Minnesota were recently notified of current teacher of the year nominees 14 Hopkins teachers are in the running for the 2025 Minnesota teacher of the year these extraordinary teachers are among 142 candidates nominated across the state and so from here on out a diverse panel of cross industry leaders will read portfolios for the 142 candidates and the winner will be announced at the Teacher of the Year banquet on May 4 congratulations to yuk Lee sarahan hve Nora tycast McKenna ynes Nicole midat Mitchell shank Kyle Stark D Den harthog Allison rubeli Andy Jensen jitk sebec Julie daring Katie York and Katie Trembley good luck to each nominee and wrapping it up here uh wanted to share that Kindergarten Roundup is right around the corner and we're really excited to meet the Future Families of next year's kindergarteners Kindergarten Roundup is probably what it um what it sounds like which is an opportunity for families to learn all things kindergarten every Elementary School hosts around up and the first one is at Eisenhower on February 18th and the last one is at the end of the month on February 27th at tanglin hope to see many many families show up for these events and then finally I just wanted to share with parents and community members that I'm doing a soup with the soup thing so it's cold and maybe coming for lunch and having soup and chatting with the superintendent could be a fun thing for um people who can take time off of work so we'll have to also come up with some um round the clock opportunities because not all of our parents and caregivers have the same schedule but this is an opportunity to just um connect with parents and community members and see what's on the minds and hearts of uh those who are raising our students in homes across the Hopkins community and at this time I would love to invite principal raselli to the table we're doing a school Spotlight on North Middle School at our January 28th board meeting you had the opportunity to see a video and uh I think his name is Cruz Cruz is a student at North so he uh gave you a glimpse into a day in the life at North Middle School and um thank you Julius for being here this evening to give us an e even closer glimpse into the school and um truly what makes North a special place what you are um focusing on as your instructional priorities and anything else that makes North special thanks for being here absolutely uh thank you for having me this evening it's a pleasure to be here with you all um you know when Roa asked me to do this I had to really think like okay what are all the things I want to highlight because you know you get like maybe one one opportunity a year to do this so um I want to make sure I make the best of it so the it feels right to to start with the people that make it all happen at north um and that's our staff and so the image you see on your screens um right now is our staff from our annual McConnell breakfast um this breakfast uh is celebrated annually at um North uh to celebrate the life of a former teacher who passed away um over 10 years ago now Robert McConnell um and also as many people may know we know we lost Gina Snell um last year so we also celebrated her life so I wanted to just come into the space and say their names um to acknowledge that our staff remembers um and carry their Spirits with us every day as we do our work so um one highlight that recently uh happened for us at North is um as you all know we're in IB School and as a part of being in um an IB school every IB School under goes undertakes a fiveyear every five years under goes an evaluation which means um IB Educators from across the country and sometimes across the world will come to your building and spend a couple of days in your space um evaluating those four components you see on the screen there so your purpose your environment your culture and your learning um and they will they they take that the time to walk around the building to speak with various stakeholders ERS um and ask questions and at the end of it um they give you sort of um a report on how they feel um you are doing as an IB School in terms of um your progress towards this uh towards those various uh goals so I have a couple of slides that touches on a couple of the things um that was share with us um for our purpose we received glowing um comments regarding our district and building leadership's commitment to IB and so that's um that that was a wonderful thing to hear because um the impact and the commitment that our district has to IB is felt daily in our building by our staff and our students um it also T um they also shared about what is evident across our building um IB being evident in all of our classrooms um and also our learner profiles we have various images and um placards all across our building um stating the things that we value um that is a part of the IB program and how it shows up in the in the way that we speak and in the things that we do at North the next slide um that I want to share uh is on our is on our school environment and it talks about how north um one of its strains was its holistic and high quality learning environment I and it's commitment to that um it also talked about the resources that are allocated to the authentic needs of our students um and dedicated time uh to students and teacher well-being um earlier I heard about you know the high school modeling a couple of their things after our 10-minute uh read that has been at North long before I got to North and we use that 10minutes almost as a you know seal and a a like a calming reset opportunity at the beginning of every class period and that was something that um the visiting team from IB we're really impressed with uh because they felt it was a holistic way to sort of approach learning and give students an oppos opportunity uh to become grounded in the learning environment that they've just stepped into um without carrying the chaos of the Halls into the classroom with them um and also they were very impressed with our uh win um opportunities that we offer at North and um and in our district one thing they shared that would be an opportunity for us is um providing more common planning time um for subject and grade level teams which is something that I know our district leadership has worked with us um in recent years to try to um tackle and accommodate so although it's listed as an opportunity it's something we've always known that we wanted to work on ourselves and are um working to do so the next highlight I wanted to um point out is the leg annual uh the annual legislative Action Coalition breakfast um this year North was uh lucky enough to be picked to host uh this breakfast I it was an honor as a principal to to show off your building obviously and to be and to be representing our school district with our legisl ative leaders um this the topic and subject matter for this uh Year's breakfast was Innovative education and to that end we were able to have a couple of our teacher leaders come and present to our legislative leaders um highlighting the amazing work that our teachers and students do at north um on a daily basis um and as a principal I was proud uh to be there to witness it so that was definitely a highlight for us this year um next uh another highlight that we have going on this year uh last year the district uh made the Bold decision to allow both middle schools half days four times a year um to really do some of that work that um was pointed out in our IB visit as a opportunity that we need which is time for teachers to create really um great content for our students and what we decided to do at North was commit those four um individual half days to inter interdisciplinary lesson planning and what we do is after the students uh depart on their buses at about 12:30 our teachers take a lunch break and then we all come together in a collective space and we work on working across uh cross-curricular content uh to build things that we believe we wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity to build with just our regular school schedule um and and it has done wonders for our school culture our staff and just it rejuvenates them to be with each other and um so for me this has just been just a tremendous highlight uh to see our staff being able to be together creating opportunities and learning experiences for our students that are truly transformative um another highlight that I want to point out um is our sixth grade band retention success um you know a couple of years ago there was a lot of conversations being had around um our district and various buildings ability to support our Band program and I was recently um in a band classroom observing and I the joy in the room was just so palpable that I had a conversation with the band teacher and just said hey I have to do this thing next week um can you give me some data and we had just done registration so I saw the numbers of students who were registered for ban in the seventh grade coming out of sixth grade and that retention um is tremendous for 128 students to come into B in the sixth grade and 122 of them to choose to continue is huge especially because at the elementary level um they get lessons and that's not something that we're able to provide for them um at the middle school level um but the fact that they have enjoyed our Band program at the sixth grade level and to have them continue is a tremendous Testament to our our our band teachers and their planning and their intentionality about creating a rich experience for all of um our band students and shout out to our Orchestra uh teachers as well because um it's it's it's a it's a beautiful thing to watch kids make music um and to use that side of their brain that you don't get to see in other classes and so it's an honor to sit here and highlight the great work of our band and music teachers across the district and in particular at North and I have an image on the next one just to show our sixth grade band students at their concert um so I'm just going to let that breathe for a second all right we can go on um and another thing I want to highlight um is obviously our wins um I just have a couple of pictures from a few winds that run uh daily at North obviously the courtyard planning uh planting doesn't run right now it's really cold outside um but daily during wind we have roughly 45 wins going on any particular day that is that means every single adult who is not supervising the halls or in a Planning Group is running a win so our adults at North are busy creating experiences for our students that are tremendous it allows them to be themselves in one of those photos you see kids playing Uno usually that's reserved for the kitchen table at your home with family but what's evident there is for those kids that's family and just giving them a chance to be with each other um it's huge and of course animal rescue um it's therapeutic in so many ways but who doesn't like cute animals to start your day right um and and so I started with a thank you to our staff I want to end with a thank you to our staff uh because ultimately everything I have talked about um in this highlight is only made possible through their hard work and dedication um and um and and my job would not be what it is without their uh support um and so thank you for this time and I appreciate you guys for having me thank you any questions I'm happy to if anyone has any questions or anything um I I just wanted to say I thank you for mentioning the Lac breakfast and I I was going to talk about that too like it was such a great experience I think for all of us that were there and thank you so much for hosting um and I'm so glad that you're here to speak because I was very touched by um what you were telling our legislators and and the the stories that you told about education and what's happening at North so thank you for being here thank you you thank you for having me jar and dreon yes I do have a real quick question do you know the um band retention rate before so it's 95 now which sounds amazing what was it before yeah so while I was putting that I wanted to try to look at it um and I couldn't it I couldn't get the exact numbers and um because as I was like running out the door to come here I was like I should probably look that up um I was just so it's not as High um I just remember you know every time we do our scheduling I would notice like just some dwindling from 6th to 7th and eth right students would you know begin to drop band um depending on whatever experience they were having but that hasn't been the case this past year and you know our teachers are just doing some wonders and really engaging with the kids um they're put in additional time we have teachers who are offering um additional band experiences during our win time to supplement you know just their regular band classes so for kids who just need that additional time they're able to be with their band teachers uh during that time so you have a band a band win well not specifically band but you know like different types of you know musical opportunities during win time so kids you know get to explore a little bit more beyond what is available in their regular courses yeah would it be easy for your data specialist to pull what it might have looked like for the last couple years I think so um I could probably even go through and look through um our previous registration sheets and and find those I know our music teachers have really been working on yeah High retention yeah and and I was excited when I saw that because I know it has a trajectory of impact towards you know our higher grades right um and the whole idea is to show and build out a strong band and musical program Beyond band even our choir um is doing a lot better than it did um and we have some stability within our choir uh department now um with um a committed teacher who is you know um really spending time to create experiences as a part of um you know the the both of the plays at north and west using that as a catalyst to to build that commitment to music and just singing yeah oh yes uh Chon yes uh is there similar retention rates for like Orchestra and Co choir um I'll have to look at that um I was mainly highlighting sixth grade because um with them not being able to have uh you know the lessons that they received at the elementary level which was more intensive and uh in helping grow their uh their band skills I don't have the exact information um on the on Orchestra and and and those other courses but I can I can easily look that up yeah Sher and dreon can I ask a questions thank you so much for the presentation and I definitely agree with Shar andreon and um that you did such an amazing job at the Lac breakfast and just sharing the story and history of north um especially the the video with Cruz it was really um inspiring for the um for the reading competition uh have you seen like a significant um Improvement amongst like the reading scores or kind of like the reading um dynamics of students since you all have like start the competition and you integrate that so heavily into like your daytoday right um we've our school you know has always had a strong tradition of like reading um and we still have a lot of our a lot of students who could use more time um perfecting and getting better with their reading um our teachers as a part of those interdisciplinary days one thing we started incorporating is um each department was required for every lesson they planned to have a list of vocabulary words that are part of the lessons that they're planning that will be essential to the understanding of those lessons so literacy is something we're we're trying to intentionally start to wrap into everything we're planning moving forward because um when students done understand some of those key phrasings or words that exist within uh the lessons they may become disengaged right and so if you frontload it uh before you even get into the content there's a higher uh opportunity for engagement whether not they're at the appropriate reading level or not right they can stay with it um and then you know we have a phenomenal reading teacher in our building Laura Jensen who works with our coaches and our entire building staff to continue to make those headways and we are very intentional about we all have to be rowing in the same direction as it as it relates to our reading uh programming and um and so we are we do see improvements but um there's still so much work to be done um and obviously um we could always use more funding for for you know various reading interventions and things of that nature um but this is one thing we can certainly do in the way that our schedule is built by setting aside that 10 minutes at the beginning of every class making sure every student has a book that they love to read um and just giving them that time to to kind of dive into it and and perfect that Craft on a daily day in and day out basis thank you so much is there any data like any um disaggregated data that shows like the different reading levels or proficiencies amongst the different student races in I'll have to pull that I don't know that off of the top sorry but I but I think we are doing a Dr erle we're doing a literacy update next board meeting correct um yes and so we can we do have FD data at the middle level provide some of thef dat so we can get at some of those questions in two weeks okay wonderful thank you thank you thank you principal Aroma Celli for being here and I do want our board and community members to know that um Julius is a very intentional principal he's built a really strong School culture with staff and students at North and we um very much appreciate your leadership thank you you thank you Dr muy Peri Reid that um takes us to um approval of the agenda for this evening do I have a motion so moved second I have a motion and a second um any discussion see none all those in favor please say I I I any opposed uh the chair votes I and the agenda is approved 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 that the board approves the consent calendar so moved I have a motion is there a second second I have a motion and a second is there any discussion as part of discussion I would like to let everyone know that I am abstaining from the vote on this um consent calendar because it contains the tentative contract agreement with par professionals and I currently work um in the district as a par professional but I will still call the vote any further discussion see none all those in favor please say I I I any opposed the chair abstains and the consent calendar has been approved and that takes us to the treasures report Treasurer Hartland wonderful thank you um I wanted to talk for just a moment tonight about our Treasures report itself um because in the state of Minnesota there is statute that outlines some Treasurer duties one of which is to furnish reports to the board um but specifies nothing about the format or the frequency of these reports and it's largely up to either a district policy or the board's preference how the treasury reports look and sound so I looked at a few surrounding districts by looking at their meeting agendas and their and watching some of their meetings though admittedly at like 2x speed just as fast as I possibly could um and in every District that I looked into which is not a comprehensive list there's like 330 districts in Minnesota and I looked at minetonka wetta Idina Minneapolis an Noah hanapin and St Louis Park public schools and none of them discuss their expenditure reports at the table and instead they're passed as part of consent and so of course any board member can pull an item out of consent and ask that it be discussed but that did not happen in any of the meetings that I observed again with the grain of salt that that was not a comprehensive review by any means um so I did not see a single District either meetings or agenda that had a Treasures report in the format that we practice and all of this is to say that we as a district and a board have taken this step purposefully towards making finances more part of an ongoing discussion and to be more transparent and accountable about our expenditures and that was a decision that the board made um several years ago like 10 close to 10 years ago now when our district came out of a previous time of um deficit and statutory um operating oversight and since we've adapted the format before I wanted to kind of Welcome one more time um if there's either this board or if there's community members who want to partner on additional things that might um shape our board report I you know that I've adapted it slightly to my predecessor to talk about kind of a more standardized set of expenses and to expand just a bit on different elements that are relevant to our financial conversations and um again just wanted to extend that partnership I do plan to once we have board reports or expense reports in the current format that can go back one full year to kind of do some more side by side comparisons and talking about differences um that data is currently difficult to to procure and to talk about because we have multiple systems in our old one is is really old um moving on some expenses of note are $231,300 that went to just one of our busing partners for student transportation with an additional $81,000 for special education transportation $1,925 to Superior Vision Services as an employee benefit um $3,443 to arvig which is a network hardware and internet service provider $ 34,44 to teachers on call one of our substitute teaching staffing agencies um $ 31,38 to ring central our phone service provider um $ 37,3 paid to various vendors from our nutrition fund and as a reminder we get approximately 90% of those expenses reimbursed from the state of Minnesota due to our Universal School meals program we paid 12,00 $70 to True North consulting which is a firm founded in Minnesota but now in many cities in the US focused on technology network and infrastructure strategic planning mostly for public entities and incidentally I saw contracts with them on the consent calendars of many of the districts that I've looked at over the last couple weeks we spent $2,571 at batteries RS for batteries um we made Seven payments to seven different PTO or activity groups within our district um our district allows groups to sign up to sell concessions as a fundraiser and any attendees who buy concessions actually pays the district and then we collect that money deduct the cost of food and pay the profit in sales to those different PTO groups we paid $956,000 for snow s removal and parking lot salting for different snow and ice events in January um $3,356 went to Lincoln's National life insurance for our portion of those insurance premiums and with that I move that we approve total dispersements of 1,168 12715 for the period of January 17th to January 31st 2025 I have a motion is there a second second I have a motion in a second any discussion chair and dreon yes clerk Thompson uh well first of all Treasurer Harland thank you so much for those opening comments and you know it's clear that you put a ton of work into your role as the treasurer and take it really seriously and I really appreciate that so thank you for that um and you know I would commend the district for putting these together in you know a transparency and here's what we're spending it on you know and it's not tucked away in consent like you're seeing some other districts do so I think that that's really good um I just have one question do you know on this vendor Red River Flags we spent $6,500 did we purchase a bunch of new Flags or something for the high school we did purchase a bunch of new flags for various sites we actually own a lot of buildings and have Flags in a lot of rooms I don't know what the real count of our flags are and it's kind of interesting that you brought that up because our business services like our Oracle system is letting us see where each site used to be paying for Flags um and many other services kind of independently and this is letting us kind of group all of those expenditures together and then reach out to vendors for you know to kind of consolidate use a single vendor and get a a better pricing package and flag Flags is one of them so we we just bought a lot of flags like uh at North Middle School alone I don't know how many flags I'm not sure if U Mr ramelli is still here but you've seen them so we we did yeah well that's that's good to hear that they can be kind of Consolidated and then purchased at like a bulk discount obviously I don't know what kind of replace cycle we on we could we could ask interesting all right thank you yep treasure har can I ask you a quick question yes director over oh thank you um so yes I I will agree with um with everything that uh that was said about your um the way that you do like the treasur report I love it I have a question about snow removal I know a couple of kids over in North now who'll get that done for about $1,500 right like seriously do we are we able to compare in contrast like compare like different snow removal companies like do they do like all the schools or do they is there like a certain um I don't know is there like a certain requirement that we have to have for our snow removal I know like like slipping on ice and stuff like that we have to make sure that like our sidewalks and everything are safe but I think that that's probably a building in grounds question I know that like for a lot of our contracts we have to go out for a bit I don't know if snow removal is one of them but it's a it's a large number it's worth potentially following up on that so I can talk with you after and okay chair andreon do you want this answered now or in a follow-up email if we have an answer director chap Anda thank you for coming to the board table the question was about um more competitive pricing for snow removal services yeah uh to my understanding the current uh arrangement we have uh it's been in the district for a while uh what we've also been doing one is part of us moving to a new system was to I Identify some of the critical services to the district where we have not re uh Ved the uh the vendors in the past and start to uh put some RFP or uh request for proposal or request for courts just to see what the market looks like uh we do have different arrangements with for example when it comes to uh certain expenditures because we pay through either federal dollars you know we have either get a multiple Cod so we go out to the market and find three vendors and uh we um we uh use the one with the competitive price meaning the lowest bid on a yearly basis we do uh we do have some uh request for proposal we send out there depending with the threshold um but again we also so have some of the service providers who have been Serv servicing the district for uh for for a number of years right now so we are still just operating on uh those old contracts okay and do those companies only do snow removal or is there other um services like um I don't know like leaf removal and things that they do as well that's like are they um I can't think of the word but like are they like it's another word for on call I can't think of the word but um so are they just yeah do they do like all of our environmental work yeah some of them do in terms of not just snow removal they also provide other uh other services to the to the district uh I mean if there's a specific company can uh check with our buildings and grounds department and then they can let us know what are the services they provide for the district we have a cycle that we review these on I'll say that again I'm sorry oh can you say that again TR I spoke out of turn here so oh no I was just saying thank you oh I asked if there's a cycle that comes up either in business services or in in individual Department that's like hey this contract hasn't been reviewed or gone out for propos yeah we've been pulling out I mean you know best practices is usually you go out for an RFP after 5 years uh to uh Scout the market uh some contracts we have like for 3 years uh that's when we either go either for an RFP or an RFQ or multiple code if it's a service provider who is unique and provide uh the service uh as a s Service in the state we usually do a S Source later and usually we do bring back uh so for example right now uh on the conscent agenda uh there were some bids we just did for some of our building and grounds contracts so uh periodically we bring this to the board uh for for approval thank you thank you thank you um and I think uh Natalia just let us know that the um flag price um was significant because we have a new state flag that would make sense yep thank you for that context thank you none of us made that connection um any further discussion see none all those in favor please say I I any opposed the chair votes I and that takes us to our oh and the treasures report is accepted and um we now go to new business and um are seeing the citizens Financial advisory committee report I would like to invite the members of the committee to the table and I believe two of our board members are joining them um to report and I'll turn it over to Dr Mary per Reed thank you chair Andre so as we get organized here um I'll just provide a quick Framing and then uh our director of Business Services can take it from there but um I would like to start by welcoming our uh guest presenters to the table we have an Hopkins a Citizens Financial advisory committee um otherwise known as CAC and these are parent actually who have some pretty deep um Financial expertise and we've met with this group along with board Treasurer Rachel Hartland and director jiming Jiao our assistant superintendent and of course Director of Business services so the group of us have met um I don't know how many times five or six or seven one of those and um I'm very grateful because this is completely voluntary so these parents well they probably have to get up to send their kids to school but then after they send the kids to school they're in either in person or virtual space with the rest of us going over lots and lots of information and I think um we've also talked about the the fiscal landscape with public school districts across the state of Minnesota um here in the metropolitan area school districts will be facing probably a more than $200 million shortfall and so what we're experiencing Hopkins is um not an isolated experience and we're we're in a difficult predicament because uh this is not the first budget reduction right we we are experiencing annual um either reduction or hard reality with limited resources so grateful to all of our thought Partners in this work and um I will just turn it over to turo well let me let me um explain who's at the table so Andrea s thank you for your service Luke Jacobson I think was Luke going to join he was but I think he was boarding a plane so I'm not entirely sure yeah it was going to be Touch and Go whether or not um literally touch and go especially if we told especially if we told probably present around 7:30 and it's like 8 to 10 okay um Andy Kemba is on the team Craig Bolson is here um Justin seof is on the team and Scott Seaman is here um so thanks very much to all of you and I'll turn it over to you Tero and then maybe you can hand it off to Andrea or whoever is speaking first sure uh thank you Dr M Reed uh as mentioned I definitely would want to thank the CAC Group which is a voluntary group of uh our community uh CAC has been in existence in the district almost for close to 20 years now and it's been pivotal it uh giving direction to the board and administration in terms of how we I mean we always facing challenges with our budgets and uh our finite resources so getting some insights from industry leaders uh on how we uh develop long-term uh financial goals and uh how we able to sustain the district is uh uh CR IAL for the success of our organization so I wanted to take this uh to take the opportunity to thank the CIFA group for uh their efforts in helping the district and their dedication uh we usually have this meetings early in the morning and uh this year we've had a number of meetings uh I think almost uh close to seven meetings and we'll continue to have uh meetings after after this presentation to the board uh and I want to take the Limelight away from the uh citizen financial advisory commit so I'll give this opportunity to miss Andrea Simmons to uh take us through the the report uh in partnership with the uh other seac members as well as uh board members thank you thank you thanks for giving us the opportunity to speak today the committee has met did we say six or seven it's a question six or seven times to review the financial health of the district we reviewed numerous sources including Financial results legislative agendas enrollment Trends and other Financial factors to come up with the recommendations presented in our board report we are thankful to the board and the staff for their work and thoughtfulness in preparing the budget for the fiscal year from 20 July 2025 to June 2026 some of the key assumptions we used for the 2026 budget include a 2% increase per in State per student funding flat enrollment 4% annual salary increases and a 3% increase in purchase Services particularly the busting and transportation the general fund unassigned fund balance is projected to decrease from 14% in fiscal year 2024 to 10% in fiscal year 2025 due to the previously authorized one-time use of the un assigned fund balance to cover the budget shortfalls for the 2024 2025 year Hopkins remains in a relatively strong financial position and continues to have good working relationships with its employee unions 67% of the district's revenue is in the form of State funds governmental funding increases are projected to be minimal and as a result the district is forecast to have a deficit in fiscal 2026 if no adjustments are made this will NE necessitate efficiencies in service and programs to address Budget shortfalls CAC continues to feel that the general fund unassigned fund balance is crucial for financial stability and in line with the district auditor recommends maintaining the unassigned fund at or above 10% to support the district's strategic goals we recommend that the unassigned fund balances not be used to cover any shortfalls if budget shortfalls are continuously covered with un assigned fund balances the fund will quickly move further away from the cac's recommended 10% CAC supports strategic efforts to retain and grow enrollment including effective marketing investment in virtual education and continuous Improvement and instructional Excellence we support the legislative advocacy for safety resources mental health support fully funded funded mandated programs and the ability to increase local Revenue to support the operating budgets our committee continues to research efficiencies to help medicate further funding constraints thank you again to the board and the staff for the opportunity for this input and for all the work towards aligning the district with the vision 2031 goals open it up if anyone has questions for us thank you I appreciate the report and the care with which um this has is always under taken by the committee I know that um it comes through in every CAC report I've ever seen um that you are careful stewards of taxpayer dollars but also um very committed to this district and the families so thank you for your work and with that I would look to see if any members have comments or questions chair Andre director West Morland so um I Echo chair Andre and sentiments thank you so much for your service and for your work on on this report um I think perhaps the the most powerful and telling page of the report is page eight with the budget projection model um so for community members who are joining us via YouTube and watching this on home at home I would encourage you to go to that page of the report um to take a look at the actual numbers that we're looking at here um this is going to be really challenging so most of us at this table have been involved in budget reductions in the past um and we're looking at the highest number that we've had to reduce since my 10 year on the board this is my eighth year on the board um and so this is the result of course we've talked about this many times of chronic underfunding by the state um of the state not living up to its obligation to fund uh special education programming to um at the level that that our state constitution requires um so here we are as local school boards having to do this incredibly incredibly hard work in partnership with our community um and I thank you so much for this report and just want to be very real with our community about the work ahead thank you any other comments answer questions Sharon dreon Clark Thompson thanks um yes Echo what uh director West Morland and chair Andre have said I mean seriously thank you for the time that you've put into this it's really appreciated um I think I had just a couple of questions here the first one um probably pretty Elementary but you know that goal to maintain the unassigned fund balance at 10% you know between 10 and 15% % like the auditor said and I think you had said um you know to enable the district to meet its goals so what what is the value of keeping it there and I'm I think we should but I I just like other than going into statutory operating debt if it gets too low like what is the other consequence of if it goes below 10 I just don't know Scott do you want to take if you want me to uh yeah I can uh speak to that um yeah I know the statutory operating debt uh I know many ago there was kind of an enrollment uh situation where Hopkins dipped into that the last time and we lost a number of kids so I think that could be a big issue um also uh kind of reduction in uh uh Bond ratings and so forth if we go to the market for uh Capital levies and so forth that could impact Bond ratings um also just continue to borrow from that unassigned fund and bringing that balance down kind of gets you to only a year or so left of fund balance as you can see in that table is pretty profound uh if we're if we you know paid that 6.9 million with the unassigned fund balance you're kind of kicking the can down the road to the next year and it's over 9 million uh for the next fiscal year and you know there wouldn't be wouldn't be a whole lot of money left after a couple years so that that was really helpful thank you for that answer makes total sense as to why you wouldn't want to go beneath 10 that makes total sense um I I was curious in the recommendations on page eight um when and you know I I think these are good recommendations when when you say when you recommend continuous Improvement in instructional excellence and academic rigor um did you have any discussions about like what what is that mean or how would we measure it how would we know if we're continuously improving in those areas I'm just ious what the discussion was there I think it was more along the lines of maintaining what the work that's being done and not um taking away from that and and having to to use funds just to support business and the really great work that's going with the vision 2031 and and being able to support that as a district um we didn't go into specifics on it I know that one of the things that we really did talk about is you know how to H you know as as uh Scott had mentioned you know these onetime fixes for something that's continually underfunded and how do we get to the next step so that we're not having to you know take from one bucket in order to cover for the other um so it's I think it's more of a long time a long-term you know longevity of the The District in order to you know but as far as you know did we get into as much of the educational pieces of it more we stay more towards the financial side of it and I if I could add there is an element when we have more in-depth conversations at the district level there's an element of class size to that we really want to think about the conditions that all of our classrooms need in order to move toward excellence and increased rigor which means that um we have to think about our adult to student ratios and figure out how we can make these reductions while protecting classroom as much as possible great thank you any further comments or questions chair Andre yes Vice chair Ross thank you um CAC committee for uh presenting this information is obviously sobering information um especially to director West morland's Point um page eight is very telling I guess the only question that I have is um not un hearing all the rhetoric um that is going to be in our east side I think you guys know what direction you know where I'm talking about is there any reason or any should we be a little bit more conservative not understanding I I guess how I see it as a holistic is that I'm not I'm planning on no more money coming from the federal government at all um especially just trying to be more with the efficiency that's happening so I'm assuming we're budgeting or we're planning for or there's some plan that there's not going to be any federal money like as a worst case scenario that will I would imagine might change some of these numbers um to go up higher so I I where I'm going is that it I'm assuming that's something um the team is kind of looked at as like let's plan on no federal funds coming to our school district yeah so I mean again that's the importance of having fund balance I mean right now everything is still up in the air so we are still waiting for uh more information in terms of uh what this might look like uh from uh the federal revenues we get to the district um there's no impact for fiscal year 2425 like I mentioned at the last board meeting uh but uh if it ends up a case where we don't have uh federal dollars coming in and we want to maintain our programs uh we not we're going to need a launching pad of how do we even eliminate certain things so that's when if we have uh savings on the side uh we can uh leverage those savings to be able to at least get us to a point where we don't impact the quality uh of service being provided for the for the district yeah I think that just reiterates the need for that fund balance you know as much as possible just to cover some unexpected um legislative changes thank you for that unfortunate news thank you you um I just had um some a few questions about um I I know that for us it's new this year that we as a school board get to um automatically renew our um our operating Levy and so just wondering and then also there's been discussion about um going to our community again and asking for um for them to help um support the district and just wondering given your knowledge and your service on CAC um what would be kind of your recommendations as community members to the school board of what to do with those questions that are coming before us yeah we did have discussions about that um I don't want to take from other people if they want to talk but uh we did have a number of conversations about that and and the risk to you know not approving it and and by chance losing those funds and you know from a long-term structure what you know what are options to to cover these these operating deficits um in the future I do you remember specific conversations I guess about what and how that looked I think we have an operating referendum coming do in 27 is that right cor right so hopefully there'll be some opportunity there to get some more Revenue otherwise uh enrollment obviously is kind of the uh the secret weapon for for gaining traction on Revenue so hopefully we can keep the steam going there it seems like we have some some forward progress on enrollment at the district so if we can keep uh that moving along that should help out for sure great thank you so I kind of hearing that that's something CAC is in support of that the board renew renew that um and then also that when it comes up for Renewal we we go back to the community I think that's definitely an option great yeah thank you that was the only question I had um so thank you so much for being here for all of the information in this report it's very comprehensive um I hope that our community that follows us and cares deeply about public education and funding um reads this um so that everyone of us are on the same page thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you all so much so we do have an action associated with this report um I will wait for our board colleagues to come back to the other side of the table now um and so that we um now that we've had a chance to review the report and to ask questions um we I would look for a motion that the board accepts the citizens Financial advisory committee report so moved I have a motion is there a second second I have a motion and a second any discussion see none all those in favor please say I I any opposed the chair votes I and the citizens Financial advisory committee report is accepted that um brings us to policies in first read I will turn it over to Vice chair Ross excellent thank you chair Andre um we're have five policies that we're going to review uh with the board uh today so policy 416 502 505 507 524 you'll see there's two policies that had changes noted and three of them three of which that did not so with that I will hand the floor over to assistant superintendent Dr Life foot um to be able to walk you guys through if there's any questions uh that the B colleagues have thank you just getting set up here good evening um all right well uh as was mentioned we continue our work uh with the set of policies that is here uh one we did some extensive work with on uh 416 uh that is related to drug testing and as you're aware with some of the statutory changes I was necessary that we go back and review that policy uh we did review that with our assistant director of Transportation uh director Williams and uh part of that review was to make sure that we were in compliance with the um state and federal requirements that are associated with any commercial driving license uh as well to make sure that we uh were in compliance with the statutory requirements that are associated with any testing that we are are required to do um as part of our work uh with our transportation department and any employee sets of circumstances that might develop so with that those changes were made uh questions comments on 416 chair andreon yes director hi Dr Lightfoot I oh sorry I do have a question for Dr Lightfoot yes yes um I uh so this policy is for mostly for school bus drivers or does it also apply to certain other employees it can um it's a great question it's an employee uh broad scope policy but really the predominant work that we do that's associated with any testing is really around the required testing that is associated with that commercial driving license which is why you see so much of the policy really paying specific attention to that level of work okay so and and I think a lot of the for the so school bus drivers totally understand there's there's requirements around that um and but for o others right there's this maybe concept of a safety sensitive employee and they could be subject to testing um and I looked at the state statute um it looks very broad right like you you know we could we could say yes a teacher is a safety sensitive uh employee is that does the district consider that to be true or how does that work no we've really looked at the qualification component there as I've said more predominantly with that commercial driving license we do have some individuals that we employ as bus drivers ourselves some we work with as your Weare through contract um so we make sure that we're compliant there as well um when we look at any testing set of circumstances we always look and the only way we would look at that is if there were an employee um concern that might develop from any specific misconduct such that it would necessitate something that we would need to look into um but that uh is a high bar and a high measure that we would look at with specific misconduct in any specific set of circumstances where there might be that duty of safety that we would owe U but that would be a review on an individual case basis got it thank you any other questions or comments I don't see any all right uh next policy is uh policy 502 there are no recommended changes for 502 uh would be open to any specific questions that are there I had a question um just in general for the monitoring committee I do know that um it's been an ongoing um student feedback on um searches that um we kind of look at this policy and be um uh careful about um yeah just more from a student lens look at it and see if we think that it's appropriate as it is so I was just wondering what kind of discussion you had at the committee level about that about our our student input and on that topic my my recollection is we didn't have any other than our student board Representatives who were with us at the meeting didn't have any other discussion around student input is there a place where that student input lives like did we have survey results about it it or is it more anecdotal um I think it was part of safety conversations that we had with um different students and then also I know the student advisory brought it up as well about having random and non um like that there's no reason to do a search but they just kind of do them periodically um that those were just kind of problematic and and a little invasive and I saw when I was reading this that that policy is it's still the district policy so just wondering if there was a discussion but it sounds like no not outside of the current stort School rips that was my only question so I'm I'm looking at you know certainly some of the definitions the terminology and the policy such as Reasonable Suspicion reasonable scope um which leads me to wonder if it's more the implementation of the policy that needs to be looked at versus the policy itself um and so I would be curious to know more specifically about what that feedback was it sounds like part of it was the randomness of the searches um but I'm wondering if this is more of a a staff training issue around what the policy actually allows well I do think that there is it it states right in the policy um um that inspection of the interior of lock may be conducted by school officials for any reason at any time without notice without student consent and without a search warrant and I think that's where the issue is we would be I mean I'll speak for myself I as a Committee Member would be happy to to take a look at it again I think that we just need more specifics around kind of like how the policy has been implemented maybe over the last couple of years where some of these these issues are cropping up is it more at the middle school level or at the high school level I would want to know more specific so that if we are going to make changes that we can really um tailor it to address those I guess the other question is do we have any fastbridge data directly from the students communicating um that this like they feel uncomfortable with like last year and this year yeah um I don't know about any current um feedback but I can dig up the the sure prior years uncomfortable with what uncomfortable with searching lockers without reasonable cause and I don't know if it's if it's a current practice at the high school um I would just find it problematic that it's in our policy right so that it can be done regardless of who's at the high school or any of our schools frankly um I do think there are protections around personal belongings which I appreciate um but I do think that you know yes we own the lockers but it is kind of student space while they're using them you know it's kind of like your landlord can come in and search your place anytime they want like that that's kind of how it feels to me anyway but I can look for that those direct or if you have like the name of somebody who would have access to that yeah I think Panorama asks that but I just I wonder how easy it would be or how hard but if we got assistant principles and students together in the same room just to talk about what this actually looks like in Daily practice I mean the majority of our kids don't use lockers right I think we would want to look at the statutory components too I mean there there have been no no changes to the statute which is why there are no changes recommended to the policy but um just to make sure that we're accurately interpreting that um and it might be interesting to take a look at the ACLU to see if they have any um guidelines around this does seem like it's pulled fromb msba language so like word for word so right and usually the determination hinges on ownership and as you identify chair Andre the ownership of the district to inspect its own property at any point in time um usually the reason you'll see policy State this is to give individuals Fair notice so that they know that it could be searched at any point in time so that they would be fully aware of any risks that they would assume for placing anything in a locker that shouldn't be placed there um in part the distinction of why the standard is higher as you identify for another individual is that there is a greater level of privacy that's afforded in understanding that when you have a personal item that affords yourself greater protection from that from being um intereted upon or looked at in any invasive way so usually that is the distinction that you'll see certainly doesn't mean that you can't look at anything different there um but usually that really is associated to the school district reserving its right to inspect its own property at any time thank you for that context M other questions um consideration 4 502 doesn't look like it all right 505 505 is the distribution of materials um there again no specific changes recommended to 505 um I would be open to any questions uh related to 505 I don't see any questions all right then 507 507 had specific changes that were based in statute the changes were really um related to the definition components and the associated materials uh regarding prone restraint so you will see that the modifications that have been made are based off the model policy that model policy was done um with language um that was created um through the work um over periods of time through various legislative uh changes and amendments that were made um and what you see right now is reflecting the current status of uh statutory language that is being recommended by the uh model policy to include for your consideration there are additional questions happy to address those as well CH chair andreon yes director xia uh Dr like I do so the way I read this is that uh prone restraints could be allowed if it's deemed reasonable is that an accurate reading of this under various conditions yes okay the statutory language is very specific and restrictive on this um and so I mean I'll speak personally that I I do not agree with a lot of the language in this policy and it is required by Statute it seems like we just added some definition but said it's fine right is that is that what we're saying it is not my favorite statute I'll leave it at that okay I will say the pieces that are important to us as a district really revolve around um training in any staff set of circumstances I think it's important to understand that as a district um if there's anything that we do within our own staff practice whether it's any kind of restraint or hold that has a an internal review process as well as reporting components and any anything that we would look at we look at individuals who are trained we do go through CPI training with individuals who may experiened sets of circumstances where anything may be required um but I think it's also critical to understand that key tenants in that training do everything possible first to make sure that restraint is a last effort um and so I think it's just really critical to understand that while this policy is here to give specific sets of information it does not in any way infer that this is a goto practice if anything it is a last attempt practice if that helps yeah I and is there any way to modify the policy language to state that because to me you know oh it was reasonable and we move on with our day I I don't want that in the district I I agree with you director xia that was my next question is that language that we can put in that it is a that it is our policy that this is last resort after other and I I see director contras coming to help us out I and I think it's important to understand one thing that the policy does is it really does the the distinction between a proner straight I mean and it's it's inherently mentioned that an employer agent of the school district shall not use prone restraint I think that's the critical element that really what you're talking about is reasonable Force um that may be necessary and director cont you can speak to with some of the training that we do with staff as well yes so any person that performs a CPI restraint should be trained first and foremost um to I believe it's like 75% of the training is all verbal deescalation because we want to use hands on the least least least restrictive amount um only if students are um at harm for themselves or others do we um perform restraints we do not do prone so we just we don't I don't since I've been here I don't know that we ever have we just um had a review so we are required by law to have quarterly reviews on all of the holds that are done in the district um we look at the an aant so what precipitated the hold how long was the hold was it um a rational use of a hold did a debrief happen so those are all of the things that we look at um I will say that the this year and last year the rates of holds have increased um and then we give that feedback to the teams after we do these quarterly reviews so we literally just had one um last week and so we do look at that data and then we do turn that data into the state um but we do not apply prone holds nor do we do sitting holds with Where We Are holding a student while seated because of air circulation there are cases that have happened in Minnesota so the training that we provide are the holds that we Implement and we do not do not do not do prone and Fonda the quarterly reviews that we have they include any holes if there were of students with IEPs and without right so General Leed and special education students the gened ones are new are what so it's new for us reporting general education holds to the state um through different requirements um that weren't in place prior to this school year but we do report and we do debrief those as well and then the committee includes um nurse there's a nurse uh administrator Jeff Goldie um who works very closely with Asha um and then we have special EDS folks on that team thank you cheer andreon has a question director roer so as far as the um when we're talking about the CPI cuz I'm trained in CPI and I know that when I had to um uh enforce it when I was working with um students who like were biting or like who were part of special education so like if a stu if a teacher or an administrator need to put them in like a hole where like they're grabbing their hand and telling them like to like stop I know there's like different ways that they like twist their hands um to get them to stop a behavior just that need to be reported to the um State like when those type of incidents happen so not just holding of a hand but if we're restricting movement or are guiding a student somewhere against their will um and happy to have the trainers come and do a little mini session if that's needed at a later date I think that would be super helpful just so we could know like which like which movements warrant a report and which movement doesn't like warrant a report um like I said just because I had to do it in the school setting before I just want to know which ones are more appropriate so thank you can just so we can manage people's ideas or expectations around this we're these are minimal numbers I mean what's the approximate number per quarter it used to be between like 9 and 10 and now we're probably in the 20s but it's still very minimal very minim 7,000 students correct very minimal um so getting back to the policy um am I correct in assuming director Xiao that you and I are speaking about the same section which is the reasonable Force section yeah um so I am wondering do we have leeway um assistant superintendent Lightfoot to add in language that you were saying and that director contras also re iterated is our current practice in Hopkins that this is kind of a last resort um after many of our tiers have been tried our mtss levels um much like we have with our our discipline policy or student Behavior policy um is it possible to put in language like that we certainly can I mean there isn't anything that would restrict that um when you think about the the use of reasonable Force um I think what we would want to to look at and the monitoring committee certainly can discuss that is how we make sure we understand um that language to be guided toward staff members understanding the district approach to how we look at the use of reasonable Force so that it can can reinforce the training that we've done um and I I really like the the concept of working with our trainers to train um with and through this policy so I think the dialogue with them would be another important element that we could utilize and trying to craft some of that language together agreed so that they're in alignment I was just thinking that just the same way we did with the mental health Wellness Group we brought them in for their input to help advice and guide so that our um policies match our practice great so just to be clear we're looking for a definition around reasonable for like how we Define reasonable force in Hopkins no I think that we're looking for um more of a guiding language to staff about when reasonable force is appropriate in our schools is that correct is that your well I I was mostly thinking you know parents or what and you know community members that read this and they're like okay right they they say they don't don't W do corporal punishment or prone restraints and then like but if it's necessary you can do it but I think we just want to be very clear that it's like to your point done you know appropriately but not like aggressively right I think that's very important that people understand that so then I wonder if it's something that we put in the purpose statement up top so that it's very clear what what the purpose of this policy is that you know corporal punishment which is an awful term um and and prone restraint like that this policy is is doing exactly what you're saying Cher andreon it is T it is guiding like when these things are done and it's it's a last resort right because I think what you're talking about encompasses the whole policy not just the reasonable Force piece of it okay because it's more of a it's a value statement too yes right yeah and I guess to a question I would have are we to your point earlier are is prod restraint and corporal punishment reasonable Force like I don't feel like that's the case I'm getting more more confused the more we talk about well I think you see that under prohibitions that employer agent of the school district shall not use prone restraint I mean there's a specific section for that I think it's really kind of the understanding of yes in general what is the general approach that we look toward any um corporal punishment Andor restraint I think then the question becomes where does that guidance work best and can work in both places so perhaps that's what we look at in the guidance that we receive from our trainers as well about what would be helpful for them because if they can use this as a training tool and then we create better understanding as well thank you thank you thank you Vonda wel all right 524 is the next 524 is the acceptable electronic use under the acceptable electronic use part of the work that you are um intimately aware of with that is that this also needed to be modified to include this specific language about the statutory requirement that is specific to uh cell phones so you will see the component based on the Workshops the data everything that we had looked at based on our previous conversations being Incorporated in um as had been um Guided by the board um so such that that this language is now included um reflects our previous conversation and if there are additional questions we'd be happy to entertain those or other comments questions from any of the monitoring committee members as well Sher andreon yes treasure Heartland I feel like that the cell phone use addition is like a logical place for this policy to end up at and then I also have the feeling that like oh it's just tacked on quick to the end of an existing policy like that makes sense logically but there was somewhat of a big Todo about develop fing this like in concert with the community and with the staff and with the students and then it's like kind of like the end of our meeting end of this policy and I almost W like I do almost wish that we had sort of specifically denoted in our agenda so that like community members if they had cared could have said like oh today they're going to pass this cell phone policy that we all took these surveys about and so I don't know if anything else needs to happen I about it I think I just you know this is information that we've seen before and have gotten as as a board to question before so I don't really have specific questions about it just this feeling like even I opened this and was like oh the cell phone policy is up today great and and kind of wish that that had maybe been called out for the community it was discussed at the workshop last time yeah we discussed the the cell phone policy right um I don't know if it was discussed that it was going to be part of this larger policy um I don't remember that was it and chair andreon yes Thompson well thank you for saying that director Harland I or treasur Harland I I feel the same way it's like you know we kept leading up to this and now it's here and there it wasn't much of a um communication I I felt like so um but what I remember the language saying was that the monitoring policy is leaning towards this and then we saw a draft of this so you know it it didn't seem well communicated and it'll be discussed in two weeks you know so um but but I I kind of agree that to have a maybe have a stand alone you know for such an important policy could could be better that's my thought um I'm wondering assistant superintendent liot did we discuss that it would be part of this policy MH it's been part of the model msba policy if you look at the model part of the electronics policy okay y thank you um and that's where it comes from is that specific section reflected from the model policy so I guess nobody brought that up last time and we discussed it so I understand exactly why it's here now so thank you for that context um were we thinking I agree um Treasurer Hartland um we have made um we have communicated directly with our community about this a lot um I don't know if people were tuned in at our last discussion um I don't know what are are there other thoughts about perhaps having more of a community discussion like we have done with other policies that kind of rise to this level of community engagement um I know that in the past we've passed the policy and then um before it's passed in second read we hold a community conversation um I don't know what the appetite of the monitoring committee would be for that but that would definitely give our community time to comment and to be aware that this has is in the process of being approved and we're seeking their feedback chair andreon yes um so I just wanted to add to this conversation that um we did send an update in a family communication there were a number of updates in there so we we sent the results and findings from the facility survey we sent the um highlevel executive report from the cell phone survey and then there was a budget piece so families can refer to that District communication to read more about um the cell phone survey findings um I do not think we specifically said and at the February 11 board meeting you'll hear more so um I'm just wondering if it fits within board protocol to place this as a separate agenda item at the February 25 board meeting to revisit and that could be and give our community heads up I don't if it fits within protocol it certain you know it doesn't do any harm to do that absolutely yeah we have two readings so you certainly can your second read does not have to be on consent um you certainly can have it as another live live item for second read which we've done for U multiple policies I think you're also looking at that timeline of March to have that implemented by March as well so you just need to be mindful of both of those how do you feel Vice chair R about that kind of compromise of having it be old business yeah I think super uh superintendent you know brought forth a a good solution so yeah I wholeheartedly agree with Dr Mir per Reed that was a Sol that's a good solution okay great I like it too treasure Heartland clerk Thompson you're feeling comfortable with that it'll be its own agenda item um chair andreon can I just ask a clarifying question sure um so are are we basically it seems like we're going to be bringing the one we just had a lot of discussion back right was that 507 the corporal punishment and prone restraint because there were requested Chang back to the because there's so much requested to change in that so um could it be appropriate that 524 would also be in first read um at the next meeting and then on March 11th it could be the second read and then we would meet that March 15th deadline um well I think that the so 507 is just going back to the monitoring committee I don't think that's the recommendation for 524 yeah that that's and I agree with that I'm just wondering if you know given the lack of communication to the community that like tonight's the night that it's in first read like you know I'd prefer that we have that communication let the community know that in first read it'll happen on um the 25th and so that's the first read on the 25th and then second read on March 11th oh go ahead so this is the first read like we've done it so it would have to be yeah it would have to be a second what I was going to say this is the but I was wondering about just like a compromise to just table this one and so it would be in first read next time I I just feel like that would be more fair communication wise I don't think we can change what's happened this is in first read um we could send it back to the monitoring committee if that's your preference like 507 but I don't see a need for that since there are no suggested changes from any board member so what would have to happen is it would come onto our next agenda if we chose that we could delay it if you'd like as its own agenda item on Old business because it's in first read right now um and it's second read we don't have to pass it if we want to give community members another chance to attend another meeting to talk about it um we could then say we want it to be in Old business again at the next meeting that would be an option for protocol but we can't do another first read unless it gets sent back I suppose but yeah yeah but there's no reason to send it back okay jar andreon yes would it be possible to do like even passing like even in parents memos that like this much talked about cell phone survey like here's a link to it and it will be passed finally in second read in the next business or in the next board meeting and then give people if there's people who have strong feelings about it they have one more chance to be heard and I think too we can be mindful about um what we're putting in the community facing agenda we can say in parentheses cell phone policy so that people know that that's what it is cuz in this it's just a number right and until you click on it you don't know what it is um so when we're crafting the agenda we can be very intentional about calling it what it what the community knows it is which is the cell phone policy I like that idea and if you want to I mean it's not uncommon I mean this is msba nomenclature so um if you would like to pull it out and even have it as 5241 and have it be its own policy so that it can be searchable under this set of information otherwise you're right it's always going to be at the end of some big long thing if you want to pull it out and have it be its own set you can do that also I mean there is no requirement that just because msba calls it this and organizes this way that you may want to just say it's worth pulling it out and having it be its own Standalone under this segment too which you could do as well and that would give us a reason to send it back to the monitoring committee mhm how do we feel about that that works as long as it satisfies the collective so speak now forever hold your piece so then that would then um so we would be sending that one back um and then it would be policy in first read at the next meeting and you could pull it out and have it be its own segment we could write it as its own segment we certainly could do that if that would be more clear for the community and it not only is more clear visually as well as more accessible we can certainly do that as well chair andreon yes um I'm I'm just really mindful about implementation and I know that staff and building leaders have already seen this policy the draft language um but I'm wondering now what the the pushback timeline if that will contribute to implementation challenges if that's something that we should consider before we change the schedule on this I to my mind I don't believe so okay unless do we do we know if School leaders have seen this draft language okay no I don't think so okay great thank you for that question Cher andreon yes I just want to get my own marching orders so are we talking about um p pulling part of this language out of this document and making it a separate like putting it into a separate document because what I'm thinking is we then create a a blurb a little paragraph that invites parents and staff to review this draft policy which would be coming to the board on February 25 for first read and then we provide the link to this excerpt is that correct mm yes okay um and I think it's going to be its own policy so then like what I'm thinking is that we page 12 on sort of yeah everything in red yeah um so then what I'm thinking is that since we are pulling this part and sending it back to the monitoring committee we can move forward with passing 524 with the directed changes if everyone feels comfortable with the rest of that policy um so that can be put on to Second read MH knowing that 5 24.1 will be a new policy that good okay great thank you everyone that that was a good discussion and that was our last one it is all right so now I get to figure out how I'm going to word this all right so um I would look for a motion that the board approves the above policies in first read um with the exception of policy 507 um which is going back to the monitoring committee and um with any corrections or um edits that um have been discussed this evening and further the board directs the administration to prepare the policies um with suggested revisions for approval in second reading at the next meeting as part of consent do I have a motion so moved I have a motion is there a second second I have a second any discussion yes chair andron I just wanted to understand was the board also asking us the monitoring committee to take a look at 502 again the um the search oh I policy were we going to is that something the monitoring committee wanted to do that works we can take that one back as well okay so um all right policy 502 and 507 are going back to the monitoring committee so I would look for a motion that the board approves the above policies um except for 502 and 507 um in first read and further the board directs the administration to prepare the policies with suggested revisions in particular with 524 for approval in second reading at the next meeting as part of consent do I have a motion so moved do I have a second second I have a motion and a second any discussion see none all those in favor please say I I any opposed the chair votes I and the policies have been approved thank you so much assistant superintendent Lightfoot do you mind sticking around for the next happy too section great thank you so much um and I'm not sure if Dr Brown if you want to join us for this discussion that would be great I appreciate it um so uh Vice chair Ross and I will be presenting an update on the um the equity audit um for the policies and the reason why I am assisting is because um I was um chair of the monitoring committee when we got the audit and started doing this work so I wanted to um help out as we did this um so we will go ahead and get started with the presentation yay and it's already up on the board thank you um so I will just pull up my notes um we um the Hopkins school board monitoring committee made several updates in response to the equity audit findings um I don't know if um Dr Brown if you want to give some context about that um and I know that you also helped us kind of look at the policies that they listed for us to review oh sorry uh thank you chair andrees um one of the uh searches of the of the audit was to comb through the policies to see which policies were true to its nature of being Equitable and um that's what they looked for and so that's what the policy committee Dr Life foot uh director Ross and you um your task was to um look at the recommendations to see um what needed to be improved thank you um and we this has been many years project um and they also include um revisions to existing policies introduction of new policies um and the adoption of tools to ensure Equity is at the Forefront of all our decision making um so I will go through they kind of broke out um policies and put them into different um categories and um we did work on the um the following sections they said that we had policies that um supported Equity um policies that implied support and then policies that blocked um attention to equity so the ones that we um were working on a lot you can go thanks um so the policies implying support um for Equity are being updated as they come up for review as part of our three we're on a threeyear cycle MH um and so we'll um kind of go over those I don't know Vice chair Ross if you want to um add anything to these but ones that we have um done are the school board code of ethics and operating principles um criminal or Civ civil action against school districts um development of regulations I know a big one that we went through with the help of the IDL team were um a series of policies 601 to 606 curriculum and instruction goals um those were revamped um and then also 615 test ing accommodations modifications and exemptions for IEPs um 620 credit for learning there are ongoing adaptations in partnership with IDL and mde um on that one and then there's 624 online learning options 652 learner to teer ratios 653 volunteer management policy and 658 is the enroll ment of undocumented students foreign exchange students homeless students and determination of residency requirements um we also have been doing a lot of work um for policies that support Equity explicitly um and we we're doing this work under our um policy 102 which is our equal Educational Opportunity policy um it ensures explicit support for equity and since the audit we've added policies addressing underserved populations in our school Community ensuring Equitable access um we passed uh 554 which is a racial Equity policy 552 which is our gender inclusion policy and 556 non-discrimination of students based on national origin or immigration status policy and I'm not sure if we have another one in the pike no but the 500 series that you're discussing those are going to be um forthcoming in review so we will be looking especially at 556 as well um you can Circle that one great um and then we revised um policies that were um blocking attention to equity those were 201 Schoolboard legal status 403 discipline suspension and dismissal of School District employees um 503 student attendance uh we worked alongside um staff to revamp that one and we also have a henpen county partner um with the program called be at school we revamped 506 our student conduct and discipline um we revised it per sta statute and then with input from students and staff to include our multi-tiered um system of support and restorative practices it's much more closely aligned with Hopkins values and vision 2031 um we revised policy 532 use of peace officers and crisis teams to remove students with IEPs um it was revised to include current restorative practices in CPI protocols uh policy 605 Alternative Learning Centers um 956 relations with law enforcement authorities revised to address the holistic safety of students and staff and policy 957 the school district public relations program um was revised to be more Equitable across our diverse Community needs and then we have a new new policy explicitly addressing equity which is our um policy 458 mental health and wellness that was crafted based on student feedback and input um the other direction we had from the equity audit was to look at our Equity lens tool that we had been using prior um they recommended that we look at a different one and they gave us some guidelines and then um at the time well I'm still on the board I'm on the board of District 287 and they had a um Equity lens and impact analysis tool so I brought that for the uh monitoring committee to consider as well and we decided that that one was a really useful one for the work that we do on the monitoring committee so um when policies come up we go through a process of figuring out who needs to partic participate in the analysis of um the policies and we use that to then communicate with our students and Community um but then as a monitoring commit committee we ask ourselves the um questions and you can go forward Natalia um we can go forward again um we ask ourselves these questions when we're looking at um all policy what are the equity impacts of this decision who will benefit from or be burdened by this decision and are there strategies to mitigate any un unintended consequences of this decision um and I think it's always interesting to think about the answers to those questions when you're looking at policy um and we also adapted this tool to be used um with our community so that they can answer these questions as well and um sometimes that gives us really good feedback m in particular from our students so that was all I had do you have anything to add do not you did a great job covering it thank you any questions or I do think that um I I applaud your efforts and and having a protocol uh to ask yourselves when a policy comes before you that you ask yourself who is harmed by this uh I don't know a very many boards that have that and I applaud your efforts in that thank you thank you thank all of you chair Andre yes um Dr Brown I'd like to thank you for your leadership on this and the equity audit process I think was really um edifying for us and that like you know you have a sense as a leader based on what you're hearing in the community and from staff and all all of that that like there are these gaps and there are these serious things that we need to attend to and it really helped us see the landscape and then I want to commend chair andrees who was vice chair at the time um for really taking lead on this policy work and getting us as a board to a completely different spot than we were in before in terms of how how we craft policy and how we think about policy so as you saw tonight it was a complete process change um and then of course our current Vice chair Ross for continuing that work and really strong leadership um of our monitoring committee and I just think this is a really great example Le of how this board collaborates um with District leadership to to serve our community um in the way that our community expects and expected when they elected us so thank you so much for this update it was great thank you and you both were here when we started it and Co interrupted it and and so it it really was a challenge to get it um to get it done and um I I'm very thankful for the board at that time to agree to let it go go forward because it was a a huge challenge to to see it through um one of the components was to interview parents and his parents picked up food for their families the team were out interviewing as they were getting in their cars cuz that was the only way right that we could interview parents at the time I didn't know how they were going to do it but they came up with that ingenious way to do it and they had zoom zoom calls also but it worked out cool I love it thank you thank you all J and J has a quick question um again I resonate everything Dr Brown and Shannon and like who all who all worked on this um I just can't see the the policies that you all read off are there on there somewhere where it could seen the policies that didn't kind of my notes I can send you a copy there on do you have a copy of this yeah I have a copy of that director rer there're on page 44 of the so all the policies that yes on page 44 to uh 48 I'm sorry of this the document oh page 48 yes if you don't have it I can get you a hard copy of it okay okay thank you natal just speak I'm sorry oh I'm sorry oh Natalia was speaky oh sorry discussed are linked in the slides in the notes okay under the first slide okay thank you thank you all thank you Dr Brown and thank you Natalia I didn't know that made it thank you you're pretty slothful over there I know I was like I'm glad GL I didn't write state flags and notes and everything not um any other comments or questions all right well thank you for your time I appreciate you being here thank you thank you Dr lot umk youan thank you Nick you're welcome Qui see you all you too get some quick input I think that um can we call the resolution to do the close session and then do board member reports and then close Okay I believe so I think so Nick doesn't seem to be upset by that so we'll go ahead um so our next order of business is a resolution um calling an executive session which um will close our meeting um so I will read out the recommendation and I believe does that require a roll call vote to close the session okay um I will read out the resolution um it is hereby resolved that the school board of Independent School District 270 Hopkins Minnesota meet an executive session to discuss negotiation strategy related to the haa contract for the 20 2425 school year that the meeting be held in person and commence immediately following adjournment of this regular meeting further that it be noted that all board members superintendent and clerk were duly notified of intention to call this executive session I would look for a motion to approve this that resolution so moved I have a motion is there a second second I have a motion and a second any discussion I would ask the clerk to please call a roll call vote cheer andreon I treasur Harland I director roer I director Vice chair Ross I clerk Thompson I uh director West Morland I director zou yes I the um board approves the resolution unanimously so we will enter into a closed session when this meeting is adjourned that takes us to our board member reports um who did I start with did I start with you treasure Harland last time yes okay how about you director rer do you want to just introduce yourself and give a report if you have one sure um my name is Brooke roer I am serving in my second year on the board for Hopkins I have two amazing children in the district um I do have just a few quick updates um thank you to the students first and foremost who made our personal mugs I cannot wait to drink some hot coffee out of it I wish I had some hot coffee tonight to drink out of it cuz I'm starting to get sleepy everyone you all know how I get when I get really sleepy um so but I really appreciate it it was such a thoughtful thing um we do have a black history networking event that will be happening next Thursday at the high school from 6:00 to 88: um it is for our so we changed our cobat group name from caregivers of black African diaspora Scholars to the Hopkins Coalition for black Student Success and so we will be meeting to talk about you know the group and just for district families to mingle and to meet each other and talk about how they can get involved in the work that we do and just to be better organized as Caregivers for our black and brown students um I did get to participate in the Chinese New Year um uh uh celebration last Thursday and it was amazing I learned a lot thank you um director Z for showing me the ropes um you did like you showed me how to do the envelope like I didn't know that with like two hands and there's just like little intricate details I didn't know that you showed me um so just thank you and um that's just really about it for me oh I did meet with the turn signal Foundation today so I can give you all an update it went really well and just wanted to understand like the next steps with them um they are an amazing organization doing great work and that's it for me thank you I can go next um I'm Kai Thompson I am the clerk on the school board um just entering into my second year here um I have three kids in the district from fourth to 9th grade um no board report for me tonight thanks director West Morland hi I'm Jen West Morland this is my eighth year on the board I'm a graduate of Hopkins schools I have an eighth grader at West Middle School and no report from me tonight hi this is uh jiming jao I use he him pronouns uh I've got two kids in the district uh in the shing shing program at Eisenhower in fourth grade and first grade um as director rer said we uh C help celebrate uh the Chinese New Year and uh I'm glad that it went well I probably spent 30 hours practice practicing my dance so and then I panicked and uh but it's okay it's it's how it's how you recover right you you did you did really well yeah I was it like a Beyonce at the Super Bowl moment where like you had to catch yourself I'll go back watch yeah there's a video no well well I tried to destroy every camera there but uh I was not successful thanks everybody my name is Jason Ross I have three kids in the district uh two at North one at tanglin um I'm entering my fourth year and my first term and I do not have a board report [Music] tonight hello everyone my name is Shannon andreon I am currently the chair of the board um in my second term here and I have a junior at the high school um who I now know I can track if they're studying for the ACT which makes me really happy um their locker and I also work as a special education PA professional at Gatewood Elementary hi everyone I'm Roa Maria pury Reid superintendent I also have a junior at the high school and yay he did say he studied yesterday for the ACT for the first time because I've been hounding him so nice to have a tracking me ISM thank you Dr Co um I'm Treasurer Rachel Heartland and I am in my fourth year on the board I use she her pronouns and have a fifth a seventh and a ninth grader and the million emails to prove it um I let see for my board report I dissected some frogs I edited a CAC report um did PTO activities in a couple buildings and the legislative Action Coalition is continuing to meet our really big kind of launch of our platform and our brakfast is done now we've moved on to the kind of the next phase of our work and that is staying in tune with various statutes that come up or various bills that get proposed and speaking to our legislators to try to understand the impact to our district on that and to Pro provide them with some feedback and so that work is just as important and less flashy than our breakfast but we continue to engage in that and I think that's all and I'm sorry Treasurer Hartland you reminded me by mentioning the Lac that we did have um one of our Hopkins staff testify at the state legislature this morning um with the Senate Finance um School finance committee um about the react and the implementation and the impact um the very real impact it's having um on classrooms and teachers and curriculum um she her name is Kimber Kimberly Smith and she is doing amazing work she there's a Consortium across the state that she's part of um so she took all of that feedback to um the legislature today um so I'm eager to learn how it went and what the outcomes are for our continued advocacy at the Lac so sorry I forgot to mention that um and now with that wrapping up we I would look for a motion to adjourn and go into um executive session so moved I have a motion is there a second second I have a motion in a second all those oh any discussion all those in favor please say I I any opposed chair votes I and this meeting is adjourned at 9:39 p.m. thank you all for coming you can leave now