e e e e everything back into session first item is the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all okay we start out today's uh program review with special education program you with Angie nice to see you nice to see you too good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board thank you for having me and students thank you for being here uh my name is Angie Luda I'm the special education supervisor for Delano I'm I'm actually employed by Meer and Wright special education Cooperative Delano is one of the member districts um we support things like itinerant services that help with cost sharing for the district occupational therapy Physical Therapy also sped leadership and additional programming when students need it in the district I thought I'd share just a couple highlights and some upcoming things for special education we've had a couple a really cool adaptive sports that have happened over uh this school year there was an Adaptive floor hockey event that was in partnership with merer and right special ed Cooperative it was hosted at Howard Lake um Delo brought a a good-sized team we had 10 players and we were actually able to have some of our students from our step program who are in our 18 to 22 join with our school age students so that was really cool and it was great because our girls hockey team also came and volunteered and so it was a very fun experience to watch they tied for a second it was a three-way tie for second but they tied for second and they were very excited um there's also going to be an event called unite 2025 it's May 1st in Rockford and so this first event was 7th through age 22 this will be K through eth grade and it'll give them an opportunity to try out some different sports and different activities and the hope is that maybe we can get some Minnesota State High School league additional sports for some of our special ed students so um Vinnie poosi one of our adapted fied teachers has been partnering with athletic directors like Megan Chatterton here and kind of bringing in some of those opportunities our step program is for our 18 to 22 year old students and their graduation on May 23rd and I just found out that superintendent Shane is doing the graduation speech so it should be good we also have a couple students that said they that Mr Voit had to attend so he's getting to attend this year too because they they wanted him to be there so that's always fun um and then a couple of things that are coming up in special education um I'm not sure how much you are all familiar with criteria for special education uh but to qualify for a learning disability we're under what's called a discrepancy model so really simplistically speaking your IQ is here and your math or reading ability has to be significantly discrepant there's lots of problems with that model it's kind of a random number and unfortunately we can miss students that need services and so Minnesota is moving to a new model and it's going to be in the next five years it seems like a long time but it's a really big shift for a lot of districts uh the positive for Delano is the qualification is through an mtss model which is a framework we've been working on for quite a few years um so the Special Education team has been working closely with general education administrators and interventionists so that we're ready to move to that that framework when um when we need to do so and then it's also been nice to see that our referrals for specific learning disability and other health disability have reduced and the reason I think that's a good thing is because the mtss process has has facilitated more effective academic interventions so what it means is we're probably meeting our kidss providing that intervention and getting them the support they need before they might need to otherwise go into special education services um we've been spending a lot of time this year talking about we have all these great academic interventions how can we add in some more emotional and behavioral interventions so we can hopefully also see our students um with emotional behavioral disorders um maybe get support prior to needing special education services um so those are just a couple of highlights um but I'd welcome any question questions if there's anything I can answer for the board the board might be thinking about that I've said this from almost annually and I say this all the time the Cooperative is the most efficient way districts our size and the six other districts that are members of The Cooperative to provide required services and the leadership at maso Andie has been our supervisor in this district for a number of years now and has provided excellent leadership in navigating through sometimes very complex I've said over the last probably 10 years now um special Edge students that uh that receive services on an IP due to their disabilities the number of students served hasn't necessarily changed maybe a percent or two here and there but I got to tell you the complexities of the services that uh we provide has uh changed exponentially um we're we're we're working with kids that have all various different levels of uh disabilities and um through the great partnership with the moso we are able to really do a good job in providing that uh the other thing that I just would like to add is that moso is now 50 years old and uh one of my colleagues looked at me and says well what what was it like man on year One what was it like putting together the charter for moso I came close to slapping anyways and that's good to celebrate because it's been uh when Ida came along in the mid 70s and all of the requirements through the federal government and through the state government districts our size just couldn't do it on their own we can't have our own special ed director it's just fiscally doesn't work and the funding doesn't even come close to what we need to do so a group of a very smart individuals got together and formed this Cooperative 50 years ago to provide required services but we did it together and it's the same concept that we have with the right tech center we can't provide all those Services it's just not cost effective but we can do it together in Partnership and that's exactly why we do this so very appreciative of Angie's leadership um she's done a fantastic job in navigating through our our processes in the district thank you thank you simar building this whole time too like oh no they've moved multiple times yeah Mary would know better than I do I I've gone through two major Generations we used to be since I've been here we've always the the the the Cooperative has been housed out of the the Howard Lake Waverly Winstead School District since I've been here um programs that offer have moved a little bit but we used to be in the Old Middle School building of the uh Howard Lake wav it no longer exists and so when we did a building project uh with Howard Lake Waverly Winstead and we're part of a 20-year lease of the of the new building that uh is part of the Old Middle School of Howard Lake Waverly Winstead I don't know where it was before that they've always been in Howard Lake itself but they used to be in a little tiny like a little hole in the wall little office area in one of the downtown buildings so yeah but this where my question was going theed doesn't have equal well they can't because we've they've got the capital bond for they had to purchase the space from um Howard Lake so they're actually because they're in Howard Lake they just lease the space from Howard Lake so Howard Lake has all the ltfm stuff andw could you share like because I've had this conversation a couple times in the last two weeks kind of the variety of services M offers because parents don't really know what you do I say well we use mle for that they're like who what y yeah absolutely UT can so for our littlest Learners students that are birth up to 3 years of age we actually provide inhome services so we have special education teachers speech language Pathologists occupational therapists physical therapists de and heart of hearing teachers Vision teachers all that go directly into homes and a big part of their services are collaborating with the family helping the parents um whatever the parents goals are for their child they're really partnering with them and they're their first experience of what it's like in special education once they hit age three they trans into our school age services so I support birth to 22 in this position but we often get a little bit more involved when they reach age three and that's when they start receiving preschool Services um we have um like I mentioned the itinerant Services we also have Federal setting 4 programs which are programs for students who maybe can't have their needs met um in the General Ed K12 environment so we have some programs for students primarily with autism spectrum disorders or other communication disorders students with emotional behavioral disorders we have some programs in Buffalo and some in Howard Lake we have our 18 to 22 transition program so getting them ready for adulthood jobs Independent Living being productive and hopefully happy members of society um we have some care and treatment programs so if there's some students that maybe need to go uh to a care and treatment program we might provide the education for that um we also have Village Ranch as a residential program where we provide the education we don't do the residential service in scholand is a similar program but but for girls in anandale and Village ranches in Coco um we also have a traumatic brain injury Consultants assist of Technology Consultants um just pretty much all the little niche specialty areas you know an audiologist very rarely is a district going to have a need for one audiologist when they're our size so we share that across our seven member districts trying to think there any other services behavioral oh behavior analyst thank you yes we we rely really heavily on our Behavior analysts um they often help students who might be having um some of the biggest concerns in school uh learn how to build their replacement skills so they can be safe and can have great peer relationships and progress academically we also have a classroom systems consultant um this is the second year of that position they go into schools and help our teachers in District establish effective Federal setting 3 programs um which means those are students that spend the majority of their day in the special education classroom and our goal is to make those programs really effective so we can keep our students here when they're able to be successful here and then hopefully they can then gain skills to then reintegrate back into the General Ed classroom but yes we have a lot of different professionals so thank you for asking that would you be able to share you had mentioned that the mtss has reduced the referral rate do you know by how much and is that here in Delo well is specifically in Delo we filled out our adsis application and I'm trying to I can't remember offhand the percentage of of I can look that up for you and get it to you though because um I think it really is a testament to we don't want to over refer students when they just need a little boost and we have some kids where it's like they just get a little reading intervention we monitor their scores things are going great we keep an eye on it but they don't need to move into evaluation um and so I'll get those numbers for you um but I will say some of our emotional behavioral disorders referrals have seen a little bit of an uptick and I think part of that's just Mental Health crisis and just some increasing needs we're seeing across the country um but we're really trying to focus on what are some tier one um instructional strategies that classroom teachers can use to help social emotional learning um for all students and so that's kind of we've been focusing on this year too obviously the academic stuff has been going for a long time really well and just working on upping the the other programming so if Andie you can just share the numbers when we do the research on it and I'll share it out in my Thursday email the idea of mtss 2 is is that it it another way to look at it it increases once once it gets to evaluation for an IEP it increases the probability that they will qualify so it's being more efficient with interventions done at the classroom level at the building level depending on what the situation is mtss are that's that multiple tiers and so it goes through those tiers so if it does get to tier three or four now which one will'll decide the the the probability of them qualifying is going I want it to be as high as possible once it gets to that point otherwise it's not an efficient use and it's not a real good use as what Angie said it might just me a a quick intervention this way and we monitor it 3 to six weeks later we go back we look how it went and there's teams that meet uh on a monthly bonly basis so that's the way the system is designed so when it does get referred to a potential evaluation for a potential IEP the rate for qualifying should be as high as we want we can get it and I would mention too it's not like a wait and see approach they're still getting interventions and supports it's just starting that out in the least restrictive environment we want them with their peers when they can be we want them to get a boost of support when they need it we don't want to pull them away from all the fun activities in gym and choir to do these huge interventions if they can be successful with a little bit um a little bit less or maybe even in their classroom with small groups so Andie have you noticed any change in the age or grade level of initial eals is that changed at all anecdotally I don't have numbers for you but it seems like we've had increasing um students with coming in with ADHD diagnoses younger and younger um and then I would say potentially some additional like emotional behavioral disorder referrals that we have seen earlier on earlier on yep and me and potentially it sometimes it's more explosive behavior quicker like before we would see like oh they're struggling a little bit and it would kind of build up but we've had students where everything was fine and now it's not um and sometimes it's attributed to an underlying mental health concern and we try to partner with families and often times those students that they're able to get some services and support whether it be whatever their family elects or maybe through one of our maso programs or maybe through a specialed teacher and behavior analyst in District they're able to make some some gains but um I've notic that right thank you Andie thank you very much the next item on the agenda is our consent agenda this is where we have minutes from prior meetings Financial reports for the month I'll entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda so move Baker Baker first do I have a second second second from Jess any discussion all those in favor I I any opposed motion carries next item is the uh resolution for the acceptance of gifts the following organizations have generously donated whereas Charities Aid Foundation $55 for Delano Elementary School Charities Aid Foundation cyber grants $1,000 for Delano Intermediate School Ohio pile Prince $31.75 for Delano High School DHS pie $241 3 for biology and pizza party delanor uh dtbc $736 for track and field hurdle system and training dtbc $4,895 79 for dance expenses girls hockey booster $3,930 for Minnesota hockey day clothing drama booster club 4 $541.25 for fall play costume position initiative Foundation $1,100 for the Dorne family scholarship Loretto Lions $3,500 for community at archery Nick Matthews pallets of wood for high school industrial Tech and the following Orange Crush robotics Delano Area Youth Hockey Association $1,000 Delano Light the Night $150 and Industrial lubers $750 all of these uh organizations have generously donated um their funds to the Delano school district for the reasons mentioned above do do this is going to be uh do I have a motion to approve the resolution of acceptance of gifts second second giry first was uh Ryan any discussion this is a roll call vote board member Mora Mora yes board member giry hi board member Roser hi member SCH hi board member Baker hi board member DEA hi all right motion carries next item is our Personnel um report one thing we'll notice on here we do have um a few long-term uh one particular long-term F custodian who's been here for quite a while who's resigning at Tim esler and then I know there's a few other coaches that we've got resigning who've been in their positions for a long time so we thank them for their service uh to the district and wish them all well on their future do I have a motion to approve Personnel matters DEA DEA first Baker Baker second any discussion all those in favor I I I any opposed motion carries moving on to our administrative reports first up superintendent Shane thank you ladies and gentlemen of the board I'll be brief um I do want to just update a little bit on where the legislature is at um not much really they've got a couple of breaks coming up here in the next few weeks but the governor did propose some additional changes and revised his budget uh from his first proposal that was sent out a couple of months ago couple of things that may Garner our attention is one he's looking at potentially reducing School library Aid uh by about $7.5 million for for fiscal year 27 and 20 26 and 27 uh $15 million again in fiscal year 28 and 29 so the next bium um this is a position that we've had um we've restructured it based on that but that's just again a potential funding Revenue that we might not have that could affect a position that we we're just going to have to navigate through so we'll see how that pans out and again his this is his budg proposal the house has to come up with their parameters for spending whether it's in education and for the entire state budget and so does the senate as well um also just looking at reducing he's looking at reducing Community Education Equalization Aid by about $15 million while permitting districts to Levy for those costs we just got the last couple of fiscal years we just got this Aid we qualified just to get this Aid this Equalization Aid through Community Education so um we're just going to have to navigate and see how it goes again this is 16,000 for Delo 16,000 for Delano okay the uh the third thing that I just wanted to potentially broo that it could have some form of um impact with us is is the Telecommunications Equity Aid uh it's not a large dollar amount it's about $375,000 for the state for the fiscal year 20 six I believe and that it these are just little things here and there that we're just going to have to keep an eye on it's kind of like what I referenced to with the federal government we're just going to keep an eye on it stay Nimble um with our budget planning we don't know um again this is like we're probably at halfway point so we're at halftime almost we've got the Easter break here at the ID Break um next week so they won't be doing much work but they do have some important deadlines that I'll share with you in just a minute but as far as the uh the both of the houses the Senate education finance committee really hasn't done much um discussion they obviously are going to set some parameters um the Senate education policy committee has nothing much that really rocks our world but the house has set a date or actually a committee they heard several bills including HF 11124 imag how I can make this interesting when I changed my octave here it would allow school districts to start before Labor Day in 2026 and 27 oh yeah ah that does make a big difference for Delo uh because in uh the 20 uh it would be the 26 27 school year Labor Day is the 7th of September we lose an entire week for the academic year I think you all know what my opinion is on starting after Labor Day in the state of Minnesota is the absolute Ridiculousness but a couple billion dollars of uh of uh Revenue in the district with regards to the state fair and all sorts of things that happen uh education takes a second seat and when we get to start I I hope one day that we as districts get to do decide when we would start our school year and not governed by the state law but um so they're looking at it and actually they're looking at it this time proactively um if you recall a couple of years back two three four years school years back they made the decision in May for the next school year well as you well know support you've already approved the calendar made no sense whatsoever actually some districts went back and changed it we decided not to so we had already mapped it out and planned it out so important dates to remember in the future uh policy Bill deadline is April 4th that means no more introduction of bills but it doesn't mean that something within the bill could still come about that everything usually is on the table until their statutory end of their session so but they have set some deadlines the funding bill uh the budget Bill deadline is the 11th of April so in a couple of weeks we'll see some things getting a little bit more traction and moving forward like I said there's a couple of breaks built into that too and their constitutional deadline to adjourn is on May 19th also another very important Date to Remember uh is June 30 is the end of the fiscal year for the state if they do not have which is required by law to have an approved budget you will see potentially a government shutdown and it's happened in the past before uh I think I've shared in previous meetings my uh I'm I'm cautiously optimistic that they'll get things figured out by the 19th of May probably will'll take a special session or two um and hopefully that we avoid a government shutdown but it is need to know that by law they have to pass their next two-year budget so that's required by the Constitution and with that said I have a special guest here that I would like to introduce our next Community Ed director Abby Lang is here uh you approved her contract today during the Personnel section of that and I just want to invite Abby to come forward and introduce herself and maybe give a little background of aby's work work in this field uh it's I can tell you it's deep in the family her mother was a longtime Community ad director and she grew up in the community ed world since childhood so welcome Abby thank you thank you very much um thanks for having me I I appreciate being able to put a a name in a face and I recognize many of the faces um but definitely some some new ones as well which will be the case for a while but I'm excited to get to know everybody um the last couple of times I was in this room it was in front of you know 10 to 13 people as an interview panel and that could be a little daunting but for me I just it really showcased the the amount of emphasis and the dedication that downo public schools has to Community Education and specifically the director position so thank you um for a very rigorous process and and like I said I'm excited I'm excited to join the team a little bit about me yes I often say that I was born in community ed I was thought it was weird that the director was in my my mom and dad wedding photos but she was 30 years in monello community ed and so I spent evenings in the district office eating dinner when Community Theater was going and Saturdays in the pool office while she was teaching swimming lessons and then you know brought my husband along for basketball tournament and and building supervision and um you know fast forward a number of years you never grow up saying I just want to be like my mom right I mean maybe you do um but I have four kids and I'm in community ed and I come from a family of four and my mom's entire career was Community Ed so you know that Apple kind of fell straight down um but a a little bit about me my husband and I have four kids and um our oldest daughter is a sheriff's deputy in P County uh we have a son who is a pilot in Phoenix uh transitioning to Fairbanks Alaska so in for a rude um a rude awakening the last time he came home he never took off his snow pants I'm like you haven't been gone that long um and then I have a son at University Wisconsin Madison and a daughter that's a junior who thinks she's an only child and you know we'll be graduating here here shortly so um we live just north of of dael um I've been with Das school district for almost 10 years as the Director of community services so um I've also spent a number of years come two two decades two decades um with adult basic ad so I have a variety of experience in many facets of Community Education and um investing in people is is my top priority and so I'm really excited to develop relationships with everybody on the team uh throughout the district and in the community I'm I'm looking forward to getting to know each of you and in a few short months I will be here so any questions for me I'm used to asking any questions at this table all right thank you very much welcome all right one last compon component related to Mr Shane's uh update is the evaluation that the board does for Mr Shane's performance and this year we're doing it on a tri anual basis um and um we evaluated Mr Shane in the following areas of developmen in or developing emergency procedures strategic planning District Operations communication and District processes superintendent Shane met or exceeded the board's expectations in developing emergency procedures strategic planning and District Operations as we look for areas of strength for I'm sorry these are areas of strength for Mr superintendent Shane we also recognize the value of continuous Improvement for everybody in the district and the board has identified that communication and District processes are areas of potential growth we're very grateful for Mr Shane for his leadership and service to the district and I thank you for all that you do including it sounds like now you're giving the um commencements us yes that's a big deal it is a very big deal feel very uh honored to be able to do that well and I'm sure the students are going to be very honored with the moments and nuggets of wisdom that you provide them as they move on so with that move on to um the principal reports M Thompson good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board um thank you for the opportunity to present to you this evening on behalf of the intermediate school I have a short report this week we've only been back in school for two weeks in spring break feels like longer but only two weeks we've had a busy two weeks um so I'll just kind of walk you through some things that are going on first with our site based leadership team um last Tuesday and now tomorrow morning as well we are working on just looking at our school Improvement plan doing some um checks of where we are in our planning um looking at some action steps we can take for the remainder of the trimester um specifically tomorrow we're going to be talking a little bit about our social emotional learning kind of goal area we're looking at where we can find some connection between we have our Tiger Pride character traits and then we have our habits of a scholar which are more of our academic skills and we're just looking for a way to kind of blend those and make them a little bit more meaningful for students um I'm hoping that as we move into our strategic planning and some of those operational um practices that that will kind of inform some of that moving forward too so I'm looking forward to that time in in June to really put that strategic plan into action so um so that's kind of what our site base has been working on that and then also just planning all of the events for the rest of the year it's just kind of an ongoing list making sure everybody knows what's happening when what schedules impacted all those things is full-time job this time of year so uh for professional development we did have our late start last week um um we had most of our teachers doing some curriculum work so they're working within their departments and wherever they're at in their curriculum adoption cycle we also have some teachers participating in the letters training so they did that as well um and some of our teachers participated in vertical teaming um K12 some of our Specialists have been doing that this year art Department PE Department music department and they've found that to be really meaningful so that's been nice to do um in the area of mtss and what we're doing with our interventions we do have our saber screener coming up again next month so this Sabers was new last year um it's a social academic and emotional Behavior rating scale is what it stands for um our kids do a self- assessment and then teachers do an assessment and then we pull both of those data sets together as our screener um so we did it in the fall we'll do it again in April typically what we find is a lot of the students who maybe show up as flagged are already identified and getting support but we still like to check in and make sure that we aren't missing anyone or any areas of need that we can address so that's coming up in April um and then finally I can just share some events that have been going on we did do our um fourth annual now give back week event last week so um Andy Brown Katie culer Rebecca olid have put this on for the last few years as an opportunity they raiseed money for um the Leukemia Lymphoma Society and the Ronald McDonald House kids bring in coins pop tabs food pretty much anything they can donate they bring in and they've been they've done a really great job this year and I wish I had totals but I don't Andy wasn't here today to give me the total so I can share those with you later but I can tell you we had a record-breaking year in our pop tab so we're very excited and it looks like a food shelf outside of Andy's room so lots of food lots of good things lots of generous donations and it's just been been a fun way to kind of get back in the swing of things after Spring Break um on Thursday we do have a speaker coming in his name is Bill Dearing um he'll be speaking to our kids on kindness on resiliency he'll be doing a couple different presentations um we actually had to reschedule this from January we had a late start it was too cold he couldn't come in so we're excited to finally be able to have Bill um come and talk to our students and then of course the big news coming up in April is that we have our MCAS all the kids in our building take the MCA so it's a really busy time um it's a real group effort to make sure we get everything done and scheduled on time so it is going to be very busy but we're ready for it comments or questions for the inter Media School would you like to buy any candy bars for band yes we're asking for a pop tops money and buy our candy bars yes the kids are through my how can you say no every single one that our music department is also doing a candy bar fun always caramel that's that's the best one too much almond it is yes all they have left is almond I know for the record too I have been recruited and I will be recording shortly after 8:00 to help load the truck and be part of the event there Mr leave me a voicemail last week and I graciously agreed to get over there and hoist all that stuff load that truck up so looking forward than you so much all right next up Mr boy good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board it's a pleasure to speak with you on behalf of the high school I always start my reports with a couple of recognitions and of course this month is no different I want to recognize senior Mike Simons um and I'm going to make sure I get this right because it was a big deal he won the welding contest at the AWS behind the mask challenge which occurred at St Paul College so he's a member of uh the right Tech Center's seconde welding program so the uh welding instructor from right Tech took a bunch of students to this competition apparently it is the state's largest welding competition um there's actually competitions for both students and instructors uh the instructor there actually did quite well in one of his contests but Mike uh took first place out of 120 college students um he competed with 120 college students he took first place in TIG which is pretty cool so he got he actually won another contest which was a virtual welding contest so he walked away with two brand new welding helmets and a a scholarship and those sorts of things so that's pretty cool uh big deal it's nice also you know usually when I'm recognizing it's uh State entrance and things like that and success for sport teams but this was an opportunity for us to recognize Mike who is obvious obviously a fantastic welder so congratulations to Mike uh the other person I want to recognize is Emily Walters she's actually sitting back there she's not expecting this I'm sure she um I I wanted to introduce Emily because she is kind of joining our administrative team as an intern she's a special education teacher here at the high school she's a special education lead at the high school uh she is embarking on her uh administrative program and so she's going to be partnering a lot with the administrative team you'll see her uh frequently I'm assuming in the coming year or so uh I'll probably have her come up and deliver some of the reports on occasion when I'm maybe not feeling like it so we'll have a chance to Pepper Emily with questions so welcome to her uh the biggest news that I wanted to share on behalf of the high school was on March 18th at 5:30 we had a very successful sixth grade transition meeting um for the first time ever usually right we we we all understand the importance of the transition from sixth grade to 7 grade that's a obviously a big deal anytime a student switches schools is a big deal um we wanted to make that a little bit more effective and be more supportive uh and so the idea that we had is to try to kind of pair it with our uh registration process and now granted there's not a lot of choices for seventh graders they basically get to choose band or choir uh so it wasn't like we had to like harass them in February to make that switch um so instead we decided to invite them over for an introductory meeting kind of tell them a little about the high school Who We Are are what do we do and what opportunities are available and the big kind of theme for the messages is what can they be doing now to be prepared for seventh grade um I was very very pleased to see that um I just a ballpark it there was probably 75% of our sixth graders and their families in attendance at the PAC um on that day and then they got to tour the building and just kind of walk around and feel comfortable lots of uh of our community members you know come to this building on a regular basis but they come um through the perspective of a spectator at a sporting event or whatever um and so you know this allowed them a chance to kind of freely walk into some of the other areas of the building get acclimated they had a map that just kind of highlighted the seventh grade areas right um so that was a a great time a lot of good feedback uh from parents and students um and then you know that this is just going to be one of several steps that we employed to help make the transition to seventh grade a little bit more effective uh we're looking forward to um integrating the tiger tracks program which is going to be a transition oriented program so that way you know at some point in the future we'll have summer activities that brings kids in acclimates in the building gets them to work with each other some more certainly we'll continue to do our openhouse um things but um for a first go around it was a very effective evening so I look forward to obviously many of more of those in the future um that same evening it was a very busy night that night because we also had our pack meeting which is the parent athlete coach meeting for all of our spring uh activity participants um obviously our spring season is up and running I think lacrosse is actually the only one that has yet to start um that should happen on Monday but uh I know you've heard about the pack meetings before Miss Chatterton our new ad has done a wonderful job of just getting kind of everybody on the same page giving them consistent information um and allowing all of the parents and the participants to see you know what does it mean to be a student activity participant student coming first and then how to communicate and those sorts of things as Katie mentioned um it is almost April which means MCA testing is coming U Mr boffman has done a a wonderful job uh navigating the scheduling and how all that works uh in our building I know our staff are working on uh incentivizing performance on the MCA not necessarily performance I should say but effort of course right uh one of the things that we like to do as a district is take stock of our performance and our levels of achievement um and our ability to do that is only as good as the validity of the data so uh it's important for us for our kids to take those tests as seriously as possible um obviously it makes us look good it attracts other um students and Community residents and those sorts of things plus we want a good accurate picture of how our students are performing so that we can make appropriate changes to the curriculum and instruction and things like that um I think I'll leave it at that but I'll be happy to answer any questions that anyone has relative to the high school just a piggy back on players at the parents athletes and coaches I was over at Kindergarten Roundup so I couldn't make the sixth grade transition mating but I did was able to make that and I've done every season the the fall the winter and the spring and I'm going to tell you that Pac is full every single season just about fall when I left the transition for uh another event there were people standing in the back of the PAC so I think they've been very effective good feedback Megan's done a really good job in organizing that we haven't had those types of orientation meetings for a while um and just to see all the parents and the coaches and the athletes there together uh was a really special thing to to see so appreciate it oh it's definitely an enhancement definitely for everybody to hear the same information so thank you you question I was going to ask you talked about no you're good the MCT testing out of curiosity what are some of the ways you're going to be rewarding students for um efforts so um I can speak specifically about the fast testing and then our teachers are going to employ similar um strategies to the extent possible the MCA testing does add um a unique complication in that um well specifically for our science MCAS this year because it's a brand new science test we won't even get those results until like the fall um so just as um as an example for MCA testing students that get a meets or exceeds are basically in some instances they'll be guaranteed a certain percentage on the final exam so it's not going to be used to like replace a final grade in a course but it can be used to supplement the final exam score for those situations like I explained the science test where we get the scores the scores much later we still have the ability to go back and update in the Gradebook and then see if the final score is changed so it's obviously a delayed uh implementation but it still exists and we can still go back uh in the event that we need to what we're doing for fast um because that's I think a little bit more reflective of what the intent is um those are based on scale scores and what we're doing is not looking at a specific achievement level but we're looking for any sort of growth so if a student score improves from Fall to Spring then they're getting bonus points again on their final exam or whatever so that's how that's layering in the nice thing about the fast test is um the scores are immediately available um and it's basically equally accessible to all um so so we're incentivizing both the Fast and the MCA and again the main reason for that is we want accurate representations of our students abilities and skills so that we can make appropriate adjustments to curriculum instruction thank you this was started last year I think at least last year right I think yeah last year we kind of piloted it and we noticed um the number of opt outs actually dropped um what we've discovered over sort of years well we did the dig the analysis last year but we were in in looking that several years prior we noticed that you know our opt outs were increasing and when we looked at student scores often times the MCAS will show you the prior year score so when I get the score reports it'll show the current score and then the prior score U more often than not the students that opted out MET or exceeded the expectations on the PRI prior year score so you know it wasn't um obviously I think our scores as reported by the state reflective of our district were under under representing uh our students abilities so we're basically you know trying to incentivize take these seriously try your best um the resulting score isn't the most important we just want students to do their best thank you hello everyone good evening on behalf of the elementary I have a brief report for you today um starting with site base we are also working on our midyear review um at first glance we are kind of um looking like we are going to be meeting most of the goals that we had um put in place so the site base reps are now Gathering um some feedback from their teams and their grade levels and then um next week we'll kind of look at that a little bit more closely and then we also have now um implemented our second round of our saber screening um and so at the elementary school we do it twice a year we do that in November and then we do it again in February so we have another few months to try to like hone in on any of those kids that we might need to give another um additional boost to as far as some intervention planning um but overall it was really exciting to see that our um as a whole building our lowrisk population increased so that's about 689 students in that low risk category and then um our Su risk category decreased so we have about 71 students there and our high- risk has about 12 students as a whole so I think those are really good numbers and very telling of the work that our um SST group is doing and then our interventionists and our tier one in our classroom instruction so I feel like we have good things happening at the elementary school to help respond um to what students are needing um and Diane pman are um she helps facilitate some of this and reviews a lot of the data she's really Savvy at kind of digging into those some risk kids and kind of finding out like okay have they been brought to SST do they need to come what exactly was it that it was was you know kind of flagging them in that sumis so then we kind of get those kids that are maybe closer to that high risk but they're in that sumis to kind of make sure that they're getting what they need to so she's been great in this process and and fun to work with there um additionally we are at a site based level we're looking at our handbook and taking feedback from teams of what we might might want to um revise and adjust so I'll be able to share that in the coming months here and then we're just starting to look at our August Retreat Day so planning that ahead as well um our PD plans we're kind of obviously most of our building is doing letters and then as Miss Thompson mentioned some vertical teams with our Specialists and then um data review and curriculum planning for some of our other staff not in letters um but then we're also starting to look at our U professional development plans for next year already um and so letters again is going to be part of that which is going to be great it'll be year two so we're going to in the final year of that which will be really nice when we're all consistently trained at our building and then Katie Thompson and Sarah bercy are um leading a small group of us um with our teacher development and evaluation plan so they are doing a really nice job working through that process to kind of align um and revamp some of our rubrics um so that work is happening and then that will be shared out to all staff in the fall um next fall during Workshop week um and then we have our educ climber work that we're working on and then we have decided as um an academic leadership team to have all of our staff trained in the fast assessments so that will ensure some of that Fidelity of when we're administering um and giving students those assessments that all of our teachers because we've had a lot of turnover and even some of our staff that have been there for 10 to 12 years they have never been totally trained on that so that will be good and then that will be on a two-year cycle um to keep us all current um um recently we've had some Kindergarten Roundup which was very well attended we have an updated number of 150 that are registered so that is that is sitting really well I would say similar to last year around this time and then we had our tiger fun fair on Saturday which was a huge success wildly attended and lots of lots of fun had by all there so a huge huge thank you to our P group um volunteers it does not run without volunteers and we had a lot of them so that was really really fun to see um we've got um our preparations for MCAS are underway and our art fair is April 24th and our tiger Dash is May 3rd um and last I would just like to thank those of you that have been able to attend some of our events recently um whether it's as as a parent or in your role professionally but um it has been noticed and appreciated and we're really glad to have you there any questions or comments more of a a comment but I I did attend that Kindergarten Roundup and you and the entire school did a great job welcoming in the parents I think that there was an overwhelming positive review amongst the parents and just that process of separation of the kids too was a really cool incorporation of starting that trusting cycle so heads off thank you thank you anything else thank you next Mary reader just a few things to report Matt and I will be meeting with the finance committee next week to go over the budget Pro projection Model results um we have a couple things going on with food service we're going we had to go up for our Prime vendors again this year we do it every three years quot and quotes will be due on April 21st at 1M we did get in the um paper last week and it'll be again this week as well we currently use upper Lakes as our Prime Food Service Ben that's where we get the and that just means that's who we used to get the majority of our food um we'll also be going up for bread milk beds again this year we usually go out in April and have it approved at the May board meeting and if we have to increase prices for adults or second meals or all cart that'll be also approved by the board at the May meeting we didn't really have to change anything last year price-wise so I don't know that we would again this year but Mel and I will be going over that here in the next month or so any questions thank you the opportunity to speak to you tonight on behalf of Community Education tonight I'd like to discuss our Aquatics and fitness program areas um as I mentioned previously one of our primary goals of community ed is to get the community members into our facilities so they can see what the district has to offer see the programs that we have taking place in our facilities um And in regards to our Aquatics program our main and primary facility is our pool um throughout the summer and throughout up to this point in the school year our pool's been in use for over 1,300 hours so there pool has seen some good use um and what does that use look like so who's using our pool we have our um Tac members community members our District staff are also using the those facilities outside of our school hours um we have lap swimmers we have water arobics programming we have our velocity swim club we have our summer diving clinics our special Olympic Swim Club um our D high school girls and boys swim programs and then also something that has been brought back that had fallen off for a little bit is our open swim sessions so we had our thanks to Natalie Borland who was able to put this together working with our lifeguards to staff the pool for those those sessions she was able to start this our first session was March 16th our next one will be coming up here on March 30th we're also going to have more days to come here in April so that's exciting to see that that program coming back and then in our regards to our fitness program programming for adults um along with Staffing and maintaining our weight and circuit room for our T Activity Center members um we currently offer water robics for two days a week um we have personal training sessions we currently we now have two personal trainers on staff that are able to work with um that many more community members and then for yoga we have currently have one instructor able to offer programming two days a week in the summer we're going to add another instructor so we're going to be able to offer up to four days a week to meet the different needs at different um times a day for for our community members um and then although we have a lot of good programming in our Aquatics and our fitness program there these are two areas within Community Ed that we do need to see some improvement um in regards last at the end of our last summer we had a long-term fitness instructor step away from teaching lessons due personal reasons um but we are currently in communication with a Community member that's interested in offering programing to kind of try to fill that void and so we're working on some final details with them to see what they're um going to be able to offer and so excited for that that option to come up here um and another area of improvement is as we've always heard swimming lessons um we are in the process we're working hard on reestablishing our swimming lesson programs we understand the importance in our community of what swimming lessons means to to the families and the importance to have our our students um go through th those classes so right now we're in the process of recruiting our WSI recruiting more lifeguards we're also in the process of recruiting a pool manager to oversee those lessons to make sure that programming is at the highest level it can be um and as soon as we have the staff in place we're going to start offering swimming lessons no matter what that looks like but as soon as we have appropriate staff in place we are planning to um offer the offer swiming lessons again so with that I'd be happy to answer any questions if you if you have any thank you thank you student board Representatives starting off in the high school March 13th was our mental health awareness day we had a guest speaker who spoke um to all students grades 7 through 12 at the high school about dreams and goals in life it was a very cool presentation I got to attend um the importance of taking care of your mental health in order to accomplish goals in life was one of the main topics that he covered and then the indco program organized booths for students um in the digital Commons to uh walk through all day there was coloring pages there was fidgets there were stickers encouraging notes and just um information about mental health awareness well also in the high school last week I didn't even know this was happening but during a win session the seniors had the opportunity to meet with seventh grade students and kind of like partner or pair up and we had a list of questions like about um academics about extracurriculars about friends about just like high school experience in general um and honestly the kids really got into it like the class I was in like I was looking around and both the seniors and the seventh grade graders were like really engaged in conversation so that was just super cool to see also um this upcoming Thursday we have our last um student listening session with the seniors um so we're kind of G to use this as like an outro interview of just overall what's what's worked well with their High School experiment or experience what hasn't worked well um and then also just some like senior year things like how did they feel they were prepared for like college application processes and stuff like that and how we and make those things better um at the Intermediate School Sophia and I had the pleasure of attending the Intermediate School student council meeting um we helped with their mint and encouraging note project for the MCAS we taped little Lifesaver mins onto encouraging notes which is such a fun project during that time we also had a good time discussing with the student council about their events that they had had about the upcoming ones the sixth graders have a special end of the year reward I'm not sure if it's out yet so I didn't know if I wanted to reveal it to the board um but this okay um the event apparently was suggested by a sixth grader which is really cool he had um he said he had been talking about this event since fourth grade so very cool that the six um the students got to kind of pick their own event um at the elementary school the MCA prep is also taking place Sophia and I have mentioned and um in the past our spreadsheet that we're working with NHS members and the teachers it still has some flaws and we're still trying to work out some Kinks but we're hoping by the end of this year and then going on to next year it'll be a little bit more smooth and just easily more easily accessed by NHS members and teachers as well any questions excellent great thank you yeah moving on to our board reports uh first up is safe February meeting um which Rachel DEA attended um so it happened like a month ago so you get another report really soon because the next one's coming I forgot to tell Bobby to put it on the agenda so it's my fault um Willie jet spoke um quickly and then had to go so just kind of gave us a summary of what's going on with the Department of Ed and then and I'm not even to say Ad Do's last name and Kathy Ericson from mg came up um they talked about a really small budget shortfall of about 5.1 billion dollar um and then talk about the governor's priorities the big ones are going to be the hold harmless provision least the big ones that are infect us um working out for compensatory Aid and then the discussion about eliminating cuop which is going to affect our teachers uh notes and minutes are attached we figured out how to do that thanks Rachel next up uh Sarah Baker maso um yeah I just want to thank Angie again for being such a professional and expert face of maso um I think just how Angie talked about the work that maso does is so student centered and that's obvious when you talk about the work that you do so thank you for that um last month we worked through um some information again about legislative advocacy the director masso had been um at the Minnesota state legislature meeting with some Representatives uh talking and just advocating for special education issues um and we got some updates on the federal level too again I do feel very that we are well served both through Matt and Mary and maso in terms of our leaders being very well aware of what's happening and keeping us um a breast of those potential changes or just what might be on the path ahead um we are still working through some like physical safety issues at the baso building with these uh delayed egress doors they're they're working through funding on those um again that's a good example of student need sort of um driving decision making and and and things that are needed um even on a physical level um maso as Matt mentioned is turning 50 this year so they are planning some celebrations at the end of this school year and we will have our meeting again tomorrow but notes and the the proposed minute meeting minut unofficial meeting minutes are attached thank you Sarah Right teex Center Jim so the righted tech center meeting was during our spring break so I was not there but I can report that uh we did Choose Or offer a position to a new director we haven't approved it yet so I really shouldn't say I guess who it is but um I believe that it's going well and it was our first choice um but I'm also on the facilities committee there and these ltfm dollars are going to be well spent on Roofing and flooring and things that are just needed throughout the plans of that building um and the the school calendar was also approved at the last meeting but our next meeting is April 1st and I'll be sure to give Bobby both minutes so you can see them thanks j y moving on to Old business the first item on Old business is to approve the second read to reinstate the 2020 version of policy 522 Title Nine non-discrimination policy grievance procedure and process due to a federal court order this was discussed last month and it's also in conjunction with the next item that we're we're going to um resend the old or the current version so with that is there anyone here for public comment related to this policy all right then I'll entertain a motion uh to approve the second read to reinstate policy uh 522 motion Rachel is the first Jess a second just is a second any discussion all those in favor any opposed osed motion carries to approve the second um policy we have under old business is to approve to resend the 2024 version of policy 522 Title 9 non-discrimination policies basically these two policies right are flip-flopping we're going back to the version 2020 as though this 2024 policy never existed is there anyone here for public comment or this policy all right I'll entertain a motion to approve I'll Mo right Ryan move second second second by Baker any discussion all those in favor I any opposed right motion carries to resend the 2024 version of the policy moving on to new business the first item of new business is our strategic road map um this is a strategic road map that the is the culmination of I don't know probably a year of effort related to work that has happened within the the community feedback within all of the every practically everyone sitting in this room have put in many many hours to get to this point of the Strategic road map for the district and I believe after the many hours that not only the board but all of you have sent on it it's something that we can be proud of that will help us drive the future of the district um with that sorry I will accept a motion to approve the Strategic plan road map for the district Jim was the first second second is a just any discussion on this all those in favor I any opposed all right we have a strategic road map very exciting and thank you to all of you who have been involved in this process I know it has been I don't know if it's a labor of love or not but it's definitely a helpful it's a labor of direction of how to help us all all right the next item under the new business is the uh approving extended field trips for Eagle Bluff Madrid Spain the Delo dance team going to Iowa the football camp going to duth and the girls volleyball going to Marshall there are um the forms of each of these uh field trips is attached below we discussed these in work session last month ran Ryan M thank you Ryan a second Deo second any discussion all those in favor I I any opposed the motion carries next item is to approve the first and only read of policy 101 legal status of District uh legal status of Delano ISD school district policy 103 complaints students employee parents and other persons policy 402 Disability non-discrimination Policy due to review schedule and again I think as Matt mentioned these are person only reads their policies we need to review on a regular annual basis so there have been no changes made to them they just been reviewed by the board is there anyone here for public comment related to these policies I'll entertain a motion motion Jess is a first motion second second by Baker any discussion all those in favor any opposed right motion carries to approve these three policies next policy of is is item 13d to approve the first read of policy 410 Family and Medical Leave is there anyone here for public comment related to this policy it was discussed in um work session all right I'll entertain a motion for approve this policy Jim was a first a second Ryan Ryan the second any discussion all those in favor I I any opposed right motion carries to approve the first and only read of policy 410 next policy is the approve the first read of policy 614 school district testing plan and procedure during work session we discussed actually leaving this policy as is there was a a recommendation that came forth from msba related some language in there and we discussed leaving the language in there related to retaliation being um absolutely not tolerated even within this policy specifically in addition to the fact that retaliation is not prohibited generally within other policies so is there anyone here for public comment for that the motion would then be that we would not make the suggested change correct you would leave the uh proposed language for removal in and it is completely at the board's discretion in this matter make the motion that we leave the proposed language in thank you Rachel second JY any discussion all those in favor any opposed all right the motion carries to leave the language in the policy rather than delete it as attached the next uh item is 13f to approve the first read to resend policy 617 School District Insurance of Preparatory and high school standards this we also discussed at work session work session as an outdated process policy that really is no longer relevant is there anyone here for public comment related to this policy entertain a motion to resend policy 617 Baker first Jim second any discussion all those in favor I any opposed all right motion carries to resend policy 17 next item 13g is to approve the first read of policy 701 establishment and Adoption of a School District budget is there anyone here for public comment related to this policy I just want somebody to stand up all right I'll entertain a motion move moved Ryan second second Jess any discussion all those in favor I any opposed right motion carries to approve policy 701 lastly public comments School patrons are given the opportunity to address the school board regarding items that are not on the agenda all patrons will be asked to State their name for the record while the school board appreciates feedback from the public in this form board members will not comment on or discuss topics brought up by speakers at this time is there anyone here for public comment anyone here for public comment anyone here for public comment all right with that we accept a motion to adjourn DEA DEA second B Baker um all those in favor we are adjourned thank you all thank you all for your time