[Music] hello and welcome to the candidate forum for the Forest Lake School Board I'm Heidi Boyd and I'm a member of the white Fair Lake Area League of Women Voters and I'll be your moderator today I do not live in the forest Lake School District the League of Women Voters is a nonpartisan volunteer organization which encourages citizens to participate in government our mission is to support voter education and voter rights we do not support or oppose any candidate or political party our goal is to encourage citizens to learn more about the positions of the candidates who will be on their ballot all candidates who filed to run for this position were invited to participate in the Forum today and today we have six candidates and they are Tessa antonsen Mark Castle Rob rafhael Jim Smith Gail Tyson and Daniel Tua there are two candidates um who were not able to be here today Julie corkran and Laura Duru there are four open seats for the Forest Lake School Board to begin our Forum today each candidate will introduce themselves by name and make an opening comment of up to one minute our timekeeper will show warning signs of 30 seconds 15 seconds and then a stop sign at the time you at if you see the stop sign you can finish your sentence for opening comments candidates will respond in alphabetical order by last name thereafter the order of speaking will be rotated candidates will have one minute to respond to each question but candidates you don't have to use the full time you can say what you have to say and be done and that will allow time for more questions each candidate will have up to three opportunities to clarify information or rebut another candidate's responses each rebuttal is limited to 30 seconds and a candidate may only use one rebuttal per question when our questions are finished candidates will have one minute for their closing remarks and that will be in Reverse alphabetical order by last name the questions for today's Forum were received in advance from the public and reviewed by a committee of League of Women voter members we are not going to use any questions that are unclear hostile or personal of in nature we may consolidate questions that fall on the same General topic area and all questions submitted are the property of the League of Women Voters so we will begin with our opening comments and we'll start with Tessa and tonen hi well my name is Tessa antonson I live in Columbus with my husband and three boys all of whom have been in the Forest Lake Area Schools uh including liono Lakes Elementary and the Forest Lake Middle School we moved here in 2012 and very much enjoy the community here and all the things it offers while giving that rural feel um we've had wonderful experiences within the school district through Community EDS School sponsored programs and events and um meeting many of our neighbors through my husband's uh honey and selling that to our friends and family as well I'm running for Schoolboard first and foremost to Advocate not only for my own children but for the taxpayer and for your kids and grandchildren the teachers in our community my goal is to encourage increased Community engagement and be more transparent about what is going on and advocate for academics thank you thank you Tessa and next we have Mark Castle thank you for inviting me here my name is Mark Castle my children have graduated in 20 14 in 2017 and um I had done many things with the school uh as far as Chap roning and um helping out in the with the sports um and there were issues when my kids were in school but it does seem like that uh the issues have increased or gotten worse and my focus is academics uh children should be independent adults when they leave the school system and uh one of the folks I've talked to during campaigning says that their graduate cannot even balance a checkbook this does not seem like success to me so I think it's time for a change thank you very much thank you Mark and our next candidate is Rob rafhael yeah hi my name is Rob Rayfield and I'm running for re-election to the for Lake School Board I mean for me when I look at my time on the board there's three things that I've focused on number one student achievement we want every student that have a set of academics and teachers that push them as far as they can go academically and um so that when they graduate they're fully prepared for what's next second options for kids it's critical that the education that kids get at Forest Lake is tailored towards them and if we look at our stem programs our t our egg all those different programs like that that's one thing we do great but it's also something that I think is critically important for our kids lastly I want to say that every student belongs when a student comes to Forest Lake I believe that when they walk through that door they deserve to have a safe and welcoming environment that helps them academically to achieve the high standards that we set thank you rob next we have Jim Smith good morning uh my name is Jim Smith let's talk about learning I've been doing just that talking about learning for years and I'm not stopping now there are many issues school board members must address but really two issues top all others the first is to support high levels of learning for all students the second is how to pay for it we move to move forward we must avoid the contentious political battles that are raging around the education and find ways of working together when it comes to providing highquality research-based learning choices Forest Lake is a leader Forest Lake staff live live the district version of Excellence for every student every day if elected I will support the current great things happening in Forest Lake schools and help to build a even stronger future yes let's continue to talk about learning and find collaborative ways of moving forward as a community to support our students their families and their teachers thank you thank you next we have Gail Tyson hello everyone I am a current School Board member Gail Tyson and I want to start by thanking the League of Women Voters for holding this forum today I'm a proud mother of two Forest Lake graduate daughters my husband Don and I live right here in Forest Lake I have been privileged to serve as a Schoolboard member since 2012 leading our schools to become an environment where every child can s succeed and feels prepared for Life After High School we have made significant improvements in our facilities and School curriculum that provide our students with a broad range of opportunities this happens by listening to parents and students working with my colleagues and being engaged in the community it really does take everyone working together for a child to succeed School boards represent what is important to the community I'm passionate about your child succeeding my priority is to preserve what is working well and look forward to continuing the student focused leadership that ensures success for all Rangers I will provide proven leadership and continue and look forward to your vote on November 5th thank you and lastly we have Daniel tuat hello thank you so much for having us here um I want to thank you Heidi for moderating and the League of Women Voters for putting this on uh Daniel tuat I'm a husband father electrician lives in Forest Lake I would say my why would be four reasons one school safety right no kid wants to feel unsafe going to school um can expound on that later the second would be academic Excellence one out of every two of our students are failing um the state MCA test and so I feel like this is unacceptable there are there are schools that have 99.5% of their students passing or exceeding and we're at like 50% right now um in science I think it's 45% so um I'd like to see acade academic excellence and then also the uh wise spending you know we're overspending our budget by more than a million every year and the general fund is about down to zero um so we need to sharpen the pencil on that and the last would be Community um representation thank you thank you we have a a written statement submitted by Julie corkran who is um states that she's sorry that she cannot be here for this important Forum today so I'm going to read her uh submitted statement my name is Julie corkran and I've lived in the Forest Lake Area School District for 38 years I work in Minneapolis as an accounting controller at an architectural firm I've been the treasur for the school board for 15 years my background in finance has helped me understand the complexity of school district finances it's been a privilege to serve on the Forest Lake Area school board for four terms and I would be honored to be elected for another four years during my tenure the school district has seen great progress our board worked extremely hard excuse me on a plan to pass the largest Bond referendum in 2015 to modernize and improve all the buildings also with the high school science addition in Fieldhouse we can offer even more opportunities for students the latest addition of our track and football field is added to the pride that our students and Community can feel when attending graduation and multiple sporting events the toool school district is the heart and soul of the community it serves if elected I will continue to listen to input from community members and make sure that we as a district keep moving forward and now we'll move move into our first question we'll be rotating who starts um their response and this for this first question we will start with Rob Rael so the question is what are the three most pressing challenges facing the Forest Lake School District thank you for me I think the the the number one thing we always have to focus on is academic achievement and that's not just uh we our district beats State Standards over and over and over but that's not good enough we always have to be looking and drilling down and making sure that every student gets the help they need if they're falling behind right because sometimes averages can hide that so academic achievement is number one second we have to ensure that we have options for those kids so that you can tailor your education to the things you need and one of the ways we do that is through our uh Pathways for Success where students can help um design or their classes for how they want what they want to do for a career later and lastly I'd say one of the things that we really have to work hard on especially after covid is making sure that every student feels welcome and has a safe environment uh for their learning thank you Rob and we'll go next to candidate uh tuat yes ma'am thank you well I think high level I look at things high level it's all about um preparing kids to become an adult right so we want to leave a better country for our kids than the one we grew up in okay we want our ceiling to be their floor so I look at it as what does it take to do life okay um three top issues probably I discussed a minute ago would be the academic Excellence um if you can't make change you go to checkout and the kid you know you give him an extra dollar and he has to type it in a computer calculator to get his change out of that whoa right um academic Excellence definitely number one spending right money in Money out just it it it has to equal or else you you go negative very quickly and then the taxpayers pay for that and number two and you can do that by being efficient you don't have to cut programs to do that number three would be uh Community representation and uh I'm out of time but we'll talk about that later thank you thank you and next we go to Gail Tyson well I want to answer your question directly and three things that affect Force searious schools and impact our financial status is Equalization and per pupil funding formula that has not kept up with the rate of inflation so it's hard for for secary schools to catch up that ground and then our Transportation sparsity has always been high on the list and I have advocated at the capital for changes to this we've had bills in our legislators to increase the the amount that we receive counterintuitive is the fact that the funding formula is based on per pupil numbers and not miles driven so for Forest Lake being the third largest District geographically we drive about 300 miles a day so that in essence is passed on to our taxpayers and to our school district where we have to pay that funding to run our buses um property Equalization we're always working on that with our legislators because it's very unfair formulas and in force like we know we don't have a lot of property wealth thank you thank you next we go to Mark Castle yes my top three things are the academic excellence and the fiscal fiscal responsibility and Community involvement especially the parents and as more and more parents get involved with their students and the rest of the community gets involved with the school and we can figure out and work out problems that exist and to increase what's going well and make that even better thank you thank you Jim Smith thank you excuse me uh if you're hear an easy answer to any of these issues there are no easy answers everything is difficult uh academic Excellence is one of them that is very very difficult uh to deal with there's a lot of moving parts to that but that has to be the number one priority in the district and I've been working in this field for 35 years and that has been my life's work to bring that forward uh number two actually is tied into number one attendance is a big problem here and in the rest of the country forest lake has uh 71% of their students are are here 90% uh 90% of the time or more that leaves 30% approximately that their kids aren't in class for even 90% of the time um research shows that without being in class they're not going to do well in school uh and reading is the third thing reading is so important to everything that we do forest lake has been a leader in this area uh with the science of learning uh stuff in Minnesota and um we're on our way in reading and I'm happy we're going there thank you great and lastly Tessa an tonsen yeah I would in my study and experience of what the three most pressing challenges are is obviously like most of us have said here academic achievement and how do we get there and I think a lot of other things tie into that funding and what kind of programs and curriculums are we using um I would also say parental rights is an issue um that may not be everybody's experience but I know that that is real and last but not least again the funding coming back to the academic achievement and what kind of programs are actually producing better academic skills for our students here because that is the utmost of importance thank you thank you yes first rebuttal I just want to kind of I just wanted to answer the the assertion that uh from a funding perspective that we're in financial danger forsake schools are not in financial danger over the years we had build up a great Reserve fund then when Co hit and we needed additional resources for uh all the offline learning we use some of that we buil drove drew that down we're now building it back up we are not in financial distress we're in very good condition thank you Gil first re bottle yes I just want to talk a little bit about the MCA the recent um State scores that came out for searious schools exceeds the state in all areas we have some very impressive re results in certain buildings and progress um but at the same time we always know that there's places of concern and we dig right into those areas and start working on them we also have our own testing um um which is called fastbridge that is done on a regular basis throughout the school year thank you and Daniel awesome thank you so much so I just wanted to talk about the MCA uh you know the state average a lot of talk about State average um 55% of our students are failing the MCA science right the state is 53% so we're 2% better exactly the same uh on reading and math is 2% different two and so we are doing better than them but we're District number 193 so that means there's 192 districts who are doing a better job and we can we can step up the game thank you Jim to address the MCA as well um I've been looking at State data everywhere around the country I've seen drops in Minnesota as well since covid and those numbers have been used to show how poor things are happening here it's the same all over the country the neap scores uh have dropped almost an identical amount over those years around the country uh it needs to we need to be realistic about what scores can do our attendance alone can knock us down quite a bit um thank you any thank you and Tessa thank you um I'd like to say that when we look at the test scores they aren't everything but they are a huge issue and I we can look at I'm wondering what ways are we looking at evaluating what's working in our schools to increase our students achievement as opposed to the extra programs that we're spending a lot of money on that may not benefit everyone and actually create the equity that we are proposing to do thank you all right we were going to move on to the second question which is related to financial challenges of the district and our our first respondent will be Jim Smith so the question is declining student enrollment has created Financial challenges for the school district including a one and a qu million budget reduction for the 2425 school year what options would you consider to address these Financial challenges start with thank you that's a good question uh the enrollment drop um I think is pretty much a result of the demographics of an uh aging population um what I would look at is uh it has to learning has to be number one uh priority uh for example the middle school program right now there or I should call the junior high the junior high is moving to a middle school model uh this is an excellent example of shifting things around based on brick and mortar decisions but it's basically really good for learning a middle middle school model is much higher uh is an Effectiveness rate than a Jer High uh so that's a positive move to save some money but it's a positive move for education and that's what I've been seeing in this District since I started going to board meetings uh a year and a half ago uh there's lots of information out there all the time if you just look for it thank you thank you and next we go to Tessa Anton I would ask that you repeat the question for me thank absolutely please so declining student enrollment has created Financial challenges for the school district including a one1 and a quar million budget reduction for this 2425 school year what options would you consider to address the financial challenges I would say we have to look at what we are spending our money on very closely and allocate those funds towards academic achievement first and foremost as well as our teachers thank you thank you and next we go to Daniel tuat yes ma'am okay so the uh declining student enrollment right 63% of students in our district go to Forest Lake Public Schools so that means almost not almost half but quite a few are going elsewhere right we're number 19 three as a district just up the road mamei is number 11 right so uh that's a whole another issue but funding wise there are creative ways to save money right collaboratives um working with multiple districts on a special program to save costs on something you don't have to cut programs in order to save money right there's efficiency things right administrative costs um Dei programs they don't call them that but they're they burn a lot of a lot of money actually and they don't add to academic success the other thing would be um creative funding sources like we have a lot of buildings right hiring one out on a Sunday morning there's a lot of churches would love to meet you know that they do that in Fridley what about um other people using our track and field you know renting it just ways to make extra money so thank you thank you and next uh Rob rafhael yeah thank you I just as our demographics change um we've just seen less students coming in and we have to adjust with that right I mean I've worked in Private Industry my whole life I was self-employed for a little while but when uh things like that change you have to adjust and so for for us for us who are focusing on academics and choices for kids we have to say we've got this community school model that we are 100% behind how do we keep those Community Schools open and yet rearrange them so that we save costs that reflect the less students coming in we are one of the best choices in this area for a school and so that uh that's number one in keeping those students coming here but we also I mean this is just a natural thing we have to adjust for and we are adjusting for it um I would also say uh we had a comparison to mamei compare the number administrators to Mami to here and you'll find that uh we're really run a tight budget in this District thank you the question next goes to Gail Tyson well I just want to counter some of the conjecture and I want to talk about the exciting news about Forest Lake High School's graduation rates which rose 6% from 2022 from 86% to 92% in 2023 we offer 15 AP courses at our high school CIS courses 19 and Industrial certifications are 14 we are doing a lot of things right and force larious schools but to speak about the declining enrollment we have already had a study done by a retired demographer so we are well aware of the declining enrollment that school boards across the state are feeling it's just low birth rates your kindergarten size isn't matching your graduation so we have done a study for our capacity and we are pushing putting something forward to include our sixth grade in our Middle School model and then hence we can more efficient with our buildings thank you thank you and the the question next goes to Mark Castle thank you um I was at the meeting where the demographer gave her two cents about why the enrollment is decreasing nothing was ever said about the academic scores and my daughter was specifically looking to move out of the area she was because of this scores of that school system and she said she would not go to Forest Lake but she was looking at mamei she was looking at Centennial Lakes and she was looking at Egan all fiscal things need to be looked at no matter if it's buying pencils or even the pay to the teachers which is the most important pay that there is and as we look into these issues and talk with the community um we can all come up with ways to decrease the costs and increase efficiency thank you thank you any rebuttal okay okay moving on to question three which will go first to to Gail Tyson the question is considering the financial challenges facing the district what experiences do you have that will help you as a school board member carry out your financial oversight responsibilities well as a school board member I continue every year to to Advocate at the state capital with legislators I have relationships built with them and we talk about how our transportation funding costs us a lot of money out of our general fund and how if we could keep that money in our general fund instead of paying to run our buses we could do a lot of things with that I also advocate for Equalization because in Forest Lake we don't have a lot of prop property wealth and passing passing things along to tax players is difficult it took us 12 years to build up our community support to pass our bond and Levy in 2018 and and that's hard for Forest like residents we have to really help with being at the capital looking at ways to get things pupil amounts increased and formulas changed um I also am ve very fudi I am on the finance committee I like to look at our budget a lot of school districts that are public schools held to a higher standard with their finances thank you the question next goes to Jim Smith could you repeat the question again yes considering the financial challenges facing this school district what experiences have you had that will help you as a Schoolboard member carry out your financial oversight responsibilities okay thank you uh in education I haven't been involved in budgeting but I've been involved in trying to save programs trying to advocate for programs at um at the legislative level um both for Forest Lake and for Centennial when I work there as a teacher uh the advocacy is is a really important part of that there are many unfunded mandates that have been some of them been taken care of there's still others that that cause deep problems and I like to point out that we are a group of people that follow laws and we don't make laws so we have to live within these laws um that we're presented with as a school board fiscally personally I'm I'm quite conservative uh I've been a teacher all my life and there's never been a whole lot of money to burn uh and I try to uh to watch the bank and save for retirement so thank you very much thank you the question next goes to Tessa antonsen I'm gonna ask that you repeat your question for again please thank you so considering the financial challenges facing this District what experiences have you had that will help you as a school board member carry out your financial oversight responsibilities well I'd say life experience I mean I've never had a budget of millions of dollars sitting in front of me but I've always been very acutely aware growing up um using welfare and food stamps being raised by a single mother I am acutely aware of how important it is to prioritize your spending um I I would think that we should be very transparent with the public as like we are going through this reimagined 2025 I have a fifth grader right now who that will greatly impact and while I appreciate um the things that I've heard about how it can be a positive for these kids I also have concerns and it is a k through six program that we have here currently that is part of a draw for me to this community so I think being transparent with the public in where we are with money and using their input to help us prioritize where we should spend it thank you the question next goes to Mark Castle well I have it been in manufacturing pretty much my whole life um I have been uh purchasing I have done uh many things with the finance people uh writing queries and stuff and and getting the data that they wanted from our system so I I do have experience with getting the information and providing it to the folks who would make decisions and um also having repercussions of those decisions and what it does to the business um the school is the business of educating the students it's different than manufacturing but nonetheless the product is independent adult at the end of the run thank you and um we'll take your rebuttal after all candidates are done yep the uh the question next goes to Daniel truat awesome thank you so much so uh for me I would say I mean you can't hit all the details in a minute but what we you can look at is mindset right we're teaching our kids how to think not what to think okay and it's it's a it can go from top to bottom any anywhere in between if you look at let's say Schoolboard right we're all W for Schoolboard is it the mindset of is it a part-time job or is it a civic duty right now in 2023 January Luke and Kirk got into the school board they got voted in and they tried to change the Schoolboard pay to a dollar right so we could have extra money you could hire a teacher with that money you could have extra school supplies right they got voted down right January this year they got voted down again in March the school board voted against them to raise their stipend so they're giving themselves raises and it's just it's a mindset right I feel like if we look at this as what is the goal the goal is our kids we put them priority and then everything else flows from that thank you thank you and then lastly to Rob rafhael thank you yeah we raised our stip in 2% so um let me use an example so the an example H uh that member Tyson alluded to is that um for busing we've got a a Hu a lot one of the largest busing routes in the state and that means it costs us a lot of money and the state was not funding it properly because they were not doing it by miles driven we went to the legislature we worked with our legislators over and over pushing them you need to get a bill we worked with beiji I testified in front of the committee about getting something in place that helps districts like s get that busing paid for and we got a bill through it was not anywhere near what we needed but the next year then we were able to add to that add to that and that's how this work is done is that you take the time you understand the problem and you work diligently over time to correct the problem and we've made progress on the busing one but it sure ain't there yet and we have more work to do on that thank you and get had a rebuttal yes so I just want to bring it back around to what I know to be true we are Guided by a strategic plan in Forest Lake Area Schools where the majority is the top priority is on academics so we have new Gateway courses at our forest lake Cary Middle Schools that uses a design thinking model that building was been redesigned to work collaborative collaboratively in groups um we also have purchased a new English language arts curriculum which has been vetted and part of the read act and so we're very proud of that you usually see a dip in scores with reading with a new curriculum but we did not thank you thank you all right moving on to the next question which will go first to Daniel tuat the question is what strengths do you have that make you uniquely qualified to be a Schoolboard member thank you so I want to honor everyone here because we all have our ideas of you know policy but everyone is Carri something to the table right and we all and I want to honor you guys for you know 20 years of service that kind of thing um I would save myself every day I'm going in to a facility manufacturing or or plant or something they have a line down it's a million dollars an hour we need to get this back up right now okay 10 people standing over your shoulder when's it going to be running right you have to go in and like hold on I don't even know what this thing does yet let alone what's wrong right so give me a minute you go in and you look at the system and you say okay how does it work what's working what's not working now you identified the problem now you can fix the problem right so it's all about just focusing on uh finding the issue like the the most pressing issue fixing that and then moving on to the less and less till you get a smooth mning machine thank you thank you question next goes to Rob rafhael thank you um for me I I mean I've worked in software engineering and uh in Machine Vision and now I'm working in medical device software and you know just kind of being an outside seeing how the outside world and business Works helps bring kind of insight to the administration as there making decisions I bring that I also bring a lot of community volunteering time I've worked with the Cubs Scouts and um I was in the drum line parent group and a lot of events like that and I think uh another thing that brings experience to me is I've had three kids that one who's uh going to graduate this year who have gone through this District all three kids are very different have very different needs and I have watched how this school district has addressed their needs uh over and over and over and so and lastly I would say I've got a lot of experience on the board I have watched how this District started out with a funding scheme that was just not great and we've moved it towards a very successful way that we do our finances thank you the question next goes to Jim Smith thank you um I've worked for 15 years as and Centennial as a classroom teacher beyond that I worked with Centennial as the district or is the uh the Middle School assessment coordinator and we worked with building professional earning communities in that building uh as a result of my work there and in another school I worked with uh I helped two schools win academic awards that we were recognized for uh moving beyond that I was then U offered a position to to train teachers around the country from a company called solution tree uh you had to have worked in an awards winning school in order to get that offer and I worked with schools from California to New Jersey for five or six years helping teachers to write assessments to look at standards uh and to improve the quality of learning in their schools I've been in public schools since I was five years old so that's almost six Decades of being in public schools and I can't seem to get out of it and here I am trying to eat a room again thank you thank you question next goes to Gail Tyson so what makes me a unique and brings my strong AB abilities to Forest Lake Area Schools as a Schoolboard member is I'm a good listener and I'm very passionate about about listening and being out and engaged in my community I'm at all the events I'm kind of a Grassroots um School Board member I came up through the ranks working at scandy elementary as a title one teacher I was on the PTO there we built a new playground I went to the force like middle school and I was on the PTO there as well working and meeting and doing those grassroot thing Grassroots things with parents I'm also a former Paran aware quality coach and an advocate for state courts as a guard at Lum um I think good listening is really one of my assets I hear that from the community all the time they seek me out to talk to me and have these conversations that are important for our students thank you thank you the question next goes to Tessa antonen um as my unique qualities um as a nurse of 28 years I've been in the service of other people and the advocate for their care and and it being a nurse um creates a position of being in the middle between what you're being asked to do making sure you understand why you're being asked to do it and then advocating for the person for whom these directives are being put so I am also a holistic coach so I have experience working with people very strong good listening skills and I believe that it is important to listen to the people when they have concerns and um understand that they are real and not just bypass things by focusing on the positive all the time we have to take a look at both sides of things thank you thank you and lastly the question goes to Mark Castle thank you uh I am largely self-educated I read manuals and things like this uh that's how uh when at one point my employers discovered that I was a geek they moved me from being the CNC Department to being the ID it Department doing the purchasing doing order entry and all these other different things because I read and learned the system and took it upon myself to figure these things out and many of the subjects that my children were learning they actually went out and saw some YouTube videos of some very good people that are educating on YouTube and 4 point better than four point grade point averages were achieved in that by doing that and so um just looking at things from a individual perspective and and how people can learn are is is where my strengths are thank you okay we're GNA move on to the next question and it's gonna go oh sorry yes yes um one of the things I there one of the things that came up um was a statement about transparency with the school district and one thing I want to say is that as a board member I am really proud of the work that I've have done and I'm proud of the work that our school district has done and as far as transparency goes I want people to see the work where doing I want people to see those kids thriving I want people to see how hard we work to get the kids that are falling behind the help they need I'm proud of our work and uh so transparency is easy thank you okay next question and and we'll start with Mark Castle the question is uh some members of the community have expressed concerns about what is being taught in the classrooms this has become a point of contention at Schoolboard meetings as a board candidate do you have any concerns about what is being taught in the classrooms and can you state why or why not uh yes I do have concerns and I've talked to many people while I'm out campaigning and they have concerns too that there are things that are in the school that actually don't have anything to do with the academic success of the student students and all of the programs that don't have viability with somebody after they come out of the school system for their being able to get a job or be an entrepreneur or whatever it is they decide to do they're they don't follow along with actual education so my concern with any of the curriculum that is not AC academic achievement is that it perhaps we need to look at it and either eliminate it or downsize it and then increase the size of the things that have to do with life skills so that the students can be prepared for adulthood thank you the question next goes to Gail Tyson well we work very hard at our culture and building community in Forest Lake Area Schools we have soft start days so that our eighth graders and our nth graders I'm sorry seventh graders and ninth graders at the high school can get that peer-to-peer support with our web leaders where everyone belongs and our link leaders at the high school um we have an incredible team of teachers that work hard on the standards that we get from mde that are embedded in our curriculum they are an exceptional group of Educators and they're both professional and exceptional in that they most of the majority of our teachers hold a degree in the Master's area um um I think that we are transparent and anybody can come and be on our curriculum committee if they want to learn more about how these decisions are made they can go into their classroom and discuss the curriculum with their teacher they can go in and talk to their building principal we are transparent we are open I hear the complaints from people that aren't willing to do that so I'm always welcoming people into our buildings to do that thank you thank you the question next goes to Rob rafhael thank you yeah I think a lot of outside organizations and National organizations that have never been to Forest Lake are putting out information saying that schools are teaching all these scary subjects and it's a bunch of baloney our schools we have shot we have a number of tech classes we excel at our science classes we have highlevel math classes our AP classes are through the roof and our students do great at them when a student leaves our our school they're ready and we give them all these different options and uh a couple other uh people were talking about our curriculum in the early grades for reading that we're working on this is important work and it happens through the curriculum committee which is open to the public if you want to have a voice in our curriculum what we teach you can be on the curriculum committee you can hear about all these different uh reading programs and it doesn't stop there it goes to the teachers and the principes and the parents they all have a voice in what we teach and it shows thank you question goes next goes to Jim Smith thank you I have been on a curriculum committee here for the last year and a half uh and it is a very good place to have discussions about this stuff it's not done in secret at all uh and I also want to point out that we are in an institution that follows laws we on the school board and members of the education Community here don't make laws we follow laws part of the laws are the uh standards in Minnesota for all the different subject areas and let me give you just a quick example uh from uh English uh language arts Math and Science there are 425 pages of Standards you can find them online uh which means there are probably two to three th000 standards that that teachers are respons ible by law to teach in class now obviously they can't get to all those uh and they don't but there are things be put in place by teaching and learning department and the uh superintendent's office to make sure we stay on that track of of U staying on the standards uh thank you thank you the question next goes to Daniel tuat yes ma'am I just realized there's two cameras don't know which one to look at but that's right um I'm just again it's back to mindset and and looking at things objectively I think a lot of parents are upset worried scared of whatever you want to call it I think Elon Musk termed it the best called the woke mind virus right you can call it whatever you want um it goes back to and what was what was spoken here earlier was we actually do are doing a lot of right things in the school district I mean we have carpentry programs shop programs like who has auto shop anymore right before for like does we have Woodworking and metal working right all these kind of things students will actually build a house and sell it I mean that is awesome right there's a lot of really good things I think parents are just worried about indoctrination creeping into education we want to be educated not indoctrinated right so it just has it's something that you need constant vigilance to keep those runchy books at a libraries to keep you know just just goofy stuff being taught thank you thank you and lastly Tessa antonsen I would ask you to repeat the full question for me again please so some members of the community have expressed concerns about what is being taught in the classrooms this has been a point of contention at Schoolboard meetings as a board candidate do you have concerns about what's being taught in the classroom and why or why not I do have some concerns yes I mean I've had personal experience with some of the concerns that people in the community have also expressed to me I believe that when we when we step foot into a school building school property venue any whatsoever everyone should be held to the same standards of behavior and accountability and I don't believe that that is happening and I think when we have children that come home and say there's repeated outbursts happening in their classroom and you don't hear anything about it from the teacher and then you're being told your child is having trouble focusing I think there's things that need to be addressed I think that's where that transparency comes in and uh I think there's work to be done there yes thank you thank you okay moving on to the next question which will go first to Tessa antonen what strategies will you use to engage teachers students families and community members in discussions regarding the direction and policies of this District well I would say at this point in the game we should be using more social media outreach to our community um I think we I know this school does a survey with parents and households about how they feel about their school as um supporting their children I think we should be having the kids do that as well and in some kind of ongoing frequently measurable fashion so that we can get realtime feedback from the students the teachers and the public thank you thank you uh the question next goes to Mark Castle sorry please repeat the question yeah what strategies will you use to engage teachers students families and community members in discussion regarding the direction and policies of the district well I don't really like the word strategies but people need to be open and honest about their feelings and how they think that things are going and so with open and honest discussions if that's going to be called a strategy that's what I would use thank you question now goes to Rob Rafael thank you um I think one of the ways that we started doing that is through what we call the Strategic plan and like when we've initially put our strategic plan together we had I bet we had 50 60 people from the public come in and we had a a three-day discussion about where we want to focus our efforts in this school district from The public's perspective what we wanted our mission to be and we have renewed that year after year after year and out of that um that strategic plan comes a bunch of action items and things that we want to make sure that we're doing in fact we were just at a fundraiser for tefla tefla came out of that um out of that one of those original strategic plans so that is one of the critical there's a lot of different ways we interact with parents um but that is one of the critical ways that we set the overall direction of our district and what we see as our vision for our kids thank you the question next goes to Daniel tuat yes ma'am this is actually something I'm passionate about um the I love that old TV quote we have the technology right so um simple things like okay so we're talking about parent Community teacher Schoolboard involvement right collaboration the magic is where it happens is communication right everyone talking together it's open lines of so what can we do to do that right simple things like uh I just started a YouTube channel I would like to take every school meeting and do a five minute recap at the end of it right not everyone has two hours to watch a meeting but you can jump on find out what happened what's upcoming boom right uh things like Twitter right it's the digital Town Square you can collaborate with the community have ideas have you know when you're representing someone you're literally representing their thoughts and ideas so we need to be in constant communication um it's super important so yes a lot of ideas thank you than you the question next goes to Gail Tyson yes well my strategy will continue as it's always been to be out in my community to be at games to be where they are be at the music concerts go to their PTO meetings be where the community is and my constituents and be very accessible to them I had a conversation that went 15 minutes at the football game a Friday ago I also will run into parents and constituents in Target wherever I am I'm always accessible if you want to grow honesty and grow your trust you need to be out in the community you need to be at events you need to be engaging with the students and the parents and everyone in our for Ranger Community thank you and lastly uh to Jim Smith thank you uh when I started looking into the district almost two years ago now actually I started going to listing sessions these are offered before board meetings uh the the first board meeting of the month where community members can come in give feedback the superintendent is writing uh I think he writes a column every so often in the The Times paper uh online is a great resource for the Forest Lake Schools Community uh also um I do have a little concern about so social media uh is being uh Avenue for this conversation uh X or Twitter as it used to be known as is an example we probably I did some quick maths we probably have close to 16,000 people in a district on Twitter out of 50,000 however Target Best Buy General Mills metronics United Health groups 3M have all stopped uh working on Twitter uh and the statement from 3M was we like many other companies want to create a safe environment for dialogue and that's the key a safe environment for dialogue where we can have these important discussions and move forward thank you and a rebuttal from Rob Rafael well it's kind of a rebuttal number one I wanted to agree with member Tyson because that is that is the core of it it's just being available for people and I just had a discussion with um uh uh somebody who was responsible for some hockey and he was having a concern about working with the district with Communications and um that conversation is critical and I'd also like to say that we have a lot of social media going out as a school district and um it's yeah if you want to W if you're interested in sports academics all those things and I'll leave with that thank you thank you all right we are going to move on to our last question for today um and then we'll have closing remarks so the last question first is going to go to Daniel tuat and the question is the number two goal of the Strategic plan of the Forest Lake School Board is to reach attract develop and retain highly qualified Educators however Forest Lake teacher salaries are lower than neighboring and and comparison districts given this pay disparity why should teachers stay in Forest Lake thank you for that question this is huge um teachers policemen firefighters and Military are some of the most underpaid uh employees in our in our individuals in our nation right um we have an issue and it is called inflation and how has in the last 10 years has school board or the school district dealt with this our property taxes have been 7% 10 years ago 7% of the operating budget Forest Lake was property taxes like levies today it's 21% of the budget is off property taxes right so um in 2023 last year Minnesota statute 126 C7 right oh 's up we'll get into that later thank you okay thank you the question next goes to RAB Rafael I'm sorry could you repeat the question yeah definitely the number two goal of the Strategic plan of the Forest Lake School Board is to attract develop and retain highly qualified Educators however Force like teacher salaries are lower than neighboring in comparison districts given this pay disparity why should teachers stay in Forest Lake uh thank you uh I would also point out that our Administration uh costs are lower as well um or salaries are lower as well it's a big problem I mean we've got a a great curriculum department and um and our new teachers that come in oftentimes come in for four or five years and then go to a higher paying District because we are so good at training our incoming teachers and it's so it's a real problem we've had it in our strategic plan we try to uh increase it as much as we can but we've got these fixed budget constraints where we can only go so much so that means we have to really ensure that we try to give our teachers uh a very positive work environment and do other things like that to keep them on board and we do and a lot of teachers do stay on but uh it's a critical problem I really think that the state uh has to increase funding to our district so that we can kind of bring those salaries up thank you the question next goes to Mark Castle uh thank you for the question uh I have talked to several people that used to be teachers and they said they could they wouldn't come in and be a teacher now for anything and so the teachers in order to maintain their presence in the same same school district this one here or anywhere where they are they need to know that what they are doing is valued and that they can work with the community and the school board and whoever needs to be worked with in order so that they're they can be productive and happy with what they're doing and we should be able to work on getting their pay to be higher just like other places but we do have fiscal problems that block or hinder that so we need to work on that thank you the question next goes to Tessa antonen can you please repeat it I'm trying to the number two goal of the Strategic plan for the Forest Lake School Board is to attract develop and retain qualified Educators however Forest like teacher salaries are lower than neighboring and comparison districts given this PID disparity why should teachers stay in force Lake well I think it's an excellent question and that is something that is of utmost important to look at because it directly affects the academic achievement that we need to also improve in this District in order to get people to stay and more people to enroll in our schools if that's what we want we need to make that a priority I being a nurse of 28 years I see some similarities from the Health Care system to uh the educational system where the teachers are the backbone such as like nurses are kind of the backbone or a big part of it in the system that they work in and when they do not feel valued and when they are not paid compensated well and when they do not feel safe in their classrooms or safe to speak up about things they disagree with they will leave thank you thank you and next Jim Smith hi thank you um how to chain teachers that's interesting when I started in Centennial Lake 40 years ago we were hemorrhaging teachers out of Forest Lake into Centennial because our pay was quite a bit better than they were out here uh it seems like that's changed it seems like a lot of teachers are looking at Forest Lake and it's got to be for something other than the pay I I would like to teachers more uh but that is an Evy aacy issue um teachers are looking for support from administrators like we heard about earlier uh they're looking for a leadership that helps develop other leaders which in the district which is Forest Lake is doing that they're looking for a learning model that works that fits in with data uh with best practices in education and research-based learning uh uh and I'm looking for people to stop a hate there's been a lot of that generated against teachers for a lot of pretty fictitious things over the years and that's need to stop as well uh there's a lot lot of great things happening here and teachers are recognizing that if we could pay them a little more that'd be good too thank you and lastly Gail Tyson yes when we go to S settle our teachers contract there's one thing that I always say to myself it's more than we can afford but unfortunately it's way less than they deserve so I want to repeat that in force like area schools we have a team of Educators that is both exceptional and professional with the majority holding a master's degree we have strong academics and it's mostly due in part to our strong teaching Force our Educators our retired Educators come back to sub for us when we have retirements every year we have teachers retiring with 20 to 30 plus years in for like area schools because there is that strong leadership there is that camaraderie there is PLC time and support for what they're doing in the classroom having time to share ideas and how to grind down and drill down on what is best practice so I'm proud of our teachers we have such a strong group they are admired by parents throughout the district as well as myself and our whole school board thank you thank you we will now turn to our closing statements which will we will do in Reverse alphabetical order by last name each candidate will have one minute for their closing statement to summarize their qualifications and positions and we will start with Daniel awesome thank you so much so property taxes tax levies right this is what got me into the race the 2018 we voted as a community to almost double our tax levy to support our schools I actually voted for it right but I voted for one tax levy I didn't vote for two that eight years is coming up very soon the current School Board is uh talking about there's a new Authority from the legislature that they can just take a vote of seven and completely reup the levy without uh bring it to the citizens to vote and I feel that's wrong there's a team of us called we call ourselves team tank because that's the acronym of our last name we're running to to against this to stop this um because we feel like that's reaching in grabbing your ballot and voting yes for you and I don't agree with that at all so team tank um Daniel tuat is my name and I would just love your vote on November 5th email me daniel. lson or give me a call and we can chat 763 568 5759 thank you thank you and next we go to Gail Tyson yes together and with your vote we can preserve what's working well in Forest Lake Area Schools and continue that upward trajectory of building our students academic Futures I am passionate about your child succeeding I always listen to parents students and Community Voices I have seen our district grow and improve since being elected in 2012 to this I'm very proud We have also faced ch challenges such as working through covid and distance learning but we are recovering from that and our scores show this too our recent MCA results show we exceed this exceed the state average in all areas my passion for public education extends beyond our school board I also serve on Northeast Metro intermediate board this is a member district board that focuses on serving our special needs students in a level four setting I was also elected by my East Metro peers to be a director of Minnesota school board of Association this has given me a leadership role in discussing policies and issues facing public schools and learning firsthand what is working well in other districts and across the state I am your partner and proven leader in education thank you for your vote on November 5th thank you and Jim Smith okay thank you I know how learning works okay I I have Pro proven track record of growing it in in many different places and I'm also not objective I will admit that up front if it doesn't you know if it's not something that works in learning if it's not research based if there's not data behind it I'm not objective about that we need those pieces in place to make sure that the learning program in this district is the best it can be and there's a lot of good stuff in place in that in that regard um I like to build coalitions um and this district is a place to do that we've got a director of curriculum and instruction who's topnotch I put up against anybody in the country on how to improve um learning in this District uh this is also why I'm a member of the Ranger team running for Schoolboard I'm working with these two and Julie uh they're heck of an NA to follow and they've done a lot of great work supporting this District over the years and uh I'm just pleasure that I can join them on the ticket thank you very much Jim smith.com Jim schoolboard.com I'm sorry it's my website thank you and next Rob Rafael thank you uh one thing I'd like to point out that uh Daniel from the tank team waited till his rebuttal or till the last statement in the in the debate to say that he's in favor of cutting funding to the schools and I'd I would have liked to have heard through this debate how they would support their academics and paying teachers and all that stuff with a big major cut to our our funding but that that aside uh I just want to number one say how proud I am OB serving the Forest Lake Schools uh being on the board and being a part of all this incredible work the proudest day of my year is handing out diplomas at the end of the year and seeing that excitement of kids and parents as they're in the stadium uh and thinking about the future before them and knowing that we have done everything we're able to give them the start in life that they need and I couldn't be prouder of my work thank you Mark Castle thank you for inviting us to this forum um I my goal is the academic achievement and again I'm largely self-educated so I there's many things that we can do to help the children actually do that for themselves along with the classroom work um you can reach me at uh Castle campaign at protonmail.com you can call me at 61224 8803 and give me your suggestions and give me your concerns and I'd like to work together with all the folks out there to improve the school system so we can have educated students thank you and lastly Tessa and tonen hi well first of all I would like to thank you Heidi for moderating this forum and uh to the League of Women Voters for hosting us today it's been quite an experience um I am Tessa an tonsen I am the a in team tank uh with Daniel tuat Tessa and tonson myself Laura Durango and Mark Castle here we are advocating for change H for high level of transparency and communication with the community I as Laura has said in the past and Daniel just now would not approve a vote to renew a levy without public input um we are also highly focused on academic achievements the fact is that in the middle school math is at 56% and in high school math is at 31.6% and respectively 21% of households strongly or disagree that teachers in that school care about their kids and I think while we do many good things well in our schools we also need to acknowledge these points and work at changing them and improving them thank you thank you this concludes our forum for the Forest Lake School board thank you all for your participation our website is lwv wb.org and has listings for all of our candidate forums and links where you can submit questions for these forums you can review the recording of this forum and all of our Forums on our YouTube channel of um WIP Women Voters wiper Lake area you can look for it also on your local cable channel and at the time of your choosing thank you and remember to vote early voting is September 20th to November 4th and election day is November 5th thank you thank you thank you [Music] [Music]