Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout2017_07_12 Board Minutes IDAHO FALLS SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 91 BOARD OF TRUSTEES -- ANNUAL BOARD REORGANIZATION MEETING DISTRICT OFFICE BOARD ROOM -- 7:00 P.M. 690 JOHN ADAMS PARKWAY WEDNESDAY, JULY 12, 2017 Present from the Board of Trustees: Present from the Administration: Lisa Burtenshaw, Chair George Boland, Superintendent Deidre Warden, Vice Chair Carrie Smith, Director of HR & Finance Dave Lent, Trustee Debbie Wilkie, Recording Clerk Larry Haws, Treasurer Excused: Trustee Larry Wilson Chairman Burtenshaw called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. and called on Carrie Smith to lead the Pledge of Allegiance. SPECIAL ORDERS OF THE DAY a. Reorganization of the Board of Trustees Chairman Lisa Burtenshaw declared the Idaho Falls School District #91 Board of Trustees dissolved. Superintendent George Boland then declared the office of chairperson for the 2017-2018 school year open for nominations. Trustee Lent made a motion nominating Trustee Lisa Burtenshaw as Chairperson for the 2017-2018 school year. Trustee Haws provided the second. No other nominations were brought forward. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. Chairman Burtenshaw reviewed the offices and duties of the board members. Chairman Burtenshaw called for nominations. Trustee Warden made a motion nominating Trustee Larry Haws as the Vice Chair. Trustee Lent provided the second. No other nominations. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. Trustee Lent made a motion nominating Trustee Deidre Warden as Clerk and Trustee Larry Wilson as Treasurer. Trustee Haws provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. Trustee Warden made a motion to appoint Carrie Smith, Director of HR & Finance, as the Deputy Clerk of the Board. Trustee Lent provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. 7/12/2017 D91 Board Minutes Page 1 of 5 Trustee Haws made a motion to accept the slate of officers for the 2017-2018 school year. Trustee Lent provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. Chairman Burtenshaw declared the Board of Trustees reorganized. b. Set Dates and Times of Regular Board Meetings Chairman Burtenshaw reviewed the proposed 2017-2018 Board Meeting Schedule and stated that additional meetings may be scheduled as needed. A discussion was held regarding the changes to the August and November meeting dates that were moved to the third Wednesday of the month because they conflicted with state level meetings. Trustee Warden made a motion to accept the 2017-2018 Board Meeting Schedule as presented. Trustee Haws provided the second. No further discussion. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. ADOPT AGENDA Trustee Lent made a motion to adopt the agenda as presented. Trustee Haws provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. REPORTS/INPUT/INFORMATION a. Superintendent’s Report – a written report is attached. b. Patron Input – written comments, if provided, are attached. Chairman Burtenshaw invited Mr. Gandhi to share his comments and warned him that if his remarks become demeaning to the administration or teachers she would not allow him to continue. Mr. Suketu Gandhi shared comments regarding involvement of the public in math and science curriculum adoptions. Chairman Burtenshaw stopped Mr. Gandhi’s testimony after she found his comments to be inappropriate to the public setting. Chairman Burtenshaw informed Mr. Gandhi he is welcome to submit his comments in writing but would no longer be permitted to give verbal testimony during the Patron Input section of the board meetings. c. IFEA Report – no report. d. High School ReDesign Project Information Chairman Burtenshaw stated she had met with Steve Taggart, a local organizer, after seeing the numbers our neighboring district had recently used regarding growth projections used in our district’s bond scenarios. The Board Chair asked Carrie Smith to look at some different scenarios based on the actual growth numbers put out by the county. Carrie reviewed that after talking with financial consultants this week to see what amount could be bonded without a tax rate increase. A handout was provided and discussions held regarding reserve fund balances, sale of the bonds, bond redemption fund and increasing market values. The Board agreed that still be conservative with our estimates it looks like we would be able to finance $110 million with no tax rate increase. Chairman Burtenshaw stated that the Board will meet on Tuesday, July 25, 2017 to vote on a bond resolution and the potential site for a new high school. Superintendent Boland also reviewed that the property adjacent to Skyline High School that the district was looking at is off the table. The district submitted an offer which was rejected and they came back with 7/12/2017 D91 Board Minutes Page 2 of 5 a counter offer of $100,000 per acre. The property only appraised for $18,000 an acre and the owners have already turned down an offer of $69,000 an acre. e. Other Items i. Committee Update – HS ReDesign Community Committee Meeting 6/27/2017 Trustee Lent and Trustee Warden stated they attended a meeting with the community group and there was consensus within the committee that a $110 million bond election was the best option. CONSENT AGENDA Trustee Warden made a motion to adopt the Consent Agenda, including the late addition of staff actions that was provided in the board packet. Trustee Haws provided the second. A discussion was held regarding staff actions and clarification for a payment of claims item. Carrie Smith will review the voucher card purchase in question and get clarification for the Board. a. Approval of Minutes i. May 6, 2017 – Board Retreat ii. May 17, 2017 – Business Meeting iii. May 24, 2017 – Work Session iv. June 12, 2017 – Work Session b. Payment of Claims i. June 2017 Bill List ii. June 2017 Checkbook List iii. Idaho School Board Association Member Invoice iv. Ehlert Solutions Group Invoice #1653 v. Ehlert Solutions Group Invoice #1654 c. Staff Actions Retirements: Name Position Location William W. Cairns Assistant Principal Idaho Falls High School Renee Portrey Speech/Drama Taylorview Middle School Resignations: Name Position Location Jared Wilcox German Idaho Falls HS / Compass Academy Kyle Van Genderen English Eagle Rock Middle School New Hires: Name Position Location Elisabeth Tallmon English Eagle Rock Middle School Nichole Clark Spec Ed Theresa Bunker Elementary rd Jessica (Nikki) Ramseth 3 Grade Temple View Elementary Sherri Rupp School Nurse Skyline High School Rourk Contor German Idaho Falls High School/Compass Academy Phaedra Beddes Spec Ed Taylorview Middle School 7/12/2017 D91 Board Minutes Page 3 of 5 .50 FTE Spec Ed/.50 FTE Title I Joan Oakey Interventionist Hawthorne Elementary Emergency Hires: A hiring emergency exists, as declared by the Board of Trustees, for the following positions: Name Position Location Walter Gates Content Specialist - Counselor Dora Erickson Elementary Wade Leavitt Content Specialist - Counselor Edgemont Elementary st Sarah Leonard Content Specialist – 1 Grade Dora Erickson Elementary th Emily Luetzow Content Specialist – 6 Grade Linden Park Elementary Phaedra Beddes Content Specialist – Spec Ed Taylorview Middle School Nicole Clark Teacher to New – Spec Ed Theresa Bunker Elementary Rourk Contor Content Specialist – German Idaho Falls High School/Compass Academy Transfers: Name Position Location th Tracy Brandstetter From: 5 Grade From: Hawthorne Elementary th To: 4 Grade To: Westside Elementary rd Diana Frickey From: 3 Grade From: Temple View Elementary rd To: 3 Grade To: A. H. Bush Elementary d. Other Items i. Discarded Items – obsolete secondary math textbooks ACTION ITEMS a. Maggie’s Place Onsite Program Agreement Superintendent Boland stated we had a contract with Right at School, an organization who provided afterschool childcare and homework assistance. There were no issues with the services provided, just not enough families participating so they chose to discontinue services. Sheryl Gettings, owner of Maggie’s Place and former area manager for Right at School, and her husband Dan Randall decided they would like to continue being the local face of afterschool programs. Sheryl stated they would like to add enrichment opportunities, such as Lego robotics, chess club, yoga, Spanish and other opportunities that students could stay after school one day a week to participate in. Tutoring services will continue to be offered at their office on Pancheri. Cheryl also stated they are pleased to continue the 5% reference share. A brief discussion was held. Superintendent Boland stated it is the recommendation of the administration to approve the contract with Maggie’s Place for enrichment and tutoring services for the 2017-2018 school year. Trustee Haws made a motion to accept the Maggie’s Place Onsite Program Agreement as presented. Trustee Warden provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. b. Third Reading – Board Policy Revisions, Section 208.0 – Administrative Travel Authorization and Allowances Superintendent Boland stated this is the final reading relative to Board Policy 208.0 revisions. No input has been received to date. It is the recommendation of the administration to adopt the revisions as presented. 7/12/2017 D91 Board Minutes Page 4 of 5 Trustee Lent made a motion to adopt the revisions to Board Policy, Section 208.0 – Administrative Travel Authorization and Allowances. Trustee Haws provided the second. No further discussion. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. Trustee Warden made a motion to adjourn. Trustee Lent provided the second. Motion carried 4 ayes, 0 nays. The meeting adjourned at 8:04 PM. 7/12/2017 D91 Board Minutes Page 5 of 5 7-12-17 Superintendent's Report: • OSEP conducts annual review of nine federal compliance indicators(e.g. Discipline rates, disproportionality of race, early childhood transitions, secondary transitions,fiscal audit). Determinations are based on data collected the prior school year to ensure LEA's have an opportunity to verify and correct data as needed. Determinations levels include Meets Requirements, Needs Assistance, Needs Intervention, Needs Substantial Intervention. Received notification that the district's Determination for school year 2015-16 is Meets Requirements in all areas. Credit to Director of Student Services Dan Keck and his staff. • June 27 & 28 was fortunate to participate in the ESGR "Bosslift" program at Gowen Field in Boise. Spent two days rotating through various training exercised Guardsmen and Guardswomen participate in during their one weekend a month and 2 week summer session. Major Aaron Jarnigan, SHS principal,facilitated the invitation and met me upon arrival. Interesting to note that Rick Amen (former EITC and now CEI acting president)was also attending as an ESGR volunteer. Significant amount of VR training, highlight though was ride in Blackhawk helicopter(even though crew looked like high school juniors). All branches of the service with the exception of the Coast Guard have a presence at Gown Field. (reference claustrophobia) • Transportation Center plans were approved by P&Z last night clearing the way for final drawings to be completed and bid packages to be developed.Tentative timeline would have bids out late July and hopefully recommendations for board approval at the August 16 meeting with a start date of August 22"d. Paving would be scheduled to be completed by end of October with final completion the first week of January. Timeline is later than anticipated&will have a contingency plan in place for plugging in busses should the need arise in December. Have a set of preliminary plans for review if interested. Sukettt Gandhi's Comments on Need to hn�olve Public in Math &Science July 12, 2017 There are many ills with the secondary mathematics and science education. Proven cures are available, but the decision makers are preventing them from entering classrooms. The major reason for this is that they lack the desire and capacity to mediate the ills. The past examples of ills include middle school students failed to learn Algebra with the imposed curriculum in the first three months of 2015-16 School year. Very few number of advanced mathematics students in grade 11 score very high (700-900 range) on SAT Math. AP Calculus BC is accessible upon completion of AP Calculus AB, instead of being offered upon completion of pre-Calculus, as done in many high schools. In science, schools no longer offer regular full year Physics and AP Physics C. The courses offered are AP Physics 1 & 2, but they lack the rigor as the regular and AP Physics C courses, and not count for college credit for STEM majors. Implementing miserable mathematics curriculum requires willful ignorance of contents and practice of credible curriculum. To mediate these ills, a credible mechanism requires reduction in the knowledge gap between the knowledgeable public and the decision makers. In the curriculum selection process, Idaho statues explicitly state this. The Administration's inability to provide credible solution can be judged from the fact that they cannot comprehend the language of the applicable statue. It seeks guidance from the lawyer on how misinterpret the language under a pretext that cumulates in denial of rightful public participating in the textbook selection process. We note that the Administration does not seek any guidance on the content of mathematics education from knowledgeable people, but eager to seek from a consultant who lacks the knowledge of the subject. Thus it would be accurate to say that at the present, the decision makers' knowledge of mathematics is at best modest, ways to stimulate students mind is questionable, and knowledge of supplementary mathematics resources is a suspect. The need to cure the mathematics illness occurs from the requirements of the STEM college curriculum in the post 1990. Blurring of boundaries between traditional disciplines adds course loads from different disciplines. This way, students complete rigorous STEM curriculum requirements in 4 years. This places demands on high school students to have several AP math and science courses to be STEM ready. Thus, the decision makers have a compelling need to determine whether the public's perception on the mathematics and science education needs have merits, and willing to discuss these issue thoroughly in a face-to-face meeting that may take several hours. Some may cheer in exclusion of the public from the instructional selection process, but in reality, these cheers are directed towards students stagnating, denial of learning experience and being unprepared to handle rigorous college STEM curriculum. It is natural to ask why public is here in .first place? Yours truly takes the partnership in education very seriously, and it goes beyond the classroom and the ballot boxes. Furthermore, the public's role in the government has been made very clear, as articulated by Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson (in 1950): It is not the .function of our Government to keep the citizen from.falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the Government from falling Into error. We could justify any censorship only tivhen the censors are better shielded against error than the censored In other words, the decision makers should be better guarded against making errors than the public makes. Idaho Falls School District No. 91 Summary Analysis ScenarioI Scenario i a Sale 1 $55,000,000 $55,000,000 $55,000,000 Sale 2 $42,000,000 $55,000,000 $80,000,000 Total $97,000,000 $110,000,000 $135,000,000 Plus interest Cost $48,267,763 $54,526,463 $78,446,863 Total $145,267,763 $164,526,463 $213,446,863 Equalization (@ 9.0% of P&I) Net Total $131,653,664 $149,719,081 $194,236,645 Combined TIC(1) 4.01% 4.01% 4.01% Projected Growth 2018 6.00% 6.00% 6.00% 2019-2020 5.00% 5.00% 5.00% 2021-2029 2.00% 2.50% 4.29% Tax Impact No Increase No Increase No Increase (1) Sale 1 interest rates plus 0.50% cushion, Sale 2 interest rates plus 0.75%cushion. GENERAL FUND BOND REDEMPTION FUND General Fund Fund Balance 6/30/2016 13,259,812 Debt Service Fund Balance 6/30/2016 4,582,486 Revenues to date 58,610,028 Anticipated Property Tax 4,574,196 Estimated Expenses to date 56,177,104 Payment in Lieu of Taxes 190,461 Estimated Fund Balance 6/30/17 15,692,736 Bond Levy Equalization 390,641 9,737,784 Reserves on fund balance Leadership Premiums 81,320 Bond Payments in 16-17 3,566,113 College and Career 55,616 US Bank and Arbitrage Expenses 2,050 K-3 Reading 96,719 3,568,163 State LEP 58,866 EL Learning 205,209 Estimated Fund Balance 6/30/17 6,169,621 Community Resource Workers 93,559 INOVA 50,000 Payment due 9/1/2017 2,740,056 Medicaid Revenue Shortfall Transfer 100,000 jAvailable reserves 3,429,565 Other Carryover 50,000 School Budget Carryover 75,000 PLANT FACILITY FUND- SPFF Non-spendable Inventories 300,000 SPFF Fund Balance 6/30/2016 4,774,722 Less Assigned for Encumbrances 500,000 Revenues to date 2,445,742 Reserved for Land Purchases 3,100,000 Estimated Expenses to date w/encumbrances 3,071,185 Total Estimated Reserves 4,766,290 Estimated Fund Balance 6/30/17 4,149,279 Est Fund Balance less Est Reserves* 10,926,446 Budgeted Emergency Reserve 250,000 Budgeted Contingency Reserves at 5% 2,998,308 Transportation Hub 2,300,000 Liquid Fund Balance 7,928,138 jAvailable for projects 1,599,279 *We spend about $5 million per month, so this is equivalent to 2.18 months of expenses. TOTALS GENERAL FUND 7,928,138 BOND REDEMPTION FUND 3,429,565 PLANT FACILITY FUND -SPFF 1,599,279 12,956,982 Surrounding School District Total Tax Rates (FY2017) 6.95 7.000005�- 6.00000 - — __— 5.80 a 0 5.00000 - 0 4.24 4.27 3 99 4.05 4.00000 -- — -------- - - ---- _- -- -- '" 3.06 3.24 ¢' 3.00000 2.40 2.00000 — s„ 1.00000 - - - - - 0.00000 - � `� �� ��� a��� p� Gp �� 4e ��� �ti°� C,�o �pfi Q�°fi 10 Bond Plant Suppl. M&O ■All Other Levies 9 Piperjaff ray C�I�S nYam Onsite After School Care Maggie's Place Onsite will provide care onsite at the elementary schools from the time school gets out until 6:00pm. We will open the afterschool program at any D91 location with the enrollment of 8 or more kids. The fees are: 5 Days after school $250.00 per month 4 Days after school $230.00 per month 3 Days after school $180.00 per month 2 Days after school $130.00 per month 1 Day after school $60.00 per month Annual Family Registration Fee $65.00 upon registration We will offer D91 staff a 50%discount of the regular OnSite tuition. The discount will not apply to Enrichment Classes or Tutoring services. Enrichment Classes At select locations, we will offer Weekly Enrichment Classes, that are addition to the regular OnSite Program. These Enrichment Classes will be offered during the regular OnSite time and any child at the school can register. The Weekly Enrichment Classes we are offering for the Fall Trimester are: LEGO Robotics Taekwondo Yoga ASL/Foreign Language Chess Club Weekly Enrichment Class costs are $49.00 per month, except for LEGO Robotics, which is $98.00 per month. There is an In-Attendance Discount of $15.00 per month for families that register for an enrichment class and attend the OnSite Program. District 91 staff will receive an In-Attendance Discount of $7.50 per month. Enrichment classes will be offered 15-30 minutes after school gets out and last one hour.