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Katy ISD · Work Study Meeting
Katy ISD Work Study Meeting, December 4, 2023
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In this meeting
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- 0:03 to 0:33 1. Call to Order
- 0:33 to 1:17 2. Pledges of Allegiance
- 1:17 to 20:08 3. Public Comment
- 20:08 to 20:30 4. Closed Meeting
- 20:30 to 21:17 5. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
- 21:17 to 1:01:50 6. Reports
- 1:01:50 to 1:08:52 7.1 Discuss and consider future Board approval of naming Junior High #18 as recommended by the Naming Advisory Committee.
- 1:08:52 to 1:16:04 7.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of the December 2023 budget amendments.
- 1:16:04 to 1:24:42 7.3 Discuss and consider October 2023 Financial Reports.
- 1:24:42 to 1:31:25 7.4 Discuss and consider Board Approval of Stop Loss Insurance Coverage for Health Plan Year 2024.
- 1:31:25 to 1:37:11 7.5 Discuss and consider Board approval of an agreement between Katy ISD and RGV CDL Services LLC.
- 1:37:11 to 1:45:36 7.6 Discuss and consider Board approval of the delivery method for the $806 Million Bond Authorization capital construction projects and approval of the selection criteria for evaluating construction contractors and construction managers.
- 1:45:36 to 1:50:11 7.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of the 2023 Educational Specifications to be utilized as the basis of design for all upcoming elementary, junior, and high school capital improvement projects as required by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) – School Facilities Standards for Construction.
- 1:50:11 to 2:27:02 7.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of the design associated with the first floor of the Katy ISD Merchants Way Building.
- 2:27:02 to 2:35:15 7.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract for the purchase of a district-wide centralized student permanent records management software.
- 2:35:15 to 3:16:08 7.10 Discuss and consider approval of a Board adopted Resolution regarding adequate funding for public schools.
- 3:16:08 to 3:24:41 7.11 Discuss and consider Board Policy CW Local.
- 3:24:41 to 3:25:43 8. Information Items
- 3:25:43 to 3:25:57 9. Future Meetings
Full transcript
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1. Call to Order
Noting that a quorum is present, I hereby call this work study meeting of the Board of Trustees of Katy Independent School District to order.
Today is Monday, December 4th, and the time is 5.01 PM.
Dr. Grogorski, will you verify that we're in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings Act with regard to the notice of this meeting?
Mr. Perez, I do confirm we are in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meeting Act for our meeting tonight.
Thank you.
2. Pledges of Allegiance
KDIC Police Chief Henry Gaw will lead us in the Pledges of Allegiance.
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 liberty and justice for all.
Honor the Texas flag.
I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state, under God, one and indivisible.
SECRETARY TILLERSON, Do we have any scouts in the audience?
No?
Okay.
Okay. At this time, the Board of Trustees will give members of the public an opportunity to speak in accordance with KDISD Board Policy, BED Local.
3. Public Comment
As defined by Board Policy, speakers who signed up by 2 p.m. on Monday, December 4, 2023, provided their first and last name and signed in 15 minutes prior to the start of the meeting will be allowed to address the Board.
Speakers who signed up to speak on posted agenda items will be allowed three minutes to speak.
If a speaker is not finished speaking at the end of the three minutes, the audio will turn
off.
If speakers wish to share written material with the Board, please provide 10 copies to
the Secretary for Board Services before the meeting begins for Board members, the Superintendent,
the Chief Communications Officer, and permanent record.
If a speaker has not attempted to solve a matter administratively through proper channels
channels, as stated in Board Policy, the presiding officer's designee shall advise the speaker
to seek resolution through the appropriate policy.
Finally, pursuant to Texas Government Code Sections 551.074 and 551.0821, the Board will
not permit the presentation of personally identifiable information regarding a student
and will not discuss the appointment, employment, evaluation, reassignment, duties, discipline,
discipline or dismissal of a public officer or employee or to hear a complaint or charge
against an officer or employee.
Should a speaker wish to address one of these issues, they must do so through the appropriate
local grievance policies FNG Local, DGBA Local, CKE Local or GF Local.
Our speakers will be called forward in the order they signed up to speak.
And the first speaker is Lisa Lister-Brown.
Welcome.
Lisa Lister-Brown, we meet again.
One step closer to Atwood's Gilead.
As the majority of this board pursues its agenda
of imposing their prejudices upon this community
through a chaplain policy.
Imposing these prejudices is part of a widespread movement
that is a cancer on liberty
and the ideals upon which this nation was founded,
as well as a disgraceful stain upon the Christian religion
that even the Pope admonishes.
This movement, the Christian Nationalist Movement,
seeks an America where the Church rules the government,
instead of both being separate as the founders intended. There is no democracy
where the church rules the state. As a parent of children of schools in this
district my point is this subjecting my children to religious indoctrination
whilst they are at public school is a breach of my parental rights to decide
when, where and how my children are exposed to religious ideology. If I want
my children to receive religious indoctrination at school, I will send them
to a private school that aligns with my religion. That is my parental right.
Bringing any religion that I don't want my children to be exposed to into my
children's schools is a breach of my parental rights. If this board truly
supports parental rights as it has claimed to do in implementing its book
ban and anti-trans policies then it will vote to refuse a chaplain policy for
this district. Are you true to your word? Do you really support parental rights or
is that just a euphemism for your efforts to push your Christian
nationalist agenda into this community.
The issue before you, whether to adopt a chaplain policy or not,
is a test of how much you really respect parental rights
and the extent to which you are true to your word.
Will you prove that you really respect parental rights
or will you expose yourself as hypocrites?
I urge every member of this community
to stand up against your prejudiced agenda
and to go to the website of bjconline.org to learn more about how to push back against what the Christian nationalists are trying to do here.
I urge every member of this community to connect with the groundswell of people in Katy
who are organised to get the majority of this board and its prejudiced, fascist, anti-American and unchristian agenda out.
Thank you.
the next person is carly peden and then followed by eve frost
hello good evening my name is carly peden and i am a parent of a katie isd student
i moved to the kisd area in 2016 and bought a home in katie in 2022. i'm happy with my
child's education thus far and hope my child can thrive in katie isd i'm here today with
a concern regarding the new state law that was passed this past legislative session
During the 88th regular Texas legislative session, SB 763 was passed, allowing school districts to employ a chaplain instead of a school counselor to perform the duties required of a school counselor under this title.
A chaplain employed under this subsection is not required to be certified by the State Board for educator certification.
For reference, school counselors in Texas are required to earn a master's degree from an accredited institution of higher education,
successfully complete a school counselor preparation program, earn a minimum score of a 240 on school counselor exam,
and pass a national fingerprint-based background check.
I think I can safely say that all parents want the best for their child,
and increasing the number of school counselors should be a priority for KDISD.
But employing individuals who do not have the education or training in mental health,
nor be certified by the State Board for Educator Certification,
sends a message to KDISD parents that our children do not deserve the best.
Every single individual that my child encounters while in school needs to be
appropriately educated and or certified based on their role in the school. I
believe KDISD has the reputation it has today because the school district has
exceeded state expectations. I hope that KDISD will continue to exceed these
expectations by employing only educated, trained, and certified personnel
specifically in the area of student mental health. I know one of the reasons
cited for the inclusion of chaplains in SB 763 was need for better student
counselor ratios. The American School Counselor Association recommends a 250 to 1 as optimum ratio,
250 students to one counselor, which reflects the goal that school counselors spend 80 percent of
their time in direct and indirect student services. According to the information on the American
School Counselor Association website, the student to counselor ratio in Texas for the 2021-2022
school year for the most recent documented was 390 to 1. During the 80th regular Texas legislative
legislative session, SB 798 removed the requirement for school counselors to have experience as a classroom teacher in order to qualify for certification.
This law came into effect September 1st, 2023. That means KDISD can immediately hire individuals who meet all other school counselor state requirements for the 2023-2024 school year to help alleviate the need for school counselors in the district.
I hope this Board of Trustees will continue to hire the best and most qualified personnel for our students in KDISD.
I also hope that the board will vote no on authorizing chaplains to perform the duties of a certified school counselor in KDISD.
Thank you so much for your time and consideration.
Thank you.
Eve Frost, and after that, Ann Russey.
Hi. My name is Eve Frost.
My family resides in KDISD, and I have children attending KD schools.
schools. I am here to speak in opposition to placing chaplains in our Katy ISD public schools
and I would encourage the board to vote no on this if it does come to a vote.
In terms of key points, I have a few. Our public schools serve as common ground for learning
and to serve children of all diverse backgrounds, beliefs, and cultures. The separation of church
The church and state and schools safeguards the rights of students and their families as it prevents any particular religious group from imposing its beliefs on others through educational policies.
Allowing chaplains in our schools will harm all of our children, all but especially those children that come from minority religious backgrounds or non-religious backgrounds.
If you vote to allow chaplains in Katy schools, you must recognize the harmful impact that this will have by forcing religious practices on children whose faith and beliefs are different.
Introducing religious practices will have the impact of alienating students who don't adhere to the promoted and dominant faith, and this will create an environment of exclusion, potentially bullying and discrimination.
Mixing religious doctrine in with curriculum can also have the impact of compromising the quality of the education.
Education should be based on rigorous evidence-based standards and not influenced by particular religious beliefs.
Our commitment to the separation of church and state in schools is a commitment to providing an unbiased, inclusive, quality education for all of our children,
regardless of their religious affiliations.
Should the board decide to approve chaplains in Katy ISD schools,
please be advised that concerned citizens will be paying close attention to how this is implemented.
It is important that these chaplains neither promote nor inhibit religion,
lest their role become an overreach of the state toward establishment of religion,
as is protected by our First Amendment rights. I appreciate your time and thank
you for listening. Thank you.
Ann Russi followed by Chava Gallaudet. Hi my name is Ann Russi. I am here tonight
to express concern about how this board will approach agenda item 6.1. I speak to
you from the perspective of a mom to two Katy ISD elementary students, a voter and
and a licensed professional counselor.
Over the past three years, this board, our district, and our state
has slid further and further down the slippery slope
towards alt-right political and ideological extremism.
Ongoing unaddressed discipline, hiring, and academic outcome disparities,
content-driven book bans, and author visits canceled,
73 In God We Trust posters donated by a political group
and placed into the hallways of every campus,
discriminatory website filters that still block the Trevor Project on elementary campus internet,
sitting board members who filed criminal police reports on library books, and protested outside
a Sunday morning worship service in alignment with literal Nazis who protested the same church,
and most recently a cruel anti-trans policy that forcibly outs trans and non-binary students
without their consent before they may be ready.
Every one of these examples disproportionately affect
students, staff, and families
who belong to marginalized groups.
The people who benefit from these actions
are mostly white, heterosexual, cisgender, and Christian.
Please keep these patterns in mind tonight
as this board takes up considering whether or not
to adopt a chaplain policy as required by SB 763.
One of the state's most vocal supporters
of this bill describes himself as a former drug smuggling pirate and has promoted chaplains as
a tool to proselytize to school children. The Texas legislature rejected a list of amendments
that could have protected the religious freedom of all students and families. The intentions by
the state here are clearly not to benefit all Texans and instead to use public school districts
as political footballs to further partisan political gains.
I ask you to vote against the creation
of any new or expanded chaplaincy services
and instead maintain the status quo
in terms of how the district
already uses chaplain volunteers.
Please adopt Mr. Graham's proposed option one
to affirm the practice of the district
permitting a chaplain to provide support services,
volunteer and programs for students
In accordance with the district's current practice, please vote no on adopting any specific new or expanded chaplain policies
Thank you for your time
Thank you
Shabbat galore and followed by Nancy
Sarsi, okay. Thank you
I'm Catholic out or I'm director of congregational learning for Temple Sinai and I have about 50 of my family
approximately 50 students that are
KDISD students. I had a meeting the other day on Sunday. I had a beautiful meeting and
12 of my families came and they spoke about what they were feeling and what they were
thinking and this is some of what they said. For kids that have an IEP, what happens at
the school, you know, you need a school counselor, not clergy, not chaplains, helping direct
that process. That was one of the big things that came up. They wanted that support. Number
Number two, and I'm going to actually share a personal story.
My sons, when they were in school,
they went to a small school.
And teenagers can be teenagers.
And they all were hanging out together.
And as they left the house, 16, 17 years old,
they left a house that they were all hanging out.
And one of my son's friends waved out this window,
being a goofball, and slammed into a pole.
and in front of all of the kids David was killed. His best friend was driving
the car, his girlfriend was next to him and there were families all around and I
think about those emergency situations where you need a real mental health
professional and let's face it if you have a I could speak from as a Jewish
person if I have four rabbis I'm gonna have four different opinions on how to
to talk about death and dying.
Same with ministers, priests, Buddhist monks, and imams.
There's not one standard.
The other challenge is that there's no certification.
There's no real certification for the chaplain's process.
And that concerns me.
It concerns my families as well.
I've just been thinking a lot about it.
I've been reading about it.
And I go back to my sons having all these learning
disabilities. One of my kids was born without platelets and had severe bruising
to the brain. If you had somebody who was not a school counselor advising me, what
would he or she say? Right? That's a huge challenge. So I'm really, I'm
asking you, I'm sort of pleading with you to vote against, against allowing
chaplains, volunteer or otherwise, to take over and be our school of counselors. We
We need them. We need to have people. Thank you. Thank you.
Nancy Sarsy.
Hello. My name is Dr. Nancy Sars. I'm a resident of Katy and a mother of two children who currently attend college.
I want to voice my vehement opposition to the use of chaplains as counselors.
As background, I am a forensic psychologist with decades of clinical experience.
I also worked 15 years as a full professor at a university and am now a professor emeritus.
During the 15 years as a professor in a graduate program in psychology, I continued to work one day a week in clinical practice.
I now run a consulting business and am heavily dedicated to violence prevention and emotional well-being,
all of which coalesce around and inform my strong opposition to using chaplains as counselors.
As a psychologist, I strongly prefer the use of counselors as counselors.
Counselors are educated, trained, supervised, and licensed with continuing education requirements.
I want qualified mental health professionals doing this vitally important work.
There is very little guidance or standards in the law for chaplains.
It is my understanding, in fact, that one can take a 40-hour online course and at the end of that course call oneself a chaplain.
Given that the majority of graduate programs for counselors, clinicians, social workers, or school psychologists require at least two years of education and training, this is woefully inadequate.
I'm aware of a letter signed by a third aid or volunteer.
Chaplains are simply not qualified to perform the work of counselors.
It is my understanding that chaplains are to be paid from the school safety allotment.
I firmly believe that this money is far better spent on mental health professionals, on violence
prevention, on suicide prevention, and on threat assessment teams.
Given the alarming rise in school violence, it is all the more essential that we dedicate
our resources to train professionals qualified to do the work.
Even if the money is drawn from another source, we would be diverting programs from designated
programs to hire chaplains to perform work outside of their profession.
Finally, I believe in the separation of church and state. As such, I strongly
suggest that we keep religion in our houses of worship and counselors in our
schools. And I say this as a person of faith. In fact, I am a deacon at my church
and still I am staunchly opposed to the use of chaplains as counselors in school.
I'm happy to provide additional information if interested. Thank you for
your time. Thank you. This concludes the open forum portion of our meeting. The
4. Closed Meeting
board will now convene and close meeting as authorized under section 551.001
of the Texas Government Code for the following purposes. Texas Government Code
551.071 and 551.129. Thank you.
Good evening. The board will now reconvene and open a meeting. Today is Monday, December
5. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
4, 2023, and the time is 6.01 p.m. On behalf of my colleagues, I welcome everyone to this
evening's work-study meeting. Each board member received the agenda and
documentation for this meeting on Friday, December 1, 2023. The board will receive
information and recommendations from staff, administration, and the
superintendent on these agenda items at tonight's meeting. Board members will be
able to ask questions, receive answers, and should be prepared to take action.
The board has just reconvened from closed meeting. In accordance with
Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code, any action arising from discussions in a closed
meeting must be taken in an open meeting.
The first item of business is a report, item 6.1, and it's discussion regarding Senate
6. Reports
Bill 763, which covers the employment or acceptance of volunteer services of chaplains by public
school districts and whether to adopt a policy authorizing the district to employ or accept
as a volunteer, a chaplain under Texas Education Code Chapter 23.
And our presenter to give us this report is Justin Graham, General Counsel.
Trustees, Dr. Gorski, I apologize for my voice.
I've been a little bit under the weather.
It's unusual for me to sit here and give you guys a report.
I normally don't give you reports.
I normally don't present to you in the report section.
section. However, this is directly tied to legislation that the Texas State Legislature
passed in the last legislative session, Senate Bill 763 specifically. We heard, for those
of you watching at home, and we heard from some public speakers tonight earlier on this
particular agenda item. I think it's fairly straightforward, so I'm going to go over with
I'm going to go over with you sort of the legal ramifications of what this board is required to do.
And then I'll be happy to take any questions.
So Senate Bill 763 related to, you've heard it called the chaplain bill.
It's related to how are chaplains accepted as volunteers and or employees of the school district?
Or are they not allowed to do either of those things?
You'll see in the public information that's on there, so if you're watching at home, there are three different things that this board has to do.
That legislation actually created a chapter.
Not only did it amend things, but it created a brand new chapter of the Texas Education Code, Chapter 23, which is specifically dedicated to chaplains.
It has, this board has to take action on this six months from the passage of the bill, when
the bill became effective, which is September 1.
So by May 1 of this year, March 1 of this year, you have to take some sort of action
on this item, which is why we bring it to you.
So I'm going to go through, I'm going to go through the three options that you have that
this board can, this board can take action on.
Again, it's not posted as an action item tonight.
I think understanding working with Ms. Perez and the superintendent on this issue is that perhaps we have some discussion, get some direction from the board, and then bring you a resolution sometime in the future.
So if you look at the public comment, I think you heard earlier today, and I want to clarify, one of the speakers said Mr. Grant's proposed option number one.
These are not my proposed options.
I'm simply restating the law to this board so that you have a clear understanding of what it is, what your responsibilities are.
So number one says affirm the practice of the district permitting a chaplain to provide support, services, volunteer, and programs for students in accordance with the district's current practice.
So what is the district's current practice related to chaplains?
Chaplains, as far as volunteers, are treated just like every other member of the community.
So long as they pass the qualified background check, they can perform duties as a volunteer.
and I was thinking about we were talking earlier about different volunteer programs that we know in this district the VIPs program
Watch watchdogs the watchdogs program any any other capacity that any member of the community
Can do we currently have that program in place?
The the second option is to permit you would go ahead and pass a resolution or take action to permit the district to employ
or accept as volunteer a chaplain to provide support services and programs for students,
which would require probably an amendment of policy.
What this would allow you to do is it would allow the district in the future
for certified school counselor positions.
Then the district could employ chaplains.
Chaplains could apply for that so long as they meet the qualified background checks.
They will not have to be certified as certified school counselors are certified now.
um they will and so that is an option that that is the um the second option that you have so the
first is continue what we've been doing with volunteers the second is adopt a policy that
allows those individuals to be employed by kdisd and the third is you could take action to to
disallow them to disallow chaplains as employees and volunteers i think that's a sort of interesting
provision we were talking about we hear the speakers talk about separation of
church and state I think it's interesting that that particular
provision is in there so one of the three options and it says again the law
what's so unusual about me having to present to you on this topic is that the
board has to buy a record vote and that's in the law record vote has to
take action on this before March 1 so trying to present it to you guys here
tonight we can have some discussion about it and then if we need to bring a
resolution or policy change in the future we can do that as well i'm happy to take any
questions that this board may have questions mr president i'm sorry that i'm a little bit under
the weather also so um one of the speakers alluded to this earlier and i just wanted to bring it up
and i've seen the open letter that was written by 100 plus chaplains who have stated that the
chaplains they themselves have said chaplains are not good replacements for counseling or
school safety measures because they lack function they lack um that they don't have
training like suicide prevention safety type things they're not trained on how to interview
and treat children and they also don't believe that the money that goes to for safety and
security to be spent on chaplains. So anyway, I have the letter and it's signed by over 100
chaplains. Anyway, there's other things that I could say about it. Like the policy says that
they have to have background checks, but that's just checking to see if they're registered sex
sex offenders and you know a lot of more training I think would have to go into it even as a volunteer if they were let into as volunteers you know it kind of makes people feel like there's not a separation of church and state as Thomas Jefferson, our founding father had said that the First Amendment was you know alluding to separation of church and state.
and there's a lot of other religions that may feel left out of it.
So anyway, I just hope that the rest of the board members can take into consideration some of these thoughts.
There's a lot of training.
I think that our school counselors, the ones that I know personally, are very, very great at their jobs.
I know that there's a big job burden for them, and they can't do everything.
But they're good at outsourcing, plus we have our social workers,
and I feel like our district is good in that respect.
Yeah, thanks.
As I understand your three options that you mentioned there, Mr. Graham,
is one, chaplains can be volunteers currently.
Yes, sir.
And can volunteer in just the regular roles of any volunteer.
Any capacity.
Like any of these programs that we currently have, like a mentor program or VIPS or the watchdog, et cetera.
So that can just continue regardless of whether we disallow chaplains.
As employees.
Yes, sir.
Right.
I would say, I mean.
In other words, if we disallow chaplains under this law to perform the functions under this law,
we can still allow chaplains to continue doing what they're doing now as
volunteers in those other capacities in regular volunteer capacities that I
understand that correct correct and I know that what a lot of again
guys, I'm not here to advocate one way or another. I'm trying to answer the legal questions that you have.
A lot of the larger districts in our area, for example,
SciFair, what they've done is they've said, look, we have a robust volunteer
process and policy in place, and we're going to confirm that policy, and so chaplains
can continue in that policy. Now, what I would tell you is
I do want to make sure that we're all clear, and I think it's probably best that we say this on the record
and we have this understanding in mind, what a chaplain looks like for one faith is going to look different for another faith.
And so when we talk about opening the door to chaplains, we are talking about,
we have to understand that there may be many faiths that chaplains apply to, right?
A wide variety of faiths.
I mean, think about the 80 or 100 different languages that we speak in KDISD.
I know that our families have all faiths of all different walks of life.
So irrespective of whether or not we allow them to continue as volunteers or if this board decides,
hey, we want to open it up for employment opportunities for them to serve as counselors,
we still cannot make an employment decision based upon faith in the future.
And I think we all understand that.
I know this board thinks at that high level.
I just want to make sure we say that out loud.
So one clarification.
The way we have it now where chaplains are just regular volunteers,
they're not really functioning in a capacity as chaplains.
I mean, they're just volunteers.
That's correct.
Okay.
And so this law attempts to impose on the chaplains, I guess,
a different responsibility.
We're assuming it's a different responsibility than what they're doing currently.
Exactly. In other words, the other option is chaplains are employed or either employed
or they're volunteers, but they're called chaplains. However, that's defined because
the law doesn't define really what a chaplain is or what the chaplain is doing.
That's right. Even though that this law specifically created a whole other chapter
chapter of the Texas Education Code, that chapter is three paragraphs long.
So it doesn't do a good job of defining what chaplains are or what specific role they may
want to define in the future.
Perhaps that's something we may give legislative clarity on in the future.
I think what the, my understanding, and I've done, I did a little bit of research on the
legislative intent on this.
If you go back, legislative intent is not doctrine, but in this instance it can be indicative
of, hey, here's what the legislators thought when they were doing this.
I think what they were trying to do is open the door for school districts that may be
in a need for school counselors, or they may say, hey, this is a, because counselors, if
we look at an area of shortage, that's one of the areas that, of course, we're always
trying to fill, and say, hey, here, district, here's maybe another tool for you to fill
this vacancy here.
Here may be another tool for you to, you know, just like we're hiring, just like we in certain positions, like our auto technicians that teach at Miller Career Tech Center.
Those, I don't know if they are or are not off the top of my head, but they don't have to be, they don't have to have a teaching certificate, right, to teach that specific thing.
So it's like we're taking that outside of the traditional definition of like a Chapter 21 employee.
I think this is an attempt to say, hey, districts here could be another another tool for you to fill these vacancies that we know are hard to fill.
But you are right. It doesn't have the law itself doesn't have clear definitions on what is a chaplain.
In fact, there's there are no certification requirements underneath the current law.
Questions, Mr. President.
Do you know if there is any kind of certification process that the chaplains could go through?
Or I know with the military, I know that they have to go through some sort of certification process.
Is that available?
To be honest with you, I can't answer that question.
I don't know off the top of my head.
What I can do, again, this is our first time to talk about this.
I can get you a little bit more research on what chaplain how chaplains are qualified to see if that's I
Really don't think it's a formal process here in the state of Texas
In fact, I was talking with a colleague and they said well
Somebody said you could go take a four-hour online course and then they give you your chaplain certificate
So then is that person now qualified to sit with children and counsel them in a position? That's normally
certified school counselor position
So I'm happy to answer that question. I don't know and get you more information
Yeah, I'm not talking in a replacement role from a counselor.
I'm just talking more like in a volunteer position role.
Yeah, again, I'm happy to get you some more information on that.
I have a question, Mr. President.
So on the chaplain role, so kind of piggybacking on what Ms. Teeney said, this is not a replacement of a counselor.
I understand that that could be what they were looking for for smaller districts.
but this would be in addition to a counselor?
That would be the Board's decision.
A completely separate role that would be a chaplain's role,
not chaplain as counselor, but chaplain.
Again, that would be this Board's decision.
Along with that decision, would it be possible,
if we were to consider that, to create our own kind of boundaries
boundaries or set up to what we feel like is best, what we would like the chaplains to act in, their role.
So what I would say is you have the opportunity to, by resolution or by policy here,
clearly define how you want, if you decide you want chaplains to serve in whatever capacity you decide,
this board can take action from the dais on policy and resolution to give clear directions to your administration to say,
here's how we envision this to look.
And on that, and this may be something that we need further clarification on with a chaplain,
my understanding is that a chaplain does not espouse or proselytize any one specific faith.
That was the role of a chaplain.
You're not necessarily, if they're a Christian by faith, they're not going and talking to somebody, if we're talking in a military role, who is Muslim.
They're not trying to proselytize to that person as they're in need.
This is just, this is a completely different thing.
We're not asking you to try to evangelize that chaplain's own specific faith.
Yeah, sure.
Sure. So what you're saying is, yes, it would be faith nonspecific,
but we do have to understand what we're doing is however you guys want to bring chaplains in,
whether in employment capacity or volunteer capacity,
you do understand that we're going to have people of different faiths serving in those roles,
and that's going to lead to the natural progression of the advancement of that faith
in their discussions with whoever they're having discussions with.
I just want us to understand, you know, if we have a Jewish or Catholic or Muslim or the Church of Satan's Angels, you know, chaplains that say, hey, I'm a chaplain and this is the group that I affiliate with.
with, once we open the door and however we open the door in it, if this board wants to
change the direction, we won't be able then to discriminate based upon the actual faith
that's there.
Unless they are teaching or counseling or advising in capacities which we think are
adverse to the educational mission or putting kids at safety or health risk, right?
Other questions?
Yes, Mr. President, I have a question.
Ms. Coachella?
Thank you.
Thank you. I was reading the actual law in print. I'd suggest you can just do a quick internet search and read it yourself. But it talks a lot about restorative justice and specific training. I'm curious how you read this. If you read that, that is a stipulation that the law, the state law, chaplains would need to be trained a certain way in restorative justice.
Justice? Did you? I'm not familiar with which provision. Again, I'm happy to provide you more information on it. Perhaps we can talk, because this isn't the first time we're going to consider this, right? So I'm happy to talk and I know we also have a policy committee, so if this board decides that you don't want to go in a policy direction, that may be a good opportunity for us to get into the minutiae of House Bill.
Senate Bill 763.
Yeah.
Mr. President.
Champagne.
I would just like to say that the letter from the Texas chaplains says that because of our training and experience,
we know that chaplains are not a replacement for school counselors.
I understand what you said, Mrs. Calhoun.
We're not necessarily saying that we want to replace them, but it does say that we urge you to reject this flawed policy.
It is harmful to our public schools and the students and families they serve.
And then also, it says that they are typically required to have a graduate theological degree
and be supported by an approved organization connected to their spiritual tradition.
Another thing that they say, I just think this is interesting,
that many of us serve in contexts in which individuals cannot access their religious services,
such as the military, a prison or hospital, which is hardly the case for children in public school
because children have homes where they have parents that provide their spiritual outlook.
Also, I think that even as a volunteer, if the chaplain were to come in,
it kind of takes away some of the parental control because now they can confide into a chaplain.
And so, you know, what are their rules about withholding information?
You know, I mean, we had this huge discussion earlier about a policy and not withholding information from parents,
but this is another avenue that possibly information could be withheld from parents again.
Mr. President.
Thank you. Any other questions?
Could I jump on that?
This law, this state law, states nothing with how we would use chaplains.
It doesn't define it at all.
So that would be up to us if we decided to approve this.
That is not confirmed in this state law at all.
So however we work with chaplains would be defined by the board.
It's not stated in this state law how schools would use chaplains,
and neither is chaplain defined in here at all.
So this is, to me, a very empty law.
And until that's defined in black and white, I think we're going to chase our tail a little bit.
Mr. President, can I just make a statement for the board?
So my first year of teaching, I had a junior high student in dire situation.
She had spoken with her parents about her situation.
She went to the nurse, spoke to the nurse about her situation, and then the nurse came to me and said, can you counsel her?
And I would have so much appreciated to have someone like a chaplain who I could have gone to and referred her to instead of myself.
I was a first year teacher. I was not married. I didn't have the experience to be counseling her.
And so in my experience as a teacher, if we can find ways to support the teacher with those kinds of issues so that the teachers can focus on academics, that's what's powerful to me.
If there's a way to do that with this law, I would love for us as a board to explore that.
If there's not, there's not.
But I you know if we're serious about teacher retainment and we're serious about teacher recruitment
This is one avenue that we could have volunteers if we have a sound policy
To that protects our district protects our children protects our families that I think could really help
with our teachers our counselors our principals if the students have another Avenue other than just
The classroom teacher so just something to consider
Thank you.
Any other?
I'm sorry, Mr. President, one last thing.
I'm going to please address Mrs. Teamey on that.
So since that time, we do have social workers,
and we have a lot of more resources now since you've taught,
and I know it's not perfect,
and I agree that we should have other avenues of support,
you know, as many as possible,
but I just think that maybe the chaplain, you know,
may not be the perfect solution for that.
Thank you.
Any other questions?
I think we're exploring this.
This is all we're doing.
We're getting this report, and we're exploring definitions.
We're exploring what this looks like.
And so I think that that was kind of the purpose of this,
and that's what we should be doing is considering what is presented to us
and what could benefit our district in the best possible way,
our students and our families.
And I do want more information before we just say, we don't know, so we're just going to blow it off.
I'm not comfortable with that.
I think that looking at this in detail of what this could mean in terms of support outside of a regular counselor position,
which a lot of times, I'm not saying that our counselors don't provide mental or emotional support to our students.
I'm sure that they do.
But a lot of what they do also, if I'm not mistaken, does fall under helping with schedules, helping with college entrances, looking at what's going forward next.
And so to have another version of support in a spiritual aspect, not necessarily saying it has to be Christian.
I'm not saying that.
But I'm just saying taking it off the table completely because we don't have a full understanding.
I think that that's a little short-sighted.
And I'm sure that the board is more than willing to dive into that to make an educated decision based on what we do next.
And we don't have to make those decisions until March.
But that is something that I know, Mr. Graham, that you are more than willing to dive into to provide us with more detail in the answers.
And I appreciate that.
So thank you.
Yeah, thank you.
I think the purpose of this was a report for us to, for the first time really, I'm sure we've read the law before this, but really be introduced to the law, what it reads, and just kind of start a discussion for a future board meeting when we would consider it.
Yeah, you're right.
So, again, the purpose is kind of kickstart the bucket.
Everybody be thinking about it.
But, again, the only way that we can have an open discussion, and I know our trustees know this, is to do it in the board meeting.
And that's why we're having the discussion here.
So I don't want anybody at home to think, hey, this is going off the rails,
or we're just kind of throwing out ideas and working collaboratively with one another
to decide how it is we're going to tackle this issue.
Because you're right, those of you who have read the law, it has a lot of just room for interpretation, right?
I mean, the law is literally three paragraphs long.
Thanks. Thank you.
Mr. President.
Real quick.
Quick, so current practice with volunteers,
I just want to be very clear,
we're talking about the VIPS program,
and anyone can sign up, get their background checked,
and be permitted into the school to volunteer.
That's what you're talking about,
or you suggested in number one, right?
As far as current practice.
As an option.
As an option, right?
So in doing that, no one has ever,
their occupation or their spiritual background
Brown is never disclosed, correct, as the volunteer?
Is that correct?
I don't know.
I'm pretty sure that's correct as far
as how I've experienced volunteering in KDISD.
So I'm just trying to say that chaplains could
be volunteering right now.
I'm confident that we do.
Not with the hat of chaplain, right?
So I just want to clarify that.
That's the current practice.
Yes.
Mr. President, Mr. Redmond.
So, at current, just thinking the next step, we walk out of here tonight.
It's not, this isn't a, what do we call it, a discussion item.
It's a report, so it's not necessarily going to be in the agenda next week for a vote.
Where do we go forward to decide what we want to do in regards to this?
Is there, are we going to walk out of here tonight with someone making a recommendation
recommendation so we kind of know to think about or
What how do you kind of envision us getting to the point where it's something that?
We can we can agree on or work on yeah
I think in the course of over January and February we need to bring it back to the board and and
Really, I think the decision first is do we want to have a chaplain program?
program, but then it behooves us that after that we have to fill in the blanks, right?
Because it's a blank slate because we have to have a board policy if we decide to go
forward with a chaplain program.
We have to create the policy to really describe the job description for a chaplain.
I mean, there's nothing in the law that tells us, that gives us any guidance whatsoever.
It would have to be totally created by the board.
One of the Senators mentioned that the reason they left it so vague was to leave it in the hands of the support.
Yeah, so the Board has to really from scratch really create the policy.
And so it's going to take a lot of work over the next few months if we go forward with it.
Yes, I'm not hearing, and I'm just listening to the comments of the Board,
I'm not hearing that anybody that wants to go with option three that says don't allow at all.
I'm not hearing that from this group.
So I think the next steps to work on this is going to be figure out, number one, do we want to allow chaplains to be employed by the district?
If so, then we'll create the boundaries of what that looks like.
And then number two, if we want them to continue to serve as volunteers and perhaps we want to expand that volunteer role, what does that look like?
So that's sort of where I think you're talking about options moving forward.
I think we can rule out option number three and sort of work towards one of those two goals here.
Mr. President, but one of the other options is, I think it's listed in number two, that they can be employed and paid or they can just be employed as a volunteer.
Yes, ma'am.
As a role of chaplain, not just like you're just somebody's parent volunteering and you happen to be a chaplain.
Yes, ma'am.
So that would be another choice.
Yes.
Like if we're going to choose to use them, then in what capacity?
Either volunteer or a paid employee.
Yes, ma'am. That's what I was trying to get at.
Fox, did you have something?
Yes, Mr. President. Thank you.
First question, how do you employ a volunteer?
Isn't an employee paid, and do they get services, or are they going to get health care?
How do you employ a volunteer?
I wouldn't use the word employ.
I mean, I know the law says employ.
They would serve as a volunteer.
We're certainly not extending the benefit.
Approve with the title of chaplain, possibly.
Say what?
Maybe volunteer as a chaplain.
Yeah, correct.
I mean, be up to the board to determine how you want to define that.
Thank you for the clarification.
I have just a couple of comments.
Thank you, Mr. President.
Just really it's reiterating a lot of the things we've already heard, the things that I've heard.
Professional chaplains have specific education and expertise, including a graduate theological degree
and support from an organization connected to their religious tradition.
So a chaplain comes with their religious affiliation, and the law includes no requirement for chaplains to refrain from proselytizing, which is a concern for me.
Chaplains, as they were designed, were meant to bring religious services to people who can't get to them.
Right? Military, prisons, hospitals is how that's going. So I just want to reiterate that.
The speaker who talked about taking away parental rights, as we've discussed on other things before, I completely agree.
this is this is for the parents to teach in the home religion and spiritual
guidance should come from the home and should not be at school and I think
there's a lot of that that you know we took all of that out decades ago no
prayer in schools things like that and I have strong feelings about if I think
that's good or not but with so many new religions that happen in kdisd as a mom i don't want a
chaplain who doesn't speak and know and study my faith beliefs to be counseling my kids i i don't
want that um i don't want them to pray with my kids if they don't adhere to the beliefs that
that we believe in our home.
I think that's the piece that disturbs me most.
We have great volunteer programs and a lot of our pastors,
chaplains, rabbis, call them as you will,
they participate in the VIPS mentor program.
They come when we have crises,
when we've had suicides or shootings or struggles.
A child dies in a car wreck when my kid was in school, and they were there available for anyone who sought them out.
But it was a one-time thing, and we called them in, and I think we have that already in place,
and I would like to see us continue with welcoming them into our schools and calling on them when there's a need.
I think we already have that and a new policy to instigate chaplains as a title is going to open the very door that Mr. Graham talked about where you can't keep out any other, you can't keep out religions, you can't say only this one or this one.
You could have Wiccans, you could have people who are dark.
I don't want any part of that for our children.
And just like all the other things, we take away books that we don't think are healthy for our children
to bring in faith-based people that don't align with family values, don't belong in our schools.
Thank you.
I just want to clarify that I don't want anyone to get the wrong impression about something that you said.
No one is talking about we're getting ahead of ourselves.
No one is talking about religious instruction, religious indoctrination, none of that.
No one's talking about that.
Let's not get ahead of ourselves.
We're just receiving a report.
We're having a little exchange of some opinions and some sort of questions.
but no one's talking about anything remotely resembling any kind of religious instruction, indoctrination, et cetera.
No one's talking about that.
Mr. President?
Mr. President, how do you align that with the law includes no requirement to refrain from proselytizing?
Like how would you take someone who is the name of a chaplain,
If you bring someone in who is a faith-based person, how can parents feel comfortable that that faith is not the thing that their children will be exposed to?
And how will we ensure that that is not happening in private conversations between a chaplain and a student?
If we decide to go forward, that's something that our policy would have to create.
We'd have to create a policy that are the guidelines, the prohibitions, the job description, et cetera.
So it wouldn't be any different for a chaplain.
That has to be something we'd have to consider for sure as part of our policy.
Mr. President, can I just say one thing?
Ms. Teeming?
Yeah, so going back to my example, I guess I'm just confused because we never talked about anything religious.
We just talked about how to make a good decision in a hard situation that was physical and life-threatening.
We talked about how she could approach her parents.
We talked about all these different issues.
We did not talk about, in my example, we didn't talk about religion at all.
However, what's funny to me is when we were discussing the transgender policy, y'all wanted teachers to be in that role.
You wanted teachers to serve as a counselor and as a whatever for children that are struggling with transgender issues.
But yet, hold on.
It's not true.
Can I just, hold on.
So what I'm saying is let's continue to meet the needs of students maybe that are having suicidal issues or whatever.
and give the teachers an avenue to suggest they go to instead of the teacher themselves,
because they're paid to teach math, science, reading, writing, whatever.
And that's a way that we can show concern for those students that might be struggling
that y'all said y'all were concerned about.
So I see it as a win-win.
IN. AND I DON'T UNDERSTAND, TO ME, I DON'T UNDERSTAND THE FLIP-FLOP ON THAT SITUATION.
MR. PRESIDENT, MAY I CORRECT THE MISREPRESENTATION BY MRS. TEAMY? MY WHOLE THING ABOUT THE TRANSGENDER
THING WAS WHEN A STUDENT COMES TO A TEACHER, THE TEACHER WOULD REFER THEM TO A COUNSELOR,
BUT NOT HAVE TO CALL THE PARENT. BUT THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT I SAID. IT'S NOT THE TEACHER'S
responsibility to deal with that issue. That's why we have highly qualified counselors. And my
strong representation during that was the teacher would say, I'm sorry, you're struggling. Go see
Mrs. Morningstar. She's amazing. Tell her I sent you. I need to get back to teaching my curriculum.
That's exactly what I said. And so bringing in a chaplain that has a spiritual connotation to it,
but the whole background of the chaplain is in theology,
and to expect that that would be well received by parents,
there better be an opt-in, opt-out, and I don't know.
I think the flip-flop is when you wanted parents to have that right at home,
and Mrs. Teeming, you and I have spoken about character strong,
and you think that those things should be taught at home
and not reinforced at school, as we talked about.
Okay, let's let's let's mr. President the big difference that we had in the whole gender thing was
Disclosing to the parents or not disclosing that was the issue is about parents
Mr. Redmond one thing we may consider as we move forward is we've talked about volunteers
I
think
Personally, I I provide chaplains for my employees right, but I'm a private business sure
Sure.
I've got friends that are chaplains in the military that work with all faiths,
and it's a very structured environment, what they can and can't do.
As I'm listening to this conversation, I know we're not to that yet,
but one route we may take is to find those requirements that we would like people to be.
So say we had a chaplain, anybody wanted to be it, and they met the requirements,
they're able to be on a list that are volunteers and when an instance like miss TV mentioned that
Maybe a family said hey, we want some help. I mean we've got a great
student support team here that over the past several years we've put together to provide that support to our teachers and our students and
license clinical social workers that if if
Proselytizing isn't part of the goal. They're very qualified to do that. But again, I
Absolutely believe that spiritual care is important
So one of the fast forward may be that we just have this group of all identified volunteers that meet the requirements that we would say are safe among many people and they were to reach out to a administrator or whoever they could reach out to them.
So say.
I think when I first read this bill, I thought, wow, this is going to make us fire every counselor and replace them with a chaplain.
There's both sides that have put that idea out there that it's a supplant to the counselor.
And I looked at it and go, okay, that's not what it says.
But also it put in my mind this idea that it has to be at every campus.
And so maybe that route we go is continue with the volunteer.
tier but similar how some schools have that when they experience a trauma they're reaching out to
local community members pastors at their churches and stuff like that maybe it's just a more formal
process that we have identified some of those counselors so that when a family or a child
needs that with the parents permission they're able to have that access so that might be a a
route forward that allows us to allow wouldn't necessarily be employment so we're not getting
into discriminating hiring practices based on faith but we also were able to
provide a much-needed support to our students when it goes beyond what our
district can already so just my kid yeah thank you mr. Edmund thank you for that
that sounds great mr. president I just I'd like to move on if we can we get
just I just want to say nothing so I did a little research of the districts that
have already voted and most are rejecting it i mean i don't know if that would be part of
any kind of equation but maybe some research can be done um you know as to what other school
districts are doing you know there have been a few that have adopted it but only as a voluntary
um situation as mr william was saying but that might be something to look into also
yeah i can provide some information on what other districts are doing sure all right well thank you
Okay. Well, thank you so much, Mr. Graham. Now we'll move on to item 7.1, which is to discuss and consider future board approval of naming junior high number 18 as recommended by the naming advisory committee. Presenter, Dr. Andrea Grooms, Chief Communications Officer.
7.1 Discuss and consider future Board approval of naming Junior High #18 as recommended by the Naming Advisory Committee.
Welcome.
Thank you. And good evening again, President Perez, Trustees, and Superintendent Grogorski.
As you indicated, I'm presenting item 7.1, the recommended name for junior high number 18.
On November 17th, the board appointed naming advisory committee, MET. The committee was
comprised of future junior high parents nominated by their current principals, as well as two board
board liaisons, they convened to review nominations for the school's recommended name.
The name selected by the committee for the board's consideration for the naming of the
junior high is Nelson.
Nelson is a family name.
The Nelson family has been a part of the Katy community for over five generations.
And before we introduce the Nelson family, who are here tonight behind me, I've asked
Mr. Craig Eichhorn, the Director of Communications, to read the bio for the Nelson family.
Craig Eichhorn, Director of Communications, Nelson Family, Thank you, Dr. Grooms. Mr. Perez,
Trustees, Dr. Grigorski. The Nelson family has resided in and around Katy, Texas for over
five generations, helping to shape Katy into the amazing community it is today.
The Nelson family history is represented by two patriarchs, Clyde and George Nelson, and their descendants.
Clyde's family moved to Katy in 1938 with their three children, Wesley, Wanda, and David.
In 1942, the family purchased the land Junior High No. 18 is currently being constructed on.
Interestingly, the family purchased the land from a Mrs. Mary Wilkinson, a beloved school teacher during the early inception of Katy ISD.
Clyde farmed rice and ran cattle on the 160 acres of land.
He and his wife, Liatia Nelson, were involved in many organizations and school activities in Katy.
Wesley and David were very active in KDFFA and Wanda was in the band. All three graduated from
KD High School. After graduating from college, Wesley served in the Air Force for two years and
then joined his father in the rice farming operation. David joined the farming business
about ten years later. All three Nelson children married KD High School graduates and made their
homes near the family farms.
Wesley and Marcella Freeman had four children.
Wanda and Jimmy Morgan had three children.
And David and Pam Moore had two children.
Wanda's daughter continued to live on the property until most of it was sold in 2014,
with the remaining few acres being sold in 2018.
The George Nelson family also moved to Katy in the early 1930s.
George and his wife, Alice, began a farming and ranching business at that time.
The family had three children, George V., Sunny, Dolores, and Johnny, and built their
home which still stands today on Katy Hockley Road.
George and Alice were also very involved in a number of organizations throughout Katy,
with George being elected to the Katy ISD school board in 1939. In addition, he
actively volunteered his time and efforts with the Katy FFA. Thank you, Mr.
Eichhorn. Oh, there's more. I'm sorry, Dr. Groom, there's still two more small
paragraphs. I think she said that's enough, Mr. Eichhorn. No, no, no. As an adult, Sonny married and
continued in the footsteps of his father by joining the family farming operation. He and his wife had
four children. Dolores married Herschel Poorman and were lifelong rice farmers and cattlemen.
They had four children who all attended and graduated from Katy ISD. Johnny and his wife
Paulette farmed and ranched and had three children. The Nelson children and their children have
contributed much to the community and Katy schools and continue to do so today. This is it, I promise.
The land the junior high is built upon represents the hard work and commitment of farming families
like the Nelsons who have contributed to the development of the community.
The Nelson family.
All right.
Thank you very much.
And now I would like to introduce the Nelson family.
I would like to ask them to please stand to be recognized.
Nelson family.
any questions thank you very much mr president mr redmond yes i i would just like to let you
the nelson family know that um in in the process uh kind of the way the way it works
that the entire committee comes together and they submit all the names and then we kind of whittle
our way down on at the very first go it was unanimous that the only the only name they got
all everybody voted for at the very beginning was the nelson family and so it it was a very
clear choice as we worked through it so just wanted to say thank you all for what y'all have
done for our community and there was overwhelming support on the committee for y'all to be named the
the junior high to be named after you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, and congratulations to you all.
Mr. President, Mr. Nelson has spoken to us a couple of times in open forum,
and tonight I visited with him, and he reminded me that he married a Freeman,
and she was a Freeman for 22 years, and he made her a Nelson for 65 years, he told me.
So the Nelsons and Freemans have been together a very long time,
and you'll be together on the same property and we're so excited for you.
Mr. President, a point of personal privilege if I might, because we're talking about namesakes,
I always think it's important for us to represent namesakes in the room. Fred and Patty Schaefer
are here and Elaine Robertson from Robertson Elementary and Schaefer Elementary. Can you all
just wave and nice to have you. And Marty Aki is here.
Is Jeannie here? No. Okay. And Marty Aki, nice to have you here.
Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you so much. Thank you.
7.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of the December 2023 budget amendments.
We now move on to item 7.2, discuss and consider board approval of the December 2023 budget
amendments. And the presenter is Esperanza Rios, Director of Budget and Treasury.
Good evening, Board President Perez, Board of Trustees, and Dr. Krakorski.
Tonight we present a couple of budget amendments, one in the amount of $190,958 to cover the
cost of the implementation and first year maintenance agreement for the new time and
attendance software which was presented at the November 6th board meeting and
approved at the November 13th board meeting we are also presenting for
approval a reduction of five million four hundred and thirteen thousand one
hundred and ninety seven dollars due to moving elementary and junior high
counselor salaries starting December through the end of their contract as to
have the district utilize remaining s or three funding all other budget
amendments are direct functional offsets the approval of these budget amendments
will result in an ink an increase of five million two hundred and twenty two
thousand two hundred and thirty nine dollars to the general operating fund
balance thank you any questions mr. president
miss Grisela thank you what is the five hundred thousand other sources and uses
could you like a little bit there 500,000 other source that come from uses
is from the terse fund tax increment reinvestment fund is a special fund that
was established in 2001 yep and it receives a certain amount of money each
year and it has a fund balance and we use those we use that fund to cover some
of the expenses associated with the Leonard Merrill Center and those
expenses come out of the general fund and we we just cover those expenses but
this is what's it associated with with the Merrill Center here it right correct
so there's 500,000 here shown as a helping out I just want to know where it
came from that transfer in transfer in yeah it's right here on your talk about
the waterfall for chairs the money that we come back and it comes back to us yes
Yes, but that's associated with the Merrill Center.
Yes.
Correct, and certain things within the city of Katy.
So how is that associated here?
So it has its own fund, okay?
So it's a separate fund than the general fund.
And so those TERS funds, it has a fund balance,
and we take cash and move it from the TERS fund to the general fund
because the expenses associated with operating that facility are general fund expenses.
And it's the right thing to have those as general fund expenses,
but we're just giving the general fund cash to pay for those expenses.
Okay.
And this expense, let's see, this is the time and attendance offer,
which is housed here in this building.
Is that correct?
And that's how we're relating it to a city of Katy and Merrill?
I think we may be on a different page.
Okay.
Yeah.
No, that's not part of this.
You're talking about the amendment to?
TERS Waterfall funds are for Merrill Center operations, things that are within the City of Katy related to the district, correct?
Yes.
Okay.
So you're telling me $500,000 came from that fund.
I see it here on the December.
Let's see.
What document is this?
Summary of changes in revenue, expenditure, and fund balance that you provided.
The second page.
Uh-huh.
Okay.
Okay, so there's 1.3 November budget revenue.
Then you showed the new expenditure for the time and attendance software, which we approved.
Correct.
You're moving salary in and out.
And then there's other sources and uses of $500,000.
And I just wanted to know how that got there.
I know now it's from TERS.
When we adopted the budget, that line item right there said $3 million.
dollars and we've already expensed sorry it was two and a half two point five two
point five million and three million of that was money from the general fund to
go to the Health Service Fund we've expensed that so that's why that three
million dollars is no longer there the net of three million dollars in that
five hundred thousand was two hundred two million five hundred thousand so
when you adopted a budget that line item read two million five hundred thousand
But now that that's been expensed and we've already expensed that $2.5 million, it's only $500,000 remaining.
And, again, that's cash being brought in from the TURS to the general fund to cover the expenses associated with operating that facility.
Okay.
So it has changed from $3 million down to $500,000 because the $2.5 million is – I mean, the $3 million has already gone to work.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you.
I had another question on the amendment report.
Just for clarification, I want to make sure I understand.
The first item, Amendment 1, I'm not sure you can answer this, maybe Ms. Hack can, but
there's a $9,500 purchase of library books.
And I was curious, is that for a new school, a new campus?
Was that the November purchase list?
What was that?
Do you know?
As for Cinco Ranch Junior High, moving from function 11 to function 12,
it must have been doing some refresh and updating the books in their library.
Cinco Ranch Junior High.
Cinco Ranch Junior High, yes.
Okay.
Thank you.
Mr. President.
Ms. Tehling.
Okay.
Could I just ask a question?
Do you have any background on Amendment 7 that you all could give?
Moving the ESSER funds?
Yes.
Moving those salaries?
Yes.
So we currently have some funds remaining in the ESSER III balance that we actually don't actually have assigned.
So to be able to use all those funds, we were going to use the salaries for those counselors to go ahead and expense those.
There's a bunch of different options since this actually qualifies for the grant.
Excuse me, I'm sorry.
Yeah.
Since the grant allows us to use it to support operating costs for the district.
Okay. And so when was the deadline on those funds had to be used by?
The ESSER funds have to be used by September of 24.
Thank you.
Since those monies weren't going to be spent, we just decided to reduce the deficit and supplant those funds.
Yeah. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Now at 7.3, which is to discuss and consider the October 2023 financial reports,
7.3 Discuss and consider October 2023 Financial Reports.
presenter Jamie Hines, Executive Director of Finance.
Welcome.
Good evening, President Perez, trustees, Dr. Gorgorski.
Thank you. Tonight you should have in front of you item 7.3, which are our financial reports for October. Included are our financial statements, an analysis by function and object of those financials, as well as a tax report and a construction report through the month of October. Also a summary of our check registers for the month of October is included.
This is through two months of our fiscal year, which represents just about 17% of the fiscal year.
A couple of things that I'll note. We've collected, there were some questions about our state funding this past month.
So far we've collected two months worth of state funding. We'll receive another month in November, which will be on the next financial statement.
and then we'll quit receiving those as we start collecting taxes in November, December, all the way through March,
and then again in April, we'll start receiving those state funding checks again,
and that will go for five more months through August.
That's all I have.
If you have any questions about this, I'd be glad to answer.
Mr. President.
Ms. Grigiolla.
Thank you.
Thank you. On the function object analysis, I just like to look at the percent of budget expended.
And I just noticed the data processing services, supplies, and material, it is number 53.
It's already 45 percent. Is that correct?
Yes, ma'am. That's normal.
This time of year, a lot of those data processing services, especially, well, those are supplies and materials.
I was looking at contracted services.
Yeah, supplies and materials.
Yeah, supplies and materials.
I couldn't tell you exactly.
And that's non-student-based figure?
Oh, they're in data processing services, so they're not under Function 11, but that doesn't mean they're not for students.
Oh, sorry, it just says support services non-student based, then you have a function 51, 52, 53.
And it's page, let's see, what page is it, three?
Yes, ma'am, I see it.
Yeah, just.
I am not sure exactly what those, that 45% is what she said.
Okay, what that is, that is software.
software. Typically at the beginning of the year, you know, software is $14 million in our budget.
It's the third largest expense behind salary benefits and utilities. And we pay for most of
those or at least encumber all of those at the beginning of every school year. Because most
software coincides with our school year. Yep. Okay. Makes sense. I just wouldn't have really
did it under supplies and materials. Okay. And the October construction report, I just want
clarification if you don't mind on specifically that TURS Waterfall Fund
it's got a 7.8 million dollar over projection I guess you will so obviously
someone gets to decide how is that allocated what kind of who's when does
that come before word or yeah it'll have to be before we can spend any at the
the board will have to approve it.
So essentially what we've done over the years is we've spent those dollars,
and you can only spend those dollars, let's just say, on this piece of property.
City of Katy.
Nowhere else in Katy ISD on this piece of property
or there's the piece of property on Danover, we could spend it there.
That's a blank piece of land now.
But you can only spend it there.
So typically what we've used those tourist water for all money for are,
replacing, maybe say the turf at Katy High School. We've done some improvements at Katy High School.
We've done some OLC work with those funds. We've done, when we closed out the shell space in this
building, we used TERS funds. We bought the credit union with TERS waterfall funds. And so you're
seeing a 7.7 million dollar fund balance we can only spend it here and what what we've kind of
are informally planning is like when the chillers go down on this building and the merrill center
needs to replace that um uh we're at some point we're gonna have to replace the grandstands or
the at least the the plastic seats because those will start breaking and stuff and and that would
be what that was for a new roof on this building a new roof on the merrill center those are kind of
what we have in mind to spend that on since we're geofenced to this piece of property.
Okay. Thank you. It's a big amount, so I just want to keep my eye on it.
All right. Thank you.
I just had one question, and that's also in the construction report.
on the 676 million authorization we are on proposition they write at budget if
you will or close to it we we are staying close to budget on that we're
through about two-thirds of the expenditures on that so we've spent
about 450 of that 676 you can see over to the right the estimates are still
still positive for where we're at. So the budgeted expenses are on track. Yes, sir.
Right. So what I was noting is that the over or the underspend, if you want to call it
that, is largely in the infrastructure, right? It's pretty much all in the infrastructure
and the busses. But that should be a pretty safe number in terms of given these projects,
in terms of the infrastructure number, I imagine doesn't have a lot of, in other words, it's more knowable.
It seems to me like it's more known at this point.
It's not subject to construction costs, et cetera.
That infrastructure, you have an underspend of like $6.4 million.
I imagine we're pretty confident in managing that number is what I'm saying.
Mr. Perez, this time last year or 15 months ago, I think Mr. Veerling and myself would be absolutely,
Well, we had ulcers over whether we were going to make all the bond projects work, and I
can speak from my perspective that my conversations with Mr. Veerling have been a little bit less
therapeutic in that we don't need to therapy each other.
I think we're going to make it all work.
I think we're going to make it all work because he and his staff have done a fantastic job
of managing those resources in an extremely, extremely,
extremely difficult time to be pricing those projects.
They did a good job managing it.
And yeah, when you talk about that infrastructure,
they had to take some money from infrastructure
to make some of these projects work.
But we've, so far so good.
And as Mr. Hines alluded to, every day we move forward,
we're gonna make it work.
And 15 months ago, I wasn't sure,
But we're going to make it work.
But the infrastructure number, I would think is what I'm saying, it should be a pretty
safe number.
Yes.
There should not be, Ms. Cassman, should not be any surprises out there that we're not
aware of at this point.
Okay, great.
Thank you.
Mr. President, may I ask a question, please?
Go ahead, Ms. Champagne.
Okay.
On the Proposition B, the technology, I'm just curious, where are we right now with
the purchasing of the one-to-one Chromebooks?
So we have not begun the purchasing, but I know that Dr. Alani's team and Ms. Davis are all working on that, and Mrs. Hack's team is working together with all of the school leadership on a plan for how that's all going to be rolled out.
Any other questions?
Thanks so much.
7.4 Discuss and consider Board Approval of Stop Loss Insurance Coverage for Health Plan Year 2024.
We now move on to 7.4, and that is to discuss and consider board approval of stop-loss insurance coverage for health plan year 2024.
Lance Naumann, Director of Risk Management. Welcome.
Thank you.
President Perez, Dr. Grzyworski, Board of Trustees.
In 2004, KDISD began providing health benefits to plan participants as a qualified self-insured.
As a self-insured employer, providing health benefits to staff, the financial responsibility rests solely upon the district.
To date, benefit options have given employees quality care while allowing the district to manage inflationary cost trends.
Every year, an independent actuarial study is performed to analyze how large losses will impact the plan with premiums and deductibles deriving from this study.
It was a conscious decision up until plan year 2020 not to carry stop-loss insurance.
For plan year 2021, the district engaged with Aetna to begin providing stop-loss coverage for individual large losses.
Factors to consider in determining the need for stop-loss insurance are as follows.
One, protection against large individual losses.
Two, long-term plan stabilization.
Three, medical and pharmacy inflationary factors.
And four, future pandemic-related events.
It is recommended by the Risk Management Department to continue the purchase of stop-loss insurance coverage
with Aetna for plan year 2024 at $14.57 PMPM per member per month
with a self-insured retention of $750,000
with an estimated annual premium of $1.383 million.
The expiring rate for plan year 2023 was $13.39.
Actual premiums are based on monthly participation in the plan by staff members.
Questions?
Mr. President.
Ms. Cozzella.
Hello.
I was just looking at these reasons for determining that you use to determine the stop-loss insurance and carrying that, sorry, suggesting for us to approve another $1.3 million annual cost.
But all the way through 2020, we never had that until the COVID hit.
Correct?
Correct. Okay. And so COVID was the main, I'm assuming, driver for the stop loss insurance.
Well, let me answer your question this way. As we were coming out of plan year 2019,
we began to look at how our plan demographics were changing. And to be frank, we were,
we had really it was time to really evaluate that because our population had
exploded in terms of medical inflation things were getting more expensive and
we felt it at that time we needed to make that decision and coincidentally we
had COVID and that really helped save the plan in certain instances of large
individual losses. So it was a decision that was based on we can't roll the dice anymore to be perfectly honest. We need to look at the changing demographics, the age of our employees began to grow and as we all know as we get older things begin to break. So and when things begin to break they become more expensive. So that was the decision process and it lined up with
with fortunately with the pandemic.
Okay.
Okay.
We obviously still have inflation,
but we don't have COVID.
So I'm just curious how much of your decision today
is weighted on your number four here,
future pandemic related events.
Well, as we look and review trends
of what's going on in the world,
I'm not saying that the sole decision
was based on COVID, but the diseases of the world can play a very important part in impacting a
health plan. But the primary look is, one, our aging population within the health plan,
two, medical inflation. As we look at, you know, I think I've come to you previously where
our medical trend is about 3.4 to 3.6, which is good, but the runaway inflation on pharmacy is
really the the guiding factor in this and it gives us good sleep insurance.
Okay, thank you. When you when you talk about the individual losses, the stop
loss is for the individual claims? For an individual? Not in the aggregate? Correct,
it is for an individual claim, not in an aggregate. So the 750,000
retention is also for individual claims or is it for the policy as a whole?
No, it's for an individual, each individual client.
So it kicks in after a single claim exceeds 750?
Correct.
Do we have many of those?
We are kind of backtracked with COVID.
We were seeing our frequency very, very high.
As I've alluded to, we're beginning to see more normalcy in the development of those large claims.
But I might also add, too, one of the things that we look at year over year is, I guess, how we've hedged our bet, if you will.
In the three years that we have performed this, we've benefited.
The health plan has not absorbed almost $3.4 million.
So it was a good business decision to do that.
So they've paid claims of $3.4 million, up to $3.4 million?
Yes, above the $750 million.
What year was that? I'm sorry?
We started in plain year 21.
That figures from 2021?
21 coming forward.
That you just quoted? Okay.
Okay.
thank you any other questions thank you very much okay
7.5 Discuss and consider Board approval of an agreement between Katy ISD and RGV CDL Services LLC.
next we have 7.5 which is our presenters leslie hack deputy deputy superintendent discuss and
consider board approval of an agreement between kdist and rgb cdl services llc thank you thank
you um good evening president perez board of trustees and dr grigorski um it is recommended
that the Board of Trustees approves a facility lease agreement between KDISD
and RGV CDL services for the purpose of leasing ground space at the Legacy and
Road Stadium complex. RGV will have a semi truck and trailer to ensure student
access to required equipment and to practice their driving skills. Any
questions? I just had one question that kind of jumped out at me. I've never seen
an agreement that that says it's between like rgb and the board of trustees well it seems like it's
always with kdisd the board of trustees signs but just a little technical question i guess
if the agreement should be with the board of trustees as opposed to with kdisd
i think if we modeled it and i have to go back and look at the mou this is an extension of the mou we
signed with rgb um but yes that's my only question is yeah is that it's just a man i mean it's just
semantics i can draft it however you'd like to draft it it seems weird it seems like it should
be with the district okay signed by the trustees but not the contract not in contract certainly
we can make that change for the okay for 11. thank you who else uh ms champagne oh i just wanted to
say this is so exciting to me that this program is here and so are the students i'm just curious
are they already taking the classes now they're driving and we have 11 that already have their
cdl license class a cpl license nine male students and two female students so where have they been
uh practicing their driving all over houston up and down okay is there like a student driver thing
on the back of the truck like a little sign of i don't know but it's it's pretty it's pretty
impressive you know i mean that that is so exciting that these kids can um they're actually
working i don't know what this is but they're working on their tanker tanker and combination
endorsement so they're going one more certification up because they got done um earlier in the semester
than anticipated.
And then we'll start a second cohort in the spring.
I'm just curious, how many other school districts do you think are doing this?
We know of two others in the country.
In the country?
We went down, Donna ISD down in the valley.
They went out to, I believe it was Bakersfield, California, to see their program.
And then they brought it to Donna ISD.
And then we went to Donna ISD to see the program.
This is so awesome.
All right, thank you.
Mr. President, a quick question.
Is this like a formality because it's a $10 a year?
What's going on here?
Formality, just the lease agreement.
They're parking the semi and the trailer right there on the right side of,
if you're looking at Legacy, on the right side of Rhodes Stadium Fieldhouse.
So it's just primarily to.
But they assume all liability for their equipment and everything.
Mr. President.
Ms. Fox.
Sorry, Mrs. Hackett.
So I looked at them, I saw leasing, and I thought, what a good idea to lease those empty parking lots to people who need to park their trucks there.
We'll make money off of it.
What a great idea.
Then I looked at the map, and I saw the agreement and saw that's not what it is.
So anyway, if you want to come up with an idea like that to lease empty parking lots, maybe we could make a little money for KDS.
More than $10.
You're welcome to consider that your idea for more than $10.
My question is, this lease, is where it will always be?
Is it just like a permanent parking place?
Is this where they do their training?
Like when I taught my son to drive, we went to the high school parking lot, practiced all the turns.
We do.
It's a practice site for them.
When they first started and they were parked out there, they have to learn every piece of equipment on that semi and that trailer.
So it would be parked, and they'll park it out right behind range towards Legacy, and the kids will go out there.
And then they have certain areas marked off on various parts of the complex where they back up and
Park and all of that. It's pretty amazing watch
Okay, so this is
It will always be parked there
It looks like it's a two-year lease and so it that's just where they'll store the trucks that only we use is that they have to
access
I-10 from that east side of the complex
They can't hit Katy land drive and go so they go right off of there and right to item. Oh, that's excellent
Is there parallel parking involved? I?
Don't know
With one of those it would be difficult. I know mrs. Champaign's I mean the
The communication department has done a great job of circulating this through the community and people are very excited
About having a program like this like where'd that come from? How did that happen? Thank you, dr
Gregorski for bringing it to us and these boys and girls are now prepared for a future well-paying future to take care of their families
I noticed a couple of them came from trucking families
So I'm sure their parents are thrilled to very excited have a great future ahead of them
I'm excited for all kinds of new things. We're gonna offer for students. Dr. Gregorski. Thank you. Thank you
7.6 Discuss and consider Board approval of the delivery method for the $806 Million Bond Authorization capital construction projects and approval of the selection criteria for evaluating construction contractors and construction managers.
We're now move on to
7.6
The presenter is Lisa Kastman, Executive Director of Facilities, Planning and Construction.
We're going to discuss and consider Board approval of the delivery method for the $806 million bond authorization,
capital construction projects and approval of the selection criteria for evaluating construction contractors and construction managers.
Welcome.
Good evening. Nathan Brooks is here because he's going to support me on the maintenance and operations projects.
So I have three items for your consideration.
The first is your consideration for the approval of the delivery methods to be used for the
construction and maintenance projects associated with the $806 million bond authorization,
as well as the criteria for selection listed below to evaluate all construction contracts
and construction managers that submit proposals to KDISD.
So in our construction department, we primarily use a CSP competitive seal proposal where
where the contractor's chosen for best value,
and we evaluate on price, experience, safety,
reputation, and experience with the district.
Typically we use that for new schools,
we call them greenfield projects.
The CMAR, which is construction manager at risk,
those are primarily for renovation projects.
So we, the contractor on early with the architect,
so we can go through phasing and scheduling,
ordering material early,
and try to minimize with the campus.
And we evaluate also on the same things.
It was very beneficial on projects like Windborn and May Creek High School.
Nathan, we'll talk now about the JOC process.
So on the JOC side of the house, we handle the bond component type of projects.
What that enables us to do is we deal directly with subcontractors, no different than if you, at your house,
if you would need to replace a roof on your house, you wouldn't go out and hire a home builder.
you'd go out and deal with a roofer so that's what we do on the maintenance side when it comes
to bond component replacements um the the procurement is handled through the cooperative
we deal directly with those cooperatives that we belong to so that being said we'd be happy
to answer any questions this board may have questions mr president i see this says the
new elementary 47 48 49 junior high 19 just unbelievable numbers true mr president miss
timi do you happen to have i know you listed four criteria mainly that you look at when you're
looking evaluating um a construction company or do you have a rubric that you use or yes we do um
the uh items number two and three are broken down into components looking at project managers
superintendent and other items and we'd be happy to get you a copy of that
rubric you like do you mind getting us a copy okay I think that would be great
for the board yeah yeah no problem and then could we see how the people that
you're looking at how they've performed on that rubric oh we can get you a copy
of one of the projects to show you would that be a help well I think I think I
think I'd like to see it like who we're considering using now what you said I'm
saying okay so what would it's a commitment competitive process so I
don't know who's gonna bid yet until we go out for proposals right so when we
get when those projects are advertised then we'll get an idea of who's gonna
bid those projects right so can we see the application of that rubric once we
get the bids in yes okay yeah when I bring to you the total project costs or
the the CM at risk thing that'll have all that information in there great and
And then before we do that, if we could get a copy of the rubric, that would be so.
Yes, definitely.
I've got a blank copy already.
Thank you so much.
No problem.
And on those four, the criteria, selection, price, experience, safety record, and past relationship,
you use a weighting, don't you?
Like, for example, price might be 40% of the equation.
That's what you're talking about?
We typically go 30-30-30-10.
Okay.
What's 10?
10 is the officer's past relationship with the district.
Okay.
And then, just to clarify, on the competitive seal proposal, that's the one you go out on the big projects and new projects and new buildings subject to competitive seal bid.
And then you bring those to the board when you get those.
Yeah, so that'll be like a lump sum project.
The construction manager at risk will bring packages to you.
So when we hire the construction manager, he'll be brought on board with a fee.
And then we may bring packages like okay package one
We're going to release equipment package two might be site work
And that's the benefits of that process and then the final amendment will be encapsulating all the amendments
We've done and the competitive seal bid it's basically at their wrist and once they submit that bid
That cost is at their risk correct and whereas as on the construction at risk. It's more
We're kind of like acting almost like our own
contractor by bringing in pieces of it or getting the construction company
involved on the front end to help us with all the planning.
All the phasing, especially on a live campus like on a high school, that's where it's important.
The superintendents, they come out there and they actually sit and they
watch student flow, see what they can do so we can decide which parts of the
building we can close off at the start. Even on the elementary at Winborn, we
did half the school, Hutzel we did half the school, now we're going to flip them
the following summer like in Hutzell's case. So they help us with that. Okay,
where can we draw the line and you know where are we going to start and finish?
Okay and for example let's say the new schools they're going to be largely
based on competitive seal bid. Correct, so they'll give us a price for the
construction and then we'll not only look at the price but we'll look at the
team. You know in the past sometimes you get a contractor that okay I'm gonna
hire people to work on your job. Well that's not what we want because that's a
recipe for disaster so we look into the team who's your project manager who's
the superintendent their references we look at what other school districts
they've worked with other architects try to get the whole picture so what once
like if you look at some like say one of these authorizations like if something
is over and under on like say over on a built on a school how did how did that
that occur, say, if we're over budget, if on a competitive proposal bid,
are all the costs included in there from the contractor?
Because I'm assuming it was at their risk.
Once they bid, the price is locked in, or am I mistaken?
No, but a competitive proposal, yes, the prices are locked in.
But, you know, we experienced a lot of inflation, as they referred to earlier,
and that's why some of those projects came in over.
You know, we put the estimates together at the beginning of the 21 bond.
that was before the inflation hit so our estimates are based on a cost per square
foot so that these are the real prices we take them for competitive seal
proposal now we do offer value engineering where we'll go work with
that contractor and so we would like to award this project but we need to we
need to get some cost savings in here so we do try to work with them on that seem
at risk we evaluate the costs along the way so um you know a design development
and sometimes we'll get an estimate, okay, and then the next time it's 25% the drawings are developed,
okay, did the price go up or down, if it went up, why did it go up, what information you need.
So it's a multi-step process.
Yeah, I just want to clarify so that we're talking about apples to apples here.
If we have a bond authorization on a project, and let's just say we think the project is going to be $40 million,
we estimate that at the beginning when we put it out to the public.
Right. Well, then once we bid the project, it may come in at $35 million, which would be under budget, or $45 million, which would be over budget.
But at this point in time where we get the bid locked in from from Ansel O'Brien or whoever it may be, they say we can build this project for $40 million.
We then don't talk about over budget or under budget on the project.
They are locked in. So you're correct. They are. Once we once they sign off on that, then the district risk is down.
Okay, I got it. That's helpful. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you.
Anybody else? Thank you.
All right.
I think you're up next still.
7.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of the 2023 Educational Specifications to be utilized as the basis of design for all upcoming elementary, junior, and high school capital improvement projects as required by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) – School Facilities Standards for Construction.
I'm up next. So is the approval of the educational specifications per TEA.
We have a presentation to show you.
Megan Irvin, one of my project managers, helped put together the presentation.
So we'll move to the podium.
Let me show it for you.
Okay, what are educational specifications?
As you can see here, TEA said as of November 2021, we had to come to the board and get
an approval for our educational specifications.
Now we've always used specifications to design our projects ever since I've been here.
We always use our current prototype with spaces and programs.
And prior to this, TEA told us that a classroom from K through 12 had to be a certain size,
library of certain size, but now they've given us some flexibility.
All right, so, and as you can, I don't want to read everything on the slide.
Okay, why are they needed?
The TEA required that.
The ed specs need to be updated every five years and provide consistency among similar
similar project types from campus to campus and reduce inequities.
And it's developed along with the long range plan.
So once again, we're starting these projects with this $806 million bond.
We will look at our current prototypes, current elementaries, and
make sure everything is online.
So the method of compliance we're gonna use quantitative and flexibility level 3,
which gives us some flexibility on using spaces.
So now TEA says it's just not a classroom you consider.
we need to look at the collaboration spaces, science labs, wherever students are taught.
Now that's considered a classroom space.
Elementary schools, we're looking now at 42 square foot per pupil, junior highs 36, and high schools also 36 square foot.
And what's included? So our elementary schools are anywhere between 150 to 160,000 square feet, junior highs and high schools.
and the programs when we go into it that's where we design administrative spaces, sizes of science classrooms, and all the programs.
And all our current designs are in line with our mission and the current prototype and our modified repeats meet this level three specification.
And I know you have the full report but we're here to answer any other questions.
Mr. President. Ms. Cuzela. Hi. Thank you. I had to just comment that we're going through,
right, a refresh of the strategic goals, and they've already been massaged and reworded,
and that's not reflected here. So I'm assuming at some point this would be updated. Yes,
we can do that for sure. Okay. Yes. Yeah. And there was, I think, any other document with more detail?
There was a computer lab still shown for the junior high builds, not for high school or elementary, but the junior high.
Is that?
Why is that?
So what you see here under the facility capacity is just a brief overview of the spaces.
It doesn't have every breakdown that the full program would have.
So when you start the prototype, there will be a further breakdown of each one of these colored spaces.
So you'll see there is a computer lab in some cases, maybe under the classroom section.
So it just depends on the specialized classroom type.
Yeah, and we typically still have computer labs for the CTE classes.
And you'll see that at the junior high and the high school.
Okay.
I know that computer lab from teachers that I know and schools that I go to, that's like a thing of the past.
So when I see computer lab on a new current design document, it raises a flag for me.
Yeah, so we should clarify.
That's more for the CTE spaces.
Okay.
it was under junior high and it was just sitting there okay uh and then okay good that that solves
it for me thank you i guess the only question i had was what are we actually approving we're
because this is this is kind of like baked in right like this is yeah so you're approving the
quantitative process with an l3 level effects flexibility in compliance with the tea in
compliance of TEA. Okay, okay, thank you.
Any other questions? One more right and then we'll have questions later.
Oh, you're up still, that's right.
7.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of the design associated with the first floor of the Katy ISD Merchants Way Building.
And this is the, we're going to the...
The design development of...
Discuss and consider board approval of the design associated with the first floor of the KDISD
Merchant's Way building. That's correct. Multiple presenters, it looks like.
Yes, so I have Gwen Coffey, the Assistant Superintendent for Special Education, who
who'll support the program,
Parul Vyas with Stantec, the architect,
she'll go through the spaces,
and Art Campbell, my project manager, is here as well.
So I'm gonna turn it over to Gwen.
Good evening, Board President, Dr. Poporsky,
and Board of Trustees.
We're happy to be here today
and share our design development progress
for the Merchants Way project.
We worked together with KTISD team for the past month,
working through the programs and the project needs and today we have some
project development diagrams to share with you. This is out of the 2023 bond.
The scope includes interior build-out for classrooms, admin and support spaces
for the KDISD behavioral learning program and KD plus program and also
anything that relates to that floor plan development, HVAC, plumbing, electrical
electrical modifications, and any sidewalk and ADA updates that would be needed for this project.
So we are working on the first floor of the Merchants Way building.
And I'll have Dr. Gwinn talk about the program a little bit.
Just as a reminder, I know that we brought some information forward related to this program,
but this building would house two separate special education for sure programs
with some access related to general education that we're still exploring.
The first program is the Behavioral Learning Center, which would be a kindergarten through 12th grade.
behavior support and therapeutic center and there's some information about how
that would support students here in summary and the second one is Katie
ISD's 18 plus program it's called Katie plus which stands for promoting learning
for universal success these are our students who have met academic
graduation requirements but continue to have IEP needs that are driven by their
admission review and dismissal committees and part of their services
under the individuals with disabilities and Education Act and they can continue
to receive support on those needs through the year that they turn 22 years of age.
And so those are the two programs that would be housed on this first floor,
and I'm very excited to talk about either of them as we move forward.
So going a little bit further in our project schedule, we are in the DD phase right now,
design development.
We are working through with Dr. Quinn and the team to develop the plans further in two years,
develop it further and our goal is to get the recommendation for the general contractor and
project costs to the board of trustees in march of 2024 and the anticipated start of construction
would be in april with the finish uh planned for january of 2025 and the district will slowly
move in in phases into the project into the campus and we will go over the proposed design we will
we'll look at the existing conditions.
Here's an aerial view of the site.
The parking and everything is already accounted for,
so we don't have anything site-related in this project.
It's mainly the interior development of the first floor.
Here, kind of showing on the plan,
west side is where we are proposing
the Behavioral Learning Center bus drop-off will occur,
and the plan east side is where the KD plus bus drop-off here is an enlarged
floor plan on the top left corner you can see there is an opportunity there to
develop a fenced in playground for the BLC kids over there and again more
enlarged view of the drop-off for the bus bus entrance since this is an
existing facilities we are keeping existing plumbing facilities as is and
and we will be using that for staff use.
There are restrooms, elevators already in the building,
fully finished out, so we are gonna work with that
where it is and develop the floor plan from there.
Here's an enlarged view of that existing
restroom facility that's already there.
And this is a three-story existing building,
so this restrooms and elevators stack up
on all three floors.
Proposed plan, we were looking at from the main central lobby, one side with the behavioral learning and the other side is KD plus with the central admin.
So this kind of shows the central admin area with the campus administrator, the secretary, workroom on one side, the central reception that meets the KDISD standard, and the clinic and offices on the plan left side.
The behavioral program also has a motor lab and from the motor lab we have access to the
playground and views outside and you can also see typical layouts for classrooms per TEA.
These are sites for the TEA and they will have around 10 students a classroom.
Again BLC said that 24 classrooms their labs like motor lab, therapy lab and speech and
And here is a view, plan view, that shows a cluster of classrooms and a hallway that has cool down rooms that serve both the junior high kids and the elementary kids in the BLC program.
Here is a kind of a diagram that shows the cafeteria because both programs will have its own cafe eating place.
It's on the plan north side of the campus where you have your delivery access and it's kind of an open space.
Katie plus side has a more like if you remember reigns Academy kind of a set up in the comments
that's how the Katie plus cafe is set up and I know when can talk about how the opportunity the
synergies happen between the two our notes our hope I'm sorry to interrupt you our hope is that
the cafeteria on the BLC side you'll see there's round tables it facilitates communication is often
an area of need for these students community facilitates communication it's very open don't
think a traditional cafeteria setting but on the other side on our katie plus side one of the
things we're working with students on is prep serving delivering and so we're hoping that we'll
be able to facilitate those two working together to be able to get meals ready for students for
them to be taken over and fed so it gives us another opportunity to put the skills that we're
teaching on both sides into action in in an authentic way.
Katie plus has has several labs there is a life skills kitchen lab we are currently working on
the layout so you have probably about four kitchen setups in there two apartment labs a simulation
lab and a crafts lab I don't know if you want to share a little bit about each. Sure so life skills
skills is a little bit confusing. It is not a life skills program like our life skills program. It is
a lab where we are learning how to do the skills that are necessary in life. And so it is learning
how to prepare food items, learning how to clean appropriately, learning how to appropriately
refrigerate items. Think of all of the things that we do in our homes to ensure that our homes and
our food are ready for consumption and are clean and are neat, knowing how to keep, you know,
maintain safety in relation to things like stoves and that sort of thing and also as i said working
in the food service industry so it serves a dual purpose an apartment lab is similar to that one of
the things we're looking at is skills for living and so for example you know how do you access your
apartment what do you do within that apartment how do you learn self-care routines some of our
students need specialized setups so how do you work with that who can help you so they can again
simulate that in an instructional environment and then hopefully generalize
as we work with them to ensure that happens into their post-secondary. A
simulation lab is similar. They might have things like vending machines, coffee,
setups, you know learning how to use those vocational and post-secondary
skills in a simulated environment. It's a classroom environment. And the crafts lab,
we are, we will have a storefront which I'm not sure if that's on this or not,
but a storefront where we're able to actually make and assemble items and then um sell those
hopefully uh similar if you've been to like the gallery furniture the brick wood kind of thing
similar to that on a much smaller scale but similar to that to provide purpose and um you
know really make that connection within the community ideally we could do things like
produce items for schools right um and and things such as that and so there's a lot of opportunity
here to do direct instruction simulated practice and then when we apply it we
that's when we move into the community or post-secondary setting and so we're
very excited about the opportunities this type of a setup affords our
students here's a large view of the storefront center that students have
access to that excels outside
side of the campus and as well as internal connections.
And I think that's all we have. Any questions?
Thank you. Questions? Mr. President?
Ms. Fox? Thank you for the presentation. To say I'm excited
about this is an understatement. I have some questions
about the BLC.
see uh dr coffee probably does this mean that
students that are now like in an a b program at an elementary school will now have a place to go to
free up some of that administrator's time on those programs that tend to require a lot of administrators
time as often as the answer in my particular area of educational practice yes and no so there are no
absolutes in special education it's what i love the most and what i hate the most about the job
the idea of this campus is that it is for our most severe students who are in need of therapeutic
intensive therapeutic intervention our goal would be the answer to your question in one respect is
yes so for example we have students who may need more therapeutic and more intensive options right
now that are on campuses and so what we want to be able to do is have that analysis right right now
the analysis and options that we have are somewhat different we want those students to be able to
remain in kdisd if at all possible we believe we educate our students very effectively we want to
keep doing that but also it allows us to really effectively utilize the resources we have in this
district i have a tremendous behavior support team but when they are traveling across the district to
get to different campuses and different ab rooms some of their time is lost and so for some of our
students being able to pull them into that centralized location who need those
intensive supports it allows us to really maximize not only campus usage
but also our internal resources that we've invested a lot in to be able to
support BTP is an existing program we have that at our OAC BTP that that is an
example of something again that will really help us utilize resources right
because we have people who visit those camp that campus to support students and
work with Miss Coleman but they also have other campuses they need to support
And so pulling all of those students that are the most intensive need, and these are most intensive, really helps us to be very efficient in our practice, our educational practice.
And I believe it's impactful for our students as well.
May I follow up?
Go ahead, Ms. Fox.
Is there any way to give, I don't know if numbers is what I'm thinking, but the things I'm hearing, and it's mostly elementary campuses, is that principals or assistant principals are called to the AB unit a lot.
And so when teachers need something, they aren't available, and some of those really big struggles for our APs.
So is that because it's a temporary assignment?
Isn't it something like it's only allowed 10 days of restriction from?
So you know where I'm going.
I do.
I do.
Yes, ma'am.
I didn't mean to interrupt you.
So it gets very confusing.
So what you're talking about is days of removal or placement.
Those are usually OSS, out-of-school suspension, ISS, or a DAEP placement.
That's very different from our special ed programs.
So our special ed programs are we've held an ARD committee.
we have looked at the unique needs and areas of support that are required for our students who have an identified disability and we've said this
program like adaptive behavior
Which is a B or Y cap or life skills or whatever is where the student will receive the interventions that are outlined in their IEP
Individualized education plan that's different than if a student for example
Gets into a physical altercation and needs to be removed to the principal's office as a result
that's a disciplinary piece and this is a behavior piece this is not a
disciplinary campus at all it is behavior now having said that we at
times in KTIC and and we want to we want to support discipline we want students
to do what students need to do so that learning can occur but there are times
when students are young and they are still learning and I would like to be
able to offer something like this that has the more therapeutic side possibly
at times when it's appropriate for example we have students who sometimes
we'll move in from another country let's say and they may not have identified
disabilities but we're in the process of doing that so in working with our legal
team one of the questions we're exploring and I do want to say it's a
question we do not have an answer on this yet is is this somewhere we could
actually work with students while they're in the process of referral right
and so if that's the case that would be an additional positive for this building
it's not discipline related it's not fully special education related but it
It is a unique approach to the needs of students, you know, that I think would be beneficial.
But we are still exploring that aspect.
I don't want to commit to something that no one has given me a green light yet on.
But really, we do have, this will free up a lot of room on campuses.
It will free up a ton of room on our high school campuses, because those students, our 18-plus students, are right now housed on high school campuses.
More importantly for our 18 plus students, it's going to provide those authentic unique
learning experiences that are very similar to those of their peers who are graduating
and moving on to college or to a trade or whatever.
So yeah, there's a lot of real positive pieces for this.
Mr. President, I have questions about the K-12, I mean the KD plus, but I'll yield until
other people have an opportunity.
I do.
Oh, go ahead.
Yeah, okay.
Yes.
Yes, are you foreseeing that the biggest relief is going to come for the OAC for this building?
So I think in January of 25, when we're slated to open,
the likelihood is that that building will have the greatest immediate relief in one place
because that's where our BTP campus is pulled from.
And so when you look at the size, like the number of total students at OAC BTP
versus the number of students in VTP that will get pulled percentage-wise, yes.
But we have probably about 170 18-plus students scattered across our district,
and so some of our campuses have 30 of those students.
And so it could be a huge impact and will be a huge impact on our high school campuses as well,
but percentage-wise, thank you, it's a larger impact, if you will.
That makes me happy because they need some relief.
They absolutely do, yes, ma'am.
Ms. Grisella?
Thank you.
The floor plan here, it's one floor of the building, correct, that we're designing right now, and it's half and half.
It's not purely half and half.
One side of it will have 18-plus students, and one side of it will have BTP or BLC students because we don't want the instruction to mix.
But a lot of the shared spaces that are necessary to run the building, like conference rooms, for example, and cafeteria areas and bathrooms and the clinic and such, are shared by both.
And so those infrastructure pieces are a shared portion.
The percentage of the building as a whole,
if I had to pull it down to a percentage,
BLC is using a larger percentage of the building
because there's a wider variety of resources needed.
Correct.
But there are more students potentially right now,
at least at the outset, using the 18 plus
because of the way that those programs operate.
Not all at the same time, but just accessing.
Okay, so from a design perspective, moving forward, I mean, this is what we know today.
Are we building something that's flexible to increase the BLC?
I mean, I hope that's not a – I hope you've discussed that because I would hate to create a KD Plus footprint for a huge amount of square footage.
No disrespect.
Those are awesome students.
students when we have all of a sudden a big behavioral population that we need to serve.
And so I would, I would be very, I would hope that this design is, is allowed for that,
allows for that. It does. So we looked at when we were, when we started working through this,
we pulled our trends in the area of behavior. We went back about 10 years. We looked at the
utilization of the programs. We looked at the percentage of growth each year. We looked at it
before COVID and after COVID. We have gone through, you know, KDIC, our committees make decisions. We
We do not, but we just kind of have, you know, based on years of knowledge and experience,
we've kind of said, what do we think is a reasonable number of students?
Estimates, okay.
Yes, ma'am.
And so we believe that the square footage that's been allotted to the BLC will take us out quite some ways
because we're looking at years from now, what will that be?
The other thing is both of these programs, to some extent, are high turnover, for lack of a better terminology.
Our KD Plus students, while there may be more students utilizing that particular portion of the building,
they're also in the community spaces.
And so they're not all necessarily there the whole time.
They're not all necessarily there all day or every day.
It's very customized for the needs of a student.
And BLC, to some extent, is the same, right?
The idea is we bring students in, we work through interventions and plans with the goal
of transitioning them eventually back to their comprehensive campus, assuming that they are
able to make that transition back based on a variety of research-based factors.
And so you might have, you know, 200 children utilize the BLC, but only 75 are there all year, if that makes sense.
Like they're coming in and out.
So you're seeing a lot more students.
And that's the beauty of these programs and why I think to some extent you get so much value for what you're investing in.
And it's really touching just a tremendous number of students.
But you can do that in a more, in a smaller space because they're not all there all the time, all day, every day.
So today, BLC students, do you have a number for that?
I do.
I do. I thought that might come up.
Versus KD+.
So for BLC, for right now, what I will tell you is that when we go to, and this matters,
when we go to an ARD committee meeting in KDIC and we offer a program, we have to be able to provide it immediately.
So I cannot ARD anybody into a program that is not available yet.
So know that.
Sure, yes.
But when I look across the number of students, you know, BTP does exist.
And there are some other programs that we have that do exist that it would simply be picking up.
It's not a change in placement, it's just a change in where the program is placed.
So we believe that in January of 25, it would open with about 200 students,
and that during that spring semester, we would begin to, not the behavior of the whole building,
the whole building would open with about 200, 225 students,
and that we would continue then as these options have become available,
if students require them, they're an option for our committees to consider.
and you know students there are more than one way to provide services to a student. What we're
looking at is what is the most effective and efficient way and this provides us with a new
option and so it's something we can begin to provide parents with as an option. We do believe
as we move forward and based on kind of what we're seeing is the trends and behavior that we will
continue to kind of fill that up through the next year and we would anticipate somewhere between 275
and 300 students kind of at the end of the 25 26 school year are the project costs separated by
kd plus and uh blc i do not know the answer to that question i will defer in some ways we can
i mean we can do square footage one side or the other but typically it's the whole building that's
done okay thank you questions mr. president man pain okay dr. coffee I I'm
so impressed with your enthusiasm for this and I'm really happy for the whole
district and I'm glad that you have we have you as the leader thank you and the
vision that you have is is great so but so you know that I'm not an educated
educated educator, so I'm just trying to understand this.
So the BLC program, as what I kind of understand,
I know it's not disciplinarian, but it's to remedy behavior,
to make behavior better.
So is there gonna be a new policy,
or is there already one on how to place children there?
So there is, it is a policy, but it's compliant with,
It's compliant with state and federal law.
So there is a process through which we have to ensure that if a student has an area of
disability, right?
So in the same way that if a student is dyslexic, we have to then program for how are we going
to go back to the beginning through systematic instruction and make sure that we're addressing
all of those concerns so that we can teach the student to learn and to remedy and to
mitigate the disability so that they are successful moving forward.
It's the same idea with behavior.
And the ARD committee process, the process we have to go through, the federal and state law and board policy, requires us to evaluate the student, determine the type of disability, how does it impact their ability to be educated.
And so if behavior is impacting your ability, your skills for learning, you can't sit in a classroom because you are aggressive towards another student or, you know, you're having intrusive thoughts that are preventing you from engaging in the learning process, then that's an impact.
So if you have a disability and an impact, you likely qualify for special ed.
The ARD committee meets and goes over these documents are often 60, 70, 100 pages long for a single document.
So know that it is a complex process.
We talk about every area of education, how it impacts you, and what are we going to do as KDIC to ensure that you can learn moving forward.
Throughout that process, we are going to try different things because we want students to be educated in their least restrictive environment,
meaning the one where they can get what they need and be successful.
and we want for all children to be included wherever that is appropriate.
Inclusion is essentially important.
And so as we work through that, we collect data,
and if the data says this BLC is where they need to get that,
then that's what sends them to the BLC,
and it also determines their transition plan to come back from it.
And so it's a very complex process, but it's extremely database-driven,
and parents are part of that process.
Okay, and just one more thing about the 18+.
less. So what I kind of imagine, I love the program, but I think that it could potentially
grow when, you know, because that's an optional thing for parents, you know, to let the student
continue into the education that they've already graduated, like you said. And so maybe, you know,
that program could actually grow also. I just wanted to. I will tell you that we are seeing,
not to, I hate to blame COVID for things, but we are seeing an increase of students who require
some level of that program. And there are multiple levels following COVID because there was some time
when they were not receiving interventions, you know, during the same kind of intervention during
that period of time. And so I do think just with population growth and the impact, a little bit of
COVID for a little bit, we may see a little bit of increase, but we have a large number of students
in our district that take advantage of some type of post-secondary services, even if that's just
us connecting them with agencies and training you know within the community and and those kind of
work like we have a um a camp for example where we do um pre-employment training and things like
that that we're working through everybody takes advantage not everyone needs that direct service
in the in the building but for those that do um you know it's it's pretty remarkable what's able
to happen anything else mr president over here go ahead it's okay oh i'm sorry no it's okay
My hope would be, you know, I hear from teachers a lot about that one student who needs help,
targeted help, and is disrupting the entire classroom.
So the BLC is a big interest of mine and I'm sure a lot of teachers.
18 plus program grade, they're not disrupting classrooms as often as the other segment of
students so when we pull a student for the dlc we're affecting the classroom that was left behind
that can now learn really well and the teacher who can now teach so my interest is that the the blc
is expanded and fully i feel like the investment would be gargantuan because you're not only
affecting that student we're helping teachers and we're helping numerous classrooms uh that are
they're going to be educated better.
Behavior is impactful, and it's important that we address it.
That's why I'm asking about how the project is allocated,
the costs, BLC versus KD+,
and how the design is being designed.
That's where I'm coming from.
Absolutely.
I can tell you I've been, from the very beginning,
I've been involved,
and I answered a question about doors the other day,
even down to doors.
Do we need to handle it this way?
And so I appreciate that opportunity.
I'm regularly pulling members of my team who have knowledge in specialized areas to make sure that we are being very efficient and effective in our development.
And I do think that it has, you know, this program, I believe, will be immensely impactful.
As a former, I mean, I worked in the elementary, I was a principal at elementary, a counselor, you know, an AP, a teacher, a special aid engineer.
And I know that child quite honestly lived in my home.
So I know what it's like.
This is a passion of mine in all areas, and I believe it will be extremely impactful.
We have to be very deliberate in our intent, and I appreciate the support that the board, that KDISD, that our departments have provided in developing this.
It is, I believe, this is, you know, phase two.
We did kind of worked on phase one last year, which was putting our behavior specialists out on campuses, and we have seen huge impact when we run data and numbers on that.
The positive comments I've gotten back from principals, who I know some of them are in the room tonight, has been extreme.
and i believe that these two things together are going to just be a phenomenal impact on what's
happening on campuses and for the students who are the disruptors because we want them to do better
as well yeah miss kathleen did you have something i did i just have a question on so this is for
that first floor and forgive me if this is repetitive do you have plans for that second floor
I always have plans, but it's not mine.
Okay.
So there are plans.
It's kind of just a thought, just a dream as far as like design or anything that we
could be utilizing that secondary space for, that second level.
Is that right?
I do think there's lots of things, but it's not mine.
I'm going to defer.
If you ask Dr. Coffey that question, she'll give you all kinds of ideas.
I will.
But right now, remember that the bond only approved the $5 million for the first level,
And so that's all we're focusing on right now.
On the second and third story, it's really kind of an open book for right now.
It will kind of depend on what we need in the future.
So it could expand.
It could be a different program.
There could be a lot of different things there.
But for right now, we don't have any plans for the second and third floor.
Okay.
And then do we have an idea on that $5 million that came from the bond,
what that looks like on a run and maintain once everything is ready to go as of January,
January what that looks like to have the utilities running to that building what that looks like in terms of salaries. I'm assuming that we're probably going to have to hire more teachers to help run that building. So the great news is there's a very small personnel cost and the reason for that is because a lot of these programs exist in Katie I see somewhere and by pulling them together we're able to greater utilize resources. So the good news is there will be maybe one or two or three very targeted positions.
that i might need in order to launch this we're still exploring but really the vast majority of
our vast majority of our personnel is covered okay all right that's just that's great speaking of the
bond when would we have bond proceeds for for this consistent construction is april 2024.
The bond sale is, y'all have it approved.
Y'all have to approve that, and that will be done at the February meeting.
I don't anticipate needing any cash until probably sometime in February,
but we have a reimbursement resolution that will be refreshed to say any expenses that we have,
We can reimburse ourselves through bond funds. I'd like to wait as long as I can on having that first bond sale
because
we
like
We didn't discuss it today, but I read some commentary by Sherry with some interest rate environments
We think that the longer we can hold out the better the interest rates on the bonds will be and so
probably sometime in
May June to have that sale
We would reimburse ourselves we will reimburse ourselves
We'll be flush with cash when the tax proceeds come in and still have that and can reimburse ourselves with that cash once the once we have that transaction.
OK, Mr. President, can I just ask?
Did we I am excited as a teacher.
I am excited about providing relief for the regular classroom as well as for what's good for the student that maybe is having a hard time in the in the regular classroom.
but can you tell me, these are pretty detailed schematics.
Were these, like did we start working on these after the bond was passed,
or did we start working on these before?
I haven't had any, I guess it was probably end of November.
Yeah.
She turned it around really quickly.
Okay.
She gave us a sketch, and we took it from there.
So it was a joint effort.
We had been talking about the project needs and ideas,
Yes, before the bond, but we started actual work after the bond.
I've been dreaming for a while.
Okay.
Okay, thank you.
Mr. President.
Any other questions?
May I please just say?
Ms. Champagne.
I just wanted to piggyback on something that somebody said earlier about the BLC.
I know that that's an important program,
but I also think that the 18-plus program is very important
because this is for a lifetime of being a productive,
possibly a productive citizen in our society.
And, you know, many people in this population are able to, you know, have jobs,
and I feel like this is something that can affect our society for years to come in a positive way.
So I personally believe both programs are equally as important.
Anything else?
Mr. President.
Ms. Fox.
Mr. Redmond, did you have something?
I'm going to take another turn.
Okay.
So I'd like to talk about the KD Plus program now, if we can, based on your designs here.
I'm going to deter one minute.
Itinerant workers, are they still spread like in different places just wherever they can fit?
And does this have room for itinerant workers to all come to one place?
I'm so sorry.
The answer to your question is yes and no.
It's okay.
um we do have some of our workers that are spread out we do have some that are here in this building
it just kind of depends because we've got such a huge group underneath us that are centralized and
then put on campuses um as far as room we were i again i have dreams but um you know i don't i
don't want to be um i don't want to be you know piggy about the space either i want to share and
so we really haven't had those conversations i don't know what the needs of the district as a
whole maybe so yeah okay so if they are specific to your program they would be
there but they do kind of go where the need is correct we do have a space that
is they don't you know they're in classrooms with kids and so they might
need a place to respond to emails or you know jump on their staffing or something
like that or have a phone call but really when they're at the BLC and the
Katie plus they're in with our students and so that's I'm thinking def ed and
home home bound and those yep homebound is right now they're located at the J
JCSA and so they do have a home.
Deaf education, we have multiple campuses and the JCSA.
Okay, great.
So when we talk about the Katy Plus program and I'm looking at the Life Skills Kitchen
and the apartment lab slide here in front of me, when you train young people how to
work the microwave and the oven and the refrigerator and all those things, my special ed people
tell me that that's great.
But then when you transplant them and put them in their own apartment and the microwave doesn't have the same buttons or the oven doesn't operate the same way, that it doesn't always, unless they're very high functioning, doesn't always translate.
If you have a simulation lab of a storefront or, you know, how to do a cash register, do a point of sale, like you put them at, let's say, Howdy Ice Cream, who is very great about employing our children and young people, and Brookwood, and, you know, they have their cafe, they have their store.
what's your plan for transitioning from this lab to real life?
Sure. So there are phases that we go through, and we do this now, just so you're aware,
there are phases that we work through, transition phases, in the 18 plus program,
so it depends on a variety of factors. So for example, let's say you have a student
and the parents would like to retain that student in kindergarten, okay?
The parents are allowed to do that, but you know what that does is it takes a year off the end,
because they're older when they enter the end.
And so some students, some adults that enter this program,
depending on a variety of factors, they may remain in phase one
or they may transition all the way through the fourth phase,
depending upon how long they have to do that and what their unique needs are.
Some students are supported in educational environments.
They just need some access to, like, training and fairs and that kind of thing.
And some students, like you're talking about,
about maybe working on more integrated skills
that are opportunities for practice and learning,
and that's scaffolded for how to work a microwave.
Some students may require,
because of their fine motor skills, an adapted situation.
And so depending upon where they transition to,
and we do support students in the community,
we have job coaches that go out.
We work with several KDIC-located businesses,
specialists, we go and we coach in the community now,
and we will continue to do that.
But the reality of the matter is part of what,
But if you're asking Gwen Coffey, part of what I would like to see happen is that we need, past the ISD, we need training in employment industry as well.
Because those accommodations and modifications and such sometimes need to transfer out.
And we're very fortunate to have multiple of our namesakes here who do this work in the community now with our students who have left KDIC.
And so the benefit of that is that we get a lot of feedback.
And that creates that loop, that reflective loop.
And so that's part of what has generated this project, right?
right, is listening to that feedback loop.
And so it's never going to be perfect.
Not all students are going to integrate.
Not all students, period, special ed or not,
are going to integrate and do the same thing.
But we do, I think, a really good job of supporting students,
but we have to look at goals
and what that student's unique needs are
and where they're transitioning to
because community is one of the transition options,
not only employment.
Thank you very much.
I, too, get a lot of feedback from namesakes.
I'm just very blessed to be able to spend
quite a bit of time with them,
and they've given me a lot of the questions to ask and we've talked through this and how excited we
all are about it and i know they're there to offer any support we need going forward and you know
from project hike to katie plus katie isd is known for its special education support of students and
families and i'm proud to be a part of it with all of you thank you thank you very much
We now move on to item 7.9. Mr. Ronnie Edwards, who's Assistant Superintendent for School Leadership and Support, is our presenter.
7.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract for the purchase of a district-wide centralized student permanent records management software.
And this is about discussing and considering board approval of a contract for the purchase of a district-wide centralized student permanent records management software. Welcome.
Good evening, President Perez, board members, and Dr. Gagorski. I'm coming to you tonight for consideration of item 7.9.
the school leadership and support department has a need for a comprehensive
student records management software solution to increase efficiencies in
maintaining student records through graduation including additional five
years retention rules for post graduation. In addition, it is
anticipated this software solution will decrease the annual costs associated
with purchasing folders, filing cabinets, printing, shredding, and the need for
campuses campus space to house the student folders the department invited various vendors to
demonstrate their products and after a thorough evaluation softdocs was found to provide the best
overall value for fulfilling the district's permanent records management needs i also have
uh in your in your board docs you will see the the cost for the software project implementation
over five years the first year implementation there is a one-year implementation services
costs of $52,461, as well as the enterprise license and annual maintenance year one. That will be a recurring fee, but that amount will change year two through five. But the first year is $63,261.50. For a total first year implementation cost of $115,672.50.
The first year project funding source, currently we have a technology software budget.
We have a product that we are sunsetting, so currently we have $85,000 in the budget for that.
This first year, due to the implementation costs, we will, if you do approve this amount,
we'll be coming back to you in January with a budget amendment for $30,670 to $50,000.
So the future annual cost of the funding source over the five-year period will be $388,059.44.
And currently we have that $85,000 a year budgeted that we have for another software that we will be sunsetting for Scribbles transcript software that we are no longer utilizing.
So if you take that 425 that we have currently budgeted over five years, we will have a five-year savings of $36,940.56 just on the software itself.
However, we do anticipate there will be more savings along the way, not just within the software.
The implementation
of softdocs will replace our current permanent records system of manila of manila folders housed
in filing cabinets and secured record rooms all across campuses the transition from paper to
permanent record system to an electronic records management system will ensure a safe and secure
means to transition student records from campus to campus when they when grade levels advance
from elementary to middle school and to high school and the electronic records management
system will also ensure that student records upon the withdrawal from KDIC
are electronically sent to forwarding school within 10 business days.
By transitioning to online records management options, it will decrease
costs associated with a hard copy method to ensure campuses have additional space
to repurpose and ensure campuses have additional space on their campuses to
repurpose for other campus needs. So due to the sunsetting of our transcript software vendor and
applying this budgeted amount towards softdocs will result in a cost savings of $36,940 over
five years. And so that is what I'm coming to you today and if you have any questions I'll be happy
to answer that. Questions? Mr. President? Ms. Grisela? A couple of questions. Thank you. Is scribbles,
That's just an unrelated, is that related to data storage?
So Scribbles is something that we brought on board to house our transcripts a few years back.
And so when we, that was how alumni and transcripts got to colleges or if an alumni requests transcripts.
But when we brought on School Links, we found that they were able to take care of that for us.
So now all of our transcripts are housed in school links.
And so that is there.
And so this budget will allow for us to do this currently.
So the scribble savings of whatever that is, $36,000?
No, no, no, no, no.
What is that?
What I'm getting at is that's a yearly cost that you already had budgeted, I'm assuming, for scribbles?
Yes.
In your budget?
$85,000 a year, yes.
Oh, that was the full scribbles budget. So it's 85,000 a year. And so we just multiplied that over five years. It was
425,000 trying to make sure we don't touch operating fund if you don't have to but but there's an overage and there would be a net
Cost savings we talked about that
But we didn't want to spread that implementation cost out over five years. Just take care of it
Now we're going to have the savings we do anticipate we're going to save more with the cost of shredding
I think we are spending in the neighborhood of $42,000 a year in shredding and also buying about $2,500 a year in buying manila folders, not to mention filing cabinets.
And then when those documents get uploaded in PowerSchool, that's how parents register, and then they're delivered into eSchool Plus,
Plus, our registrars have to physically print those items out and put them in a manila folder and file them and then scan them back when they are requested.
So this is going to allow us enhanced protection and be able to be much more efficient with what we're doing.
Okay.
Just accounting-wise, we didn't choose to show that savings here.
We can't do that yet, I guess.
It'd be nice not to touch operating fund.
We could show $42,000 savings if we're not shredding, correct?
Well, so I don't think we're going to immediately, that cost savings is not going to become immediate
because obviously we have these records that we have to transition to digital.
So when we, it's going to take us about, it's going to take us five years to be fully electronic.
So we'll still have some of those savings, excuse me, some of those costs as we go through.
But it's going to transition out over five years.
Okay.
Mr. President.
Ms. Cheney.
So are you estimating a cost of like for years two through four, would you estimate about
68,000 per year?
Is that what you're forecasting?
Yes, sir.
So actually what it does, and I didn't break those out year by year, year two, year three,
year four, year five.
I do have that.
That actually is in their contract.
But basically it's standard for them to, for a software vendor to increase that by approximately
2% a year.
Okay.
So I don't know if that answers your question.
So can you just give me an idea then?
So it would be about 60 to 70 per year?
So year two is 65.
I have it sitting here.
Year two is 65,107.85.
Year two is 67,000.
Year three is 67,000.
Year four is 69 and some change.
And then year five is 71,000.
Okay, thank you very much.
Questions?
Any other questions?
Thank you very much.
The next item is 7.10, which is to discuss and consider approval of a Board adopted resolution
7.10 Discuss and consider approval of a Board adopted Resolution regarding adequate funding for public schools.
regarding adequate funding for public schools.
And the presenter is Ms. Champagne.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. First of all, I'm happy to have the opportunity to have this on the agenda with the help of Mrs. Fox.
Anyway, Governor Abbott called the Texas legislature to reconvene on Tuesday, November 7, 2023, for a fourth session of the 88th legislature.
Several education-related topics are included in this session.
Number one, education savings account.
Two, school finance.
And three, funding related to school safety measures.
The KDIC Board of Trustees adopted legislative priorities on December 12, 2022 with the help of community input.
We met several times and Mr. Redmond was in charge of that and we had a great, you know, outpouring of input into that.
And basically the four major things that the community was interested in presenting to the state legislature was school finance, state testing and accountability, teacher recruitment and retention, and House Bill 4545, which is essentially the ESSER funds.
funds. So now we are coming up this year on this date with the resolution of the Board
of Trustees of the Katy Independent School District regarding adequate funding for public
schools. And I'd like to read the resolution. Whereas the Texas Constitution Section 7 Article
1 mandates the Texas legislature to establish and make suitable provision for an efficient
efficient system of public free schools for the preservation of democratic values and
whereas the constitutional delegates who framed the Texas Constitution believed that education
was a fundamental right and a cornerstone of our democracy and whereas the constitutional
delegates recognizing the importance of community representation and responsiveness entrusted
public school authority to local agencies accountable to public elections
and whereas Texas public school districts accept every student and
whereas the strength of Texas economy depends on well educated workforce and
whereas relatedly Texas economic future hinges on the success of our public
schools and whereas Texas currently rates on the bottom ranks in the bottom
on 10 states and per student funding,
and whereas the most recent increase of basic allotment
was made in 2019, and whereas the state of Texas
received more than $30 billion surplus revenue this biennium,
and whereas Texas expects continued record revenue growth,
and whereas local school districts
are facing historic levels of inflation of 17%,
and whereas local school districts are facing statewide and nationwide teacher and staff shortage,
requiring competitive compensation for teachers and staff,
and whereas House Bill 3, passed during the 88th legislative session,
requires the addition of armed personnel for all campuses without sufficient funding necessary for local school districts to implement this requirement,
and whereas House Bill 1416 passed during the 88th legislative session is an unfunded mandate
and federal ESSER dollars utilized to support high-quality tutoring programs for students are ending,
and whereas we wholeheartedly support parent and family involvement in their children's education
in ways that honor parents as partners and respect parents as experts in their children's needs.
So, this will be in the consent agenda next week to be voted on or approved or not approved
by this board.
Is there any questions?
Yes.
Just curious who wrote this resolution?
I wrote it.
I'm looking at other school districts resolutions that were so you know that
that I kind of compiled it what school districts did did someone help you get
the resolutions and help me write the resolution yeah and like where did you
you get the other resolutions from? Like who gave you the other? Well, actually, let me explain this.
So before, there was a resolution that was presented to us as, you know, a possible
resolution to be put on the agenda. And the person that presented that to me was the superintendent.
attendant and that did not make it onto the agenda and it had some things in there about
you know the vouchers or however you'd like to say it the ESAs and it had some other type
things so I decided to let's try to present it again but not state those things because
I know that that's kind of like a highly controversial type subject.
So I pretty much kind of copied that and pulled some other information
and left out the stuff about the school vouchers.
Okay, I think let me just continue with my question.
So I think we're all, everybody's in agreement that we want the increase in the basic allotment
to fund operations.
And we're all in agreement that we want to increase teacher compensation,
that we need funding for that.
I guess my question is, since we've already, you know,
we had the listing circles, we've had teams go to Austin
to speak to our legislators, our representatives.
We have approved the legislative priorities, which you mentioned.
So I'm just curious about the benefit, if you will, of this resolution because it's
something that everybody knows, all the legislators know that we want an increase in the basic
allotment and that we want to pay teachers more.
So I'm just wondering or asking the benefit and the timing of this resolution right now.
Well, do you want me to answer?
Sure.
I think that the benefit of this is to show the KDISD Board of Trustees has a united front in our position that we would like to have an increased basic allotment,
that we would like to see some of that $30 billion given back to the school districts so that we can do all the things that we have stated on this, the resolution.
And I think it would just be in good showing.
It's not really going to change anything.
I think maybe that's what you're asking.
It's not going to change anything, but it will show that we're united in our feeling about that.
Show to who?
The public, our community.
You know, the 95,000 students, all the parents and the staff.
that we are united and we stand behind this.
And it's just a more powerful declaration of the things that we stand for.
Because I think we all are definitely here, as far as I know,
in favor of increasing the basic allotment,
getting more funding for safety and security, the armed guards, et cetera,
as well as increasing teacher compensation.
I'm just wondering about the resolution.
And is this the right resolution?
It's just a resolution as worded that we should be considering.
Mr. President, which part of the resolution do you disagree with?
Well, I think it's something that we could discuss or we could receive input on.
Is that what we're doing now?
Yeah, we could do that.
Well, Mr. President, I...
Okay, sorry, go ahead.
Have you, did either of you reach out to our legislators to see where they're at in the process and what strides they have made to fund public education?
Have you talked to Representative Schofield or Representative Kitzman or Ms. Huffman?
Have you talked to Mr. Jaton?
on have you reached out to any of those people that have the actual ability to impact any of
this because if i'm reading this correctly this isn't something that we can necessarily do from
this dice this is kind of like out of our depth and so we're reliant on our legislators to make
these things happen um so i'm just curious what the conversation looked like between you guys and
and our legislators.
Well, we have talked to them.
We actually went there recently.
When was that, Lance?
April.
We've spoken to them many times during the session.
This resolution is something this board has done every legislative session.
We're a little late with this one, but it will send a message,
the same message we're all saying in public education,
but this is just a statement where we can all agree
that what we ask our legislators is there is money for public education and
if they would release the money that is not tied to whatever you call it
vouchers school choice ESA they've tied all of the funding to that piece and if
they would release that piece and fund teacher raises as they promised during
the campaign as the for the increased student allotment there have been lots
Lots of bills written about it, and the two houses can't come together.
The House and Senate don't agree.
But if they would just focus on these things without that piece, then maybe we could make a little bit of progress before they recess this special session.
So was the December 2022, this legislative priority, the prior board, you guys were on that.
So that was before the legislative session opened.
So we already did present a resolution that was focused on funding and that was focused on the necessity of that prior to.
So now we're kind of rehashing something.
That's kind of what it feels like.
And I don't understand.
I guess I don't necessarily disagree with anything that's on there.
But if we're wading into something that feels a little contentious already, I don't necessarily know that that's going to be helpful to that cause other than us reaching out to our legislators and continuing to pressure or advocate for the district or the public education statewide.
So I'm just curious as what is the – what does accomplishment look like if we pass that?
that. It does exactly what you just said. It just provides a little pressure and a united
front here to say we still have these requests and expect this from our legislators. Do we think
that they're not already pressured? Is there something we disagree with? Like what would be
the downfall to doing it? That's my question for you all. Well, I would just say this reads very
very political to me. I actually like the one y'all passed in 2022 much better. It doesn't feel
as very, I mean, we're depending on them to act. We would like them to act on our behalf.
And this resolution to me, because I was, I did attend the legislative update on Thursday.
Don, I know you weren't there. And Lance, you were doing the strategic goals. And so were you,
president Perez but we all attended other than Don you weren't there so we
got an update on where they are they're still hoping they can get a vote for for
school safety funding you left early so maybe it maybe you missed that part okay
Okay. But anyway, I just, I would, I don't, I don't like trying to offend parties that are trying, we're trying to get to work on our behalf.
I don't think it's a wise move. I don't think it's discerning.
And I just, I think we should advocate, but do it in a respectful way.
way. And this feels very political to me the way it was written and actually like the 2022
one much better.
And that makes the 2022 one was not a resolution. It was just the priorities that we set forth.
Well, I kind of interrupted Mr. Perez and I apologize. But can you tell us what school
districts you got this from our mr. Gorg or ski since you may be participated in
this can you tell us what school districts you're wanting to reference in
this I don't recall the school districts mrs. champagne and I had a question on or
a conversation on this as the board will recall that the board had requested that
that I have quarterly meetings independently with each trustee.
And that was back in October, and that's when Mrs. Champagne and I had that discussion.
And she had brought up, like she explained, and I think she summed it up pretty good,
that she had inquired and she liked the idea of that resolution.
And I said, well, if you would like to see other resolutions that districts have, boards have passed,
I'd be happy to provide some of them.
They're available online.
So I gave her somewhere, maybe three or four, Dawn, I don't remember exactly,
how many it was from some other districts but it was it was quite a
while ago and I don't remember which ones I gave her I can find those and
share those with the board I'm sure I still have them from when I provided
miss champagne up she has them as well if I were weighing in on this and just
to give you some of my recommendation or my thoughts on the issue it's fully a
board decision whether the board wants to pass a resolution or not or what the
board puts in a resolution where i would argue when it comes to public school funding is this
we did put some legislative priorities together and advocated for those at the capitol with our
elected officials spent a lot of time at the capitol with our board our trustees our legislative
committee and some constituents who joined us at that meeting and we've talked to people
the board or the our elected officials have not taken any action on public school funding okay
when I say they haven't taken action they haven't passed a bill that has gone through the house and
the Senate and been sent to the governor and they have had between January and May to do so there
There was a $34 billion surplus.
The state currently sits on $4 billion allocated to public ed
that they will not release to public schools.
Those are dollars that could be working today for our children,
our families, our teacher, and our staff.
They've had multiple special sessions, the elected officials,
to come to agreement on how to
allocate the $4 billion and they have failed to do so.
While I'm with you, Ms. Teamee, on this,
I don't mean to make it political either.
I do not like to be in political fights.
I don't like to be in political arenas.
But I will always advocate for public schools
and advocate for KDISD.
And I can assure you, every one of our elected officials
knows how I feel about those dollars.
So that's kind of where I stand on that.
Well, then, if everybody knows how we all stand,
why do we need to poke the bear further?
Yeah, it's a good question.
Why should we continue to tell them where we stand?
Because they have failed to take any action.
They have had, what I would say, four bites at this apple.
This is the fourth session, and they still haven't done anything.
anything. Now the political side of that is what we've heard here. I think somebody just said it. It's tied to the vouchers. They will not decouple school funding from vouchers or ESAs. Now that's their issue at the state level. Would any of our elected officials stand up and say would you please decouple these issues so we can vote on them both independently? Vote on school finance, the $4 billion, and vote on your ESAs.
school vouchers separately and they can't come to agreement to do that so I believe it's the
superintendent's job and I will continue advocating and telling them that the longer the the state
continues to take in action on adequately funding public schools the more I'm going to either push
push back voice my opinion or kind of poke the bear I don't really see it as poking the bear I see it as continually holding our elected officials accountable for adequately funding public schools which they have failed to do for four sessions.
Mr president.
Coming out of the strategic design me on Thursday one of the things that we heard was that so many of our community members.
recognized that school finance was an issue and it came down to what our next steps what actually
steps can we take and so many of them walked away hopeless because they they just said there's
nothing we can do um so the reason i think this would be good for us to move forward is because
i believe it is a step it is an action item that i heard our community wanted to see happen um
and it's not tied to like like dr gregorsky mentioned this isn't against anything it's
simply what we're for is that we're focusing on public school finance we're not we're not calling
them out we're not calling out a representative because they've been supported of something that
might be against public schools what we're simply saying is like dr roberts you mentioned
fund public schools take the money you've already put in the budget and give it to the people you
budgeted for and let's work on the other stuff take them as individual items of their own merit
it as opposed to coupling them then together so thank you mr president um i'm not going to repeat
here like team miss teamy and um miss calhoun and you and perhaps a couple others um have said we
we already all agree about increasing the basic allotment and funding teacher compensation
the the legislative session is about to close and i believe it's expected to close in about
three days so what's the point with I don't understand why we're we're
communicating at this juncture it's good I mean we can define it again we've
already said this multiple times what is the purpose here there are rumors of a
fifth sorry rumors of a fifth session being called really okay came out today
day that's okay that's different than what we heard at the I did not hear that yeah I would
just like to add if I if I may that this district is really seeing and we all know this that this
district's really seen as as a leader in the in this state and I think people would in in Austin
Austin would really respect that we have come forward again.
You know, I know we did it already last year, but we are doing it again.
And it's kind of like, you know, we're not going to give up on this venture.
And we, I don't know, which, are we fourth largest, fifth largest district?
Okay, number fifth largest district.
I think that that's very compelling argument coming from us.
us and I just would hope that we could be united in going forward with this resolution.
Mr. President, so as elected trustees part of our role is advocacy for public ed, our teachers,
our students and this to me feels like the role that we have and even though it's nearing the
the end of the fourth session with a rumor of a fifth session whether or not it happens that's
the governor's decision and no one quite knows what he's going to do but this still tells them
there are still i think thursday is the last day is what i'm hearing but there's still time for
them to make a decision i know there is a bill on the house floor that has some of this without
out that is not tied to ESA's SB2 is at the House floor, and they could make a decision by Thursday.
So I realize it's strong language, but it's factual. And I was at the Capitol three times
during this legislative session. I've been at every legislative session since I got elected
to this board and i have lots of conversations with our elected officials like what's happening
is there any movement i text them and call them quite frequently so i'm not sure how many times
you all have been there how many conversations you've had if they're different than the ones
i'm having but as a trustee i consider a huge part of my role to be an advocate for public ed
and I think this is I think it's I think it's a good thing to tell them that
we're still waiting we still expect every single person talked about we're
going to give teachers a raise we're going to give teachers a raise Dan
Patrick campaigned on getting teachers a raise and it they've been there a whole
year they're normally only there 140 days and they've been there since
since January and it's December and they've been there an entire year. So instead of having
there a supposed to be a temporary representative government and go back and work in the communities,
you know that they represent live and work and they've they've been trying but they need
to come together and this I think since the message that we haven't given up and they
shouldn't either. Well just because I'm a I'm opposed to the harsh language of this
doesn't mean that I'm not for student increase or increase in student allotment. It doesn't mean
that I'm opposed to additional student funding for safety. It doesn't mean that I oppose
public education, and it doesn't mean that I oppose teacher salary increases. So I just think
there's a better way of communicating this to our elected officials in a way that is not a bully
tactic I
prefer not to behave that way in my family life in my personal life in my business and
in the way i operate so this feels that to me i i can't get behind um something that i feel is very
divisive and not commun not the best communication let me let me suggest um
So I just would like to know, can you read a sentence to me that says it's bullying?
Please, Mrs. Tamey, just tell me which one of these.
I think the 2022 legislative priorities that y'all passed is much more, it's not political.
It's very factual.
I don't have a problem with that.
But this is very, there's an agenda here, and I can read it.
anyone that reads this and understands the financing function of public schools can see
that there is a political agenda here it feels very similar to a lot of the emails that our
administrative team sent in off and on throughout the summer in the legislative session let me make
a suggestion here and that is of course there's a work study meeting we're not voting on this today
I would say if anyone has any suggestions and if anyone had any have as any input or suggestions
on this
On this resolution to
To email me over the next day or two and we'll try to craft like a revised
resolution
To present to the board again
it mr president to receive any input do not email anybody else don't reply to anyone else on the
board but just just you know provide your input to what exactly you know would uh would allow us
to go forward on this so suggestion to just you know email me as president with uh with suggestions
changes or just or no changes or whatever but just email me only not anyone else on the board
because of open meetings considerations.
That would work.
I apologize.
I thought you were finished.
I apologize for interrupting you.
May I just say, if there's not a fifth special session called,
I'd like us to consider that and the purpose of this.
And we should know that within days.
Yeah, but in any case, I would say in the next couple of days,
send me whatever comments you might have or objections or or approvals or not
approvals because we're not we're just it's just basically it suggestions and
input like just to me not to any of the other board members mr. president I kind
of agree with mrs. champagne I'm not sure where the pushback is when it says
Texas public school districts accept every student the strength of our
our economy depends on well-educated workforce. Texas' economic future hinges on success of
public schools. We currently rank in the bottom 10 states in per-student funding.
The most recent increase to basic allotment was in 2019. The state of Texas received more than
$30 billion surplus revenue this biennium. Those are all true. They expect continued record revenue
revenue growth. Local school districts are facing historic levels of inflation at 17%
accurate. Local school districts facing statewide and nationwide teacher and staff shortages,
and we need competitive salaries, compensation. They increased and they gave an unfunded mandate
for security and we support parent and family involvement I don't see the
bullying I don't see the negativity the constitutional delegates frame the Texas
Constitution believed education was a fundamental right and there's also the
constitutional support of providing a system of public free schools for the
preservation of our values yeah i'm just looking for what the where is the right i'm just saying
that you know i appreciate miss champaign bringing this resolution forward and we put it on the
agenda we're discussing it but it's not it's not required that the board accepts this resolution
as written like today uh we should the board individuals should be able to provide input
and tweak the resolution as they would like.
So I'm just saying, I'm just suggesting as a way to do that,
after tonight, email me with any suggestions or comments regarding this resolution.
But, Mr. President, Mrs. Timmy basically called me,
said that what I wrote is a bully, like implied that I'm a bully by the things that I wrote.
And so I don't really, you know, I feel like I should be able to defend myself because I'm just trying to find out because I'm not, you know, she says she doesn't do her family that way, her business that way, and I don't either.
So I just want to know what it is in here so that I can at least defend myself about what she considered to be a bullying statement.
I'm just going to say that it's not a personal thing.
I don't think it's a personal thing.
i think she has an issue perhaps with the style or some of the things that are in here etc so i'm
just saying uh provide input let all the all the board members provide input give their suggestions
and we'll try to put together another another version or draft all right but i'm also not a
bully and i don't conduct my family like that or anything else so i don't really appreciate
the implication that that i've written this to be a bully i didn't i didn't mean to make it a
personal attack at all.
And just for the record, I'm still at a loss for what is negative.
What is false?
What is...
I can offer one comment, Mr. President.
Just perhaps I'll offer a suggestion that when you state facts and you repeat them to
someone who likely already knows, and you've repeated it 15 jillion times, sometimes, and
I'm just offering this as a suggestion, it seems demeaning.
And it's a little, but, you know, we don't know exactly how our legislators are going to receive this, but they could receive it as, I've already heard this 50 times, and be upset about it.
So I'm just offering that perhaps as the color here that we don't like.
We all agree with these facts because they're facts.
And they already know this, likely, I'm assuming.
But, okay, Mr. President, I would just like to say there have been many things presented
to us as a board, for example, book type things over and over and over and over again.
And you know, eventually we did change the policy and sometimes things do need to be
heard over and over and over again.
Same thing we can say for the literacy program that we developed and there's been a few other
things in the past several years that people have continuously come here sometimes 20 30 people a
month and it is you know another overly stated thing sometimes but sometimes it takes that
and you know two years it took the book policy to be rewritten and you were one of the ones who came
and spoke several times we heard you every time and you emailed us and we listened and so
So eventually it all happens.
So sometimes it does take reiteration of the facts.
May I offer just a small thought towards that?
I agree that sometimes it does take repeated begging, pleading, forcing it out in front of someone to say,
please pay attention to what I am saying.
Please hear me.
Please act on this.
And the examples that you gave, the board had the ability to act on those issues, and it chose not to for a while.
So we had new leadership that came in and then did choose to act on that.
But those were items that this board had the opportunity and ability to create an action item and then follow through with.
None of this do we have the ability to actually create an action item out of,
other than us just taking our thumb and shoving it in the eye of our legislators,
which I don't feel like is very helpful at this point.
I understand the need to fund public education.
I see the billions of dollars that is out there that is being held back from our institutions,
which I do not agree with.
But to craft this and throw it in front of our legislators and say,
you're not doing anything, Representative Schofield, I don't think that's right.
Because he is trying.
I have faith in that.
And when we're working in collaboration and conjunction with our legislators to make impacts, to make changes,
I just don't feel like that this is helpful.
Now, if we could craft something together that we could come behind and unify as a team, I could get on board with that.
But we didn't have that ability because there were just two of you that did that alone.
And so as President Perez has said, if we would like to add to maybe potentially add to or potentially change it just a little bit in the tone and the way in which we're presenting it, I think that that could be helpful.
I'm not saying no.
No, I'm just saying let's give it a chance to where we can all add our own input to that.
Well, there were other policies that were written by just a few that were, you know, expected to be accepted to.
And we didn't have input.
We weren't allowed input.
We tried to have input.
Just like tonight, you know, y'all are going to be able to give input because Mr. Perez, the president, is allowing you to have input.
which i really you know think that that's great but there was another policy that we wanted to
have input into and we weren't and this isn't a policy by the way this is only um a statement
but the other one was a policy but i think you've been here longer than i have so if you rebecca and
or sorry miss fox um but you know what i mean normally in the past there's been like a group
that works in a committee this goes before committee y'all you know you could have brought
it to the finance committee we could have worked on it together and then presented it to the board
but what i don't think is okay is for one person to write a resolution and then ask the board
to unanimously agree i don't think that's realistic i don't think that's fair to the board
as a whole and it's not really fair to our community because uh doesn't really allow the
community to have representation and and that's what we're here we're here representing the people
We're not here representing a certain political party.
We're here representing the people that elected us.
And so when one person writes this and it doesn't ask for feedback from anybody else, you know, that's not how it's been done since I've been here.
And I'm surprised that you – I'm surprised this was presented this way.
Well, we did have a lot of community feedback from the listening circles last year.
everything that they said i was part of the listening circles actually also and um then
let's just re-vote on the 2022 one how about that because that was something to be presented to the
legislature when they were before they met this is now saying that this is our statement of support
for what we support financially i don't think that's how they will represent how they will
interpret it you know school board members are allowed to put things on the agenda sure and so
So you could put something on the agenda, too, with someone else that maybe I'm not in agreeance with.
And that's just the way it is.
I mean, you or Ms. Calhoun or any one of you could do that.
I think the difference with that, though, is that that is not then taking the voice of the entire board.
When we have policies that we vote on and that you choose to pass or you choose not to pass, you have a vote.
And you get to decide.
and the policies that we have put forth it is passed by a majority for next week
what I'm asking for is if anyone has any input any comments any suggestions any
changes to please send them to me and we will you know propose a perhaps a new
draft that we can all agree on.
I'm just astounded by the hypocrisy of some people when the gender policy, but it's factual
to say that we didn't have input when there were three of us who wanted to talk about
one sentence in the gender policy and we were not given the opportunity to give
input on that is and it was voted through without it's just you since you
you know you're not going back and that not the topic at hand actually it's been
brought up many times you want to go back to that between the work study and
the approval of the gender policy no one provided any input no one and we were
not provided an opportunity to speak to your lawyer did you ask to talk to the lawyer did
you ask dr yes i did no i asked for i asked for i did request to have our con uh comments from
the lawyer yes and i gave you the comments from the lawyer and i gave you the comments from the
lawyer yes i did yes you asked no i i but that night we asked to have a legal brief before we
voted and we were denied so it's just when trying to work together i appreciate you mrs champaign
for trying to draft something that everyone could agree with because this looks like
something we all can agree to because i will never stop fighting for teachers and our public schools
and that's that you know i think the difference is we all agree that teachers need to be paid better
We need an increase in the basic allotment.
So it doesn't mean that just because we have an issue with one piece of paper,
or some people here, some of the board has an issue with one piece of paper
that's represented to us as a take it or leave it,
that we're not for teachers or that I'm not for teachers
or not for an increase in the basic allotment.
Okay, well, you know.
As we said, we're all for increasing teacher pay
and we're all for increasing the basic allotment
for funding safety and security, et cetera.
But this doesn't mean that we'll have to depend on this one resolution
in order to accomplish that, the way it's written, take it or leave it.
And I'm saying, if anyone has any suggestions for tweaking it,
for deleting, for adding, whatever, let's look at that.
Mr. President, may I request that this not be included on the consent agenda
for next week so that we can talk about it independently as an independent item
because changes will be made.
Thank you.
Okay, but it will still be on the agenda.
Sure. Okay. Oh, absolutely. But it's a building.
Independent as a separate item. Okay.
Okay, we're on to 711 and I think that.
7.11 Discuss and consider Board Policy CW Local.
Mr Redmond is our presenter.
And it has to discuss and consider board policy. CW local.
Mr. Redmond, go ahead.
Thank you.
So for the past several weeks we've been discussing several ideas and naming facilities.
We looked at last time the local CW local had been revisited was 2018.
Throughout the past two names with Freeman High School and Nelson Junior High now,
now. We even, each of us on the board were contacted by a community member whose name
due to just confusion in the criteria wasn't included in one of the names. When we asked
about that, we saw that reading it saw why the confusion was there. And so had a couple
things wanted to ask to have done. In addition, we've also had over the past couple years,
several people bringing people, coaches that they would like to honor the naming portions of facilities.
And so what I'd like to do present to the board is that we task our administration with updating that policy for January.
Next week might be a little too soon.
But if they could provide clarification that might have addressed the confusion this past naming cycle,
cycle, give us a more robust naming criteria for naming portions of the facility and address
the funding costs for those new names.
So for example, historically when this has been brought to the board, there was the idea
that we didn't want to open up the flood gates, that people are going to want to rename everything
in the school.
That's not a good enough reason, I don't believe, to say no, because we have some great people
in this community and I'd love to honor them.
them. But maybe there's some ways that we can add a more robust criteria when it comes
to naming a stadium. Like was that coach a state champion or are they part of a hall
of fame? Laying some groundwork out there that would lay that out so that it isn't opening
the flood gates but we can still honor our people. And then the last part was that funding
any changes. The difference between if we were to rename a library and putting a name
on it would be uh minimal uh but say we wanted to redo one of the stadiums here at a high school or
junior high or whatnot that could the the cost could could go all over the map from
scoreboards and entrances and all kinds of stuff and so i wanted to ask if if we can test them
with doing that uh obviously bring it back i would imagine uh once they get that to a um
to the next work study, and then kind of go forward just to provide more clarity in the process for our administration.
That's it. That's all I got.
Thank you, Mr. Redmond.
So are you saying, are you proposing that the administration come up with new language for CW local,
or do you have any language you want to propose?
Sure.
Sure. So those requested recommendations, if we could task the administration with updating the policy to address the confusion of the optional names as we dealt with this last time, update that policy on naming a facility without a committee.
And so historically what our policy currently says that if we want to name something, we would create a committee.
In the instance that we're maybe wanting to honor a specific person, we're not really looking to go name the committee, I mean to name a facility just to name the item.
We're really looking at a specific person that we're wanting to honor.
And so our policy doesn't address that.
And so I want to make more work for that group to go look at it.
And then I did think adding some clearer or more stringent requirements, our district continues to grow.
And we have so many great people, that bar to name some of those facilities.
And specifically, we've had many coaches that have been brought to us that many of them coached me at some point.
But were they a state champion?
Were they voted into a coaching hall of fame?
Is there some level of achievement that would get them to there?
And then that fourth part was the funding for the changes.
So are there minimum signage requirements?
Is there a minimum district expenditure?
And then what if, for example, say a booster club came along and said, you know what, we want to put a certain amount of money to redoing these items.
So those are the four things, and I can share those.
I've written down.
Go ahead, Dr. Dorosky.
If I may, it would be my recommendation to the board to ensure that we capture, well, let me back up first.
CW Local gives the board the authority to name our facilities and portions.
So it's board driven, and I want to make sure the board has their representation on the items that we go into that.
So the recommendation would be if independent trustees would want to give their recommendations of what that policy would look like to the policy committee,
the policy committee would sit down with administration and work through the board's thoughts and ideas on that and come back to the board with a draft.
and that way we've captured all of the board's thoughts on that new policy and
not just the administration's and mr. Redmond's which are good ideas but I
just want to make sure we ask for everyone's input and put it together
like we've done before yes mr. Perez part of that committee yep I don't I
I don't remember, Mr. President.
Are you the lead on the committee?
Ms. Gonzala and Ms. Calhoun.
And so we can...
We should just send it to you because not...
Yes.
Mr. President, what I thought was that if they presented those at the next work study,
that would be our ability to incorporate them in the entire board or the policy committee to take it at that point.
So I do think that would fit well with my intentions.
Okay.
Okay. And if anyone has any input on what Mr. Redmond has proposed for CW Local, then send those to the Policy Committee. Send those to me.
Mr. Perez, may I ask Mr. Redmond to repeat what he just said? What were you thinking?
I said my intention was that after we had the day-to-day issues in the policy that we don't necessarily deal with,
Once we had some of those recommendations from administration presented back to us at the next work study, if possible, then we'd have the ability to take those and incorporate them into it.
So what Dr. Gorski said, I think, fits with that.
Right. We need to run it past administration once we receive all the feedback into the policy committee.
We'll run it past and discuss it with Dr. Gorski and the administration.
Well, and I do know that there were some of the, I was on the second committee, the family that was not considered, and I read the application, and I can see why it was confusing on whether it was included or not.
And so doing that in the meeting, I asked, can we fix this?
And there seemed to be some openness to that, that there might be the administration may have some recommendations to say, hey, let's keep this from happening again and provide more clarity to all involved.
Thank you.
Mr. President, because it could be that while we're doing this about one piece of a campus or district, that we could look at some of the other things in that whole CW policy, and maybe the policy committee could improve on some other pieces based on maybe some feedback from Dr. Grooms.
And I don't know if Mr. Veerling knows how much it's going to cost to put a sign in front of a baseball field or something, but I can see where administration could help your policy committee.
And I agree the policy committee should write that and bring it to us for review.
I like that idea.
Right.
It would be the entire policy.
It wouldn't just be like the – it would be the whole thing.
Any changes for us to discuss.
That would be great.
Thank you, Mr. Redman.
the board has the information items and also I think we did have some member some board member
8. Information Items
requests I have that mr. Graham was going to provide some more information about the SB 763
I'm not sure I can't remember exactly but also I know that he was going to also provide what
the other districts are doing and then um i believe it was miss timmy wanted the rubric
from uh miss cassman about the bids okay if i've left anything else let me know
do we do the donated list what the the only other thing i want to add ms champaign is i did capture
sure that the sample resolutions from other districts, I'll send them out to the board
as well, the ones that I shared with you.
Okay, thank you.
Do you have any questions about that?
No, I just didn't know if you wanted to come on.
Okay.
9. Future Meetings
As far as future meetings, there will be a regular board meeting on Monday, December
11, 2023.
There being no further business before the board, this meeting is adjourned, and the
time is 9.06.
Thank you.
Official documents
Motions and votes
Recorded actions
The motions and votes for this meeting have not been recorded here yet. Whether any were taken is not stated either way. The agenda and the recording above are the primary sources.